Heavy Tank Division

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The heavy tank detachments were battalion-sized German tank units from World War II . These were independent units that were equipped with heavy battle tanks of the Tiger and Tiger II types and were used to establish the focus.

history

development

The Commander-in-Chief of the Army, Colonel General Walther von Brauchitsch , put forward the first ideas regarding the organizational integration of heavy tank units in a memorandum in November 1938 in which he wanted to assign a heavy tank company to each tank brigade. These plans were discarded when the organization of the tank divisions had been changed at the beginning of the war and each tank division consisted of two light and one medium companies.

Although the combat experience during the attack on Poland and the campaign in the west had clearly shown the deficits of the German tanks, the development of a heavy tank was not a priority due to the rapid success. This changed after the beginning of the war against the Soviet Union , when the - still relatively seldom and tactically unfavorable use - Soviet T-34 and KW-1 outclassed the German tanks. Simultaneously with the provision of the Tiger heavy armored combat vehicle, which was then developed at an accelerated rate, the plan arose in the spring of 1942 to assign a heavy company with a total of nine tanks to each tank regiment.

When it turned out that the elaborately manufactured Tiger would never achieve such high production figures to replace the Panzer IV and that its partially severely restricted mobility opposed the Blitzkrieg tactics of the regular tank divisions, the "heavy tank divisions" were created.

structure

Organization D
Structure of the organization D

The initially chosen structure consisted of a mix of tigers and the Panzerkampfwagen III Ausf. N. This formation, which was still considered experimental, was referred to as "Organization D". Each division had three companies, each with nine Tigers and ten Panzer III. Together with the two tigers of the battalion command staff and the five Panzer III of the light platoon, a heavy tank division consisted of 29 tigers and 35 tanks III according to the war strength certificate. However, since it was not possible to set up the third company at Organization D due to the slow start of tank production, the first units consisted of 20 Tigers and 25 Panzer III. The Tiger had the task of taking out enemy tanks, while the Panzer III was to fight soft targets such as infantry or anti-tank weapons with its short 7.5 cm cannon.

Organization E
Structure of the organization E

The first combat experience showed that the combination of Tigers and Panzer III gave a high degree of flexibility. In contrast, however, it became very clear that the Panzer III was insufficiently armored and, in contrast to the Tiger, had suffered above-average losses. Due to this and the fact that more Tigers were now available due to series production, the General Inspector of the Panzer Troops, Colonel General Heinz Guderian , ordered the heavy tank departments to be divided into pure Tiger units in March 1943 . These now consisted of three companies with 14 tigers each, which together with the three staff tanks resulted in a target population of 45 tigers. The target level was almost always only reached after a refresh, so that the units usually had fewer tanks. This structure, known as “Organization E”, which was ultimately better suited for breakthroughs and at the same time meant less logistics expenditure, was not changed until the end of the war.

Support units

In addition, a heavy tank division should consist of the following support units:

Military device     1943     1945
Flakpanzer IV - 8th
Sd.Kfz. 7/1  (with 2 cm Flak Vierling 38 ) 6th 3
Armored personnel carrier Sd.Kfz. 251 10 11
Bergepanther - 5
Sd.Kfz. 9  (18-ton towing vehicle) 8th 7th
Sd.Kfz. 10  (1 ton towing vehicle) 8th 13
Sd.Kfz. 2  (Kettenkrad) - 14th
Motorcycles ( Wehrmacht team and solo bikes) 42 6th
Kübelwagen 64 38
Trucks (including Opel Blitz ) 135 118
Mule (half-track) - 6th
Crane vehicle 3 3
total 276 232

Lineup

In May 1942 the first units were set up with the heavy tank divisions 501, 502 and 503. The training was carried out by the "heavy tank operations and training department 500" at the Bergen military training area and Sennelager military training area , where the Panzerkampfwagen IV was mainly used due to the lack of training vehicles. The personnel was removed from existing units, and it also happened that existing tank departments were reclassified to heavy tank departments. Due to the fact that they were exclusively experienced personnel, the heavy tank divisions were considered elite units.

The first five established departments were structured as Organization D, while the following ones were structured as Organization E and those established up to then were reclassified to the new organizational structure. The last heavy tank department for the army was set up in June 1944 with the sPzAbt. 510. Later in the war, the units were converted to the successor to the Tiger , the Tiger II . Due to the low production figures, only a few units were fully equipped with the King Tiger at the same time. In addition, it happened that several units had to be re-established several times or returned to their homeland to refresh because they were completely worn out during the fighting.

In the course of the war the following units existed in the army :

In addition, from 1943 the Greater Germany Division had a Tiger Company, which was expanded into a full division in the summer. Some Tigers also received the "Pz.Abt. (Fkl) 301 “, which was equipped with Goliath radio armored vehicles.

In addition to the Wehrmacht, the Waffen-SS also had heavy tank units:

These departments emerged from the tiger companies of the SS divisions Leibstandarte , Das Reich and Totenkopf and were corps troops of SS Panzer Corps I to III. At the end of 1944, the heavy SS Panzer divisions were then listed under the numbers 501 to 503, whereupon the corresponding army units were renamed.

commitment

Operational doctrine

The heavy tank divisions were independent units that served to create priorities. The tiger was seen as a breakthrough weapon. The heavy tanks were supposed to pierce the enemy's defenses and thus enable the advancing units to advance. For this purpose, the departments were temporarily assigned to large units - mostly an army corps  - and placed under a division. The disadvantage of this only short-term subordination was that the higher-level associations had little understanding of the high need for repairs on the defect-prone tigers and only provided the departments with logistical support, as they were not viewed as divisional units.

The first large-scale operation took place in the battle of the Kursk Bogen , where the two participating heavy tank detachments were deployed in a tactically unfavorable manner, as the sPzAbt. 503 had to surrender their three companies to three different armored divisions and the sPzAbt. 505 was not subordinate to a tank division, but to an infantry division. In the further course of the war, the units could hardly be deployed in a concentrated manner, but almost exclusively individually. It turned out that the restricted mobility of the tiger, due to its mechanical unreliability and its short range, prevented its function as a breakthrough weapon. Due to the changed war conditions, the heavy tank detachments had to be used more and more in defense. It was often used in stationary defense, for which the tigers were not suitable. They achieved better results when they were held back as a mobile reserve and counterattacked in the event of enemy breakthroughs.

According to their doctrine, the heavy tank divisions were hardly ever used as a focus weapon. The first concentrated deployment as part of an armored force with support troops consisting of artillery and mechanized infantry did not take place until February 1945 as part of the Südwind company , which was also successfully completed immediately. At no point during the war was there a strategic breakthrough. The operational doctrine as a center of gravity and breakthrough weapon was not changed despite the greatly changed strategic situation, although the war situation made a revision of this doctrine appear necessary.

Use statistics

As the operational statistics show, the Tiger tanks recorded more losses from self-destruction and other causes than from direct enemy action, which can be attributed to the technical unreliability, the limited mobility and the lack of adequate recovery possibilities of these heavy vehicles.

Kill and loss statistics of the heavy tank divisions
unit Losses in battle Self-destruction Other losses Total losses Enemy kills Kill / loss ratio fight Total kill / loss ratio
III./PzRgt. GD 62 32 10 108 600 9.7 5.55
sPzAbt. 501 24 12 84 120 450 18.75 3.75
sPzAbt. 502 88 14th 5 107 1400 16 13
sPzAbt. 503 113 123 15th 252 1700 15th 6.75
sPzAbt. 504 29 80 - 109 250 8.6 2.3
sPzAbt. 505 47 62 18th 126 900 19th 7th
sPzAbt. 506 61 116 2 179 400 6.6 2.2
sPzAbt. 507 43 57 4th 104 600 14th 5.8
sPzAbt. 508 15th 46 17th 78 100 6.7 1.3
sPzAbt. 509 75 40 5 120 500 6.6 4.2
sPzAbt. 510 35 1 29 65 200 5.7 3
SS dept. 101 72 33 2 107 500 7th 4.7
SS dept. 102 38 29 9 76 600 15.8 8th
SS dept. 103 10 9 20th 39 500 50 12.8
sw. Kp./SS-PzRgt. 1 42 400 9.5
sw. Kp./SS-PzRgt. 2 31 250 8th
sw. Kp./SS-PzRgt. 3 56 500 9
total 712 654 214 1709 ≈ 9850 ≈ 12 ≈ 6.3

References

Web links

literature

  • Thomas L. Jentz : Tiger I & II. Combat and technology. Podzun-Pallas Verlag, Wölfersheim 2000, ISBN 3-7909-0691-3 .
  • Christopher Wilbeck: Sledgehammers. Strengths and Flaws of Tiger Tank Battalions in World War II. Aberjona Press, Bedford PA 2004, ISBN 0-9717650-2-2 (English).
  • Gordon Williamson: German Army Elite Units 1939-45 . Osprey Publishing, Oxford 2002, ISBN 1-84176-405-1 , English, full text online (PDF)
  • Franz W. Lochmann, Richard von Rosen, Alfred Rubbel, Rolf Sichel: Memory of the Tiger Department 503: The heavy tank department 503 at the focal points of the front in East and West. Flechsig, 2nd edition 2010 (1st edition 2008), ISBN 978-3881897792 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Outline → Wilbeck: sledgehammers. Pp. 19-21.
  2. ^ Wolfgang Schneider: Tigers in Combat I. Stackpole Books 2004, ISBN 9780811731713 , p. 2 (English).
  3. ↑ Wilbeck: sledgehammers. Pp. 30-31.
  4. ↑ Wilbeck: sledgehammers. P. 24.
  5. ↑ see #Literature . The 503 was set up on May 4, 1942 as the first of ten independent Tiger divisions in Neuruppin, Putlos, Fallingbostel and Döllersheim; it passed its baptism of fire on December 30, 1942 on the lower Don and on the Manych. Upgraded to full strength in February 1943 (3 companies with a total of 45 Tiger tanks), she took part in the defensive battle in the Donets region and in the Mius-Donets position in March and April 1943. Relocated to the Kharkov area, she fought at the Citadel , the last great German offensive in the east. After the fighting as part of the 8th Army on the Dnieper, near Kiev and in southern Ukraine, it opened the Cherkassy pocket together with the Bäke heavy tank regiment and thus enabled the German units to break out of the pocket. From March to mid-April 1944 she was deployed at Tarnopol. During a refresher, the 1st Company was the first unit of the German Wehrmacht to be converted to the Panzerkampfwagen VI Tiger II . From June 1944 to August, the division fought at Caen, Cagny and east of the Orne. After a refresher in Paderborn, defensive battles followed in Hungary, Operation Horty and battles in the Budapest area, on Lake Balaton, the Danube, the Carpathian Mountains and north of Vienna.
  6. ↑ Jentz: Tiger I & II: Combat and Technology. Pp. 27-29.
  7. ↑ Jentz: Tiger I & II: Combat and Technology. Pp. 143, 150, 166 and 168.
  8. ↑ Wilbeck: sledgehammers. P. 36 and 183-184.
  9. ↑ Wilbeck: Sledgehammers , pp. 182-191.
  10. ↑ Wolfgang Fleischer: The Panzerkampfwagen VI "Tiger" with the troops , Podzun-Pallas, ISBN 3-7909-0637-9 , p. 96.
  11. ↑ The shooting figures are minimum values, almost all of which should be above the stated figures. "Kill / loss ratios" are minimally rounded.
    Explanation of the table: The number 12 in the "Kill / Loss-Ratio Combat" column means that for every Tiger shot down there are 12 destroyed enemy tanks, whereby the loss of a tiger in combat could also result from artillery fire or fighter-bombers .
    Table (with the exception of the three companies of the SS tank regiments) in → Wilbeck: Sledgehammers
    data of the three companies of the SS tank regiments → Kill / Loss Ratios table (table otherwise agrees with the data of Wilbeck Sledgehammers ).