The Strategy & Tactics of World War II

Number 8
Arriba
España!

Spanish Civil War:

Prequel to WWII
Patton Raids the Reich
Slovakia in WWII
Japan’s Convoy War
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 The Strategy & Tactics of World War II

Number 8
Oct/Nov 2009

Features
6 The Spanish Civil War: 6
A Strategic Analysis
Nationalists rebel against the Spanish Republic in a dress
rehearsal for World War II.
by Brian Train
20 Patton’s Raid on Hammelburg
Gen. Patton launches a task force to rescue US
prisoners of war, but the rescuers have to be rescued.

by Kelly Bell 20
38 Japan’s World War II
Oilers & Tankers

Features

US submarines attack Japan’s Achilles heel.

by John Whitman
46 Slovakia in World War II
Hitler creates a new state.
by Blaine Taylor 38
50 The Organization of the Red Army
at the Start of WW II
The organization and combat doctrine of Stalin’s forces
evolved under extreme wartime pressure.
by Joseph Miranda

46
4 #8

WaW 8 Issue.indd 4 8/7/09 3:23:41 PM

 columns
18 Design Corner:
Arriba España!
Joseph Miranda
28 Game preview: Publisher: Christopher Cummins
Coral Sea Solitaire Editor: Ty Bomba
Assistant Editor: Joseph Miranda
29 Observation Post Copy Editors: Stephen Bacon, Jon
Cecil, Eric Harvey and Dav Vandenb-
Elite Beat: roucke.
CCB, 10th Armored: Design • Graphics • Layout:
True Saviors of Bastogne Callie Cummins & Chris Cummins
Raymond E. Bell Map Graphics: Meridian Mapping

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Arriba España!
by Brian Train
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WaW 8 Issue.indd 5 8/7/09 3:23:42 PM

 On
17 July 1936, units of the Spanish
Army of Africa seized control of
their garrison towns in Morocco
and prepared to move by ship to
metropolitan Spain. Once there, they planned to join the
rest of the army, along with assorted right-wing militias,
which were to have risen against the government on
18 July. The senior officers who planned the rebellion
expected the violence to end within two days, at most,
by which time they believed they would consolidate
military control of the government in Madrid. They
believed they could follow the pattern that had been
repeated so many times before in Spanish and Latin
American history that it had its own word: pronuncia-
mento (announcing) to the people the fact they had new
rulers. Instead, the popular and spontaneous opposition
6 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 6
to what was intended to have been just another military
coup d’etat ignited a civil war that lasted until 1939, cost
Spain over a million dead and wounded, and witnessed
demonstrations of startling idealism by foreigners and
equally startling cynicism by their governments.
The wrenching social, economic and political changes
wrought by the First World War affected all European so-
cieties, including Spain, which managed to stay neutral.
As left and right ideologies attracted larger numbers to
more extreme political positions, Spanish society polar-
ized. The Great Depression spurred the process, as well
as the examples provided by the rise of communism in
Russia and fascism in Italy. In the early 1930s the left-
wing part of the Spanish spectrum was temporarily in
ascendancy. King Alfonso XIII abdicated in 1931, and
8/7/09 3:23:53 PM
 The Spanish Civil War:
A Strategic Analaysis
the dictatorship of Primo de Rivera, of which the king
was actually only the titular head, was replaced by the
Second Republic, dominated by a coalition of centrist
and social democratic interests.
Governing Spain during that time was a difficult
job, as the government was hemmed in on all sides. The
extreme left, consisting of a militant socialist party, a
small but highly disciplined communist party, and an
anarchist movement dominated by trade unions, made
ever louder demands for faster and more radical reform.
The right wing, dominated by the Catholic Church, two
types of monarchists and a small fascist party, was just
as determined to turn back the clock to maintain a unity
of church and state in which everyone knew their place
and kept to it. To complicate matters further, separatist
WaW 8 Issue.indd 7
by Brian R. Train
movements in Asturias, Catalonia, Euzkadi (Basque
country) and Santander also pressed the government
to respect their autonomy.
A government beset by so many competing pressures
could please no one, and succeeding cabinets reeled
from crisis to crisis over the next few years. General
strikes contributed to disorder in the cities, and the
semi-autonomous regions added to the chaos by inde-
pendently adopting land reform measures. There were
local revolts, incidents of churches being burned, and
even a full-scale uprising in Asturias in October 1934.
Political murders became commonplace. In an effort to
unify at least part of the political spectrum, a center-left
“popular front” government was established in January
1936. The national elections the following month saw
the front elected by a slim margin of 150,000 votes out
of 10 million cast.
Some military officers, displeased with the results
of the election and fearful of even more civil disorder
and anti-clericalism, began to plan a coup with the
knowledge and assistance of the right-wing parties and
their growing militias. Three generals, Emilio Mola,
Jose Sanjurjo and Francisco Franco, bore the main
responsibility for that turn of events. Their plan was
to have the Army of Africa, a force of about 24,000 of
Spain’s best trained and best equipped troops stationed
in Spanish Morocco, revolt and secure that colony’s
air and naval bases. Twenty-four hours later, the rest
of the disaffected elements in metropolitan Spain (the
remainder of the Spanish Army, Navy and Air Force
and the three militarized police forces) would rise in
their garrison towns and cities and seize control of lo-
cal government. In towns where there was no garrison,
the Civil Guard (one of the three police forces, charged
with keeping order in rural areas) or right-wing militias
from the Falange or Carlist organizations would seize
public buildings and declare the new order. The date
chosen for the start of the revolt was 18 July 1936.
World at War 7
8/7/09 3:24:00 PM
 Airlift & Opening Round
The seizure of Spanish Morocco went off according
to plan, but things began to go wrong soon thereafter.
Gen. Sanjurjo was killed in an air crash on the first day
of the uprising, leaving Mola in command. In many
cities, officers wavered in their loyalty and didn’t join
either side. In those cases, whoever got to their units
first and surrounded their barracks would usually receive
the surrender. In other units the troops ignored or killed
their officers and declared for the government. That also
happened on many of the larger ships of the navy, a cru-
cial development when the rebels depended so heavily
on naval transport to cross the Mediterranean. It was
only prompt intervention by Germany and Italy, in the
form of transport and combat aircraft, which allowed
the rebels to carry the Army of Africa by air in the first
few critical days and weeks. It was the first strategic
troop airlift in history.
In Spain’s three largest cities—Madrid, Barcelona and
Valencia—confusion among the rebels and spontaneous
popular reaction by left-wing militias saved the day for
the government. In many cases those loyalists broke into
police armories and helped themselves to weapons. On
19 July, a day when there were three prime ministers in
succession, the government acknowledged the support
of the leftist militias and gave orders to loyal garrison
commanders to arm the workers. The new prime minister,
Jose Giral, also signed an order disbanding the Spanish
Army. The hope was that would encourage troops to
desert from rebel units; however, the order was for the
most part ignored.
As soon as matters had been decided in the towns,
mixed columns of regular troops, police and militia
(left- and right-wing) fanned out to take control of the
surrounding countryside. Due to the confusion on both
sides, many opportunities were missed, and it wasn’t
until early August that stable zones of Nationalist (as
the rebels called themselves) and Republican control
began to emerge. At that time the Republicans controlled
slightly more than half the country and population
(105,000 square miles and 14 million people). They also
Condor Legion: early model Heinkel 111 bomber.
8 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 8
held the large cities with the majority of heavy industry,
the mining areas and the gold reserves. They controlled
slightly less than half of the conscript army—about
50,000 men—but only about a third of the professional
officers and non-commissioned officers (NCOs); and
about 30,000 of the paramilitary police: 5,000 from the
Carabineros (border and customs police); 14,000 from
the Civil Guard (rural and town police), and 11,000 from
the Assault Guards (urban police). (It’s important to note
that, on an individual basis, the policemen were normally
better disciplined and equipped than the conscripts,
lacking only crew-served weapons and artillery.)
The Republicans also controlled most of the ships
of the Navy and merchant marine. At the same time,
though, most of those ships no longer had enough officers
to handle them efficiently, which worked to ensure the
Navy mostly remained in port throughout the war. They
also had most of the approximately 200 usable aircraft
in the Air Force, though less than half of the available
pilots
Finally, there were possibly as many as 100,000
militia volunteers from an array of political parties,
trade unions and regional governments. Most of them
were badly equipped and almost untrained, but they
held the front lines for the first few months when there
was nothing to compel their staying beyond their own
dedication.
As for the Nationalists, they controlled roughly
917,000 square miles (not including Spain’s offshore
territories and colonies) and 11 million people, includ-
ing the major food-producing areas, along with 24,000
highly trained troops from the Army of Africa (though
many of them were still being transported to Spain by
air and sea). They also had the loyalty of about 55,000
troops from the regular Army, including the majority of
the junior and senior leadership. They mustered 38,000
paramilitary police (10,500 from the Carabineros,
20,500 from the Civil Guard and 7,000 from the Assault
Guards), along with some of the smaller ships of the
navy, and for the moment more pilots than there were
aircraft for them to fly. Last, they also had about 6,000
Carlist militia and some 10,000 Falangist militia.
The Nationalists were concentrated in two zones:
a northern one under Mola, extending from Galicia
through Leon, Old Castile and Navarre almost to the
French border; and a smaller one in western Andalucia
under Franco. It was important to link the two zones
and capture the capital of Madrid as soon as possible; so
it fell to the troops of the Army of Africa to drive north
from Seville to accomplish both objectives. Organized
in truck-borne columns of several battalions of infan-
try along with the available artillery, they made rapid
progress pushing through inexperienced militia units.
Merida and Caceres were taken on 10 August and, after
a detour to capture Badajoz (to secure a route for sup-
plies and “volunteers” from the sympathetic Portuguese
government) they headed northwest.
8/7/09 3:24:01 PM
 Franco, who’d meanwhile been chosen to take over
as Nationalist commander-in-chief at a conference of
generals on 21 September, opted to divert the advance
toward Madrid to liberate the Alcazar. That was an old
Roman fortress near Toledo, the historic birthplace of
the Catholic Church in Spain. It had been used as a
military academy, and after the uprising it was occupied
by some officer cadets and several hundred Civil Guards
and Falangist militia from the nearby countryside. The
defenders were almost immediately besieged by the
local leftist militia, and their continued resistance be-
came a symbol of Nationalist resolve. Franco realized
the psychological benefit of raising the siege, even at
the price of delaying the capture of Madrid. The siege
was lifted on 27 September, and Franco was declared
Generalissimo on 1 October, cementing his position as
supreme leader of the Nationalists.

The Generalissimo: Francisco Franco.

World at War 9

WaW 8 Issue.indd 9 8/7/09 3:24:04 PM

 Spanish troops, German helmet: Nationalist troops observe the siege of Madrid.
Fifth Column
The battle for Madrid absorbed the efforts of both
sides for the next five months. The main Nationalist attack
was from the southwest by four columns of regular and
Moroccan troops, prompting Mola’s statement that he
had a “fifth column” of underground fighters inside the
city awaiting the word to rise up, which was where we
got the term often still used today to describe subversive
elements.
Madrid’s resistance became for the Republicans a
symbol every bit as strong as that of the Alcazar for the
Nationalists, and even as the Republican government
removed itself to Valencia on 6 November, large numbers
of troops arrived to defend the city. Units included the
Communist-led 5th Regiment of Militia, 1,500 men from
the 11th and 12th International Brigades (actually the
first two to be raised), and a column of 3,000 anarchist
militia led by Buenaventura Durruti. Numbers of T-26
tanks and I-15 fighter aircraft, both technically supe-
rior to the tanks and aircraft used by the Nationalists,
were beginning to arrive from the Soviet Union. The
Nationalist armies converged on Madrid to be met by
stiffening resistance and belts of improvised defensive
positions. By the beginning of November they’d reached
the outskirts of the city, but there the attack stalled.
Franco’s frontal assault to take Madrid had failed,
and he then tried to cut off the city from relief. On 14
December the Nationalists began an offensive to the north
of Madrid to cut the road to Corunna. After a month of
fighting the road itself was indeed cut, but the flanks of
Madrid remained otherwise open. On 6 February 1937,
10 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 10
a new attack began in the Jarama valley southeast of
Madrid, aimed at cutting the road between that city and
Valencia. At first the Nationalists made headway, but as
they advanced they found themselves outrunning their
artillery support and supply lines. The Republicans, who
had less weight of firepower overall, were falling back
on their own depots and had the advantage of defending
first a river line and then the heights looking down on
that river. As the battle developed, they were able to
keep shifting their better troops, tanks and aircraft from
Madrid to the center of the fighting. After three weeks of
sustained combat, both sides ran out of reserves and the
sector settled down. The Republicans had lost ground,
but the road to Valencia remained open.
The following month the Nationalists tried once more
to isolate Madrid, this time from the northeast near the
town of Guadalajara. Their main offensive force was
Italian expeditionary troops, the Corpi di Truppi Volun-
tari (CTV). That composite corps, of one regular and
three Blackshirt militia infantry divisions supported by
two tank battalions, heavy artillery and assault pioneers,
had arrived in January and February and had captured
Malaga in its first battle against Republican militia units.
The new Italian advance began on 8 March and, as at
Jarama, the initial move stalled in the face of bad weather
and the defense mounted by the best troops available
to the Republicans, who were hastily switched to that
front. The Republican Air Force established local air
superiority, and a general counterattack on 18 March
erased half of the CTV’s initial gains.
8/7/09 3:24:05 PM
 It’s also interesting to note the 12th International
Brigade, one of the defending units, contained the
Garibaldi Battalion composed of Italian communist
volunteers. More than once patrols encountered each
other, conversed in Italian, and only later found out they
were from opposite sides.
Frustrated, Franco ceased his attempts to seize Ma-
drid, though the city would remain under constant threat
and bombardment until nearly the end of hostilities in
March 1939. He switched to concentrating on snuffing
out the smaller of the two Republican-controlled zones:
the semi-independent regions of Asturias, Santander and
Euzkadi, arranged along the northern coast of Spain.
As well as eliminating the threat to the Nationalist rear,
seizing that area would secure the industrial center of
Bilbao and the coal fields and iron mines of Asturias.
The Basque region was attacked first. On 31 March
the Nationalist Army of the North struck west from
San Sebastian. The main force consisted of the 61st
Navarrese Division (four strong brigades of fanatic
Carlist militia), two Italian divisions, and fighter and
bomber aircraft from the Italian expeditionary air force
and the German Condor Legion. Facing them were 23
battalions of Basque militia, another 25 battalions of
anarchist and socialist militia and regular troops, and a
few battalions of Asturians and Santanderos. (Though
the people of those regions were nearly unanimous in Inflaming opinion: poster for the Battle of Madrid.
wanting independence from the central government,
their troops didn’t work well together.) the northern front and cutting off the Nationalist salient
The Nationalists made slow progress through the that extended to Madrid itself. Again, some ground was
mountainous terrain; the first 10 miles took a month to taken but the Nationalists diverted reinforcements from
traverse. The famous air attack on the village of Guer- the northern and Guadalajara fronts, and after three
nica, which inspired the Picasso painting, occurred on weeks of fighting the situation was restored. As would
27 April. A further six weeks brought the front within 10 happen to the Republicans many times in the future,
miles of Bilbao, by which time that place had become the the battle proved a net loss because they lost so much
center of a fortified area called the “Iron Belt.” An act of equipment and so many quality troops (especially from
treachery allowed the Nationalists to break through the the 13th and 15th International Brigades) which couldn’t
fortifications on 12 June, and Bilbao fell on 19 June. be replaced.
An attack by 11 reorganized Republican divisions at The advance on Santander resumed on 14 August,
Brunete, about 10 miles west of Madrid, was launched on and the city fell two weeks later. The Basque government
6 July with the dual intention of relieving the pressure on negotiated a separate surrender with the Nationalists,
continues on page 14

World at War 11

WaW 8 Issue.indd 11 8/7/09 3:24:07 PM

 A Tale of Two Armies:
Development of the Republican & Nationalist Forces

Prewar Military Establishment

Before the military revolt of July 1936, the Spanish Army Those militias were no match for the veteran troops of the
consisted of the following main combat units. Army of Africa, however, as well as the Nationalist Air Force.
• Eight territorial-based infantry divisions, using a “square” In early October 1936 the Republican government started to
organization dating from World War I. Their organiza- form “mixed brigades” of regular troops, militias and new
tion was based on two infantry brigades of two infantry conscripts for the Popular Army (as the force formed to replace
regiments each. the prewar army was called). Each brigade was to consist of
• One cavalry division, composed of three cavalry brigades four infantry battalions with organic artillery, engineer and
and one artillery regiment. combat support elements, so it would be better able to conduct
independent operations. In practice, few brigades had adequate
• Two mountain infantry brigades, composed of four
equipment. Even so, over 150 mixed brigades were formed
battalions each.
over the course of the war.
• Two light infantry divisions, known as the Army of Af-
The policy of forcing units of the workers’ militias into a
rica and stationed in Spanish Morocco. Those divisions
more disciplined mold did marginally improve their combat
were actually regional commands that coordinated the
effectiveness, but it was unpopular politically. The process
operations of two infantry regiments of the Spanish
coincided with the political maneuverings within the Repub-
Foreign Legion (which were actually more than 80 per-
lican government that installed the communists in a position
cent Spanish in composition); five infantry regiments of
of dominance. The communists in turn had their connection
regular infantry; five infantry regiments of the Meha’la,
to the Comintern (Communist International), which organized
troops who actually belonged to the client government
the staffing and formation of the “International Brigades” and
of Spanish Morocco and were recruited mostly from
assisted in the continued dispatch of military equipment from
the Rif tribes.
the Soviet Union.
Smaller combat units consisted of: one bicycle battalion,
Other ideological outlooks were sidelined, and matters
six machinegun battalions, two ceremonial guard battalions,
came to a head in Barcelona in May 1937, when anarchist
two tank and one armoured car regiments (vehicles in those
and communist militiamen fought in the streets for a week.
units amounted to only 20 French FT-17 tanks and 28 armored
Shortly afterward the anti-Stalinist communist party based in
cars), two anti-aircraft battalions and 12 engineer companies.
Catalonia, known as the Marxist Party of Workers’ Unifica-
With the exception of the units assigned to the Army of Africa,
tion (POUM, to use its better known Spanish initials), was
all formations were staffed with poorly educated conscripts,
declared an illegal organization, its leaders arrested and its
were understrength, badly equipped and badly trained with
battalions disbanded.
poor leadership.
In January, February and March 1937 the Popular Army
The Air Force and naval air arm consisted of about 400
began to establish higher echelons of command. Division
obsolete aircraft, many of which weren’t serviceable due to
headquarters were formed, each to control groups of two or
a lack of spare parts.
three mixed brigades, with extra artillery, cavalry, armored
The main units of the navy consisted of two battleships, car, anti-tank or engineering assets added if the division was
two heavy cruisers, four light cruisers, 15 destroyers and 12 a “shock” (attack-capable) unit. Corps headquarters were
submarines. There were also three battalions of naval infan- also formed, each to control groups of two to four divisions.
try. Certain divisions were permitted to remain dominated by
The Republican Army anarchist troops, and the regional forces kept sizable numbers
in their respective divisions. Later, field armies were formed
The beginning of the civil war was chaos for both sides
to control several corps in sustained campaigns, such as the
since, except in the Army of Africa, few units joined one side
Army of the Ebro in 1938.
or the other en masse. There are degrees of chaos, however,
and the Republic had more of it to deal with, since they
controlled about half of the 117,000 troops in metropolitan
Spain but had fewer than half of the professional officer and
non-commissioned officer cadre.
What saved the Republic in the early days was the spon-
taneous mobilization of popular militias from among political
parties (communist, both pro- and anti-Stalinist, and socialist),
trade unions (mostly anarchist) and the separatist regions of
Asturias, Catalonia, Euzkadi and Santander. Almost 50,000
ill-equipped, disorganized but highly motivated civilians
formed themselves into armed “columns” in the first two
weeks. They first secured their own cities and towns, and then
went out into the surrounding countryside. They were all that
prevented the less disorganized Nationalists from taking over
the country in the first six months of the war.
12 #8

WaW 8 Issue.indd 12 8/7/09 3:24:08 PM

 The Nationalist Army
As has already been mentioned, most of the professional
officer and senior NCO cadres of the prewar Spanish army
joined the Nationalist revolt. They formed the cadre of the
many units the Nationalists would fill out from conscripts
and Falangist party militia, giving them an army that showed
more discipline in its ranks than the other side. (They were
still a long way from being able to compare themselves to
other professional standing armies, such as those fielded by
Britain, Germany or Japan).
In the spring of 1937 the Nationalists began to break up
the ad hoc columns of mixed troops they’d been using and to
form coherent divisions. Unlike the Republicans, who wanted
to field units with organic support, the Nationalists would
often assign artillery, engineer, armor, or anti-tank units to
divisions as needed for each mission, while other divisions
in quieter sectors went without.
Theoretically, a Nationalist infantry division would be
composed of headquarters and support units, a cavalry or
reconnaissance squadron, an artillery group and an anti-tank
battery. Main units would be three infantry brigades, each of
four infantry battalions (called Banderas in the Foreign Legion
or Tabors for Moroccan units). In practice, though, as few as
eight or as many as 14 battalions could be found in a division,
along with a variety of troops drawn from different forces.
The best troops available to the Nationalists were from the
Army of Africa. Composed of long-service regulars, men of the
Spanish Foreign Legion and mercenaries from the hill tribes
of the Rif, those troops were able to secure large amounts of
territory in the chaotic early months, even when committed in
small numbers. Thereafter they were concentrated in brigades
and divisions whenever possible to be used as shock troops.
Almost equal in quality, and possibly superior in spirit,
were the Carlist militia units. Most of them were from the
province of Navarre, and their political leader wanted a return
to an ultra-conservative and traditional Catholic monarchy. At
the time of the revolt almost 6,000 militia had already been at
least partially trained by ex-army officers or Carlist volunteers
who had themselves been trained in Italy. (Mussolini had
been supplying the Carlists with small amounts of money
and arms since 1934.) Carlist forces reached their peak late
in 1937, when they formed five divisions each containing 16
to 18 battalions instead of the standard 10 to 12.
WaW 8 Issue.indd 13
The Falange was a small right-wing political party before
1936, but it exploded in numbers soon after the revolt. That
wasn’t due to the appeal of their fascist-like ideology; joining
the party was more an act of individual political survival if you
lived in a Nationalist zone. Like the Carlists, they received
some material aid and training from Italy and formed part of
almost every column in the first phase of the war. They sported
distinctive uniforms and ranks, but by December 1936 their
units were formally incorporated into the Nationalist Army.
Unlike the Carlist militia, who formed “pure” brigades and
divisions, the Falangist militia could be found mixed into
units of all sizes, led by regular officers. Most Falangist troops
were of low quality and were most often used for rear area
security or counter-guerrilla duties, or to fill out divisions as-
signed to quiet sectors of the front. For example, the several
static divisions formed during 1938 to hold Madrid contained
Falangists, while better troops were used in the campaigns in
Aragon.
Battle Drill
Most Spanish senior officers didn’t have the skill, training
or experience to initiate or sustain large offensive or counterof-
fensive operations. All too often battles degenerated into World
War I-style contests of attrition, where the side that first ran
out of reserves would lose. In 1937 and 1938 officers were
sent from the Soviet Red Army to work as advisors in Popular
Army units at division and brigade staff levels. Between 150
and 250 of those men were deployed at any one time, and
both the Republicans and the Soviets thereby gained valuable
experience. In contrast, the Nationalist generals normally
didn’t integrate their German and Italian advisors at the staff
level, except for liaison with the units of the Condor Legion
and CTV. The Nationalists also tended to use the firepower
furnished by their air and artillery superiority as a substitute
for skill in maneuver or coordination.
Taking aim: Republican militia woman.
World at War 13
8/7/09 3:24:10 PM
 taking themselves out of the war, and what remained
of the Asturian forces withdrew toward Gijon. The fi-
nal phase of the campaign began on 1 September. The
Nationalists had air superiority and a greater weight of
artillery, but the rugged terrain limited their advance to
only a few hundred yards each day. Gijon finally fell on
21 October; some troops and civilians were evacuated
by sea and made it to safety in France, while 18,000
others slipped into the mountains south of Oviedo.
From there they waged a guerrilla campaign that tied
up considerable numbers of Nationalist troops for the
next six months. In fact, sporadic resistance in that area
continued into the 1950s.
Turning Point
Of the approximately 200,000 men comprising the
Republican Army of the North at the beginning of the
campaign, only about 9,000 escaped to France or crossed
the lines to Republican territory. They lost over 33,000
dead. Many of the over 150,000 men taken prisoner were
drafted into Nationalist labor battalions. Meanwhile,
with the threat to the rear extinguished, over 65,000
Nationalist troops were released to concentrate against
Madrid and Barcelona, the two most important cities
left under Republican control. It was the turning point
of the war and, as long as the Nationalists continued to
receive foreign assistance and nothing changed for the
Republicans, defeat for the latter was inevitable.
Both sides took time in the fall of 1937 to reorganize
and refit. By December, Franco felt confident he could
launch another offensive on the Guadalajara front to cut
off Madrid. The Republicans detected the preparations
for the attack and launched one of their own at Teruel, a
weak spot in the Nationalist lines on the Aragon front: a
town at the tip of a bulge into Republican territory held
by only one understrength division. The Republicans
flanked and isolated the town with six divisions in a
pincer movement on 15-16 December.
Corpi di Truppi Voluntari
14 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 14
Franco quickly organized a relief force of 10 divi-
sions, but blizzards and sub-zero temperatures—some
of the lowest recorded in 50 years in an area known for
having some of the worst weather in Spain—prevented
aircraft from taking off and hindered quick reinforce-
ment. Even so, by 29 December the counterattack was
ready to go in. The weather then cleared for two days,
allowing intense artillery and air bombardment, but the
Nationalists couldn’t break into the pocket to relieve the
town. Blizzards closed in again, dropping almost four
feet of snow, and on 8 January 1938 the Nationalist com-
mander of the forces besieged in Teruel surrendered.
Ten days later the Nationalists resumed their attack.
Even though the town had surrendered, Franco was
determined to never let the Republicans gain and keep
territory. Finally, on 5 February, 11 Nationalist divisions,
including the entire Italian corps and the single Nation-
alist cavalry division, attacked with 100,000 men, 500
guns and over 300 aircraft on a 20 mile front north of
Teruel. The defending troops fled and the Nationalists
swung south to outflank the town. The Republicans
withdrew, but not before one of their better divisions,
46th Shock, was destroyed in Teruel. A defensive line
was established along the Alhambra River, but the Na-
tionalists continued to push the Republicans back for
several more weeks.
The battle was a disaster for the republic. It had
diverted the anticipated attack on Madrid, but at the
cost of nearly 60,000 dead and wounded (a quarter of
them from frostbite), almost 15,000 prisoners, and large
amounts of irreplaceable equipment and aircraft. If the
attack turned out to be a symbol of anything, it was of
the increasingly desperate mindset of the Republican
commanders. The Nationalists had controlled the major-
ity of Spain’s food-producing areas from the beginning
of the war and, as the people in the Republican zones
grew hungrier, the government felt a need to demon-
strate it could hit back and capture ground. They also
8/7/09 3:24:11 PM
 hoped to inspire intervention by Britain and France, as
those two countries seemed at the time to be adopting
a harder line against the fascist powers.
As the weather cleared and grew warmer, Franco
prepared for his next move. To defeat the Republicans
in detail, he proposed to attack along the entire Ara-
gon front, from Teruel north to the French border. By
advancing to the sea at Castellon, Republican territory
would again be divided into two parts. The Nationalists
could then reduce Catalonia, capture the industrial areas
around Barcelona, and cut off the Republicans’ access
to supplies and equipment crossing the French border.
The Nationalist Army of Maneuver, which consisted of
150,000 men in 27 divisions, with 700 guns, 160 tanks
and almost 600 aircraft in support, positioned itself near
Zaragoza.
On 8 March 1938 the Moroccan Corps under Gen.
Yague opened the attack, followed by a wave of Carl-
ist and Italian troops. The preparatory air and artillery
bombardment smashed the Republican line, and the
Nationalists advanced 25 miles on the first day. It was
the first time German Ju-87 “Stuka” dive bombers were
used in combat, and one of the first occasions in which
all available tanks were used in a Schwerpunkt (concen-
tration) instead of in individual troop and squadron-size
detachments. Front soldiers: Republican soldiers pose around a gun.
On 22 March the Nationalist forces on the front
between Zaragoza and Huesca advanced with Lerida
as their objective, while the Moroccan Corps crossed
the Ebro River to outflank the retreating Republicans. called the “XYZ Line” proved futile, and by 23 July
Lerida fell on 3 April, and while the troops north of that the lines stabilized only 20 miles north of the capital of
river consolidated their gains and swung north to close Valencia.
the French border, other Nationalist troops reached the Final Offensives
sea at Vinarroz on 15 April. The Republican commanders in Barcelona chose
Franco could have pressed on and taken Barcelona that moment to launch what would be their last offen-
without difficulty, since the Republican defenders were sive of the war: an attack across the Ebro River into
in full retreat. At that moment, though, external diplo- the Nationalist rear area, with the ultimate objective of
matic and political factors outweighed strategic ones linking the two zones. The Army of the Ebro was formed
in Franco’s mind. Germany had annexed Austria on 11 of 80,000 of the best troops remaining to the Republic.
March, and a crisis was brewing over Berlin’s further They expected to achieve initial surprise, but the odds
demands for the Sudetenland. Italy had plans to conquer against lasting success were long. The Republicans
Albania. It seemed to all in that spring and summer of would first have to conduct a large river assault cross-
1938 a general European war was only weeks away, ing, and then not only maintain a bridgehead, but push
and such an event could only benefit the Republic by it forward against determined resistance using inferior
either forcing a stalemate or provoking Anglo-French numbers of trucks, guns and aircraft.
intervention in Spain. On 25 July the Army of the Ebro crossed the river. The
Franco feared using Italian and German troops to Moroccan Corps, which had been resting and refitting in
take Barcelona would provoke such an intervention. that sector, was surprised and forced back. Within three
A leftist popular front government under Leon Blum weeks the army had advanced about 10 miles; however,
had come to power in Paris on 13 March, and Franco Franco withdrew eight divisions from the Valencia front
believed France had long wanted to annex Catalonia. So, to reinforce the line and also redeployed all available
in his careful and methodical way, he decided to switch artillery and aircraft. The Republicans couldn’t keep
the main effort away from Barcelona and instead strike their bridgehead supplied, as the bridges across the Ebro
for Valencia. From late April to mid-June, the corridor were placed under constant air attack or destroyed by
dividing the two Republican zones was widened against floods caused by the Nationalists opening the upriver
stiffening resistance. Castellon fell on 13 June. Five dams. Nevertheless, the Republicans were as determined
weeks of further fighting against a fortified position to keep the ground they held as Franco was to retake
World at War 15

WaW 8 Issue.indd 15 8/7/09 3:24:11 PM

 Taking the salute: Italian armor column drives down a Spanish street.
it. For over three months the Nationalists conducted a
series of World War I-style frontal assaults against the
Republican lines, smashing one position after another
with concentrations of firepower.
On 16 November the last Republican troops with-
drew to the east bank of the Ebro. They had suffered
75,000 casualties, including 30,000 dead, and they’d
lost almost all of the new equipment they’d obtained
that spring and now needed to defend Catalonia. There
were only 40 tanks, fewer than 100 field guns and some
50 serviceable aircraft left in the region.
Armored car used in the war.
16 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 16
The Nationalists couldn’t overlook such weakness
a second time. They quickly redeployed three corps
along the Segre River, and on 23 December the drive on
Barcelona resumed. Their overwhelming numbers and
firepower told and, after a month of frantic defensive
and delaying actions, the Republican front collapsed
and the Nationalists took Barcelona on 26 January 1939.
Combat units scattered into the hills and columns of
refugees—including the republican government, which
had moved to Barcelona in October 1938—headed for
the French border. Almost half a million people crossed
the frontier in the following month, to be placed in
internment camps.
Great Britain and France officially recognized
Franco’s government on 27 February. It was obvious
to all but the most deluded the war was lost, but the
communist-dominated government of Juan Negrin
(meeting in Alicante) was determined to keep fighting,
hoping a general European war would save them. They
refused to consider negotiating with Franco, who in
turn never wavered from his demand for unconditional
surrender.
On 6 March, Col. Casado, the officer commanding
the Republican Army of the Center, based in Madrid,
executed a local revolt and named himself “Provisional
President of the National Council for Defense.” A civil
war within the civil war erupted as street fighting raged
in Madrid for a week before order was restored and
communist troops were forced out of the city. Casado
8/7/09 3:24:12 PM
 tried to open negotiations with Franco, but he refused.
By 27 March all fronts were in a state of collapse as
the Republican troops streamed to what ports they still
controlled, hoping to be evacuated. Within a few days
all organized resistance had ended and, on 1 April 1939,
Franco declared the war over.
Those who’d supported the Republic and escaped
to France faced years of internment camps, wandering,
and more fighting and privation as the general European
war they’d thought would save them, started five months
later in September. Those who didn’t escape faced im-
prisonment, labor camps, show trials and executions: at
least 10,000 were condemned to death in the first five
months after the end of the war. Franco ruled Spain like
a military governor, effectively suspending all social
and political development for two generations until his
death in 1975.
Even today, 70 years after its end, Spain is still
dealing with the issues raised by the war. At the end of
2008 the Spanish government announced the children
and grandchildren of Spaniards who’d fled the country
during Franco’s dictatorship were eligible for citizen-
ship.
at
Sources
Beevor, Anthony. The Battle for Spain. Revised edition, Penguin Books
2006.
Bolin, Luis. Spain: The Vital Years. J. B. Lippincott Company, 1967.
Borkenau, Franz. The Spanish Cockpit. Phoenix Press, 2000.
Chorley, Katherine. Armies and the Art of Revolution. Beacon Press,
1943.
Elstob, Peter. Condor Legion. Ballantine Books, 1973.
Jurado, Carlos. The Condor Legion: German Troops in the Spanish
Civil War.
Osprey Elite #131, Osprey Publishing, 2006.
Orwell, George. Homage to Catalonia. Secker & Warburg, 1938.
Preston, Paul. A Concise History of the Spanish Civil War. Fontana
Press, 1996.
Starinov, A.K. Behind Fascist Lines. Ballantine Books, 2001.
Thomas, Hugh. The Spanish Civil War. Revised edition, Penguin Books,
1965.
Zuehlke, Mark. The Gallant Cause. Whitecap Books, 1996.
WaW 8 Issue.indd 17
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www.StrategyAndTacticsPress.com
World at War 17
8/7/09 3:24:14 PM
 Arriba España!
By Joseph Miranda
Designer Brian Train has a history of tackling
military-political situations and presenting them
simply but effectively as wargames. In Arriba Es-
pana he models the military, political, logistical and
diplomatic factors that were present in the Spanish
Civil War of 1936-39. It’s also useful for examin-
ing the bigger picture of civil conflicts that involve
foreign intervention and changing technologies, les-
sons we can still use today. The critical thing is the
design does so in a way that’s accessible to players.
One way that’s done is via the sequence of play.
It organizes the various game functions such that,
by simply following the sequential phases of a turn,
players can easily deal with several sub-systems.
Another way to maintain simplicity is through the
use of a map divided into areas rather than the more
usual wargame hexagons. That makes movement
simpler. It also reflects the indistinct nature of op-
erations in a civil war, where you must account for
control across regions as opposed to specific points
on a map.
The Political Support Index is central. It models
Design Corner
the ramifications of battles and other actions. You
have to fight with a constant eye on your political
support level because it can translate into an ability
to recruit more or fewer troops. In a civil war, the
ability to mobilize forces goes beyond cranking up
factory assembly lines. You have to have important
sectors of the populace behind you; otherwise, you
won’t be able to keep troops in the field. The Re-
publicans, especially, have to deal with the various
factions that made up their coalition.
The armies that fought in the Spanish Civil War
were still largely of the World War I type, being
mostly formations of infantry and artillery. Both
sides upgraded during the war, however, eventually
approaching the kinds of organizations that became
common in World War II. That evolution is mod-
eled by the use of “assets”—armor, artillery and
air—representing the material factors of modern
warfare.
There is also the bigger picture, in so far as
the various European powers got involved. The
Nationalists historically did better on the foreign
front, getting the support of both Nazi Germany
and Fascist Italy. The former sent aircraft and
tanks; the latter committed several divisions. The
18 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 18
Republicans received material support and advisors
from the Soviet Union, as well as numerous volun-
teer units; however, the democratic countries, France
and Britain, generally stayed out. Interestingly, the
Soviet and German high commands drew conflicting
lessons from their participation. Among other things,
the Red Army decided (mistakenly) the Spanish Civil
War proved tanks were most effective when used in
infantry support rather than for independent mobile
operations. The Germans gained operational experi-
ence in the use of airpower, which they applied fully
in World War II. The optional Variable Doctrine rule
shows how the Spanish Civil War was used as a test
bed for the development of new weapons systems.
Much of the game is in managing logistics. There
are supply rules, but there are also other forms of
logistics, such as airlift and naval transport, and
organizing your forces into battlegroups, as well as
committing equipment points to supporting major
offensives. Related to that is unit cadre level. It re-
flects the factors of training and leadership that were
frequently more important than materiel alone.
Another important element of the design is the
Random Events Table. It provides historical color to
make the situation more distinctive. It also accounts
for the other forces that effected the Spanish Civil
War, and it reveals the background chaos that was
characteristic of the whole struggle. In the end, the
Nationalists were better able to deal with that chaos
than were the Republicans. Indeed, the Republican
“cause” was divided among communists, anarchists
and socialists, which at times resulted in open conflict
between those factions. The Random Events Table
brings all that to light without having to write numer-
ous extra rules.
8/7/09 3:24:16 PM
 March on Madrid!

The wargame featured in this issue is Brian
Train’s Arriba Espana: The Spanish Civil War,
1936-39. It’s mostly intended for two-player play,
one representing the left-wing coalition government
of the Spanish Republic, and the other the alliance
of right-wing forces that rose in revolt against it. Soli-
taire play is doable.
The 34x22” area-map shows all of Iberia and
is divided into regions, each with its own name. A
region may be in one of three states: government
control, rebel control, or contested, meaning neither
side controls it. Getting and maintaining control of
regions is central for keeping your units supplied and
for gaining a high political support level. Each region
is subdivided into one or more areas corresponding to
that region’s component provinces.
Each winter game turn represents three months,
while those at the other times of year each represent
two months.
Most of the 264 iconic counters are military units;
however, their scale is abstract, with each generally
representing groupings of two or more historic regi-
ments, brigades or divisions. There are also 16 new
variant-add-on counters included for issue number
one’s Barbarossa game.
There are four armed autonomous regions in the
game: Asturias, Basque, Catalonia and Santander.
The Government player controls those units along
with the Popular Army, the anarchists, the Marxist
POUM, and the international brigades. The Rebel
player controls Nationalist, Carlist, colonial, Portu-
guese, German and Italian units.

To purchase the game that covers the battles featured in

this issue send your name and address along with:
$26 US Customers
$32 Canadian Customers All prices include postage for first class or airmail shipping.
$34 Overseas Customers CA residents add $1.75 sales tax. Send to:
Decision Games
ATTN: S&T Game Offer
PO Box 21598
Bakersfield CA 93390
World at War 19

WaW 8 Issue.indd 19 8/7/09 3:24:21 PM

 Patton’s Raid on
Hammelburg
By Kelly Bell

late March 1945 the Third Reich was collapsing. On the eastern front, the Red Army was heading
toward Berlin. On the western front, the Allies had crossed the Rhine at Remagen and were driving
into the German heartland. Even so, the Nazis weren’t about to give up; the fighting was still hard, and
sometimes the enemy didn’t wear the expected uniform.
When the crack US 4th Armored Division of Lt. Gen. George Patton’s Third Army rumbled across the Rhine,
its men believed one last great offensive would bring victory. That was indeed the case, but for some units of that
division’s Combat Command A (CCA—a brigade equivalent), led by future Vietnam War notable Lt. Col. Creighton
Abrams, the next operation would be anything but easy.
20 #8

WaW 8 Issue.indd 20 8/7/09 3:24:22 PM

 CCA was composed of the 37th Armored and 10th
Armored Infantry Battalions (AIB). On 24 March,
Patton ordered Abrams to send CCA on a 60-mile raid
into the German rear area. Their objective was a POW
camp near the town of Hammelburg. Their mission was
to seize the camp, free the US prisoners held there, and
then return with them to friendly lines. The raid was
supposed to have been led by the 10th AIB commander,
but he was removed from duty owing to medical rea-
sons. The operation would instead be overseen by Capt.
Abraham “Able Abe” Baum.
Why the raid was ordered is still a matter of histori-
cal debate. In the Pacific, Gen. Douglas MacArthur had
recently grabbed headlines by liberating Americans from
a Japanese POW camp at Cabanatuan in the Philip-
pines. When Patton telephoned 4th Armored Division
commander Brig. Gen. William Hoge to outline his
plan, he closed with the revealing statement: “This is
going to make MacArthur’s raid on Cabanatuan look
like peanuts!”
So the word went down to CCA/4th Armored, and
a task force was quickly organized, called after its
commander Task Force (TF) Baum. Company C of
the 37th, with 10 tanks, would spearhead the advance.
Also present were Company A/10th AIB, the 37th As-
sault Gun Platoon, a light tank platoon from the 37th’s
Company D, and the 10th Scout Platoon. Abrams felt
such an ambitious undertaking required the effort of
his entire combat command, but Patton, who may have
feared too large a column might attract the attention
of both the enemy and press correspondents, and thus
compromise security, refused to release the rest of the
units. He instead outlined a plan in which Company B Canine reached Hoge, and Patton took the receiver.
of 37th Armor and Company B of the AIB would open He then simply directed his subordinate: “Carry out the
a breach through the intervening town of Schweinheim plan!”
to clear a route for TF Baum. When Hoge responded that he couldn’t spare a single
On 25 March one of Patton’s aids, Maj. Alexander man or tank, Patton wheedled: “I promise I’ll replace
Stiller, suddenly showed up at Hoge’s headquarters and every man and vehicle you lose!”
announced he was to “go along” on the raid to Ham- Stiller was with Hoge when he received Patton’s
melburg. Hoge remained less than enthusiastic about call, and he listened in on the conversation. He turned
a mission that could easily turn into a suicide run, and to Hoge and let him in on some revealing information.
he’d been hoping it would be canceled. So he called Patton, explained Stiller, was totally determined to
Patton’s headquarters, where XII Corps commander liberate Stalag 13 at Hammelburg. Further, one of the
Maj. Gen. Manton Eddy promised to take up the mat- men imprisoned there was Lt. Col. John Waters, Patton’s
ter with Patton. The next morning Patton flew to the 4th son-in-law.
Armored’s command post and demanded to see Hoge,
Faced with a direct order from Patton, Hoge was
who happened to be momentarily absent. Finding Brig.
stuck with the mission. When he reiterated the orders
Gen. Ralph Canine, Patton snapped: “Pick up the phone
to Abrams, whose troops had just secured an intact
and get Bill Hoge. Tell him to cross the Main River and
railroad bridge across the Main River, he told Hoge
get over to Hammelburg.”
a much larger force would be required to execute the
“General,” Canine bravely responded, “The last thing mission, specifically the entire combat command, and
Bill told me before he left was that if you came by and that a company or two alone would be doomed. Hoge
told me to issue that order I was to tell you I wasn’t to could only respond that he’d already informed Gen.
do it!” Eddy of that fact and, like Patton, Eddy had declined to
Patton remained amazingly composed in the face of provide the entire CCA. A small strike force would be
such insubordination. He mildly responded: “Get Hoge going in alone, and Stiller’s function was specifically
on the phone and I’ll tell him myself.” to assure that Waters made it back.
World at War 21

WaW 8 Issue.indd 21 8/7/09 3:24:23 PM

 The wire: Guardpost overlooks the perimeter fence of a German PoW camp.
Into Germany
The operation kicked off on schedule at 9:00 p.m. on
26 March, but after clattering across a newly captured
rail bridge the advance hit tough opposition. The Ger-
man garrison in Schweinheim met the attackers head-on,
and securing the town took over four hours. That was
twice as long as Patton and Abrams had anticipated, and
even then the entire task force had to pitch in to open
a passage. By the time the Americans cleared the town
it was past midnight, and the noise of the battle had
alerted all enemy units in the area of the incursion.
The next stop was Straushessenbach. There TF Baum
turned north to the town of Laufach, veered east on
what is now Autobahn E5, and passed a unit of German
soldiers busy with their morning calisthenics. Eager
to keep moving, the Americans directed a few volleys
of machinegun fire at the flabbergasted Nazis without
pausing to take careful aim. Minutes later the convoy
shot up an anti-aircraft artillery train and then a column
of trucks. After ceasing fire, the GIs were horrified to
discover the trucks had been carrying a unit of female
auxiliaries.
Time was getting short as the task force sped along
the highway. Baum needed to reach the town of Ge-
munden and cross its bridge spanning the confluence
of the Main, Saale and Sinn Rivers. He was in such a
hurry that, when his men captured a German general
outside the town of Lohr, Baum released the officer to
save the time and personnel that would otherwise have
been needed to guard him.
The ongoing resistance was continuing to make the
operation difficult. At Gemunden, Baum was wounded
22 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 22
in the right hand and knee by a Panzerfaust anti-tank
rocket. Also by that time, an entire German division
had arrived in the railroad yard and began to deploy
some armored vehicles in defensive positions. German
sappers were also busy preparing nearby bridges for
demolition and strewing mines across the highway. Just
as they approached Gemunden, the soldiers of TF Baum
watched in dismay as its bridge was blown to pieces.
Grabbing a German passerby, the Americans ques-
tioned the man, who told them of a second crossing
upriver at Burgsinn. As the column moved out of town
they riddled barges on the Main River and freight cars
parked in the yards with fire—if nothing else, the raid
would have that much effect on the Germans.
By that time word of the US advance had reached Col.
Hoepple, commander of the German garrison in Ham-
melburg. He had under his command an entire company
of regular army NCOs, an SS officer cadet class, and
a platoon of combat engineers. And, besides being the
location of Stalag 13, the town also boasted an anti-tank
training center, and those classes were still in session.
To further beef up his defense, therefore, Hoepple had
an anti-tank company sent to him as reinforcements.
Meanwhile, Baum had finally managed to find
Burgsinn, grab its bridge and cross the Main River.
As the Germans at Hammelburg readied for his ar-
rival, however, the TF commander became lost in
the meandering thoroughfares northeast of Burgsinn.
He grabbed a resident civilian to act as guide, but the
terrified old man clamed he’d never been more than a
dozen miles from Burgsinn, and he proved of little use
8/7/09 3:24:24 PM
 as a navigator. Grabbing a second local, this one more Taking with him a German interpreter
widely traveled, the Americans got straightened out and named Fuchs and two other American
headed southeast. prisoners to carry the flags, Waters left
The next community was Grafendorf, where the GIs via the barracks side door, intending to
liberated a sizable contingent of Soviet POWs who then approach the trigger-happy Americans
spent the next few days freebooting across the area. Then from their flank. As the small procession
a low-flying German reconnaissance aircraft spotted the marched along the perimeter fence, an
column and radioed to Hoepple its whereabouts, size uninformed German soldier charged them
and heading. from outside the enclosure, shoved his
From 2:00 to 4:00 p.m., TF Baum cane under fire rifle muzzle through the fence and shot
from Hoepple’s self-propelled anti-tank company. Every Waters in the right thigh before Fuchs
one of Baum’s Shermans was destroyed or damaged, could explain the situation. The flag
and five halftracks also went up in flames. One of the bearers wrapped the bleeding Waters in
destroyed halftracks was carrying the task force assault a blanket and carried him back to the barracks.
guns’ ammunition, and another had been hauling fuel. It was all for nothing, for just after Waters’ wounding
Baum then changed the direction of his advance to try to the guards lost heart and laid down their arms. Along
avoid further contact with the efficient tank destroyers. with the camp’s American captives, Baum had also liber-
Their objective was finally in sight.
Topping the last rise before Hammelburg, the raid-
ers saw the Stalag 13 POW compound spread before
them. Gunning their engines, they charged through the
barbed wire and opened fire on the guards. Gen. Gunther
von Goeckel, the camp commandant, realized his men
lacked the firepower to repulse the attack; so he called
for a senior POW, who turned out to be none other than
John Waters, to try to arrange a truce.
Waters had been behind wire quite awhile, having
been captured during the Battle of Kasserine Pass in
February 1943. Suddenly he was being thrust back
into the war. Out in the compound, the Americans were
firing on hapless Yugoslav prisoners whose uniforms
were similar to those of the Germans. Anxious to stop
that killing of the wrong men, Waters agreed to act as
intermediary. Turning to the commandant, he said: “OK,
I’ll go out. We ought to take an American flag and a
white flag so we don’t get shot.” Liberation: American tank breaks into the PoW camp.
World at War 23

WaW 8 Issue.indd 23 8/7/09 3:24:30 PM

 ated about 4,000 Serbians. Baum sent off a laconic (and
somewhat premature) radio dispatch
to inform his headquarters: “Mission
accomplished.” Then he got a further
shock.
Patton had told Abrams and Baum
the camp held 200 Americans, and
900 others, at most; however, the
TF commander could only look on in dismay as some
1,400 US POWs crowded around his remaining vehicles.
There was no way the decimated convoy could hope to
transport so many to friendly lines. On top of that, Baum
and his men were exhausted, having been constantly
on the move and in combat for almost 30 hours. As
realization of the situation’s hopelessness began to set
in, some impatient prisoners set off westward on foot
while others threw up their hands and returned to their
barracks. Meanwhile, Hoepple was staying busy.
When he heard the task force had stopped at the camp,
Hoepple moved to a promising ambush site outside the
hamlet of Bonnland. He next transferred his anti-tank
Somewhere in Germany: armor column fights its way through a town.
24 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 24
NCOs past the village of Obereschchenbach to a posi-
tion adjacent to the camp itself, where they had a clear
field of fire into the compound. Lastly, he relocated the
SS cadet company, reinforced by a just-arrived tank
platoon, to dug-in positions outside the nearby towns
of Hollrich and Hessdorf. The noose was tightening.
At midnight Baum was ready to move out. His re-
maining vehicles, crammed with hopeful hitchhikers,
drove out of Hammelburg as unobtrusively as possible
southward on Highway 27 in the hope of reaching
friendly lines under cover of darkness. The German
NCOs blocked them, however, and their fire sent the
column reeling back to the north. Turning west, Baum
ran straight into the SS cadets at Hollrich who knocked
out his two lead Shermans. Then turning south, his next
destination was, unfortunately, no better. At Hessdorf the
SS and tank men had heard the shooting from the direc-
tion of Hollrich and were on full alert as the Americans
arrived. They opened fire and hurled back the intruders.
With nowhere else to go, Baum returned to the camp
and then set up a perimeter beside a nearby medieval
castle on an elevation called Hill 427.
Baum set his men to work draining gasoline from
eight of the remaining halftracks in order to refuel the
surviving vehicles, which he intended to use in his
next breakout attempt at daybreak. Meanwhile, some
prisoners who’d earlier begun walking now returned
to the camp, while others belatedly struck out on their
own into the encircling forest. After setting afire the
gasoline-drained halftracks, Baum’s men made the
wounded as comfortable as possible in an empty build-
ing emblazoned with red cross symbols.
Hoepple’s forces were closing in. By the cruelest
coincidence, Baum had circled his wagons on a for-
mer anti-tank firing range. The Germans therefore had
8/7/09 3:24:32 PM
 precise reference points by which to achieve accurate
line-of-sight gunnery. They were also well connected
by telephone, enabling Hoepple to easily direct what
was rapidly becoming a turkey shoot.
At first light the next morning, the convoy tried to
make a break for it. The Germans cut loose with salvoes
of tank, anti-tank and Panzerfaust fire. Task Force Baum
was quickly shot to pieces, with every machine blazing
and most of the men dead, wounded and/or captured.
About 20 GIs managed to slip through the enemy perim-
eter and temporarily escape. After starting out with 53
vehicles and 294 men, the column was annihilated.
Just before he was captured, Baum received his third
wound, a rifle bullet in the leg. He hurriedly threw away
his dog tags, lest the Nazis learn he was Jewish. After
being rounded up with a few other Americans, Baum,
At Hammelburg: prisoners await the word.
half-carried by Stiller, was marched back to the scene of
the firefight. The barn where he’d placed his wounded
was a smoldering ruin. Only 35 soldiers from Task Force
Baum managed to get back to friendly lines.
Despite all that, of course, suspicions and hard feel-
Aftermath ings remained. Hoge, Abrams and Stiller kept silent.
When word of the task force’s fate began to cir- Stiller kept quiet all his life, while Hoge and Abrams
culate, along with the added fact Patton was Waters’ said nothing for almost 20 years, long after Patton’s
father-in-law, the heat started coming down. Denying death. Nevertheless, Patton’s towering reputation, along
that rescuing Waters had been the main motive for the with the euphoria caused by the impending end of the
abortive raid, Patton claimed its true aim had been to European war, were all that protected him from accusa-
distract the enemy from a massive wheeling maneuver tions that might have otherwise finished his career. In
to the north by the bulk of his Third Army. That mission any case, he was dead a few months later from injuries
was in fact accomplished, he insisted, as the diversion suffered in a non-combat automobile accident.
of German forces to Hammelburg had caused them to As for TF Baum, in retrospect it can be seen it lacked
lose sight of the US turn north. Patton said his only real sufficient artillery and air support to fight its way to the
error was in not sending a complete combat command target and back. The mission also lacked a definite plan
on the diversionary operation, but he’d originally be- for returning to friendly lines. As it was, it was only a
lieved the smaller force could slip behind German lines few days after the destruction of Task Force Baum that
unnoticed. elements of US Ninth Army reached Hammelburg on
Not all the news was bad. The incursion did manage 6 April and permanently freed the prisoners, including
to disrupt the enemy in that sector, and it temporarily both Waters and Baum, who all finally had a real cause
liberated enough Allied troops to tie down a large number for celebration.
of German soldiers. TF Baum also decimated the enemy’s
rail and river traffic along its route of advance, throwing at
that area into chaos while disrupting the deployment to
the front of a just-arrived division. The raiders actually
also fooled the Nazis into believing Third Army would be
continuing east instead of executing its actual northern
maneuver.

Sources
Robel, Michael. Patton’s Hammelburg Raid, Issue 54, Command.
Toland, John. The Last 100 Days, Bantam Books, 1966.
Whiting, Charles. Bounce the Rhine, Avon Books, 1985.
_______. The Battle of Hurtgen Forest, Pocket Books, 1989.

World at War 25

WaW 8 Issue.indd 25 8/7/09 3:24:33 PM

 New Games for 2009!
D-Day at Omaha
Beach
6 June 1944
D-Day at Omaha Beach recreates America’s most bloody
and heroic day of World War II. In this solitaire game from the
designer of the solo classics RAF and Ambush, you control the
forces of the US 1st and 29th Divisions landing under fire on the
Normandy shore, and struggling desperately to establish a vi-
able beachhead. The game is also great for two players playing
cooperatively, each controlling one US division.
US units include assault infantry, amphibious tanks, artil-
lery, engineers and HQs. The game system controls the hidden
German defenders in Widerstandsnest resistance points on the
bluffs overlooking the beaches. US forces that manage to break
through the deadly coastal defenses and reach the high ground
must then contend with German mobile reinforcements in the
bewildering hedgerows of Normandy’s bocage. An innovative
diceless combat system highlights unknown enemy deployments
and the importance of utilizing the right weapons and tactics.
Event cards keep the action flowing and the rules simple,
while controlling German strategy and introducing extensive
historical detail. The game includes amphibious landings, Ger-
man artillery and rocket barrages, US naval bombardment, tides,
engineer operations, and intangibles such as US leadership under
fire and the initiative of the American GIs.
Scenarios: The First Waves (two to three hour playtime) intro-
duces the basics of the game in a recreation of the initial assault.
Beyond the Beach (four to five hours) picks up on the high ground
at 10:00 a.m. and adds rules for German tactics. D-Day at Omaha
Beach (seven hours) covers the entire day, from 6:15 a.m. to 6:00
p.m. Optional rules explore what-ifs, such as more pre-invasion
bombardment or the arrival of German armor.

Game Contents:
• 352 5/8” Counters
• One 34x22” Full-Color Game Map
• 55 Event Cards
• Rules Booklet
• Historical Study Booklet
• Player Aid Cards.
Game Scale
Time: each turn equals 15 minutes in the basic game,
30 in the extended game.
Units: companies for both sides.
Map: each hex equals 275 yards (250 meters).
Players: one or two.
26 #8

WaW 8 Issue.indd 26 8/7/09 3:24:35 PM

 :
Ed i tion
ayer
RAF
N e w
o- P l
The Battle of Britain, 1940
A l l
& Tw
France has fallen. England stands alone against the might of a triumphant Germany,
r e
tai
defended only by the Spitfire and Hurricane squadrons of the Royal Air Force. Hitler
l i
So orders his mighty Luftwaffe to destroy the RAF in preparation for Operation Sealion—the
invasion of England. German fighters and bombers fill the English skies and the RAF
responds.
Now you command the RAF or the Luftwaffe in history’s greatest air campaign—the
Battle of Britain. Improving on his award winning solitaire classic, designer John Butterfield
ramps up the historical accuracy, tension and play options with three complete games.
RAF: Lion puts you in control of British Fighter Command, responding to German raids.
The game’s unique card system generates targets and forces, which may remain hidden
until after you commit your squadrons. Your foe is no mindless system: the Luftwaffe
has priorities and a strategy. Scenarios range from one raid day, taking an hour to
complete, to the full campaign, playable in 12 hours.
RAF: Eagle puts you in control of the Luftwaffe forces raiding England. You schedule raids
and assign missions to your bombers and fighters, attempting to deliver the knockout
blow. Can you take out the British radar system and cripple their aircraft production?
The game controls the RAF response to your strategies. How does a foe so close to
defeat keep coming back?
RAF: 2-Player pits you against a live opponent, one controlling Fighter Command and the
other the raiding Luftwaffe forces. Historical features include: German high command
priorities, close escort, free hunt, the Channel Patrol, Jabos, day and night bombing,
radar, the Observer Corps, weather, ULTRA intercepts, squadron patrols, “big wings,”
altitude advantage, ace squadrons and flak.
Game Scale
Time: each game turn equals a “raid day” with six two-hour segments.
Units: British squadrons and German Gruppen.
Map: one inch equals 20 miles (32 kilometers). Contents:
• 176 Die cut counters
• 165 Cards
• 3 34” x 22” Map
• Rule booklets
• Player Aid cards & display
• 2 Dice
• Storage bags

QTY Title Price Total

RAF: Lion vs Eagle $75
D-Day at Omaha Beach $55
Available Now
Shipping
PO Box 21598
Bakersfield CA 93390
Name 661/587-9633 • fax 661/587-5031 • www.decisiongames.com
Address
City/State/Zip Shipping Charges
1 unit
st
Adt’l units Type of Service
Country
$12 $2 UPS Ground/USPS PM + $5
V/MC # Exp.
24 4 Canada
Signature 34 8 Europe, South America
Phone # 38 9 Asia, Australia
World at War 27

WaW 8 Issue.indd 27 8/7/09 3:24:38 PM

 World at War No. 10:
Coral Sea Solitaire
Coral Sea Solitaire (CSS) is a purpose-designed
one-player wargame covering the aero-naval battle
that took place between the US and Imperial Japanese
Navies in May 1942. It was the first such engagement
of the Pacific War.
CSS is based on the game system used in World at
War number three’s Solomons Campaign; however,
Game Preview
The game map shows the Coral Sea and adjoining
waters, islands and bases as they were in 1942. Each
hexagon on the map represents 75 miles from side to
opposite side. Each game turn represents 12 hours.
Each aircraft strength point represents from six to 24
aircraft, depending on type and pilot quality. Naval units

there are significant differences owing to the smaller
scale of this operation and the systemic necessitates
inherent in a solitaire design.
The player controls various US and Allied forces; the
game system controls Japanese forces. The player may
use Allied forces as he pleases within the structures of
the rules, while Japanese forces are moved and fought
by the game’s rules
Historically, US strategic intelligence was good in
terms of identifying Japanese forces and their intentions.
Consequently, the player will have a certain edge over
the IJN insofar as he will have a general knowledge of
the location and objectives of major IJN task groups.
represent one ship for carriers, battleships and heavy
cruisers, and two or three ships for other units.
The rules contain a little more than 11,000 words.
That works out to mean an experienced player can finish
a game in about three to four hours. Rules cover such
things as: leadership, random events, reinforcements,
task force organization, carrier operations, surface
combat, shore bombardment, transporting ground
units, amphibious landings, air bases, anti-aircraft fire,
fatigue, night operations, fog of war, scouting, alterna-
tive deployments, and panic.

Issue # Month Game Topic & Lead Article

9 Dec 09 Destruction of Army Group Center
10 Feb 10 Coral Sea Solitaire
11 Apr 10 Afrika Korps: Decision in the Desert
12 Jun 10 1940: What If?
13 Aug 10 East Front Battles
14 Oct 09 Invasion Pearl Harbor

28 #8

WaW 8 Issue.indd 28 8/7/09 3:24:39 PM

 Elite Beat
CCB, 10th Armored: True Saviors of Bastogne
The conventional wisdom is the
US Army’s 101st Airborne Division
saved the critical town of Bastogne,
Belgium, during the Battle of the
Bulge. The deeper truth is the 101st
arrived just in time to block the final
German efforts to take that road hub
town. Bastogne had, however, already
been saved by the sacrificial efforts
of Combat Command B (CCB) of the
10th Armored Division, commanded
by Col. William L. Roberts.
As the 101st arrived from its post-
Market-Garden recuperation site in
France, German 2nd Panzer Division
was moving to overrun Bastogne, but
it never got there. Nor did any of the
other German formations that had
been given the mission of rubbing out
the town that interdicted road move-
ment through it in every direction.
Except for the initial and stubborn
resistance of the teams of CCB, it’s
likely the 101st never would’ve had its
days of glory.
When the Germans began moving
into their initial attack at 5:30 a.m.
on 16 December 1944, the staff of
10th Armored Division was located in
a schoolhouse in the small town of
Apach, on the Moselle River along
the Franco-German border. That staff
was just then planning on how to
exploit the hoped for breach of the
Germans’ West Wall, by either the US
90th or 95th Infantry Divisions, which
had secured bridgeheads over the
flooded Saar River earlier that month.
While XX Corps’s infantry fought
to penetrate the German defenses
around the towns of Dillingen and
Saarbrucken, the mechanized forma-
tions of 10th Armored deployed in
the fields near Thionville. There the
division’s men engaged in much-
needed vehicle and equipment
maintenance, as they too waited for
the anticipated infantry breakthrough.
No one expected to be diverted from
that mission.
The first orders from Eisenhow-
er’s headquarters, aimed at stymieing
and then defeating the bold German
WaW 8 Issue.indd 29
thrust into the Ardennes, came on 17
December. He sent the 7th Armored
Division south from Lt. Gen. William
H. Simpson’s Ninth Army to the vicin-
ity of St. Vith, close to the German/
Belgian border. He also ordered north
the 10th Armored Division to bolster
what was already developing into the
southern ‘shoulder’ of the German
advance. The previously planned
breakthrough exploitation was
cancelled. At 2:00 a.m. on the 17th,
then, XX Corps alerted 10th Armored
to move. Less than three hours later,
as the official history of the division
recorded, “leading tanks and half-
tracks clattered down the road—not
east toward the bridgeheads, but north
toward Luxembourg.”
CCB led the advance-to-contact,
moving toward the crucial crossroads
at Bastogne in Belgium. CCA and the
remainder of the 10th came behind,
driving through Luxembourg City to
reinforce elements of 4th Infantry Di-
vision, then trying to hold the border
town of Echternach. CCA’s timely
arrival there helped channel German
Seventh Army’s advance into northern
Luxembourg and away from that
Duchy’s capital city.
CCB, traveling fast over a portion
of the road net that was in better
shape than the one being used by
the Germans, got to the outskirts
of Bastogne just in time to get into
position ahead of them. Col. Roberts
had elements of two armored infantry
battalions, the 20th and 54th, and a tank
battalion, the 3rd, under command.
From those three battalions he formed
three mixed teams, named for their
respective commanders. The 420th
Armored Field Artillery Battalion, as
well as Company C of the 609th Tank
Destroyer Battalion and Company
C of the 55th Armored Engineer Bat-
talion were also in support.
Roberts led CCB into Bastogne,
where he reported to VIII Corps com-
mander Maj. Gen. Troy H. Middleton.
Middleton, an infantry officer, gave
him orders that ran counter to how
Roberts thought he should deploy
his teams. He relented, though, and
in turn issued orders to have his
command take up positions to block
the advancing Germans. It was those
moves that actually prevented the
enemy from moving into and through
Bastogne in one rush.
The first team (or task force) to
be attacked was named for the com-
mander of 3rd Tank Battalion, Lt. Col.
Henry T. Cherry. During the night of
18/19 December he deployed outposts
around the town on Longvilly, direct-
ly in the path of German 2nd Panzer
and Panzer Lehr Divisions. Longvilly
is east of Bastogne, and also lay on
one of the major axis of the German
advance. In a series of desperate and
chaotic engagements, the two teams
within Task Force Cherry (com-
manded by Capt. William F. Ryerson
and 1st Lt. Edward P. Hyduke) were
shot to pieces. During that first night
the task force lost 40 tanks, more than
half their strength in armored fighting
vehicles.
By the afternoon of the 19th, Hy-
duke had lost all his vehicles in battle
against 2nd Panzer east of the hamlet
of Mageret, which lay on the road
between Bastogne and Longvilly. He
and some of his men barely managed
to escape on foot and move back into
Bastogne.
US armored column rolls through a Belgian town.
World at War 29
8/7/09 3:24:40 PM
 Ryerson, who led the larger
contingent of Task Force Cherry, had
attempted to go into laager between
Mageret and Longvilly during the
night. The Germans, though, had
managed to seize most of Mageret
by evening on the 19th, which then
threatened to cut off Ryerson’s force
from Bastogne. The 2nd Panzer Divi-
sion in the meantime deflected north
toward the town of Noville, which lay
on the main road between Bastogne
and Houffalize. It was to be left to
elements of the 26th Volks Grenadier
Division and Panzer Lehr to finish off
the remainder of Task Force Cherry.
For all practical purposes, Task
Force Cherry ceased to exist as its
last retreating column, made up
mostly of soft-skinned vehicles, was
soon shot up and destroyed. But the
ad hoc unit had delayed the German
advance long enough for the 101st’s
501st Parachute Infantry Regiment
to move in and stabilize the situation
along the final eastern approach to
Bastogne.
While TF Cherry was being bat-
tered by elements of three German
divisions, two of them armored, Task
Force Desobry was engaged by the
enemy on the main road between Bas-
togne and Noville, which lies about
four miles northeast of Bastogne.
TF Desobry was named after Maj.
William R. Desobry, and he had under
his command a company of Sher-
man tanks and some supporting tank
destroyers and armored infantry. That
force was struck by lead elements of
2nd Panzer Division on the morning
30 #8 Bastogne from the air
WaW 8 Issue.indd 30
of the 19th. The US unit, organized
around a core of 15 Sherman tanks,
had been in position only a short time
when German halftracks plowed into
their roadblocks. Each side’s men
threw a hail of grenades at each other
in the fog, and then the Germans
withdrew. The quiet didn’t last long,
however, as the German commander,
intent on regaining the momentum
he’d already begun to lose farther
east, had his artillery hit Noville with
all available firepower. At 10:00 a.m.,
as the fog began to lift, 30 German
tanks launched a new effort against
TF Desobry from the north. At the
same time the German infantry came
back in from the east.
Several panzers soon bogged
down in the off-road mud. Several
others were then knocked out by fire
from the American tanks and tank
destroyers. The enemy infantry broke
off when the fog lifted more fully,
revealing them clearly just as they
started to enter Noville. That still
didn’t end the German effort to take
the town.
Desobry could see his position
would indeed soon be swamped by
the superior German numbers, and
he therefore requested permission
to withdraw toward Bastogne. Col.
Roberts told him to use his own judg-
ment, but also said he was sending
reinforcement in the form of three
more tank destroyers to supplement
the four Desobry already had. The
arriving 101st also sent 1st Battalion of
the 506th Parachute Infantry. Desobry
decided to hold.
German artillery continued to
pound Noville, and American casual-
ties mounted. Most of the available
ambulances were destroyed, and
it became difficult to evacuate the
wounded. The two nearby aid stations
overflowed.
At 2:30 p.m. the 506th launched a
counterattack intended to retake some
German-held high ground. That effort
immediately ran into, and stalled in
front of, a new German advance in
battalion-strength, with 32 panzers
providing standoff fire support. The
panzers that then attempted to push
into the original American positions
were in turn driven back by fire from
the defenders’ remaining armored
vehicles.
The paratroopers and Task Force
Desobry still held onto Noville, even
though a German shell landed near
the US command post, killing the
paratroop commander and seriously
wounding Maj. Desobry. (He was
evacuated by ambulance, which was
captured on the road to Bastogne,
and he spent the rest of the war in
captivity.) Desobry was replaced by
Maj. Charles L. Hustead, who was
also determined to hold on in Noville,
and who brought his eight remaining
tanks into the town itself.
On the 20th at 5:30 a.m. the
Germans launched another attack on
Noville, supported by heavy artillery
fire and coming in from three direc-
tions. If it hadn’t been for CCB’s 420th
Armored Field Artillery Battalion’s
105 mm self-propelled guns mak-
ing highly effective protective fires,
Task Force Desobry/Hustead would
certainly have been destroyed. As it
was, the Germans got in behind the
Americans on the Noville/Bastogne
road. The US tanks then ran out of
armor-piercing ammunition, and the
Germans pressed in for the kill. A
platoon of tank destroyers from the
US 705th Tank Destroyer Battalion ar-
rived just in time to stop the German
attack.
Word came in from Bastogne that
all available reserves had been com-
mitted and the overall situation was
critical. Noville was ordered given
up. Moving through the fog, and with
8/7/09 3:24:41 PM
 the continued effective support of the Weapons & Tactics
tank destroyers, the task force and
paratroopers made it into the new, T-34 Crew & Internal Layout
smaller perimeter around Bastogne
by 5:00 p.m. The desperate action
The early versions of the Soviet rods running along the floor. Both
had again cost the Americans heavy
T-34 tank were excellently armored those design decisions allowed the T-
casualties, but the Germans had again
for the time and could be formidable 34 to have a lower silhouette, but they
been denied the prize of Bastogne.
fighting machines when well handled. came at the cost of space available for
While Task Forces Cherry and Unfortunately, they had significant the crew.
Desobry were being hammered, the internal design flaws that impeded The turret of the T-34 was so
smallest CCB sub-unit, Task Force their crews’ ability to fight. Later ver- cramped it hindered servicing the
O’Hara, named for Lt. Col. James sions of the T-34 corrected some of main gun. The sloped armor, low sil-
O’Hara, had moved into position near them, but initial versions had serious houette and lack of a basket all came
the hamlet of Marvie, on the main shortcomings. into play; so, even with only two men
road from Bastogne to Ettelbruck.
The T-34 was crewed by four. in the turret, it was difficult to move
At first, due to the thick fog, which
There was the driver in the left-front around and handle the long main gun
greatly reduced visibility, they had
of the hull, a machinegunner/radio rounds.
little contact with the enemy. It wasn’t
operator in the right-front of the hull, The turret also offered only
until the 20th that one of their patrols
a loader on the right of the turret, limited visibility outside the tank.
spotted a German detachment from
along with a commander/gunner in There were two panoramic periscopes
the 902nd Panzer Grenadier Regiment
the left side of the turret. intended to be fitted to the turret,
and directed heavy fire into that for-
mation. Except for some occasional The T-34 was cramped. The turret one for each crew member, but due
German probes, then, TF O’Hara, didn’t have a “basket,” which is to say to wartime shortages the loader’s
supported by 2nd Battalion of the 327th there was no floor in it. The fighting periscope was often omitted. The gun
Glider Infantry, easily came out best compartment was completely open. sight had a 2.5x magnification and
of all the elements of CCB in the The commander and loader had seats was often used by the commander/
initial fighting to keep the enemy out that were attached to the turret, but if gunner in place of his periscope
of Bastogne. they had to move around it could be a once action started. No periscope for
dangerous place with no floor. the loader resulted in the primary
By 21 December the CCB delay-
The T-34 had its transmission view from the tank being reduced
ing action was completed. The sur-
placed at the rear of the tank; so there to the narrow gun sight picture of
vivors of the combat command were
was no drive train running along the the commander/gunner. Both those
amalgamated into what was called
bottom of the tank, just some metal crewmembers had an armored glass
“Team SNAFU” (American slang
for “Situation Normal, All Fouled
Up”), and served as a mobile reserve
and source of replacements during
the remaining days of the battle for
Bastogne.
CCB, 10th Armored can therefore
be seen to have paid heavily for its
crucial role in saving Bastogne. Its
presence around that town during the
first days of the German offensive
was clearly key to its remaining in
US hands. A well-justified Distin-
guished Unit Citation was the combat
command’s reward for that desperate
and superb performance. At the same
time, though, it’s also undeniable the
appreciation of CCB’s sacrifices will
always be filtered through the brighter
public relations light of the 101st
Airborne’s ultimate success in the
battle.
~Raymond E. Bell, Jr. Interior of a Soviet T-34/85 tank displayed in Finnish Tank Museum
(Panssarimuseo) in Parola. It offered much more room than the earlier T-34 model.
World at War 31

WaW 8 Issue.indd 31 8/7/09 3:24:44 PM

 viewing port on the side of the turret,
along with a pistol port, but they were
tactically useless.
The only hatch on the turret was
a large, single-piece plate that hinged
forward. In order to see out of that
hatch to the front of the tank, the
commander had to open it and then sit
on the turret roof to see over it. That
took him completely out of the tank
if he chose to go “unbuttoned”; so
it was virtually never done once the
tank was in action.
The main gun was able to be
elevated to +30 degrees, but only
depressed to -3 degrees due to the low
turret. That made it hard to find an ef-
fective “hull-down” position (only the
turret sticking up above ground) on
any kind of hill. The turret had both
an electric and manual traverse, but
the gearing for both was poorly fitted.
That, combined with the low power
optics in the gun sight, made precise
aiming of the main gun difficult at
long ranges.
The loader had to load the main
gun with his left arm. Only nine
rounds were stowed in the turret, with
the rest in boxes on the floor of the
tank. Even worse, only three rounds
were mounted next to the loader in
the turret, with the other six “ready
rounds” in racks on the commander’s
side of the turret. Easier to get to
than the rounds on the floor, it still
required reaching past the commander
to get them and load them into the
main gun. Some crews developed a
routine in which the front machine-
gunner would assist the loader with
retrieving main gun rounds from the
floor of the tank to speed up loading.
The commander/gunner had a
difficult job. Once the action started,
he had to fulfill the gunner role at the
expense of directing the actions of
the tank. Rather than searching for
targets, coordinating his actions with
nearby friendly forces, and directing
the actions of his crew, he became a
gunner, with his perspective narrowed
to the gun sight. That’s like going into
battle looking through a soda straw,
and commanders would rapidly lose
track of the situation. The state of af-
fairs was even worse for platoon and
32 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 32
company commanders, who had to try
to balance their additional command
responsibilities with their gunnery
duty.
The end result was T-34s tended
to bunch up on any “mother hen” tank
commanded by someone who seemed
to know what he was doing, or else
they acted individually in a disjointed
fashion. A tank platoon would seldom
engage individual targets but would
tend to focus all their fire on the target
being shot at by their platoon leader.
Soviet tanks were in general slow
to find and engage targets and could
often get off only one round to every
three from a German panzer. Until the
T-34/85 appeared, with its three-man
turret, Soviet tanks were at a severe
disadvantage in that regard.
The driver had a single large hatch
in front of him, as well as a standard
set of vision blocks. When buttoned
up, he had limited vision and required
guidance from the tank commander
in order to drive effectively. As noted,
however, once the fighting started, the
commander had little time to direct
the actions of the driver. German
sources noted T-34s almost always
drove along the easiest path, such as
through the most open areas or along
the crests of hills, due to their drivers
being poorly trained and without
adequate direction.
The driver had to be physically
strong to handle his job. He controlled
the steering of the tank with a set of
braking levers. With the transmission
placed at the rear of the tank, he had
to control it via a set of rods running
nearly 20 feet back to the transmis-
sion. The rods often become jammed,
and drivers used mallets to beat on
them when they froze up.
The last member of the crew was
the machine gunner/radio operator.
At the start of the war, company com-
manders were the only ones autho-
rized to have radios in their tanks, and
even that wasn’t guaranteed. As the
war went on, attempts were made to
install radios in platoon command-
ers’ tanks as well. Without a radio to
operate, the machinegunner serviced
the bow machinegun and helped the
loader retrieve ammunition from the
floor of the tank. The job was often
left unfilled, due to a shortage of
trained tank crews and the lack of
radios. Those few crewmen who did
know how to operate radios were
prized. Many pictures of Soviet tank
units show only three men ranked up
in front of their vehicles, proof this
last position often remained open
even late in the war.
The lack of adequate communi-
cations was one of the reasons for
the poor tactics shown by Soviet
armored units. Internal communica-
tion was adequate, by means of head
phones and throat mikes, but beyond
the tank things broke down rapidly.
With perhaps one radio per company,
coordination in combat was nearly
impossible. Soviet tankers relied on
flags, using a set of simple and well-
rehearsed signals. There was even a
special hatch for flags built within the
main turret hatch to allow signaling
while buttoned up. Even so, platoon
commanders often found it impos-
sible to signal the rest of their unit
while acting as gunners, and the rest
of the platoon found it hard to watch
for his signals even when he was able
to actually make them. The solution
was to have the other tanks in the
platoon simply follow behind the
platoon leader, which allowed some
control but severely limited effective
deployment.
All those problems with the
internal layout of the T-34 negatively
affected the ability of the crew to
fight their machines. Things came
to a head when Soviet crews had to
fight the fast and well-trained panzers.
Fortunately for the Soviet tank crews,
their thick and well-sloped armor
helped to keep them in action even
after taking many hits from lighter
German guns. Against infantry and
other soft targets, the problems of the
T-34 weren’t as pronounced, as the
crew had more time and wasn’t in
as much danger from return fire, and
their tanks therefore operated much
more successfully in those situations.
~David Newport
8/7/09 3:24:45 PM
 Behind the Lines
The Longest Day & Patton as History
Two of the most popular war
movies ever made are The Longest
Day and Patton; so it’s certainly fair
to ask how well they actually depict
history.
One sequence in The Longest Day
concerns Pvt. John Steel, a para-
trooper who got his chute caught in
the finials of the church tower in the
hamlet of Sainte-Mere-Eglise, and
ended up hanging from his harness
while fighting raged below. Despite
the happy ending for the Red Buttons
character in the movie, the real life
Steele was eventually taken prisoner
by the Germans. To this day, a replica
paratrooper hangs from the church
tower as a tribute from the grateful
parishioners.
Probably the most glaring inac-
curacies of The Longest Day concern
Gen. Cota, portrayed in the film
by Robert Mitchum. Contrary to
Mitchum’s portrayal, that infamous
speech—“There are only two kinds of
people on this beach: those who are
already dead and those who are going
to die! Now let’s get the hell out of
here!”—wasn’t actually delivered by
Cota. It was spoken by Col. George
A. Taylor, commander of the 16th
Infantry Regiment, 1st US Infantry
Division.
Cota was indeed a hero on D-Day,
and rightfully earned a Distinguished
Service Medal; however, the things
he really did aren’t shown, in favor
of events actually performed by
others. The real Cota led a squad of
men, stormed a draw with a subma-
chinegun, ran up a hill, killed some
Germans, and then returned to the
beach to inspire other soldiers that
it could indeed be done. On 7 June,
Cota came across a group of scared
GIs, and he asked them why they
were all huddled, seemingly afraid
of a nearby farmhouse. “Sir, the
Germans are in there, shooting at us,”
one replied. Cota unbuckled a few
grenades and showed the troops how
to take a house with Germans in it. So
Mitchum’s final line in the movie cer-
tainly does catch Cota’s spirit: “Drive
me up the hill, son.”
WaW 8 Issue.indd 33
Most of the film is historically giving tours of ancient battlefields on
accurate, right down to Lord Lovat’s Malta and then commenting: “Up in
bagpipes. Ironically, one favorite London they’re planning the invasion
scene is pure make-believe, though of Europe. What in God’s name am I
it probably did occur somewhere in doing here?”
some fashion on 6 June. Actor Rod In reality, Eisenhower was aware
Steiger had told his agent he wanted of the respect the Germans had for
to be in The Longest Day, no matter Patton. He used that respect to the
how small the part. So the writers Allies’ advantage by placing Pat-
came up with his speech—“They will ton in charge of the fictitious First
remember this day long after we are Army Group and sending him off to
dead and gone.”—just to get him into “inspect” those fictional troops. The
the film. inspections were staged and filmed
The movie portrays the naval and shown as newsreels. It was all
bombardment of the beaches but no part of the master deception campaign
air strikes. To be sure, the bombers for D-Day, and Patton himself whole-
were ineffective and dropped their heartedly agreed to it.
payloads too far inland, but they did
attack.
Trivia buffs may enjoy the
tidbit that actor Richard Todd, who
portrayed Maj. John Howard, actu-
ally fought with the 6th Airborne on
D-Day. He said he felt odd portraying
his former boss. Further, songster
Paul Anka, who wrote the film’s
theme song, had a small role as an
Army Ranger. It should also be noted
that as many of the action sequences
as possible were shot on location in
Normandy.
Oliver Stone once said Patton was
one of the few movies that directly
influenced American history: suppos-
edly, President Richard Nixon was
inspired by it to order US and ARVN
forces to invade Cambodia in 1970.
Patton does a good job of portraying
history accurately. The one major
shortfall was in the use of NATO-era
tanks for World War II armor. Alas,
there were few Shermans and Tigers
available when the movie was made
in the late 1960s. Still, the German
Heinkel-111s are real enough, having
been provided by the Spanish Air
Force, which used them as counterin-
surgency aircraft.
Following the Sicily campaign,
the movie shows Patton being
punished for the infamous slapping
incidents, and thus was prohibited
from being allowed to participate in
the planning of Overlord. He’s shown
World at War 33
8/7/09 3:24:46 PM
 Following the invasion, we see
Patton in a meeting with Bradley.
Bradley tells Patton of the Cobra plan
to use Third Army for the exploita-
tion of a breakthrough. Patton says:
“I think you need a screwball old
horse cavalryman to command Third
Army.”
In reality, Patton was by then al-
ready aware of Eisenhower’s decision
to place him in command of Third
Army. The entire scene where Patton
is surprised to learn of this appoint-
ment is fantasy, though it certainly
makes for a good show within the
context of the film.
In several scenes, we’re shown a
German officer named Steiger who’s
chronicling Patton’s life from his
side’s point of view. Francis Ford
Coppola, who wrote the original
screenplay, admits that character was
fictitious but used Steiger to provide
some needed exposition.
Movers & Shakers
The Immortal Four
For what these four men did,
Congress would create a medal never
before and never since issued. To this
day they are the archetypal icons of
self-sacrifice and the embodiment of
the phrase “greater love hath no man
than this, that he who lay down his
life for his friends.”
The story of the “Immortal Four”
began in February 1943 aboard a
ship, the USAT (United States Army
Transport, often mistakenly called
the USS) Dorchester. The 5,649-ton
Dorchester had once been a luxury
liner, but it was no longer luxurious
and had been stripped of all non-criti-
cal amenities.
As January rolled into February,
the Dorchester left New York harbor,
packed to the limit with soldiers
bound for war. She joined convoy
SG-19 at St. John’s, Newfoundland,
to traverse the dreaded “Torpedo
34 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 34
Much of the rest of the film
concerning the drive across France
is accurate, including Patton person-
ally directing traffic. The night battle,
however, where the tanks run out of
gasoline, is shown during the time of
Falaise. Though such actions did oc-
cur, they took place after the capture
of Paris, when Montgomery was
given priority for supplies for Opera-
tion Market-Garden. The scene was
added to show the logistical situation,
but even in that context it’s inac-
curate, as Patton says he knows the
Germans are finished because they
used carts to carry their supplies and
wounded. Horse-drawn wagons were
standard transport for the Germans all
through the war, outside of the motor-
ized elements of their armies; so the
statement by Patton makes no sense.
Alley,” just the mention of which was
enough to strike terror into the heart
of soldiers waiting in the crowded
spaces below decks.
SG-19 left St. John’s bound for
the Army Command Base at Narsar-
suaq, in southern Greenland. SG-19
consisted of six ships: Dorchester,
two merchant ships leased by the US
from the Norwegian government-in-
exile, the DS Lutz, and DS Biscaya.
They were escorted by three small
US Coast Guard cutters: Comanche
Throughout the commentary
track of the DVD, Coppola refers
to the massive amount of research
he performed prior to writing the
screenplay. Much of the dialogue
(at least that spoken by Patton), is
words straight from the general’s own
mouth. Though filmed primarily in
Spain, the locales seem real enough.
One wishes, however, certain historic
events had been included to truly
show the dichotomies of Patton’s
personalities. For instance, the failed
attempt to rescue Patton’s son-in-law
from a German POW camp late in
the war, or scenes depicting Patton
getting sick when visiting the con-
centration camps, would have added
much to the film. Nevertheless, it is
all high drama. Patton truly is a great
historical biography and drama and
war movie all in one.
~Paul Koenig
(WPG-76), Escanaba (WPG-77)
(both 165 feet), and Tampa (WPG-48)
(240 feet).
All went normally until 1:00
a.m. on 3 February. The area through
which the ships were then passing
was known to many as “Torpedo
Junction” and, sure enough, one of the
Coast Guard escorts was getting sonar
reports of a possible sub in the area
throughout the day. The Dorchester’s
captain, Hans J. Danielsen, took seri-
ously the sonar reports, and instructed
8/7/09 3:24:47 PM
 all the men aboard to sleep in their
clothes and life vests. Many chose not
to follow those instructions, since in
the cramped quarters the heat of the
engines made below decks hot and
the life jackets were uncomfortable.
Shortly after midnight, the Ger-
man sub U-223 found the convoy
about 150 miles from Greenland and
fired a torpedo into the Dorchester.
The torpedo struck mid-section
and exploded in the boiler room.
Boiler power was lost, and there was
inadequate steam to sound the full
six-whistle signal to abandon ship.
Loss of power also prevented sending
a radio distress signal, and no rockets
or flares were launched to alert the
escorts. A severe list prevented launch
of some port-side lifeboats, while
other lifeboats capsized through over-
crowding. Survivors in the water were
so stiff from cold they couldn’t grasp
the cargo nets on rescue vessels.
Many men died instantly. Some
were trapped below deck. The ship
took on water rapidly, and began
listing to starboard. Lifeboats were
overcrowded, and some sank. The
Dorchester, severely crippled,
sank by the bow in the frigid North
Atlantic in under 15 minutes, taking
about 675 men with her out of a total
of 902, one of the worst disasters to
befall the fleet of US troop carriers
during the war.
Because of security requirements,
the ship’s crew wasn’t allowed to
employ distress flares. After learn-
ing of the event just minutes after it
occurred, the captain of one of the
escort ships ordered his crew to pre-
pare for a rescue operation. But the
overall escort commander chose not
to launch a rescue, fearing his ships
might become vulnerable to further
U-boat attack.
Coast Guard Cutters Comanche
and Escanaba broke from the convoy
searching for the U-boat, but without
success. In the process they rescued
227 men from the frigid water that
night. Unofficial accounts also indi-
cate the commanders of the cutters
disobeyed, or ignored, the orders of
the escort commander and moved out
on their own.
WaW 8 Issue.indd 35
Dorchester’s demise, and the loss
of life, however painful and tragic
was an expected part of war. In the
normal course of events, Dorchester
was simply another statistic in the
“ships lost at sea” column. It was
what happened on the deck of the
Dorchester that would live on forever.
As the ship reeled and rocked
from the torpedo in her midsection,
chaos ensued: fire, smoke and the
screaming of the wounded filled the
night air. Fear dominated the scene.
Some panicked and jumped into the
water without life jackets; others
froze in fear and refused to leave the
sinking vessel. Taking on water rapid-
ly, the ship began listing to starboard.
Overcrowded lifeboats capsized,
and rafts drifted away before anyone
could reach them.
In the midst of the confusion
and terror, four chaplains—Protes-
tant Ministers George Lansing Fox
and Clark Poling; a Catholic Priest,
Father John Washington, and Rabbi
Alex Goode—moved about the ship,
exuding composure while calming
frightened men, directing bewildered
soldiers to lifeboats and distributing
life jackets with calm precision.
One witness, Pvt. William B.
Bednar, found himself floating in
oily water surrounded by dead bodies
and debris. “I could hear men crying,
pleading, praying,” he recalled. “I
could also hear the chaplains preach-
ing courage. Their voices were the
only thing that kept me going.”
Another sailor, Petty Officer John
J. Mahoney, tried to reenter his cabin
but was stopped by Rabbi Goode.
Mahoney, concerned about the cold
Arctic air, explained he’d forgotten
his gloves.
“Never mind,” Goode responded.
“I have two pair.” The rabbi then gave
the petty officer his own gloves. In
retrospect, Mahoney realized Goode
wasn’t conveniently carrying two
pairs of gloves, and that the rabbi had
decided not to leave the Dorchester.
Soon the supply of jackets was
exhausted, yet four young soldiers,
afraid and without life vests, stood
waiting.
The chaplains had followed
the captain’s instructions and had
their life vests on when the ship
was struck. Realizing there weren’t
enough for all the men, the chaplains
removed their own jackets and gave
them to the young soldiers without
hesitation. The four men of faith had
given away their only means of sav-
ing themselves in order to save others.
“It was the finest thing I have seen or
hope to see this side of heaven,” said
John Ladd, another survivor who saw
the chaplains’ selfless act.
Then, according to another survi-
vor, the four chaplains joined some
of the other men trapped onboard for
prayers that “sounded like a babble of
English, Hebrew and Latin.”
Men rowing away from the sink-
ing ship in lifeboats saw the chaplains
clinging to each other on the slanting
deck. Their arms were linked together
and their heads were bowed as they
prayed to the one God each of them
loved and served.
When the news reached American
shores, the nation was stunned by
the magnitude of the tragedy and the
heroic conduct of the four chaplains.
The Distinguished Service Cross and
Purple Heart were awarded posthu-
mously on 19 December 1944 to the
next of kin by Lt. Gen. Brehon B.
Somervell, Commanding General
of the Army Service Forces, in a
ceremony at the post chapel at Fort
Myer, VA.
A special stamp was issued in
1948 by the United States Post Office.
A posthumous Special Medal for Her-
oism, never before given and never
to be given again, was authorized by
Congress and awarded by President
Dwight D. Eisenhower on 18 January
1961. Congress had wanted to confer
the Medal of Honor, but was blocked
by the stringent requirements calling
for heroism performed under fire.
This medal is a commemorative deco-
ration not to be worn on a uniform,
and it doesn’t appear on any military
awards charts. The unique medal was
intended to have the same importance
as a Medal of Honor.
~ David W. Tschanz
World at War 35
8/7/09 3:24:47 PM
 Technology Backdate
Rubber for Victory
Rubber played an important part
in everyday life for Americans on the
home front during World War II. It
was used for tires, hoses, wiring and
clothing, but it was even more impor-
tant for the war effort. The military
used rubber for many types of equip-
ment; for example, a gas mask used
1.11 lbs. of rubber, a heavy bomber
1,825 lbs.; tanks contained over a half
a ton of it, and battleships over 75
tons.
Rubber comes from two sources,
natural and synthetic. Natural rubber
comes in the form of latex, which is
tapped from rubber trees. Synthetic
rubber comes from a combination of
petroleum and other chemicals.
Early natural rubber products had
their limitations: cold temperatures
made rubber brittle, and it easily stuck
together when left in the sun. In 1844
the turning point in rubber develop-
ment came when Charles Goodyear
invented the process called vulcaniz-
ing. That process changed rubber into
a highly elastic and stable material,
which could thereafter be made into
raincoats, overcoats, tires and other
useful items.
In 1906, German scientists began
experiments in the production of syn-
thetic rubber. Those experiments paid
off when, during World War I, their
supply of imported natural rubber
was cut off. Germany then began the
production of a synthetic known as
methyl rubber. Methyl rubber proved
to be expensive to process and a poor
quality replacement when compared
to natural rubber; however, it was bet-
ter than having no rubber. Germany
stopped the production of methyl
Attention readers: We’re always looking
for authors for FYI for Strategy & Tactics
and Observation Post for World at War.
If you’d like to try your hand at writing
short (under 2,000 words), pithy articles
for this column, on virtually any aspect of
WWII military history, contact Ty Bom-
ba, FYI editor, at: WhiteRook@att.net.
36 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 36
rubber at the end of World War I, but
continued experiments in other types
synthetic rubber development.
In the 1930s German scientists
discovered synthetics known as Buna
rubbers. One of them, called GR-S for
Government Rubber Styrene, became
the basis of some production in the
US; however, it wasn’t until World
War II that the need for synthetic
rubber became a matter of national
security.
The supply of rubber was
threatened for the US and the other
Allies when the Japanese took control
of over 90 percent of the world’s
natural sources with their conquest of
Malaysia and the Dutch East Indies.
President Franklin Roosevelt acted
quickly: he called on the citizens
of the US to save all types of scrap
rubber for recycling. “Scrap Tires
Mobilized for Victory” became an
official war slogan. At one Midwest
recycling center, millions of used tires
covered over 100 acres. The work-
ers systematically piled and arranged
them in sections so as to reduce fire
hazards.
On the home front, recapped tires
became the kind used by the majority
of the population; only individuals in
public safety, essential truck opera-
tions and public health got new tubes
and tires. Even those who earned
a living with their car, such as taxi
drivers and salesmen, weren’t allowed
new tires.
The populace in the US also faced
a rationing program of certain foods,
sugar, coffee, and gas. For example,
you couldn’t simply go out and buy
athletic, sport or gym shoes, since
they contained rubber and were there-
fore on the rationed list. Shoe repair
shops used materials taken from
obsolete or orphaned single shoes to
repair other shoes.
Under the “Idle Tire Purchase
Plan,” in order to be allowed to
obtain gas rationing coupons drivers
couldn’t own more than five automo-
bile tires. In a further effort to save on
both gas and rubber, the government
asked drivers to drive no faster than
35 mph, which was called “Victory
Speed.”
Not only was it difficult to
obtain tires, starting in 1942 even
the thought of buying a new car
became impossible when civilian car
production stopped in February. All
auto manufactures switched to full
production of military vehicles and
warplanes.
As early as 1940, Roosevelt had
created the Rubber Reserve Company,
which sought to oversee the rubber
supply in the US by building a one
year stockpile of natural rubber in a
government-owned reserve. The ma-
jor rubber producers, Firestone, B.F.
Goodrich, Goodyear and US Rubber
worked together with their research-
ers, government scientists and uni-
versity researchers to provide enough
synthetic rubber to solve the rubber
shortage for the Allies. The govern-
ment built the plants for synthetic
rubber production, and the major
rubber producers ran them. At the end
of World War II the government sold
the plants to the rubber companies.
In peacetime the US used 600,000
tons of rubber a year. In 1941
synthetic rubber production almost
reached 8,000 tons. During 1943 that
annual figure rose to 800,000 tons,
which certainly helped enable the
final victory in World War II.
~R. J. Musto
8/7/09 3:24:48 PM
 Struggle for the
Galactic Empire
In the far future, Earth is a distant myth. When mankind
gained the means to transit the vastness of space safely and
quickly, a great human wave extended across the galaxy, and
humans soon inhabited thousands of worlds. Communities of
worlds formed alliances; alliances became federations, and
eventually a galactic empire was born. That empire existed
for millennia, growing and consolidating, bringing most of the
inhabited worlds under its control.
Despite its size and apparent success, though, all is not
well in the Galactic Empire. There are rebels, usurpers, those
who want to create empires of their own, and aliens of every
imaginable form. Over the long millennia, even the form of man
is taking a new shape with genetic engineering.
Struggle for the Galactic Empire is a solitaire science fic-
tion game. You assume leadership of the forces of the Galactic
Empire as it strives to maintain and expand its dominion while
fighting off the forces of chaos that seek to destroy it. You
make all the military, political, social and economic decisions
to deal with the threats that arise, keep the far-flung empire
stable, and still expand and bring new glory through discovery,
colonization and conquest.
The map shows the entire galaxy divided into sectors of
star systems. Production is carried out by nano-assemblers to
create starships and world-sized weapons. Units include com-
bat and colonization ships, control groups and leaders. Units
have two types of combat values: weapons and morphogenetic
systems. Weapons destroy the enemy, while morphogenetic
systems change them into friends. Loyalties switch back and
forth depending on the situation.
Threats are generated by over 100 randomly drawn chaos
markers. They include: rebels, usurpers, independent empires,
invaders and alien forces, as well as technological, economic,
social, political and military events. You can also launch expedi-
tions to attempt to gain new knowledge and technology. Other
rules allow you to use psychosocial warfare and propaganda
$50.
to repress rebellions. 00

Contents:
• 176 Die cut counters • Player Aid cards
• 1 34” x 22” Map • 1 Die
Available Fall 2009
• Rule booklet • Storage bags PO Box 21598
Bakersfield CA 93390
661/587-9633 • fax 661/587-5031 • www.decisiongames.com
Name
Address
City/State/Zip Shipping Charges
1 unit
st
Adt’l units Type of Service
Country
$12 $2 UPS Ground/USPS PM + $5
V/MC # Exp. 24 4 Canada
Signature 34 8 Europe, South America
Phone # 38 9 Asia, Australia
World at War 37

WaW 8 Issue.indd 37 8/7/09 3:24:50 PM

 Japan’s World War II
Oilers & Tankers
By John W. Whitman

From the periscope: USS Wahoo observes a Japanese destroyer it has sunk.

Oil War
Japan began the war in an oil crisis. That is, petroleum
had been the goad to Japan’s expansionist offensive
in 1941. More generally, oil powered their economy,
moved their army, flew their air force, and sailed their
navy. Prior to the war, the US supplied 80 percent of
Japan’s oil imports, while the Netherlands East Indies
had supplied 10 percent. Japan imported 37 million
barrels of crude and refined oil in 1940 and, before the
1941 oil embargo, had relied heavily on foreign ships
to carry it. In fact, foreign bottoms carried roughly half
the pre-war oil imports to Japan.
Of course, those shipping resources and much of
that oil would be denied once war began. At the same
time, Japan’s oil consumption would rise dramatically,
and her shipping, including tankers, would come under
attack. True, oil availability would rise once Japan had
secured petroleum producing areas, but there would be
no return of foreign vessels to carry it.
Japan also began the war with a small number of new
and fast oilers, intended to support her far-ranging war
fleet. Seven of those oilers and a gasoline tanker sailed
with the attack group to Pearl Harbor. They averaged

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 a little over 10,000 gross tons and four years in age.
All could sustain 19 knots or more and directly service
warships at sea. They were all government-subsidized
Toa Maru-class from Kawasaki shipyards.
In 1942 those fast oilers supported the fleets that
steamed west into the Indian Ocean and east toward
Midway. Plodding across rear areas behind them were
the more numerous and older merchant-marine tankers
and post-World War I oilers. It was those tankers that
would decide whether Japan could bring home conquered
oil. Once Japan concluded her conquests, the crucial
question then became: could the tankers haul home the
oil in sufficient quantities?
WaW 8 Issue.indd 39
Japanese tankers moved supplies of oil in 1942 and
1943 while suffering minor losses. Losses were small,
more from American weakness and torpedo failures than
any Japanese prowess in antisubmarine warfare. Despite
early problems and disappointing results in the first two
years of war, however, American submariners learned
valuable lessons. They worked out torpedo defects and
command failures to reach full effectiveness by 1944.
The US submarines that year began inflicting grievous
losses on shipping while also reducing supplies sent to
deployed forces. US Submarines sank 603 Japanese
ships in 1944, which meant the Japanese lost, from all
causes, over half their cargo carrying capacity.
World at War 39
8/7/09 3:24:52 PM
 Losing ships like Nippon Maru and Kenyo Maru
shocked the Japanese Navy high command. The three
oilers in that convoy had all served at Pearl Harbor, the
Indian Ocean and Midway. It suddenly became clear that
keeping elements of the fleet at advanced bases such
as Truk was henceforth going to be costly in support
vessels.
Completely aside from the threat to those sea lines
of communication, Japan’s tankers began to come under
attack even when moored at major bases such as Truk
and Palau. On 17 February 1944, US naval aircraft
sank five oilers and tankers at Truk, in total grossing
over 52,000 tons. The fast 19.8-knot, 10,020-ton oiler
Shinkoku Maru, a workhorse of the early war carrier fleet,
had survived torpedo hits in 1942 and 1943; however,
at Truk she went to the bottom.
Japanese supply ship under attack. A few merchantmen substituting as tankers also
went under. The fast combination cargo ship/tanker
The first serious American interdiction of the oil Amagisan Maru, 7,624 tons and 19.9 knots, had arrived
supply line to the naval base at Truk in the Caroline at Truk just four days earlier. She carried drummed
Islands occurred in January 1944, as three big naval gasoline, aircraft and naval air personnel. She sank still
oilers were carrying oil and aviation gasoline east out stuffed with her cargo. The navy had also modified the
of Borneo to the fleet. On 14 January, three submarines, coal-burning, war-built, 4,667-ton Type-1B cargo ship
alerted by MAGIC code breakers, penetrated the inad- Hanakawa Maru into a tanker. She was anchored at
equate two-destroyer screen. They sank one destroyer Truk loaded with gasoline when aircraft torpedoed her,
and then went after the 9,971-ton Nippon Maru and the which caused her to blow up and sink in four minutes.
10,022-ton Kenyo Maru. Both oilers were modern, 19- The small, 2,829-ton Daiho Maru was awaiting a chance
knot, prewar construction. Nippon Maru was hauling to unload. An aircraft put a torpedo into her, and 8,450
aviation gasoline; and she exploded under the impact drums of gasoline and 300 bombs exploded in a single
of two torpedoes. Six hours later, two torpedoes hit huge blast.
Kenyo Maru. She went under with 14,000 tons of heavy
On the high seas, US submarines focused ever more
oil and 2,000 tons of drummed aviation gasoline. The
of their attention on oil shipments to the Home Islands.
third oiler, the 10,026-ton Kokuyo Maru, survived only
The Japanese had begun 1944 determined to move
because she was just out of range.
home large quantities of oil from the southern fields
and refineries. As a result, imports in February 1944
nearly equaled the peak import numbers of August 1943.
War-Built Tanker Types It was all downhill after that. Shipyards increased the
Type Average Gross Number Knots priority for tankers in 1944, launching 204 new tankers
Registered Tons Built grossing 624,000 tons. Many of them were small, and
Merchant Oilers & Tankers many were poorly constructed, and Japan lost nearly
the same tanker tonnage throughout that year.
Type 1TL 10,000 23 18.5
Japan’s conquests, which they called the “Southern
Type 2TL 10,000 33 15
Resource Area,” produced 36.9 million barrels of oil
Type 3TL 10,000 5 19 in 1944, of which planners hoped to get home 28.5
Type 2AT 6,900 34 13 million barrels. Yet tankers hauled in only 4.9 million
Type 3AT 7,200 2 13 barrels throughout that entire year. (Recall that in 1940
Type 1TM 6,400 26 15.5
the Japanese had imported 37 million barrels.)
Type 2TM 2,850 43 11.5 Convoy Battles
Early 1944 was successful for the Moji, Japan, to
Type 2ET 873 135 9
Miri, Borneo, back to Moji, series of 8-knot convoys.
Type 1TS 1,020 5 ? From May through July, five slow northbound convoys
Naval Oilers & Tankers (MI-02, 04, 06, 08 and 10) left Miri for Manila with
Kazahaya-class 18,300 2 16.5 59 ships, 40 of which were tankers. The Japanese lost
Ashizuri-class 7,951 2 16
one of them. Then 55 ships, 31 of them tankers, from
those five convoys left Manila for Japan. Submarines
Sunosaki-class 4,465 2 16
pulled only down three. Five ships sunk out of 59 over
three months was an 8.5 percent loss rate. Considering
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 the ongoing construction of new tankers, those losses
shouldn’t have been serious.
The Japanese faced three shared problems, though,
with their slow “MI” convoys, their faster “HI” con-
voys and their other operations. First, aggregate 1944
oil tanker lift was inadequate to fuel Japan’s economy.
Second, losses in the previously successful MI convoys
began to soar. Third, voyages took longer and longer
as the year progressed and defensive measures became
more elaborate and time consuming. Each tanker was
therefore less efficient at delivering oil.
From August through early November, Borneo dis-
patched north to Manila, convoys MI-12, 14, 16, 18,
and 20, with 47 ships, 24 of which were tankers. They
lost a total of 14 ships, an unsustainable 30 percent loss
rate. Worse, even on reaching Manila, the surviving
ships were still only halfway home. More losses would
occur on the next leg north.
The math became easy to understand: inadequate
aggregate tanker lift minus losses plus insufficient con-
struction equals defeat. Building a 10,000-ton tanker to
replace a tanker lost on the way north was good, and the
nation’s tanker tonnage might thus remain level. Unless
that new tanker actually reached the oil supply, and then
delivered that oil to the Home Islands, the addition of
10,000 tons to the fleet was of no practical value. It
was true new tankers kept sliding down the slipways,
but more and more often they weren’t surviving long
enough to unload oil in Japan.
Postwar US statistics on tanker losses don’t tell how
bad things actually were on the Japanese oil front. For
example, when a submarine sank Ariake Maru on 3
February 1944, the postwar Joint Army-Navy Assess-
ment Committee (JANAC) recorded that 5,149-ton
ship as a cargo vessel. Ariake Maru was, in fact, a
purpose-built, May 1943 Type-1TM (first year, tanker,
medium) wartime standard tanker coming north out of
Singapore with oil. Statisticians failed to include her in
their postwar analysis. JANAC likewise listed the loss of
2,825-ton Kashimasan Maru on 6 June as a cargo ship.
The Japanese had built her as a wartime standard Type-
1C cargo ship, but she was hauling aviation gasoline to
the Marianas when a submarine sank her. She wasn’t a
tanker by construction, but she was operating as such.
Similar circumstances apply to numerous other ships
the Japanese used to haul oil.
Statistics are also incomplete in another way. On 28
January 1944, a submarine hit the old Navy oiler Kamoi.
A naval auxiliary, she displaced 17,000 tons and had been
able, when she was young, to steam at 15 knots. Three
torpedoes caused extensive damage and laid her up until
29 August. A month later, attacking naval aircraft badly
damaged her again. Three days after that a submarine
hit her with another torpedo. Repairs at Hong Kong
lasted into December, after which she finally reached
Japan. Only on 29 December did she join a convoy
headed south to pick up oil, and she didn’t complete
WaW 8 Issue.indd 41
Shipyards
Japanese shipbuilding couldn’t keep pace with war time losses.
The delay in expanding existing shipyards and in building new yards
slowed expansion of the merchant fleet. Unlike the Americans, who
had made huge investments in shipyards and ship contracts, the
Japanese remained complacent due to their early war successes.
Their shipyards weren’t organized for mass production, and it
wasn’t until 1943 the Japanese began to put greater priority on
merchant shipbuilding.
Few yards had done anything to modernize, expand or build
new sites. The established owners opposed new independent yards.
Shipyards used techniques of the 1920s and 1930s. Owners didn’t
encourage volume production. Scarce skilled workers had to remain
versatile, rather than become efficiently specialized, because they
had to perform many tasks. Owners competed with each other to
get whatever work was available.
Shipyards were also cramped and lacked heavy duty cranes and
equipment. Lightweight equipment wasn’t capable of extensive ship
fabrication and pre-assembly. Techniques for cutting and welding
steel plate were poor.
Older merchant shipyards had grown in piecemeal fashion and
were congested. Privately owned yards had been reluctant to expand
before the war because of uncertain demand. Expansion would
further dilute the already fully committed labor force. The prewar
expansion that did occur increased the overcrowding. Expansion
often required dredging shallow water, excavating or tunneling
into hills, as well as encroaching on nearby industrial properties.
Not enough plants could produce first-class parts. Contracts
often went to companies that turned out poor work. Machine tools
and floor space were tangibles that could be counted and measured;
less finite was human expertise. Scarce skilled workers, production
engineers and experienced executives were needed to manage a
surge in mass production.
In the wartime rush to expand, merchant yards reduced the
variety and dimensions of steel plate sections for ships. Sizes and
profiles of steel plate fell from over 1,000 to about 100. Shipyards
stored plates by thickness and dimensions rather than by where
they were to be used. Yards lowered the acceptable tensile strength
of plates so that 10 percent more steel passed the testing process.
Regardless of that rushed modernization, though, Japan remained
outclassed by US shipbuilding. Japanese yards failed the test of
war.
Japanese battleship Yamato under construction at the Kure
Naval Base, Japan, 20 September 1941. The aircraft carrier
Hosho is at the extreme right. The supply ship Mamiya is in the
center distance.
World at War 41
8/7/09 3:24:54 PM
 Wartime Standard Ships
As the war progressed, Japanese shipyards started to turn
out more merchantmen. Planners diverted more and more
steel to shipbuilding and dedicated more and more of the
economy to ships. From 1 April 1943 until 31 March 1944, a
total of 1.95 million tons of new merchant shipping slid down
the slipways. In that same period, however, the Japanese lost
2.56 million tons. The shipyards replaced only 43 percent of
what was lost.
The Japanese standardized their ship construction, but they
did so too late and built their effort on a modest shipbuilding
infrastructure. Their biggest shipbuilding efforts settled on
five standard cargo designs, three tanker types, and an ore car-
rier. That was good, but their failure was in timeliness. Yards
completed the first war-built standard cargo ship, the Type-1A
(first year, model A) of 6,400 tons, only on 31 October 1943.
The next three became available in late December. Builders
were quicker at putting the new wartime standard medium
tanker into service. The first of 26 Type-1TMs (first year,
tanker, medium), roughly 6,000 tons and 15 knots, appeared
early in 1943.
Builders had been launching a small number of cargo
ships and tankers through 1942 into late 1943, but they were
peacetime models, which were expensive in time, labor and
materials when compared to wartime standard models. In US
Liberty ships alone, which was the closest equivalent to the
four Japanese Type-1A 6,400-ton cargo ships completed in
1943, American yards were two years ahead. In late 1942 the
US was averaging three Liberty ships day.
Considering the rate of ship losses and Home Island
shipyard capabilities, Japan simply couldn’t produce ships
fast enough. Japan was outclassed when matched against
US shipbuilding efforts. Before the war the Japanese had
planned to build an average of 600,000 tons a year in 1942,
1943 and 1944. In 1943 alone, US shipyards produced 1,949
merchantmen for 13 million gross registered tons. That was
12 times Japan’s production for that year (1.095 million grt)
and more than twice Japan’s entire 1941 merchant tonnage.
The Japanese were therefore in a bind. They’d gone to
war so as to acquire raw materials. In order to transport home
those riches, they then had to consume more and more of those
very resources simply to maintain the shipping assets that
hauled them. They had to divert more and more raw materials
needed to build aircraft, fighting ships and munitions simply
to move raw materials. Every merchantman that Japan built
meant one less destroyer, or fewer aircraft, or fewer bombs
and torpedoes. The Southern Resource Area failed to live up
to its prewar billing.
The defenders: Japanese destroyer Shimikaze.
42 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 42
that voyage. Aircraft damaged her off Hong Kong on
16 January 1945. Repairs were still incomplete when
B-24s fatally sank her on 5 April. So, during Kamoi’s
last 14 months, she consumed large amounts of repair
material and manpower but delivered not a drop of oil
to the Home Islands.
Some ships just wore out, often due to wear hastened
by battle damage. Naval oiler Hayatomo, another sister
to the three Shiretoko-class oilers mentioned above,
was bombed in December 1941, torpedoed on 23
August 1942, and torpedoed again on 9 October 1943.
Ultimately, another ship had to tow her and her ruined
engines to the anchorage at Lingga, southeast of Sin-
gapore, where she remained as a floating oil tank. Like
Notoro, she didn’t actually “sink,” and was therefore
never included in tankers-lost statistics. Even so, from
October 1943 on she no longer served as a sea-going
oiler.
Numerous damaged tankers sat for months in port
waiting for and undergoing repairs only to fall victim
to air attacks. Those attacking airmen received credit
for their demise, but it had actually been submarines
that had hobbled them and put them in port where the
planes caught them.
In the face of mounting tanker losses, the Navy
worked to improve its convoy system. The addition
of small escorts and the use of evasive tactics helped.
Convoying reduced tanker losses, but the inefficiencies
involved in the tactic also further slowed oil transport.
Whereas a prewar round trip to the Netherlands East
Indies might consume 24 days, including loading and
unloading oil, tankers involved in the Japan-Singapore-
Japan convoys experienced serious delays.
Until 1944, tanker round trips took about as much time
as peacetime voyages. Times lengthened in mid-1944.
For instance, on 13 July, tanker Otowasan Maru started
out of Japan toward Singapore with Convoy HI-69 and
returned with HI-70, a round trip of 34 days. She then
departed with HI-73 and returned with HI-74: 30 days.
She sortied again nine days after her return with HI-77
and returned with HI-78. Her final departure with HI-
81 was on 14 November. Three complete round trips,
including evasive routing, reduced convoy speeds, load-
ing and unloading, and time spent waiting for the next
sailing took 124 days, or two-thirds more than a prewar
tanker could’ve managed. A study of Omurosan Maru
shows she likewise completed six round trips in 1944
that averaged 44 days each. The remodeled 4,701-ton
Type-1B tanker Chihaya Maru made eight round trips
in a little over a year and averaged 45 days per trip.
Battle damage also interrupted round trips. Seven-
year-old merchant tanker Itsukushima Maru (10,006
tons) made four deliveries of oil to Japan in 1944. The
round trips consumed 37 days, 36 days, 45 days, and 59
days (the fourth round trip included dry dock time). A
fifth round trip required 125 days, which included repair
for torpedo damage but no delivery of oil to Japan. A
8/7/09 3:24:54 PM
 Tonan Maru No. 3: The Tanker That Helped Doom Japan
An odd example of good news turning bad for the Japanese Ever since the war began, American torpedoes had suf-
centered on Tonan Maru No. 3. That huge tanker grossed fered from failures to explode and from running deep. Many
19,209 tons. On 12 July 1943, the USS Tinosa spotted her submarine skippers had complained, but no one had taken
when she was fully loaded and on a course for the naval base action. Faced with this nearly laboratory exact test, the Bureau
at Truk. Tinosa maneuvered into the path of the unescorted of Ordnance could no longer ignore the problem. The improp-
tanker and began firing. erly designed exploder was fixed, and American submariners
The first spread of four torpedoes raised two splashes thereafter accelerated their destruction of Japan’s merchant
alongside the tanker, but the ex-whale-factory ship turned marine.
away and continued steaming. Tinosa fired two more torpe- Had Tonan Maru No. 3 sunk after the first explosions, it’s
does and both hit and exploded. Tonan Maru No. 3 stopped anyone’s guess as to how long corrective action on American
and settled by the stern. In the absence of threats from air torpedoes might’ve been delayed. Tanker crewmen aboard
or surface escorts, Tinosa moved in for the kill. The skipper Tonan Maru No. 3 rejoiced over their improbable salvation,
carefully positioned his submarine and fired. The following but it brought on a much earlier correction of torpedo problems
comes from Tinosa’s patrol report: than would otherwise have occurred.
1009 hours. Having observed target carefully and found Even aside from the long-term significance of American
no evidence of a sinking, approached and fired one torpedo torpedo redesign, Tonan Maru No. 3’s miraculous deliverance
at starboard side. Hit, heard by sound to stop at same time didn’t do Japan any good. The tanker reached Truk, where the
I observed large splash. No apparent effect. Target had inadequate repair facilities worked on her. She was still there
corrected list and was firing at periscope and at torpedo seven months later when American naval aircraft sank her.
wakes with machine guns and one inch [gun].
1011 hours. Fired eighth torpedo. Hit. No apparent ef-
fect.
1014 hours. Fired ninth torpedo. Hit. No apparent effect.
Target firing at periscope, when exposed, and at wake when
torpedoes were running.
1039 hours. Fired tenth torpedo. Hit. No apparent ef-
fect.
1048 hours. Fired eleventh torpedo. Hit. No effect. This
torpedo hit well aft on the port side, made splash at the
side of the ship and was then observed to have taken a
right turn and jump clear of the water about one hundred
feet from the stern of the tanker. I find it hard to convince
myself that I saw this.
1050 hours. Fired twelth [sic] torpedo. Hit. No effect.
1100 hours. Fired thirteenth torpedo. Hit. No effect. Circled
again to fire at other side.
1122 hours. Picked up high-speed screws.
1125 hours. Sighted destroyer approaching from east.
1131 hours. Fired fourteenth torpedo. Hit. No effect.
1131½ hours. Fired fifteenth torpedo. Started deep.
Destroyer range 1,000 yards. Torpedo heard to hit tanker Tonan Maru No. 3.
and stop running by sound. Periscope had gone under by
this time. No explosion. Had already decided to retain one
torpedo for examination by base.

submarine then torpedoed her, and an aircraft finished
her off on 1 November as she tried to make a sixth trip
(fifth delivery) to the Home Islands.
It can be seen, then, military threats that deterred
Japanese shipping from sailing were nearly as effective
as actually sinking a tanker. Waiting for escorts often
delayed entire convoys. Pulling a tanker out of the convoy
rotation for routine dockyard maintenance could lay up
a ship for three weeks. And torpedo and bomb damage,
though not as satisfying to the Americans as a sinking,
removed ships from service for many months.
Philippine Sea
Hauling oil to the Home Islands was inescapably
critical to the overall war effort. Even so, the Navy
was forced to interrupt that flow to support fleet ac-
tions. For the June 1944 Battle of the Philippine Sea,
the Navy loaded oilers and tankers and sent them south
to the Mobile Fleet. The 20-year-old 10,050-ton oiler
Tsurumi was one of the few such vessels that hadn’t
yet been damaged. On 1 May she fueled warships
(the battleship Yamato being one) as they arrived from
the Home Islands. On 21 May, Adm. Matome Ugaki,
commanding Battleship Division 1, wrote in his diary:
World at War 43

WaW 8 Issue.indd 43 8/7/09 3:24:55 PM

 The Umbrella Solution
As their wartime standard shipbuilding program hit its
peak in March 1944, the Japanese completed 67 ships grossing
178,419 tons. Unfortunately for their crews, those ships were
built to reduced wartime standards, and therefore suffered
structural failures and engine breakdowns. Put simply, the new
ships had less strength than prewar designs. The merchantmen
had single instead of double bottoms, wider spacing between
their structural members, and lighter engines, so as to conserve
raw materials and speed production.
In shipyards where prisoners of war worked, rivet teams
applied undersize rivets into normal holes and thereby further
weakened structural integrity. POW workers also overheated
rivets until they became brittle. When the captain of the newly
built 2,858-ton Type-2TM tanker Hakuba Maru first saw his
wartime standard ship, he found rain leaking through innu-
merable overhead rivets. Hard pressed Japanese yard workers
could only offer to supply umbrellas as a solution.
Shipyards also built some ships too fast. The Mitsui yard
took 58 days to complete the Type-2AT 6,892-ton emergency
tanker Oshikayama Maru. Mitsui’s workers completed wartime
standard Type 2A cargo ship Asukasan Maru, 6,886 tons, in
just 29 days. The prospective master and crew of the 6,890-
ton Type-2A Eiryaku Maru found that no one at the shipyard
cared about the complaints they lodged about poor construc-
tion. Yard workers only cared about meeting the completion
date. When Eiryaku Maru sailed, a turbine immediately broke
down. Such frequent breakdowns aboard war-built tankers
further disrupted the flow of oil and clogged repair yards.
Not enough: Arisan launching from a shipyard.
44 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 44
“How to supply is a great question. One is appalled at
the condition of the supply ships.”
He worried about the availability of oilers to service
the fleet at sea. Of 23 top-of-the-line merchant and na-
val oilers that had accompanied the fleet one or more
times at Pearl Harbor, in the Indian Ocean, Midway, the
Aleutians, the Eastern Solomons and Santa Cruz, only
six were still afloat. Four of those assembled for the
upcoming operation at Tawi Tawi in the far southwest
Philippines. Of six war-built naval auxiliaries able to
carry oil or aviation gasoline, four were needed. The
Navy itself, then, was on the verge of being unable to
fight due to the growing oiler shortage.
Ugaki believed the loss of one or two of the oil-
ers servicing the operation would crucially affect its
chance for success, and that’s exactly what happened.
A submarine drew first blood on 14 May, when it dam-
aged a loaded tanker headed for Tawi Tawi. On 24 May
another sub torpedoed and sank the 18-knot merchant
oiler Tatekawa Maru, 10,090 tons. She was in a small
convoy en route to Davao in the Philippines with the
mission of fueling the fleet when it sortied.
On 5 June, just north of Tawi Tawi, a submarine sank
auxiliaries Ashizuri, 7,951 tons, and Takasaki, 4,465 tons.
Both were early 1943 16-knot naval supply ships, and
both were rigged as aviation fuel tankers. Each could
supply two aircraft carriers with aviation gasoline.
Three days later, in the eastern Celebes Sea, a sub-
marine torpedoed and sank aviation fuel tanker Shioya,
the only sister of Ashizuri. Three days after that, on 11
June, war-built, 15.5-knot, 5,141-ton Asanagi Maru was
torpedoed and sunk 100 miles north of Tawi Tawi. A
possibility existed that submarines might have blasted
enough ships out of the fleet’s supply force to entirely
derail the upcoming operation.
Once the 19-20 June Battle of the Philippine Sea
ended, naval oilers and merchant tankers returned to the
convoy stream. The navy’s purpose-built 18,300-ton,
16.5-knot oiler Hayasui, commissioned just before the
Philippine Sea engagement and lightly damaged there,
headed south with the 20-ship convoy HI-71. Submarines
attacked off northwest Luzon; Hayasui went down on
19 August.
In October 1944, the American invasion of Leyte
put air and naval forces astride Japan’s supply line from
the south. Air and submarine attacks sank tankers that
tried to sail past that new US base area. January 1945
marked the peak in the destruction of Japanese tankers,
the worst month of losses in the war. The Japanese were
risking the last of their assets in a furious bid to bring
in oil before the Americans totally cut the sea lanes.
On 15-16 January 1945, US naval aircraft sank five
big tankers grossing 59,205 tons. On 21 January, airmen
struck Takao on Formosa and sank seven more tankers.
In all, the 10-day carrier raid sank 33 merchantmen, 12
warships, 25 tankers, and one military transport. From
8/7/09 3:24:55 PM
 Imperial sinews: transport France Maru.

French Indochina through Hong Kong up to Formosa,

those mid-January carrier raids sank 280,000 gross tons
of shipping, easily 10 percent of Japan’s remaining
tonnage and 250 percent more than shipyards built that
month. Ships sunk from other causes pushed January’s
total past 434,000 tons.
Though there was much death and destruction still
to come, the remainder of the war was a formality for
the gutted tanker fleet. By the end of February 1945, the
big tankers were out of business, and Japan was nearly
out of oil.
at
Tanker Crew
By late 1944, Japan was on its last legs as it searched
for merchant seamen to man its tankers. For example,
when Otowasan Maru sank on 22 December, the crew
consisted mostly of youngsters. Among those killed
were thirteen 15-year-old crewmen, nine 16-year-olds
and seven 17-year-olds. Only 18 of the 62 who died
were more than 20 years old.
Sources
Blair, Clay. Silent Victory: The U.S. Submarine War Against Japan. New York:
Bantam Books, 1975.
Heal, S. C. Ugly Ducklings: Japan’s WWII Liberty Type Standard Ships. An-
napolis: Naval Institute Press, 2003.
Noma, Hisashi. Japanese Merchant Ships at War: The Story of Mitsui and O.S.K.
Liners lost during the Pacific War. Tokyo: Privately Printed, 2002.
Parillo, Mark P. The Japanese Merchant Marine in World War II. Annapolis:
Naval Institute Press, 1993.
ww6.enjoy.ne.jp/~iwashige/ and the named ship.
www.combinedfleet.com.

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World at War 45

WaW 8 Issue.indd 45 8/7/09 3:24:58 PM

 Slovakia in World War II
By Blaine Taylor

A
ccording to the memoirs of Henriette Hoffmann von Schirach, Adolf Hitler called Father Josef Tiso—a
monsignor in the Roman Catholic Church and premier of fascist Slovakia—the “Little Parson.” CBS radio
broadcaster William L. Shirer described Tiso as being “almost as broad as he was tall.” Paul Schmidt of
the German Foreign Office recalled in his memoirs, Hitler’s Interpreter, that: “It was strange to see Hitler greeting
this Catholic priest with friendliness; the short, stout Catholic dignitary stood facing a man who could hardly be
called a friend of the Catholic Church, but when Tiso wanted something for Slovakia, he would have visited the
devil himself. He once told us: ‘When I get worked up, I eat half a pound of ham, and that soothes my nerves.’”
46 #8

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 Tiso (1887-1947) was one of a trio of unusual
men—two of them priests—who together helped deliver
Slovakia into the fold of the Axis as Nazi Germany’s
first ally in Europe, even before Italian Foreign Minister
Count Galeazzo Ciano signed the Italo-German “Pact
of Steel” on 22 May 1939. The other priest was Andrej
Hlinka (1864-1938), and they were joined by law profes-
sor Vojtech Bela Tuka (1880-1946).
Both Tiso and Tuka had been preceded by the initial
efforts of the third man, Hlinka, who in 1913 founded
the Slovak People’s Party. He was inactive politically
during the First World War, though, while the famed
Czech Legion was fighting on the eastern front and, in
the United States, Czech nationalists Tomas and Jan Ma-
saryk and Eduoard Benes were busy working to create a
polyglot Czechoslovakia, a new nation that united Czechs
and Slovaks. That idea was launched at a conference in
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in May 1918 and was brought
into being by the Versailles Treaty of 28 June 1919.
In October 1918, Hlinka was a co-founder of the Slo-
vak National Council and a signatory of the “Declaration
of the Slovak Nation.” On 19 December he reestablished
the Slovak People’s Party, whose chairman he remained
until his death. In the interim, he became the most eminent
Slovak politician within the Czechoslovak Republic,
opposing Prague’s centralism and demanding Slovakia
be granted autonomy as had been promised at the Pitts-
burgh conference. He was a deputy to the Czechoslovak
National Assembly from 1918.
He first gained prominence when he traveled in
August 1919 to the peace conference in Paris to make
the case for the autonomy of Slovakia. On his return he
was interned by the Czechoslovak government, despite
being a member of the national assembly, and he wasn’t
released until the elections of 1920.
Hlinka had originally been a strong supporter of multi-
ethnic unity within the new state, but he grew bitter as
he witnessed the influence of the Catholic Church being
limited. Tiso, a chaplain in the Austro-Hungarian Army
during World War I, became one of his closest associ-
ates.
There came to be two main factions in the Slovak
People’s Party. The conservatives were led by Hlinka
and Tiso, who both wanted regional autonomy within
the Czechoslovak Republic. Tuka, in turn, came to rep-
resent the radicals who wanted a total break from the
Czechs. That faction worked in tandem with the German
separatists of the Sudeten German Party. On 4 August
1933, Hlinka officially declared for the sovereignty of
the Slovak nation and, before his death five years later,
met with Sudeten leader Karl Hermann Frank in a joint
effort to destroy the Czech state.
As leader of the radical wing of the party, Tuka was
to prove a strong ally of Tiso, the most powerful and
longest-lasting of the three men responsible for the cre-
ation of the Slovak state. Tiso was born on 13 October
1887 at Velka-Bytec, Slovakia. At the time of his birth,

On 30 September 1938, the Italian delegation arrives at the Munich railway station for the four power Munich
Conference to settle the fate of the Czech Sudetenland. From left to right are seen: German Reich Labor Front leader
Robert Ley (brown uniform), German Luftwaffe Commander-in-Chief Field Marshal Hermann Goering (blue
uniform), Italian Foreign Minister Count Galeazzo Ciano, Italian Prime Minister and Fascist Party Leader Benito
Mussolini, German Fuehrer Adolf Hitler (brown uniform), and German Army Gen. Wilhelm Keitel .
World at War 47

WaW 8 Issue.indd 47 8/7/09 3:25:02 PM

 the Slovak language was banned in most public institu-
tions and there was but a single library in the country (as
compared to 3,000 that would be built under the later
Czech Republic he helped destroy). Within Slovakia at
that time, out of a population of over 2 million, there
were fewer than 1,500 with professional training, and
of that number a third were clergy. It was only after
Czech and Slovak forces pushed the Hungarians out
of Slovakia that Tiso suddenly discovered he’d been a
Slovak nationalist all along. Upon the birth of the new
Czechoslovak Republic, he joined the SPP.
Recalling the promises made regarding Slovak
autonomy at the Pittsburgh conference in 1918, many
Slovaks felt betrayed when those pledges weren’t kept.
All the important government positions in Slovakia
were, in fact, held by Czechs, and almost all its police
officers and teachers were brought in from Bohemia.
To those complaints the Czechs replied that the effect
of Austro-Hungarian rule over Slovakia had been such
that there were virtually no Slovak intelligentsia in the
first years after the war.
Tiso was elected to parliament in 1925, generally
supporting the republic while in Prague, but attacking
the Czechs back home when stumping in his electoral
district. The next year he was named minister of health
in a coalition government.
In August 1938, Tiso delivered the eulogy at Hlinka’s
funeral and assumed the leadership of Slovak Peoples
Party. The conclusion of the Munich Pact on 30 Sep-
tember then gave him the opportunity to demand more
autonomy for Slovakia within what was left of the
republic. Thus he coerced Prague to grant permission
for the formation of an autonomous Slovak government
in Bratislava, but still within the overall jurisdiction of
the federal republic. Tiso then assumed the premiership
of that new government.
At the last Nuremberg Nazi Party Congress of Sep-
tember 1938—the last of 11—Hitler had trumpeted,
“I want no Czechs!” in his Thousand Year Reich. In
The two foreign ministers review a German guard of honor at
Vienna Airport in 1940, just before the Vienna Awards Conference
that redrew the map of Nazi-controlled Central Europe after the
fall of France (previously unpublished photo, JRA).
48 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 48
fact, though, he was then already plotting to seize both
the capital city of Prague and its two rich provinces,
Bohemia and Moravia. After the Munich agreement
he contemptuously referred to what remained of the
republic as “Czechia” and the “Rump State.” His key
to destroying what the Allies had created in 1919 was
to split off from it Slovakia, and in that design both Tiso
and Tuka played starring roles. As early as 14 October
1938, Hitler told Czech Foreign Minister Frantisek
Chvalkovsky: “The British and French guarantees [of
his country’s frontiers] were worthless.”
On the 21st, Hitler gave orders for a military plan
to be drawn up for the invasion of “Czechia.” As those
preparations went forward, the Fuhrer received Tuka in
a formal audience in Berlin. During that meeting Tuka
addressed him as “My Fuehrer,” adding, “I lay the
destiny of my people in your hands. My people await
their complete liberation by you.”
That was exactly what Hitler wanted to hear, and he
told Tuka he would help if Slovakia would also move to
aid itself. An overjoyed Tuka later called it the “greatest
day of my life.”
Prague reacted on 9 March 1939, when President
Emil Hacha dismissed Tiso’s Bratislava government
from office. The next day Hacha ordered the arrests of
Tiso, Tuka and other separatist Slovak leaders, while
also proclaiming martial law throughout Slovakia. Hitler
was initially taken by surprise, but on the 11th he decided
to force the issue by simply occupying all of Bohemia
and Moravia.
Meanwhile, Hacha replaced Tiso with Karel Sidor,
who’d taken office as president of Slovakia. During
his first cabinet meeting, the new Slovak leader was
called on by Nazi leader Arthur Seyss-Inquart and five
German generals, demanding he proclaim Slovakian
independence immediately, noting that otherwise Hitler
would “wash his hands of their fate.”
Tiso had in the meantime escaped from house arrest,
and he immediately accepted an invitation from Berlin
to see the Fuehrer. While locked up, the prelate had
telegraphed Hitler asking for help and had thus been
answered.
While awaiting Tiso’s arrival, Hitler dispatched 14
German divisions to the new Czech frontier, increas-
ing international tension. Tiso was informed that, if he
refused the Fuehrer’s invitation, two of those divisions
would cross the border, occupy Slovakia, and then
divide it between the Reich and Hungary. So it was
that at 7:40 p.m. on 13 March 1939, Tiso arrived at
Hitler’s study in the Reich Chancellery. The Fuehrer
was flanked by High Command Chief Wilhelm Keitel
and Army Commander-in-Chief Walther Brauchitsch.
Hitler bluntly told Tiso to accept Slovak independence
“under German military protection”—or else.
Tiso did so, signing a Nazi-drafted telegram declaring
independence and asking for Reich armed aid, which
8/7/09 3:25:02 PM
 was duly granted. The next day Hacha—also summoned
to Berlin—signed away his country’s independence.
Hitler entered Prague late that same day. As noted the
1943 edition of Current Biography:
On March 18, 1939, Tiso signed a pact with
Hitler in Vienna in which Nazi Germany guaranteed
to protect the boundaries of Slovakia for 25 years,
and in return received complete domination of the
country. Slovakia, with an area of 14,386 square miles
and a population of 2,450,096 has been drastically
Nazified under Tiso’s stewardship.
It vies with Germany in the size of its concentration
camps, in its oppression of minorities, and in its
savage treatment of political opponents. Tiso has
proved a willing Nazi tool, not only domestically,
but also in his foreign policies. At first a rabid
and open anti-Bolshevik, he temporarily changed
when Hitler signed the Non-Aggression Pact with
Stalin, and he appointed his cousin, Frano Tiso, as
Minister to Moscow. On Nov. 7, 1939, he sent an
anniversary greeting to (Soviet President) Kalinin
and on Dec. 23rd, a birthday message to Stalin, but
when Germany invaded Russia in June 1941, Tiso
sent his troops to help the Nazis.
For his betrayal of the Czechs and the Slovaks,
Tiso received the Iron Cross from Hitler on Oct.
25, 1939 and a day later was elected President of
Slovakia. Since then, he has made several unsuccess-
ful attempts to influence the Slovaks in this country
[the US]. The Slovak League of America, which
in 1918 supported with Masaryk in Pittsburgh the
independent Republic of Czechs and Slovaks, has A German Army military band plays for the victory parade in
repeatedly denounced Tiso as a traitor. On Dec. downtown Prague in the spring of 1939 (LC.)
12, 1942, Tiso’s ‘government’ declared war on the
United States.
As a priest, Tiso is ostensibly responsible to a
bishop, but the bishop under the Nazi-dominated
‘constitution’owes his allegiance to the ‘President.’
To the persecuted Catholics of Slovakia, Tiso’s very
name has become anathema. Under his rule, several
outspoken priests have been executed and hundreds
of others, including high dignitaries of the Roman
Church, are languishing in concentration camps.
His brutality toward the Catholics is rivaled only by
his treatment of his Jewish countrymen. Of 90,000
Slovakian Jews, according to figures releases by
the US State Department, some 70,000 had been
deported to East European prison and labor camps
and the remainder were expected to follow.
On March 15, 1943, the Berlin radio announced
that Hitler had decorated Tiso with the highest grade
for foreigners, the Gold Grand Cross of the Order of
the German Eagle, ‘on the fourth anniversary of the
independence of the Slovak Republic.’ In April 1943, Inside Hradcany Castle, discussing the technical problems of the
Hitler conferred at his headquarters with Tiso and other occupation of Bohemia and Moravia with Hitler are, from left to
Southeast European puppet leaders -- a fact which was right: unknown officer; Gens. Wilhelm Keitel (hand to mouth);
interpreted as indicating that he was making a supreme Heinrich von Stulpnagel and Johannes Blaskowitz; and another
bid to get men from satellite states, and to get the satellite unidentified officer inside, possibly Capt. Gerhard Engel, Hitler’s
governments to oppose actively an Allied invasion. military liaison with OKW, the High Command of the Armed
Tuka was named by Tiso as minister without portfolio Forces, run by Keitel at Hitler’s direction.
World at War 49

WaW 8 Issue.indd 49 8/7/09 3:25:04 PM

 The arrival of Czech President Emil Hacha in Berlin (second from right) on 15 March 1939 in a snowstorm. To
his left is German Reich Chancellery State Secretary Otto Meissner, and behind him the German Foreign Office’s
Secretary of Protocol, Baron Alexander von Dornberg.

on 15 March 1939, and was elevated to prime minister on 27
October. On 15 November 1941, Tuka ordered Slovakia’s
adherence to the Anti-Comintern Pact, and the next year
oversaw the deportation of his country’s Jews. Ultimately,
though, Tuka came to clash with Tiso over his desire to
replace him as supreme leader of Slovakia. Forced from
office by Tiso on 12 January 1943, he retired to an Austrian
spa until the end of the war.
To emphasize the closeness of his regime with the one
in Berlin, Tiso coined the term “Hitler-Hlinka jedna linka”
(“Hitler and Hlinka on the same track”). And, indeed, they
were on parallel courses: the new Slovak state took part in
the campaigns against Poland and the Soviet Union, and
was Germany’s sole ally until Fascist Italy’s declaration
of war against the Allies on 10 June 1940. Slovakia also
declared war on the US and Great Britain on 12 December
1941. (Because it ceased to exist as a state after the war,
Slovakia never signed peace treaties with the victorious
Allies.)
After Pearl Harbor, Hitler’s war and the German alliance
became unpopular in Slovakia because many people there
had relatives in the US. A resistance movement surfaced,
and the “Slovak national rising” erupted on 29 August
1944. Sadly, the Germans then invaded and crushed the
revolt within two months.
On 5 May 1945, Tiso and his entire government first
fled to Austria, then moved on to the Capuchin monastery
in Altotting, Bavaria, where they were taken into custody
by the US Army on 8 June. Tiso was soon thereafter de-
ported to Bratislava, where he was tried and convicted as a
war criminal. Tiso spent the night before his execution (by
hanging) in prayer with a priest, and his appeal for clem-
ency to Czech President Benes was denied. According to
the New York Times of 18 April 1947: “Msgr. Josef Tiso
walked firmly to the scaffold where he was hanged in the
Bratislava jail.”
Tuka had also been arrested and tried the previous July,
and he was also convicted as a war criminal by a Slovak
tribunal. Strangely, two dates have been recorded for his
execution by hanging in Bratislava: 20 and 28 August
1946.
at

50 #8

WaW 8 Issue.indd 50 8/7/09 3:25:05 PM

 A Fast & Easy Playing Series of Card Games
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World at War 51

WaW 8 Issue.indd 51 8/7/09 3:25:11 PM

 The Organization of the Red
Army at the Start of WW II
By Joseph Miranda

Armor
The Soviet Red Army had been a pioneer in mobile would undermine the Red Army’s mechanized forces by
warfare in the 1930s, being one of the first militaries the time that the Germans invaded the USSR in 1941.
to organize not only armored divisions but also creat- During the Spanish Civil War, Moscow provided
ing mechanized corps in 1935. On paper, the armored military assistance to the Spanish Republicans, including
formations look good, with many tanks as well as motor- large numbers of tanks. The experience of the Spanish
ized infantry, artillery and antiaircraft in support. The Civil War was that large tank formations quickly bogged
Soviets also created motorized rifle divisions which, down in combat. This was often due to a lack of train-
again, looked like reasonable combined arms forma- ing in mobile warfare, but the lesson seemed to be that
tions. Soviet industry had the capacity to provide large independent armored formations were unfeasible. As
numbers of armored vehicles and by 1938 there were a result, the Soviet People’s Commissariat for Defense
some 15,000 tanks in the Red Army’s inventory, more decided to reorganize its armored forces. The mighty
than any other country in the world. But several factors mechanized corps and divisions were broken down into
smaller units: tank/mechanized brigades which could
Red Army Armor Required Actual support infantry armies, and tank battalions assigned
Requirements on 21 June 1941 directly to infantry divisions. Effectively, a decade of
KV tanks 3,528 508 armored experience was thrown out and the Red Army
T-34 medium tanks 11,760 967 was reverting to World War I tank doctrine.
T-28 tanks 0 500 Along with the loss of the mechanized corps went
the mobile doctrine. Post World War one Soviet military
BT light tanks 7,840 6,000
thinkers emphasized the use of independent mechanized
T-26 light tanks 5,880 11,000 and cavalry units as theater maneuver units, capable of
Scout tanks 476 4222 making deep thrusts into the enemy rear and fighting
Armored cars 7448 4819 the decisive battle. With the breakup of the mechanized

52 #8

WaW 8 Issue.indd 52 8/7/09 3:25:12 PM

 Red Army Rifle Divisions Sept April July December March German Infantry
1939 1941 1941 1941 1942 Division 1941
Personnel 1,8841 14,483 10,859 11,626 12,725 Personnel 17,200
Infantry 8,000 6,800 6,300 6,600 6,600 Infantry 8000
Submachineguns 0 1204 171 582 655 Submachineguns 700
Rifles & Carbines Not 10,429 8,341 8,565 9,375 Rifles & Carbines 15,500
available
Light machineguns 578 392 162 251 352 Light machineguns 527
Medium machineguns 162 166 108 108 114 Medium machineguns 116
Quad antiaircraft 15 15 18 0 0 Quad antiaircraft 0
machineguns machineguns
Heavy machineguns 18 18 9 12 9 Heavy machineguns 0
50mm mortars 81 84 54 72 76 50mm mortars 84
82mm mortars 36 54 18 72 76 81mm mortars 58
120mm mortars 12 12 6 18 18 120mm mortars 0
Antitank rifles 60 0 0 89 279 Antitank rifles 90
45mm antitank guns 54 54 18 18 30 50mm antitank guns 75
76mm antitank guns 0 0 0 12 0 75mm antitank guns (1)
37mm antiaircraft guns 8 8 6 6 6 20mm antiaircraft guns 11
76m m antiaircraft guns 4 4 4 0 0 88mm antiaircraft guns 0
76mm field guns 38 34 28 28 32 75mm infantry guns 20 + 6 150mm
122mm howitzers 28 32 8 8 12 105mm howitzers 36
152mm howitzers 12 12 0 0 0 150mm howitzers 12
Multiple rocket 0 0 0 8 0
launchers
Tanks + armored cars 38 0 0 0 0 Tanks + armored cars 3
Motor Vehicles 817 657 208 248 169 Motor Vehicles 1394 (2)
Notes: (1) 75mm or captured 76mm antitank guns replacing 50mm starting in late 1941. (2) Includes 452 motorcycles

corps, training for such large-scale operations no longer
was conducted.
Still, Stalin was willing to learn. The German blitz-
krieg in Poland in 1939 and against the West in 1940
suddenly showed the efficacy of independent armored
operations. The Defense Commissariat quickly ordered
that the tank divisions and mechanized corps be re-
established. The dilemma was, of course, that the Red
Army’s mobile forces would have only a few months
to undo years of neglect before the Germans invaded
on 22 June 1941.
Building an armored force is not simply having
machines in the inventory, or men on the muster rolls.
A cadre of experienced commanders and well trained
troops are needed. But the commanders were not there.
The officers who should have been trained to lead large
armored formations had been dispersed throughout the
armed forces. And it was not simply combat leaders who
were conspicuous by their absence. Good staff officers
were also scarce, men who could draw up plans to coor-
dinate the movement of hundreds of vehicles in complex
operations, or who could project logistical requirements
for a modern industrial army. At the troop level, many
tank crewmen had only a few hours of experience as
drivers or on the gunnery range. Trained mechanics and
truck drivers were, like staff officers, scarce.
Making things worse were Stalin’s purges. In a pro-
longed spate of paranoia, the Soviet dictator effectively
wiped out much of the Red Army’s higher leadership.
Generals and colonels who might have been able to
provide innovative operational and tactical methods
ended up in Siberia, or executed.
Rebuilding the mechanized corps meant that for-
merly independent tank battalions and brigades had to
be combined into units one or two echelons higher than
that in which they now operated. Tank battalions were
pulled out of infantry divisions, leaving the divisional
commanders without one of their strongest units. They
were then combined with tanks battalions from other
divisions, and independent tank brigades, into the new
tank and motorized divisions. Often this was done
without regard to logistical considerations. Light tank
battalions might find themselves in the same regiment as
the heavier T-34s. This overstrained the already creak-
ing logistics system, and made coordination difficult,
again owing to the lack of qualified command and staff.
World at War 53

WaW 8 Issue.indd 53 8/7/09 3:25:13 PM


Moreover, many of the tanks were obsolete. The light
T-26, for example, could not stand up against German
Panzer IIIs and IVs.
Nonetheless, units were formed, mostly in the months
just prior to the opening of Operation Barbarossa. In
June of 1941, the Red Army had 60 tank divisions and
36 motorized rifle divisions, with most of these units in
the 29 mechanized corps. There were also some inde-
pendent heavy tank brigades, and light tank battalions.
While this was the largest armored armada in the world
(the Wehrmacht had some 20 panzer divisions at this
time), it was not an effective combat force. Most of the
divisions were at 50 percent strength in tanks. Even with
15,000 tanks, the Red Army fell short in equipping so
many large mechanized units. As the chart shows, the
Red Army had an excess of light tanks and insufficient
medium and heavy.
There were also critical shortages in trucks. Infantry
and artillery could not keep up with the tanks because of
a lack of transport. After the invasion began, Soviet tank
attacks often degenerated into “charges” which German
antitank gunners could shoot up. The Germans, for their
part, emphasized combined arms training and battlegroup
tactics, giving them the tactical advantage.
Soviet units found that large numbers of their tanks
were “down” owing to maintenance and repair issues.
Red Army vehicles frequently had to be abandoned in
the middle of a fight because they would run out of fuel.
Again, while the Red Army’s mechanized forces looked
54 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 54
good on paper, in the field they were able to use only a
fraction of their potential combat power.
The Red Army’s short term solution was to abandon
the mechanized divisions and corps as unworkable. In
the summer of 1941, they were reorganized back into
brigades to be used mainly to support the other arms.
However, the tank brigades contained the seeds of future
armor greatness. These brigades were combined arms
formations, including tank, motorized (or tank carried)
infantry, and guns. Tank companies had 5-10 tanks, giv-
ing the brigade an armored strength of about a Western
tank battalion, though the infantry and other arms in-
creased its combat power somewhat. The infantry was
there mainly to protect the tanks from enemy antitank
forces, and proved effective in this regard, though suf-
fering from a lack of armored personnel carriers. The
tank brigades later became basis for the mighty tank
and mechanized corps of 1943-45.
Infantry
The Soviet infantry (or “rifle”) division was origi-
nally intended as a combined arms formation. As noted,
it was supposed to have a tank battalion assigned to it
for support. The final Red Army reorganization just
prior to the opening of Barbarossa removed the tank
battalions so they could be used to reform the tank and
mechanized corps.
While the Red Army infantry divisions looked good
on paper, again there were shortfalls under the surface.
Stalin’s purges removed much of the capable leader-
ship, with majors sometimes commanding divisions.
While the division had what appeared to be a plethora
of support units on paper, often they were not present.
For example, engineer battalions might only be the size
of a company in a Western army.
In response to the German invasion, the Red Army
reorganized the infantry division. It was made smaller
so as to be easier to control, especially given the large
numbers of conscripts who had to be assimilated. This
also reflected the personnel situation, that pre-war in-
fantry divisions were often 50 percent under-strength,
anyway. Indeed, the Defense Commissariat convinced
Stalin in April 1941 to recall 500,000
reservists just to bring the divisions
in the western USSR up to partial
strength.
Once the war began, Red Army
practice was to build new divisions
around a cadre rather than sending
replacements to rebuild units which
had been depleted in combat. This
contrasted with the German practice
of pulling units out of the line for
replacements and rest, then sending
it back in. The advantage of the Ger-
man system was that it maintained
unit traditions and allowed veterans
8/7/09 3:25:14 PM
 to give the advantage of their experience to recruits.
Again, while the Red Army infantry division looked
similar to its Wehrmacht equivalent in general structure,
there were serious shortfalls. Divisional artillery was
only a fraction of that in the German division. This meant
that the Germans had the advantage in firepower. Soviet
medium and heavy artillery tended to be concentrated in
non-divisional units because, given the lack of training, it
was easier to control in centralized units. But this meant
that the guns were not up front to support the troops, at
least not in 1941. Antitank, flak, engineer, signal and
support units, while frequently termed battalions, would
be the equivalent of a Western company or battery in
size. The Soviet division also did not have the extensive
divisional services that the German unit did. The result
was that the Soviet infantry division tended to become
a mass of infantry supported by heavy weapons.
The Red Army also deployed the very effective
120mm mortar down to regimental level, a weapon the
Wehrmacht would later adopt. The divisional artillery
headquarters was also responsible for controlling these
mortars as well as multiple rocket launchers which were
sometimes assigned at divisional level. The Soviets
made considerable use of submachineguns and semi-
automatic rifles to increase infantry firepower, and were
somewhat ahead of the Germans in this regard. A major
Soviet weakness was the lack of radios. This made it
very difficult for commanders to control operations,
especially in mobile conditions. Soviet artillery was
good, considered to be something of an elite arm. But
the lack of radios, and just as importantly, the lack of a
fire control system, made most Red Army guns effec-
tive mainly for direct fire only. And it was here that the
Germans had a marked advantage with their superior
tactical communications and forward observer system. Forge of Victory
German units could call in artillery fire to radically Thus, while the Red Army in 1941 was woefully
increase their firepower. inadequate when compared to the Wehrmact, nonetheless
it contained considerable organizational strengths. The
Soviets held for the critical battles of 1941 and 1942,
creating the foundations for the war-winning army of
1943-45
at
World at War 55

WaW 8 Issue.indd 55 8/7/09 3:25:15 PM

 Battle of Surigao Strait, by Anthony Tully (Indiana
Univ. Press, 2009). Reviewed by Chris Perello.
Description. A detailed examination of the night battle
in the Surigao Strait, part of the larger battle for Leyte
Gulf and the last major collision of big-gun battleships. In
broad brush, it follows what may be called the standard
battle book format: the overall situation, description of
the forces, the battle itself and the aftermath. The battle
itself accounts for the lion’s share of the book. The book
is revisionist; using newly revealed Japanese sources,
Tully takes the position the Japanese didn’t stumble into
a trap, but knowingly charged forward into battle.
Good Stuff. The detail is impressive, including the
individual histories of most of the combatant ships.
Media Reviews
The combats are described in specific terms, with con-
siderable attention to the mechanisms of naval gunfire.
Tully’s argument is persuasive and well documented.
At the very least, it sheds new light on a one-sided fight
obscured by the larger actions around it.
Bad Stuff. The chapter titles are on the poetic type—tak-
en from quotes of participants—with no other guideposts;
so it is impossible to know where one is in the course
of battle without reading through several paragraphs.
The maps are woefully inadequate: there are only three
in a nearly 300-page book, one of which is relegated
to an appendix. That increases the isolation of each
chapter. Granted this battle wasn’t filled with complex
maneuvers, but there’s room here for several more map
to at least create context for the chapters.
Overall. Connoisseurs of naval combat will find much
to like, and the new material makes it a valuable addi-
tion to the story of the Great Pacific War, but an atlas
of the Leyte Gulf actions would be a valuable aid to
reading it.
Attention readers: We’re looking for media reviewers for Strategy & Tactics and World at War.
Any media will do: book, magazine, film, website, etc. Absolute max is 500 words. We want it to
be a critical analysis, not just a description. Contact Chris Perello at: cperello@calpoly.edu.
56 #8
WaW 8 Issue.indd 56
Bailout, by Don Charles Osborne (Center Street, 2009).
Reviewed by Chris Perello.
Description. This is the author’s memoir of his service
as a B-17 crewmember in Europe. Reaching the war
zone in August 1944, he flew 13 missions as a gunner
or bombardier. Those missions are recounted in brief
detail, though each adds detail to the life of an airman.
On the 14th mission, his plane was hit by anti-aircraft
fire and the crew forced to bailout. He spent the last
half-year of the war as a POW, living through increasing
destitution and a last-minute long march as the prisoners
were shepherded away from the advancing front.
Good Stuff. It’s an unusual memoir. For one thing, it’s
short and avoids the minutia clogging so many other
books of this type. It also adds a fair amount of technical
detail on the processes of flying, fighting and bombing.
Most unusually for a memoir, there are a number of
interesting photos and several good maps.
Bad Stuff. Like most memoirs, it is an intensely worm’s-
eye-view story, with relatively little context. That isn’t
a major flaw, and the maps help, but the personal story
is always part of a larger one.
Overall: One man’s story, well told.
8/7/09 3:25:16 PM
 Now Available.
Panzer Battles, by F.W. Mellenthin (1955, new release
by Spellmount, 2008). Reviewed by Chris Perello.
Description. This was one of a number of books au-
thored by German generals in the decade after the war
(others include Guderian’s Panzer General and Senger’s
excellent Neither Fear nor Hope). Like the others, this
is both a memoir of Mellenthin’s assignments and an
analysis of the combat lessons he drew from his experi-
ences on various fronts.
Good Stuff. Mellenthin served in nearly every major
theater of the war, and thus he has a great breadth of
experience on which to draw. A well trained staff officer,
he can’t help but describe actions from a dispassionate,
almost detached point of view, which reinforces the
lessons. (Both the author and the book were used as
resources for NATO armies during the Cold War.)
Bad Stuff. Not surprisingly, the author often overstates
the circumstances under which the battles were fought: The Holy Grail sought by American Civil War generals was the
German defeat is rarely explained by anything but decisive Napoleonic battle, yet it happened only rarely. This
overwhelming opposing numbers. Like all books of its book analyzes the mechanics of battle, from raising and train-
kind, Mellenthin’s takes great pains—not always hon- ing armies to planning the campaign to fighting the battle. Each
estly—to draw a clear distinction between the German chapter looks at one part of the process with a detailed account
military and the regime it served. Given the amount of of a particular battle or campaign, liberally illustrated with maps
new research on the topic, some kind of introductory and diagrams. By Christopher Perello. $35.00
material is called for; however, this is only a reprint,
with no new explanatory material and without the maps
of the original. Next book: Crowns in the Gutter.
Overall. The original printing is superior, but this book
remains one of the standard resources for German
combat techniques.
3 easy ways to order
online: www.StrategyAndTacticsPress.com
Call: (661) 587-9633
Fax: (661) 587-5031
Post: Strategy & Tactics Press
PO Box 21598, Bakersfield, CA 93390-1598
World at War 57

WaW 8 Issue.indd 57 8/7/09 3:25:18 PM

 available now!
China: The Middle Kingdom
China: The Middle Kingdom covers the full scope of
Chinese history, from its beginnings as a collection of warring
feudal states, to the current cold war between China and Taiwan.
In this epic game based on the classic Avalon Hill Britannia
system, four players each control several factions simultaneously,
with each faction having their own objectives and situations, such
as conquering certain provinces. The winner is the player who
scores the most points by the end of the game. This breathtaking
game unfolds on an illustrated map of China with 432 counters,
covering 50 separate countries and peoples, including all of the
major dynasties of Chinese history, the arrival of the European
powers, both World Wars and the Japanese invasion, right up
to the end of the civil war between the Communists and the
Nationalists. The game occurs over 24 turns, starting from 403 BC, during the
“Warring States” period as China begins to rise from its feudal age. The game
has two shorter campaign scenarios covering the first half and second half of
the full campaign game.
Battles between armies can be dramatically affected by the presence
of mountains, emperors, heroes, new inventions, and even the Great Wall.
Rebellions, barbarian invasions, and uprisings may spring up from anywhere,
and signal the end of one dynasty and the birth of a new dynasty. Diplomacy
is as important as military strength. Each player continually must defend
against multiple enemies on multiple fronts. $60

Highway to the Reich

Highway to the Reich is a tactical simulation of the largest airborne operation in
history. Over 35,000 men belonging to 1st Allied Airborne Army dropped from
the skies of Holland. Their objective: capture and hold a highway. The result:
a salient into German territory that lacked only the last objective, and was thus
a tragic defeat.
The 2,000-plus counters detail Gen. Brereton’s airborne corps of three divi-
sions, the units of 30th Corps, and Model’s scattered and disheveled forces at
company level for infantry; battery level for artillery, anti-tank and anti-air, and
troop-level for tanks and armored cars.
The four maps cover from the front along the Meuse-Escaut Canal to
the area, nearly 200 hexes away, surrounding Arnhem Highway Bridge.
Each map is positioned to cover the operational area of one airborne
division in order to allow one-division scenarios.
All the activities of each formation are completed before those of
another are begun. Attacks start with a preliminary barrage, followed
by fire attack by maneuver companies, and then close action with tanks
and assault troops. All activities involve comparisons of involved units’
capabilities. Optional rules focus on hidden movement and multi-player
variations, as well as giving the Allied player the opportunity to execute
his own operational plan. The revisions have made this classic game
easier and faster to play than ever before. $160

Contents:
Four 22” x 34” maps Player Aid Cards
2,520 die-cut counters Campaign Analysis
Rule & scenario books Six-sided Dice
6 Organization Charts

58 #8

WaW 8 Issue.indd 58 8/7/09 3:25:24 PM

 available now!
Flying Circus:
Aerial Combat in WWI
Flying Circus: Aerial Combat in WWI depicts the fun and flavor of World War I aerial dogfight-
ing. You fly the colorful and agile aircraft of WWI as you make history in the world’s first use of
aircraft in a military role.
This is the basic game. You have everything you need to play single aircraft duels to multi-air-
craft dogfights. Each aircraft has its own unique characteristics reflected in its ratings and special
abilities. The basic game rules cover all the maneuvers that made WWI aerial combat: barrel rolls,
stall turns, Immelmanns, vertical rolls and Chandelles. Outmaneuver your opponent to line up your
guns and watch his planes go down in flames!
Gamers who have played the Down in Flames game series will find many similarities in game
play, however, previous experience is not necessary. The basic game rules can be read in less than
20 minutes and you can play your first game immediately. Includes: 110 full color playing cards & rules sheet. $
23

This is the deluxe game. You will need the basic game
card deck to play this expanded version. Then you will have
everything you need to play single aircraft duels and team
play with multiple flights in swirling dogfights. This deluxe
game adds rules for altitude, pilot abilities—including a Shipping Charges
deck of 25 pilot cards for historical campaigns—bombers, 1 unit
st
Adt’l units Type of Service
rear gunners, scouts and other optional rules. This deluxe $12 $2 UPS Ground/USPS PM + $5
game also includes cards and rules for playing multi-mis-
24 4 Canada
sion games of famous WWI campaigns such as Cambrai
and Meuse-Argonne, along with a “Campaign Analysis” 34 8 Europe, South America
article detailing the development of the aircraft, their tactics 38 9 Asia, Australia
and strategy. $40
QTY Title Price Total
Contents: China The Middle Kingdom $60
110 Deluxe deck cards (bombers, scouts, plus more fighters & action cards)
Deluxe Game rules booklet Highway to the Reich $160
6 Campaign Cards Flying Circus-Basic $23
Pilot Log
36 Pilot & altitude cards Flying Circus-Deluxe $40
Dice marker Shipping

Name
Address
City/State/Zip
Country
V/MC # Exp.
PO Box 21598 Signature
Bakersfield CA 93390
661/587-9633 • fax 661/587-5031 • www.decisiongames.com Phone #
World at War 59

WaW 8 Issue.indd 59 8/7/09 3:25:28 PM

 Decision Games…
Games
your full line game publisher.
Ancient to Renaissance QTY Issue #/Game Title Price TOTAL
Battles of the Ancient World $80
China the Middle Kingdom $60
Empires of the Middle Ages $100
Americana
Rebels & Redcoats $80
Battle Cry of Freedom $40
War Between the States $110
Seven Days Battles $28
Blue & Gray $35 Sub Total
Antietam Campaign $35 Sub Total
The Alamo $15 TAX (CA. RES.)
Lords of the Sierra Madre $40 Shipping from Chart below
Gunpowder & Napoleonic TOTAL ORDER
Napoleon’s Last Battles $35
Emperor’s First Battles &
Napoleon’s First Battles $40
Thirty Years War Quad $35 Shipping Charges
Empires at War $35 1 unit
st
Adt’l units Type of Service
The ‘45 $35 $12 $2 UPS Ground/USPS PM + $5
The Sun Never Sets $40 24 4 Canada
34 8 Europe, South America
World War I
38 9 Asia, Australia
Nine Navies War $50
Over The Top! $38
Storm of Steel $140
Name
World War II
Battles for the Ardennes $38 Address
Battle for Germany $15
Battle Over Britain $20 City, State Zip
Beyond the Urals $25
country
Cherkassy Pocket:
Encirclement at Korsun $45 Phone email
Drive on Stalingrad $48
Highway to the Reich $160 VISA/Mc (ONLY)#
Land without End $50 Signature Exp.
Luftwaffe $50
NUTS! $40
Operation Kremlin $35
Pacific Battles, Vol. 1:
The Rising Sun $48 Decision Games
USN Deluxe $70 PO Box 21598
Modern Bakersfield CA 93390
Firefight $15 661/587-9633
The Forgotten War: Korea $40 Fax- 661/587-5031
www.decisiongames.com
60 #8

WaW 8 Issue.indd 60 8/7/09 3:25:30 PM

 Windows Edition
War in Europe is a computer-moderated simulation of the European Theater
of Operations in World War II.  There’s no computer/AI player in the game;
players make all the critical decisions. You decide on production schedules,
declare war on neutral nations, and control the ground, air, sea and strategic
forces of the Axis, Allied and Soviet powers in order to change or recreate
the events of the war. The game is a division-level simulation, with some
brigade and corps-sized ground units. Play takes place on a 159x133 hex
map of Europe and North Africa. Naval power and air power are abstracted
as points rather than on-map units, including: surface fleet, U-Boat,
transport, amphibious assault, tactical air and strategic bomber points.

F Battle on three fronts—War in the West (two-player, Allies versus

Axis); War in the East (two- player, Soviets versus Axis); and
War in Europe (three-player, Axis versus Allies & Soviets).
F Select from 10 scenarios (shorter games focused on a single major
offensive), or 16 campaigns (the whole war from a specified date
through May ‘45 or the defeat of one side).
F A unique “tabbed” map display allows each player to define his
own set of map views, while also allowing one-click switching
between areas of interest.
F Multiple map overlays show the supply net, territory ownership,
air range, and zones of control.
F Fully integrated PBEM mode, with autosend, inbox, browse mode
and multiple file load/save tracking.
F Support for any screen resolution; multiple customizable map sets
and customizable icons.
F Fully featured game editor for creation of new scenarios and
campaigns; create new units, new setups, and edit the data tables
used in the game. $59.95
Shipping Charges
1 unit
st
Adt’l units Type of Service
$12 $2 UPS Ground/USPS PM + $5
System requirements :
24 4 Canada OS : Windows 98/ME/NT/2000/XP/Vista (XP/Vista recommended)
34 8 Europe, South America CPU : Pentium III 800Mhz (Pentium 4, 1.2Ghz recommended)
RAM : 128 MB (256 MB recommended)
38 9 Asia, Australia Screen : Minimum resolution 1024x768, 16 bit color
HD : 50MB free space
Windows Compatible Sound Card and Mouse
Name
Address
City/State/Zip
Country
V/MC # Exp.
Signature PO Box 21598
Bakersfield CA 93390
Phone # 661/587-9633 • fax 661/587-5031 • www.decisiongames.com
World at War 61

WaW 8 Issue.indd 61 8/7/09 3:25:32 PM

 Decision Games…
Games
publisher of military history magazines & games

Here is the Pacific Theater like never before. Advanced Pacific

Theater of Operations is the most comprehensive game ever pub-
lished on this topic, encompassing the entirety of the war in the
Pacific. From the Japanese invasion of China in 1937 to the end of
the war, the entire conflict is portrayed.
Like Advanced ETO, the forces in APTO are exactingly accurate
and have been exhaustively researched. There’s no guesswork;
every piece is based on the most thorough study ever devoted to
a wargame. It even features all the Soviet and Japanese forces
that engaged in the “Nomonhan Incident,” along with the units of
every nationality that fielded a military in the war. Indeed, this is
actually a division-level game, and is even more detailed than the
acclaimed Advanced ETO.
APTO and AETO can be linked to simulate the entire Second
World War more accurately than any other game ever produced.
This is more than an AETO supplement; though, in that it features
special rules for: elite pilots, atomic bombs, midget submarines,
coast-watchers, tropical disease and more.
Advanced PTO is the most realistic yet playable game on the
subject; it includes admirals and generals, every type of aircraft
and every capital ship that existed in the Pacific Theater, and even
some refits. APTO represents the ultimate blend of playability and
detail. In conjunction with AETO and also Africa Orientale Itali-
ana (the East African expansion for AETO and APTO), no World
War II strategic series has ever been so all-encompassing, detailed,
playable and realistic.

Contents:
• 1,680 Die cut counters
• 2 34” x 22” Map
• 2 Rule booklets & 1 Scenario booklet
• Player Aid cards & display
• 3 Dice
• Storage bags

62 #8

WaW 8 Issue.indd 62 8/7/09 3:25:34 PM

 Available Now!

Africa Orientale
Italiana—AETO
Expansion
The first game to cover the entire East African
Theater of Operations during World War II, Africa
Orientale Italiana (Italian East Africa or AOI) is
designed to expand Advanced European Theater of
Operations into Africa and the Middle East, as well
as presage the general war in Europe, beginning with
the Italian invasion of Ethiopia in 1935, and continu-
ing into the Second World War as British and Italian
forces fight for control of the vital Red Sea region.
AOI also includes an entire map of India and the
Indian Ocean that will link to Advanced Pacific
Theater of Operations, thus being the only corps-
level World War II game ever published that connects
every front of the war via uninterrupted hexagonal
maps. Further, a Global Administrative Map is also
included that allows you to manage off-map move-
ment.
AOI also includes a full counter sheet (280 units)
that features the Ethiopian order-of-battle, all the such as: combat veterans, naval night movement, mountain pass movement,
Italian and British forces that operated in East Africa, fire bombing, German Flak, Manstein and more.
as well as a complete AETO upgrade that includes
AOI also includes a map of Spain that adds additional Atlantic Ocean sea
40 new types of aircraft, such as the Me-163 Comet,
areas to AETO, and incorporates an entire Spanish Civil War scenario with
the Mig-3, the PBY Catalina, and the Gloster Meteor.
a complete order-of-battle of Nationalist and Republican land, air and naval
AOI also includes new rules specifically for AETO,
units. With AOI, AETO and APTO players can experience all of World War
II. AOI has been designed to link with the AETO and APTO maps, or to be
set-up alone as a scenario of the Ethiopian campaign.
This is an expansion kit for Advanced European Theater of Opera-
tions. You must own the base game to play this expansion.

Contents:
QTY Title Price Total • 280 Die cut counters
• 1 34” x 22” Map
Adv Pacfic Theater Op. $120
• 2 11” x 17” Maps
Africa Orientale Italiana $35 • 1 Rule booklet
• Player Aid cards & display
Shipping • Storage bags
PO Box 21598
Bakersfield CA 93390
Name 661/587-9633 • fax 661/587-5031 • www.decisiongames.com
Address
City/State/Zip Shipping Charges
1st unit Adt’l units Type of Service
Country
$12 $2 UPS Ground/USPS PM + $5
V/MC # Exp.
24 4 Canada
Signature 34 8 Europe, South America
Phone # 38 9 Asia, Australia
World at War 63

WaW 8 Issue.indd 63 8/7/09 3:25:38 PM

 Turning the Pages of History
Strategy & Tactics magazine covers all of military history and
its future possibilities. The articles focus on the ‘how’ and
‘why’ of war, and are richly illustrated with maps, diagrams
and photos. Use the subscription card or order online.
Don’t miss a single issue!

In-Depth Analysis

Detailed Maps

Orders of Battle

P.O. Box 21598

Bakersfield, CA 93390-1598
ph: (661) 587-9633 • Fax: (661) 587-5031
64 #8 www.StrategyAndTacticsPress.com

WaW 8 Issue.indd 64 8/7/09 3:25:43 PM