"Define Blitzkrieg " Topic

That poll today got me thinking about what it really means. What elements are essential for classifying an action as a form of lightning war? Speed, striking a weak part of a defensive line, rapid, all-arms? exploitation of a breach?

Must it involve vehicles?

I'm not a WW2 gamer so I've never thought of it too deeply.

A disruptive bombardment, quick infantry assault with self propelled gun support, tank breakthrough and pursuit with recon on the flanks, total air supremacy and on-call airstrikes, mechanised infantry support of tanks followed by motorised infantry.

If no vehicles substitute cavalry/light infantry for tanks but regular infantry cannot lag behind.

Then the journalist/cameraman team criticising every phase of the operation.:)

The origins of the word blitzkrieg as I recall were in German military discussions prior in the 1930s and focused on swift ("lightning") warfare, which while they may not necessarily have involved vehicles did involve rapid focused attacks to create a breach in the enemy's defenses which could then be exploited by swift movement to disorder and encircle the enemy

Apparently some of the German leadership did not especially like the word "blitzkrieg"

Certainly conventional concepts of blitzkrieg involve vehicles and combined-arms teams

The Germans used the term Schwerpunkt, or hard point, for the combined arms team that had the mission of punching through the defenses. Ideally two ruptures would be made, followed by a pincer movement to seal of the retreat of units in the area and then another bound forward. Their biggest problem was a lack of motorized infantry, especially in Russia, to complete an encirclement. The armor unit is safest on the move. Having it tied up keeping a pocket closed made it vulnerable to counterattack and gave the enemy time to adjust.

Hitler didn't like the word. He even referred to it as "Italian phraseology"

Try Wikipedia:

link

Streitax

Schwerpunkt is used to define the commanders main effort, this would normally be the enemies centre of gravity.

Auftragstaktik, also known as Mission Command have been a central to the tactics of German armed forces since the 19th century.

Add internal combustion engine, armour, tactical air power, decentralised command and nerve!

Blitzkrieg simply requires speed and the application of force at the right point(s) to paralyze and defeat the enemy. 'Shock and awe' would qualify as blitzkrieg. It doesn't require any element in particular as long as it overwhelms.

One of Bryan Perretts better books, "A brief history of blitzkrieg" covered it quite succinctly.

I suspect it is one of those things people apply their own interpretation to. We will soon have someone claiming that Atilla the Hun conducted Blitzkrieg, or Hannibal.

I suspect it is one of those things people apply their own interpretation to. We will soon have someone claiming that Atilla the Hun conducted Blitzkrieg, or Hannibal.

Those turbo-charged elephants really changed warfare as we knew it.

LOL, not as much as cataphract camels.

That wiki link is actually very good.

Combined arms approach which doctrinally seeks out weaknesses to exploit (rather than strengths to crush), combined with de-centralized command to allow seizure of initiative at lowest tactical level, thereby operating at such a quick pace the enemy is forced to react to your plans rather than sticking to theirs (i.e., "getting inside their OODA loop").

For simple folks like me, it was 'push, push on, push no matter what.' If you run into a tough nut, go around it, if you're worried about logistics/threats, stop worrying and keep moving.

At times this had units from WWII to present to move so (unanticipatedly) quickly and deeply into enemy rear areas that commanders at various levels 'chickened out' and called a halt to the whole process, introducing a new term to the maneuver warfare vernacular: operational pause.

**With that third paragraph, I'm not really interested in a debate about whether calling the halt was the right thing to do or not, I was just point out what I think is a funny anecdote regarding 'blitzkrieg.' I guess for your Blitzkrieg formula you need to add "commanders at higher echelon that are on top of their game regarding situational awareness, and excellent intelligence to help you make the decision regarding too pushing too far or just far enough (with regards to 'damn the supply lines, he's broken' vs. 'better halt to consolidate as enemy reserves are massing.').

V/R,
Jack

Blitzkrieg is just moving faster than the enemy can react, especially once you have broken through his front line. The key element was radios.