pamak

Thank you for the reply Ssnake. This was exactly what I was looking for.

Thank you Abraxas for the reply. I am not sure if any of the above is equivalent to the "passage of lines" operation as it is defined in the Anglo-Saxon manuals. For example, I do not think that any of the terms you mention can be used to describe the operation of passing a whole tank division passing through a friendly infantry division in order to continue an attack An English manual or war diary or operations order will describe such an operation by saying that the tank division executes a passage of lines. In other words, the term "passage of lines" is quite broad and describes an operation which can include many of the elements you mention, such as, coordination lines or gaps between minefields and so on.

Hello everybody, I am trying to find the German term for the "passage of lines" type of operations. I often find this term in English manuals (forward or rearward passage of lines) which signifies the type of operation during which a unit passes through the area of a friendly unit in order to continue an attack (as in the case of the forward passage of lines) or to withdraw towards the rear (as in the case of the rearward passage of lines). However, I cannot find this type of operation in the few German WWII manuals I have. I also tried to find the German term in the TM 30-506 (German-English Dictionary) but I could not find it. I am somewhat surprised that the German manuals I have (including Truppenführung) do not include the " passage of lines" operation together with the the classic ones of march, attack, defense, delay, withdraw, etc. On the other hand, it does not make sense to assume that the Germans ignored and did not teach the principles of the "passage of lines" this operation. So, there must be somewhere a German term equivalent to the "passage of lines." Can anybody help? Thank you

I guess the issue is that in combat situation you do not have the luxury of training enviroment to play safe. The best approach will often be the one with tricky terrain at high speed in the middle of smoke and other LOS obstacles and adrenaline which can make even the best tanker commit serious mistakes. By the way, how many times during your carreer you were forced to ask for recovery (do not be ashamed ) and how many hours of cross-country in bad terrain you roughly estimate to have under your belt?

hello I was participating in a discussion in another forum and the subject of off-road tank mobility was brought up. Obviously there are many parameters linked to it, weather, slope, type of soil , obstacles, vegetation and so on. In that discussion there were basically two arguments. On one side some people were saying that in good conditions basically dry flat terrain the probability of immobilization cause of terrain would be minimal, in the order of 1%, or as someone said it will be comparable to the immobillization cases during a movement in dirt roads. Some data about road movement were also brought in conversation. Others said that even in those conditions of flat dry terrrain, there is a good chance to see a tank getting stuck by rocks, branches of wood ,terrain anomalies (which exist even in "flat terrain") and so on. The problem according to the second side is that those things can immobilize temporary a tank. In most cases these will be short-time immobilzations. The crew will be able to overcome the problem very quickly on its own. The use of a recovery vehicle (or another tank) will be nessesary only in the most serious cases, which will be relative few compared to the "short-term immobiliations" which actually happen in the field. In addition, since these short term immobilizations can not really be tracked by data since most of them will not be recorded in unit diaries and road movement information, so it is difficult for simulation developers to develop an accurate cross-country movement behavor . Anyway according to the second side, the situation is certainly not comparable to a road march on a dirt road. The cases of immobilizations in flat dry terrain would be much more. I decided to come here and ask the opinion of members since i know there are many who have real life experience. So how often during your career you found youself temporary immobilized in a cross-country movement in a "good going" terrain? Meaning get stuck for whatever terrain reason (not mechanical breakdown) for a very short time, (a few minutes) and be able to overcome the situation without the need of another tank or recovery vehicle. How often during your carreer you were forced to ask for a recovery vehicle (or another tank) to help you overcome a serious case of immobilization? How many miles of cross-country movement you think you accumulated during your service? What were the dominant terrain you encountered during your cross-road movement? Do you have any idea about the expected percentage of tanks which will become immobilized because of terrain during a typical cross-country movement during an attack in different enviroments and weather? Finally how does SB treat this subject regarding the probability of a tank getting stuck in dry terrain or mud? I understand that this question is too broad and there are too many parameters to give a certain answer. I am trying to find a very rough approximation . By the way, when i did a search regarding this subject i found some links expressing probability of traversing a certain type of terrain ,in global security pages. However, this was not linked to the legth of the route. So if for example a certain type of terrain gave a 80% probability to traverse it, then that would be the same nomatter if we were talking about a 10 miles or 1 mile travel distance. So it was basically a 80% chance to see all vehicles traverse any length of route over this terrain or a 20% to have this terrain impassable by all units. Dose anybody have data linking length of cross-country movement and terrain casualties ? The link i am talking about is the following http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/fm/5-430-00-1/CH7.htm Thank you

in real life is there some rule of thumb regarding the time you fire from the same hull down location? Assume that enemy is aware of your general position and is able to kill you

thank you for the answer. yes i was curious to see if the computer can bracket you . As to the other coment about seeing the same question in the battlefront forum, i guess it has to do with the fact that you can have the same question about a different game

Hello everybody. I have one question regarding how probability of hit works. Assume you are stationed in a hull down position, against computer controll units. Is the probability of hit linked to the amount of time you remain in the same position (increase over time)? In other words Do you reduce the probability of hit by enemy computer controlled units if you change locations frequently and pop up in different hull down positions nearby? Thank you

"Well, I am kinda shocked that no one tried to do a thread about this before" I guess one of the reasons is that Europeans are relative less linked to markets at a personal at least level. For example if in US you count on your 401 as the main source of retirement and having Social security as a secondary one, in Europe it is actually the opposite. On the other hand i do not know the situation for every EU country. I live in US for the last 7 years and i just see the differences between US and Greece, my country of origin. It will be intersting to see the perception at a personal level from people living in different countries. At a national level, with this type of interconnection between economies, we are all in deep shit. If a strong player goes down ,everybody will.

I did not want to make it sound narrow. That is why i used the word "potential firepower". The less time you have ,the less fire you can apply using the same exact number and types systems . It is not just the fact that acting fast you gather less equipment overall . It is not only about the number of fire systems you can bring to the battlefield. It is more general including things like, less supply available, no time available to establish common survey, register and so on that make the already available fire systems apply less firepower . A single artillery piece for example has a "potential firepower" which is a "ranged value". Acting slower in general has the effect that you are able to get the higher range value while acting faster gives you values of the lower range. However, as i explained before the benefits of blitzkrieg approach come from other sources. During wwi, lot of firepower was applied to overcome trenches and machine guns, and this is understandable considering that tanks were either not available to assist for the most part of the war or were very unreliable. However, days were required to bring all this impressive firepower towards the enemy . At the same time you delivered this firepower, you also delivered a warning about your intentions and by the time you started moving forward you had an enemy who had much less uncertainty about your actions and much time to apply countermeasures and beat your attack.

To me Blitzkrieg is the willingness to trade a portion of your potential firepower and information , in exchange of more speed. Of course as others said, everybody needs to use firepower under any theory. The idea is that under blitzkrieg you count on going with less (firepower and information) but still be able to overpower your enemy because 1. He also has less information (operationally speaking) and the simple fact that you go faster than him adds more uncertainty to his side. So although you accept higher level of uncertainty, you still aim towards information dominance over the enemy 2. He also has less firepower cause he lacks information and time to concentrate it against you. Again you aim to overpower him at a location of your choice , and although you traded a portion of firepower for speed, the simple fact that you have the initiative to choose where to fight and speed of execution, gives you the time advantage of concentrating superior firepower over him before he applies counter-measures.

I get the idea and i will agree. Can somebody recall a book about a unit's experience in national training center? Was it "dragons's at war" or something? I think i recall the description of one scenario where the oppossing force (tanks) decided to use tactics similar to the ones described here. That is using frontal cover and dead areas to engage the attackers piece-meal. There was actually a drawing of the terrain profile and the use of dead spaces by the opposing force (tanks). Does anybody have it available for a quick review to confirm it? I recall also that the first time when the attackers were opposed by such tactics ,they lost. They had to modify their attacking tactics and won the second engagement. Can anybody who has the book , comment about the nature of those changes?

I understand the logic behind bounding in a higher level. I am going to assume that this forces companies to be more concentrated in order to have a stationary company in overwatch able to observe the ground in front of the moving one,ready to engage possible targets. Do you also have a closer seperation distance between platoons? Can you also clarify if this so short seperation distance of 5-10 meters between tanks is real life practice in your army or "personal preferance" ? As to your example , i have a few observations. I will assume that if a battalion commander assigns a whole company for overwatch, he will expect that his subordinates will concentrate more towards speed than security. The coordination lines and times for advance will certainly reflect the commander's intentions clearly and will actually prohibit the subordinates to apply too much overwatch. The way i see it, having a company advancing using bounding overwatch , takes at least twice as long compared to a continous advance of the same level element. For every subordinate element adopting bounding overwatch, the time of advance increases. So if a company using bounding overwatch, has its platoons using also bounding overwatch, it will need at least twice the amount of time to reach the same point on the ground, compared to a company using bounding overwatch only at the company level. The other thing is that it is not exactly clear what is too much overwatch. IF there is not a clear threat, then your example can be too much overwatch. It sacrifices speed for security and leads to an unacceptable slow rate of advance . You can not acheive surprise and decisive results with such a slow tempo If on the other hand there is a clear enemy resistance, then you do not really know what is the "appropiate" level of overwatch. In this case , you go by the signs and feedback you get from the battlefield. IF by bounding at company level you are able to acheive fire superiority and you are able to advance your platoons with an acceptable rate of casualties, then you have an "appropiate" level of overwatch. IF you are not able to do so, then you need more bounding overwatch at platoon level and again you monitor for the results. IF this is not enough ,then you go with bounding overwatch at a lower level and yes it might be the case where you might need to have 28 tanks engaging the enemy from stationary positions , in order to have only 8 tanks closing the distance with him. It is true though that if the attack tempo becomes so slow, the attacker is in difficult position, since time in general works against him and in favor of the defender.

Do not pay too much attention to the type of formation. Similar results will occur under any type of formation if you decide to locate tanks near each other. The geometric implications are still the same. The difference will be the azimuth where observation will suffer. In your wedge for example , if you decide to close the seperation distance, the tanks in the rear of right and left wing will have a smaller obesrvation field towards their forward and left or right respectively. I hope you understand what i mean. IF you do not agree, i will have to make a new sketch. As to the Peri, although i do not have real life experience, i am going to assume that although you are able to see over the roofs of nearby tanks, you are not really able to observe the ground behind them up to a considerable distance. You are mostly able to observe the ground near the horizon . In addition your gun tube is blocked under any circumstances. P.s I have not played SBPRO for a long time . I wonder if what i am saying about Peri is portraited the same way inside the game.

Ok, here is one drawing i did to clarify my point. For simplicity, i am dealing with a formation of two tanks in two variations. Close formation with both tanks located near each other, and open formation, with tanks located farther apart. I drew the field of view towards the right of friendly tank numbered 1. Then i drew a friendly tank located near (number 2) and i present graphically the portion of the field of view which is blocked by its presence. Then i drew a third tank located farther away (number 3) and again i present graphically the portion of the field of view which is blocked by its presence. Notice that in the second case , a smaller portion of the field of view is affected. At the end i drew an enemy tank which can be detected and engaged by both tanks in an open formation (1 and 3) but can be detected and engaged by only one tank in the close formation variation (tank 2) P.S You have to click the picture to zoom in. The second picture is exactly the same with the first one,except that i hatched the blocked field of view in both cases, for better visualization.