But the Soviets had developed a far superior concept of the operational art and especially the principles of depth and sequential effects.
Soviet tactics were largely rigid, cookbook battle drills, with the soldiers and the lower-level leaders functioning as mere automatons. German tactics were innovative and flexible, and their leaders and soldiers were well trained and exhibited initiative down to the lowest levels. On the tactical level of war, the German Army was superior to the Red Army on almost every count, yet the Soviets still beat the Germans in the end. It also focused far too heavily on annihilation and rapid decision by a single bold stroke. Blitzkrieg did feature the innovative use of combined arms tactics aimed at achieving rupture through the depth of an enemy’s tactical deployment, and it did exhibit many of the features we now associate with the operational art. But a long war on even more than two fronts is exactly what the Germans ended up fighting twice in a 30-year period.ĭespite their rapid movements and deep armored thrusts, the German Blitzkrieg battles of World War II were not true operational campaigns but rather were tactical maneuvers on a grand scale. And since logistics is the critical enabler of any extended period of operations, the Germans never developed the robust logistics structure or the adequate logistics doctrine needed to carry them through a long war. Thus, sequential effects and extended operations in time carried a low priority in German thinking. To avoid this trap, German military thinking focused on conducting short wars that would be won by a single decisive battle. With its geographic position in Europe and relatively defenseless borders east and west, Germany’s worst strategic nightmare was always the two-front war.
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