Feldgrau.net

A few comments: PzGren and Pz were different arms of service, in both the Heer and W-SS. There are sound technical reasons for this -- the one requires training on infantry weapons and vehicles such as the the SPW halftrack, whereas the pz arm required training in a tank. However ... command appoint...

Well, yes and no. As often the case, be careful about drawing direct inferences from practice in Anglo-American armies when discussing German practice. The German philosophy for elements like this was not directly analogous to the "recon", "recce" or "scout" platoons in...

Frontages is an interesting issue. Doctrine manuals, inevitably, always spell out "ideal" frontages, but this needs to be understood in context. The primary purpose behind doctrinal frontages is to give a framework for teaching how to position elements on the ground. There are certain pure...

Okay, I am answering this off the top of my head, so no screaming if someone can offer better detail... First off: the German for infantry is infantrie. This was the traditional term, used exactly as we would in English. During the war, however, it was decided to "honour" the infantry arm ...

Persistently poor intelligence is generally considered one of the features of the German war effort. But first, it needs to be stressed that intelligence exists at all levels. At the very lowest, a company or platoon gets "intelligence" from its sentries and patrols - obviously of a very l...

The airstrike that knocked out Pz Gp West's HQ was on 10 June. A few further refs I have found suggest that the location was in the village of LA CAINE, just to the North-West of THURY-HARCOURT.

Pz Gp West, under Geyr von Schweppenburg, was deployed to the CAEN area later in June.

Actually, there is a recent new contribution to this field -- "Strange Victory: Hitler's Conquest of France" by Ernest May, a Harvard prof. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0809088541/qid=1076798413/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/002-3924495-0572051?v=glance&s=books It has a provocativ...

Does anyone have a precise location for the Headquarters of Panzer Group West in Normandy? It was established at the "Chateau La Caine" near THURY-HARCOURT shortly after D-Day, then bombed on 10 June, destroying most of its communications suite and killing many of the staff, including the ...