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4 Problems with Blitzkrieg
Blitzkrieg is not without its disadvantages; there is a danger of the attacking force overextending its supply lines, and the strategy as a whole can be defeated by a determined foe who is willing to sacrifice territory for time in which to regroup and rearm. In addition, the defending army can maintain strong points which the attacking army must either eliminate thereby disrupting its momentum or bypass which creates the possiblity that the defender will use them to encircle the attacker. Once the attack loses momentum, the war becomes one of attrition in which the mobility and surprise involved with blitzkrieg are no longer useful.
The limits of blitzkrieg were seen in Operation Barbarossa in 1941. Although the German attack took huge areas of Russia, the overall strategic effect was more limited. The Red Army was able to regroup far to the rear, and eventually defeat the German forces for the first time in the Battle of Moscow. In the following summer of 1942, when Germany launched another Blitzkrieg offensive in southern Russia against Stalingrad and the Caucasus, the Soviets again lost tremendous amounts of territory, just to counter-attack again when they stopped in front of the city.
As the war progressed, Allied armies became able to effectively use blitzkrieg tactics against Germany. Many operations in the Western Desert and on the Eastern Front relied on massive concentrations of firepower to establish breakthroughs by fast-moving armoured units. These tactics were also decisive in the Normandy operations after Operation Overlord, which resulted in a massive encirclement of Germany military strength in France.
5 Successors
The possibility of a massive Soviet tank attack on Western Europe using blitzkrieg tactics was the focus of NATO planning in the Cold War. The difficulty was that the standard tactic of trading space for time would have lead to Western Europe being overrun. The solution in the 1950s was a rapid escalation to nuclear war. In the 1960s, the existence of Mutual Assured Destruction made this untenable, and the focus of defense was changed to air land doctrine.
The military doctrine of Rapid Dominance or shock and awe is considered by some a modern successor to blitzkrieg. Like blitzkrieg, rapid dominance emphasizes high amounts of communication and rapid strikes using combined arms to create confusion in the enemy. Unlike blitzkrieg, rapid dominance relies heavily on air power, large amounts of central coordination, and focuses on destroying the enemy's command and control structures rather than its supply lines.
6 Further reading
- Shock and Awe: Achieving Rapid Dominance, Harlan K. Ullman and James P. Wade with L.A. "Bud" Edney, Fred M. Franks, Charles A. Horner, Jonathan T. Howe, and Keith Brendley, NDU Press Book, 1996 available online at http://www.dodccrp.org/ (Look under publications for html version)
7 See also
World War II European theatre
Nazi Germany
