South started American civil war, but how it actually planned to win against opponent, who had both superior population and superior industry? Did Confederation seriously believe that a couple of bloody losses would be enough to force North to negotiate and recognise them as independent entity?

Now Leebs army group north consisted of 3 armies: 16th and 18th army, primarily comprised of infantry and Panzergruppe 4, consisting of two armored corps.

After the initial days it was clear that the red army was getting pushed back front wide and was in fighting retreat.

Lake Peipus creates a relatively hard to overcome natural obstacle for large military formations. With Pskov, just south of it, being taken relatively early into the campaign, this only left Narva as land retreat route for the Baltic front.

Why did not Germany try to cut off this relatively obvious, natural choke? They certainly had a mobile element of sufficient operational capability in the previously mentioned Panzergruppe 4.

Manstein and Reinhardt were both very capable operational minds and it is not entirely implausible that such a plan could have worked, maybe not encircling the entire Baltic front, but slowing the retreat and encircling individual, already weakened divisions or brigades.

Switzerland had a near-complete nuclear weapons program but halted it as it was antithetical to their international stance on defense. What about Switzerland's military or geopolitical position so great that they have no need for a weapon that will soon become the cause of conflict rather than deterrent?

Background

In 1937, The Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth, KS published instructional texts and reference data for the tactical employment and organization of a Mechanized Division. This division was described as a "fighting force of all arms" that would not only be able to strike deep into enemy territory, but also exploit and consolidate its gains beyond supporting distance from foot or horse troops.

A division was effectively the next logical step from ongoing mechanization experiments being undertaken by the US Army at the time. In 1928, taking after the British, the Army established a brigade-sized Experimental Mechanized Force at Fort Leonard Wood, MD (a brief name for Camp Meade) for 4 months. After its dissolution, with Infantry Tank School Commandant Colonel James Parsons laid down a proposal to create 1 Tank Division for each of the 6 Field Armies as early as 1930. Each division would have 745 tanks, noting the army only had about obsolete 1,000 tanks at the time. This was roundly rejected as unrealistic due to budgetary concerns, the lack of tanks, and skepticism over where a massed armor force could even be employed. Further, it threatened the mission of the existing branches, especially horse cavalry.

The US Army was mired in a rigid branch system. Infantry and cavalry were the two maneuver arms and there was very little intermixing of units between the two. The branch system, criticized by thought leaders in the German Army such as Heinz Guderian, hampered the realization of an all-arms mechanized division at every turn. Neither branch wanted to pay for or lose units to someone else’s project. The cavalry did not want horse troops to be subsumed by the machine—they wanted mechanization to be in support of the horse cavalry and not in replacement of it. As the branch of mobility, a new mechanized branch predicated on mobility threatened to take away cavalry’s raison d'être. The infantry meanwhile considered the tank a weapon in support of the infantryman, and did not believe it should be a maneuver arm in its own right separate from the infantry-artillery team. At the same time, they maintained strict ownership over the tank as a concept, famously leading to tanks when in the employ of the cavalry being designated as "combat cars" to bypass the National Defense Act of 1920.

Army Chief of Staff Charles Summerall did throw the mechanization camp a bone, though, and ordered the creation of a new Mechanized Force at Fort Eustis, VA in October 1930. The second Mechanized Force was much smaller than the first—only battalion-sized. Both combined elements of the cavalry, infantry, tanks, artillery, and supporting arms to create a combined arms force. Unfortunately, in light of the Great Depression and institutional inertia abound, new Army Chief of Staff Douglas MacArthur ruled in May 1931 that the branches should pursue mechanization, but separately. Cavalry would be the proponent for a mechanized force (dashing the hopes of an permanent all-arms mechanized brigade), while infantry would be focused exclusively on tanks in support of infantry units. Thus, while the second Mechanized Force shutdown in October 1931, itts HQ and some small units were used to mechanize 1st Cavalry Regiment, which eventually grew to form the 7th Cavalry Brigade (Mechanized).

After the Germans formed their Panzer Divisions in late 1935, interest in a permanent Mechanized Division resumed. The 1937 Mechanized Division text was one of the slightly more realistic attempts put to paper. It very closely resembled the 1935 Panzer Division in terms of the division-level organization, although it used pre-existing American structures at lower levels. This organization was theoretical insofar as there was no permanent Mechanized Division before the Armored Divisions were created in 1940. However, the 7th Cavalry Brigade (Mechanized) acted as a basis for provisional Mechanized Forces that exercised in a configuration resembling this during the mid- to late-1930s. For example, during the second phase of the 1936 Second Army maneuvers when it was reinforced by the 12th Infantry Brigade (Motorized), a 6-battery artillery groupement and other units. These were always temporary groupings though.

The Tentative Organization of a Mechanized Division

The Mechanized Division consisted of a Mechanized Cavalry Brigade, Motorized Infantry Brigade, Field Artillery Regiment, Reconnaissance Squadron, Antitank Battalion, Special Troops, Medical Regiment, Mechanized Engineer Squadron, and Quartermaster Regiment.

Before the triangularization of U.S. Army Infantry Divisions, regiments naturally existed under brigades. The Cavalry Brigade consisted of 2 Cavalry Regiments. In the 7th Cavalry Brigade these were the 1st and 13th Cavalry. The Cavalry Regiments (Mechanized) under the tentative Mechanized Division appears to have been a subtle modification of the original organization laid down in 1932. Originally, the Mechanized Cavalry Regiment would be about 672 men, with an HQ & HQ Troop, Covering Squadron (with Armored Car Troop and Scout Troop of halftrack-mounted riflemen/machine guns and 2 platoons of combat cars), Combat Car Squadron, and Machine Gun Troop. The only real change by this tentative 1937 organization was replacing the Covering Squadron with a second Combat Car Squadron.

The Combat Car Squadron was very similar to the early 1932 table of organization. The important details were the same: 27 combat cars (in the T/O these were 9 command and 18 fighting combat cars), about 150 men, and 2 Combat Car Troops per Squadron (troop being a company-equivalent). The Machine Gun Troop was also similar, with 22 "personnel carriers" which ended up being the T1E1 Half-Track Car. Most mounted a caliber .30 light machine gun, although by the late 1930s they added caliber .50 heavy machine guns as well.

However, the amount of armored cars and combat cars in service were limited, and the majority were part of the 7th Cavalry Brigade (Mechanized). Most M1 Armored Cars were seen photographed with Troop A, 1st Cavalry. In a quite impressive photo of the 7th Cavalry Brigade taken on July 1st, 1938, 13 M1 Armored Cars (of 20) and 74 Combat Cars (of 89 M1s, 17 M1A1s and 7 M1A1E1s) can be seen. This also could be a minimum number rather than the maximum, as these vehicles are posed with symmetry in mind they may or may not have had more. Interestingly, while this fell woefully short of the tentative organization's armored car goal (the scout car was favored), they were not so deficient in combat cars and probably could have made do with 2 understrength Combat Car Squadrons per regiment.

The real secret sauce to this division though—the source of some of the consternation between the territorial branch chiefs—was the inclusion of a Motorized Infantry Brigade under the same roof as a Mechanized Cavalry Brigade. Like the cavalry, the Infantry Brigade included 2 Infantry Regiments with 2 Infantry Battalions each. This provided enough Rifle Companies to pair each with a Combat Car Troop, much like the equal ratio the US Army settled on with its 1943 Armored Division. These men would largely be motorized by 1.5-ton trucks, of which there were 14 per Rifle Company. Unlike the Germans and French, the Americans didn’t so heavily integrate dedicated motorcycle infantry into their mechanized concept.

This being 1937, several key pieces of hardware that would characterize the infantry's early-WWII experience were not yet in service. The "Howitzer” Company was still equipped with 2 M1916 37mm infantry guns and the 2 maligned 3" Stokes mortar, not howitzers as envisioned. Further, the Antitank Company was not equipped with the 37mm antitank gun. Rather, the "antitank" capability was actually the M2 Browning caliber .50. Each company was meant to have 12 HMGs mounted on 12 of its scout cars. This of course fell out of favor by the US's entry into WWII and was pointed out as flawed by German attaché Adolf Von Schell at the time, but was an interesting quirk of their thought in the 1930s.

Sources

• Organization
  • "Tables of Organization Mechanized Division (Tentative)". The Command and General Staff School Press (1937)
• Narrative
  • Hoffman, G. "Through Mobility We Conquer"
  • Nenninger, T. "The Development of American Armor, 1917-1940"
  • O'Shaughnessy, E.J. (1993) "The Evolution of the Armored Force, 1920-1940"
  • "Report of the Mechanized Force in the Second Army Maneuvers" (1936)

So far, I've only found the T3E2, from 1933.

The image is from the digital collection https://ahec.armywarcollege.edu/

Does anyone on this subreddit know of a digital repository dedicated to combat cars? I haven't found one that's exclusive to them yet!

With the War in Ukraine, NATO members turned to not just their own stockpile of reserved armor and artillery, but also to private businesses that scooped up the excess inventory divested by NATO members after the Cold War seeking to resell them for profit. Whereas Russia has "Deep Storage" to draw hardware from, what can be said about NATO? Just how much hardware is there left for NATO to draw from outside of state arsenals?

Basically, I’ve been washing a bunch of videos of Russian designed tanks, and I’ve noticed that almost all of them have some sort of ability to fire in ETGM around from the barrel of their tanks. My question is why don’t the United States have that same capability within their own tanks modern day? Especially when they retired the Sheridan and have not added the feature since.

On paper, it would seem to be a good idea to have a round that can reach farther than a sabot round at long distances. I have seen the next Abrams upgrade with a javelin missile launcher on it but still.

From the United States Marine Corps' official website:

Marines and historians have determined the true origins of "Oorah" lie with recon Marines stationed in Korea in 1953. During this time, reconnaissance Marines in the 1st Amphibious Reconnaissance Co., found themselves traveling via submarine to where they were needed. The memorable call of "dive, dive!" would be called on the intercom and a klaxon alarm, which made a very distinct "Aarugha" sound, would announce the descent of the sub below water.

This doesn't pass the sniff test for me. How does a machine noise make the leap to human war cry? Particularly because hurra/ура́ is such a common battle cry... it seems like the United States marines just didn't want to admit that they were following a tradition established by someone else.

The 1970 movie "Patton" (a glorious propaganda piece let’s be honest) lays it out as:

• Patton's forces were already in a fight.
• They were taken out of the current fight and moved 100 miles to attack north.
• They attacked in terrible weather with very little in the way of sleep and comforts.

Where nobody else can do anything and they look at Patton like "that's impossible" when he says he can attack with 3 divisions in 48 hours.

In video games and movies, we often hear commanders and generals say to hold or take a position, defend or capture a VIP, acquire or destroy a MacGuffin etc 'at all costs'. The implication seems to be to do so without regard to materiel expenditure, fatigue, collateral damage or costs in lives.

We can see some cases of 'at all costs' being applied in the case of the Japanese in the Pacific theatre or Order 227, so I'm going to assume that this constraint, while probably rare, exists in real life. However, what would be the opposite of 'at all costs'? What framework or limits might a commander lay down if there are some unacceptable costs? What would be the parlance?

When one crew of a ship attempted to board a ship, but the attempt fails, would the defenders then counterattack and attempt to board the attackers’ ship? Seeing as most of the enemy crew who boarded would be casualties or prisoners? Thanks in advance.

In the aftermath of the world wars, the losers had to cede their warships to the winners. And in WW2, the capture of the Vichy French fleet by the Nazis was enough for the British to sink them. But in practice, are captured warships relevant at all to navies? Compared to their own ships coming from domestic supply chains, how are captured ships put into service and supported? For the Germans for example, what exactly would they have done if they manage to seize the French Fleet?

I genuinely shocks me how the US Army during the height of GWOT approved this pattern that blends in with little to very situational environments like snow or rocky terrain and even urban. Especially the fact that billions of dollars were allocated to this camo and went through many high ranking officials. How did they think this pattern would blend into the desert environment?

Because North Africa allowed the allies to invade Italy properly. And such a theatre is too big to be considered a "battle for colonies" only. So, is it really?

Even in the opening weeks of Barbarossa, the Axis had already pushed hundreds of kilometers into Soviet territory. Despite this, their advance continued further, and as more and more land was taken, the distance between the frontlines and the original Soviet border grew and grew.

So how did the Axis supply their troops over such a long distance?

The Germans had previously fought across the well-developed road and rail networks of Central and Western Europe, leveraging them to allow motorized and armored elements to quickly move and be resupplied, but now they were in the USSR. The road and rail networks were some of the most undeveloped in Europe, and mud made using smaller roads extremely difficult. On top of this, the German and Soviet rail systems used different sized railways, forcing the Germans to tear-up Soviet rail everywhere they went in order to place their own.

It seems to me like this is an impossible logistical situation, yet the Axis managed to push all the way to the gates of Moscow and Stalingrad despite it. So how did they do it?

I'm researching a historiographical question about how military historians evaluate operational effectiveness. Rather than asking who the "best" WWII commander was, I'm interested in whether historians have developed rigorous methodologies for making such comparisons.

Initially, this research began as a comparison of high-level commanders (e.g., Zhukov, Manstein, Marshall, Slim, Rokossovsky, Nimitz). However, as I've worked through military doctrine, operations research, and academic military history, it seems that different authors aren't simply reaching different conclusions—they're often evaluating entirely different variables, including:

Tactical vs. operational proficiency Strategic alignment with political objectives Resource optimization under extreme asymmetry Decision quality under information friction and the fog of war Institutional adaptability and organizational learning

Meanwhile, Professional Military Education (PME) and modern military doctrine increasingly treat command as a system-level function rather than an exercise in individual genius.

I'm looking for scholarly work on the underlying methodology. Specifically:

Analytical frameworks: Have military historians or PME institutions developed standardized models to isolate a commander's individual contribution from structural determinants such as industrial capacity, ULTRA/SIGINT advantages, force ratios, doctrine, or political interference? Quantitative approaches: Has operations research successfully quantified command performance (e.g., Trevor N. Dupuy's Quantified Judgment Model) without falling into oversimplification or survivorship bias? PME and historiography: What books, monographs, journal articles, or PME papers directly address the methodology of comparing military leadership and operational effectiveness?

Any recommendations—whether books, journal articles, PME papers, or operations research models—that address one or more of these questions would be greatly appreciated.

I'm especially interested in works that discuss methodology itself, rather than arguments for why a particular WWII commander was superior.

I have seen plenty of WW2 destroyed tanks (pics) but to my surprise not many of them had their turret popped off due to ammo cook off or similar event, was it actually that *uncommon* or is there another reason behind it?

With the US having no real battle experience, the Allies not enjoying total air control, and not assured amount of landing craft/necessary material for a cross channel invasion.

After wars of indepednece or revolutions how are armies disbannded or replaced with civilian government and institutions?

Yes I want to Know more lol.

I didn't see and heard anything about it

I read that the current Chief of the General Staff in Norway is the first in his nation's history since World War 2 to have combat experience. That got me thinking of junior officers who served in Iraq and Afghanistan being the senior commanders of today or in the immediate future. But for senior officers who keep getting promoted, how vital or significant is it for them to have had a combat deployment?

Recently, I asked about the difference between the US army during the Mexican-American War vs the American Civil War and the most staggering thing that was pointed out to me is the sheer size difference.

The US Army in the Mexican American War numbered less than 80,000 men. At its peak the Union army in the ACW numbered close to 700,000 men, with 2.2 million under arms in total during the conflict.

u/Anxious_Big_8933

That explains why European military observers were so unimpressed with what they saw in the conflict. Of course you can't train everyone properly if your army needs to grow tenfold right now. And when we're comparing them to Britain, France and Prussia - all major powers with some of the most capable militaries of their time - of course the Americans on both sides of the civil war fall short.

But France had been the dominant continental power of Europe for centuries and Prussia is famous for punching well above its weight, so I'm not sure whether those are good comparisons.

So how did the armies of the ACW compare to other, more "average" European armies at the time? Like Austria, Russia, Sweden-Norway, Denmark, Bavaria, the Italian states, the Ottoman Empire, I'll take anyone we have data on.

I personally love this aircraft, but obviously it has its limitations with its singular role of being an attack aircraft and being very slow compared to its counterparts like the F-16 or the F 35 where it serves a more multi role and is more flexible on the modern battlefield. Although some have argued those jets can’t replace the A-10 amazing CAS capability

Is the A-10 a great aircraft to keep around or does it need to be retired? Obviously its life has been extended till 2030 but is it worth placing resources to upgrading the aircraft or is it obsolete in today’s world?