The Best German Army Division

HunterSeeker · Post by **HunterSeeker** » Sat Jul 31, 2004 5:43 pm

Which German Army Division was the Best one ?

(Army Division can include Infantry , Panzer and S.S .....etc)

Grading Scale might help.

#of Battles (Won)

# of Battles (Lost)

General Tactics

# of Enemy (Killed)

# of Men (Killed, Wounded)

Combat Skills & Combat Expierences

Christoph Awender · Post by **Christoph Awender** » Sat Jul 31, 2004 6:41 pm

I wonder if you even think a few seconds about the questions you ask or if you just want to provoke people on this forum.

If that is not the case:

#of Battles (Won)

No human on earth has a list of all battles of all hundreds of german divisions that existed. Beside that what can be considered as battle etc....
Divisions which existed at the beginning of the war would have of course more battles on their list than divisions formed 1943, 1944. So this is no serious criteria.

# of Battles (Lost)

Same as above

General Tactics

All german soldiers, NCO´s and officer learned from the same "Ausbildungsvorschriften" so they used all the same tactics.

# of Enemy (Killed)

Beside that no such list exists for all divisions for the entire war these numbers would be not more than very, very rough estimates of course. You are really a history teacher??

# of Men (Killed, Wounded)

I don´t understand what the number of wounded has to do with the quality of a divisional size formation??
The german casualty report system completely broke down late 1944 and most documents related to this were destroyed. Again this would be pure guesswork and not a serious criteria.

Combat Skills & Combat Expierences

What are combat skills in connection to divisional size formations??
The germans had a rating system which categorized the combat value of divisions. For example these were grades like :"Fit for limited offensive operations", "fit for all kind of offensive operations", "fit for defense only" etc....
This was of course just a status at a certain point of time. It is impossible to make a overall criteria for a 5 year period out of it. Divisions were refreshed, destroyed, reformed, reorganized etc.. etc... so nobody can make this a serious criteria for the entire war.

\Christoph

Fredd · Post by **Fredd** » Sat Jul 31, 2004 11:04 pm

With all due respect (from the reasons stated above by Christoph) if you are really a history teacher then God have mercy on your students.

HunterSeeker wrote:(Army Division can include Infantry , Panzer and S.S .....etc)

When you asked 'Army' wasn't it obvious you refered to the Wermacht, did you? And next you enumerate with one breath: infrantry, panzer, SS (Waffen-SS presumably)?

Gebirgsjaeger · Post by **Gebirgsjaeger** » Sat Jul 31, 2004 11:25 pm

Ha ha! I must totally agree with Christoph and Fredd. This question disqualified itself the moment it was posted!

Greetings from Germany
GJ

P.S: Oh, and of course the best German division ever was the 1. Gebirgsdivision

(sarcasm....)

Witzland · Post by **Witzland** » Sun Aug 01, 2004 4:28 am

if you ask for the best divison I say that one of the first waffen-ss divions was the best , LLSAH or Das Reich

Gebirgsjaeger · Post by **Gebirgsjaeger** » Sun Aug 01, 2004 7:09 am

Really? What makes them better than 1. PzDiv or Großdeutschland or 2. PzDiv or or or.......

Christoph Awender · Post by **Christoph Awender** » Sun Aug 01, 2004 9:47 am

Witzland wrote:if you ask for the best divison I say that one of the first waffen-ss divions was the best , LLSAH or Das Reich

And which facts give you this oppinion?

Witzland · Post by **Witzland** » Mon Aug 02, 2004 10:36 am

beacuse they were put into every major battle and they had most experience and battel record + they had the highest ammount of medals awarded :P The russians were so affired of them that the propaganda told the soldiers that those divisons were completly destroyed...

Witzland · Post by **Witzland** » Mon Aug 02, 2004 10:37 am

omg sorry my spelling is so BAD soz

Christoph Awender · Post by **Christoph Awender** » Mon Aug 02, 2004 11:05 am

Witzland wrote:beacuse they were put into every major battle and they had most experience and battel record + they had the highest ammount of medals awarded :P The russians were so affired of them that the propaganda told the soldiers that those divisons were completly destroyed...

Most experience is simply not true. The early war Panzerdivisionen (if we stick to Pz.Div.) had several years more experience and had more battles fought.

And the divisions you speak of were nearly destroyed several times. Just an example on 26.Nov.43 the division had 9 Pz.IV's, 2 Tigers, 7 Panthers and 2 command tanks fit for combat before it was transferred to France for refreshment. These are 20 tanks!

\Christoph

Gebirgsjaeger · Post by **Gebirgsjaeger** » Mon Aug 02, 2004 1:11 pm

Christoph Awender wrote: Most experience is simply not true. The early war Panzerdivisionen (if we stick to Pz.Div.) had several years more experience and had more battles fought.

And the divisions you speak of were nearly destroyed several times. Just an example on 26.Nov.43 the division had 9 Pz.IV's, 2 Tigers, 7 Panthers and 2 command tanks fit for combat before it was transferred to France for refreshment. These are 20 tanks!

\Christoph

Hm, so the SS-Verfügungstruppe, SS-LAH and SS-Totenkopf haven´t fought since the early war years?

And tanks do say absolutely nothing about experience - NOTHING!

Christoph Awender · Post by **Christoph Awender** » Mon Aug 02, 2004 3:49 pm

Hm, so the SS-Verfügungstruppe, SS-LAH and SS-Totenkopf haven´t fought since the early war years?

And tanks do say absolutely nothing about experience - NOTHING!

I am very sorry Gebirgsjäger my mistake you are correct.

\Christoph

Gebirgsjaeger · Post by **Gebirgsjaeger** » Mon Aug 02, 2004 4:01 pm

Christoph Awender wrote:
Hm, so the SS-Verfügungstruppe, SS-LAH and SS-Totenkopf haven´t fought since the early war years?

And tanks do say absolutely nothing about experience - NOTHING!
I am very sorry Gebirgsjäger my mistake you are correct.

\Christoph

Well I don´t know if you really mean what you wrote just here or if you want to fool me. But I don´t want to correct you. It was just a question. You may also be right. The original members of those SS units may have well been almost depleted when the DIVISIONs came onto the stage of world history.

Christoph,

I do NOT have any hard feelings against you!
GJ

wasp · Post by **wasp** » Sun Aug 08, 2004 3:55 pm

Would i be correct to say that a great deal depended on how recently the divisions had been reinforced. I find it no wonder that 6 pz division was the top unit on the southern front during the attempt to free 6th army since it came frech out of france. The same goes for the 1st, 3d, 5th SS during kharkov and kursk. And of course they had always been motorized, ( not sure SSVT was motorised). I' d say 11pz d put on a great show, ( sure gespenster will agree) even in southern france when they were still being reinforced. Do you guys think i'm correct here?

Benoit Douville · Post by **Benoit Douville** » Sun Feb 13, 2005 8:51 pm

First of all, I don't really understand all the fuzz about that question but if we exclude the Waffen-SS Division from the topic, it would be really interesting to know what was the best German Infantry Division in the Wehrmacht in term of effectivenes in Battles and who suffered the least casualties.

Regards