For Lo! We Are Back On The Details Of Prof Bartov's Work
'Hitler's Army' because I made detailed notes and you're going to get their benefit, like it or not. Probably not.
Okay, onto the short lesson in Teuton. Since we are dealing with the meat grinder battles of attrition on the Eastern Front during the Second Unpleasantness, I wondered what 'Meat grinder' was in Teuton. Art!
Sorry. Couldn't resist*.
'Fleischwolf'. Which sounds peculiarly appropriate, since Ruffia now and the Sinister Union then are/were both awash with wolves.
ANYWAY Ol' Ommy focussed on two contrasting Teuton divisions: one was the extremely bog-standard 12th Infantry Division, the other being the totally not-bog-standard Gross Deutchland regiment, later a division. We shall look at the 12th first. Art!
12 Infantry Division symbol
Like most infantry divisions in the land of the Teutons, it was based on a geographical location, that being Pomerania. Where the dogs come from.
The 12th was no stranger to combat: it had fought in Poland, suffering 900 casualties; it also fought in the battle of France in 1940, although I can't find a specific casualty total. Let's look at an ideal depiction of a Teuton infantry division pre-Operation Barbarossa. Art!
Theoretically it would total 17,200 men and officers, in three infantry regiments, each of three battalions, each of about 1,000 men. Also, 5,375 horses - so much for the mighty mechanised Wehrmacht, hmmm? - and 942 motor vehicles. This Table of Organisation and Equipment, TOE, in no way reflects reality, because men would always be off on leave, on training, off sick or injured, or just plain dead. War will do that. Art!
Teuton stubble-hoppers during the beginning of Operation Barbarossa. Note that, in the Sinister Union, the 'road' is a dirt track and, once again, horsed Teuton transport.
When the 12th began the invasion, as part of Army Group North, it was at a strength of 14,073 men and 336 officers, so already understrength, probably due to losses in France not being replaced. By early November each infantry regiment had to dissolve a battalion, as they were not getting replacements. By 14/12/1941 NOTE PROPER DATE FORMAT their losses amounted to 4,200 men, leaving 11,351 men and 287 officers. Art!
The 12th was then unlucky enough to be surrounded by Sinister forces in their 1942 counterattack, in the 'Demyansk Pocket', along with five other divisions, as shown above. Under siege for 81 days, there are no figures for what 12th Division's losses were, but the total overall for the units in the cauldron was 55,000, so if we average that out, possibly 9,000 casualties as a maximum. However, read on.
By April the 12th had suffered so many casualties that it took troops from wherever it could find them, leading to one battalion having soldiers from 17 different units, and 17 companies being led by NCO's instead of officers.
We now have definite figures for losses in May 1942: 9,272 men and 341 officers, so 6,000 men down from establishment. By August the losses reached 10,897. Ol' Ommy gives a flavour of how intense the fighting along Army Group North's front was: During December 1942 one regiment, reduced to a third of it's nominal strength (793 men), lost 614 men. The 12th's 'Sturm Battalion' was left with 36 men and one officer or 5% of it's original roll. Art!
"This holiday abroad is s-"
Once again not getting any replacements, the 12th was shunted to the Lovat River front, where it's strength had fallen to 4,822 men and 171 officers. You might wonder why the Teutons kept this skeleton force in existence, rather than split it up and redistribute it amongst other formations.
The Lovat River then and now
Because Herr Schickelgruber was convinced that keeping these skeleton divisions around would fool the Sinisters every time. Hint: it didn't.
ANYWAY AGAIN there the 12th sat for over a year until June of 1944, until it was completely destroyed in the Sinister's Operation Bagration.
This long, sorry tale of woe in warfare comes down to the Teutons underestimating the Sinisters, whom they knew to be tough opponents going back to the eighteenth century, and overestimating themselves. Also, it proves that 'Bewegungskrieg' (as the Teutons actually called it) tended to have very high casualties whilst in progress. These unpleasant facts were camouflaged during short campaigns but came into harsh focus for the endless war in the East.
We didn't even get to deal with Gross Deutchland. Maybe tomorrow. I bet you can hardly wait.
Remember Mister Jimmy?
The grizzled hard-as-nails process worker whom manglement tried to replace and sack, and whom ended up costing them at least a million dollars. This was because the business had run out of the electronic control modules that Jimmy and Jimmy alone could make, they were up against deadlines and had to accede to the ex-owners flat statement that they paid him a seven-figure number to come back and train a batch of new ECM workers. Art!
PEN, the narrator, mentioned in his original tale that the new manglement might have broken the law and that he'd update if there was any more news.
There was more news. As Jimmy put it in rather saltier language, "Those <very rude swear redacted> didn't know who they were dealing with, they sure as <another redaction> do now."
Manglement realised things had gone badly wrong when the workers tried to unionise, which failed but lit a fuse under the management staff. They restructured and things improved considerably, sufficient for Jimmy to return, BUT he had conditions. O boy did he have conditions. Art!
Jimmy wanted two of the problematic higher-ups gone, which had also been the position of a lot of other workers as well. Two weeks after he came back they were walked out of the plant by security and warned never to return - see above for corroboration.
What's This?
Allow me to put up an illo that just caught my eye on the BBC website. Art!
ANYWAY what I was surprised at was that MacGowan was dead, firstly because it would be hard to distinguish between him alive or deceased, and secondly the news of his demise three years ago completely passed me by. Art!
How he outlived Kirsty McColl is a mystery for the ages. You know, the other half of their duet on "A Fairytale Of New York", the best and most unseasonal Christmas song ever. Art!
Since the song is a perennial favourite at Yuletide, he must have made a mint in residuals and royalties over the decades, which explains how he could afford to get his pegs fixed.
Ewwwww!
Conrad, as we all know, is the world's biggest coward, all the more so about anything to do with his eyes, which squeamishness made for an icky moment last night as I was watching 'Falling Skies'. Art!
This unappealing little beggar is an alien 'eye worm'. The backstory is that Tom Mason deliberately gave himself up to the aliens in order to ensure his son Ben was no longer affected by the remnants of an alien harness that had been plugged into his spinal column.
Well, Tom brought back an extra guest - the above worm, in his left eyeball. Doctor Glass has to remove it with tweezers - Art!
Yuck a duck. They restrain him but you get the perspective of his feet thrashing around, hinting that this might, just possibly, be a painful experience.
The question of what was it doing and are there any more? is left open to speculation.
Finally -
Ending with another pearl of poison wit from Ambrose, here we are:
"Army, n: A class of non-producers who defend the nation by devouring everything likely to tempt an enemy to invade."
* I think this translates as "Revenge against the Ukrainians!" and "I didn't realise -"
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