Since the circumstances of military life prevent the constant experimentation under realistic conditions such as is common to other professions, the armed forces tend to be inherently conservative. A clue to the opening strategy of any war is, therefore, to be found in the last main war preceding.
Defects in the Military Policy of the Allies.
At the beginning of World War II this factor led the United Nations into planning based on the first World War and therefore twenty-five years out of date. Then, fixed fortifications with barbed wire and machine guns and a concealed enemy made offensives unduly expensive. Huge losses accompanied attacks even on objects of slight value, while defending forces suffered in a much less degree. On the Western Front there was little scope for maneuver, and the eventual winner was the coalition able to withstand the greater attrition because of superior reserves of manpower and raw materials.
The Cult of the Defensive.
In Britain and France the cult of the defensive in war rose to a new high typified by the writings of Liddell Hart and the construction of the French Maginot Line. The victor in war was felt to be the power taking the fewest chances. But the Germans, limited by the Versailles Treaty to a small army of professionals, studied the war to determine the causes of their defeat and looked for — and found — an offensive answer to the fixed defenses of 1918. The answer discovered, the plane-tank team, was nothing new. In fact, the essentials of the blitzkrieg already lay at hand and had seen limited use in 1918.
In 1939, therefore, the Allies put to use what they thought were the 'lessons' of 1914-18. A stringent blockade had caused Germany great suffering and internal collapse in 1918. Therefore the superior British and French navies at once proceeded to institute a distant blockade from the North Sea and the English Channel hoping that shortage of raw materials would cause the enemy's collapse. On land they relied on the Maginot Line and the French Army to offset the might of the Wehrmacht. Thus they really expected to win the war without fighting it.
Improved Position of Germany.
It is doubtful if a more fundamentally defective military policy has ever guided a modern state. Even had no progress whatever been made in tactics and weapons in twenty-five years the Allies would still have been at fault. The blockade of 1914-18 succeeded because the Germans were shut off from supplies both on land and sea and because they were compelled to expend resources in a land war. In 1939 Germany had open boundaries to the north and south and the agreement with the Soviet Union and 28-day conquest of Poland opened sources of supplies to the east. Nor did an active land front force them to spend their resources. The counter-blockade by U-boat warfare started in 1939 where it had stopped in 1918 but, due to British control of the two routes by which submarines reached the open sea, did not at first attain any real success.
Realistic German Military Policies.
On the other hand, German weapons had been forged more realistically for the situation at hand and had been tested by the Spanish Civil War. They consisted of a strong army, thoroughly trained and equipped for a new type of offensive action and officered by relatively young men. The largest air force in the world had also been created and had as the main point of its tactical doctrine cooperation with the army. It bombed and strafed ahead of advancing ground units. The spearheads of the army took the form of armored or Panzer divisions, principally composed of tanks. These were sent through weak spots in the enemy's line and were followed closely by mechanized and motorized troops and finally by regular infantry. Artillery sometimes prepared the way for attack. Tactics, in fact, were flexible and depended upon the local situation. As the Panzers reached the lightly defended areas in the rear they fanned out, breaking up communications and headquarters organization, surrounding enemy units, spreading confusion and panic in all directions. The use of parachute troops dropped in the enemy rear to aid in the process of demoralization was borrowed from the Russians, but the large scale employment of 'Fifth Columnists,' rumor mongers and local traitors was peculiarly German. The small German Navy was frankly a nuisance force and nothing more. It did not pretend to contest command of the surface of the sea but was designed to cooperate with the army in campaigns and force the Allied navies to pay the highest price possible for that sea command. Intense coordination of military, naval, aerial, economic and psychological weapons to produce quick victory in 'total war' was the keynote of the German system. Of vital importance was the direction by relatively young men, military amateurs not bound by conceptions of the past.
Reasons for German Successes.
A mere description of these supplies the reasons for their success. In the Polish campaign of 28 days the Germans provided their army a full-scale dress rehearsal and conquered a numerically formidable opponent with very slight loss. At the same time they eliminated their eastern front. No effort was made by the western Allies to take advantage of the concentration of troops in Poland and the opportunity was soon past. There followed the 1939-40 winter of 'phony' war in which the French and British did nothing and concluded that the Germans were similarly occupied. With startling suddenness a second campaign, singularly bold in concept and brilliant in execution, was started in Norway. By this step the Nazis protected their northern flank, especially important for containing the source of much of their iron, and provided new bases for U-boats. British efforts to reinvade were poorly managed and unsuccessful.
Blunders of the Allies.
In May 1940, the Allies proved conclusively that the two preceding campaigns had taught them nothing. The German drive through Holland and Belgium found them completely unprepared. Their operations were confused and uncoordinated and nearly everything done in defense was bungled. The northward extension of the Maginot Line proved inadequate. Allied planes were outnumbered and poorly used and the French ground army, forced to fight a war of movement, proved hopelessly inferior in quality as compared with the Germans. A break-through on a wide front occurred near Sedan and the subsequent German drive to the coast isolated a million Allied troops in a narrowing pocket from which the British Navy, operating under cover of a local air superiority rescued over 300,000. Late in the campaign, in a purely gratuitous demonstration of the faultiness of French strategy, the Germans, at slight cost, broke through the Maginot Line.
A German Error in Strategy.
Following Dunkirk the Germans made their first great mistake in strategy. They had fully expected that the downfall of France would mark the end of the war and consumed weeks in consolidating their already certain French conquest while waiting for the British to sue for peace. This time could much better have been spent in preparation for invasion of the British Isles. When it finally dawned on the German General Staff that the islanders had no intention of giving up, the British had already been permitted an opportunity to turn out planes and other arms and erect shore defenses.
The immediate strategy of the Germans in the summer and fall of 1940 and early 1941 was therefore improvised. The Luftwaffe was to fly over England, devastating war production centers and destroying civilian will to resist. As the R.A.F. planes rose to defend they would be wiped out by the greater numbers of attackers. Finally, the Luftwaffe, having won undisputed air superiority, would cover an invasion attempt across the English Channel.
For several reasons the plan miscarried. Wide decentralization kept the British planes from being destroyed on the ground as had occurred several times in Europe. R.A.F. defenders rose to do battle only in small numbers but the qualitative superiority of the defenders caused a wide disparity of losses. Meantime, the bombing of cities, however destructive, failed to destroy any large amount of British industry and merely stiffened the civilian will to win.
German Gains in 1940-41.
The conquests of 1940, however, brought other benefits to the Germans. The fall of France multiplied the Royal Navy's responsibilities while it decreased the force available. The entrance of Italy cut the Mediterranean 'life line.' More important than either of these disadvantages were the new submarine and air bases stretching from Spain to the North Cape. Most of these were not subject to mine fields or close watch by patrol vessels, and the U-boat's passage to its hunting grounds was thereby facilitated. Focke-Wulf bombers added scouting for convoys to their regular duties. Under the cumulative effect of these disadvantages the price of British command of the sea went up so sharply that for several months in the spring of 1941 it threatened bankruptcy. Only the working out of better protective tactics and large-scale American naval assistance brought sinkings below replacements.
During the whole of 1940 and 1941 the British were so markedly inferior to their opponents that they were necessarily reduced to the defensive. However, they held on, endured bombings, trained Home Guards to repel invasion attacks, waged a grim fight against submarines and an occasional surface raider and, with American aid, built up airpower.
British Easy Victories in Ethiopia and Libya.
Britain was not, however, averse to taking advantage of opportunities. Though hopelessly inferior to her two opponents on land she concluded that the Rome end of the Axis was the weaker and forced control over both ends of the Mediterranean. Until Germany entered the picture she was also operating with considerable success in the center of Mussolini's 'lake.' The Italians in Ethiopia, isolated from their homeland, were slowly but cheaply wiped up and British naval and air units administered a sound beating to Italian warships wherever they were able to find them. In both Libya and Albania Mussolini's armies were stunningly defeated by weaker forces of British and Greeks.
Germans Overrun Yugoslavia, Greece and Libya.
The easy victories came to a sudden conclusion with the appearance of the Germans in the spring of 1941. They came not only to prevent Hitler's Axis partner from being made too ridiculous but for the more serious purpose of gaining control of the sources of raw materials in southeast Europe and laying the bases for future attacks. Partly by air, partly by sea these reinforcements reached Libya. In less than two weeks the Yugoslav armies were defeated but not eliminated and the heroic Greeks with their British allies were conquered, first on the mainland of Greece, later in Crete by a brilliant air-borne invasion. The Allied armies in Libya, weakened by withdrawals to Greece, were then attacked and driven back.
Hitler Misses Another Opportunity.
Following his victories in Libya and Crete Hitler made a second mistake in strategy, probably his worst of the war. A determined attack against the British position in the Middle East by any one of three routes would have offered excellent chances of success. Had it succeeded, the Mediterranean would have become an Axis lake, Iraq and Iran oil would have changed hands and even India would have been endangered. Germany would then have passed beyond any likelihood of defeat. The Germans probably considered and the British certainly expected exactly this move as evidenced by the preliminary moves in Syria, Iraq, and Iran. However, Hitler contented himself with maintaining troops in Libya which protected nothing vital to the Axis, but whose neutralization required a greater effort by the British.
War in Russia.
Early German Victories.
The desire to eliminate a possible future threat, shortage of raw materials, and underestimation of the Soviet as a potential foe are the considerations which doubtless explain the opening of the Russian campaign. The last thing the German leader wanted or expected was a long drawn-out war of attrition. A rapid surprise attack, elimination of the Red Army before winter, the capture of Moscow, Leningrad, and other centers and the winning for Axis Europe of the farm lands of the Ukraine, metals, and oil of the Caucasus, then possibly a peace which would leave a Russia militarily impotent behind reduced borders were the objectives on which Nazi spokesmen focused public attention.
In the early campaign German successes were marked. The impact of attack was such that it took the defenders some time to recover. The southern commander, Budenny, proved to be a fine soldier but a poor general and the entire Ukraine fell into German hands amid enormous captures of Soviet troops. Further north disasters also befell the Russians as the Germans, operating their 'Kiel und Kessel' tactics, surrounded and captured or destroyed several large armies. But many Red troops, retreat cut off, turned into guerrilla bands in the rear of the German forces. Nor did units, whose position was tactically hopeless, surrender easily but continued fighting, in many cases to the last man. The Soviet air force was repeatedly 'destroyed' in German communiqués but as often proved to have the lives of the proverbial cat. Against defenses prepared in depth the familiar blitzkrieg tactics at times failed completely. Furthermore, very little booty fell to the invaders as the defenders destroyed as they retreated. The Russians soon became battle-seasoned, replaced their weaker generals with new men, brought up great reserves and continued the struggle. As the season advanced, they were aided by the winter, against which the Germans had failed to take adequate precautions. A last drive to capture Moscow failed in December. The Germans had inflicted enormous casualties while taking very heavy losses of their own. They had acquired a vast expanse of territory. Tactically their invasion had succeeded, but strategically they failed of reaching their objectives.
Winter of 1941-42 in Russia.
With the setting in of cold weather the Russians first stopped the German drives, then started offensives of their own. These operated to considerable advantage due to natural conditions. The plane-tank team was handicapped by extreme cold, whereas artillery and infantry, in which arms the Red Army excelled, suffered no equivalent disadvantages. The Germans gave ground slowly and reluctantly with no signs of panic or rout. They finally rested their defenses upon a series of 'hedgehogs' or fortified strong points with outlying defenses and abundant supplies which the Russians could and did surround but were unable to take. The lack of Russian offensive power, as compared to that of the Germans, also proved a disadvantage as badly-flanked and nearly-surrounded enemy troops sometimes escaped while the Russians strove vainly to close the prongs of the pincers. About one-fifth of the territory lost earlier was regained, the main Russian successes being on the central front.
Japan and the United States at War.
War Now Global.
At the time the Germans were making their greatest bid for Moscow two more antagonists, Japan and the United States, formally entered the war and turned what had been chiefly a European struggle into one which was global to a greater sense than any earlier conflict.
British and American Miscalculations.
Prior to Dec. 7, 1941, the British Empire and the United States had taken united action on many occasions against the threat offered by Nippon. In fact, Japan had never for ten years been absent in their calculation of a possible war. Unfortunately, in years in which Japan had approached closer to attack step by step, both had outrageously underestimated their opponent and overestimated their own strength and abilities. It was freely admitted in military circles that such exposed positions as Guam, Hong Kong and the Philippines might not be able to do anything more than delay the enemy. But Singapore and Pearl Harbor were felt to be invulnerable and naval forces at each would be able to conduct a long-distance blockade. A decisive blow might be struck by an island-hopping process which would reduce Japan's outposts and finally bring airpower into close contact with her cities. Only students of war thoroughly appreciated the difficulty and risks of this course. Unfortunately, too, there was wide feeling that Japan was secondary to Germany. On Dec. 4, three days before Pearl Harbor, a leak of American war plans which appeared in the Chicago Tribune revealed that the Army-Navy Joint Board viewed economic boycott, aid to Siberia, attrition of Japanese commerce by submarines, and air defense of the Netherlands Indies and Malaysia as 'strategic means' sufficient to hold Japan in check. The diversion of a large portion of the Pacific Fleet to the Atlantic to deal with submarines in the summer of 1941 greatly reduced the potential threat in the Pacific at a time when economic boycott of Japan brought into play the first American war measure.
Japan's Great Gains in the Pacific.
In main outlines the Japanese strategy was a repetition of that of the 1904-05 war with Russia. In both cases her two giant opponents were each stronger but their forces in the Far East were not. Surprise attack at Pearl Harbor sank or damaged every American battleship in that area before the outbreak of war. In a few minutes Japanese torpedo planes sank two British dreadnoughts, something the Germans had been unable to do in more than two years. Task forces struck everywhere at once, usually in superior force. But they won not solely because of numbers but also because of their opponent's poor leadership, failure to take common sense precautions, lack of coordinated direction, obsolete tactics, and inadequately trained troops. The Japanese were more numerous but they were also better. Their campaigns, besides gaining a great colonial empire at very little cost, accomplished strategic objectives of the utmost importance. Singapore's fall deprived the Anglo-American combination of the last suitable naval base. Enormous wealth, much of it unscorched, fell into Japanese hands with the taking of Malaysia and here, too, the Allies lost their sources of rubber and tin. The sack of military booty and prisoners was also large. The Burmese campaign cut off China from supplies sent by her Allies, protected Japan's Malay conquests from attack by land and established bases for possible attack on India.
Battle of the Coral Sea.
Once the Japanese had taken areas in the Western Pacific, their own natural zone of operations, further gains proved much more difficult. The leisure given the American Navy permitted it to open convoy lines and establish bases in the southwest Pacific. Australia was rapidly reinforced. Attempts of the Japanese to penetrate further south were then roughly handled both by MacArthur's bombers and American warships. A battle in the Coral Sea on the approaches to Australia resulted in approximately a drawn fight and the first naval battle of history in which the opposing squadrons never came within eyesight of each other. Convinced by this attempt that aggression for an area of such dubious economic and military value as Australia would be worth little, the Japanese turned their attention elsewhere.
Battle of Midway.
The next attempt, made against Hawaii and the Aleutians, eventuated in the Battle of Midway, largest naval engagement of the present war. The attack was strategically unsound and, though made with a larger force than that of the defenders, met with overwhelming defeat at the hands of American naval aviators. Again the opposing task forces never saw each other. This battle, together with the Coral Sea engagement, was in some respects as important as the famous fight between the Monitor and Merrimac. The battleship with its tough armor and tremendous short-range hitting power was clearly less valuable under most circumstances than the more vulnerable but longer-ranged plane-carrier. The northern flank of the Japanese invasion fleet occupied some useless islands in the Aleutians but this foothold later proved an encumbrance rather than an aid to the attacker.
Japanese Position Menaced.
Following Midway the Japanese position was strong but not invulnerable. The Russian base at Vladivostok was felt to offer a probable future threat and the Japanese, confident that a China cut off from western aid could wait, sent many of their divisions to the Siberian frontier where they remained in a position to take advantage of any pronounced Russian weakness which might appear as a result of the war in Europe. China, if she were kept well supplied, might also offer a definite threat, but the little aid the Western Powers were able to provide lay in the air. On both south and east the islands under Japanese control were flanked by possible enemy bases of attack and island-hopping as a basic line of strategy remained feasible but difficult.
American Pacific Strategy.
American Pacific strategy appeared to be rather confused. Germany continued to be regarded as the principal foe, and the bulk of United States supplies and manpower and a good deal of sea strength were being diverted to Europe rather than the Pacific. However, as Japan had proved she could not be ignored, a war of attrition to whittle down her naval and air strength and merchant shipping was pushed by means of bombers and submarines, and enemy losses here mounted. It began to appear that the High Command hoped by these means to cut down enemy strength while its own huge industrial machine prepared the United States. Local offensives were not ruled out but it was expected (falsely in the case of the Solomons) that they would not require any very great concentration of American forces. There were many critics of this procedure who warned that delay in attack held the risk of allowing Japan time to develop her economic gains and solidify her defenses. This, they argued, would make her a much more formidable antagonist later.
Submarine Warfare Supplies a Second Front.
Soon after the United States entered the war calls for a 'second front' to relieve the military burden of Russia became especially insistent in both Great Britain and the United States. In actuality the 'second front' was established as early as January 1942 — by German submarines off the Atlantic Coast of the United States. At first coastal raids were dismissed as of slight military importance, but sinkings increased so rapidly that by midsummer world records being made in shipyards were put in the shade by losses which exceeded them. The northern convoy route to Murmansk was especially hazardous, sinkings among ships making the trip frequently being in the neighborhood of 50 per cent. The removal of the Atlantic Coast 'second front' was a prerequisite to supplying a land offensive anywhere else and when the Navy, badly handicapped by lack of enough patrol vessels, tardily approached the problem, it made steady progress in solving it. The enormous area covered by coastal shipping was a complicating factor with which the British had earlier not been forced to struggle, but losses fell off in one sector after another as defenses were organized and by late summer most of the German U-boats had sought safer but much poorer hunting grounds. Few expected that the threat had been permanently removed and in late November losses were again increasing but the several favorable months permitted sharp gains in the battle of supply.
German Gains in the Summer of 1942.
The Russian Fronts.
In the summer of 1942 the Germans again sought victory in Russia. While Hitler in April grandiloquently proclaimed the destruction of the Red Army as the year's objective it is very doubtful if his generals were equally sanguine. It is more likely from their actions that they hoped for the striking of an effective economic blow, possibly from gain of the Caucasus or the cutting of north-south communication lines. With both armies greatly weakened the Germans started their campaign by clearing the Crimea and retaking the peninsula of Kerch to provide better transportation lines. They confined later activity to the southern third of the long line. After the preliminary moves, Bock, the German commander, outmaneuvered and defeated Timoshenko's smaller forces in a series of engagements which necessitated rapid Russian withdrawals. In a few weeks the Russians lost more territory than they had won in the whole of the preceding winter. And much of it was more valuable strategically. The main north-south railways were taken and the Germans for at least a short time held bridgeheads on the west bank of the Volga, north and south of Stalingrad. A minor oil field at Maikop fell to the invader and the cutting of railway lines reduced severely shipments from Baku. However, the Germans failed to reach the strategic south Caucasus and for several months were held with practically no result other than a large-scale bloodletting at Stalingrad. Russian attacks on the German positions on the Central front, which had been deliberately weakened to secure striking power further south, gained ground, but were held by Axis defenses from achieving any break through of real importance. The whole Russian campaign was beginning to indicate a swing of the pendulum back to the power of the defensive.
German Offensive in Libya.
In the Near East the Germans also came close to snatching victory when their offensive in Libya, aimed at a greatly superior British army, caused a disaster. After two weeks of fairly even fighting the British armored units walked into a German tank ambush and were mostly destroyed by artillery fire. A rapid retreat of the badly mauled British army carried it within 70 miles of Alexandria. Luckily for the United Nations Hitler had not made adequate preparations to follow up his brilliant subordinate with supplies and reinforcements and at El Agheila Rommel began to suffer from many shortages. Meantime the British brought in better leaders, corrected the tactical blunders that had caused their downfall, and once more built up a great margin of striking power.
Growth of Allied Air Power.
In only one theater of action did the United Nations hold the initiative in the summer of 1942. That was in the air over western Europe. With most of the Luftwaffe in Russia Hitler found himself heavily outmatched both in quantity and quality of air strength. The R.A.F. and growing contingents of the American Army Air Corps employed this advantage to bomb northwestern Germany, the French and Dutch Channel coast, and later the cities of northern Italy. One raid was made by more than 1,300 planes and in any one of a score ten times the tonnage of bombs of the famous Coventry raid was dropped. Several strategic objectives were served. In the first place the air enthusiasts who held to the Douhet doctrine believed that sufficiently heavy bombing could produce victory by destroying an opponent's heart and will to resist. Less optimistic students of war viewed the air offensive as being diversionary in character and still others interpreted it mainly as a prelude to invasion by troops. The exact amount of damage done in any air raid is hard for the attacker to determine but there was little doubt that in Europe it was great. On the other hand, it had not yet become a decisive factor in the war and notably failed to divert German air strength from Russia. The inevitable stepping up as more American machines come into play might, however, produce strategic results of great importance.
Fall and Winter Campaigns.
Initiative Swinging to the Allies.
The fall of 1942 marked a turning point. In the summer of this year the Axis offensives failed to win the war despite three years of nearly continuous victories. For a few months the initiative hung in the balance but in November it definitely was swinging toward the United Nations, who were taking the first steps toward victory.
War in the Solomon Islands.
Important but not decisive American victories were won in the southern Solomons where the Navy in August had seized an anchorage at Tulagi and a nearly completed airfield on Guadalcanal Island. Almost immediately this step lost all character of a minor operation as the Japanese attacked again and again, taking (and at times inflicting) extremely heavy losses in order to land troops with which to dispute the possession of Guadalcanal. Shore-based airpower made these operations costly but did not prevent them and at one time Guadalcanal looked like a second Bataan. A series of night naval engagements, however, reduced Japanese sea strength and the fine American planes destroyed large quotas of Zeros.
Allied Drives in North Africa.
In late October and November the United Nations started a two-pronged drive to push the Axis out of Africa. The first part of the offensive saw Generals Alexander and Montgomery start a cautious but powerful offensive against weaker opponents in Egypt. The British showed in this fight that they had learned the lessons of earlier defeats and killed or captured fully half of Rommel's army, driving the remainder of it into western Libya where it was still in retreat at the year's end. A few days after the British victory had become definite an extremely strong expedition under General Dwight Eisenhower landed in Morocco and Algeria where the French quickly collaborated after only mild resistance. A race between the British First Army (which had landed later) and German troops to gain strong positions for a struggle in Tunisia was won by the latter, but after minor actions both sides hastened to build up forces for a decisive battle.
Few war moves served so many purposes as this one. A solid Allied North Africa would present Hitler with a whole string of bases from which air attacks on poorly defended objectives could be launched. The transportation route through the Mediterranean might be restored. The entire 'soft' underside of Europe was exposed to invasion attempts and Hitler was forced to divert weapons to guard against such an attack. Further, additional troops might well be secured among the French in North Africa.
Russian Offensives of November and December.
More important, though difficult to interpret, was the news from Russia where the Red Army started several offensives in November and December. These gained ground and resulted in heavy German losses in some sectors. The attackers of Stalingrad were isolated and the Russians were pushing determinedly against the flank of the bulge created by the German gains in the previous summer. Marked success here would endanger the entire German position in southern Russia. But whether this offensive was likely to reach success or merely inflict losses could not be learned from the contradictory communiqués issued by both belligerents.
Renewed Conflict in Burma.
In one sector long dormant, southeast Asia, there were signs of increasing activity as the Allies carried air and land attack into western Burma and the Japanese invaded rugged Yunnan Province in an effort to knock out some of the way stations by which a trickle of supplies were still reaching the Chinese by air. The United Nations had even more to gain by the reopening of the Burma Road with a view to getting sufficient supplies to China to make her a major factor in the war and a possible future base for attack against Japan.
Changes Produced by Three Years of War.
More than three years of war naturally witnessed many changes, though these lay not so much in the introduction of new and revolutionary weapons as in the evolutionary improvement of old ones. Within the last year of war the defensive after an eclipse was making decided gains as answers were being found for the Panzer type assault which two years earlier had been irresistible. At sea the plane-carrier had replaced the battleship as the basic unit of naval strength. Airpower was becoming steadily more potent but had accomplished more when acting in conjunction with armies and navies than as an independent weapon. Victory normally followed the coordinated action of all arms rather than brilliant performances in any one field. Increased mechanization became the order of the day as war felt in ever augmenting degree the effects of the Industrial Revolution.
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