"The Horny Goat" ha scritto nel messaggio
news:uskgm5da2mf6l95h91qkje16apstjp8alh@4ax.com...
> On Tue, 2 Feb 2010 09:25:54 +0100, "Michele"
> wrote:
>
>>> Hitler seems to have largely given up on paratroop operations after
>>> Crete though had he intended to equip Rommel with infantry he would
>>> have done better to send more trucks than paratroopers who are
>>> relatively immobile once on the ground.
>>
>>Yes, if one did have spare trucks that would have been a good idea. Also
>>note the usual logistical bottleneck. men and light equipment are easier
>>to
>>send. In a pinch they can be deployed by air, and they are a more
>>manageable
>>payload by ship. Trucks are more difficult, and every additional truck you
>>send also needs additional fuel, of course, which is even more difficult,
>>and so on.
>>
> Also (as was shown in spades at Arnhem) with trucks you can use
> heavier anti-tank weapons than are readily man-packable.
>
> Were the German airborne troops in North Africa issued with heavier
> weapons than their usual air-droppable kit?
>
> No one denies they were darned good infantry - the question concerns
> their equipment.
Both the German _and the Italian_ paratroopers (the Italian ones were those
who beat back the Southern attack at El Alamein) received attachments.
Artillery battalions and batteries racked up here and there and assigned to
them, say. Individual 88s in the AT role. Not all of those had integral
motor transport. The paratroopers themselves had to rely on army-level
rear-echelon truck units for their logistics, and these might be ordered
elsewhere at the inconvenient moment. The divisional kitchens, when the
British finally attacked, were in Italy, and makeshift replacements were
used. Things like that. It's better than nothing but it's not the same as an
organic infantry division with its own artillery regiment, its own AT units,
its own logistics, and not just from the POV of the equipment but also from
the POV of unit cohesion.
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