"Effects of Guerilla and partisans in WW2" Topic

Had someone tell me that the attempts of these types of actions in France and Eastern Europe/Russia had no real effect on Germany and were played up to make the media happy.

what I am looking for is.

1. How much men/materiel did the Germans have to dedicate to controlling partisan actions.

2. How effective were these partisans?

Any sources are appreciated.

I expect it is hard to arrive at any definitive impact.

It can't have been no effect and large forces were tied down to counter the partisan threat.

I would however question some of the extravagant claims made during and after the war.

Some effect – sure. The intelligence gathering and possibly the escape routes for aircrews had meaningful value. The sabotage and attacks on the occupying forces rather less.

But I'm very curious to hear what others have to say.

In effectiveness, the blocking delay for major supply routes and hindering communications is another reason.

I am interested in the amount of troops that the Germans had to dedicate to keeping their supply lines open. Also the idea of how effective, the increasing German atrocities to deter partisan actions were.

Depending on how much manpower the Germans were committing will tell the tale of how effective the partisan activity was.

I would assume it is hard to measure the effect of partisan activity during WW2 since there is no official organization documenting the success.

You might want to look at these:

link

link

Partisans certainly tied up a lot of troops, especially police battalions.

Yes, the US Army Center for Military History analyses are worth looking at.

On the eastern front, partisan groups were operating in division and corps strength, and the Germans countered with similar force levels. In Russia and Yugoslavia they were heavily bolstered by external military aid, and effectively functioned as conventional military forces.

In France, Greece, the Netherlands etc, they were just pin pricks. Useful for intel gathering and morale boosting, but not much more and major resistance groups (such as at Vercours) were ruthlessly exterminated. Population densities, force levels and levels of collaboration were much more in the Germans favour in the west.

The threat and reality of atrocity worked fairly well as a security measure in the west (see force ratios above), but made almost no difference whatsoever in the east apart from to raise the general level of barbarity, popular resistance and increase the desire for revenge.

The main lesson being that repression works well against civilian populations, and to be successful partisans require the operational support of major external organised military forces.

The exception to this would appear to be Afghanistan, where the entire population seems to be in a permanent state of insurrection:)

The Germans had divisions dedicated to security only. Plus many small local units (company size and up) that were employed in a security roll. Oh, and that's not counting what many German units were doing while regrouping/resting behind the immediate front line. It was a major problem.

Yugoslavia: Entire divisions (some with armor) were committed to suppressing patisans.

Italy: After the Italians changed sides the partisan war there became wide spread and brutal.

Russia: Again, whole divisions committed (I believe division size forces were used to battle the partians on occasion).

Poland: Warsaw uprising. German ad-hoc division size units employed. One of the few times the StormTiger was used in combat. The Poles even had tanks. If I recall correctly, the Poles fought so heroically the Germans offered the Polish fighters regular status to induce them to surrender.

France: Das Reich Pz Div spent days murdering civilians (in Tulle and Oradour) instead of going to Normandy to combat the allied invasion due to partisan activity.

I think the partisans were very effective. Fighting them was a full time job.

Some books I've read: German Report Series-The Soviet Partisan Movement; Hitlers Bandit Hunters; Rising '44 The Battle For Warsaw; Warsaw 1-Tanks In The Uprising; Das Reich.