Germany Conquers Middle Eastern Oil (WWII)
FleetlordVT
East during World War Two, I got into an argument with my professor,
who asked me to provide sources as to why Germany couldn't transport
the oil out of the Middle East. I said that the Royal Navy could
intercept what little tanker tonnage was available to the Axis, and
that the single double-track route through Turkey wasn't sufficient
either.
That being said, she wanted sources. Can you all help me? Are there any
good sources, both primary and secondary that would back this up, and
is it even possible for the RN to intercept tanker traffic without
bases east of Malta? Thanks for your help. Online sources would be
best, but books are fine.
--
Richard Macdonald
news:d1vmn9$67c$1...@gnus01.u.washington.edu...
I would not worry so much about tanker tonnage as the Trans-Arabian
Pipeline (tapline) was not built until the mid 1950's so there is no
pipeline across from the Persian Gulf to the Med yet. Any flow of oil
would have to go out by rail or around the Arabian Peninsula by tanker
and up through the Red Sea and Suez Canal, quite easy for the RN
to interdict, so not practical for the axis.
Do research on the various pipelines and when they were built to verify.
--
Richard A. Macdonald. CPA/EA
SSG (Ret), USA, ADA 16P34
(Drove Tapline in 1991)
--
FleetlordVT
Richard Macdonald wrote:
> I would not worry so much about tanker tonnage as the Trans-Arabian
> Pipeline (tapline) was not built until the mid 1950's so there is no
> pipeline across from the Persian Gulf to the Med yet. Any flow of oil
> would have to go out by rail or around the Arabian Peninsula by
tanker
> and up through the Red Sea and Suez Canal, quite easy for the RN
> to interdict, so not practical for the axis.
>
> Do research on the various pipelines and when they were built to
verify.
Excellent. So the bottleneck will not be so much getting from the Med
coast to greater Europe, but from Persia/South Iraq to the coast. Thank
you for the tip.
--
Michael Emrys
rmacd...@verizon.net wrote on 3/25/05 8:54 AM:
> ...the Trans-Arabian Pipeline (tapline) was not built until the mid 1950's...
However, the pipeline from Mosul and Kirkuk in Iraq to Haifa (?) was in
existence.
Michael
--
Dwilma
could find that in just about any source the war in Russia where the
problems of supplying the armies is discussed. You would have to do
some math and calculate how much could reasonably be moved. In this
case, oil is not a supply problem, but a transportation problem.
If using Turkey is not an option, then crude or refined product would
have to go around the Black Sea where the Soviet Air Force would be an
additional factor. A single rail line would be very vulnerable to
interdiction.
Where would the crude be refined, in the ME or in Germany or occupied
territories? Did the refineries have the capacity for this new supply?
Transport by sea would not only have to confront RN surface forces, but
RAF land-based units as well.
OTOH, the axis seizing ME oil would at a minimum take it out of the
Allied equation, which should be part of your discussion as well. If
the Germans couldn't use the oil, at least they could deny it to the
Allies.
Lots of speculation.
David Wilma
www.Historylink.org, the online encyclopedia of Washington State History
--
FleetlordVT
Dwilma wrote:
> For the rail option, look at what a train could carry ca. 1940. You
> could find that in just about any source the war in Russia where the
> problems of supplying the armies is discussed. You would have to do
> some math and calculate how much could reasonably be moved. In this
> case, oil is not a supply problem, but a transportation problem.
>
> If using Turkey is not an option, then crude or refined product would
> have to go around the Black Sea where the Soviet Air Force would be
an
> additional factor. A single rail line would be very vulnerable to
> interdiction.
I don't believe British and Soviet forces could be pushed back enough
to make this line work. As you say, a single line would be at most
available, and that would be critically vulnerable to partisans in the
mountains, as well as the RAF and SAF.
>
> Where would the crude be refined, in the ME or in Germany or occupied
> territories? Did the refineries have the capacity for this new
supply?
>From what I've gathered, it would have to be refined in Germany or
occupied Europe. The space involved would give the British sufficient
time to remove or destroy most refining and extracting equipment,
putting Germany in the similar position of Japan's taking of the East
Indies oil fields.
>
> Transport by sea would not only have to confront RN surface forces,
but
> RAF land-based units as well.
And there wasn't all that much tanker tonnage available to begin with,
and production of new shipping was minimal. I've got to do research on
this, though.
>
> OTOH, the axis seizing ME oil would at a minimum take it out of the
> Allied equation, which should be part of your discussion as well. If
> the Germans couldn't use the oil, at least they could deny it to the
> Allies.
The Allies could make it up with American sources. Not a seamless
transition, but in the long term, little difficulty.
>
> Lots of speculation.
>
Yep.
--
Steve Sundberg
<jkbro...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>Excellent. So the bottleneck will not be so much getting from the Med
>coast to greater Europe, but from Persia/South Iraq to the coast. Thank
>you for the tip.
You might also cite the (recent?) disclosures that Enigma decrypting
allowed the British to sink whatever German shipping in the
Mediterranean that they wanted. Also, there were no supertankers in
existence until the 1960s. Whatever oil the Germans could have
transported via ship from the Middle East would have to have been
pumped into a large fleet of small tankers to meet their consumption
needs.
The T-2 tanker, standard in the US fleet during the war years, was
rated at 16,000 deadweight tons; the Germans had nothing approaching
the same size, more probably in the 10-12,000 deadweight ton range
that was in common use in the 1930s. The largest of the supertankers
today (the Idemitsu Maru) weighs in at 200,000 deadweight tons --
almost 13 times the size of a T-2 and 20 times the size of other
prewar oil tankers.
You might also find this link to be of interest:
Oil for the War
http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/books/wwii/persian/chapter15.htm
--
asp...@pacific.net.au
And what, conservatively, is the chance that it would be taken intact?
If you say "nil or less" then you'd be close to being accurate, I'd
guess.
Phil
Author, Space Opera (FGU), RBB #1 (FASA), Road to Armageddon (PGD).
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Email: asp...@pacific.net.au
--
Richard Macdonald
news:d229fm$2r6$1...@gnus01.u.washington.edu...
That's why I said, check when the other pipelines were built.
Any idea what them production capacity was at the time?
--
asp...@pacific.net.au
<DaveW...@aol.com> wrote:
>For the rail option, look at what a train could carry ca. 1940. You
>could find that in just about any source the war in Russia where the
>problems of supplying the armies is discussed. You would have to do
>some math and calculate how much could reasonably be moved. In this
>case, oil is not a supply problem, but a transportation problem.
ISTR that a thread on this topic here some years ago brought up the
interesting observation that the Deutsche Reichsbahn had real problems
with tanker (and other) car capacity for internal use *and* Barbarossa
at the same time and was unable to significantly increase this due to
manufacturing bottlenecks (basically resource based ... "Do you want
tanks or fuel to run the tanks?" sorta thing, but worse).
Ergo, they would now find themselves having to find *more* of the
already barely adequate tanker cars to move the oil home.
Which begs the question, of course, of exactly how they are going to
repair all the wells, wellheads, pipelines and refineries that *will*
have been destroyed in Iraq on the capacity of a single track line
that was, as of 1939 at least, decommissioned, and had been for years
(and which, also, would likely have been substantially sabotaged).
Single track lines have a daily capacity of 20000 tons, 10k tons each
way, and, sadly, they have to move the repair supplies down this track
and the oil back and they require different consists, so you'll be
getting a hell of a lot less than 10k tons of oil per day shipped
back.
Worse, this doesn't allow for any supplies for the large Axis air,
ground, and naval forces that would be required to garrison and defend
Iraq. Assume 300 tons per day for Infantry Divisions and 600+ tons per
day for Mechanised Divisions and you'll see a modest army of, say, a
dozen infantry divisions and 3 Mechanised Divisions will chew up
around 4200 tons of capacity (which mostly won't be tanker cars
suitable for shipping oil back up the line). Worse, factor in army
level units (logistics, artillery, C3I, medical, etc.) and you could
easily double that 4200 tons of supply ... and we haven't even started
on the Luftwaffe or Kriegsmarine requirements.
Suffice it to say that even a modest garrison would actually require
more than 10k tons per day ... which leaves no room for repair
supplies to repair the wells and refineries and no room for tanker
cars to ship home the oil if they were repaired.
Does the term "right royally fucked" mean anything under the
circumstances?
Andrew Clark
"Richard Macdonald" <rmacd...@verizon.net> wrote ...
> the Trans-Arabian Pipeline (tapline) was not
> built until the mid 1950's so there is no
> pipeline across from the Persian Gulf to the Med yet.
No. There was a Vichy tanker terminal at Haifa connected to
the Persian oilfields and the Basra refineries via Kirkuk.
Additionally, there was pipeline link to Alexandria, as the
RN Eastern Med Fleet got its fuel oil that way. Source:
Playfair, Vol I.
--
eleanor_on_burns
very supportive of your argument. One of the major reasons the
German's lost in North Africa is that they couldn't get supplies to
their troops. It seems the burden of proof should be on how the
Germans *could* transport crude oil, since they often had huge
logistical problems throughout the war not only in the Mediteranean,
but also on the Eastern Front and as the war progressed, even in
Western Europe. (See the chapter on Rommel in 'Hitler's General's' by
Cornelli Barnett.)
It shouldn't be ignored either, that the shift in Axis focus to the
Middle East would have brought a corresponding shift in Allied
priorities, and once the US was in the war, there would not have been
much time before the Axis was seriously outclassed in terms of weapons
production and troop numbers.
I think your Prof is seriosly off base in regards to the burden of
proof, when the most substantial evidence against his/her argument is
the actual events (German inability to maintain logistical support) in
the Mediteranean. Any route to the Middle East would have been longer,
and more susceptible to Allied interdiction.
--
Alan Meyer
> East during World War Two, I got into an argument with my professor,
> who asked me to provide sources as to why Germany couldn't transport
> the oil out of the Middle East.
Another point here is that "German conquest of the Middle East"
is much too vague. The "Middle East" is a big place. Even if the
Germans had successfully defeated the British in Egypt - a very,
very big and unlikely "if", could they have gone the further thousand
miles from Cairo to the oil fields of the Gulf? Bear in mind that
they had not really succeeded in keeping Rommel supplied in
North Africa. It was only Rommel's brilliance as a commander
that kept their offensive going.
It's hard to see how they could supply an army 1,000 miles
across the desert to get to the oil fields or to hold them after they
got there in the face of British and, if necessary, Russian or
American resistance based in much nearer countries with vastly
superior naval and air forces.
And if they did seize and hold the oil fields, how could they possibly
defend a thousand miles of pipeline or rail line against any air or
commando attacks?
German exploitation of middle eastern oil sounds like a complete
pipe dream to me.
Alan
--
Haydn
"Alan Meyer" <ame...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>Even if the
> Germans had successfully defeated the British in Egypt - a very,
> very big and unlikely "if"...
I wouldn't say it's a very unlikely if. After all, with the historical asset
at his disposal Rommel got to a place 100 kilometers west of Alexandria. I
guess it's perfectly and amply likely, though of course not a sure bet, that
a German all-out Mediterranean strategy would get him to Suez.
Naturally, there will be an important difference between squashing 8th Army
and taking Egypt (hypothesis #1) and taking Egypt while 8th Army slips off
into Palestine (#2). An Axis drive "across Suez" possibly in conjunction
with operations in Syria (Vichy French) and Iraq (Gailani insurrection) -
the logical aftermath - is quite more likely to initially succeed in case #1
than case #2.
Also, a German overland push across Turkey southward has been previously
discussed in this newsgroup. Although ridden with logistical troubles, it
can't be completely ruled out of the realm of historically possible chances.
That would be the worst and nightmarish case for Britain.
The problem obviously is what will Rommel do with any victory of his near
Jerusalem or Baghdad, assuming he will go so far. The oil wells will be in
flames and it will take the Axis months and a huge effort to start
reactivating them. Logistical constrictions about taking the oil west or
using it locally to feed the motorized forces have already been pointed out.
> It's hard to see how they could supply an army 1,000 miles
> across the desert to get to the oil fields or to hold them after they
> got there in the face of British and, if necessary, Russian or
> American resistance based in much nearer countries with vastly
> superior naval and air forces.
Much also depends on the degree of resistance the British could put up after
being chased out of Egypt. In other words, it depends on the British still
having anything like a field army or not when the Axis reaches the Canal.
Reorganizing a disrupted army is one matter; building, equipping and
training a new one from scratch is another matter and I don't believe they
could do it very quickly. Montgomery could comfortably advance all the way
Alamein to Tripoli, slowly but steadily, with just some intermissions (and
some bloody noses), also because he had so little Axis left in front of him.
Chances are an intact or rapidly reorganized full strength Rommel might have
been another story.
Haydn
--
Bill Shatzer
> On Sat, 26 Mar 2005 00:13:42 +0000 (UTC), Michael Emrys
> <em...@olypen.com> wrote:
-snip-
>>However, the pipeline from Mosul and Kirkuk in Iraq to Haifa (?) was in
>>existence.
> And what, conservatively, is the chance that it would be taken intact?
> If you say "nil or less" then you'd be close to being accurate, I'd
> guess.
Still, while the situations were not strictly comparable, the Japanese
did manage to capture a considerable portion of the oil facilities
in the NEI in an undamaged or only slightly damaged condition. The
oil facilities and oil fields at Balikpapan were captured almost entirely
undamaged and intact, for instance.
Of course, several oil facilities -were- blown before the Japanese could
capture them and the Japanese never succeeded in restoring NEI oil production
to its pre-war levels. OTOH, presumably the Germans would be more successful
in restoring damaged facilities than were the Japanese, having better
engineers and equipment, and even production at a level equal to 50% of
pre-war levels (which the Japanese obtained in the NEI) would have made
a significant contribution to the German war effort.
Shipping the oil "home" would have been a problem for sure but at
the least possession of the ME oil fields and facilities would have
supported the fuel needs of the Wehrmacht in the theatre and made it
unnecessary to ship fuel from Europe to North Africa/ME for its
support. The fuel not shipped to North Africa/ME (and the fuel
required to ship it) could then be diverted to other uses within
Europe.
Cheers,
--
"Cave ab homine unius libri"
--
Geoffrey Sinclair
>After discussing the plausibility of the German conquest of the Middle
>East during World War Two, I got into an argument with my professor,
>who asked me to provide sources as to why Germany couldn't transport
>the oil out of the Middle East. I said that the Royal Navy could
>intercept what little tanker tonnage was available to the Axis, and
>that the single double-track route through Turkey wasn't sufficient
>either.
The middle east is a rather big place and in any case if the axis
had control of the area the RN would not be able to operate in the
Mediterranean very well. Since Egypt would presumably be under
axis control.
You not only have to take into account the Turkish rail capacity but
that of the Balkans to ship the crude to refineries, if you are allowed
to use the Turkish railways in the first place. Assuming possession
of the oil fields then the amount of oil available is far greater than
the capacity of the railways to move it, and you are talking about
upgrading around 2 thousand of miles of track, Persian Gulf to
the Romanian oil fields to hook up with the oil refining and
transport system there, followed by upgrades to the transport
system, barge and rail to Germany. See the US army history The
Persian Corridor and Aid to Russia by T H Vail Motter for an idea
of the transport problems in the Persian Gulf area and the effort
needed to improve them.
>That being said, she wanted sources. Can you all help me? Are there any
>good sources, both primary and secondary that would back this up.
The problem here is the forces needed to take and hold the area
compete with the raw materials for supply lift.
The UK history merchant Shipping and the demands of War by
C Behrens notes the Italian Merchant marine had 571 ships of
1,600 or greater Gross Registered Tons, totalling 3,107,000 GRT.
Of this 82 ships of 427,000 GRT were tankers.
The book the Italian Navy in World War II by Bragadin uses 500 GRT
as the lower limit for counting ships, says on 10 June 1940 the Italian
merchant marine was 786 ships of 3,318,129 GRT of which 212
ships of 1,216,637 were trapped outside the Mediterranean, in
addition there were 26 ships of 352,051 tons decommissioned as
unsuitable or being turned into hospital ships. This left 548 ships
of 1,749,441 GRT.
The reduction of over 1/3 in tonnage is bad enough but the ships
trapped overseas were the ones that would have been more
available to help military actions. Much of the shipping in the
Mediterranean was needed by the Italian economy for routine
work, so the effect on shipping available for military purposes
was much greater than the 1/3 loss implies. If you assume 1/3
of the tankers were trapped it leaves around 280,000 to 290,000
GRT of tankers available.
In addition to the Italian ships there were some 56 German ships
of 352,051 GRT available.
The following ships were added by 8 September 1943.
Italian ships built or recovered 84 ships 416,742 tons
Foreign ships captured/purchased 126 ships 428,954 tons
German flagged ships added 124 ships 378,784 tons
(Italian merchant ships built is put at 60 ships 305,733 tons)
So the total merchant ships used (10 June 1940 plus
additions) comes to 938 ships 3,177,433 tons.
Losses 565 ships 2,018,616 tons.
Tonnage 9 September 1943 373 ships 1,158,817 tons
of which 101 ships 410,239 tons were undergoing repairs,
leaving 272 ships 748,578 tons available.
Italian flagged ships lost ships/tonnage 10 June 1940 to
8 September 1943
year 500 or more GRT less than 500 GRT
1940 45/161423 29/4775
1941 156/617986 122/20511
1942 138/480652 122/18075
1943 226/758555 486/44544
totals 565/2018616 759/87905
Total axis losses including German ships
1940 74/166198
1941 278/638497
1942 260/498727
1943 712/803099
total 1324/2106521
As for German merchant ship construction in Northern Europe, that was
largely allocated to non German yards which did much to ensure very
little tonnage was delivered, even when the Germans actually allocated
some steel for the work. The German controlled shipyards managed to
build some 23 merchant ships of 46,700 GRT in 1943. So to build up
the Italian merchant fleet would take significant changes to historical
resource allocations and take years.
>is it even possible for the RN to intercept tanker traffic without
>bases east of Malta? Thanks for your help. Online sources would be
>best, but books are fine.
Presumably submarines operating from an advanced base at Gibraltar.
In summary the axis ability to exploit Middle East Oil starts with having
enough refining capacity, moves to having enough rail and pipeline
capacity to move the oil to the refineries and/or ports and ends with
the tanker fleet to ship oil across the Mediterranean. Certainly,
assuming no war with the US and USSR and the axis powers win the
battles, the axis powers can concentrate on the infrastructure, more
tankers, boosting rail capacity from ports or direct to the oil fields,
building pipelines and so on. It would take years though for the capacity
to become available and it would take at least all of 1941 to conquer
the oil fields in the first place.
In a final note, assume the Italian tanker fleet can, on average transport
500,000 tons of crude oil a month, assume there are no rail capacity
problems nor refinery problems, further assume all of the oil goes to
Germany. That boosts Germany's oil products supply by some
6,000,000 tons per year, or more than double the historical 4,600,000
tons in 1940, 5,600,000 tons in 1941, near double the 6,400,000 tons
in 1942 and an extra 80% over the 7,500,000 tons in 1943.
By the way German natural oil refinery capacity was 3,000,000 tons
per year and were running at 50 to 66% capacity in the 1940 to 1943
period. The Italian railways were hard put to cope with the historical
war traffic and the transport of crude oil from Ploesti in Romania to
Germany stressed the available rail and barge capacity.
Total axis crude oil supplies in Europe in 1943 were around 8,600,000
tons historically. The US alone produced this much oil every 15 days
in 1943. The German synthetic plants added another 5,400,000 tons
of oil products in 1943.
Geoffrey Sinclair
Remove the nb for email.
--
Bernardz
says...
> I think the actual history of events in regards to North Africa are
> very supportive of your argument. One of the major reasons the
> German's lost in North Africa is that they couldn't get supplies to
> their troops.
>
The major bottleneck for the Germans in supplies was the RN submarine
campaign and the limitations of the ports both as they were small and
they were far away.
If one magically supposes that Egypt and the Suez fell, then the RN
would have to evacuate the Eastern Mediterranean due to lack of supplies
so the first problem goes. Then if they get the ports of Alexandra going
and say Haifa, the second disappears.
--
It is frightening when you read many of these posts and you realize that
most have been carefully thought out before posting.
Observations of Bernard - No 73
--
efr...@memphis.edu
As someone else said, the burden of proof ought to be
on those who argue that the Germans could have 1)
conquered the oil-areas of the ME, and 2) gotten the
product back to the Reich. But as an exercise in historical
research, it would be good for FleetlordVT to continue to try
to prove the professor wrong.
EGF
--
asp...@pacific.net.au
<mrbrid...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>"Alan Meyer" <ame...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>Even if the
>> Germans had successfully defeated the British in Egypt - a very,
>> very big and unlikely "if"...
>
>I wouldn't say it's a very unlikely if. After all, with the historical asset
>at his disposal Rommel got to a place 100 kilometers west of Alexandria. I
>guess it's perfectly and amply likely, though of course not a sure bet, that
>a German all-out Mediterranean strategy would get him to Suez.
A German "all out" strategy would have resulted, as it did, in 250,000
Axis troops being taken prisoner in Tunisia at the end rather than
50,000.
A water pipe can only carry so much water ... regardless of pressure.
Likewise, the supply constraints the Germans were operating under are
simply not amenable to being forced to carry more supplies.
The ports, for example, simply did not have the physical space to
unload more ships than they already were. There was not enough coastal
lighterage as it was etc. etc.
Handwaving will not change this.
Just like you can't force more the water flow of a 2" pipe through a
1" pipe.
Andrew Clark
"Bill Shatzer" <aw...@freenet.carleton.ca> wrote
> The oil facilities and oil fields at
> Balikpapan were captured almost
> entirely undamaged and intact, for instance.
Yes, but in that case a very considerable industrial complex
was defended by only 1100 demoralised troops isolated from
any hope of reinforcement and assaulted by surprise from the
sea by a superior force. In the case of Abadan, a similar
complex was defended by two entire divisions, some 40,000
men, as early as 1940 and had substantial protection from
any surprise air or sea raid.
> Shipping the oil "home" would have been a
> problem for sure but at the least possession
> of the ME oil fields and facilities would have
> supported the fuel needs of the Wehrmacht
> in the theatre
Crude oil at the well heads in Kirkuk and Persia is not the
same as refined petrol/gasoline and aviation fuel in the
tanks of lorries and aircraft. Without the pipelines and
pumping stations, the refineries are useless. And without
the refineries, the crude would need to be shipped to Europe
then shipped back again before it was of any use to the
Wehrmacht. And without the refineries producing heavy fuel
oil for the electricity generating stations, the pipelines
and pumping stations are useless...
In short, the oil extraction and refining industrial complex
in Persia and Iraq was a complex interdependent facility
which could be rendered useless (or practically useless)
with extraordinary ease - one reason why the British
calculated as early as 1936 that five divisions and a large
airforce would be needed to secure and defend its essential
parts if Germany captured Egypt or Turkey.
--
FleetlordVT
you all have suggested, then I'll be off to her office hours. Thanks
again!
--
Michael Emrys
asp...@pacific.net.au wrote on 3/27/05 5:25 PM:
> On Sat, 26 Mar 2005 00:13:42 +0000 (UTC), Michael Emrys
> <em...@olypen.com> wrote:
>
>> in article d21fo0$em8$1...@gnus01.u.washington.edu, Richard Macdonald at
>> rmacd...@verizon.net wrote on 3/25/05 8:54 AM:
>>
>>> ...the Trans-Arabian Pipeline (tapline) was not built until the mid
>>> 1950's...
>>
>> However, the pipeline from Mosul and Kirkuk in Iraq to Haifa (?) was in
>> existence.
>
> And what, conservatively, is the chance that it would be taken intact?
>
> If you say "nil or less" then you'd be close to being accurate, I'd
> guess.
I hope you were not thinking I was claiming otherwise. I was merely
clarifying a point as to what existed historically at the time.
Quite some time ago I too reached the conclusion that capturing the Middle
Eastern oilfields would do little or nothing to advance the Axis cause
during the war. Supposing that they had somehow won the war (a far-fetched
hypothesis I know, but bear with me), they might have either kept and
returned them to production *at that time* or perhaps used them as
bargaining chips in a negotiated settlement.
I posted to that effect last year, but whether it was in this forum or
another, I don't recall.
Michael
--
Bill Shatzer
> "Bill Shatzer" <aw...@freenet.carleton.ca> wrote
>> The oil facilities and oil fields at
>> Balikpapan were captured almost
>> entirely undamaged and intact, for instance.
> Yes, but in that case a very considerable industrial complex
> was defended by only 1100 demoralised troops isolated from
> any hope of reinforcement and assaulted by surprise from the
> sea by a superior force. In the case of Abadan, a similar
> complex was defended by two entire divisions, some 40,000
> men, as early as 1940 and had substantial protection from
> any surprise air or sea raid.
Well, it is always possible to read too much into these sorts
of comparisons but it's worth noting that Crete was defended
with some 42,000 troops and Singapore by over 60,000. Both
fell rather quickly.
Certainly two divisions, well led and well motivated, should
be enough to hold the oil facilities - at least long enough
for the demolition folks to do their work. But, as history
demonstrates, troops are not always well led and well motivated.
If - in this hypothetical alternative history world - the Germans
actually advanced far enough to threaten capture of some or all
of the ME oil facilities, they would have necessarily inflicted
a series of rather substantial and perhaps crushing defeats on
British forces. The moral and confidence of the remaining troops
would be unlikely to be high.
Perhaps of equal importance, no plan survives contact with
the enemy and s**t happens.
>> Shipping the oil "home" would have been a
>> problem for sure but at the least possession
>> of the ME oil fields and facilities would have
>> supported the fuel needs of the Wehrmacht
>> in the theatre
> Crude oil at the well heads in Kirkuk and Persia is not the
> same as refined petrol/gasoline and aviation fuel in the
> tanks of lorries and aircraft. Without the pipelines and
> pumping stations, the refineries are useless. And without
> the refineries, the crude would need to be shipped to Europe
> then shipped back again before it was of any use to the
> Wehrmacht. And without the refineries producing heavy fuel
> oil for the electricity generating stations, the pipelines
> and pumping stations are useless...
The question, I had thought, was what might have been possible,
not what would have been likely. I fully agree that even given
the counter-historical premise of the Wehrmacht advancing far
enough to threaten capture of ME oil facilities, the most
LIKELY outcome would have been that it failed to secure them.
And, if it did, that it would secure them in a highly damaged
condition and capable of producing little, if any, fuel.
But that is not pre-ordained. There is at least SOME chance
that a substantial portion of the facilities might have been
captured undamaged or so damaged that they might be quickly
returned to at least some production. The fog of war is
repleat with misunderstood orders or orders not being received,
units getting lost, demolition charges set improperly or not
being set at all, etc.
And there were multiple refineries in the ME at that time.
I don't know what may have existed in Iran at that time but
certainly there were some Iranian refineries and there was
a refinery at Haifa, two in Syria and a couple in Bahrain at
the least. I suspect there were others.
Certainly it doesn't take a great leap of logic to imagine
that one or more -might- have been captured in an undamaged
or lightly damaged condition through some combination of
exceptional German daring-do and/or British screw-up?
It is not, after all, as if the British always fought well
or the Germans always blundered. And any German advance to
the oil areas is going to come only after a series of
potentially demoralizing British defeats.
> In short, the oil extraction and refining industrial complex
> in Persia and Iraq was a complex interdependent facility
> which could be rendered useless (or practically useless)
> with extraordinary ease - one reason why the British
> calculated as early as 1936 that five divisions and a large
> airforce would be needed to secure and defend its essential
> parts if Germany captured Egypt or Turkey.
I agree in sofar as what was -likely-. Still, given the
hypothetical that the Germans actually managed to advance
that far, it seems at least -possible- that a significant
portion of the oil facilities might have been captured in
a condition such as allowed the early resumption of oil
production and refining.
Cheers and all
Haydn
<asp...@pacific.net.au> wrote:
> A German "all out" strategy would have resulted, as it did, in 250,000
> Axis troops being taken prisoner in Tunisia at the end rather than
> 50,000.
Maybe, but later than 1943. The war is going to last longer if Germany
abstains from launching Barbarossa and focuses on the Med and Middle East.
Pure what-if of course, but that's what we are talking about.
> The ports, for example, simply did not have the physical space to
> unload more ships than they already were.
I guess Alexandria proved pretty well adequate to keep 8th Army supplied in
Egypt. Or did Commonwealth supply lines span thousand miles all the way from
Calcutta?
Now, if Alexandria is taken over by the Axis, it will take them a while to
make the shipwreck-littered harbor fit for full use again. And possibly,
port capacity won't be restored to 100%.
But there is little doubt that, just as the Commonwealth did to some extent
with Benghazi when that town was in their hands, the harbor *would* be
reactivated. If Alexandria worked fine to keep mammoth 8th Army supplied, it
would as well work fine to keep the smaller Axis army on the Suez Canal
supplied. I suppose. All the more reason in that most Axis shipping would
make it to Alexandria unmolested.
And in order to seriously disrupt loading/unloading of moored ships, the CW
air forces - supposedly badly stretched and heavily engaged anywhere -
should steam ahead and mount full scale bombing offensives. Something like
the historical 1941 pinprick raids over Tripoli would hardly be enough.
A successful Axis drive into Palestine might entail the seizing of Haifa,
another major harbor and another supply source for forces operating up
there.
Haydn
--
Louis Capdeboscq
> I don't believe British and Soviet forces could be pushed back enough
> to make this line work.
If Germany gains access to Middle Eastern oil, then it clearly has
pushed the British back far enough. I don't see what the Soviets could
do about it, they had their hands full defending their side of the
Caucasus as things were.
>From what I've gathered, it would have to be refined in Germany or
> occupied Europe.
Yes. There was plenty of spare refining capacity.
Additionally, the Germans were planning to expand the existing pipeline
to Haifa.
LC
--
Remove "e" from address to reply
--
Klaus Petrat
<ewo...@gmail.com> wrote:
>I think your Prof is seriosly off base in regards to the burden of
>proof, when the most substantial evidence against his/her argument is
>the actual events (German inability to maintain logistical support) in
>the Mediteranean. Any route to the Middle East would have been longer,
>and more susceptible to Allied interdiction.
AFAIK about 50% of oil came from Romania to Germany by river tanker
ships. And Romania has a water connection to the Black sea and via
Turkey to the mediteranian area. The German navy transported even
several submarines via rivers, chanels and streets to the Black sea,
why not oil?
--
Best regards
Klaus Petrat
--
Arie Biemond
Andrew Clark wrote:
> "Bill Shatzer" <aw...@freenet.carleton.ca> wrote
>
>
>> The oil facilities and oil fields at
>>Balikpapan were captured almost
>>entirely undamaged and intact, for instance.
>
>
> Yes, but in that case a very considerable industrial complex
> was defended by only 1100 demoralised troops isolated from
> any hope of reinforcement and assaulted by surprise from the
> sea by a superior force.
The oil refineries and depots of Balikpapan were completely destroyed
on January 20th, after the message came in that the Japanese landing
force had left Tarakan; they landed there two days later only to find
everything fully ablaze.
It was in Palembang that the defenders were surprised by the Japanese
airborne landing on the airfield and the refineries on Feb.. 14th.
This attack prevented the already prepared destruction of all oil
facilities there; the most important installations of the Royal Dutch
were only slightly damaged.
Arie Biemond
--
asp...@pacific.net.au
<mrbrid...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
><asp...@pacific.net.au> wrote:
>
>> A German "all out" strategy would have resulted, as it did, in 250,000
>> Axis troops being taken prisoner in Tunisia at the end rather than
>> 50,000.
>
>Maybe, but later than 1943. The war is going to last longer if Germany
>abstains from launching Barbarossa and focuses on the Med and Middle East.
>Pure what-if of course, but that's what we are talking about.
Oh, agreed. The war will last longer indeed.
>> The ports, for example, simply did not have the physical space to
>> unload more ships than they already were.
>
>I guess Alexandria proved pretty well adequate to keep 8th Army supplied in
>Egypt. Or did Commonwealth supply lines span thousand miles all the way from
>Calcutta?
But to *take* Alexandria the Germans have to force a 10" capacity
through a 1" pipe. Historically they couldn't do it.
Louis Capdeboscq
> "Haydn" wrote:
>><asp...@pacific.net.au> wrote:
>
>>>The ports, for example, simply did not have the physical space to
>>>unload more ships than they already were.
>>
>>I guess Alexandria proved pretty well adequate to keep 8th Army supplied in
>>Egypt. Or did Commonwealth supply lines span thousand miles all the way from
>>Calcutta?
>
> But to *take* Alexandria the Germans have to force a 10" capacity
> through a 1" pipe. Historically they couldn't do it.
The problem with the 1" pipe analogy is that it ignores that the pipe
was historically constricted to 1" because the Allies were standing on
it with Malta.
When Malta was inactive, or neutralized, then the Axis unloaded a lot of
supply to North Africa. Port capacity was significant, and they could
use coastal shipping.
Their problem was lack of resources, not supply. Their airforce could
either fight 8th Army OR pound Malta, but not both. So when they pounded
Malta, the Axis supply situation improved but there was no fighting. As
soon as Rommel attacked again, with his newly acquired supply, his air
support meant leaving Malta off the hook, and the British went at it
again on the Axis supply lines.
When the front reached El Alamein, the Axis got the worst of both
worlds: because of Malta interference, they didn't get enough supply
reaching them at the front to operate a significant air effort, which
meant that what air force they could support on these limited resources
was barely enough to help Panzer Army Africa a bit, but not enough to
protect coastal shipping all the way from Tobruk, let alone neutralize
Malta. At the same time, an attempt to defeat Malta "on the cheap", so
to speak, was decisively defeated when Park was appointed head of air
defense in the island.
What this shows is not that the historical supply capacity was a
maximum. It shows that the Axis needed additional resources to keep
Malta neutralized (either by continued air attacks or by invasion), in
addition to the resources historically committed to North Africa. These
additional resources would not be based in North Africa and would
therefore draw from a different "pipeline", the Italian navy would save
fuel with convoy escorts, and - most significantly - the North African
ports could be operated at something approximating full capacity,
something that they rarely did.
Would all of this translate into sufficient capacity to overwhelm 8th
Army ? Possibly not the 1942 8th Army, but probably enough for what
forces the British had in 1941. Of course, the extra resources amount to
practically half of the Luftwaffe committed full-time so Barbarossa is
scratched for 1941. No free lunches...
asp...@pacific.net.au
<loui...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>> "Haydn" wrote:
>>><asp...@pacific.net.au> wrote:
> >
>>>>The ports, for example, simply did not have the physical space to
>>>>unload more ships than they already were.
>>>
>>>I guess Alexandria proved pretty well adequate to keep 8th Army supplied in
>>>Egypt. Or did Commonwealth supply lines span thousand miles all the way from
>>>Calcutta?
>>
>> But to *take* Alexandria the Germans have to force a 10" capacity
>> through a 1" pipe. Historically they couldn't do it.
>
>The problem with the 1" pipe analogy is that it ignores that the pipe
>was historically constricted to 1" because the Allies were standing on
>it with Malta.
Well.
No.
The problem with your statement is that, while Malta was important,
and no-one denies it, its importance was only long term ... it never
prevented supplies from getting to North Africa (AFAIK) to such an
extent that the port facilities there were *under* utilised.
The real problem was at the North African end.
>When Malta was inactive, or neutralized, then the Axis unloaded a lot of
>supply to North Africa. Port capacity was significant, and they could
>use coastal shipping.
I can cite chapter and verse from Van Creveld "Supplying War" and
Thompson "Lifeblood of War" where they say different.
Where they say, in fact, that Port Capacity was inadequate to the
existing demands and that coastal lighterage was completely
inadequate.
I have provided cites in the past and will be happy to do so on
demand.
>Their problem was lack of resources, not supply. Their airforce could
Which both Van Creveld and Thompson disagree with quite definitely.
Andrew Clark
"Bill Shatzer" <aw...@freenet.carleton.ca> wrote
> Well, it is always possible to read too
> much into these sorts of comparisons
> but it's worth noting that Crete was defended
> with some 42,000 troops and Singapore by
> over 60,000. Both fell rather quickly.
Singapore fell 38 days after the first landings in Malaya,
and 8 days after the first landing on Singapore island.
Crete fell 11 days after the first airborne landings
(incidentally, the effective number of defenders of Crete
was circa 30,000 men with 35 aircraft, attacked by 22,570
air-mobile troops supported by 610 aircraft).
Neither of those situations can be sensibly compared with
the 24-hour raids which seized some Pacific oil facilities
intact
> If - in this hypothetical alternative history
> world - the Germans actually advanced
> far enough to threaten capture of some
> or all of the ME oil facilities, they would
> have necessarily inflicted a series of
> rather substantial and perhaps crushing
> defeats on British forces. The moral
> and confidence of the remaining troops
> would be unlikely to be high.
With respect, I think you are missing the point. It is one
thing to use naval and air superiority to pounce on an
isolated garrison out in the Pacific and gain sufficient
surprise to capture industrial installations intact. It is
quite another to expect even the least competent commanders
to miss the need to destroy the Persian oil refineries after
several months notice that the Germans are coming.
> The question, I had thought, was what
> might have been possible,
> not what would have been likely.
I think the possibility of the Germans gaining significant
amounts of POL from the Middle East wells and refineries is
so small as to be impossible for all sensible uses of the
word.
> But that is not pre-ordained. There is at least
> SOME chance that a substantial portion
> of the facilities might have been
> captured undamaged or so damaged
> that they might be quickly
> returned to at least some production.
Of course. The point I was trying to make is that a
significant part of *all* the infrastructure elements - the
well heads, the pipelines, the pumping stations, the
refineries, the storage tanks, the power-generating
stations, the transformer sets, the distribution panels, the
power cable networks, even the port tanker facilities -
would have to survive for the system as a whole to be
capable of significant POL output. And that possibility -
multiple survivals - is such a vanishing small prospect as
to be discountable.
> And there were multiple refineries
> in the ME at that time. I don't know
> what may have existed in Iran at that
> time but certainly there were
> some Iranian refineries and there was
> a refinery at Haifa, two in Syria and a
> couple in Bahrain at the least.
The British refineries were at Abadan on the Persian Gulf,
one of the largest and most technologically advanced
facilities in the world, and supplied direct from the large
adjacent fields at Maiden-i-Naftun. There was a small Vichy
refinery at Haifa and two oil distillation facilities (not
refineries as such) in Syria. The Bahrain facilities were
insignificant.
> Certainly it doesn't take a great leap
> of logic to imagine that one or more
> -might- have been captured in an
> undamaged or lightly damaged condition
> through some combination of exceptional
> German daring-do and/or British screw-up?
Certainly. The Vichy coastal refineries were vulnerable to a
coup-de-main, especially if the Luftwaffe doesn't decimate
the airborne corp in Crete. But these were supplied
exclusively by the pipeline from Kirkuk. Capture of the
Kirkuk field and the pipelines, plus all the other
infrastructure support, would be needed before any of the
Vichy refineries would be of any use. And Kirkuk was a long
way off: too far for a coup-de-main to be made without long
preparations of the sort likely to give the game away.
And as for Abadan, it was 1100 miles from Egypt. Enough
said...
(snip remainder)
--
Bill Shatzer
On Fri, 1 Apr 2005, Andrew Clark wrote:
> Singapore fell 38 days after the first landings in Malaya,
> and 8 days after the first landing on Singapore island.
> Crete fell 11 days after the first airborne landings
> (incidentally, the effective number of defenders of Crete
> was circa 30,000 men
You're obviously not counting Greek troops. British strength
alone was circa 30,000 and there was significant Greek troop
strength on the island. The Germans reported taking nearly
6,000 Greek PoWs. Add in the Greeks killed, plus evacuees, escapees,
and evaders and 12,000 Greeks seems a reasonable estimate for Greek
troop strength although admittedly I can't find an accurate order
of battle for Greek troops on Crete pre-invasion.
Still, the generally published figure of 42,000 defenders seems
reasonable.
> with 35 aircraft,
The RAF -lost- 47 aircraft according to Arthur Tedder's
report.
And certainly it wasn't wiped out to the last aircraft. Obviously
the RAF had more than 35 a/c.
-generally cogent stuff with which I don't strongly disagree snipped-
Cheers and all,
--
Louis Capdeboscq
> Louis Capdeboscq wrote:
>
>>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>
>>>But to *take* Alexandria the Germans have to force a 10" capacity
>>>through a 1" pipe. Historically they couldn't do it.
>>
>>The problem with the 1" pipe analogy is that it ignores that the pipe
>>was historically constricted to 1" because the Allies were standing on
>>it with Malta.
>
> Well.
>
> No.
>
> The problem with your statement is that, while Malta was important,
> and no-one denies it, its importance was only long term ... it never
> prevented supplies from getting to North Africa (AFAIK) to such an
> extent that the port facilities there were *under* utilised.
Hm, let's see...
Tonnage sent/delivered in North Africa, in thousand tons.
1941
Jan: 51/49, Feb: 80/79, Mar: 102/93, Apr: 89/81, May: 75/69, Jun:
133/125 Jul: 77/62, Aug: 96/84, Sep: 94/68, Oct: 93/74, Nov: 79/30, Dec:
48/39
Please note that this is for all Axis forces in North Africa. Some
figures for the Germans: Jun 45/27, Jul 45/16, Aug 53/21, Sep 53/25, Oct
45/10, Nov 30/5, Dec 30/10. (source: TOBRUK 1941 Der Kampf in
Nordafrika, Adalbert v. Taysen 1976 Rombach ISBN 3-7930-0180-6, if
anyone wants to know).
What this second series shows is that doubling or trebbling the amount
of supply available to the DAK is a fairly small increase in total
deliveries to North Africa, and well within the tonnages achieved the
following year. On the other hand, such an increase in the supply of
German forces - which were providing most of the effective combat power
- would have a large impact on the battlefield, which would generate
more captured supplies, which would sustain the German momentum, etc.
Sort of like what happened after Gazala.
Anyway, the monthly average for 1941 is some 84,000 tons sent and some
71,000 tons received. These are metric tons.
Now, these were by no means maximum rates: the Italians conducted port
improvement in 1942, and we are talking average deliveries, including
the effects of Malta, lack of OKW interest, etc. But I think it's fairly
clear that when, say, deliveries are below the average for 5 months in a
row (Nov-41/Feb-42), and even down to 50% of average as in the end of
1941, this indicates beyond doubt that there was some under-utilized
port capacity.
1942
Jan: 66/66, Feb: 60/59, Mar: 58/48, Apr: 152/150,
May: 93/86, Jun: 42/32, Jul: 97/92, Aug: 77/52, Sep: 97/78, Oct: 84/47,
Nov: 86/64, Dec: 13/6.
So when the RN is successful, we have North Africa receiving some 50-60%
of what it was receiving when the RN is inactive (as in early 1942).
Regarding the low figures for February and March: Sadkovich p.251 ?In
February and March [42], the loss rate were negligible, but deliveries
were only 66,000 and 59,000 tons, respectively, because there was simply
not enough material to ship.? Yes, these figures are higher than those
from my list above which are drawn from a different source. The
important point is that at these comparatively low deliveries indicated
lack of interest by OKW and poor Italian industrial capacity, not lack
of North African port capacity. For the latter, look at the April figures...
What these figures show is that the North African ports delivered on a
sustained basis some 80,000 tons monthly, with a peak at 200,000 tons
(which you may want to dismiss as a combination of surge rate and low
personnel arrivals). By contrast, when Rommel was in trouble, e.g.
during Crusader and later El Alamein, his supply was drastically cut.
So Malta was the problem, more than port capacity. Additionally, port
capacity could be increased, but that increased itself cost shipping
space, and if Malta restricts the available shipping deliveries then
port upgrade can't take place, so Malta has both a direct and an
indirect effect on the North African supply situation, as it affects the
deliveries and it affects the capacity. For example, in 1942 the
Italians upgraded Tobruk from a capacity of some 600 tons per day to
2,500 tons per day according to Montanari's 'Le operazione in A.S.'.
According to Sadkovich p.278, Tobruk was clearing 1,900 tons daily in
August 1942. The Italians didn't do anything in '42 that they couldn't
have done earlier, unless you know of a major technological breakthrough
that took place in the meantime, or subscribe to the theory that
Italians are inherently lazy and it takes a German to make them work.
In case you wonder, the monthly delivery figures listed above are from
the 30-volume Marina Militare Italiana official history.
> The real problem was at the North African end.
Yes, because of a situation created by Malta.
Most of the Axis convoys had to go to Tripoli because using Benghazi and
Tobruk (when available) to full capacity would have made the task of
Axis escorts far more difficult, and cost fuel which the Italian Navy
didn't have. Why were such Axis escorts so necessary ? Because of Malta.
Additionally, Axis coastal shipping was attacked off Cyrenaica. From
where ? Malta. Then Axis coastal shipping was attacked east of Tobruk,
from the Alexandria-based RAF (the same RAF also hit trucks on the Via
Balba). The Luftwaffe couldn't defend effectively against that threat,
because 1/ lack of aircraft (cause: OKW), and 2/ lack of supply to
operate the required number of aircraft (cause: Malta). With Malta, 11%
of the tonnage sent using lighters, Siebel ferries etc. from
Tripoli/Benghazi to Tobruk/Derna between July and September 1942 was
sunk. The North African ports were not the primary problem, OKW and
Malta were, with Malta being a consequence of OKW.
When Malta was neutralized, Rommel received enough supply to defeat the
1942 8th Army as far east as Mersa Matruh. This means that - again,
provided that sufficient resources were allocated - there was AT LEAST
enough port capacity in North Africa to operate the 1942 Panzer Army
Africa in Egypt (because it was done). Since both sides built up between
1941 and 1942, and given that Rommel's supply situation was degraded -
again, by Malta - during Crusader, it seems clear that the 1942 PAA
could have beaten the 1941 8th Army (or Army of the Nile, I forget when
it renamed).
>>When Malta was inactive, or neutralized, then the Axis unloaded a lot of
>>supply to North Africa. Port capacity was significant, and they could
>>use coastal shipping.
>
> I can cite chapter and verse from Van Creveld "Supplying War" and
> Thompson "Lifeblood of War" where they say different.
Be my guest. I'm aware of Van Creveld, but haven't read Thompson.
> Where they say, in fact, that Port Capacity was inadequate to the
> existing demands and that coastal lighterage was completely
> inadequate.
Coastal lighterage was inadequate due to enemy action. No Malta = more
ability to optimize port capacity, more ability to use coastal shipping
over the Gulf of Syrta. This translates into more capacity. More
capacity = RAF can't attack coastal shipping & trucks east of Tobruk.
This means that ships can actually sail to Tobruk instead of just barges
and ferries, etc. Malta created a snowball effect.
Port capacity was strained by the convoy system - as in Allied ports -
and it wasn't adequate to meet demand. That doesn't mean that it
wouldn't be adequate to beat the British. Rommel considered 120,000 tons
monthly to be a minimum requirement for his German troops alone. The
best he ever got was some 80,000. But he beat the British just fine with
that amount.
>>Their problem was lack of resources, not supply. Their airforce could
>
> Which both Van Creveld and Thompson disagree with quite definitely.
Tell you what.
When I bother to post facts, you may either reply with facts or post
your quotes. Instead of "snipping disingenuously" or whatever phrase you
use when someone else dares edit out parts of your posts. Just parading
the names of Van Creveld or Thompson doesn't constitute an answer.
As indicated, the figures I'm using are from various Italian official
histories, Bagradin's history of the Italian Navy, the multi-volume
German history of WWII, etc. There's plenty more where these came from,
if you want detailed references, complete with page numbers etc, then
"show me yours and I'll show you mine".
So better drop that condescending tone and go hit the books. Make sure
to address the points that I actually made in the previous post as
opposed to just copying a paragraph that agrees with what makes you feel
good. Off you go, chop ! chop !
Andrew Clark
> You're obviously not counting Greek troops.
> British strength alone was circa 30,000
> and there was significant Greek troop
> strength on the island.
According to MacDonald ("The Lost Battle: Crete 1941",
Macmillan, 1993), there were about 11,000 Greek troops on
Crete, comprising about 1000 raw conscripts with nondescript
and elderly small arms, 3000 lightly armed but well-trained
and led paramilitary police, and 7000 escapees from the
mainland, mainly unarmed except some personal weapons and
unorganised.
The Greeks, however gallant and determined, were not really
an *effective military fighting force* proportionate with
their numbers.
> Still, the generally published figure of 42,000
> defenders seems reasonable.
See above.
> The RAF -lost- 47 aircraft according to
> Arthur Tedder's report. And certainly
> it wasn't wiped out to the last aircraft.
> Obviously the RAF had more than 35 a/c.
On 7 May 1942, there were 35 RAF aircraft based on Crete: 16
Hurricanes, 6 Gladiators and 13 Blenheim. By 18 May, there
were only five: 3 Hurricanes and 2 Gladiators. On 19 May,
the Hurricanes were withdrawn to Egypt and thereafter air
cover was in the form only of small and infrequent fighter
sweeps from Alexandria.
The total loss figure you quote includes all aircraft lost
in the Crete operation, including those flying from Egypt.
--
Geoffrey Sinclair
>On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 17:13:32 +0000 (UTC), Louis Capdeboscq
><loui...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
(snip)
>>> But to *take* Alexandria the Germans have to force a 10" capacity
>>> through a 1" pipe. Historically they couldn't do it.
>>
>>The problem with the 1" pipe analogy is that it ignores that the pipe
>>was historically constricted to 1" because the Allies were standing on
>>it with Malta.
>
>Well.
>
>No.
>
>The problem with your statement is that, while Malta was important,
>and no-one denies it, its importance was only long term ... it never
>prevented supplies from getting to North Africa (AFAIK) to such an
>extent that the port facilities there were *under* utilised.
>
>The real problem was at the North African end.
>
>>When Malta was inactive, or neutralized, then the Axis unloaded a lot of
>>supply to North Africa. Port capacity was significant, and they could
>>use coastal shipping.
>
>I can cite chapter and verse from Van Creveld "Supplying War" and
>Thompson "Lifeblood of War" where they say different.
>
>Where they say, in fact, that Port Capacity was inadequate to the
>existing demands and that coastal lighterage was completely
>inadequate.
>
>I have provided cites in the past and will be happy to do so on
>demand.
I think part of the trouble is port capacity was something of a moving
target, depending on the amount of damage and repairs. It also
depends on the type of cargo, in particular the amount of fuel.
In addition it is unlikely any port was used to 100% capacity all
the time.
The following factors are in play.
When Italy declared war some 1/3 of the merchant marine was
trapped outside the Mediterranean, and clearly much to most of
the remaining tonnage was needed for normal domestic uses.
So there was a shortage of ships to supply an army in Africa.
The axis fuel situation played a key part in deciding the routing
of convoys and the number of escorts. Van Crevald is clear
fuel shortages in Italy played a part in the amount of sailings
for North Africa and which ports were used. Clearly Malta plays
a key part here, the need to route around the island and the need
to protect the merchant ships from Malta based attacks, indeed
by being in allied hands Malta forced the inevitable inefficiencies
that convoys create. However the size of the ports in North Africa
is also a factor, the size of the convoys was limited by the reception
capacity.
Fuel: some 599,338 tons sent, 20% of this was lost leaving 480,000
tons, of which 402,000 tons are noted in their own column in my
cargo arriving figures. However these figures do not break the fuel
tonnage out of the total cargo arriving for June 1940 to March 1941
and November and December 1941. So 80,000 tons of fuel as part
of the around 590,000 tons of cargo noted as delivered during these
months, so around 13.6% on average of this cargo was fuel. However
most probably a larger proportion of fuel was delivered in 1941
when the German units arrived with their greater need for fuel,
as well as the Italian armoured division.
It should be noted, delivered is not the same as unloaded.
Thinking out loud time.
Van Crevald states the following,
Tripoli had a "comfortable" capacity of 50,000 tons per month and
as a result a deal was done to use Bizerta in Tunisia for another
20,000 tons per month. This was as Rommel was deploying in
early 1941 but in the end the Tunisian ports were used at this time.
I therefore will rate initially the capacity at around 55,000 tons per
month.
Benghazi had a theoretical capacity of 2,700 tons per day, or
81,000 tons per month, which would make it bigger than Tripoli.
however in 1941 a good day was around 800 to 900 tons, so
really around 20,000 tons per month. After it was recaptured by
the axis powers in early 1942 its capacity was boosted to
"full capacity" handling "one third of the supplies". Which would
be around, you guessed it, 18,500 tons per month of cargo and
7,500 tons per month of fuel, February to July 1942. Note when
Benghazi was recaptured the axis found some of their supply
dumps intact.
Tobruk's capacity is put at 20,000 tons per month, out of a
theoretical capacity of 45,000 tons per month when the Italians
were using it. Rommel captured the port intact in June 1942,
presumably benefiting from any work the British did on the port.
Plus some 2,000 vehicles, 5,000 tons of supplies and 1,600 tons
of fuel captured in the port.
Also it seems for Tobruk and Benghazi to operate at full efficiency
they required coastal shipping to carry much of the cargo, not the
bigger freighters, and the axis powers were short of such shipping.
So the axis Libyan port situation is like this,
June 1940 Tripoli, Benghazi, Tobruk
22 January 1941 Tripoli, Benghazi
7 February 1941 Tripoli
4 April 1941 Tripoli, Benghazi
24 December 1941 Tripoli
29 January 1942 Tripoli, Benghazi
21 June 1942 Tripoli, Benghazi, Tobruk
13 November 1942 Tripoli, Benghazi
20 November Tripoli, Benghazi
23 January 1943 none.
So assuming van Crevald is right the monthly port capacity was
95,000 tons until November 1940, 85,000 tons in December 1940,
then 65,000 tons in January 1941, 55,000 tons February to April
1941, 65,000 tons in May 1941, 75,000 tons June to November
1941, 65,000 tons in December 1941, 55,000 tons in January
1942, 65,000 tons in February 1942, 75,000 tons March to June
1942, 85,000 tons in July, 95,000 tons August and September,
85,000 tons in October, 65,000 tons in November and 55,000 tons
in December. Assuming ports at half capacity the months they are
lost to either side, and rating Tripoli at 55,000 tons, Benghazi 20,000
tons and Tobruk 20,000 tons per month.
If you do this then the port capacities versus cargo looks like this,
June to December 1940, capacity 655,000 tons, cargo 300,000 tons.
All of 1941, capacity 810,000 tons, cargo 860,000 tons including at
least 160,000 tons of fuel, probably around 200,000 tons of fuel.
All of 1942, capacity 900,000 tons, cargo around 780,000 tons including
250,000 tons of fuel.
In the February to May 1941 period the axis forces used some 280,000
tons of supplies or 70,000 tons per month, there were a nominal 7
divisions present in February and 9 in May. This time period included
about 1 month of offensive action. Somewhere between 70,000 and
90,000 tons per month was the effective port capacity limit for this time
period according to OKH. The landings were on average around 82,000
tons per month including fuel. Note the Van Crevald figures would indicate
55 to 65,000 tons per month to be the limit.
There are two possible explanations, firstly that Van Crevald has
underestimated the capacity of the ports, or alternatively he has
the estimate for dry cargo capacity without the fuel capacity.
Unloading a WWII tanker is more about the size of the pipeline
to the dock, the pumping capacity and the size of the storage.
Dry cargo requires much more labour, needs suitable cranes
to lift the cargo from the ship and transport to move the cargo
off the docks.
The peak for dry cargo landings in 1941 was probably June 1941,
with 89,226 tons landed plus 35,850 tons of fuel. (March 1941
has total landings of 95,753 tons but I expect would include at
least 10,000 tons of fuel). This is at a time when my estimate from
the Van Crevald figures would be 75,000 tons per month. Similarly
the February 1941 figure of 79,183 tons landed and March 1941 figure
of 95,753 tons landed, both including fuel has to be offset against the
estimated port capacity of 55,000 tons for those months. In April 1941
the landed figures are 57,796 tons of dry cargo and 23,676 tons of
fuel.
Therefore I conclude my estimate of 55,000 tons per month of cargo
at Tripoli, based on the 50,000 tons per month "comfortable" figure is
incorrect unless the port was damaged. On 21 April 1941 three RN
battleships bombarded the port but RAF attacks during 1941 were
minimal. It would appear Tripoli's capacity was around 65,000
tons per month of dry cargo in 1941. Which means around 3 times
the capacity of Benghazi or Tobruk which is a figure more consistent
with the general remarks about North African port capacity. Tripoli
could also probably handle up to 25,000 tons of fuel per month.
Assuming Tripoli is undamaged then the port capacities versus cargo
landed now look like this,
June to December 1940, capacity 725,000 tons, cargo 300,000 tons.
All of 1941, capacity 930,000 tons, cargo 860,000 tons including at
least 160,000 tons of fuel, probably around 200,000 tons of fuel.
All of 1942, capacity 1,020,000 tons, cargo around 780,000 tons including
250,000 tons of fuel.
On this basis the basic port capacity in Libya was not the problem in
supplying the axis armies there. The ports were underutilised. Note
the peak month for cargo landed was in April 1942, 102,358 tons of
dry cargo (equal to the previous 3 months tonnage or the next 2 months)
plus 48,031 tons of fuel. This is the only month the actual landed tonnage
exceeds my revised port capacities for dry cargo.
As a final check if you take the June 1941 figures as around the limit
and say multiply them by ten you end up with a theoretical capacity
around 50% more than the cargoes landed historically. Do the same
for the April 1942 tonnages and the result is even greater.
Van Crevald noted a full strength German division required 10,000 tons
of supplies a month, which would include fuel. Therefore at peak,
assuming the supply service did not require supplies for itself and
there was no air force, the port capacity was around 40,000 tons
per month at Benghazi and Tobruk, plus 65,000 tons from Tripoli plus
around 25,000 tons per month of fuel at Tripoli, total 130,000 tons, or
13 German divisions at full strength. The axis forces at El Alamein
were a nominal 13 divisions plus non divisional units, of course they
were all understrength. Then add the air force.
Now comes a real limit to the supply tonnage, the lack of transport
within Africa itself, effectively no railways from the axis controlled
ports. When Rommel reached Alamein Tripoli was 1,300 miles in
the rear and Benghazi 800 miles, Tobruk around 400 miles. In
1944/45 the US Army concluded 175 miles was the maximum
efficient operating distance for truck borne supply. In the second
half of 1942 the RAF made using Tobruk too expensive.
In France in 1944 the US army was trying to supply 16 divisions
(6 armoured) by road at a range of about 300 then 600 miles using,
on average, 83 truck companies, probably around 5,000 trucks
plus all the other vehicles pressed into action. When the Germans
invaded the USSR each Army group was given 2,200 trucks to
shuttle supplies between the railheads and advanced depots.
Now we have 90,000 tons of supplies 1,300 miles away, 20,000
tons 800 miles away and 20,000 tons 400 miles away, or, on
average all supply around 1,100 miles away along a single road.
Versus the US army of all supplies say 600 miles away along
at least two roads. On the best day the US Army managed 17,342
short tons, around 15,800 metric tons, using just under 6,000
trucks but this was over around 300 miles. On average the
Red ball express delivered between 25 August to 5 September
6,250 short tons a day, total 75,000 short tons, again over the
initial, shorter route.
To complete the back of the envelope calculation, to deliver
all the 130,000 metric tons of supplies by truck lift from an
average distance of 300 miles would require 5,000 US type
trucks times 3.67 (3.67 times the distance) times 4,300 metric
tons per day divided by 5,700 metric tons per day (the US lift)
say 13,850 vehicles. Now add 20% for vehicles out of action,
up to 16,600, and round up to account for the fact supply
requirements tend to go up more quickly than the distance
being covered. So say 17,000 trucks. By doing things like
using French vehicles the Heer managed 6,600 trucks for
the main supply units for invasion of the USSR and I understand
the average German truck was smaller than its US counterpart.
For operations in the Persian corridor the US army found the
Studebaker 2.5 ton 6x4 truck/tractor good for 50,000 miles
before repair was uneconomic, the 10 ton Mack diesels
were good for 100,000 miles. The average distance per
journey for the axis trucks is 2,200 miles, so 23 to 46 trips
before the truck is not worth repairing. So budget for 100
to 200% replacements per year before combat losses.
Finally the Red ball express was burning around 300,000 gallons
of fuel per day, or around 850 metric tons, times 30 is 25,500
metric tons per month to deliver something like 170,000 metric
tons of supplies per month, add things like spare parts and the
express was going through over 30,000 tons of supplies, so an
overhead of 15%. Now note the Germans require twice the
distance (assuming the 300,000 gallons is for the 600 mile
part of the Red Ball operation) and the supply service would be
using 60,000 tons of supplies per month to deliver the US tonnages,
but we only have 130,000 tons being delivered. As an estimate
around 30% of the supplies landed would be needed to haul the
supplies to the front, on average twice the US overhead for twice
the distance, this leaves some 90,000 tons of supplies or 9 full
strength German divisions. Less the allocation for ground units
to defend the ports and the roads, plus repair the ports and roads.
Then add the Luftwaffe.
Anybody think they will end up with more than around six
German motorised and armoured divisions in full fighting trim
and fully supplied, backed by some corps troops, extra artillery for
example, plus the supply units, plus the defensive units plus say
100 to 200 fighters, reconnaissance and dive bomber aircraft?
The above divisional strength assumes many of the defensive units
and aircraft are based close to the ports and the supply units pick
up their supplies as they pass the ports. The supply units will be
running at least 10,000 trucks assuming all units bar the combat
divisions pick up their own supplies, more likely running 12,000
trucks.
Since this is a back of the envelope calculation every 8% less
the supply service would use would free supplies for another
combat division.
On another note the ferries and inshore cargo craft the Germans
built appear to have fuel consumptions not so much better than the
trucks, simply switching to these water craft will not make a big
difference to the supply system's fuel requirements.
Of course capture Alexandria and the situation is instantly solved.
So it looks like in order of importance for the axis to build the
supply system in North Africa,
1) railways from Tripoli to Alexandria.
2) more coastal shipping to maximise the use of Benghazi, Tobruk
and the smaller ports, plus help the trucks.
3) more fuel for the Italian navy.
4) Italy waits until more of its ships are back before declaring war
5) the capacity of the ports in Libya are boosted.
(snip)
Bernardz
How long would it take to build a railway from Tripoli to the front?
asp...@pacific.net.au
<gsinc...@froggy.com.au> wrote:
>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote in message ...
>>On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 17:13:32 +0000 (UTC), Louis Capdeboscq
>><loui...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>>>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>I can cite chapter and verse from Van Creveld "Supplying War" and
>>Thompson "Lifeblood of War" where they say different.
>>
>>Where they say, in fact, that Port Capacity was inadequate to the
>>existing demands and that coastal lighterage was completely
>>inadequate.
>>
>>I have provided cites in the past and will be happy to do so on
>>demand.
>
>I think part of the trouble is port capacity was something of a moving
>target, depending on the amount of damage and repairs. It also
>depends on the type of cargo, in particular the amount of fuel.
Whew! Amazing erudite exposition!
Well done!
>Anybody think they will end up with more than around six
>German motorised and armoured divisions in full fighting trim
>and fully supplied, backed by some corps troops, extra artillery for
>example, plus the supply units, plus the defensive units plus say
>100 to 200 fighters, reconnaissance and dive bomber aircraft?
>The above divisional strength assumes many of the defensive units
>and aircraft are based close to the ports and the supply units pick
>up their supplies as they pass the ports. The supply units will be
>running at least 10,000 trucks assuming all units bar the combat
>divisions pick up their own supplies, more likely running 12,000
>trucks.
Has anyone failed to note that all the above requires *double* the
number of trucks the Germans could scrape together to support
Barbarossa?!
It is hinted in VC that the DAK was provided with more than its fair
share, for its size, of trucks ... I think it is even mentioned, or
implied, that this was around 2000 trucks.
Note the shortfall.
8-10000 trucks.
>Since this is a back of the envelope calculation every 8% less
>the supply service would use would free supplies for another
>combat division.
>
>On another note the ferries and inshore cargo craft the Germans
>built appear to have fuel consumptions not so much better than the
>trucks, simply switching to these water craft will not make a big
>difference to the supply system's fuel requirements.
>
>Of course capture Alexandria and the situation is instantly solved.
Well. A quibble.
"Capture Alexandria *intact* and the situation is instantly solved."
Further quibble.
"Instantly solved for the same distance around Alexandria as noted
above for the North African ports."
>So it looks like in order of importance for the axis to build the
>supply system in North Africa,
>
>1) railways from Tripoli to Alexandria.
Which would be rather difficult to do unless the British co-operated
for the length from the Libyan border to Aledxandria ... and then
further co-operated by not destroying the rail lines on their retreat
from the first DAK offensive.
>2) more coastal shipping to maximise the use of Benghazi, Tobruk
>and the smaller ports, plus help the trucks.
Which begs the question of where it comes from ... which is, I am
sure, is your point ;-)
>3) more fuel for the Italian navy.
Which, as I am sure you mean to imply, "less fuel for the Germans"
since this is where the fuel that *was* supplied to the RM came from.
>4) Italy waits until more of its ships are back before declaring war
Which would help somewhat, but also telegraph their intentions.
>5) the capacity of the ports in Libya are boosted.
Indeed.
Most erudite.
Louis Capdeboscq
precisions more than disagreements.
Geoffrey Sinclair wrote:
(snip)
> Fuel: some 599,338 tons sent, 20% of this was lost leaving 480,000
> tons, of which 402,000 tons are noted in their own column in my
> cargo arriving figures.
Breakdown by cargoes, figures are sent / delivered in metric tons.
Period is June 1940 to January 1943.
Fuel and other liquid combustibles: 599,337 / 476,703
Vehicles: 275,310 / 243,633
Weapons and ammunition: 170,060 / 149,462
Other: 1,200,673 / 1,060,157
Breakdown per recipient (if you want yearly breakdowns, ask and you will
receive) in metric tons, figure in parenthesis is % of tonnage sent.
Italian Army 942,698 tons (86%)
Italian Navy 84,046 tons (81%)
Italian Air Force 93,705 tons (82.4%)
German forces 554,885 tons (84.7%)
Civilians 254,611 tons (91.8%)
The source is the "Dati Statistici" volume of the Italian official naval
histories.
> However these figures do not break the fuel
> tonnage out of the total cargo arriving for June 1940 to March 1941
> and November and December 1941.
Here you go. Figures are in metric tons and arranged by month / men sent
/ men arrived / tonnage sent / tonnage delivered / [fuel].
1940
Jun 1358 1358 3618 3618 [ 0]
Jul 6407 6407 40875 40875 [ 8820]
Aug 1221 1221 50699 50699 [13709]
Sep 4602 4602 53635 53635 [10992]
Oct 2823 2823 29306 29306 [ 371]
Nov 3157 3157 60778 60778 [ 8142]
Dec 9731 9681 65556 58574 [ 5486]
1941
Jan 12491 12214 50505 49084 [ 2897]
Feb 19557 19557 80357 79183 [10682]
Mar 20975 20184 101800 92753 [ 4059]
Apr 20968 19926 88597 81472 [23676]
May 12552 9958 75367 69331 [20027]
Jun 12866 12886 133331 125076 [35850]
Jul 16141 15767 77012 62276 [11570]
Aug 18288 16753 96021 83956 [37201]
Sep 12717 6630 94115 67513 [13108]
Oct 4046 3451 92449 73614 [11951]
Nov 4872 4628 79208 29843 [ 2471]
Dec 1748 1074 47680 39092 [ 7133]
> Van Crevald states the following,
>
> Tripoli had a "comfortable" capacity of 50,000 tons per month and
> as a result a deal was done to use Bizerta in Tunisia for another
> 20,000 tons per month.
Here are some figures provided by "Haydn" a few years ago in a private
exchange. I don't have the article that he refers to. BEGIN QUOTE:In the
port of Tripoli, in 1941, 2,700 tons per day (daylight) could be
unloaded, and 300 additional tons of fuel could be unloaded through
hoses. To unload as fast as possible 5 ships carrying 20,000 tons in
January 1942, it took the port's unloading structures and personnel 8
days. Benghazi: until the first Commonwealth offensive in December 1940,
~1,800 tons per day; subsequently much less than 1,000 and in 1942,
after a heroic effort, 1,500 per day. Tobruk: in 1942, barely 1,000 per
day. Matruh: 300 tons per day. Derna: about 500-600 per day (?) In 1941
Derna was the DAK's own port, where German ammunition was unloaded.
Bardia, Gazala, Ras el Halil: just small ships (Bardia), little
freighters and submarines could carry a few tons of material to those
tiny harbors where port structures were almost non-existent. I'm unsure
about Derna but I think that's a reasonable estimate. My sources are the
Italian Army's official history and two articles, "The Ports of Libya",
appeared in the "Storia Militare" magazine, February-March 1998.END QUOTE.
According to the Italian Navy official histories, peacetime por capacity
in Libya was:
Tripoli : 5 merchantmen + 4 transports. By mid-1941 this was reported to
have been significantly degraded.
Benghazi : 3 merchantmen + 2 transports. This was reduced to nothing due
to damage in the wake of Compass and subsequent Luftwaffe attacks, then
restored to 3 ships total (not 3+2) using their own cranes to unload.
Tobruk : 3 cargo ships + 2 troopships. It became practically nothing due
to RAF air attacks.
The thing is, interest in port capacity was a case of "too little, too
late". The Italians ended up shipping cranes from mainland Italian ports
to North Africa in 1942. They could easily have done it earlier - it is
most unlikely that the equipment was manufactured during the war, as
opposed to requisitioned from inactive ports - they just didn't have the
impetus.
> Tobruk's capacity is put at 20,000 tons per month, out of a
> theoretical capacity of 45,000 tons per month when the Italians
> were using it.
Note that on a good day, i.e. when a Siebel ferry came through, the Axis
unloaded some 2,000 tons at Tobruk. Here again, the problem wasn't port
capacity it was enemy opposition. On the other hand, without enemy
opposition further back in the supply chain (i.e. Malta), then there is
more port & shipping capacity available west of Tobruk which translates
to the RAF not having the historical air superiority over Tobruk, which
means Tobruk port capacity increases, etc. One of the effects of Malta
that both you and I forgot about is the many Italian ships sailing
half-loaded in convoys, for more speed and faster deliveries. This was
an inefficient use of shipping caused by the tactical situation.
> Also it seems for Tobruk and Benghazi to operate at full efficiency
> they required coastal shipping to carry much of the cargo, not the
> bigger freighters, and the axis powers were short of such shipping.
Berthing space was lacking at Tobruk, so the sea-going ships were
supplemented by coastal ships loaded in Tripoli. Some even came from
Crete. On the other hand, it wasn't bound to be, it's just that it was
uneconomical to repair the port under RAF attacks.
Benghazi also operated like that for most of the period, except when it
was repaired so 3 ships could use it simultaneously with their own cranes.
In the two months preceding Alam Halfa, coastal shipping delivered
11,090t to Bengasi, 17,655t to Tobruk and 10,030t to Matruh.
(snip)
> On this basis the basic port capacity in Libya was not the problem in
> supplying the axis armies there. The ports were underutilised. Note
> the peak month for cargo landed was in April 1942, 102,358 tons of
> dry cargo (equal to the previous 3 months tonnage or the next 2 months)
> plus 48,031 tons of fuel. This is the only month the actual landed tonnage
> exceeds my revised port capacities for dry cargo.
Just taking the average between the 150k tons unloaded in April and the
86k tons unloaded in May gives a 81% increase over the average monthly
deliveries for the year 1942. If that ins't underutilized port capacity,
then what is ?
I think that part of the problem is that many Allied authors used the
figures achieved by the British from Benghazi as their baseline,
reasoning that the hapless Italians can't have done better. But in fact
the Axis got quite a lot of use out of Benghazi, and ditto Tobruk.
> Now comes a real limit to the supply tonnage, the lack of transport
> within Africa itself, effectively no railways from the axis controlled
> ports. When Rommel reached Alamein Tripoli was 1,300 miles in
> the rear and Benghazi 800 miles, Tobruk around 400 miles. In
> 1944/45 the US Army concluded 175 miles was the maximum
> efficient operating distance for truck borne supply. In the second
> half of 1942 the RAF made using Tobruk too expensive.
1. If Benghazi + Tripoli are restored to 5,000 tons daily between them -
which was done although not for long enough - then about 90% of the
army's needs are covered with an overland LOC that is only half as long.
2. Regarding the truck LOC itself, the situation was different from the
one faced by the 1944 US Army, due to the existence of a handy
coastline. If coastal shipping is used to unload dumps with fuel, food &
water, spare parts etc along the coast, then the trucks no longer have
to carry their own supply. This means that they can be used to carry
only cargo from the ports to the frontline, and the truck LOC can be
quite long. This is basic truck management, logistics 101. The Axis
tried it. The reason why it didn't work was that their coastal shipping
was attacked, but that wasn't the fault of the logisticians.
3. Finally, the historical LOC was straining, but it was still holding.
At El Alamein, the first attack was stopped. The second attack was
contained. It was the third one that broke through. I'm not going to
claim that Rommel would have won if he had had more supply, but it is a
case that his problem was lack of fuel, preventing him from using his
tactical reserves, and this shortage didn't primarily come from the
trucks bringing the fuel from the ports to the front but from a lack of
tankers - sunk by ULTRA-assisted British forces immediately before El
Alamein. Malta again...
> To complete the back of the envelope calculation, to deliver
> all the 130,000 metric tons of supplies by truck lift from an
> average distance of 300 miles would require 5,000 US type
> trucks (...) So say 17,000 trucks.
According to Sadkovich, the Axis had 18,000. Montanari says some 15,000
or so. Many of these will be captured Allied trucks, and the figure
counts everything, i.e. trucks hauling supply and trucks with the units.
That's still a lot of trucks.
The Italians sent some 3,600 trucks in the third quarter of 1942. But
average wastage rate from operational (i.e. noncombat) causes was around
30% and the trucks consumed some 10% of the supplies.
(snip)
> Anybody think they will end up with more than around six
> German motorised and armoured divisions in full fighting trim
> and fully supplied, backed by some corps troops, extra artillery for
> example, plus the supply units, plus the defensive units plus say
> 100 to 200 fighters, reconnaissance and dive bomber aircraft?
Well, as for me, I don't.
On the other hand, I think that this force could have been deployed in
1941 rather than 1942, and had it been deployed then it would have been
sufficient to capture Egypt from the Crusader-sized, -trained and -led
British forces, as opposed to the larger, better-equipped and -led 8th
Army defending at 1st El Alamein and Alam Halfa.
Ultimately, going back to the pipeline analogy, the Allies managed to
build a larger pipeline than the Axis to North Africa. From that larger
pipeline, they overwhelmed the force that the Axis could support locally
and had enough to spare to stand on the Axis pipeline as well for good
measure. But it took the Allies a lot of time to do that, and the Axis
never tried to use all of the available resources until it was too late.
So when all is said and done, the problem that the Axis had in North
Africa wasn't that geography made it impossible for them to prevail
there, it was that OKW had decided that Russia should be prioritized.
From this followed insufficient air support and resources, insufficient
fuel, which meant that it became a matter of Tobruk OR Malta (instead of
"and"), etc.
> On another note the ferries and inshore cargo craft the Germans
> built appear to have fuel consumptions not so much better than the
> trucks, simply switching to these water craft will not make a big
> difference to the supply system's fuel requirements.
This is interesting.
I don't have that data, but today a barge is about three times more
fuel-efficient in tons per mile than a truck. I don't see why it should
be different in WWII, so if you can find the time to flesh out this
claim I'll be interested.
> So it looks like in order of importance for the axis to build the
> supply system in North Africa,
>
> 1) railways from Tripoli to Alexandria.
> 2) more coastal shipping to maximise the use of Benghazi, Tobruk
> and the smaller ports, plus help the trucks.
> 3) more fuel for the Italian navy.
> 4) Italy waits until more of its ships are back before declaring war
> 5) the capacity of the ports in Libya are boosted.
I would add as a 1bis) "more airpower". An additional fliegerkorps means
the Axis can have their cake and eat it: they can pound Malta (which
means higher deliveries to North Africa) AND provide air support - or
defend against RAF attacks on their NA ports. If Malta is neutralized,
then there are many favorable ripple effects as you listed in the
beginning of your post.
So for me the #1 factor is how high a priority OKW assigns to North
Africa. I'm not blaming them for deciding that Russia was more
important, but my point is that North Africa was a deadend for the Axis
due to competing priorities, not because geography determined that it
would be.
Bernardz
says...
> I would add as a 1bis) "more airpower". An additional fliegerkorps means
> the Axis can have their cake and eat it: they can pound Malta (which
> means higher deliveries to North Africa) AND provide air support
> - or defend against RAF attacks on their NA ports. If Malta is neutralized,
> then there are many favorable ripple effects as you listed in the
> beginning of your post.
What actually happened in July of 1942, is that planes were diverted to
attack Malta for the invasion which never happened and so were not
available to support Rommel directly.
>
> So for me the #1 factor is how high a priority OKW assigns to North
> Africa. I'm not blaming them for deciding that Russia was more
> important,
More air force would have been available had the Germans not invaded
Russia.
Louis Capdeboscq
> Has anyone failed to note that all the above requires *double* the
> number of trucks the Germans could scrape together to support
> Barbarossa?!
Has anyone failed to note that the truck numbers quoted by Geoffrey
referred to vehicles allocated at army group level for supply purposes,
which is not the same thing as the total number of trucks hauling supply
in Barbarossa, let alone the number of trucks that the Germans used in
Barbarossa (over 300,000) ?
> It is hinted in VC that the DAK was provided with more than its fair
> share, for its size, of trucks ... I think it is even mentioned, or
> implied, that this was around 2000 trucks.
I see how providing references stops at the author's name and "I think
it is even mentioned".
According to Italian sources, Axis forces in North Africa had some
15,000 trucks. 3,600 Italian trucks alone were sent during the summer of
1942, and then you can add captured trucks, German production, trucks
bought from the French, etc. 2,000 is far too low.
asp...@pacific.net.au
<loui...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>> Has anyone failed to note that all the above requires *double* the
>> number of trucks the Germans could scrape together to support
>> Barbarossa?!
>
>Has anyone failed to note that the truck numbers quoted by Geoffrey
>referred to vehicles allocated at army group level for supply purposes,
>which is not the same thing as the total number of trucks hauling supply
>in Barbarossa, let alone the number of trucks that the Germans used in
>Barbarossa (over 300,000) ?
And one could, of course, simply provide the number of trucks
allocated to the typical German division as well.
I have the reprint of the US Army's Handbook of German Military Forces
which has TO&Es, of course, and could easily post what the official
allocations were.
Has anyone failed to note that Divisional level transport was for
tactical transport of supplies with the division, NOT for transport of
supplies from a distant railhead or seaport?
That would also be indicative, of course.
>> It is hinted in VC that the DAK was provided with more than its fair
>> share, for its size, of trucks ... I think it is even mentioned, or
>> implied, that this was around 2000 trucks.
>
>I see how providing references stops at the author's name and "I think
>it is even mentioned".
I have provided cites for this before. If you wish to, Google offers
excellent search tools.
Of course, you could provide cites that show this is wrong.
>According to Italian sources, Axis forces in North Africa had some
>15,000 trucks. 3,600 Italian trucks alone were sent during the summer of
>1942, and then you can add captured trucks, German production, trucks
>bought from the French, etc. 2,000 is far too low.
But Italian trucks are supplying Italian units, which are additional
to the German units that are the subject of this article. So we're
back to a maximum of less than 12,000 for the Germans, and,
presumably, much much less, as you indicate that the Italian trucks
were *additional* to what was, presumably, already there.
asp...@pacific.net.au
>On Tue, 5 Apr 2005 15:57:41 +0000 (UTC), Louis Capdeboscq
><loui...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>> Has anyone failed to note that all the above requires *double* the
>>> number of trucks the Germans could scrape together to support
>>> Barbarossa?!
>>
>>Has anyone failed to note that the truck numbers quoted by Geoffrey
>>referred to vehicles allocated at army group level for supply purposes,
>>which is not the same thing as the total number of trucks hauling supply
>>in Barbarossa, let alone the number of trucks that the Germans used in
>>Barbarossa (over 300,000) ?
>
>And one could, of course, simply provide the number of trucks
>allocated to the typical German division as well.
>
>I have the reprint of the US Army's Handbook of German Military Forces
>which has TO&Es, of course, and could easily post what the official
>allocations were.
>
>Has anyone failed to note that Divisional level transport was for
>tactical transport of supplies with the division, NOT for transport of
>supplies from a distant railhead or seaport?
>
>That would also be indicative, of course.
According to the TO&Es provided in the US War Department's Handbook
mentioned above, the number of motor vehicles provided German
divisions are as follows ...
Infantry Division (Old Type) 942
Panzergrenadier Division 2637
Panzer Division 2685
Now, if one assumes, reasonably, that only those motor vehicles
actually in the supply element of the Division are likely to be
available for carrying supplies, the breakdown is interesting ...
ID (Old Type), Divisional Services
Motorcycles 88
Motor Vehicles 253
Horse Drawn Vehicles 245
Horses 753
Panzergrenadier Division, Divisional Services
Motorcycles 85
Motor Vehicles 323
Panzer Division, Divisional Services
Motorcycles 85
Motor Vehicles 323
Now, what was the notional DAK proposed going to be of? Six divisions?
Assuming all of them are PzGr or Pz Divisions, that's 6 x 323 trucks
available for carting supplies to and from the division ...
1938 trucks.
The rest of the motor vehicles are, strangely enough, actually being
used to transport the Panzergrenadiers or move supplies tactically.
Rather less than the 10-12000 required, indeed.
Of course you knew all this.
Geoffrey Sinclair
>I agree with most of the post, here are some quick comments, mostly
>precisions more than disagreements.
>
>Geoffrey Sinclair wrote:
Definitions,
Register ton 100 cubic feet of ships space.
Gross tonnage, entire enclosed space on a ship expressed in register
tons, or GRT.
Net tonnage, entire useful cargo capacity of a ship expressed in register
tons.
Dead Weight Tonnage, ship's total carrying capacity including the ship's
gear, supply and personnel, in long tons, or DWT
Dead Weight Effective Lift, effective cargo lift of a ship expressed in long
tons, approximately 80% of the dead weight tonnage.
1,000 GRT = approximately 1,500 DWT, approximately 1,200 dead weight
effective lift.
(snip) of very useful figures, thanks
I will note one item, Civilians 254,611 tons, which is around 13%
of the cargo that arrived. Or almost all the supplies Van Crevald
says would be required by a full strength German division for
the entire June 1940 to January 1943 period (320,000 tons)
An interesting overhead, there were also some exports to Italy as
far as I know but most ships would have returned empty and in
any case locally produced food would have been required for the
increase in manpower.
The pre war immigration program meant that there were some
90,000 Italian and 6,000 other European civilians in Libya in 1940,
out of a population of 890,000. So the 1941 axis army in North
Libya increased the population by around 13%. Goes a long
way to explaining the problems the supply system had. The
equivalent for France in 1944 would be around 5,000,000 men.
Derna was a town of 10,000 people, Benghazi 50,000, Tripoli was
100,000.
In 1940 the railway had reached Mersa Matruth from the Nile delta.
>> Van Crevald states the following,
>>
>> Tripoli had a "comfortable" capacity of 50,000 tons per month and
>> as a result a deal was done to use Bizerta in Tunisia for another
>> 20,000 tons per month.
>
>Here are some figures provided by "Haydn" a few years ago in a private
>exchange. I don't have the article that he refers to.
>BEGIN QUOTE:In the
>port of Tripoli, in 1941, 2,700 tons per day (daylight) could be
>unloaded, and 300 additional tons of fuel could be unloaded through
>hoses.
So 81,000 tons per month cargo and 9000 tons of fuel. And a decent
night fighter force to allow unloading at night would be useful. Though
none with airborne radar would appear before 1942. So I wonder
how many of the port capacities are based on assuming daylight
operations only?
The fuel tonnage capacity seems low though, when you realise around
130,000 tons was delivered to North Africa in 5 months in 1941. I
presume it means Benghazi had a similar capacity for fuel as Tripoli.
Or else fuel was carried in containers on the standard freighters as well.
One point I am unclear about, is whether DAK transported fuel in
tanker trucks like the 1944 US Army or it was all in jerricans, which
significantly cut the effective fuel load thanks to the can's bulk and
weight. When the histories I have read mention fuel transport they
imply it was all jerricans.
>To unload as fast as possible 5 ships carrying 20,000 tons in
>January 1942, it took the port's unloading structures and personnel 8
>days.
In theory 75,000 tons per month at that pace. The US Army figures
indicate it took the best part of three weeks to load and then unload
a typical allied freighter at well equipped ports. A liberty ship could
carry around 8,600 tons of cargo, so in 8 days the Italians unloaded
the equivalent of 2.3 liberty ships. Given Tripoli is credited with 5
berths then presumably all ships were worked simultaneously and
were obviously smaller than the standard US ship. So the unloading
times appear similar to allied ships.
However, see below, the ships on the run were not loaded, on average,
to anything like the average utilisation the US Army made of its ships.
Which would indicate the unloading was significantly slower as well.
The UK merchant ship history, counting ships of 1,600 GRT or more
says the average large Italian cargo ship was 5,714 GRT or 6,550
deadweight tons. Bragadin's figures, ships of 500 or more GRT have
the size of the average ship available in June 1940 as 3,193 GRT.
>Benghazi: until the first Commonwealth offensive in December 1940,
>~1,800 tons per day; subsequently much less than 1,000 and in 1942,
>after a heroic effort, 1,500 per day.
So 54,000 tons per month in 1940, around 20,000 tons per month in
1941 and 45,000 tons per month in 1942.
>Tobruk: in 1942, barely 1,000 per day.
So another 30,000 tons per month at most.
>Matruh: 300 tons per day. Derna: about 500-600 per day (?)
So in theory around another 24,000 tons per month. Though Derna
was around 100 miles west of Tobruk
All up, if the system was working fully, far more port capacity than
needed to cope with what was sent.
Of course ports do not operate at 100% efficiency in peace time.
Wartime, with convoys delivering ships in bulk, the efficiency tends
to go down.
Sinking a ship on the way to North Africa has a double effect then,
depriving the forces of their supplies plus leaving port capacity idle.
Unless the axis deliberately send more than the port can handle,
which makes inefficient use of the shipping, which the axis were
short of.
It appears Van Crevald has underestimated the North African port capacity.
>In 1941
>Derna was the DAK's own port, where German ammunition was unloaded.
>Bardia, Gazala, Ras el Halil: just small ships (Bardia), little
>freighters and submarines could carry a few tons of material to those
>tiny harbors where port structures were almost non-existent. I'm unsure
>about Derna but I think that's a reasonable estimate. My sources are the
>Italian Army's official history and two articles, "The Ports of Libya",
>appeared in the "Storia Militare" magazine, February-March 1998.END QUOTE.
Yes, so we have a moving target given the usual "friction", plus war
damage plus the need to match the shipping to the harbour, the
Queen Elizabeth could move a division at a time, trying to off load
it at Derna would be an interesting exercise. Tobruk and Benghazi
had long periods of restricted capacity thanks to damage.
>According to the Italian Navy official histories, peacetime por capacity
>in Libya was:
>Tripoli : 5 merchantmen + 4 transports. By mid-1941 this was reported to
>have been significantly degraded.
>Benghazi : 3 merchantmen + 2 transports. This was reduced to nothing due
>to damage in the wake of Compass and subsequent Luftwaffe attacks, then
>restored to 3 ships total (not 3+2) using their own cranes to unload.
>Tobruk : 3 cargo ships + 2 troopships. It became practically nothing due
>to RAF air attacks.
Yet we have Benghazi and Tobruk landing significant cargo tonnages
in 1941 and 1942, so there is a contradiction for Tobruk at least.
The next piece of the puzzle is what sized ships could be handled,
Queen Elizabeth or siebel ferries to use the extremes.
>The thing is, interest in port capacity was a case of "too little, too
>late". The Italians ended up shipping cranes from mainland Italian ports
>to North Africa in 1942. They could easily have done it earlier - it is
>most unlikely that the equipment was manufactured during the war, as
>opposed to requisitioned from inactive ports - they just didn't have the
>impetus.
So in other words the Italians judged the port capacity adequate and
only later moved to do simple upgrades, or, given Benghazi was
reduced to ships using their own cranes, replacements for damage.
Given the supplies sent the Italians seem to be correct.
>> Tobruk's capacity is put at 20,000 tons per month, out of a
>> theoretical capacity of 45,000 tons per month when the Italians
>> were using it.
>
>Note that on a good day, i.e. when a Siebel ferry came through, the Axis
>unloaded some 2,000 tons at Tobruk.
The trouble is how sustainable this was, given the state of the port,
including transport to move the supplies of the docks and labour.
Is a good day including unloading into the night, under lights? If
you can operate at night you in theory double the port capacity.
>Here again, the problem wasn't port
>capacity it was enemy opposition. On the other hand, without enemy
>opposition further back in the supply chain (i.e. Malta), then there is
>more port & shipping capacity available west of Tobruk which translates
>to the RAF not having the historical air superiority over Tobruk, which
>means Tobruk port capacity increases, etc.
Malta effectively sits on the direct Naples Tripoli route. Any coasters
that have trouble with open water would sail to Palermo in Sicily, then
Cape Bon and so along the African coast, spending an extended time
in range of Malta's strike aircraft.
In September 1942 the main convoy routes were via Cape Bon in
the west and the eastern route, Taranto to Benghazi/Derna/Tobruk,
via the Greek coast or even through Corinth, to Crete and then Libya.
>One of the effects of Malta
>that both you and I forgot about is the many Italian ships sailing
>half-loaded in convoys, for more speed and faster deliveries. This was
>an inefficient use of shipping caused by the tactical situation.
So the ships were half loaded so they could steam at higher speeds
and would not take as long to unload at the other end? Malta is
worth an extra knot or two? Can faster deliveries be taken to mean
quicker unloading in Libya?
Another set of figures is the capacity of the cargo ships used,
so the figures are capacity (but in GRT which is less than the
weight actually able to be carried, multiply by 1.2 for an estimate
of weight carrying ability), cargo sent in tons.
1940 (Jun-Dec): 1,291,245 / 304,467 (plus 29,299 men)
1941: 5,442,381 / 1,016,442 (plus 157,221 men)
1942 and Jan 1943: 2,511,545 / 924,472 (plus 19,882 men)
Total: 9,245,171 / 2,245,381
Bragadin states some 2,249 cargo ships were sent from Italy to Libya
carrying 2,245,381 tons, or just under 1,000 tons of cargo each.
Even if the Italian navy figure of 1,789 merchant ship trips is correct,
rather than 2,249, it still indicates under loading.
Now the US Army, shipping purely military cargoes managed to
use 70 to 80% of the capacity, so I could understand if the Italians
managed 60 to 70% given the US efforts in improving shipping
efficiency.
I should add there were 206,402 men sent in those "cargo" ships
so there is an adjustment to the averages needed, but they cannot
account for such a big difference, at less than 10 men per ship on
average.
On the face of it this has to be one of the least efficient shipping
runs going around. The average ship used was 4,110 GRT,
(assuming 2,249 trips) so able to carry something like 5,000 tons
of cargo, and they carried 1,000 tons. It sounds like everything
was effectively combat loaded, designed to be moved off the ship
quickly and preserving formations, so one ship had equipment
from one unit, regardless of the efficiency problems. Minimal
packing or bulk loading done.
If you assume each man weighed 100kg including kit there is
another 20,600 "tons" of personnel sent.
>> Also it seems for Tobruk and Benghazi to operate at full efficiency
>> they required coastal shipping to carry much of the cargo, not the
>> bigger freighters, and the axis powers were short of such shipping.
>
>Berthing space was lacking at Tobruk, so the sea-going ships were
>supplemented by coastal ships loaded in Tripoli.
So we have another factor, double handling the cargo at Tripoli, the
cargo offloaded from a larger ship, counting against capacity, then
loaded onto a coaster, again counting against capacity. Which starts
to imply there was a lack of port capacity thanks to the ships the
other ports could actually service.
I gather coasters in Italian service were smaller than those in British
service? Given the British ships were expected to handle Atlantic
and North Sea weather you would have thought Italian coasters could
have crossed the Mediterranean, or are we talking things like Seibel
ferries?
According to the figures from the Italian Navy history you sent me,
Inter-Libyan traffic.
In 1940 (Jun-Dec): 244 convoys with 375 ships and 14,878 gross tons lost.
In 1941: 280 convoys with 503 ships and 17,747 gross tons lost
In 1942 and Jan 1943: 232 convoys with 302 ships and 19,100 gross tons
lost.
I like the fact that many convoys were 1 merchant ship.
So some 1,180 ship movements between Libyan ports and there were
a further 1,789 merchant ship voyages from Italy to Libya, using the
same set of figures. It would be nice to declare the inter Libyan traffic
was all coasters loaded in North Africa but it is clear ships were delivered
to one port from Italy and then moved to another port. Even so the figures
point to a lot of double handling of the ships at least, by making them take
the indirect route to their final destination. They also hint at a fair amount
of cargo double handling in North Africa, loading it onto the smaller ships.
Do the statistics give the amount of cargo shifted by these convoys,
is there some sort of cargo landed total by port, so we can see if
there is any double counting? Could it be the cargo is counted once
when arriving in Tripoli and then again when arriving at another port?
>Some even came from
>Crete. On the other hand, it wasn't bound to be, it's just that it was
>uneconomical to repair the port under RAF attacks.
Presumably in the maximum axis commitment Tobruk receives
better defences and more engineers.
>Benghazi also operated like that for most of the period, except when it
>was repaired so 3 ships could use it simultaneously with their own cranes.
Sounds right given the total shipments, clearly it would be better for the
army to have more supplies at Benghazi, but the lack of berths is a nice
excuse to avoid exposing ships to attack from Egyptian based RAF
bombers.
>In the two months preceding Alam Halfa, coastal shipping delivered
>11,090t to Bengasi, 17,655t to Tobruk and 10,030t to Matruh.
So around 39,000 tons, some or most of it double handled at Tripoli?
So we are talking July and August 1942., given voyage times the coasters
would be delivering a mixture of cargoes delivered to North Africa in June,
July and August. Arrivals for June were 32,327 tons, July 91,491 and
August 51,655 tons. So as a minimum some 22% of the freight was
trans shipped, (the coastal deliveries over the June to August deliveries
to Libya). Looks like a good first approximation is around 33% of the
cargo was trans shipped. That depresses Tripoli's effective capacity.
Now above Benghazi was listed as able to clear something like 1,500
tons per day in 1942, or 45,000 tons per month, Tobruk 1,000 tons per
day or 30,000 tons per month as a maximum limit. So the dependence
on coasters for making best use of these ports can be seen.
>(snip)
>> On this basis the basic port capacity in Libya was not the problem in
>> supplying the axis armies there. The ports were underutilised. Note
>> the peak month for cargo landed was in April 1942, 102,358 tons of
>> dry cargo (equal to the previous 3 months tonnage or the next 2 months)
>> plus 48,031 tons of fuel. This is the only month the actual landed tonnage
>> exceeds my revised port capacities for dry cargo.
>
>Just taking the average between the 150k tons unloaded in April and the
>86k tons unloaded in May gives a 81% increase over the average monthly
>deliveries for the year 1942. If that ins't underutilized port capacity,
>then what is ?
My question would be is the figure we have the cargo that arrived
in port, or the figure the ports unloaded that month? Given the original
documents are in Italian I worry about what arrival means.
If it truly means landed then, based on the peak months, the ports had
around twice the capacity used in both 1941 and 1942 assuming no
significant damage to the ports. If you drop the December 1942 figure,
then the average cargo arriving in 1942 was 71,100 tons per month,
January to November, peak 150,389 tons in April. In 1941 the average
was 70,300 tons per month peak 125,076 tons in June.
>I think that part of the problem is that many Allied authors used the
>figures achieved by the British from Benghazi as their baseline,
>reasoning that the hapless Italians can't have done better. But in fact
>the Axis got quite a lot of use out of Benghazi, and ditto Tobruk.
Is this Benghazi as of the first time the British took it, when the Luftwaffe
made it hard to use, the second time when they did not hold it for very
long or the final time, when the Germans made very sure it was
demolished and Sirte captured 1 month later and Tripoli captured 2
months later?
The British worked hard to improve communications in 1941/42 and
boost Tobruk. One map I have shows the railway making it to Tobruk,
but I think it was only to the Egyptian border when Rommel was at
Alamein.
>> Now comes a real limit to the supply tonnage, the lack of transport
>> within Africa itself, effectively no railways from the axis controlled
>> ports. When Rommel reached Alamein Tripoli was 1,300 miles in
>> the rear and Benghazi 800 miles, Tobruk around 400 miles. In
>> 1944/45 the US Army concluded 175 miles was the maximum
>> efficient operating distance for truck borne supply. In the second
>> half of 1942 the RAF made using Tobruk too expensive.
>
>1. If Benghazi + Tripoli are restored to 5,000 tons daily between them -
>which was done although not for long enough - then about 90% of the
>army's needs are covered with an overland LOC that is only half as long.
I presume you mean Benghazi and Tobruk, with contributions from
the other small ports, Bardia and Derna. It still gives an LOC of,
on average, 600 miles, so we are down to the US Army situation
if the capacity can be done.
>2. Regarding the truck LOC itself, the situation was different from the
>one faced by the 1944 US Army, due to the existence of a handy
>coastline. If coastal shipping is used to unload dumps with fuel, food &
>water, spare parts etc along the coast, then the trucks no longer have
>to carry their own supply. This means that they can be used to carry
>only cargo from the ports to the frontline, and the truck LOC can be
>quite long. This is basic truck management, logistics 101. The Axis
>tried it. The reason why it didn't work was that their coastal shipping
>was attacked, but that wasn't the fault of the logisticians.
Well by 29 August 1944 the US railheads were at Dreux and Chartres,
and a line had been just opened to Paris, the first train to go beyond the
city was on 4 September. By 31 August the US fuel pipeline was at
Alencon, fuel was being delivered to Chartres via the pipeline in mid
September. The railways had done 11,500,000 tons miles in August.
So just like the German truck fleet in North Africa the US trucks had
their helpers.
It was not until September 10 that the Red Ball route was officially extended
to Soissons and Sommesous, or about double the distance it was previously
running, to Chartres, La Loupe and Dreux. So the trucks could obtain supplies
on the way to the combat moved by other transport.
Mind you the US Army used the rail tanker cars to move avgas since the
forward army units had real trouble handling a large fuel shipment arriving.
Both systems had air supply, the allied air forces, despite diversions to
Anvil and Market Garden managed some 14,213 tons to 19 August then
another 23,000 tons mid August to mid September.
>3. Finally, the historical LOC was straining, but it was still holding.
>At El Alamein, the first attack was stopped. The second attack was
>contained. It was the third one that broke through. I'm not going to
>claim that Rommel would have won if he had had more supply, but it is a
>case that his problem was lack of fuel, preventing him from using his
>tactical reserves, and this shortage didn't primarily come from the
>trucks bringing the fuel from the ports to the front but from a lack of
>tankers - sunk by ULTRA-assisted British forces immediately before El
>Alamein. Malta again...
Sort of, the historical LOC was holding provided there were no major
or even semi major combat operations. In other words the British had
the initiative. The attempts to hold the attack cost too many troops
and supplies. Note the Alamein line the 8th Army attacked was about
as formidable as the lines the Germans assaulted at Kursk.
>> To complete the back of the envelope calculation, to deliver
>> all the 130,000 metric tons of supplies by truck lift from an
>> average distance of 300 miles would require 5,000 US type
>> trucks (...) So say 17,000 trucks.
>
>According to Sadkovich, the Axis had 18,000. Montanari says some 15,000
>or so. Many of these will be captured Allied trucks, and the figure
>counts everything, i.e. trucks hauling supply and trucks with the units.
>That's still a lot of trucks.
The trouble is the majority of the vehicles were needed in the combat
units, otherwise they are just leg infantry hauling their own supplies
on their backs.
It is rather like the US Army in France in 1944, there were far more
trucks than the Red Ball was using, but they were needed elsewhere,
in the units, in the ports to clear the landed cargo and so on.
The British trucks have the problem of spare parts, put the captured
trucks on long haul and you will soon lose them, at least the axis
trucks have a spare parts supply.
>The Italians sent some 3,600 trucks in the third quarter of 1942. But
>average wastage rate from operational (i.e. noncombat) causes was around
>30% and the trucks consumed some 10% of the supplies.
Is the rate 30% per year, quarter or month? Are "the trucks" meant
to be the supply system trucks only?
>(snip)
>> Anybody think they will end up with more than around six
>> German motorised and armoured divisions in full fighting trim
>> and fully supplied, backed by some corps troops, extra artillery for
>> example, plus the supply units, plus the defensive units plus say
>> 100 to 200 fighters, reconnaissance and dive bomber aircraft?
>
>Well, as for me, I don't.
>
>On the other hand, I think that this force could have been deployed in
>1941 rather than 1942, and had it been deployed then it would have been
>sufficient to capture Egypt from the Crusader-sized, -trained and -led
>British forces, as opposed to the larger, better-equipped and -led 8th
>Army defending at 1st El Alamein and Alam Halfa.
As for the what if.
Before June 1940 the axis would have been thinking of simply holding
Libya, given French and British armies on both sides and how close
Tripoli was to Tunisia. Only after France was defeated could the idea
of taking Egypt be realistically considered. Up until that point investing
anything in the North African supply infrastructure would have been
considered a waste.
In the period June to September 1940 the Germans really must
concentrate on trying to defeat England, otherwise it is going to
take years to have any sort of chance to directly defeat England.
That means the Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine but also learning
how to sink ships and starting to build effective small coastal
shipping.
So in say October 1940 parts of the Luftwaffe start refitting for
service in the Mediterranean. Assuming the axis are intent on
defeating England then most of the Luftwaffe has to stay in
France to keep attacking.
Given the Italians have some 14 infantry divisions present and
did send an armoured and motorised division in January 1941
the question then is why should the axis decide to send German
troops until after the British prove superiority over the average
Italian unit?
Apparently Italian intelligence came to the conclusion in late
1940 there were 13 allied divisions including 2 armoured in
Egypt. This could result in German troops being sent, or it
could result in a why bother they are too strong report.
Assuming there is a German build up in Libya will the British
commit a corps to Greece? The first Germans arrived in
Libya on 14 February and had their first combats on 17
February, the first British troops sailed for Greece on 5 March.
When operation Crusader was launched there was a nominal
5 British, 3 Australian, 2 South African, 1 or 2 Indian and 1 New
Zealand divisions present in the desert or Palestine.
Think of it this way, it all goes according to history until the end
of March 1941. Then the axis make a major effort to build up
the supply system in North Africa, the shipping, the trucks and
then send the troops, while presumably conducting the invasion
of Malta. It would probably still be late 1941 before a major
desert battle, the British would be aware of the increased strength
and the Alamein line is quite tough to crack. You have maybe
5 or 6 full strength German divisions to do it with because the
major infrastructure work, better ports and railways are going
to probably take until 1942 to complete.
>Ultimately, going back to the pipeline analogy, the Allies managed to
>build a larger pipeline than the Axis to North Africa. From that larger
>pipeline, they overwhelmed the force that the Axis could support locally
>and had enough to spare to stand on the Axis pipeline as well for good
>measure. But it took the Allies a lot of time to do that, and the Axis
>never tried to use all of the available resources until it was too late.
The allies had better facilities to start with, Alexandria, pipelines from
the oil fields in place. So you can expect the axis to take a long time
as well.
>So when all is said and done, the problem that the Axis had in North
>Africa wasn't that geography made it impossible for them to prevail
>there, it was that OKW had decided that Russia should be prioritized.
> From this followed insufficient air support and resources, insufficient
>fuel, which meant that it became a matter of Tobruk OR Malta (instead of
> "and"), etc.
Certainly the axis could have done more, but be aware the Italian
shipping would be needed to supply the airpower in Sicily attacking
Malta and the Italian railways were being heavily loaded with the
historical shipments. That axis supply pipeline started in Germany
and needed improvements starting there.
>> On another note the ferries and inshore cargo craft the Germans
>> built appear to have fuel consumptions not so much better than the
>> trucks, simply switching to these water craft will not make a big
>> difference to the supply system's fuel requirements.
>
>This is interesting.
>
>I don't have that data, but today a barge is about three times more
>fuel-efficient in tons per mile than a truck. I don't see why it should
>be different in WWII, so if you can find the time to flesh out this
>claim I'll be interested.
Sorry, no explicit data, that is why I used "appear". The ferries tended
to use derated aero engines to power them and, I understand, were
not that hydrodynamically efficient, not to mention carting around some
significant AA guns for defence, with the weight penalty that means.
Hence the fuel consumption was not strikingly better, but I have not
seen any figures to find out how much the difference really is, in terms
of per ton of cargo delivered for the same round trip distance. It would
depend on the truck and ferry chosen of course.
>> So it looks like in order of importance for the axis to build the
>> supply system in North Africa,
>>
>> 1) railways from Tripoli to Alexandria.
>> 2) more coastal shipping to maximise the use of Benghazi, Tobruk
>> and the smaller ports, plus help the trucks.
>> 3) more fuel for the Italian navy.
>> 4) Italy waits until more of its ships are back before declaring war
>> 5) the capacity of the ports in Libya are boosted.
>
>I would add as a 1bis) "more airpower". An additional fliegerkorps means
>the Axis can have their cake and eat it: they can pound Malta (which
>means higher deliveries to North Africa) AND provide air support - or
>defend against RAF attacks on their NA ports. If Malta is neutralized,
>then there are many favorable ripple effects as you listed in the
>beginning of your post.
I would add the caveat 1c) any airpower deployed to North Africa is
going to add to the supply requirements. A Bf109G fuel capacity was
400 litres, which means around 3.5 sorties using all the fuel would
burn a ton of fuel. So say 35 defensive sorties per day times 30
days is around 1,000 tons per month of fuel.
To fill a Panzer IV set you back 480 litres. A Ju87D 780 litres.
A Bf110G 1270 litres. A Ju88 1660 litres. So I do not expect a
big axis air force in North Africa.
I suspect though to do things properly the axis would need to boost
the fuel handling capacities of the various ports, while they had
adequate dry cargo capacity I doubt the fuel capacity. Clearly they
did do something but the more you move to the sort of army that
could have won the desert war, full strength Panzer army backed
by 1 or 2 fliegerkorps, the more you need the fuel.
>So for me the #1 factor is how high a priority OKW assigns to North
>Africa. I'm not blaming them for deciding that Russia was more
>important, but my point is that North Africa was a deadend for the Axis
>due to competing priorities, not because geography determined that it
>would be.
While priorities mattered the biases of the Axis high command come
into play, they thought combat first supply second. My bet would be
they would initially put too much into North Africa than could be properly
supplied, which is what effectively happened. If these forces failed then
the supply system would be worked on. All of this gives the British time
to deploy the sort of forces needed to counter the attacks.
So what we have is the historical port capacity was good enough for
the supplies sent. All up some 1.9 million tons of supplies were landed
in a 32 month period, which works out to an average of 60,000 tons
per month or 6 full strength German divisions using Van Crevald's
supply figure, but no other forces.
However we have to account for the fact cargo needed to be offloaded
at the major Libyan ports onto smaller ships that could use the smaller
Libyan ports, since some to most of the coasters were just that, unable
to cross the Mediterranean. This would reduce the effective capacity of
the ports as they simply import and immediately export the cargo.
At the other end comes the limits on ship size at the major berths in
Tripoli and the other ports.
You also need to reduce the supplies to the combat units, and probably
the combat units themselves in order to import the materials for port
expansion and railways plus the manpower to build and operate the
new infrastructure. The axis also need to build the relevant coasters,
ideally ones that could cross the Mediterranean to avoid having to trans
ship cargoes in North Africa.
Given the way the allies found they were short of coastal shipping in
1944 for Normandy it is interesting to see the axis come up with the
same problem. Coastal shipping as a neglected bottleneck in the
plans of both sides.
It does look like the various negative feedback loops the allies found
in France in 1944, where it takes a long time to bring the capacity on
line then "suddenly" it all takes shape. The suddenly would probably
be 1942 for the axis in North Africa.
Historically the average merchant ship on the run was loaded to
somewhere around 20% of weight carrying capacity, 9,245,171
GRT (around 11,500 deadweight lift) to transport 2,245,381 tons
of cargo plus 206,402 men. So there appears plenty of spare
shipping.
If Bragadin is correct there were 2,249 merchant ships in 1,210
convoys with 1,913 escorts to Libya. Or each convoy consisted of
1.86 merchant ships with 1.58 escorts. If the inter Libya figures are
correct the supply system also generated 1,180 ship movements
in 756 convoys between Libyan ports, average convoy size 1.56
merchant ships plus an unknown number of escorts. That is a lot
of shipping movements to deliver under 2,000,000 tons of supplies
plus 190,000 men.
Louis Capdeboscq
> Louis Capdeboscq wrote:
>
>>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>
>>>Has anyone failed to note that all the above requires *double* the
>>>number of trucks the Germans could scrape together to support
>>>Barbarossa?!
>>
>>Has anyone failed to note that the truck numbers quoted by Geoffrey
>>referred to vehicles allocated at army group level for supply purposes,
>>which is not the same thing as the total number of trucks hauling supply
>>in Barbarossa, let alone the number of trucks that the Germans used in
>>Barbarossa (over 300,000) ?
>
> And one could, of course, simply provide the number of trucks
> allocated to the typical German division as well.
There was no such thing as a typical German division. The bulk of the
German divisions were infantry, they never had all that many trucks to
begin with and they usually had less and less as the war went on. An
infantry division would count itself as lucky if it had 600 or so trucks.
> I have the reprint of the US Army's Handbook of German Military Forces
> which has TO&Es, of course, and could easily post what the official
> allocations were.
What prevents you, then ?
> Has anyone failed to note that Divisional level transport was for
> tactical transport of supplies with the division, NOT for transport of
> supplies from a distant railhead or seaport?
No, but when the railhead becomes distant then the trucks are stripped
from combat units to haul supplies. All armies did that: Montgomery
stopped one of his corps to keep his pursuit going after El Alamein, the
Americans did the same in France in 1944, etc.
IIRC, the VC figures for Barbarossa are 20,000 tons lift in each Army
Group Grosstransportraum which would be about 7,000 trucks per army
group. This was achieved by stripping some units (e.g. the rail repair
companies) of transport, but doesn't count the transport organic to some
of the combat units, e.g. corps or lower, particularly the motorized
ones, and neither does it count the trucks later sent to Russia to
supplement those initially deployed there, when it became clear that
rail repair was falling behind schedules but truck attrition was greater
than planned.
>>>It is hinted in VC that the DAK was provided with more than its fair
>>>share, for its size, of trucks ... I think it is even mentioned, or
>>>implied, that this was around 2000 trucks.
>>
>>I see how providing references stops at the author's name and "I think
>>it is even mentioned".
>
> I have provided cites for this before. If you wish to, Google offers
> excellent search tools.
Google provided me with a lot of hits with your admonitions to "read Van
Creveld", but I found no cite. Please post a cite, or a link to the post
where you posted it.
> Of course, you could provide cites that show this is wrong.
I did.
>>According to Italian sources, Axis forces in North Africa had some
>>15,000 trucks. 3,600 Italian trucks alone were sent during the summer of
>>1942, and then you can add captured trucks, German production, trucks
>>bought from the French, etc. 2,000 is far too low.
>
> But Italian trucks are supplying Italian units, which are additional
> to the German units that are the subject of this article.
I'll spell it out for you: AXIS forces in North Africa had 15,000 trucks
between them. This includes German trucks.
A lot of the rear-area work was handled by the Italians, if Germany
alone is "the subject of this article" then there's no question that
purely German logistics could never have supplied much, let alone as far
as El Alamein. Fortunately for the Germans, and unfortunately for the
rest of the world including their own allies, the Italians were helping
them out so they count.
> So we're
> back to a maximum of less than 12,000 for the Germans,
Well, "less than 12,000" is still quite a bit more than the 2,000 from
your previous unsupported assumption, isn't it ?
> and,
> presumably, much much less, as you indicate that the Italian trucks
> were *additional* to what was, presumably, already there.
I'm not sure I understand what you mean here. You wrote of 2,000 German
trucks as a figure for supply calculation purposes, and I pointed out
that it couldn't be right because in summer '42 the Italians alone
received 3,600.
I already posted a breakdown of supply deliveries between the Italians
and the Germans in my answer to Geoffrey's post, bearing in mind that
for the truck-borne LOC you can remove the civilian needs as well as the
Italian navy from the equation (and a fair chunk of the Italian army as
well).
Louis Capdeboscq
>
> How long would it take to build a railway from Tripoli to the front?
I don't know, but the likely answer would be "too long". It took the
British a lot of time to build their railway from IIRC Matruh to Tobruk.
Tripoli to Benghazi alone is much farther.
Louis Capdeboscq
>
> What actually happened in July of 1942, is that planes were diverted to
> attack Malta for the invasion which never happened and so were not
> available to support Rommel directly.
Without checking, my memory is that the aircraft attacked Malta until
Rommel's Gazala offensive, after which the plan was that the Luftwaffe
should again concentrate against Malta while Rommel consolidated but
instead Rommel pressed for the cancellation of Hercules and pursuit to
Egypt, which left Malta off the hook.
At about the same time, Park was appointed head of the Malta air
defenses and began to run a competent air battle which gutted the Axis
effort to subdue the island again that summer. On the other hand, I
doubt that Park could have achieved the same success against much larger
numbers of Axis planes.
> More air force would have been available had the Germans not invaded
> Russia.
Absolutely.
As I wrote, the Axis problem in North Africa was resources, not
geography. The Axis had the resources to conquer Egypt if it had wanted
to, on the other hand deploying the resources required in 1941 pretty
much meant postponing Barbarossa for that year, or doing it with less
air support, neither of which sounds like a great idea.
However, I'm not arguing that the Axis should have made North Africa a
higher priority item, I'm arguing against the claim that it was
physically impossible for Germany and Italy to support sufficient forces
in North Africa to capture Egypt.
Louis Capdeboscq
later but for the moment here are clarifications on three of the
unimportant and one of the important questions, as these are the
quickest to answer.
Geoffrey Sinclair wrote:
> So I wonder
> how many of the port capacities are based on assuming daylight
> operations only?
All of them, as far as I can tell. The problem with port capacity was
not just installation, it was lack of personnel. The "surge" capacity
mentioned for Tripoli probably meant night shifts as well, but I don't
think that this would be a sustainable rate unless more personnel (which
cost supply) were shipped.
(snip)
> So in other words the Italians judged the port capacity adequate and
> only later moved to do simple upgrades, or, given Benghazi was
> reduced to ships using their own cranes, replacements for damage.
>
> Given the supplies sent the Italians seem to be correct.
The Italians decided that the port capacity was more or less adequate to
handle the existing amount of traffic. This doesn't mean, as Van Creveld
and Phil imply, that the amount of supply landed in NA was cut to match
the maxed out port capacity.
Port capacity was adjusted to expected traffic, not the other way
around. So if we discuss capacity, we have to take what the Italians did
when they finally were ordered to improve the capacity (in '42), not
what they did most of the time.
(snip)
> So we have another factor, double handling the cargo at Tripoli, the
> cargo offloaded from a larger ship, counting against capacity, then
> loaded onto a coaster, again counting against capacity.
Yes.
Which is why I counted total port capacity based on Italian figures for
monthly deliveries rather than by adding up individual port capacity.
The latter means that the Axis can send a steady stream of the right mix
of ships to each port, which wasn't the case.
The "total deliveries" figures don't double count the tonnage offloaded
by lighters, as far as I'm aware. The "port capacity" figures, on the
other hand, count both coastal traffic and larger ships. Please note
that Tobruk received mostly lighters & ferries but it could also - and
did - receive cargo ships. The decision was largely (though in what
proportion I'm not sure) based on tactical considerations.
(snip)
> Is the rate 30% per year, quarter or month? Are "the trucks" meant
> to be the supply system trucks only?
This refers to the Italian trucks sent in July-August 1942 for supply
purposes only, and 30% seems to have been either for the two-months
period or per trip (perish the thought, but I can't rule it out as a
possibility given the average record of the Italian army to do crash
operations).
(snip)
> I would add the caveat 1c) any airpower deployed to North Africa is
> going to add to the supply requirements.
My "plan" is to have one Fliegerkorps to support PAA and provide air
superiority as historically, except that it would operate full-time
instead of part-time. The additional Fliegerkorps tasked with keeping
Malta suppressed (and/or supporting an invasion) is based in Italy and
Sicily and therefore no drain on North African logistics.
Drazen Kramaric
<acl...@deletethisstarcott.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>In the case of Abadan, a similar complex was defended by two
>entire divisions, some 40,000 men, as early as 1940 and had
>substantial protection from any surprise air or sea raid.
What were the designations of these "two entire divisions" numbering
40,000 men "as early as 1940"? I always thought British invaded Persia
in August 1941?
I presume you have some Indian divisions in mind, perhaps 8th?
And even if you can show how British spared "two entire divisions"
with 40,000 men (with whole complement of artillery and engineers
perhaps, given that 1941 British infantry division numbered 17,300 men
according to Ellis) for defense of Abadan, once can take a look at
Antwerpen that had entire German 15th army to take care of it, yet the
port was captured by the British, intact.
Drax
--
Bernardz
says...
> However, I'm not arguing that the Axis should have made North Africa a
> higher priority item, I'm arguing against the claim that it was
> physically impossible for Germany and Italy to support sufficient forces
> in North Africa to capture Egypt.
>
I notice with many of your arguments to other people, you are implying
that Van Creveld states that North Africa could not have been taken by
the Axis for logistical reasons. This is not true.
Van Creveld does discuss the issue and states that it probably could not
be done but does state two ways possibility that Axis might have done
it.
A) Get rid of the Italians soldiers
B) That the Axis should only attack after they have stored enough
supplies in North Africa.
Michele Armellini
news:d3e8he$44m$1...@gnus01.u.washington.edu...
>
> Van Creveld does discuss the issue and states that it probably could not
> be done but does state two ways possibility that Axis might have done
> it.
> A) Get rid of the Italians soldiers
> B) That the Axis should only attack after they have stored enough
> supplies in North Africa.
>
And this could supposedly be done without giving up or curtailing
Barbarossa?
--
David Thornley
Bernardz <Berna...@REMOVEhotmail.com> wrote:
>
>I notice with many of your arguments to other people, you are implying
>that Van Creveld states that North Africa could not have been taken by
>the Axis for logistical reasons. This is not true.
>
>Van Creveld does discuss the issue and states that it probably could not
>be done but does state two ways possibility that Axis might have done
>it.
>A) Get rid of the Italians soldiers
And this runs into political difficulties. After all, the Axis forces
could only be supplied by Italian action, and Mussolini is unlikely
to go quietly along when Hitler tells him to withdraw Italian troops
and continue to supply the Germans. Even if Hitler demanded and
Mussolini acquiesced, it is likely that the Italians would be more
cautious about supplying North Africa.
>B) That the Axis should only attack after they have stored enough
>supplies in North Africa.
>
Which means a commander besides Rommel, who was a loose cannon with
little appreciation of logistics. This means that the German
commander in Africa is probably less tactically adroit and certainly
less daring than Rommel. This has other consequences: the pacing
of the campaign is almost certainly going to be more to the British
liking, and the Axis will probably not achieve any great victories,
so the campaign is likely to become one of attrition, so the British
can probably hold on.
--
David H. Thornley | If you want my opinion, ask.
da...@thornley.net | If you don't, flee.
http://www.thornley.net/~thornley/david/ | O-
--
Bernardz
> little appreciation of logistics.
Van Creveld obviously agrees with you here.
What Van Creveld is *not* saying, as some suggest here, that logistics
make the Axis North African campaign unwinnable.
Andrew Clark
> What were the designations of these "two
> entire divisions" numbering 40,000 men
> "as early as 1940"?
5th and 6th British-Indian divisions.
> I always thought British invaded
> Persia in August 1941?
Correct. But elements of the above force (3 brigades, IIRC)
had secured the vital oil infrastructure long before the
Anglo-Soviet occupation.
> ... can take a look at Antwerpen that
> had entire German 15th army to take care
> of it, yet the port was captured by the British, intact.
You might try comparing the two scenarios more closely, with
particular reference to the military situation and
geography.
--
Donald White
> Which means a commander besides Rommel, who was a loose cannon with
> little appreciation of logistics.
I have read this comment about Rommel many times. Since you are making
it now, perhaps you could direct me to some supporting source.
I ask because I remember reading Rommel on logistics in NA, probably in
THE ROMMEL PAPERS, and he seemed quite aware of logistics problems. He
was particularly concerned with relative rates of supply between his
forces and the British forces and with calculating the time at which his
relative superiority would be the greatest. Often that was now as with
each passing day his relative strength would decrease. Thus, at least
following his logic the best chance for victory was to attack
immediately even with poor supply since to wait was to invite defeat.
Are there data that show that Rommel mischaracterized his situation or
convincing arguments that his analysis was wrong? Is the criticism just
that Rommel and perhaps all generals should first fight not to lose and
only then fight to win?
Don
--
David Thornley
Bernardz <Berna...@REMOVEhotmail.com> wrote:
>> Which means a commander besides Rommel, who was a loose cannon with
>> little appreciation of logistics.
>
>Van Creveld obviously agrees with you here.
>
>What Van Creveld is *not* saying, as some suggest here, that logistics
>make the Axis North African campaign unwinnable.
>
(Not to mention that it's easier to imagine improving the logistics
than improving the political situation, or finding a commander
as daring, aggressive, and tactically adept as Rommel while still
managing to keep a leash on him.)
There's also the fact that Germany had to attack the Soviet Union
in 1941 to have any real hope of winning, given the reforms going
on in 1940 and 1941.
Michael Emrys
dbw...@asu.edu wrote on 4/13/05 9:29 AM:
> I ask because I remember reading Rommel on logistics in NA, probably in THE
> ROMMEL PAPERS, and he seemed quite aware of logistics problems.
The thing is that he did little to accept responsibility for them. His
problems were largely a result of exceeding his brief, which was to prevent
the British from conquering Libya. Instead, he took it upon himself to
attempt to counquer the Middle East.
And rather than constrain his strategy to the means at hand, he chose to
complain, loudly and at great length, to Commando Supremo, OKH, and OKW.
Michael
--
Louis Capdeboscq
> According to the TO&Es provided in the US War Department's Handbook
> mentioned above, the number of motor vehicles provided German
> divisions are as follows ...
Thanks for the figures.
> Now, if one assumes, reasonably, that only those motor vehicles
> actually in the supply element of the Division are likely to be
> available for carrying supplies,
This may be "reasonably" assumed, but since the Germans were not always
reasonable it's not always correct to assume so.
The error is in thinking that German logistics have to maintain a given
supply flow, whereas the Germans can perfectly up their surge rate by
using their tactical trucks to stockpile supplies, and then used these
stocks in an attack. They did it historically, too. I consolidated the
example in my answer to Geoffrey's post.
asp...@pacific.net.au
<loui...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>> According to the TO&Es provided in the US War Department's Handbook
>> mentioned above, the number of motor vehicles provided German
>> divisions are as follows ...
>
>Thanks for the figures.
>
>> Now, if one assumes, reasonably, that only those motor vehicles
>> actually in the supply element of the Division are likely to be
>> available for carrying supplies,
>
>This may be "reasonably" assumed, but since the Germans were not always
>reasonable it's not always correct to assume so.
Well, a reasonable person would make the reasonable assumption that a
division's transport, if that division is allegedly a motorised or
mechanised division, especially in "line" units as opposed to
Divisional service units, is required to *make* the unit motorised or
mechanised and that, therefore, if they are used for operational or
strategic supply of said unit *instead* said unit has instantly been
converted into leg infantry with minimal strategic or operational
mobility, which makes it effectively useless in the Western Desert.
>The error is in thinking that German logistics have to maintain a given
>supply flow, whereas the Germans can perfectly up their surge rate by
>using their tactical trucks to stockpile supplies, and then used these
>stocks in an attack. They did it historically, too. I consolidated the
>example in my answer to Geoffrey's post.
Indeed they may have done so ... and if they do the results will be
the same historical problems, and failures.
Louis Capdeboscq
> Definitions,
>
> Register ton 100 cubic feet of ships space.
>
> Gross tonnage, entire enclosed space on a ship expressed in register
> tons, or GRT.
> Net tonnage, entire useful cargo capacity of a ship expressed in register
> tons.
> Dead Weight Tonnage, ship's total carrying capacity including the ship's
> gear, supply and personnel, in long tons, or DWT
> Dead Weight Effective Lift, effective cargo lift of a ship expressed
in long
> tons, approximately 80% of the dead weight tonnage.
>
> 1,000 GRT = approximately 1,500 DWT, approximately 1,200 dead weight
> effective lift.
Hm, 100 cubic feet look like a cube 1.41m to a side, more or less. 1,200
DWEL will be 1,219 metric tons. Close enough. Too bad Napoleon didn't
make it to Britain !
> (snip) of very useful figures, thanks
>
> I will note one item, Civilians 254,611 tons, which is around 13%
> of the cargo that arrived.
Yes. There are two ways of looking at this figure: either it's a fixed
cost for "true" civilians in which case this rather supports my points
that small increases in supply deliveries were perfectly possible using
existing means, but would have a disproportionate effect at the sharp
end (DAK), or the cost includes civilian port employees in which case it
is going to increase a bit if port capacity is improved.
Given the relatively low figures accounted for in Italian accounts
mentioned below (lower than the demographic data that you mention), I
suspect that the latter is more true than the former.
(snip)
> The pre war immigration program meant that there were some
> 90,000 Italian and 6,000 other European civilians in Libya in 1940,
> out of a population of 890,000. So the 1941 axis army in North
> Libya increased the population by around 13%. Goes a long
> way to explaining the problems the supply system had. The
> equivalent for France in 1944 would be around 5,000,000 men.
On the other hand, by 1945 US Army strength in Europe was 3,000,000
strong. Adding Commonwealth, naval and airforce personnel plus those
French troops coming from overseas, late 1944 France must not have been
very far from that total.
(snip)
>>BEGIN QUOTE:In the
>>port of Tripoli, in 1941, 2,700 tons per day (daylight) could be
>>unloaded, and 300 additional tons of fuel could be unloaded through
>>hoses.
>
> So 81,000 tons per month cargo and 9000 tons of fuel. And a decent
> night fighter force to allow unloading at night would be useful. Though
> none with airborne radar would appear before 1942. So I wonder
> how many of the port capacities are based on assuming daylight
> operations only?
Firstly, I would caution against extrapolating too much from these
figures. Rounding errors can add up to fairly large ones when you do
that. This is why I provided the figures for total supplies landed in NA
as a more useful - IMO - guide to what was the true sustainable rate (as
opposed to surge rate).
I provided these figures both as an additional data point and as an
indication of the relative importance of Tripoli vs Benghazi vs Tobruk
vs other ports.
Secondly, the problems involved with night unloading were more lack of
personnel than RAF night harrassment attacks. Again, it all depends on
which period is considered but most after early 1941 the British
frontline was in Egypt. Sidi Barani to Tripoli is 750 miles which is
close to maximum range for a Blenheim IV. If the airfields are at
Matruh, then this is even farther.
By contrast, personnel seems to have been a pressing problem, along with
infrastructure.
> The fuel tonnage capacity seems low though, when you realise around
> 130,000 tons was delivered to North Africa in 5 months in 1941. I
> presume it means Benghazi had a similar capacity for fuel as Tripoli.
> Or else fuel was carried in containers on the standard freighters as
well.
As states, the capacity is for containers - all types of cargo,
including fuel - with an additional capacity to unload fuel through
hoses into local fuel tanks. So a maximum of 3,000 tons of fuel per day
could be unloaded: 300 through hoses and 2,700 in containers (this would
include the weight of the containers).
> One point I am unclear about, is whether DAK transported fuel in
> tanker trucks like the 1944 US Army or it was all in jerricans, which
> significantly cut the effective fuel load thanks to the can's bulk and
> weight. When the histories I have read mention fuel transport they
> imply it was all jerricans.
In 1940, the Italians used practically only tanker trucks. By 1942, fuel
transport was mostly jerricans. The reasons for the shift were mostly
tactical, but I don't have detailed breakdowns.
>>To unload as fast as possible 5 ships carrying 20,000 tons in
>>January 1942, it took the port's unloading structures and personnel 8
>>days.
>
> In theory 75,000 tons per month at that pace. The US Army figures
> indicate it took the best part of three weeks to load and then unload
> a typical allied freighter at well equipped ports. A liberty ship could
> carry around 8,600 tons of cargo, so in 8 days the Italians unloaded
> the equivalent of 2.3 liberty ships. Given Tripoli is credited with 5
> berths then presumably all ships were worked simultaneously and
> were obviously smaller than the standard US ship. So the unloading
> times appear similar to allied ships.
Yes, that is how it appeared to me, too.
Some extracts from the minutes of the Italian High Command conferences
("verbali delle riunioni tenute dal capo di Stato Maggiore Generale" - I
don't own these books, I'm relying on extracts quoted in another forum):
-14 Nov 1941. Total minimum requirements for the Axis in NA till year's
end are estimated at 80,000 tons (of which 30k foodstuffs). There are
63,000 German and 186,000 Italian troops plus 35,000 Italian civilians.
40,000 tons could go through Benghazi (est time 50 days), 3000-3,500 to
Bardia with submarines, small ships from Greece etc. The rest would go
to Tripoli, which is already stuck with 25,000 tons of German ammo.
There are plans to move 25,000 tons + 9,000 tons of fuel to Tripoli in
one month with 6+1 ships calculating to lose 30% of them and 22% overall.
-On Dec 4th port capacity at Benghasi is given as 1 large + 1 medium + 2
small ship subject to enemy activity and winter weather. Minimal monthly
fuel consumption for the navy and convoys is 80,000 tons, remaining
stocks remaining are 50,000-60,000 including 12,000 received from Romania.
-on Jan 8th 1942, decision to prepare 3 ships for Tripoli. Offloading
time there estimated at 7 days. No fuel available, destroyers are
undergoing maintenance after sustaining weather damage while escorting
the previous convoy.
So it looks like unloading one ship takes about a week, this is
consistent with other mentions from the Italian officials.
> The UK merchant ship history, counting ships of 1,600 GRT or more
> says the average large Italian cargo ship was 5,714 GRT or 6,550
> deadweight tons. Bragadin's figures, ships of 500 or more GRT have
> the size of the average ship available in June 1940 as 3,193 GRT.
Obviously, the large ships have a larger average size: 5,441 GRT
according to the UK merchant ship history, versus an average of 4,222
GRT for the prewar Italian fleet according to Bagradin.
Predictably, those ships that were lost in foreign ports were mostly
ocean-going types: their average size comes out at 5,739 GRT so Italy
lost its largest ships according to the Italian officials, Bagradin and
the UK history. So far, no surprises here. I'll add that these ships
were not just larger but also more modern in terms of self-loading /
self-unloading capacity so their loss was disproportionate in more than
just tonnage terms.
Doing the math, Bagradin arrives at an average size of 3,193 GRT for the
remaining Italian ships, while the figure from the Italian official
history is 3,640 GRT (535 ships, 1,947,307 GRT). Bagradin and the
Italians agree with the number of available German ships (56 and 54
respectively), but significantly disagree about their tonnage (188,344
vs 352,051) so the average tonnage of the German ships varies by a
factor of 2 (I suspect a typo somewhere) but the average Axis ship comes
out at 3,626 (Italian officials) vs 3,479 (Bagradin) so these sources
agree on the important point.
(snip)
> All up, if the system was working fully, far more port capacity than
> needed to cope with what was sent.
Yes.
Another point about NA logistics compared to the Allied experience in
Europe is that Italy was not the United States, there were no mountains
of stuff piling up in home ports and waiting to be shipped, unloaded and
delivered to the troops.
Part of the reason why the pipeline was a low-debit one (or a 1" hose as
Phil put it) was that there wasn't much "water" available to run through
it. Many times, shipments were restricted by lack of available material
in Italian ports, not by NA port capacity. Logistical difficulties
encountered in North Africa proper were only part of the overall problem.
(snip)
> It appears Van Crevald has underestimated the North African port
capacity.
This is my conclusion, too. Phil mentioned Thompson's "Lifeblood of
War", which I haven't read and don't remember seeing quoted so I'm not
sure what it says or what its sources are.
(snip)
> Yet we have Benghazi and Tobruk landing significant cargo tonnages
> in 1941 and 1942, so there is a contradiction for Tobruk at least.
>
> The next piece of the puzzle is what sized ships could be handled,
> Queen Elizabeth or siebel ferries to use the extremes.
The answer to that question depends on when you ask it, and what level
of effort the Axis is prepared to devote to the theater. Historically,
both were related as the amount of effort that the Axis devoted to North
Africa increased.
Tripoli and Tobruk were deep enough to handle all kinds of ships.
Benghazi was shallower, which is where port improvement played a role,
as well as the arrival of newly built ships in 1942.
Berthing space was the main problem, and Benghazi was very useful in
that regard as its mole could accomodate several ships. Tobruk - and at
times Tripoli - also had a problem with obstructions and wrecks, and
here again the question of whether it was profitable to clear them or
not depended on available resources which were themselves a consequence,
not a cause, of OKW interest.
In short, 1940-41 port capacity was inadequate to deal with the 1942
scale traffic, let alone with what would be necessary for an upgraded
PAA, but it could easily be upgraded using resources available in Italy
as the 1942 experience demonstrated.
(snip)
> So in other words the Italians judged the port capacity adequate and
> only later moved to do simple upgrades, or, given Benghazi was
> reduced to ships using their own cranes, replacements for damage.
The Italians judged the port capacity adequate - and it was - for the
low level of supply that was being sent. So they didn't bother improving it.
This doesn't mean that the Axis had reached the maximum attainable port
capacity, as opposed to its current max capacity in, say, early '41.
>>Note that on a good day, i.e. when a Siebel ferry came through, the Axis
>>unloaded some 2,000 tons at Tobruk.
>
> The trouble is how sustainable this was, given the state of the port,
> including transport to move the supplies of the docks and labour.
At this rate clearing the harbor wasn't a problem. We're not exactly
emulating Antwerp here.
> Is a good day including unloading into the night, under lights?
So it seems, yes.
(snip)
> So the ships were half loaded so they could steam at higher speeds
> and would not take as long to unload at the other end? Malta is
> worth an extra knot or two? Can faster deliveries be taken to mean
> quicker unloading in Libya?
Mainly, the ships were half loaded to spread the risk in case some were
damaged, as well as minimize the unloading time. If you have 5 berths
and are not going to use the whole capacity, then your best bet is to
send 6 half-full ships (expecting to lose 1 en route and unload the
other 5 simultaneously) rather than 3 full ones.
I don't think that this made a great difference in speed. The limited
time that I spent on a cargo ship, it doesn't seem that extra load
slowed the ship down much. Weather was more of an issue. As far as I can
tell, everytime that the practice is mentioned in the Italian sources
(either the official histories or the "Verbali") then the reason given
is insurance against combat losses. Few eggs, many baskets, so why not
spread them ? As opposed to the Allies having more eggs than baskets...
> Another set of figures is the capacity of the cargo ships used,
> so the figures are capacity (but in GRT which is less than the
> weight actually able to be carried, multiply by 1.2 for an estimate
> of weight carrying ability), cargo sent in tons.
>
> 1940 (Jun-Dec): 1,291,245 / 304,467 (plus 29,299 men)
> 1941: 5,442,381 / 1,016,442 (plus 157,221 men)
> 1942 and Jan 1943: 2,511,545 / 924,472 (plus 19,882 men)
> Total: 9,245,171 / 2,245,381
Ok, to begin with, I don't know where the figures for "capacity of the
cargo ships used" comes from. Assuming it comes from Bagradin, then
coupled with his figure of 2,249 "trips" (Bagradin counts departures,
the Italian official history counts arrivals) this means an average
capacity of 4,111 GRT per ship. Ok, I can live with these figures.
The problem of course is that you aren't counting the 206,402 troops
sent. From the "Handbook on German forces" chapter 6, it seems that 1
man requires 2 GRT, so the total sent would be 2,658,185 "tons". So your
estimate at 100kg per man is off by a factor of 20 (at least: see below).
So the efficiency ratio that you're trying to measure comes out at 36%
rather than 20%.
There are several problems with these approximations, however. The first
is that I'm really not comfortable with using a constant average
capacity per ship because it doesn't account for the evolutions in
sinkings. The Axis navies lost small and large ships about equally, the
average tonnage of the ship lost being inferior to the average (this
means that coastal shipping was targetted and more vulnerable than the
average). As a result, the size of the average Italian ship didn't
decrease, and neither did that of the average Axis ship, but the average
German ship became smaller over the years.
The second problem is that I think the personnel fudges the issue. For
example, the average efficiency ratio of 36% as calculated above breaks
down in the following fashion: 35% in '40, 31% in '41, 46% in '42. I'm
not sure how to explain the variation, but one obvious factor is the
amount of personnel sent: the higher the ratio of personnel to tonnage
sent, the lower the efficiency in the formula that you're using. Using a
quick macro to change the variable of "how many GRT's per man" so as to
minimize the difference between the yearly rates, I find a value of some
7 GRT per man instead of 2.
At this point, I'm enclined to believe that back of the envelope
calculations can only go so far...
> Bragadin states some 2,249 cargo ships were sent from Italy to Libya
> carrying 2,245,381 tons, or just under 1,000 tons of cargo each.
> Even if the Italian navy figure of 1,789 merchant ship trips is correct,
> rather than 2,249, it still indicates under loading.
Bagradin's figures are remarkably consistent with those that I posted
and those that I sent you when you break them down to their component
parts. The only difference is in the number of ship trips, and if you
account for the difference between "arrived" and "sent" the difference
becomes minimal (I'll spare the formulas for now, this is sufficiently
garbled as it is).
> Now the US Army, shipping purely military cargoes managed to
> use 70 to 80% of the capacity, so I could understand if the Italians
> managed 60 to 70% given the US efforts in improving shipping
> efficiency.
IF these figures are accurate, then they would be consistent assuming
that the Italian ships sailed mostly half-loaded.
> I should add there were 206,402 men sent in those "cargo" ships
> so there is an adjustment to the averages needed, but they cannot
> account for such a big difference, at less than 10 men per ship on
> average.
I'm generally suspicious of arguments that rest on "they cannot
possibly" assumptions. Not that I don't use them myself occasionally,
but see above about my little macro. Also, this is less than 100 men per
ship, not 10. I'd say it makes a difference.
I had the intention of digging up a few figures for troop transport GRT
and troops carried to see what the average was, but I'm not going to
have time for this right now. Maybe later.
> On the face of it this has to be one of the least efficient shipping
> runs going around.
I don't know about the others. It looks less efficient than the
trans-oceanic Allied runs, but I don't know how it compares with the
British deployment in Greece, for example.
> The average ship used was 4,110 GRT,
> (assuming 2,249 trips) so able to carry something like 5,000 tons
> of cargo, and they carried 1,000 tons. It sounds like everything
> was effectively combat loaded, designed to be moved off the ship
> quickly and preserving formations, so one ship had equipment
> from one unit, regardless of the efficiency problems. Minimal
> packing or bulk loading done.
One thing that is clear is that the Italians were not constrained by the
amount of shipping at their disposal. This is obvious not just from back
of the envelope calculations as above but particularly from the
historical record. What they kept complaining about was fuel, most of
which was needed for the escorts, warship availability (escorts again),
and time to unload in port.
The impression that comes across is really like that from the British
Malta convoys: move in as fast as you can using completely unreasonable
numbers of warships to protect a handful of transports, zig-zagging
under the bombs, unload as fast as you can, and get away from Dodge at
flank speed while you can.
> So we have another factor, double handling the cargo at Tripoli, the
> cargo offloaded from a larger ship, counting against capacity, then
> loaded onto a coaster, again counting against capacity. Which starts
> to imply there was a lack of port capacity thanks to the ships the
> other ports could actually service.
No, this implies that port capacity figures are not indicative of
overall import capacity which is why I used the amounts historically
delivered to NA instead of port capacity.
It does not imply that port capacity was in fact lacking. Also - and
this bears repeating - the historical figures are about the historical
port capacity, when the Axis didn't bother upgrading Benghazi until
1942, when Tobruk was not considered defensible against Allied attacks
due to the insufficient means available to the Axis in Africa, etc.
These are not logistics-related, they are a problem of lack of resources
which was a strategic decision.
> I gather coasters in Italian service were smaller than those in British
> service? Given the British ships were expected to handle Atlantic
> and North Sea weather you would have thought Italian coasters could
> have crossed the Mediterranean, or are we talking things like Seibel
> ferries?
We are talking all manners of ships, ranging from the sailing boat to
the Siebel ferry, with the odd coaster added. As usual when discussing
Axis equipment, particularly the not cutting edge equipment,
"standardization" is not part of the picture.
> According to the figures from the Italian Navy history you sent me,
>
> Inter-Libyan traffic.
>
> In 1940 (Jun-Dec): 244 convoys with 375 ships and 14,878 gross tons lost.
> In 1941: 280 convoys with 503 ships and 17,747 gross tons lost
> In 1942 and Jan 1943: 232 convoys with 302 ships and 19,100 gross tons
> lost.
>
> I like the fact that many convoys were 1 merchant ship.
Yes.
And I note fairly large amounts lost, with presumably larger amounts not
sent due to the threat of enemy attacks. Enemy action was the #1 problem
here. This doesn't mean that logistics wouldn't have become a problem,
but it does mean that the '1" hose' theory stands at best unproven right
now.
> Do the statistics give the amount of cargo shifted by these convoys,
> is there some sort of cargo landed total by port, so we can see if
> there is any double counting? Could it be the cargo is counted once
> when arriving in Tripoli and then again when arriving at another port?
1. There are figures for cargo landed and handled per port, but I don't
have them. Books are on the way, which should clear some things up.
2. I'm fairly positive that the figures I provided for amounts delivered
in North Africa don't include double counting. Although I can't
absolutely rule out padding, I doesn't seem an important factor.
(snip)
> Looks like a good first approximation is around 33% of the
> cargo was trans shipped. That depresses Tripoli's effective capacity.
Yes, it does, which is why I used figures for loads delivered to NA,
which show that more than enough total capacity remained.
Note that this isn't specific to the Axis. After El Alamein, Tobruk was
opened 20 November, and then the railhead reached it 1 Dec with a
capacity of 2,500 tons/day. This allowed to turn Tobruk from a port of
imports to a port of transfer - by sea - to El Agheila. Before this (26
Nov), Benghazi was turned into a port of imports and the major Allied
base of operations. Construction of a railroad between Tobruk and
Benghazi was never completed before the end of the campaign.
(snip)
> My question would be is the figure we have the cargo that arrived
> in port, or the figure the ports unloaded that month?
I wouldn't completely rule out padding, but these figures normally are
for cargo unloaded. I don't have as complete figures for cargo cleared
from the port, although I may have them in a few days.
Here are other numbers from vol. 3 of the multi-volume German history,
table V.V.I. The pages around it discuss the reliability of sources.
Example for the Wehrmacht loads (tonnes)
Shipped Unloaded
1941
June 37,848 37,848
July 39,512 32,784
August 34,170 27,372
September 34,522 27,723
October 24,358 15,723
November 13,531 5,138
December 11,793 10,275
1942
January a) 19,948 19,943
February a) 29,087 29,087
March a) 19,134 13,276
April a) 56,727 5,883
May a) 34,675 31,787
June a) 11,976 8,267
July a) 35,095 32,060
a) Table V.VI.I. DRZW vol 6.
As far as I can tell, there's no great difference with the Italian figures.
> If it truly means landed then, based on the peak months, the ports had
> around twice the capacity used in both 1941 and 1942 assuming no
> significant damage to the ports.
Yes, which is why Phil asked for evidence of unused port capacity and I
posted these figures which clearly indicate that port capacity was
underused.
>>I think that part of the problem is that many Allied authors used the
>>figures achieved by the British from Benghazi as their baseline,
>>reasoning that the hapless Italians can't have done better. But in fact
>>the Axis got quite a lot of use out of Benghazi, and ditto Tobruk.
>
> Is this Benghazi as of the first time the British took it, when the
Luftwaffe
> made it hard to use, the second time when they did not hold it for very
> long or the final time, when the Germans made very sure it was
> demolished and Sirte captured 1 month later and Tripoli captured 2
> months later?
The first two times, with a bit of the third. They never got much
service out of Benghazi - although they had planned to in the last time
- and some British historians obviously assumed that the Italians hadn't
either.
> The British worked hard to improve communications in 1941/42 and
> boost Tobruk.
Yes, and they worked just as hard to close down Tobruk after Gazala.
They were fairly successful, too. But this doesn't indicate that the
Axis were doomed not to use Tobruk because of the DAF. That was the
result, not the cause, of the lack of resources.
(snip)
>>2. Regarding the truck LOC itself, the situation was different from the
>>one faced by the 1944 US Army, due to the existence of a handy
>>coastline. If coastal shipping is used to unload dumps with fuel, food &
>>water, spare parts etc along the coast, then the trucks no longer have
>>to carry their own supply. This means that they can be used to carry
>>only cargo from the ports to the frontline, and the truck LOC can be
>>quite long. This is basic truck management, logistics 101. The Axis
>>tried it. The reason why it didn't work was that their coastal shipping
>>was attacked, but that wasn't the fault of the logisticians.
>
>
> Well by 29 August 1944 the US railheads were at Dreux and Chartres,
> and a line had been just opened to Paris, the first train to go
beyond the
> city was on 4 September. By 31 August the US fuel pipeline was at
> Alencon, fuel was being delivered to Chartres via the pipeline in mid
> September. The railways had done 11,500,000 tons miles in August.
> So just like the German truck fleet in North Africa the US trucks had
> their helpers.
Ok, so both truck LOCs had help.
So much for "the situation was different" but my argument stands
regarding the fact that we're not discussing trucks running 600 miles
unassisted.
As another set of figures, the British official history counted an
armoured division in pursuit mode needed 400 tons a day, actually 520
with the need for water.
A General Transport Compagny had a truck lift of 300 tons, but in
practice only had a practical range of 100 miles / day in the desert. So
6 British divisions at 600 miles = 6 x 6 x 520 / 300 = 6,240 3-ton
trucks equivalent, not counting the needs of the supply chain itself.
Assuming that the average Axis truck was 2 tons instead of 3, plus a 20%
overhead for the needs of the supply line, we have a requirement of
11,200 trucks, not counting the need for replacements or losses from
enemy action.
On the other hand, the amount of supply under discussion is around 3,120
tons daily, or 93,600 monthly. If we assume that the British calculated
in short tons, then the needs for supplying a monthly 130,000 metric
tons 600 miles away by truck would be 17,333 trucks, a figure remarkably
similar to your estimate.
On the other hand, using your formula then the requirements - with
average distance dropping from 1,100 to 600 miles - would be 9,052
trucks rounded up to 10,000.
(snip)
>>>To complete the back of the envelope calculation, to deliver
>>>all the 130,000 metric tons of supplies by truck lift from an
>>>average distance of 300 miles would require 5,000 US type
>>>trucks (...) So say 17,000 trucks.
>>
>>According to Sadkovich, the Axis had 18,000. Montanari says some 15,000
>>or so. Many of these will be captured Allied trucks, and the figure
>>counts everything, i.e. trucks hauling supply and trucks with the units.
>>That's still a lot of trucks.
>
> The trouble is the majority of the vehicles were needed in the combat
> units, otherwise they are just leg infantry hauling their own supplies
> on their backs.
Look at how 5th Leichte Division managed to keep going by unloading all
vehicles and making them carry fuel before resuming the pursuit, on 3/4
April '41.
This isn't a sustainable rate, but it shows that the Axis can do a surge
rate to stockpile enough supplies for a one-of effort. If this works,
then they are home free to Alexandria.
Also, bear in mind the many overheads involved in all the previous
calculations: a 10% increase in supply deliveries that goes 90% to the
Germans will improve the German supply situation by 30% using the
overall figures.
> The British trucks have the problem of spare parts, put the captured
> trucks on long haul and you will soon lose them, at least the axis
> trucks have a spare parts supply.
I think that the spare parts situation will be just as bad for all types
of trucks.
(snip)
> In the period June to September 1940 the Germans really must
> concentrate on trying to defeat England, otherwise it is going to
> take years to have any sort of chance to directly defeat England.
Yes. The Luftwaffe, in particular, is unavailable. The Kriegsmarine is
redeploying to France, licking its wounds from Norway and drafting memos
showing how there's no way it can do Sealion.
> So in say October 1940 parts of the Luftwaffe start refitting for
> service in the Mediterranean. Assuming the axis are intent on
> defeating England then most of the Luftwaffe has to stay in
> France to keep attacking.
Not necessarily.
At this stage, the Battle of Britain is clearly lost and the Luftwaffe
needs a break, so Germany settles down to a long siege. The really
important policy decision is to *not* decide "let's finish off the
Soviets meanwhile" - which I'm not saying would be a good decision, but
which would be a necessary decision for the required assets to be
deployed in the Med rather than in Russia.
> Given the Italians have some 14 infantry divisions present and
> did send an armoured and motorised division in January 1941
> the question then is why should the axis decide to send German
> troops until after the British prove superiority over the average
> Italian unit?
Absolutely.
> Apparently Italian intelligence came to the conclusion in late
> 1940 there were 13 allied divisions including 2 armoured in
> Egypt. This could result in German troops being sent, or it
> could result in a why bother they are too strong report.
Historically, this did result in German troops being sent, and the
decision wasn't influenced by reported British strength but by a desire
to keep Italy in fighting shape.
Therefore assuming that Compass results in an Italian disaster, then
Germany sends troops to North Africa with Ribbentrop + Goering + Raeder
capitalizing on the opportunity to implement their "Britain first"
policy. At this stage, instead of a weak motorized corps tasked with
keeping the British at arms' length, the Germans can plan to insert an
army with the objective of clearing the British from the Mediterranean
altogether.
> Assuming there is a German build up in Libya will the British
> commit a corps to Greece?
From what I remember of this debate in Churchill's memoirs and the
Playfair histories, the German buildup was underestimated but not a
factor in the British decision to help Greece. Pursuit to Tripoli was
considered out of the question as being simply too far, the Italians
were no threat and German reinforcements considered insignificant.
The British outlook seems to have been that the main German forces were
arrayed against Britain and Yugoslavia / Greece. Churchill was hoping to
get Turkey on board soon, too.
Let's keep in mind how surprised the British were by Rommel's initial
attack (so of course was OKW).
> Think of it this way, it all goes according to history until the end
> of March 1941. Then the axis make a major effort to build up
> the supply system in North Africa, the shipping, the trucks and
> then send the troops, while presumably conducting the invasion
> of Malta. It would probably still be late 1941 before a major
> desert battle, the British would be aware of the increased strength
> and the Alamein line is quite tough to crack. You have maybe
> 5 or 6 full strength German divisions to do it with because the
> major infrastructure work, better ports and railways are going
> to probably take until 1942 to complete.
1. Infrastructure improvement didn't take all that long: a few months in
1942.
2. With a better supply situation, Rommel is going to be in the Crusader
position by late 1941, i.e. investing Tobruk while the Axis assaults
Malta. Best case is Rommel captures Tobruk (unlikely) or Crusader is
launched prematurely because of the emergency situation in Tobruk (more
likely) with Rommel probably beating the British in such a case.
The logistics equation translates to 6 full strength divisions as far as
El Alamein. Are these going to be enough ? 1st El Alamein was touch and
go, and the 1941 British didn't have as much force in the area as the
Summer 1942 ones, particularly as Japan will have come a-knocking in the
meantime.
>>Ultimately, going back to the pipeline analogy, the Allies managed to
>>build a larger pipeline than the Axis to North Africa. From that larger
>>pipeline, they overwhelmed the force that the Axis could support locally
>>and had enough to spare to stand on the Axis pipeline as well for good
>>measure. But it took the Allies a lot of time to do that, and the Axis
>>never tried to use all of the available resources until it was too late.
>
>
> The allies had better facilities to start with, Alexandria, pipelines
from
> the oil fields in place. So you can expect the axis to take a long time
> as well.
I think that the Allied build up dwarfed that of the Axis. By 1942,
Egypt could repair 1,600 airframes and 2,400 engines aircraft per month.
The 1940 capacity was negligible.
In 1940, there was only nominal maintenance capacity, sufficient to the
needs of the small force then present in Egypt. According to the
official history of the REME, the Advanced Base Workshop employed 900
service personnel and 1,200 civilians, while the base area at
Tel-el-Kebir near Suez employed 3,000 military, 8,000 civilians, and
1,500 POW at peak (which I don't know when it was reached). The Base
Ordnance Workshop at Cairo employed 20,000 civilians, and while there
are no figures for employment at the one at Alexandria we know that it
covered 35 acres vs 30 for Tel-el-Kebir. So the REME total would be
6,900 military + 3,000 POWs + 37,200 civilians so that's some 45k
personnel, then add the personnel figures for the RAF and USAAF.
All of this to say that yes, the 1940 British had more facilities to
draw from like pipelines, but the 1942 British had built up
considerably, and to a larger extent than the Axis had (or could). My
point being that the British military build up was predicated on the
realization of very large infrastructure improvements, which were not
complete in 1941. By contrast the Axis didn't need to embark in such
large works - and probably wouldn't have, even if they had had the
resources which they didn't - so they would be "operational" earlier.
In fact, all I'm doing is showing what the Axis had available in 1942 -
when they decided to take NA half-seriously - and in 1941 when Malta was
neutralized, and assuming that they get it all in the second half of
1941. Which there is no reason appart from a strategic-political
decision to assume they couldn't: all the necessary items were already
in the Axis inventory by 1940.
>>So when all is said and done, the problem that the Axis had in North
>>Africa wasn't that geography made it impossible for them to prevail
>>there, it was that OKW had decided that Russia should be prioritized.
>>From this followed insufficient air support and resources, insufficient
>>fuel, which meant that it became a matter of Tobruk OR Malta (instead of
>> "and"), etc.
>
> Certainly the axis could have done more, but be aware the Italian
> shipping would be needed to supply the airpower in Sicily attacking
> Malta and the Italian railways were being heavily loaded with the
> historical shipments. That axis supply pipeline started in Germany
> and needed improvements starting there.
I don't know about the Italian railways being overloaded. Extra shipping
for Sicily shouldn't be a problem: just the shipping saved from Malta
attacks in 1942 would be enough to supply a Sicily-based airforce.
Besides, the Axis _did_ base aircraft in Sicily, they never had large
amounts of aircraft in Sicily and North Africa simultaneously, that's
all. It doesn't take the Normandy Allied air forces for the Axis to win
in the Med.
>>>On another note the ferries and inshore cargo craft the Germans
>>>built appear to have fuel consumptions not so much better than the
>>>trucks, simply switching to these water craft will not make a big
>>>difference to the supply system's fuel requirements.
>>
>>This is interesting.
>>
>>I don't have that data, but today a barge is about three times more
>>fuel-efficient in tons per mile than a truck. I don't see why it should
>>be different in WWII, so if you can find the time to flesh out this
>>claim I'll be interested.
>
>
> Sorry, no explicit data, that is why I used "appear". The ferries tended
> to use derated aero engines to power them and, I understand, were
> not that hydrodynamically efficient, not to mention carting around some
> significant AA guns for defence, with the weight penalty that means.
> Hence the fuel consumption was not strikingly better, but I have not
> seen any figures to find out how much the difference really is, in terms
> of per ton of cargo delivered for the same round trip distance. It would
> depend on the truck and ferry chosen of course.
This is still interesting. I wonder how it applied to other forms of
coastal shipping.
(snip)
> I would add the caveat 1c) any airpower deployed to North Africa is
> going to add to the supply requirements. A Bf109G fuel capacity was
> 400 litres, which means around 3.5 sorties using all the fuel would
> burn a ton of fuel. So say 35 defensive sorties per day times 30
> days is around 1,000 tons per month of fuel.
Ok, so for 1,000 tons of fuel you get a fighter squadron for a month, is
that it ?
Well, this has taken a while to write so I don't feel like researching
detailed figures for monthly fuel losses, but just extrapolating from
the % of material lost and applying it to the fuel delivery figures that
I posted here and sent you, the monthly average is 3,189 tons in 1941
and 2,760 in 1942. So just by cutting the sinkings by 50% you have
enough for 1.5 extra fighter squadron in Tobruk without hurting the Axis
fuel supply.
> To fill a Panzer IV set you back 480 litres. A Ju87D 780 litres.
> A Bf110G 1270 litres. A Ju88 1660 litres. So I do not expect a
> big axis air force in North Africa.
Neither do I, but "big" is never the problem in warfare, what matters is
"big enough".
> I suspect though to do things properly the axis would need to boost
> the fuel handling capacities of the various ports, while they had
> adequate dry cargo capacity I doubt the fuel capacity.
There were large fuel tanks in all three big ports, dont know about the
details of fuel handling capacity.
> Clearly they
> did do something but the more you move to the sort of army that
> could have won the desert war, full strength Panzer army backed
> by 1 or 2 fliegerkorps, the more you need the fuel.
Yes.
On the other hand, this isn't going to be like the 1944 ETO because the
British in Egypt are not going to be the Wehrmacht at the German border,
they'll be more of the "one good push and the whole rotting structure
will come crashing down" variety. After that, of course, whoever is in
charge has to decide where to go from Egypt as well as whether he should
guard from British commandos based in Sudan, but that's another story.
(snip)
> While priorities mattered the biases of the Axis high command come
> into play, they thought combat first supply second. My bet would be
> they would initially put too much into North Africa than could be
> properly supplied, which is what effectively happened.
I don't know. When exactly did this happen ? I can think of sending the
164th division in the Summer of 1942 but by then the supply situation
was already bad and particularly the Axis ability to deal with it was
most limited - Pedestal had come through and Malta was fighting back.
Part of the logistic problem was Rommel, but Rommel largely made himself
part of the problem because the Germans operated on a shoestring. With a
better supply situation overall, Rommel's behavior isn't going to
significantly jeopardize the Axis supply situation in North Africa as it
historically did.
> So what we have is the historical port capacity was good enough for
> the supplies sent.
Assuming you mean "sent" as opposed to "arrived" (which would be a
tautology), this means a 16% increase. I think it could have been more,
but using the historical ratios and assuming all the extra supply goes
to the Germans then even this small increase translated into a 48%
increase for the German component of PAA.
I know that the Italians would in practice get some of the increase, I'm
just using this figure to illustrate the discrepancy between how a
seemingly low figure at the departure end translates into a
disproportionately high increase in effective combat power.
> All up some 1.9 million tons of supplies were landed
> in a 32 month period, which works out to an average of 60,000 tons
> per month or 6 full strength German divisions using Van Crevald's
> supply figure, but no other forces.
Yes. That's about the strength of the historical PAA which is where I
believe Van Creveld derived his figures from (I can't be bothered to
check right now).
> However we have to account for the fact cargo needed to be offloaded
> at the major Libyan ports onto smaller ships that could use the smaller
> Libyan ports, since some to most of the coasters were just that, unable
> to cross the Mediterranean. This would reduce the effective capacity of
> the ports as they simply import and immediately export the cargo.
Yes, but again the record show that the ports were under used. As I
wrote in my previous post, if you take the figures for April and May
1942, the average for this two months period is 181,414 tons per month.
Again, that's the rate maintained during two months, so it is clearly
sustainable.
This rate is 66% higher than the average 1941 monthly delivery rate, and
82% higher than the average 1942 one. Compared to 1940, this is a 179%
increase. So clearly, the port capacity was good enough for more than
just the supply historically sent which is barely 16% above what was
delivered.
> At the other end comes the limits on ship size at the major berths in
> Tripoli and the other ports.
Again, I'm not saying that Tripoli + Benghazi were ever going to amount
to Antwerp + Marseilles. But they didn't have to.
What it comes down to is whether you believe that an at least 50%
greater supply delivery rate could have made a difference.
> You also need to reduce the supplies to the combat units, and probably
> the combat units themselves in order to import the materials for port
> expansion and railways plus the manpower to build and operate the
> new infrastructure.
Yes, particularly since as shown in the beginning of the post the cost
of shipping personnel seems to have been very high.
On the other hand, the capacity existed and most of the extra need is a
one time cost.
> The axis also need to build the relevant coasters,
> ideally ones that could cross the Mediterranean to avoid having to
> trans ship cargoes in North Africa.
I think that we can safely assume that they wouldn't. They would rather
build warships and rely on requisitions and improvisations to fill that
particular need. Not arguing that this would be more effective, just
that assuming they would behave otherwise tends to stretch the imagination.
> Given the way the allies found they were short of coastal shipping in
> 1944 for Normandy it is interesting to see the axis come up with the
> same problem. Coastal shipping as a neglected bottleneck in the
> plans of both sides.
Yes. Not sure what possibilities existed of a more thorough requisition
program, as well as purchases from e.g. Turkey (or the Soviet Union ?).
> It does look like the various negative feedback loops the allies found
> in France in 1944, where it takes a long time to bring the capacity on
> line then "suddenly" it all takes shape. The suddenly would probably
> be 1942 for the axis in North Africa.
I don't know, it seems to me that the time between decision and
"suddenly" is shorter for the Axis than for the Allies, due to lower
volumes and shorter LOCs. But I could be wrong of course, in particular
it doesn't seem that the Luftwaffe could have begun to operate from
Sicily much earlier than it historically did.
> Historically the average merchant ship on the run was loaded to
> somewhere around 20% of weight carrying capacity, 9,245,171
> GRT (around 11,500 deadweight lift) to transport 2,245,381 tons
> of cargo plus 206,402 men. So there appears plenty of spare
> shipping.
Although I disagree with your ratio, I agree with your conclusion.
Especially if some spare shipping is generated by reducing the losses
from Malta.
> If Bragadin is correct there were 2,249 merchant ships in 1,210
> convoys with 1,913 escorts to Libya. Or each convoy consisted of
> 1.86 merchant ships with 1.58 escorts. If the inter Libya figures are
> correct the supply system also generated 1,180 ship movements
> in 756 convoys between Libyan ports, average convoy size 1.56
> merchant ships plus an unknown number of escorts. That is a lot
> of shipping movements to deliver under 2,000,000 tons of supplies
> plus 190,000 men.
Yes, and that is a big part of my argument, as well as what made me look
into this whole issue of North African logistics: I noticed that a lot
of the problems plaguing Axis logistics were not due to geography
(distances, poor terrain, etc) but to the operational situation:
enormous amounts of fuel (by Axis standards) are wasted on an
inefficient convoy system forced on the Axis by Malta attacks, port
capacity is reduced because airpower is insufficient to defend Tobruk,
and insufficient airpower comes from 1/ OKW, 2/the need to keep Malta
suppressed, 3/ the inefficient convoy system mentioned above, finally
coastal shipping can't be used to its full capacity to relieve the truck
LOS due to Malta- and Egypt- based attacks.
Remove Malta and you have cascading effects: more efficient convoying
means more fuel, which means more convoys, which means more supply,
which means adequate air cover, which means greater port capacity, which
means more supply (etc). The "adequate air cover" one branches off to
more coastal shipping, which saves on LOC requirements by easing on the
truck requirements west of Benghazi. All of this translates to
significantly more force at the sharp end. Given that the British
couldn't really send more to the Middle East than they did, what is left
is the force historically wasted in Greece & Crete, and that's about it.
Drazen Kramaric
<em...@olypen.com> wrote:
>The thing is that he did little to accept responsibility for them.
Why should he accept the responsibility for the things outside his
control?
>His problems were largely a result of exceeding his brief, which was to prevent
>the British from conquering Libya. Instead, he took it upon himself to
>attempt to counquer the Middle East.
He was preventing British from conquering Lybia the best way he could,
by attacking them rather than waiting for British to attack him.
Whenever he was forced to allow British the time to build up, he lost
(Crusader, Alamein).
>
>And rather than constrain his strategy to the means at hand, he chose to
>complain, loudly and at great length, to Commando Supremo, OKH, and OKW.
By that line of reasoning, Germans should have stayed behind their
borders and conquer the continent economically. German goals went
above their material capabilities from the day one.
Drax
--
Drazen Kramaric
<acl...@deletethisstarcott.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>"Drazen Kramaric" <draxNEV...@post.htnet.hr> wrote
>
>> What were the designations of these "two
>> entire divisions" numbering 40,000 men
>> "as early as 1940"?
>
>5th and 6th British-Indian divisions.
Indian 5th division was formed by 7th, 9th, and 10th brigades. After
losing 7th brigade to 4th Division, it went to East Africa with only
six Indian battalions. When three British battalions from 21st brigade
joined, 5th Indian was comprised of 9th, 10th and 29th brigades with
standard composition of 2 Indian and 1 British battalion in each
brigade.
Other brigades that served under 5th division HQ were 5th and 161st.
9th brigade fought at Keren, served in Iraq and Cyprus, fought at
Gazala and First Alamein and was then redeployed to Iraq.
10th brigade fought at Keren, served in Iraq and Cyprus, fought at
Gazala and was then redeployed to Cyprus.
161st brigade garrisoned Cyprus, held the line at Alamein, fought the
Second one and was later redeployed to Iraq.
5th and 29th brigade were never deployed in Iraq-Persia theatre.
Indian 6th division was composed of 24th, 26th and 27th brigades.
24th brigade was deployed in Basra and was part of the August 1941
force that invaded Persia.
26th brigade arrived to Basra in November 1941.
27th brigade arrived to Basra in November 1941.
As far as I see, neither 5th nor 6th Indian divisions nor their
component brigades entered Persia prior to the invasion in August
1941. Where did you find an information about two Indian divisions,
40,000 strong that secured Abadan as early as 1940?
Drax
--
Michael Emrys
draxNEV...@post.htnet.hr wrote on 4/19/05 8:49 AM:
>> The thing is that he did little to accept responsibility for them.
>
> Why should he accept the responsibility for the things outside his control?
It was definitely within his control whether or not he obeyed the explicit
orders given to him both by OKH and Hitler himself.
>> His problems were largely a result of exceeding his brief, which was to
>> prevent the British from conquering Libya. Instead, he took it upon himself
>> to attempt to counquer the Middle East.
>
> He was preventing British from conquering Lybia the best way he could, by
> attacking them rather than waiting for British to attack him.
Poppycock. Rommel desired a dazzling victory, the capture of the Suez Canal
and whatever he could get his hands on, in order to enhance his own
reputation and further his personal ambitions and perhaps incidentally the
fortunes of the Reich.
He was sent to Africa with explicit orders not to cross into Egypt, but
merely to eject the BCE forces from Libya and then stand on the defensive.
When he chose to exceed those orders, he also exceeded the Axis ability to
keep him supplied, a fact he should have been very well aware of if he was
not. He tried to establish higher strategy on his own hook and drag the Axis
behind him, which was not his job. He exceeded his means, which is not
something that a wise general does unless he can also count on exceptional
luck. Rommel gambled that the 8th. Army was so disorganized, so ill-led, and
so dispirited that he could march through it with exhausted troops and no
supplies coming up behind him. It turned out he was wrong on all counts.
Rommel possessed many excellent qualities as a commander of soldiers in
combat. He made a first rate division commander and a pretty good corps
commander. But thrust into the situation in North Africa, all the
shortcomings of his personality began to emerge. He really needed someone
over him with the insight and the will to rein him in when he needed reining
in. Patton, for instance, a man with a somewhat similar personality was more
fortunate to have such superiors.
Michael
--
narrl...@hotmail.com
knew they
were sending one of the boldest of their commanders to an independent
command,
and who failed to relieve him when he exceeded his charge.
Just out of curiosity, who, in your opinion, would have had the right
temperament
to follow orders and defend doggedly?
EGF
--
Andrew Clark
"Drazen Kramaric" <draxNEV...@post.htnet.hr> wrote
(snip lists)
> As far as I see, neither 5th nor 6th Indian
> divisions nor their component brigades
> entered Persia prior to the invasion in August
> 1941. Where did you find an information about
> two Indian divisions, 40,000 strong that secured
> Abadan as early as 1940?
You are quite right, and thank you for the correction.
Although 5 & 6th Indian divisions were *set aside* by CinC
India for the defence of the Persian oilfields and
refineries from 1939 onward, they did not actually enter
Persia until 1941. See Playfair, Volume I
--
Geoffrey Sinclair
Louis Capdeboscq wrote in message ...
>Geoffrey Sinclair wrote:
> > Definitions,
> >
> > Register ton 100 cubic feet of ships space.
> >
> > Gross tonnage, entire enclosed space on a ship expressed in register
> > tons, or GRT.
> > Net tonnage, entire useful cargo capacity of a ship expressed in register
> > tons.
> > Dead Weight Tonnage, ship's total carrying capacity including the ship's
> > gear, supply and personnel, in long tons, or DWT
> > Dead Weight Effective Lift, effective cargo lift of a ship expressed in long
> > tons, approximately 80% of the dead weight tonnage.
> >
> > 1,000 GRT = approximately 1,500 DWT, approximately 1,200 dead weight
> > effective lift.
>
>Hm, 100 cubic feet look like a cube 1.41m to a side, more or less. 1,200
>DWEL will be 1,219 metric tons. Close enough. Too bad Napoleon didn't
>make it to Britain !
It is even more fun when you realise the American definition of
length is based on the metre, so an American inch/foot/yard is
not the same as a British inch/foot/yard. So a foot in England
is 0.3048 metres, in the US it is 0.30480061 metres. This
actually mattered for high precision parts in WWII.
Do you really think the English would easily give up something
like Quaterns, 8 of which make a Bucket, or 2 of which make
a Gallon? Or the Puncheon, which is just under 70 gallons?
And let us not forget the Firkin, worth 72 pints, in England
and the US, or in other words the US version is worth 34.06675
litres, the other 40.91364 litres. Not to mention the joy of pounds
being either a weight or a monetary amount, the way inches and
miles roll off the tongue much better than centimetres and kilometres
Oh yes, the Normans brought their version of French to England and
made English the number 3 language in the kingdom, after French
and Latin, for 200 to 300 years, hence the major difference between
the real "Olde Englishe" and the start of the modern dialects, and
the non official status is a reason for the strong regional dialects still
in England today, no central government driving a standard version.
Much of the "English" words for many military items like castle, even
surrender are French in origin. Similar for words like court in the
judicial system. The strong points of the Norman system.
Yet the English have a habit of ignoring foreign inventions, Napoleon
making it to England could mean the French becoming tea drinkers,
rather than the English speaking world adopting the metric system
in the 19th century. The US had already split from England before
Napoleon, and they seem to have compromised, the metric version
of the imperial measurements system, despite the early French
influence. The US also appears to have invented some
measurements, the Township is 23,040 acres or 36 square miles,
and redefined others, 1 US gallon equals 0.8326747 UK gallons.
I will heavily edit the post I am replying to so I will summarise the
main points here and hope they can evolve into the agreed points.
1) The port capacity of the ports available to the axis powers was
not usually fully used, and as a result there were few attempts made
to increase capacity, though there were steady attempts to repair
war damage. Van Crevald, in his book Supplying War,
underestimates the port capacity. When it came to war damage
Benghazi and the ports to the east of the town could be reached by
Egyptian based bombers but Malta was really needed to attack
Tripoli and the convoys heading for that port.
2) however it must be pointed out port capacity depends on the
ports receiving ships they can handle, a problem for the axis
merchant fleet in the Mediterranean when it comes to coasters,
Van Crevald quotes the OKW war diary for 11 May 1941 noting
only enough coasters to carry 15,000 tons of cargo per month,
instead of the projected 50,000 tons per month. Also the port
must have the trained work force to unload the cargo, which in
turn generates the need to supply the work force. There is
little doubt the axis could have boosted port capacity, small
gains could be made quite cheaply, a few more cranes for
example, but the ports came second to "internal" transport
as a problem.
3) The axis shipping capacity was adequate enough to supply the
forces in North Africa an average of around 71,000 metric tons of
cargo arrived per month in 1941 and an average of around 70,000
tons per month January to November 1942.
4) The figures we have of shipping allocated to the run show each
ship carried around 1 ton of cargo per 5 GRT of capacity. This is
very low. On the other hand if you look at the loss figures the average
was 1 ton of cargo lost per 2 GRT of shipping. This seems a more
realistic figure of the average loading state of ships on the run. This
would mean something like 2 tons shipped for every 5 tons of weight
capacity of the ships.
5) So in theory, with a well chosen mix of cargoes, carefully packed,
the axis could have shipped over twice the weight of cargoes. We
know though from the US army that military cargoes even when well
packed used only around 70 to 80% of the capacity, and much
less if unpacked. The voyage between Italy and North Africa was
short enough that elaborate packaging was not worth the effort,
the cost in weight and time needed to pack and unpack and the
effort needed in Africa to handle the unpacking. So it is clear the
available shipping could have lifted more, but the increase is
more likely to be closer to 25% than 75%. The US Army figure
seems to be 102.4 GRT to ship 1 long ton of cargo, or using
around 81% of the weight lift available.
6) The initial axis supply problem limit is the ability to move cargoes
within Africa, while coastal shipping can help the reality is for the
axis the ports continue to drop in size the further they advance from
Tripoli until the hit Alexandria, and one of the best defensive areas
in the desert is quite close to Alexandria. The probable toughest
fight in the supply wise worst place. The supply movement problems
are compounded by there being only one sealed road, the coast road
which I doubt was engineered for significant heavy vehicle traffic. The
road certainly ended up being much repaired. To return to back of the
envelope for a moment, assume 60,000 tons per month of supplies,
2 tons per truck, is 30,000 round trips or 60,000 truck movements
along the road. Basically 1 truck every 43 seconds passing a
particular point, or every 86 seconds one way, all day every day.
Given the problems with night movements the average would go up
in daylight. Van Crevald notes to keep a division in supply with 350
tons per day over 300 miles of desert would, according to OKH, need
1,248 two ton trucks.
7) The distances involved are also a real problem, when Rommel
reached Alamein Tripoli was 1,300 miles in the rear, Benghazi 800
miles and Tobruk around 400 miles. Apart from the ground combat
forces the Luftwaffe, in trying to take Alexandria, will also need to be
based well forward of the ports, given the range of its fighters and
ground attack aircraft. Forcing a trade off between Luftwaffe and
Heer supplies. Also a defeated army can retreat hundreds of miles
before giving up anything important, and use the fact to stretch their
opponent's supply lines.
8) The African battlefields were at about 30 degrees north, meaning
about 4 more hours of daylight in high summer than in mid winter.
However the high summer temperatures can limit the effectiveness
of men and machines. Sandstorms basically stop everything.
9) A major axis limit is the amount of fuel available for the warships
as well as some merchant ships. Clearly the situation would be better
if the axis were not fighting in the USSR. In 1942 Romania exported
some 862,179 tons of oil to Italy and 2,191,659 tons to Germany or
the German army direct. Sending a destroyer to North Africa from
Italy would cost 200 to 300 tons of fuel, depending on the size of the
destroyer, speeds and the start and destination ports. Cruisers would
cost 3 to 4 times more fuel. The Italian fleet received around 275,000
tons of fuel in the first half of 1942. It received around 103,000 tons of
fuel April to September 1941 while using around 546,000 tons.
> > (snip) of very useful figures, thanks
> >
> > I will note one item, Civilians 254,611 tons, which is around 13%
> > of the cargo that arrived.
>
>Yes. There are two ways of looking at this figure: either it's a fixed
>cost for "true" civilians in which case this rather supports my points
>that small increases in supply deliveries were perfectly possible using
>existing means, but would have a disproportionate effect at the sharp
>end (DAK), or the cost includes civilian port employees in which case it
>is going to increase a bit if port capacity is improved.
>
>Given the relatively low figures accounted for in Italian accounts
>mentioned below (lower than the demographic data that you mention), I
>suspect that the latter is more true than the former.
Well, assuming very little was sent for the Arab parts of the population
you have 96,000 people receiving 254,611 tons in 33, really 32 months.
Works out to be around half a pound per day per civilian. Sorry for the
switch to imperial measurements but it can then be compared to the
US Army's requirements, in Appendix A of Global Logistics and Strategy,
Volume 1.
US army allowances, per man per day, in pounds, rations 6.22, clothing
and equipage 0.84, medical 0.27, quartermaster sales items 0.27 (the
PX supplies basically). Libya produced little clothing or medical supplies
and had little industry, but should be able to feed most of its population.
Of course men on active service go through food, clothing and medical
supplies faster than the average civilian population.
So half a pound per person per day would indicate we are talking about
basic supplies the European population needed, some food, medicines,
clothing, tools, even fertiliser. There were agricultural areas and it would
be preferable for them to continue. It would be interesting to find out what
the civilian cargoes were given the Italian attempts to set up versions of
home which would require significant help from Italy.
The above figures assume no supplies for nearly 90% of the population
so short of shipping the civilians out I think you have to assume the civilian
cargo requirements are going to be around the historical figure.
In leaving the US army allowances I note the total figure was 45 pounds
per man per day, including air force supplies.
>(snip)
> > The pre war immigration program meant that there were some
> > 90,000 Italian and 6,000 other European civilians in Libya in 1940,
> > out of a population of 890,000. So the 1941 axis army in North
> > Libya increased the population by around 13%. Goes a long
> > way to explaining the problems the supply system had. The
> > equivalent for France in 1944 would be around 5,000,000 men.
>
>On the other hand, by 1945 US Army strength in Europe was 3,000,000
>strong. Adding Commonwealth, naval and airforce personnel plus those
>French troops coming from overseas, late 1944 France must not have been
>very far from that total.
Agreed, but note the US figures include those in England, the peak was
around 2,650,000 on the continent in May 1945, plus another 380,000
in England.
>(snip)
> >>BEGIN QUOTE:In the
> >>port of Tripoli, in 1941, 2,700 tons per day (daylight) could be
> >>unloaded, and 300 additional tons of fuel could be unloaded through
> >>hoses.
> >
> > So 81,000 tons per month cargo and 9000 tons of fuel. And a decent
> > night fighter force to allow unloading at night would be useful. Though
> > none with airborne radar would appear before 1942. So I wonder
> > how many of the port capacities are based on assuming daylight
> > operations only?
>
>Firstly, I would caution against extrapolating too much from these
>figures. Rounding errors can add up to fairly large ones when you do
>that. This is why I provided the figures for total supplies landed in NA
>as a more useful - IMO - guide to what was the true sustainable rate (as
>opposed to surge rate).
Agreed, I should emphasise more the "thinking out loud" and "back
of envelope" points. Reality means the theoretical maximums are
rarely reached, the lack of detailed figures means I am only talking
estimates.
>I provided these figures both as an additional data point and as an
>indication of the relative importance of Tripoli vs Benghazi vs Tobruk
>vs other ports.
In other words I need to treat it as a data point but be aware the figures
vary and more explicitly label my figures as estimates.
So we have 3,000 tons in Tripoli, 1,800 tons in Benghazi, dropping to
1,000 tons in 1941, back up to 1,500 tons in 1942, and Tobruk barely
1,000 tons per day.
>Secondly, the problems involved with night unloading were more lack of
>personnel than RAF night harassment attacks. Again, it all depends on
>which period is considered but most after early 1941 the British
>frontline was in Egypt. Sidi Barani to Tripoli is 750 miles which is
>close to maximum range for a Blenheim IV. If the airfields are at
>Matruh, then this is even farther.
The Wellingtons would have to do any sort of bombing at that range,
any Blenheim would need tanks in the bomb bay to have the
necessary range. The Wellington IC figures are 1,200 miles with
4,500 pounds of bombs, 2,550 miles with 1,000 pounds of bombs.
A 1,500 mile round trip would take the Wellington something like
8 hours minimum. The further into the desert the airfields the
greater the problem of supplying them.
>By contrast, personnel seems to have been a pressing problem, along with
>infrastructure.
So the axis have to invest more of their supply capacity to increase
the supply capacity.
(snip)
> > One point I am unclear about, is whether DAK transported fuel in
> > tanker trucks like the 1944 US Army or it was all in jerricans, which
> > significantly cut the effective fuel load thanks to the can's bulk and
> > weight. When the histories I have read mention fuel transport they
> > imply it was all jerricans.
>
>In 1940, the Italians used practically only tanker trucks. By 1942, fuel
>transport was mostly jerricans. The reasons for the shift were mostly
>tactical, but I don't have detailed breakdowns.
Jerricans were a wonderful, durable container, but at a real cost of
weight and lost volume, the packaging was a considerable amount
of the weight and a noticeable part of the volume. If only they had
made them stackable.
> >>To unload as fast as possible 5 ships carrying 20,000 tons in
> >>January 1942, it took the port's unloading structures and personnel 8
> >>days.
> >
> > In theory 75,000 tons per month at that pace. The US Army figures
> > indicate it took the best part of three weeks to load and then unload
> > a typical allied freighter at well equipped ports. A liberty ship could
> > carry around 8,600 tons of cargo, so in 8 days the Italians unloaded
> > the equivalent of 2.3 liberty ships. Given Tripoli is credited with 5
> > berths then presumably all ships were worked simultaneously and
> > were obviously smaller than the standard US ship. So the unloading
> > times appear similar to allied ships.
>
>Yes, that is how it appeared to me, too.
However I think I made a mistake, the port handled the discharge
at the US Army rates, but not per ship. With 5 ships to unload,
assuming they all had the same amount of cargo it works out to
around 500 tons per day per ship. Something like 60% the US
per ship rate, but without a detailed breakdown of the ships and
their cargoes this is about as far as I can go. I would say the
number and capacity of cranes in the port and on the ships
(smaller ships tend to have smaller capacity cranes as well as
fewer of them), also fewer hatches to unload through all play
their part . Then we need to account for the labour supply restricting
the unloading capacity. Remember the US figure is for a US
defined well equipped port.
>Some extracts from the minutes of the Italian High Command conferences
>("verbali delle riunioni tenute dal capo di Stato Maggiore Generale" - I
>don't own these books, I'm relying on extracts quoted in another forum):
>
>-14 Nov 1941. Total minimum requirements for the Axis in NA till year's
>end are estimated at 80,000 tons (of which 30k foodstuffs). There are
>63,000 German and 186,000 Italian troops plus 35,000 Italian civilians.
So 30,000 tons of food, for say 7 weeks, 49 days, for 284,000 people,
some 2.16 kg per person per day, around 4.8 pounds per person per
day with the US army figure being 6.22 pounds per person per day.
Seems reasonable, especially if the minutes refer to a shorter period
than the final 7 weeks of the year, 6 weeks would mean 5.6 pounds
per person per day.
Not much local food supply though by the looks of the food
required figures.
I note the civilian figure is much below the one I found in the
Australian Official History, 90,000 Italians plus 6,000 other
Europeans. So either my figure is wrong, or many civilians
were evacuated or the "civilians" in the minutes are those
working for the military, not all the Italian civilians in the area.
Sort of makes me wonder what, if anything, the both sides did
to the Italian civilians in the areas fought over in 1941/42. In
theory the British should have interned them. And if lots of the
civilians were gone what did that to local production, could
the supply requirements of the civilians gone up even as
their numbers declined because Libya effectively lost farmland?
>40,000 tons could go through Benghazi (est time 50 days), 3000-3,500 to
>Bardia with submarines, small ships from Greece etc. The rest would go
>to Tripoli, which is already stuck with 25,000 tons of German ammo.
>There are plans to move 25,000 tons + 9,000 tons of fuel to Tripoli in
>one month with 6+1 ships calculating to lose 30% of them and 22% overall.
So at this stage the Italians are assuming half the supplies will go
via Benghazi which is being credited with being able to unload
around an average of 900 tons per day. So, using van Crevald's
supply figures, the capacity would keep around a three division
German corps in action.
(snip)
> > Yet we have Benghazi and Tobruk landing significant cargo tonnages
> > in 1941 and 1942, so there is a contradiction for Tobruk at least.
> >
> > The next piece of the puzzle is what sized ships could be handled,
> > Queen Elizabeth or siebel ferries to use the extremes.
>
>The answer to that question depends on when you ask it, and what level
>of effort the Axis is prepared to devote to the theater. Historically,
>both were related as the amount of effort that the Axis devoted to North
>Africa increased.
>
>Tripoli and Tobruk were deep enough to handle all kinds of ships.
>Benghazi was shallower, which is where port improvement played a role,
>as well as the arrival of newly built ships in 1942.
Interestingly enough Van Crevald quotes the Kriegsmarine as
dismissing Tobruk as a disembarkation port for large ships.
Presumably a main reason being it was close to the front.
(snip)
> > Another set of figures is the capacity of the cargo ships used,
> > so the figures are capacity (but in GRT which is less than the
> > weight actually able to be carried, multiply by 1.2 for an estimate
> > of weight carrying ability), cargo sent in tons.
> >
> > 1940 (Jun-Dec): 1,291,245 / 304,467 (plus 29,299 men)
> > 1941: 5,442,381 / 1,016,442 (plus 157,221 men)
> > 1942 and Jan 1943: 2,511,545 / 924,472 (plus 19,882 men)
> > Total: 9,245,171 / 2,245,381
>
>Ok, to begin with, I don't know where the figures for "capacity of the
>cargo ships used" comes from. Assuming it comes from Bagradin, then
>coupled with his figure of 2,249 "trips" (Bagradin counts departures,
>the Italian official history counts arrivals) this means an average
>capacity of 4,111 GRT per ship. Ok, I can live with these figures.
>
>The problem of course is that you aren't counting the 206,402 troops
>sent. From the "Handbook on German forces" chapter 6, it seems that 1
>man requires 2 GRT, so the total sent would be 2,658,185 "tons". So your
>estimate at 100kg per man is off by a factor of 20 (at least: see below).
The capacity figures are from Bragadin.
The answer to the problems is relatively easy, I assumed the axis
would use the small passenger capacity on the freighters or guests
on board the escorts, given they were not lifting large numbers of
troops, rather than liners, which ran the risk of major casualties
should they be sunk. One of the first things the Italians did was take
some trans Atlantic liners out of service as they were considered too
vulnerable, and other liners were converted to hospital ships.
I have not heard of many Mediterranean actions where an axis
troop transport was the target. I also note the Italians saved most
of the troops from ships that were sunk. That also implies the
troops were spread about, not concentrated, there should have
been one disaster in human life terms if there were a steady
stream of troop transports sent given 17,265 men sent did not
arrive.
>So the efficiency ratio that you're trying to measure comes out at 36%
>rather than 20%.
Quite possibly, it would depend on how many troop transports sailed
for North Africa. Also note men were flown in, but they would not be
in the Italian shipping figures.
In 1941 the monthly figures peaked at 20,975 men sent in March, and
the yearly total was 157,221. Unfortunately Bragadin only gives the
total sailings for the entire war, and the average works out to 92 men
per "cargo ship". These figures indicate there were at least some
troop transports in service.
>There are several problems with these approximations, however. The first
>is that I'm really not comfortable with using a constant average
>capacity per ship because it doesn't account for the evolutions in
>sinkings. The Axis navies lost small and large ships about equally, the
>average tonnage of the ship lost being inferior to the average (this
>means that coastal shipping was targetted and more vulnerable than the
>average). As a result, the size of the average Italian ship didn't
>decrease, and neither did that of the average Axis ship, but the average
>German ship became smaller over the years.
>
>The second problem is that I think the personnel fudges the issue. For
>example, the average efficiency ratio of 36% as calculated above breaks
>down in the following fashion: 35% in '40, 31% in '41, 46% in '42. I'm
>not sure how to explain the variation, but one obvious factor is the
>amount of personnel sent: the higher the ratio of personnel to tonnage
>sent, the lower the efficiency in the formula that you're using. Using a
>quick macro to change the variable of "how many GRT's per man" so as to
>minimize the difference between the yearly rates, I find a value of some
>7 GRT per man instead of 2.
>
>At this point, I'm enclined to believe that back of the envelope
>calculations can only go so far...
Agreed. Let us work backwards, assume that the cargo loadings
were like the loss figures, about 1 ton per 2 GRT.
>From Bragadin, ship capacity, GRT, tonnage lifted, men lifted.
1940 (Jun-Dec): 1,291,245 / 304,467 (plus 29,299 men)
1941: 5,442,381 / 1,016,442 (plus 157,221 men)
1942 and Jan 1943: 2,511,545 / 924,472 (plus 19,882 men)
So in 1940 some 600,000 GRT transported the cargo and 700,000
GRT transported the men, 24 GRT per man.
In 1941, 2,000,000 GRT for cargo, 3,400,000 GRT for men, or
22 GRT per man.
In 1942, 1,850,000 GRT for cargo, 650,000 GRT for men, or
33 GRT per man.
I think there is a good chance the "ship capacity" includes the
coasters and/or some other tonnage, like ships under repair,
and so the cargo capacity is therefore exaggerated.
Appendix XXXIII Merchant Shipping and the Demands of War by
C Behrens, on average on 1 October 1941 the UK troop ship fleet
had a capacity of 1 man per 8 GRT, by 29 March 1944 the figure
was 1 man per 5.5 GRT, thanks to things like the 325,000 GRT of
"monster" liners being rated at 28,163 men in 1941 and 55,223
men in 1944.
Your 7 GRT per man is quite a good estimate.
To put it another way 124.6 men on average per 1,000 GRT in
October 1941 and 180.2 per 1,000 GRT in March 1944. The
big lift in average capacity occurred in 1942, from 127.3 men per
1,000 GRT in March 1942 to 167.8 men per 1,000 GRT in October.
(snip)
>It does not imply that port capacity was in fact lacking. Also - and
>this bears repeating - the historical figures are about the historical
>port capacity, when the Axis didn't bother upgrading Benghazi until
>1942, when Tobruk was not considered defensible against Allied attacks
>due to the insufficient means available to the Axis in Africa, etc.
>These are not logistics-related, they are a problem of lack of resources
>which was a strategic decision.
I thought the investment in port capacity at Benghazi happened after
it was recaptured in January 1942? Rather than post June 1942. It
seems for whatever reason the Italians did not do much work on the
port in 1941, but this changed in 1942. I wonder how much the politics
played a part, the need to restrain Rommel and the worry about the
ships being attacked.
(snip)
> > Inter-Libyan traffic.
> >
> > In 1940 (Jun-Dec): 244 convoys with 375 ships and 14,878 gross tons lost.
> > In 1941: 280 convoys with 503 ships and 17,747 gross tons lost
> > In 1942 and Jan 1943: 232 convoys with 302 ships and 19,100 gross tons
> > lost.
> >
> > I like the fact that many convoys were 1 merchant ship.
>
>Yes.
>
>And I note fairly large amounts lost, with presumably larger amounts not
>sent due to the threat of enemy attacks. Enemy action was the #1 problem
>here.
It would be good to see the average amount of shipping and cargo
moved via the coasters to figure out what the percentage loss figures
were. Also how many were to hostile action, as opposed to weather
or marine accidents.
Assuming for a moment all the coasters were Italian then the losses
represent around 8% of the total losses in 1940, 3% in 1941 and
4% in 1942.
>This doesn't mean that logistics wouldn't have become a problem,
>but it does mean that the '1" hose' theory stands at best unproven right
>now.
>
> > Do the statistics give the amount of cargo shifted by these convoys,
> > is there some sort of cargo landed total by port, so we can see if
> > there is any double counting? Could it be the cargo is counted once
> > when arriving in Tripoli and then again when arriving at another port?
>
>1. There are figures for cargo landed and handled per port, but I don't
>have them. Books are on the way, which should clear some things up.
>
>2. I'm fairly positive that the figures I provided for amounts delivered
>in North Africa don't include double counting. Although I can't
>absolutely rule out padding, I doesn't seem an important factor.
I am not worried about padding in the sense of inflated figures of
arrival tonnage, it is more a case of the fact if the port has to
"export" the cargo a few days later this counts against the port
capacity.
In any case to round off the import figures we need to see the
amount of air transport used.
>(snip)
> > Looks like a good first approximation is around 33% of the
> > cargo was trans shipped. That depresses Tripoli's effective capacity.
>
>Yes, it does, which is why I used figures for loads delivered to NA,
>which show that more than enough total capacity remained.
The point I would make is the more the small ports are used the
more the capacity of the bigger ports is reduced by them
"exporting" the cargo to coasters that can use the smaller ports.
(snip)
> > My question would be is the figure we have the cargo that arrived
> > in port, or the figure the ports unloaded that month?
>
>I wouldn't completely rule out padding, but these figures normally are
>for cargo unloaded. I don't have as complete figures for cargo cleared
>from the port, although I may have them in a few days.
I doubt there is any padding, it is more a case of the reality that it takes
a week to unload a ship, supplies arrived are when the ship enters
port, supplies landed are when it is unloaded, so maybe a week later
before all the supplies are off the ship. Sometimes more if there
are berthing or labour problems.
>Here are other numbers from vol. 3 of the multi-volume German history,
>table V.V.I. The pages around it discuss the reliability of sources.
>
>Example for the Wehrmacht loads (tonnes)
>
> Shipped Unloaded
>1941
>June 37,848 37,848
>July 39,512 32,784
>August 34,170 27,372
>September 34,522 27,723
>October 24,358 15,723
>November 13,531 5,138
>December 11,793 10,275
>1942
>January a) 19,948 19,943
>February a) 29,087 29,087
>March a) 19,134 13,276
>April a) 56,727 5,883
>May a) 34,675 31,787
>June a) 11,976 8,267
>July a) 35,095 32,060
>
>a) Table V.VI.I. DRZW vol 6.
Otherwise called Germany and the Second World War in the
English translation. The table I have starts in December 1941
and ends in January 1943. The one point I would make is the
April 1941 German forces discharged figure in the book is
wrong, the graph on the opposite page says the figure is 55,883
tons, not 5,883 tons, as you have correctly transcribed. Confirmation
can be see by the way the all forces monthly total is 151,578 tons
sent, 150,389 discharged and there is no figure in say May or
June of discharge greater than dispatched, which you would
expect if 50,000 tons of cargo was awaiting discharge from April.
>As far as I can tell, there's no great difference with the Italian figures.
No, certainly to within the sorts of errors that occur in counting
cargoes, what is the official weight of a truck for shipping purposes
sort of thing. Also I note the source of the figures appears to be
Italian records, not DAK figures for say arrivals.
(snip)
>As another set of figures, the British official history counted an
>armoured division in pursuit mode needed 400 tons a day, actually 520
>with the need for water.
>
>A General Transport Compagny had a truck lift of 300 tons, but in
>practice only had a practical range of 100 miles / day in the desert. So
>6 British divisions at 600 miles = 6 x 6 x 520 / 300 = 6,240 3-ton
>trucks equivalent, not counting the needs of the supply chain itself.
>Assuming that the average Axis truck was 2 tons instead of 3, plus a 20%
>overhead for the needs of the supply line, we have a requirement of
>11,200 trucks, not counting the need for replacements or losses from
>enemy action.
>
>On the other hand, the amount of supply under discussion is around 3,120
>tons daily, or 93,600 monthly. If we assume that the British calculated
>in short tons, then the needs for supplying a monthly 130,000 metric
>tons 600 miles away by truck would be 17,333 trucks, a figure remarkably
>similar to your estimate.
Thanks for the confirmation but as far as I can tell if a British history
mentions tons, assume long tons, 2,240 pounds, if a US history
mentions tons, assume short tons, 2,000 pounds, and of course if
it is a European country's history assume metric tons, 2,204.6226
pounds, unless otherwise stated. The USSBS tends to use short
tons for allied figures but metric tons for German production, a
straight lift of the documents, rather than recalculating, even though
the USSBS does the recalculation from long tons for things like
RAF bomb tonnages.
>On the other hand, using your formula then the requirements - with
>average distance dropping from 1,100 to 600 miles - would be 9,052
>trucks rounded up to 10,000.
>(snip)
> >>>To complete the back of the envelope calculation, to deliver
> >>>all the 130,000 metric tons of supplies by truck lift from an
> >>>average distance of 300 miles would require 5,000 US type
> >>>trucks (...) So say 17,000 trucks.
> >>
> >>According to Sadkovich, the Axis had 18,000. Montanari says some 15,000
> >>or so. Many of these will be captured Allied trucks, and the figure
> >>counts everything, i.e. trucks hauling supply and trucks with the units.
> >>That's still a lot of trucks.
> >
> > The trouble is the majority of the vehicles were needed in the combat
> > units, otherwise they are just leg infantry hauling their own supplies
> > on their backs.
>
>Look at how 5th Leichte Division managed to keep going by unloading all
>vehicles and making them carry fuel before resuming the pursuit, on 3/4
>April '41.
As did Patton's third army at the start of the pursuit, leading to a major
problem because there was no accounting for this extra supply lift until
the distances became so great the units could not use their trucks to
supply themselves. Leading to a radical revision upwards of what the
army really needed supply wise.
>This isn't a sustainable rate, but it shows that the Axis can do a surge
>rate to stockpile enough supplies for a one-of effort. If this works,
>then they are home free to Alexandria.
No I doubt it given the distances involved, the troops need the trucks to
move themselves and each time they move forward the pause to wait
for the supply trucks grows longer.
The drive from Tobruk to Alamein is around 400 miles.
>Also, bear in mind the many overheads involved in all the previous
>calculations: a 10% increase in supply deliveries that goes 90% to the
>Germans will improve the German supply situation by 30% using the
>overall figures.
Yes, it is clear the best way the axis can handle the North African
campaign is replace many Italian troops with Germans, and cut
down the number of Italians in Africa. Freeing supplies.
> > The British trucks have the problem of spare parts, put the captured
> > trucks on long haul and you will soon lose them, at least the axis
> > trucks have a spare parts supply.
>
>I think that the spare parts situation will be just as bad for all types
>of trucks.
I would vote for it being easier to find parts for your trucks than
finding them for theirs.
>(snip)
> > In the period June to September 1940 the Germans really must
> > concentrate on trying to defeat England, otherwise it is going to
> > take years to have any sort of chance to directly defeat England.
>
>Yes. The Luftwaffe, in particular, is unavailable. The Kriegsmarine is
>redeploying to France, licking its wounds from Norway and drafting memos
>showing how there's no way it can do Sealion.
I think we are in agreement the attempt has to be made.
> > So in say October 1940 parts of the Luftwaffe start refitting for
> > service in the Mediterranean. Assuming the axis are intent on
> > defeating England then most of the Luftwaffe has to stay in
> > France to keep attacking.
>
>Not necessarily.
>
>At this stage, the Battle of Britain is clearly lost and the Luftwaffe
>needs a break, so Germany settles down to a long siege. The really
>important policy decision is to *not* decide "let's finish off the
>Soviets meanwhile" - which I'm not saying would be a good decision, but
>which would be a necessary decision for the required assets to be
>deployed in the Med rather than in Russia.
Yes, but my point would be the Luftwaffe and Kreigsmarine need to keep
up the threat level against England, to minimise the willingness of the
British to send forces out of the country.
(snip)
> > Think of it this way, it all goes according to history until the end
> > of March 1941. Then the axis make a major effort to build up
> > the supply system in North Africa, the shipping, the trucks and
> > then send the troops, while presumably conducting the invasion
> > of Malta. It would probably still be late 1941 before a major
> > desert battle, the British would be aware of the increased strength
> > and the Alamein line is quite tough to crack. You have maybe
> > 5 or 6 full strength German divisions to do it with because the
> > major infrastructure work, better ports and railways are going
> > to probably take until 1942 to complete.
>
>1. Infrastructure improvement didn't take all that long: a few months in
>1942.
I think we are using different definitions of infrastructure improvements.
I am talking about railways, at least from Benghazi eastwards, not the
relatively straightforward port improvements done.
>2. With a better supply situation, Rommel is going to be in the Crusader
>position by late 1941, i.e. investing Tobruk while the Axis assaults
>Malta. Best case is Rommel captures Tobruk (unlikely) or Crusader is
>launched prematurely because of the emergency situation in Tobruk (more
>likely) with Rommel probably beating the British in such a case.
I would actually say, based on the time he actually took Tobruk and
the attempts of every other WWII "fortress" to hold out the chances
of capturing the port are high. Though the problem becomes, given
the perimeter length it will take 2 of his divisions to hold the line.
At Crusader Rommel had a nominal 3 German divisions, backed up
by an Italian force of 5 infantry, 1 armoured and 1 motorised division.
If the Italians have left and been replaced by Germans the question is
how many? It would need around 2 divisions to keep Tobruk quiet,
leaving say 4 full strength German divisions versus the historical
situation of 3 understrength units backed up by the Italian armoured
and motorised divisions, who seem to have performed reasonably
well. The Italian infantry divisions were largely out of the fighting.
Rommel did not handle his forces well during the battle.
>The logistics equation translates to 6 full strength divisions as far as
>El Alamein. Are these going to be enough ? 1st El Alamein was touch and
>go, and the 1941 British didn't have as much force in the area as the
>Summer 1942 ones, particularly as Japan will have come a-knocking in the
>meantime.
In mid 1941 the British army had some 5 divisions, 2 armoured, 2 infantry
and 1 converting from cavalry to armour. This was supplemented by 3
Australian, 2 South African and 1 New Zealand Infantry divisions. Note
1 Australian and the New Zealand divisions were recovering from their
losses in Greece and Crete, the 2nd Armoured division had been lost,
and there was a need to garrison the newly captured Syria. So a nominal
11 divisions, of which maybe 8 were fully up to strength.
In July 1942 the forces were 10 divisions in the desert, after the destruction
of 2nd South African and the effective withdrawal of 1st Armoured division.
It should be noted the perceived garrison requirements for places like
Iran, Iraq and Syria were influenced by the chances of the Germans
breaking through from the USSR. During operation Crusader there
was a 3 division Australian corps, with full corps troops, plus the
slowly converting 10th Armoured division (ex 1st cavalry) on the
other side of the Nile, and 1st Armoured division in Egypt. The latter
unit came forward in December
By Alamein the size of the garrison troops had been dropped
significantly, the divisions were all in Egypt.
(snip)
> > Certainly the axis could have done more, but be aware the Italian
> > shipping would be needed to supply the airpower in Sicily attacking
> > Malta and the Italian railways were being heavily loaded with the
> > historical shipments. That axis supply pipeline started in Germany
> > and needed improvements starting there.
>
>I don't know about the Italian railways being overloaded. Extra shipping
>for Sicily shouldn't be a problem: just the shipping saved from Malta
>attacks in 1942 would be enough to supply a Sicily-based airforce.
>Besides, the Axis _did_ base aircraft in Sicily, they never had large
>amounts of aircraft in Sicily and North Africa simultaneously, that's
>all. It doesn't take the Normandy Allied air forces for the Axis to win
>in the Med.
Agreed on force levels, but my reasoning goes like this. The axis
had to build additional airfields in order to deploy the aircraft to
attack Malta. The Italian supply system has to provide the materials
to build and maintain the airfields and the air forces in Sicily, dropping
the capacity available for North Africa.
Then the capacity to North Africa has to include the supplies needed to
enhance and maintain the supply system including adequate labour.
All of this cuts into the tonnage available to the combat troops until the
supply system is enhanced.
Each bit of "help", airpower in Sicily, more men and cranes for Benghazi
comes with a cost, and the cost needs to be accounted for.
> >>>On another note the ferries and inshore cargo craft the Germans
> >>>built appear to have fuel consumptions not so much better than the
> >>>trucks, simply switching to these water craft will not make a big
> >>>difference to the supply system's fuel requirements.
> >>
> >>This is interesting.
> >>
> >>I don't have that data, but today a barge is about three times more
> >>fuel-efficient in tons per mile than a truck. I don't see why it should
> >>be different in WWII, so if you can find the time to flesh out this
> >>claim I'll be interested.
> >
> > Sorry, no explicit data, that is why I used "appear". The ferries tended
> > to use derated aero engines to power them and, I understand, were
> > not that hydrodynamically efficient, not to mention carting around some
> > significant AA guns for defence, with the weight penalty that means.
> > Hence the fuel consumption was not strikingly better, but I have not
> > seen any figures to find out how much the difference really is, in terms
> > of per ton of cargo delivered for the same round trip distance. It would
> > depend on the truck and ferry chosen of course.
>
>This is still interesting. I wonder how it applied to other forms of
>coastal shipping.
Put it to you this way, a destroyer at 14 knots moved 1,500 tons
of ship at around 12 miles to the ton of fuel, up the speed to
35 knots and it is less than 3 miles per ton. The Panzer IV
manages 125 miles on 0.35 tons of fuel, so around 355 miles
to the ton of fuel, for a 22.3 ton weight. The ratio of weights
is 67.3 to 1 in favour of the destroyer, which means the Panzer
IV fuel consumption per ton of vehicle moved is more than
the 14 knot destroyer but less than the 35 knot one.
Agreed this is not comparing coastal shipping to trucks, but it
does show the fuel economy gap can be much closer if the
"ships" are not an optimal, fuel efficient, design. Destroyers
are not of course, but then again neither are tanks. Anyway
tanks and destroyers I can easily find weights and fuel
consumption figures for. The fuel consumption of say a
Liberty ship and a US army 2.5 ton truck, with a given cargo
weight, is harder to track down.
The British LSI Glengyle could move its 10,000 GRT at 14
knots at 10 miles to the ton of fuel, thanks to using the more
fuel efficient diesel engines. Of course the destroyer tonnage
is displacement, not the same as GRT. A liberty ship came
in at 3,479 tons light displacement, 7,187 GRT and 10,783
DWT.
Real easy to accurately compare things, right?
>(snip)
> > I would add the caveat 1c) any airpower deployed to North Africa is
> > going to add to the supply requirements. A Bf109G fuel capacity was
> > 400 litres, which means around 3.5 sorties using all the fuel would
> > burn a ton of fuel. So say 35 defensive sorties per day times 30
> > days is around 1,000 tons per month of fuel.
>
>Ok, so for 1,000 tons of fuel you get a fighter squadron for a month, is
>that it ?
No, it would be a fighter Gruppe and it would be working reasonably
hard if all aircraft were flying on average once a day.
>Well, this has taken a while to write so I don't feel like researching
>detailed figures for monthly fuel losses, but just extrapolating from
>the % of material lost and applying it to the fuel delivery figures that
>I posted here and sent you, the monthly average is 3,189 tons in 1941
>and 2,760 in 1942. So just by cutting the sinkings by 50% you have
>enough for 1.5 extra fighter squadron in Tobruk without hurting the Axis
>fuel supply.
Given the Bf109 range it would be port protection but clearly cutting
the losses is an advantage.
Unfortunately the RN figures for Italian merchant ship losses in 1941
include some outside the Mediterranean. The RN figures for the
Italian merchant ship losses in 1941 come to
50,462 GRT sunk by surface ships, 389,991 GRT sunk by submarines,
161,589 GRT sunk by aircraft, 10,228 GRT sunk by mines, 140,190
GRT sunk by other causes, total 652,450 GRT. In addition the German
merchant fleet in the Mediterranean lost 29,150 GRT to surface ships,
42,681 GRT to submarines, 16,639 GRT to aircraft, 30,534 GRT to
mines, 12,514 GRT to other causes, total 131,518 GRT.
(snip)
> > While priorities mattered the biases of the Axis high command come
> > into play, they thought combat first supply second. My bet would be
> > they would initially put too much into North Africa than could be
> > properly supplied, which is what effectively happened.
>
>I don't know. When exactly did this happen ?
I was thinking of 1941, the complaints about the supply situation,
the fact it was not fixed, so the forces were not properly supplied.
(snip)
> > However we have to account for the fact cargo needed to be offloaded
> > at the major Libyan ports onto smaller ships that could use the smaller
> > Libyan ports, since some to most of the coasters were just that, unable
> > to cross the Mediterranean. This would reduce the effective capacity of
> > the ports as they simply import and immediately export the cargo.
>
>Yes, but again the record show that the ports were under used. As I
>wrote in my previous post, if you take the figures for April and May
>1942, the average for this two months period is 181,414 tons per month.
>Again, that's the rate maintained during two months, so it is clearly
>sustainable.
>
>This rate is 66% higher than the average 1941 monthly delivery rate, and
>82% higher than the average 1942 one. Compared to 1940, this is a 179%
>increase. So clearly, the port capacity was good enough for more than
>just the supply historically sent which is barely 16% above what was
>delivered.
Yes, I think I need to put both things together,
1) historically there was more port capacity in North Africa than used,
2) historically some of the North African port capacity was used to
"export" supplies to coasters to send the supplies to other North
African ports.
3) an increase in coaster usage comes at a cost of the import capacity
of Libya. Whether this is as simple as one ton of import capacity lost
per ton of exports is another question.
4) At some point he capacity will fill, that is imports + "exports" to other
Libyan ports will equal capacity. Then the port upgrades are needed,
alternatively more land transport.
5) A working port needs a good land transport system to move the
cargo away from the docks, plus warehousing. The more cargo the
more trucks on short haul around the port, unless rail lines can be
put in place, and then you need to start importing coal, unless the
axis actually used diesel powered shunter engines.
Sort of like the way the export of 21st Army group to France in 1944
affected the British port and transport system.
(snip)
> > It does look like the various negative feedback loops the allies found
> > in France in 1944, where it takes a long time to bring the capacity on
> > line then "suddenly" it all takes shape. The suddenly would probably
> > be 1942 for the axis in North Africa.
>
>I don't know, it seems to me that the time between decision and
>"suddenly" is shorter for the Axis than for the Allies, due to lower
>volumes and shorter LOCs. But I could be wrong of course, in particular
>it doesn't seem that the Luftwaffe could have begun to operate from
>Sicily much earlier than it historically did.
This is the question to answer, just when the "axis army able to
conquer Egypt" is in place, fully supplied and able to stretch
the supply lines that few hundred miles to Alexandria.
Given the axis treatment of, I suppose, "strategic" supply, the
basic infrastructure, I can see many mistakes being made when
the initial attempts are made to increase the North African
transportation system. This is a new experience for the axis
military. Even the US had troubles.
I was also thinking about at least some railways. So my conclusion
was the need would be proved in late 1940, the shipping would
start in early 1941, the axis would advance to around the Egyptian
border, building up the supply system, taking Tobruk, learning to
move in the desert, things like better air filters for vehicles come
to mind as a point noted, and all in all it would be 1942 before the
whole thing would come together, short of assuming a caricatured
British Army command that handed victory to the axis.
Ah I think the point in dispute is the quantified effects of this chain.
How much does Malta cost the axis. Certainly it makes a big
difference for convoys to Tripoli, but the port is very badly placed
to help the armies. Aircraft can still hit ships attempting to sail to
Benghazi, and points east, submarines can operate out of
Alexandria, so the need for escorts, and some evasive routing is
still present (for example Naples to Benghazi would likely be sail
as it to Sirte, then head due east to Benghazi to minimise exposure
to air attacks) Sicily is really in the way of the Naples Tripoli route.
The convoy sizes are still limited by the size of the ports
There will be an improvement. The next point is from when, I presume
the idea is the axis airpower suppress the island from early 1941
with an assault say around the historical assault on Crete? Or at
least by the northern autumn of 1941.
I presume, given Italy invaded Greece in October 1940 the axis will
need to devote the resources to a Balkan campaign in early 1941
as well as start the build up in North Africa. I doubt the axis had the
strength to invade Malta and Crete close together time wise. The
"Crete convoys" were a much shorter route. Crete is not as good
as Malta for interdicting axis supply lines but it would help.
Drazen Kramaric
<em...@olypen.com> wrote:
>> Why should he accept the responsibility for the things outside his control?
>
>It was definitely within his control whether or not he obeyed the explicit
>orders given to him both by OKH and Hitler himself.
Logistical arrangements were not under Rommel's control. In fact, up
until 1943, Rommel was subordinated to Italian commander in chief, so
he had no control over the transport of supplies to Lybia.
As commander of DAK and later Panzergruppe Afrika he was always liable
to be relieved if he didn't perform like any other German general.
>Poppycock. Rommel desired a dazzling victory, the capture of the Suez Canal
>and whatever he could get his hands on, in order to enhance his own
>reputation and further his personal ambitions and perhaps incidentally the
>fortunes of the Reich.
This is completely unsubstantiated position. One can personally
dislike his character without inventing unsupported charges.
>He was sent to Africa with explicit orders not to cross into Egypt, but
>merely to eject the BCE forces from Libya and then stand on the defensive.
And this is what he largely did until after Gazala. In 1941 he
recaptured Cyrenaica (with an exception of Tobruk) first, then
repulsed two British counteroffensives (Brevity, Battleaxe), got
kicked out of Cyrenaica in Crusader, counterattacked up to the Gazala
line, won at Gazala, recaptured Tobruk and asked and got the
permission to pursue the defeated 8th Army into Egypt.
In the course of the pursuit he won at Mersa Matruh and was stopped at
El Alamein.
>When he chose to exceed those orders, he also exceeded the Axis ability to
>keep him supplied, a fact he should have been very well aware of if he was
>not.
He asked permission to continue with the pursuit and got it. He also
got the reinforcements.
>He tried to establish higher strategy on his own hook and drag the Axis
>behind him, which was not his job. He exceeded his means, which is not
>something that a wise general does unless he can also count on exceptional
>luck. Rommel gambled that the 8th. Army was so disorganized, so ill-led, and
>so dispirited that he could march through it with exhausted troops and no
>supplies coming up behind him. It turned out he was wrong on all counts.
My readings suggests that British were very much concerned about
Rommel's advance and definitely did not dismiss the possibility of
Rommel's capture of Alexandria because "he exceeded Axis ability to
supply him" nor because "8th army was not disorganised and dispirited"
following the trashing it received at Gazala.
>Rommel possessed many excellent qualities as a commander of soldiers in
>combat. He made a first rate division commander and a pretty good corps
>commander. But thrust into the situation in North Africa, all the
>shortcomings of his personality began to emerge. He really needed someone
>over him with the insight and the will to rein him in when he needed reining
>in. Patton, for instance, a man with a somewhat similar personality was more
>fortunate to have such superiors.
I guess your suggestion would be for Rommel to stay put after the
recapture of Tobruk and wait for British to stage Crusader II, this
time in coordination with Torch. How was that going to improve Axis
position in North Africa, I don't know.
As far as Patton is concerned, putting Bradley over him hindered
Allied war effort if you ask me. Patton, as 12th Army Group commander,
would not be winning the war "in the wrong direction" by sending
armoured divisions to Brettany like Bradley did, nor would let anyone
out of the Falaise pockett.
Drax
--
Geoffrey Sinclair
>On Wed, 20 Apr 2005 00:02:49 +0000 (UTC), Michael Emrys
><em...@olypen.com> wrote:
>
>>> Why should he accept the responsibility for the things outside his control?
>>
>>It was definitely within his control whether or not he obeyed the explicit
>>orders given to him both by OKH and Hitler himself.
>
>Logistical arrangements were not under Rommel's control. In fact, up
>until 1943, Rommel was subordinated to Italian commander in chief, so
>he had no control over the transport of supplies to Lybia.
There are two points here. Certainly Rommel had little control over
the supplies sent to North Africa, though clearly he was the one
framing the requirements. Secondly it was Rommel's duty to tailor
his operations to the available supplies his army actually had, and
to a lesser extent what had been promised.
The indications are he did not pay as much attention to supplies as
he should have, particularly in 1941.
>As commander of DAK and later Panzergruppe Afrika he was always liable
>to be relieved if he didn't perform like any other German general.
And as a favourite of Hitler he had certain privileges, real and
imagined. His continual attack mindset also appealed to
Hitler.
(snip)
>>He was sent to Africa with explicit orders not to cross into Egypt, but
>>merely to eject the BCE forces from Libya and then stand on the defensive.
>
>And this is what he largely did until after Gazala.
The trouble is his first offensive was well before he had been given
permission to undertake the operation.
This meant he was stuck outside Tobruk, he was then, to an
extent jammed, he needed Tobruk's supply capacity to have
the supplies in the front to then capture Tobruk.
The axis spent much of 1941 building up to capture Tobruk,
things like sending a siege train and accumulating supplies.
(snip)
>As far as Patton is concerned, putting Bradley over him hindered
>Allied war effort if you ask me. Patton, as 12th Army Group commander,
>would not be winning the war "in the wrong direction" by sending
>armoured divisions to Brettany like Bradley did, nor would let anyone
>out of the Falaise pockett.
Then understand the US captured Avranches on 30 July and on 3
August Bradley was telling Patton to minimise the forces in the
Brittany peninsula.
It was Patton who on 1 August ordered 6th Armoured division to
take Brest.
At this stage the allies were not thinking pocket, they assumed a
steady withdrawal by the German forces. The allies also knew
they needed working ports soon, and tried for the Brittany ones.
The Mortain counter attack started on the 7th of August and this
gave the allies a chance to pocket the German forces. This
was discussed on 8 August. The Germans came to the conclusion
the allies were trying for a pocket on 10 August. The US moves
north stopped on 13 August but the Germans did not decide on
withdrawing until 14 August. The first official effort to close the
gap from the north was on 14 August.
On 20 August the Falaise gap was sealed, and the US XV corps
established a bridgehead across the Seine down stream from Paris.
It was a 21st Army group decision to close the gap using British and
Canadian forces, not Bradley's decision.
The problem with the "not let anyone out" idea for the Falaise pocket
is all pockets leaked, as long as the troops within the pocket could
keep some cohesion they stood a chance of breaking out. Also the
more the US advanced to close the pocket the thinner the lines would
be to break through and the less effort made to secure crossings
over the Seine.
Louis Capdeboscq
> I will heavily edit the post I am replying to so I will summarise the
> main points here and hope they can evolve into the agreed points.
So will I, for the same reasons.
(snip agreed points)
> 3) The axis shipping capacity was adequate enough to supply the
> forces in North Africa an average of around 71,000 metric tons of
> cargo arrived per month in 1941 and an average of around 70,000
> tons per month January to November 1942.
What shows that the shipping capacity was adequate is that when you
remove the "low" months then the average is higher, and these "low"
months were caused not by a shortage of shipping but by a shortage of
goods to ship, lack of will to ship anything more to a secondary
theater, lack of escorts and/or of fuel for the escorts, etc.
So I would say that the Axis shipping capacity was adequate for more
than the historical shipments.
> 4) The figures we have of shipping allocated to the run show each
> ship carried around 1 ton of cargo per 5 GRT of capacity. This is
> very low. On the other hand if you look at the loss figures the average
> was 1 ton of cargo lost per 2 GRT of shipping. This seems a more
> realistic figure of the average loading state of ships on the run. This
> would mean something like 2 tons shipped for every 5 tons of weight
> capacity of the ships.
Yes, which indicates IMO that we're missing some data and/or a relevant
benchmark e.g. what the figures were for other shipping efforts like the
British in Greece, the PTO etc.
(snip other points of agreement)
> So half a pound per person per day would indicate we are talking about
> basic supplies the European population needed, some food, medicines,
> clothing, tools, even fertiliser.
...or alternately we could be talking about some *very* basic supplies
for the European population in Libya and more supplies for the extra
"civilians" (stevedores etc) that would be shipped to North Africa as a
result of the war, in other words we would have to account for an
increase of the "civilian" needs if the Axis military effort in North
Africa is to increase in intensity, as the Axis armed forces can't rely
on local labor to meet their demands.
(snip)
>>>>BEGIN QUOTE:In the
>>>>port of Tripoli, in 1941, 2,700 tons per day (daylight) could be
>>>>unloaded, and 300 additional tons of fuel could be unloaded through
>>>>hoses.
>>>
>>>So 81,000 tons per month cargo and 9000 tons of fuel. And a decent
>>>night fighter force to allow unloading at night would be useful. Though
>>>none with airborne radar would appear before 1942. So I wonder
>>>how many of the port capacities are based on assuming daylight
>>>operations only?
>>
>>Firstly, I would caution against extrapolating too much from these
>>figures. Rounding errors can add up to fairly large ones when you do
>>that. This is why I provided the figures for total supplies landed in NA
>>as a more useful - IMO - guide to what was the true sustainable rate (as
>>opposed to surge rate).
>
> Agreed, I should emphasise more the "thinking out loud" and "back
> of envelope" points. Reality means the theoretical maximums are
> rarely reached, the lack of detailed figures means I am only talking
> estimates.
We can only talk estimates: there's a theoretical daily capacity which
is what everyone - including all the decision makers at the time -
mentions and which is the theoretically useful figure for port capacity.
Then we have the historical monthly amounts supplied, which are more
reliable as they allow us to differentiate between surge rates and
sustained rates, so I find them more useful to make conservative
estimates although of course they don't indicate what the maximum
capacity would have been and have problems of their own.
So we're both making back of the envelope calculations here, what I was
pointing out was that by adding theoretical port capacities you could be
overoptimistic for some of the ports, or alternately understate the
capacity actually used by the historical forces. The problem being of
course that "theoretical capacity" is very much a moving target.
>>Secondly, the problems involved with night unloading were more lack of
>>personnel than RAF night harassment attacks. Again, it all depends on
>>which period is considered but most after early 1941 the British
>>frontline was in Egypt. Sidi Barani to Tripoli is 750 miles which is
>>close to maximum range for a Blenheim IV. If the airfields are at
>>Matruh, then this is even farther.
>
> The Wellingtons would have to do any sort of bombing at that range,
> any Blenheim would need tanks in the bomb bay to have the
> necessary range. The Wellington IC figures are 1,200 miles with
> 4,500 pounds of bombs, 2,550 miles with 1,000 pounds of bombs.
Yes. I'm not sure what the RAF had in that theater, at least initially.
I remembered mostly Blenheims which is why I mentioned them but as I
didn't look this up I could easily have been wrong.
I don't think that the RAF had the capacity to interdict Tripoli, though.
(snip)
> I note the civilian figure is much below the one I found in the
> Australian Official History, 90,000 Italians plus 6,000 other
> Europeans. So either my figure is wrong, or many civilians
> were evacuated or the "civilians" in the minutes are those
> working for the military, not all the Italian civilians in the area.
I think that the latter explanation is the correct one. See above about
my estimate for "civilian" needs increasing.
> Sort of makes me wonder what, if anything, the both sides did
> to the Italian civilians in the areas fought over in 1941/42.
According to Moorehead, they were happy enough to be left alone and both
sides' armies seem to have done just that.
(snip)
> Interestingly enough Van Crevald quotes the Kriegsmarine as
> dismissing Tobruk as a disembarkation port for large ships.
> Presumably a main reason being it was close to the front.
I'm positive that large ships could be used in Tobruk, and the reason
why they weren't was enemy action. We have the reports of large Italian
ships reaching the port, and later of British ships. We also have a
German report (forgot the reference at the moment, I think it was a
postwar study by former Wehrmacht officers now working for the
Bundeswehr, i.e. the equivalent to the US "German reports" series but
with better access to original documentation).
(snip)
> The answer to the problems is relatively easy, I assumed the axis
> would use the small passenger capacity on the freighters or guests
> on board the escorts, given they were not lifting large numbers of
> troops, rather than liners, which ran the risk of major casualties
> should they be sunk.
This is a very good point. It does seem that the Italians didn't use
liners much, the way the Allies did, and theoretically your estimate of
shipping should be correct.
On the other hand, please note that I used the German figure of 2 GRT
per man shipped to show that just this relatively low rate already
increased the % of capacity used by 50%.
Theoretically you can easily accomodate 100 extra people on a freighter
but it's hard to estimate the tonnage cost, a calculation which is made
worse by the Italian practice of sending some of their ships at half load.
(snip)
>>At this point, I'm enclined to believe that back of the envelope
>>calculations can only go so far...
>
> Agreed.
Just to clarify, the above remark applied to MY back of the envelope
calculations.
> Let us work backwards, assume that the cargo loadings
> were like the loss figures, about 1 ton per 2 GRT.
>
>>From Bragadin, ship capacity, GRT, tonnage lifted, men lifted.
>
> 1940 (Jun-Dec): 1,291,245 / 304,467 (plus 29,299 men)
> 1941: 5,442,381 / 1,016,442 (plus 157,221 men)
> 1942 and Jan 1943: 2,511,545 / 924,472 (plus 19,882 men)
>
> So in 1940 some 600,000 GRT transported the cargo and 700,000
> GRT transported the men, 24 GRT per man.
>
> In 1941, 2,000,000 GRT for cargo, 3,400,000 GRT for men, or
> 22 GRT per man.
>
> In 1942, 1,850,000 GRT for cargo, 650,000 GRT for men, or
> 33 GRT per man.
>
> I think there is a good chance the "ship capacity" includes the
> coasters and/or some other tonnage, like ships under repair,
> and so the cargo capacity is therefore exaggerated.
Probably. What is interesting here is that the rate is relatively
constant in 1940 and 1941 but goes up by 50% in 1942. So it doesn't look
like the rate is as affected by the volume of troops shipped as the
previous estimate, on the other hand coastal shipping was more used in
1942 and the number of Italian ships awaiting repairs or standing idle
for lack of fuel or escorts was higher, too.
> Appendix XXXIII Merchant Shipping and the Demands of War by
> C Behrens, on average on 1 October 1941 the UK troop ship fleet
> had a capacity of 1 man per 8 GRT, by 29 March 1944 the figure
> was 1 man per 5.5 GRT, thanks to things like the 325,000 GRT of
> "monster" liners being rated at 28,163 men in 1941 and 55,223
> men in 1944.
>
> Your 7 GRT per man is quite a good estimate.
Funnily enough, it wasn't intended as an estimate, just an experiment to
see how important this ratio was in explaining the efficiency rate. With
this value, it was around 50% IIRC (51-52%) and as it was so high I
thought it had "proven" that this was the wrong tack, hence my remark
about back of the envelope calculations...
(snip)
> I thought the investment in port capacity at Benghazi happened after
> it was recaptured in January 1942? Rather than post June 1942. It
> seems for whatever reason the Italians did not do much work on the
> port in 1941, but this changed in 1942. I wonder how much the politics
> played a part, the need to restrain Rommel and the worry about the
> ships being attacked.
It started in January 1942, first repairs and then upgrades.
Historically the shift was gradual. Initially the Italians couldn't
afford to do much (and didn't do it anyway because of the mismanagement
in their war effort) and the Germans wanted an economy of force theater.
Then with Rommel winning victories the theater status was upgraded, both
because of Axis propaganda and because of the British reaction which
made it imperative to field a larger force to hold the place. So by
1942, Rommel had fought a full-scale battle with Crusader and it was no
longer expected that a handful of forces would be sufficient to hold the
British at bay.
(snip)
> I am not worried about padding in the sense of inflated figures of
> arrival tonnage, it is more a case of the fact if the port has to
> "export" the cargo a few days later this counts against the port
> capacity.
Yes, but again halving Tripoli's port capacity (i.e. 100% of what it
gets is reexported to eastern ports) still leaves ample port capacity,
and requires more coasters than the Axis had anyway.
>>(snip)
>>
>>>Looks like a good first approximation is around 33% of the
>>>cargo was trans shipped. That depresses Tripoli's effective capacity.
>>
>>Yes, it does, which is why I used figures for loads delivered to NA,
>>which show that more than enough total capacity remained.
>
> The point I would make is the more the small ports are used the
> more the capacity of the bigger ports is reduced by them
> "exporting" the cargo to coasters that can use the smaller ports.
Only up to a point: if more supply is available then Tobruk can be
turned into one of the "bigger ports". Also, the overall tonnage
delivered shows that there was spare capacity.
(snip)
>>>My question would be is the figure we have the cargo that arrived
>>>in port, or the figure the ports unloaded that month?
>>
>>I wouldn't completely rule out padding, but these figures normally are
>>for cargo unloaded. I don't have as complete figures for cargo cleared
>>from the port, although I may have them in a few days.
>
> I doubt there is any padding, it is more a case of the reality that it takes
> a week to unload a ship, supplies arrived are when the ship enters
> port, supplies landed are when it is unloaded, so maybe a week later
> before all the supplies are off the ship. Sometimes more if there
> are berthing or labour problems.
I see your point, but what would it change to the figures we already
have regarding the port capacity ? If all deliveries are moved back one
week, odds are that this will affect all monthly figures equally and
only result in large shifts if all shipments arrived near the end of the
month.
> (snip)
>>As another set of figures, the British official history counted an
>>armoured division in pursuit mode needed 400 tons a day, actually 520
>>with the need for water.
>>
>>A General Transport Compagny had a truck lift of 300 tons, but in
>>practice only had a practical range of 100 miles / day in the desert. So
>>6 British divisions at 600 miles = 6 x 6 x 520 / 300 = 6,240 3-ton
>>trucks equivalent, not counting the needs of the supply chain itself.
>>Assuming that the average Axis truck was 2 tons instead of 3, plus a 20%
>>overhead for the needs of the supply line, we have a requirement of
>>11,200 trucks, not counting the need for replacements or losses from
>>enemy action.
>>
>>On the other hand, the amount of supply under discussion is around 3,120
>>tons daily, or 93,600 monthly. If we assume that the British calculated
>>in short tons, then the needs for supplying a monthly 130,000 metric
>>tons 600 miles away by truck would be 17,333 trucks, a figure remarkably
>>similar to your estimate.
>
> Thanks for the confirmation but as far as I can tell if a British history
> mentions tons, assume long tons, 2,240 pounds, if a US history
> mentions tons, assume short tons, 2,000 pounds, and of course if
> it is a European country's history assume metric tons, 2,204.6226
> pounds, unless otherwise stated.
Yes, I remember calculating that if the British were using long tons
then this saved German logistics 2,000 trucks but obviously I forgot to
write it.
So according to the British or your estimate, then the Axis needed some
12,000 trucks. Taking the conservative route and using British figures
for tonnage and truck lift with your estimate for tonnage of supplies
needed then the number goes up to 16,000 (rounded up).
(snip)
> No I doubt it given the distances involved, the troops need the trucks to
> move themselves and each time they move forward the pause to wait
> for the supply trucks grows longer.
Yes, but this assumes organized British resistance all the way as
opposed to a German decisive victory near e.g. Matruh.
>>Also, bear in mind the many overheads involved in all the previous
>>calculations: a 10% increase in supply deliveries that goes 90% to the
>>Germans will improve the German supply situation by 30% using the
>>overall figures.
>
> Yes, it is clear the best way the axis can handle the North African
> campaign is replace many Italian troops with Germans, and cut
> down the number of Italians in Africa. Freeing supplies.
That's not the point that I was making. I don't think that shipping the
Italians out to replace them with Germans was 1/ politically possible
and 2/ desirable (for all the moaning about Italians their manpower was
useful as German manpower was in short supply).
On the other hand, what I meant above was that if the Italian force
remained constant, then most of the extra supply sent goes to the
Germans which results in a dramatic improvement in the cutting-edge part
of the Axis army.
(snip)
> Yes, but my point would be the Luftwaffe and Kreigsmarine need to keep
> up the threat level against England, to minimise the willingness of the
> British to send forces out of the country.
Absolutely.
There's no way that the bulk of the Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine can
redeploy to the Mediterranean both for the reason that you outline -
though the British were conscious of the German central position so they
wouldn't match a redeployment - and because this strategy can only be
sold to Hitler as part of a package which would go something like "we
will defeat England in 1941, and deal with the Soviets later".
Obviously, such a strategy will keep a large effort against Britain
proper - which I don't think it can defeat in 1941 but that's not the point.
> I think we are using different definitions of infrastructure improvements.
> I am talking about railways, at least from Benghazi eastwards, not the
> relatively straightforward port improvements done.
We were indeed.
At first glance, I'd say that this would require a material increase in
the tonnage shipped to North Africa, in other words it's not really
going to happen.
(snip good points)
> Then the capacity to North Africa has to include the supplies needed to
> enhance and maintain the supply system including adequate labour.
> All of this cuts into the tonnage available to the combat troops until the
> supply system is enhanced.
Yes, but that's a one time drop - and again there was spare capacity -
except if the Axis decides to build a railway which I don't think they
would really afford.
(snip)
(snip more useful points)
>>Ok, so for 1,000 tons of fuel you get a fighter squadron for a month, is
>>that it ?
>
> No, it would be a fighter Gruppe and it would be working reasonably
> hard if all aircraft were flying on average once a day.
The point is that the fighter protection over Tobruk can pay for itself
fuel-wise.
(snip)
>>>While priorities mattered the biases of the Axis high command come
>>>into play, they thought combat first supply second. My bet would be
>>>they would initially put too much into North Africa than could be
>>>properly supplied, which is what effectively happened.
>>
>>I don't know. When exactly did this happen ?
>
> I was thinking of 1941, the complaints about the supply situation,
> the fact it was not fixed, so the forces were not properly supplied.
Leaving aside the fact that everyone during WWII was more intent on
increasing the division count in theater than on optimizing the logistic
situation (Ruppenthal blames the Allies for doing just that in his
conclusion), I'm unaware of any time when the Axis forces in North
Africa didn't complain about their supply situation...
(snip)
> 1) historically there was more port capacity in North Africa than used,
> 2) historically some of the North African port capacity was used to
> "export" supplies to coasters to send the supplies to other North
> African ports.
> 3) an increase in coaster usage comes at a cost of the import capacity
> of Libya. Whether this is as simple as one ton of import capacity lost
> per ton of exports is another question.
> 4) At some point he capacity will fill, that is imports + "exports" to other
> Libyan ports will equal capacity. Then the port upgrades are needed,
> alternatively more land transport.
> 5) A working port needs a good land transport system to move the
> cargo away from the docks, plus warehousing. The more cargo the
> more trucks on short haul around the port, unless rail lines can be
> put in place, and then you need to start importing coal, unless the
> axis actually used diesel powered shunter engines.
Agreed.
The difference between us is when the "at some point" occurs, i.e.
before shipments to North Africa are adequate to secure victory or not.
If the second solution, then the Axis probably don't have the time to do
the upgrades before 1942, in which case the game is probably up. Or
maybe they could but this would require giving North Africa highest
priority and I can't imagine why OKW would want to do that.
But it seems to me that if the Axis simply matches its historical
high-paced delivery rate - to repeat: the rate that was historically
achieved with the historical infrastructure - then this is a 66%
improvement over the full year (no empty months) which translates into
more than doubling the amount of supply reaching German troops as the
bulk of the increase will go their way. 21st Army Group in 1944 was
using far more supply and was tackling a large army.
> This is the question to answer, just when the "axis army able to
> conquer Egypt" is in place, fully supplied and able to stretch
> the supply lines that few hundred miles to Alexandria.
(...)
> to mind as a point noted, and all in all it would be 1942 before the
> whole thing would come together, short of assuming a caricatured
> British Army command that handed victory to the axis.
Yes, that's one possibility extrapolating from the historical buildup rates.
I've seen more favorable time lines with historical data being
insufficient either way.
(snip)
> Ah I think the point in dispute is the quantified effects of this chain.
> How much does Malta cost the axis.
'xactly. And to think that it only took 3,000 lines of posting to clear
that up...
> Certainly it makes a big
> difference for convoys to Tripoli, but the port is very badly placed
> to help the armies.
Yes, but Malta was a big reason why Tripoli was being used so much in
the first place. No Malta means less need for convoying and far less
escorts, which means more fuel available.
> Aircraft can still hit ships attempting to sail to
> Benghazi, and points east, submarines can operate out of
> Alexandria, so the need for escorts, and some evasive routing is
> still present (for example Naples to Benghazi would likely be sail
> as it to Sirte, then head due east to Benghazi to minimise exposure
> to air attacks) Sicily is really in the way of the Naples Tripoli route.
> The convoy sizes are still limited by the size of the ports
Obviously. On the other hand, I think that the air threat over Benghazi
and Tobruk can be dealt with by additional air assets which will mostly
pay for themselves supply-wise. This does require an increased initial
commitment, though.
> I presume, given Italy invaded Greece in October 1940 the axis will
> need to devote the resources to a Balkan campaign in early 1941
> as well as start the build up in North Africa. I doubt the axis had the
> strength to invade Malta and Crete close together time wise. The
> "Crete convoys" were a much shorter route. Crete is not as good
> as Malta for interdicting axis supply lines but it would help.
I don't think that the Axis can invade both islands close together,
particularly given that invading Malta will be no picnic - the terrain
is no more friendly to paratroopers than Crete, even less so. I'd
consider making the British operate out of undeveloped Crete and out of
Alexandria a big improvement for the Axis over having an active Malta
sitting on their LOC.
Rich Rostrom
informative thread for their very valuable contributions.
I have learned a lot from this thread, both about the subject
and about research and evaluation of sources.
Louis Capdeboscq <loui...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> ... I assumed the axis would use the small passenger capacity
>> on the freighters... rather than liners, which ran the risk of
>> major casualties should they be sunk.
>
>It does seem that the Italians didn't use liners much...
The Italian liner LIGURIA (formerly Canadian SS MELITA)
was sunk in 1940 while serving as a troopship, and
reportedly about 1,500 Italian troops were drowned.
This is exactly the sort of major disaster that any power
would want to avoid, and getting so burned would make them
very shy of using liners thereafter.
--
Nothing which was ever expressed originally in the English language resembles,
except in the most distant way, the thought of Plotinus, or Hegel, or Foucault.
I take this to be enormously to the credit of our language. -- David Stove
--
Rich Rostrom
> I doubt the axis had the
>> strength to invade Malta and Crete close together time wise...
>
>I don't think that the Axis can invade both islands close together,
>particularly given that invading Malta will be no picnic - the terrain
>is no more friendly to paratroopers than Crete, even less so.
The Axis does not _require_ the German paratroops for
an invasion of Crete, IMO. The island can be invaded
by sea from several different routes - Britain cannot
station naval forces there indefinitely.
I have been told that the British decision to evacuate
Crete was only partially caused by the German capture
of Maleme airfield. The nail in the coffin, so to speak,
was the news that Italian forces from the Dodecanese
islands had landed in eastern Crete.
dp
>> It does seem that the Italians didn't use liners much...
>
> The Italian liner LIGURIA (formerly Canadian SS MELITA)
> was sunk in 1940 while serving as a troopship, and
> reportedly about 1,500 Italian troops were drowned.
>
> This is exactly the sort of major disaster that any power
> would want to avoid, and getting so burned would make them
> very shy of using liners thereafter.
I thought that one of the attractions to using liners was that they were
very fast ships and required relativly few escorts to move a substantial
number of troops. Speed was a defense against submarines. The troops were
also exposed to danger for a much shorter time period than if they were in a
half dozen freighter types moving at a quarter or third of the speed of a
liner.
--
dp
--