Army Group (German Empire)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Army Group was the name of a large unit and the associated command authority of the German Army . An army group comprised several armies .

Until the beginning of the First World War , the armies and their associated Army High Command (AOK) were the largest military units directly controlled by the Commander-in-Chief of the Army (in the Wars of Unification this was the Prussian King Wilhelm I , in the First World War the German Kaiser Wilhelm II ) and his respective chief of staff .

Due to the very strong expansion of the army (at the beginning of the Franco-Prussian War the German army consisted of three armies with approx. 450,000 men, in the First World War the German army already went with eight armies with 2.2 million soldiers During the war, the army grew to around 3.5 million men and at last almost 20 armies and army divisions ) the Supreme Army Command was soon no longer able to lead individual armies directly, which is why these higher army group commands were subordinate to those at the end of the war to 1.5 million soldiers.

This structure was essentially retained during World War II . In both world wars, the army groups of the main theater of war were led directly by the Supreme Army Command or the High Command of the Army , while the army groups of the secondary theaters of war e.g. B. were still subordinate to their own commander-in-chief (e.g. Paul von Hindenburg commanded several army groups as Commander-in-Chief in the First World War ).

Army groups on the western front

Between August 1916 and February 1917 the western front was reorganized and the armies, which had been directly led by the Supreme Command, were subordinated to three army group commands. From north to south these were:

Outline Western Front, 1918

At the beginning of 1918 another " Heeresgruppe Gallwitz " was inserted between the Army Group of the German Crown Prince and the Army Group Duke Albrecht .

Army groups on the Eastern Front

As early as November 1914, Hindenburg had been appointed Commander-in-Chief East and briefly commanded all German troops in the East. His area of ​​command was later restricted again. At the end of 1915 there were two further large formations south of the "Army Front East" with the " Army Group Prince Leopold " and the " Army Group Linsingen ", which were directly subordinate to the Supreme Army Command.

Structure of the Eastern Front, 1915

After the Brusilov offensive , which had led to a severe defeat of the KuK army , Hindenburg received on July 27, 1916 the command over the entire eastern front up to the main ridge of the Carpathians , including the Austrian army group Boehm-Ermolli. A little later, Hindenburg became chief of the Supreme Army Command and Prince Leopold of Bavaria was his successor as Commander-in-Chief East. At the end of 1916, the Eastern Front was structured as follows under the unified supreme command of Prince Leopold (from north to south):

Web links