Empire101
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Flaviusx
For myself, I've always thought that Fall Blau was pretty boneheaded. The plan didn't make a lick of sense. Neither the logistics nor forces were adequate for it, and dividing one army group into two half army groups seeking wildly divergent objectives looks pretty bad on general principles.
It failed and imo very predictably so. It opened up brilliantly enough, sure, and took advantage of Soviet fiascos in Kharkov and the Crimea to wreck the southern position; but it all went south after that. (pun intended.)
I've always thought the Germans should have turned north after reaching Voronezh and rolled up the Soviet positions. And chop off the bizarro salients by Rzhev, etc. in conjunction with such a move.
To paraphrase Grant vis a vis Lee: the Red Army is your objective. Wherever it goes, you go. This is even the completely orthodox Clausewitzian strategy -- and Hitler, who fancied himself some kind of expert on Clausewitz, threw out that playbook completely.
Very well put sir!!
I've been reading this thread with interest, as it has raised many interesting points. What I would say however is that while denying those resources in Caucasus to the Soviets is important, there should be a mechanism to allow the Germans to utilise those resources in some meaningful and realistic way.
This then can lead to players formulating their own equivalent 'Fall Blau's' in 42. I think it could only be good for the game, and would lead to some very interesting games, and putting some measure of uncertainty into the Russian players planning ( ie Are the Germans going south for the oil or OMG!! He has switched his axis of advance and is rolling up the defences and heading North. Break out the vodka, its going to be a grim year. )
Conversely it would add to piling up pressure on the Germans to actually let rip in 42 before the overwhelming numbers of the Red Army begin to tell. If those resources can in some measure contribute to the German war effort ( again I emphasise in a meaningful way ), then perhaps players will start coming up with alternative strategems to get their greasy mitts on them. It puts both players in the seat of aquiring/denying access to these valuable assets, and would stretch each player to attack/defend to the absolute limit.
Lets not forget that Fall Blau came close to success. The immolation of VIth Army at Stalingrad led to disaster, and the whole plan unravelled faster than a ball of wool. Although the fixation of Stalingrad came largely from Hitler, I have always looked to von Paulus as the architect of the German disaster on the Volga.
Humour me, as I hope this post bears relevance ( I hope I'm not waffling ) to what is being argued in this thread.
Lets see, what would I do if there was a large, bombed out, 20km long city on a river, with 90% of the city on my side ( ie the western side) of the river.
Would I:-
a) Look at the situation and apply a 'Verdun' approach to the whole battle. Apply frontal assaults in ever increasing brutality and ferocity, attempt to cut off river traffic with artillery and aircraft, and basically sacrifice the lives of my men in WWI types of assaults to literally 'push' every single one of the gallant defenders off the western bank and out of the city?
or
b) Get to the northern end of the city and river bank ( achieved by 16th Panzer Div and 60th Motorised Div). Get to the Southern end of the city and riverbank. ( achieved by 14th, 24th Panzer Division, and 94th Inf Div). Cut off river traffic with artillery and aircraft. Then work up and down the riverbank respectively, denying the Russians their landing stages and jetty's, until 62nd Army is either cut off or they retreat back over the Volga.
Battle over.
It seems amazing, sitting here in my armchair, that von Paulus never really latched onto the signifcance of (b), which is an adaption of the Blitzkrieg mindset, and instead went for (a), the tried and tested WWI mindset, that could'nt possibly match the results of (b), and as we all know, paved the way to disaster.
As an aside, in my opinion, fate played a huge hand in the outcome of Fall Blau. Von Reichenau had died of a heart attack in January 42.
If this fellow had lived for another year, the strategy employed at Stalingrad would almost certainly have been (b), and the outcome very different.
I hope you'll pardon the slight digression from the topic, but I'm trying to show that Fall Blau could have ended very differently, no matter how half cocked it was at the planning stage. Which brings me back to the whole reason for Fall Blau.....the simultaneous aims of denying the oil to the Soviets, while at the same time the Germans being able to boost their own war effort. Those resources and VP's in the Caucasus must be made more meaningful to the German player, he must start weighing in his mind those far off glittering prizes, what they are worth and what to do about them. The Soviets too would have to carefully weigh up the strategic significance and defence allocations made accordingly.
Lets face it. In most games, the German player is going to have basically four strategic choices in 1942.
1) A new Operation Typhoon to invest Moscow.
2) Capture Vorenzh, wrong foot the Soviets, roll up their defences and attack towards Moscow from the South
3) Capture Vorenzh and head south for the oilfields.
4) Sit behind his defences and do vitually nothing.
Well, none of us ( I hope ) want to see (4) becoming a viable option. We all need to come up with the workable and achievable idea to plant this seed in the German players mindset, not just in 42, but 43 as well.... which is this....
'Mein Fuhrer, the final objective is just over the next hill..... obtain it, and the war is ours!!'
Apologies for going on a bit, and I hope there was'nt too much waffle.
< Message edited by Empire101 -- 9/23/2011 1:45:27 PM >
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Our lives may be more boring than those who lived in apocalyptic times,
but being bored is greatly preferable to being prematurely dead because of some ideological fantasy. - Michael Burleigh
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RE: Simple Fix for German Raiding - 
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