Forces
and resources of the European combatants.
In September 1939 the Allies, namely Great Britain, France, and Poland, were together
superior in industrial resources, population, and military manpower, but the German
Army, or Wehrmacht, because of its armament, training, doctrine, discipline,
and fighting spirit, was the most efficient and effective fighting force for its
size in the world. The index of military strength in September 1939 was the number
of divisions that each nation could mobilise. Against Germany's 100 infantry divisions
and six armoured divisions, France had 90 infantry divisions in metropolitan France,
Great Britain had 10 infantry divisions, and Poland had 30 infantry divisions,
12 cavalry brigades, and one armoured brigade (Poland had also 30 reserve infantry
divisions, but these could not be mobilised quickly).
It
was the qualitative superiority of the German infantry divisions and the number
of their armoured divisions that made the difference in 1939. The firepower of
a German infantry division far exceeded that of a French, British, or Polish division;
the standard German division included 442 machine guns, 135 mortars, 72 antitank
guns, and 24 howitzers. Allied divisions had a firepower only slightly greater
than that of World War I. Germany had six armoured divisions in September 1939;
the Allies, though they had a large number of tanks, had no armoured divisions
at that time.
The
six armoured, or panzer, divisions of the Wehrmacht comprised some 2,400 tanks. And
though Germany would subsequently expand its tank forces during the first years
of the war, it was not the number of tanks that Germany had (the Allies had almost
as many in September 1939) but the fact of their being organise into divisions
and operated as such that was to prove decisive. In accordance with the doctrines
of General Heinz Guderian, the German tanks were used in massed formations
in conjunction with motorised artillery to punch holes in the enemy line and to
isolate segments of the enemy, which were then surrounded and captured by motorised
German infantry divisions while the tanks ranged forward to repeat the process:
deep drives into enemy territory by panzer divisions were thus followed by mechanised
infantry and foot soldiers. These tactics were supported by dive bombers that attacked and disrupted the enemy's supply and
communications lines and spread panic and confusion in its rear, thus further
paralysing its defensive capabilities. Mechanisation was the key to the German
blitzkrieg, or "lightning war," so named because of the unprecedented
speed and mobility that were its salient characteristics. Tested and well-trained
in manoeuvres, the German panzer divisions constituted a force with no equal in
Europe.
The
German Air Force, or Luftwaffe, was also the best force of its kind in 1939. It was a
ground co-operation force designed to support the Army, but its planes were superior to nearly all Allied types.
In the rearmament period from 1935 to 1939 the production of German combat aircraft
steadily mounted.
The
standardisation of engines and airframes gave the Luftwaffe an advantage over
its opponents. Germany had an operational force of 1,000 fighters and 1,050 bombers
in September 1939. The Allies actually had more planes in 1939 than Germany did,
but their strength was made up of many different types, some of them obsolescent.
At sea the odds against Germany were much greater in September 1939 than in August 1914, since the Allies in 1939 had many more large surface warships than Germany had. At sea, however, there was to be no clash between the Allied and the German massed fleets but only the individual operation of German pocket battleships and commerce raiders.
