High Level Light Infantry Combat

QuikManeuvers’ publication Close Assault also provides some interesting information about the combat achievements of properly led light infantry divisions. In July 1950, the lightly armed 4th North Korean Division (Communists) encountered the US Army’s far more powerful 24th Motorized Infantry Division, and outmaneuvered it.

“In spite of massive air support, the US 24th Infantry Division's regiments were speedily outflanked and overrun by the 4th NKA Division. The US division was then driven out of Chonan, Chonui and Cochiwan by its light infantry adversary.
The US 24th Division suffered massive casualties (29%) in one week of fighting the communists, including 1,500 missing men. The division's 21st and 34th Regiments were reduced to approximately 1,100 men each and the 24th Division shrunk to 11,400 men.”
For more details about how that was accomplished, order the book Close Assault.

Combat Along the Skirmish Lines

Light Infantry in Close Combat

A subscriber recently said, “I understand why Soviet Combat-Origined Battle Norms are so important to guiding future offensive operations, but such studies appear to be more appropriate for larger scale operations. What about fighting at the sharp end, small scale actions along the skirmish lines?”

First we must clarify the situation. Battle norms are available at all levels of combat. QuikManeuvers offers several publications in their Light Infantry category, to include Close Assault; Hard-Striking, Fast-Moving War; and Infiltration that focus particularly on infantry combat. Light Infantry combat consists of the armament organization weapons and tactics of infantry forces who are fighting without air, artillery, or tank support. They fight with machine guns, RPGs and light mortars, and the tactics discussed are those used by light infantry units (America has no regular army light infantry units), commando special forces, ranger, and guerrilla operations.

Machine guns are of prime importance to infantry combat. The following excerpt from Close Assault demonstrates the superiority of the small infantry units of the German 3rd Fallschirmjager (parachute) Division in World War Two.

”The 3rd Fallschirmjager Division (3rd FJD) in 1944, had 930 light machine guns, eleven times as many as its chief opponent, the U.S. 29th Infantry Division. Rifle companies in the 3rd FJD had twenty MG 42s and 43 submachine guns; rifle companies in the US 29th Infantry Division had two machine guns and nine Browning Automatic Rifles (BAR). At the squad level, the GIs had a single BAR; the German parachute squad had two MG 42s and three submachine guns. The Germans had three times as many mortars as the Americans, and heavier ones. So in any encounter between equal numbers of Americans and Fallschirmjager, the Germans had from six to twenty times as much firepower.”
(excerpt from Close Assault)

High-Speed Offensive Combat - Most Important Aspect of a Battle

In WW2, Red Army battle norming paradigms proved beyond all doubt that high-speed offensive combat was the most important aspect of a battler or war-winning scheme.
For example, the Soviets discovered that high speed offensive advances resulted in fewer casualties and lesser consumption of most of the critical supplies needed by any army.

(from Red Blitzkreig)

“Soviet analysis of offensive operations conducted by tank armies in 1944-45 shows that, when they advanced at 16-45 kilometers (km)/day, they used only one-third the amount of fuel and one-sixth the amount of ammunition required when the rate of advance was only 4.5-13 km/day. At the higher rate of advance, they also took only one-third of the personnel and two-thirds of the tank casualties (and most of the latter were repairable mechanical breakdowns). Plainly, such calculations have considerable impact on the desirability of achieving surprise.” (as well as the importance of offensive action)

The modern conventional American ground forces fighting inside Iraq and Afghanistan spend too much time on the defensive. As a result, they loose more men, equipment, and consume more supplies than if they were attacking constantly. Constant attacks must be based on good intelligence. Such intelligence locates the enemy and identifies targetable weaknesses and vulnerabilities. The US military cannot depend upon the incompetent CIA, and its own intelligence resources are still weak and improperly utilized. However, we cannot afford to use that excuse any longer to justify a lack of good offensive performance. US military has existed for nearly 300 years. So, it has no excuse for not ruthlessly transforming itself into a continuous offensive juggernaut.

For more detail insight into this offensive concept, read Thunder of the Euphrates, Thunder from the East, Red Blitzkrieg, Daring Thrust; Deep Battle, Disgraced; the Soft Corps, and Halls of Vahalla.

Future Blogs to look for here at Military History Matters:

• Alternative View of Infantry Weapons
• A Measure of Combat Effectiveness: Useful for Military History Junkies and Wargamers
• The Strange Relevance of Horse Cavalry Operations on the Eastern Front (WW2)
• The Reconnaissance Battle
• Clauswitz’s Critik Method
• Sun Tzu Warfighting Contributions

Soviet Army Battle-Origined Norms Guide Future Operations

Soviet Army Operational Art in War

In WW2, the Soviet Army on the Eastern Front decisively defeated the German Army, unarguably the best army in the world (and perhaps in the 20th and 21st century), but we are not going to talk about why that happened right now.
The victorious Soviet Army marked itself as consummately professional when it required that participants in hundreds of campaigns and battles write down lesson learned. Red Army military intellectuals then studied those lessons learned, and came up with guidance for future combat, which they called Battle Norms.
“Norms have become all pervasive in Soviet military practice, reflecting general guidelines for specific operational eventualities. "…Procedural (or operational) norms suggest how the Soviets are likely to conduct a conventional campaign with regard to sequence, timing, depth, location, and movement of the various elements. Numerical norms define the distances, frontages, advance rates, strength, etc. involved in such campaigns..."
Norms enable Soviet commanders to more effectively plan and execute operations. For example, engineer norms for the preparation of a fortified position specify that the following assets are required for fortifying a given area: "...230.55 man days...and 46.3 machine hours (in one day, or)...115 men and one bulldozer...(in 2 days)..." “ (exceprt from Red Blitzkreig: Soviet Army Operational Art in War)

To fully understand the extremely important concept of Red Army battle norming, and its potential for improving American Military Warfighting today, a diligent study of several of QuikManeuvers’ offerings would provide both the main course and dessert for the intellectually hungry.
See Army of Darkness; Army of Conquest; Red Blitzkreig; Twilight Zone; and Share the Pain, Share the Glory.

Red Army Battle Norms Influenced by Napoleon

One of the most important influences on the success of the Red Army in WW2 and thereafter, was Napoleon Bonaparte. His concepts shaped many Red Army warfighting approaches, including battle norming.

“Before he formally established a staff, the great French Field Marshall, Napoleon Bonaparte, was forced to retain a prodigious amount of highly relevant military/logistics data in his field notebooks. He maintained figures on his troop characteristics, dispositions, march lengths and rates, frontages, time and space factors and units of supply. (In another set of books he maintained constantly upgraded intelligence data.) The aggregate of troop management and maneuver information constituted Napoleon's battle norms.
The odd bits of seemingly unrelated information contained in battle norms were vitally important to the execution of Napoleon's campaigns, especially since his opponents regularly failed to make adequate assessment of such realities. Many of the Emperor's own combat marshals never mastered his system either.
Napoleon's battle norms enabled him to think more rapidly and realistically while under the pressure of campaigning. Supported by his battle norms and latest intelligence data, he could study maps and plan campaigns with a precise command of the relevant factors of time (e.g. for movement, entrenching, terrain effects) and space (e.g. frontages, depths, maneuver room).” (except from Red Blitzkreig)

It is very evident that organized warfare is a direct indicator of success on the battlefield. This is just as true today as it was in the 1700s. The Soviets evoked a scientific method to what they learned from Napoleon, realizing success against the Germans in WW2. Read more about that next time…

History of Maneuver Warfare & Operational Art

Although QuikManeuvers focuses on crucial events that occurred within the most important wars during the 66, years that we consider most significant to America’s future (1940-2006), we cannot ignore a central historical figure whose influence on the 20th and 21st century is far greater than most people recognize.

“The French military genius, Napoleon Bonaparte, is a historical figure of supreme importance to the development of modern, twentieth century maneuver warfare. He is both the father of strategy and the most excellent historical model for maneuver warfare. His combat skill at an infinite variety of force deployments and maneuvers has never been equaled. That skill enabled him to overrun most of Europe in a few years. Few commanders of any era can match Napoleon in military insight or combat experience; he commanded over sixty battles. When he led his army groups into Russia in 1812, Napoleon led the largest, best-organized army the world had seen in either the 18th or 19th centuries. His twelve all-arms corps (many the size of armies), one artillery corps, and his four cavalry corps (45,000 horsemen), included an elite Imperial Guard of over 75,000 men. With 614,000 infantry, 152,000 cavalry and 1,266 guns, Napoleon's army group had a higher mobility ratio, 40% cavalry, than did Adolph Hitler's forces that invaded Russia 129 years later.” (excerpt from Center of Gravity)

Napoleon Bonaparte was the first general to develop the modern concept of operational level warfare. Creating unique combined arms corps, another pioneering innovation; he moved them into combat along several parallel avenues of approach. When he converged on the enemy, his battles were usually marked by operational holding action coordinated with enveloping maneuvers by corps not yet engaged in combat.

It is appropriate that QuikManuevers’ publication, Center of Gravity, begins its discussion of maneuver warfighting with Napoleon. If you are interested in reading more, go to http://www.quikmaneuvers.com/center_of_gravity.html

Military History Matters - Welcome from QuikManeuvers

Military History Matters

The famous quote reads: “those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it.” Military History Matters.

To that end, the staff at QuikManeuvers.com has decided to start this blog to further the awareness of past successes and failures, to facilitate discussion, and to educate our readers of how they can influence those events today that should be influenced by the past – to learn how to duplicate success, and succeed where others have failed.

QuikManeuvers.com is a web site that sells espionage and military history books. The staff is dedicated to providing excellent military analysis and military history about war and spying in the modern era. We are historical investigative reporters focusing on the time period of 1940-2006 because we believe the key to understanding what is happening now, and in the future is embedded in the bloodstained archives of those sixty-six years, times of heroes and traitors.

QuikManeuvers’ books deal with military and espionage research and analysis. We provide you with information you can find nowhere else. Visitors to our site can access free newsletters about intelligence, the military, and terrorism, as well as military and espionage predictions.

We know that it is fun to study military history for its own sake, but we are determined not to sell books that are like most military history books today. For example such books might be discussing the battles of a certain war in a very shallow way: the NVA attacked Pleiku from the northeast, and after launching several night attacks, were driven back into Laos. QM approach to the same battle would be to describe the personality and modes of thinking of one or more of the combatant leaders, their military organization and fighting style, the influence of the terrain and strengths and limitations of opposing forces, as well as the way the battle unfolded with particular attention to both mistakes and appropriate warfigthing behaviors. To us, psychology and determination, along with proper organization and training in appropriate warfighting skills and maneuvers, are the arbiters of successful battles and campaigns.

We hope you will visit our web site at www.quikmaneuvers.com, and definitely…
Come back to this blog to participate in discussions about military history and its influence on today.