Maneuver Warfare - Lessons Learnt from Manstein, Rommel & Guderian

[PanzerKiel]

@Armchair @PanzerKiel can you guys kindly suggest me some books on defence and strategic studies?
syllabus includes strategic thoughts of sun tzu, carl won clauzwitz, henry jomini, machiavelli,hazrat khalid bin walid,alfred t mahan, mckinder, galio douhet and lidel hart.


nuclear strategies by
1 bernard brodie
2 albert wohlsetter
3 thomas schelling
Any book or books would be great help!!

 

[SD 10]

Thanks. Highl appreciated!!

 

[PanzerKiel]

@Armchair @PanzerKiel can you guys kindly suggest me some books on defence and strategic studies?
syllabus includes strategic thoughts of sun tzu, carl won clauzwitz, henry jomini, machiavelli,hazrat khalid bin walid,alfred t mahan, mckinder, galio douhet and lidel hart.


nuclear strategies by
1 bernard brodie
2 albert wohlsetter
3 thomas schelling
Any book or books would be great help!!

 

[Armchair]

Point 2 is also debate-able, if you can clarify it in detail....just to give you an example....Indian accounts are full of praise for tactical handling and drills of PA armor at Khem Karan.

I'd love to learn more. The little I know - Pakistan chose the position to attack poorly, and the battle was not a successful employment of blitzkrieg. Khem Karan is 5 km from the Pakistani border.

 

[PanzerKiel]

@Armchair @PanzerKiel can you guys kindly suggest me some books on defence and strategic studies?
syllabus includes strategic thoughts of sun tzu, carl won clauzwitz, henry jomini, machiavelli,hazrat khalid bin walid,alfred t mahan, mckinder, galio douhet and lidel hart.


nuclear strategies by
1 bernard brodie
2 albert wohlsetter
3 thomas schelling
Any book or books would be great help!!

I'd love to learn more. The little I know - Pakistan chose the position to attack poorly, and the battle was not a successful employment of blitzkrieg. Khem Karan is 5 km from the Pakistani border.

Nopes...Khem Karan wasnt the objective.

 

[Armchair]

Excellent! lots of good reading! I'll download it all but I hate reading on a screen.

 

[PanzerKiel]

I'd love to learn more. The little I know - Pakistan chose the position to attack poorly, and the battle was not a successful employment of blitzkrieg. Khem Karan is 5 km from the Pakistani border.

That plan, both sides agree, was brilliant in its conception and had great potential had it been properly implemented at Divisions and Brigades' levels.

Excellent! lots of good reading! I'll download it all but I hate reading on a screen.

Get them printed then......thats what i do.

 

[SD 10]

Nopes...Khem Karan wasnt the objective.

 

[Armchair]

Nopes...Khem Karan wasnt the objective.

I think the bottom line is that it was not an example of successful blitkrieg. That's how far they managed to get.

That plan, both sides agree, was brilliant in its conception and had great potential had it been properly implemented at Divisions and Brigades' levels.

But.... bottom line is it was not a successful implementation of maneuver warfare. Meaning, there is no success story here. We can spin it as we like and make all the excuses but bottom line is bottom line.

 

[PanzerKiel]

I think the bottom line is that it was not an example of successful blitkrieg. That's how far they managed to get.



But.... bottom line is it was not a successful implementation of maneuver warfare. Meaning, there is no success story here. We can spin it as we like and make all the excuses but bottom line is bottom line.

Where did i say that it was a success?

The little I know - Pakistan chose the position to attack poorly

I disagree....you may like to keep in mind that those were also good brains at that time who planned all this.....

View attachment 641967

 

[Armchair]

Where did i say that it was a success?



I disagree....you may like to keep in mind that those were also good brains at that time who planned all this.....

View attachment 641967

So, we were discussing employment of Deep Battle and German blitzkrieg and I noted:

Pakistani attempts at tank dominant armoured thrusts have almost always been a failure.

You mentioned:

Point 2 is also debate-able, if you can clarify it in detail....just to give you an example....Indian accounts are full of praise for tactical handling and drills of PA armor at Khem Karan.

But this doesn't follow logically as Khem Karan was a failure so it does not prove a success in the employment of German maneuver tactics for Pakistan. Leaving the ifs and buts aside... is that not the reality? Sorry don't mean to upset you.

 

[PanzerKiel]

So, we were discussing employment of Deep Battle and German blitzkrieg and I noted:



You mentioned:



But this doesn't follow logically as Khem Karan was a failure so it does not prove a success in the employment of German maneuver tactics for Pakistan. Leaving the ifs and buts aside... is that not the reality? Sorry don't mean to upset you.

Point is.... Something might be a success at tactical and operational level, but not strategic level.... And vice vers ....

You need to be much clearer once you mention s thing like.... Khem Karan battle was a case of bad handling Of armor by PA... what you should add is at what level was it a success and where it was a failure.... Or was it a complete success or failure..... This you'll know once you read the battle in detail, not just the outcome. If outcome was important then no need to study Germans since they lost the war... This thread becomes a No-Go then.

But this doesn't follow logically as Khem Karan was a failure so it does not prove a success in the employment of German maneuver tactics for Pakistan. Leaving the ifs and buts aside... is that not the reality? Sorry don't mean to upset you.

Correspondingly, blitzkrieg was also a failure then... So it also disproves German armor tactics failed.... No need to discuss anything German here then.

Name of the thread needs to get changed then or... A new thread?

 

[Armchair]

Point is.... Something might be a success at tactical and operational level, but not strategic level.... And vice vers ....

You need to be much clearer once you mention s thing like.... Khem Karan battle was a case of bad handling Of armor by PA... what you should add is at what level was it a success and where it was a failure.... Or was it a complete success or failure..... This you'll know once you read the battle in detail, not just the outcome. If outcome was important then no need to study Germans since they lost the war... This thread becomes a No-Go then.

But the Germans had many many battles they won, while Khem Kharan, would not even be considered a battle in German terms, was a small skirmish 5 km from the Pak border where PA was beaten by the IA.

I'm trying to think of a successful employment of maneuver warfare by either India or Pakistan. This is not even going to the scale of operations that the Germans engaged in, nothing similar exists in Indo-Pak history.

I'm all ears to hear how you think that Khem Karan was a successful employment of German maneuver warfare. It sounds to me more like India talking about how they defeated China in the latest border skirmish in Ladakh... but I would love to hear your explanation of it. Perhaps I'm grossly wrong and it was a resounding success at some level. Perhaps a microscope is needed to see that level and I don't have the depth of knowledge to see that microscopic success story...

 

[PanzerKiel]

2. Pakistani attempts at tank dominant armoured thrusts have almost always been a failure.

That's a big sweeping and generic statement which can be negated by multiple examples.

But the Germans had many many battles they won, while Khem Kharan, would not even be considered a battle in German terms, was a small skirmish 5 km from the Pak border where PA was beaten by the IA.

I'm trying to think of a successful employment of maneuver warfare by either India or Pakistan. This is not even going to the scale of operations that the Germans engaged in, nothing similar exists in Indo-Pak history.

I'm all ears to hear how you think that Khem Karan was a successful employment of German maneuver warfare. It sounds to me more like India talking about how they defeated China in the latest border skirmish in Ladakh... but I would love to hear your explanation of it. Perhaps I'm grossly wrong and it was a resounding success at some level. Perhaps a microscope is needed to see that level and I don't have the depth of knowledge to see that microscopic success story...

Keeping German operations as a yardstick, you will hardly find an operation matching their scope in subcontinent.

First of all then, you need to find somewhere the detailed account of Khem Karan battle.

 

[Joe Shearer]

That's a big sweeping and generic statement which can be negated by multiple examples.



Keeping German operations as a yardstick, you will hardly find an operation matching their scope in subcontinent.

First of all then, you need to find somewhere the detailed account of Khem Karan battle.

Umm, 2 stops away - the Bridge at Dograi, the Bridge at Barki.....