AmmoSgt
Posts: 1002
Joined: 10/21/2000
From: Redstone Arsenal Al
Status: offline
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GUTB I have to question your casulity figures . In WW2 the US suffered about 300,000 killed on all fronts, while the Germans suffered about 4,500,000 combatants killed. In the ETO The US suffered about 180,000 killed in combat with about 60,000 of those being from aircrews. The US had a much higher wounded to killed ratio due to the US having penicilin , hence a higher proportion of US wounded survived. The numbers I have, indicate , despite the fact that US Forces were on the offensive , the US had about 120,000 dead and 500,000 wounded in the ETO from ground combat, while inflicting over 500,000 dead and about the same number wounded . US Arty was the primary casuality producer . The US had more Arty Bn's in the ETO than Tank Bn's . US Arty was much better supplied despite having to supply transatlantic. As stated above most casulities from arty occur very early in a barrage , The US was the master at co-ordinated fires . TOT was developed in the 1930's . In addition to TOT , VT fuzing ( also called proximity fuzing )increased the lethality of US Arty by a factor of about 4 . The Only other country to have VT Fuzing was Britian. Physics do not lie. Pen and armor are based on physics. IF the US player uses more than 1 in 4 76mm armed Shermans in the game buy , that is historically questionable, much like Tigers being in every battle in the game ( heck just having any Tanks in EVERY battle is not Historically proper, most battles were Infantry and Arty affairs), However the US had as many AT Bn's armed with M10's M18's and M-36's as it did Tank Bn's in the ETO. So a 50/50 mix of TD's and Tanks is appropiate, Primarly M-10's.
The Bazooka did have HE capability and even more devestating it had a White Phosphorus for both smoke and anti- personnel use which is not even modeled in SPWAW. The doctrine of using Bazookas against dug-in Infantry was prefected in the PTO well before Normandy. The Bazooka was one of the few weapons so respected by the Germans they actually copied it. The TO&E issue on Bazookas is actually under represented in the Game insofar as Mech Infantry had 68 Bazookas in a Bn and most non tank combat vehicles had one issued as part of the Vehicle equipment.
German casulities where so high , even on defense , primarily due to the massive intial bombardments by US Arty and Air. I defy anybody to find a Russian Bombardment that matched the tonnage of HE that was delivered on the Panzer Lehr Div in France . US Heavy and Medium Bombers in addition to US Arty literally destroyed over 50% of the Division at the outset of the battle. In fact, if you factor in Naval Bombardment, prepatory US fires preceeding Amphibious Assults , tonnage wise, were compareable to Soviet massed Arty fires .
The closest to equal casualities the the Germans achieved against the US ( unless you count Normandy and ignore German casulities caused by Air and Naval fires ) was at the Battle of the Bulge. US 80,000 including wounded , Germans about 110,000. Most US casulities occured in the initial week while the Germans had intially a 6 to 1 advantage down to about 2 to 1 by the end of the first week.
The Tooth to Tail ratio for the US was about 1 to 7 total ( counting the whole "back to stateside" logistical train, about 1 to 4 in the ETO proper.
Most of this info is easily available doing a simple websearch.
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"For Americans war is almost all of the time a nuisance, and military skill is a luxury like Mah-jongg. But when the issue is brought home to them, war becomes as important, for the necessary periods, as business or sport. And it is hard to decide which
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