Tank-infantry
cooperation
Of all the aspects of combined
arms operations, that between tanks and infantry presented the severest
challenge, and the greatest potential rewards.
The difficulties can almost be
summed up in a single word, communication.
What infantry commanders wanted from their assigned tank support, and
what those tanks could actually provide were subject to a wide range of
constraints, imposed by terrain, vehicle type and the strength of enemy
defences. Similar problems ensued
when infantry from non-armoured formations found themselves supporting tanks
instead of the motorised or mechanised troops who were more familiar with the
role. As the war progressed, and
the arsenal of anti-tank weapons available to the individual soldier grew
evermore numerous and lethal, so too did the need for mutual support between
tanks and infantry, requiring new tactics to be forged in combat to replace the
flawed doctrines still being taught on the training grounds.
Who goes first?
The tactics pioneered during the
Great War called for tanks to lead the assault over no man’s land and rake the
enemy positions with shell and machine gun fire, pinning the defenders in their
trenches. Part of the tank force
would then break through to the supporting trenches, while the remainder kept
the firing line immobilised, and repeat the process. During this the accompanying infantry would follow up to
begin the gruelling work of actually clearing the enemy trenches before
consolidating the newly won positions.
The interwar years saw prolonged
and often heated debate on the role the tank would play in the next major
conflict. This largely centred on
the schism between those who saw the tank as the new arm of decision on the
battlefield and those who believed its mechanical limitations would restrict it
to nothing more than the infantry support role. The former argued that tanks should not be tied down to the
walking pace of the infantryman, but let loose to exploit through the gaps they
created and pour into the enemy’s lines of communication, assembly areas and
supply depots. Even among the
latter, little thought was given to refining and improving the tactics of twenty
years earlier, especially given the appearance of the anti-tank gun in many
infantry units.
Early war doctrine largely
called for tanks to lead the assault wave, with the objective of destroying
enemy strongpoints and machine gun nests that would target the following
infantry. They would then breach
the defensive line and begin to engage deeper lying positions.
The infantry would follow in their wake, sometimes with further
detachments of tanks ready to deal with any threats bypassed during the initial
assault. They would in turn use the
gaps created by the tanks to exploit through into the rear of the enemy lines
and overwhelm the defenders.
This seemingly simple concept
helped foster the belief that on the battlefield tanks and infantry would occupy
the same space, but would act independently of one another.
This sense of separation would have damaging consequences for both arms
well into the war. The idea that
tanks would lead, infantry would follow, ignored the fact that tanks were
acutely vulnerable in close country, unable to breach minefields unaided, and
were subject to the attentions of an ever-growing arsenal of anti-tank weapons.
In certain situations, infantry would need to take the leading role, not
tanks, something that seemed to fly in the face of logic as far as the average
rifleman was concerned.
For the infantryman the presence
of tanks could provide a steel curtain between his flesh and blood and the
machine gun fire directed his way. The
suggestion then that they should take the van was understandably not greeted
with much enthusiasm. The reality
was though that the most effective way to defeat a combined infantry and tank
assault was to separate the two, allowing concealed anti-tank guns and latterly
handheld launchers to pick off the tanks, clawing holes in the protective screen
they provided through which previously dormant machine guns could target the
infantry. Some of the tactics
taught by the allied armies even into 1944 practically guaranteed this division
between infantry and tanks would occur during assaults, requiring precious
little intervention from the Germans to achieve it.
Recognising when to switch from
tanks to infantry in the lead was perhaps the key to successful tank-infantry
cooperation, which required both good communications and familiarity between the
two. Here again though, there were
hurdles to overcome.
Communications covered a wide
range of matters; signalling intent from one party to another, passing on
intelligence gathered from local reconnaissance, requesting a variation to a
predetermined plan due to unexpected problems, or conversely recognising an
opportunity to exploit a perhaps fleeting weakness in the enemy’s
dispositions. But for an,
infantryman trying to talk to the crew of the tank he was knelt besides often
proved an exercise in futility. In
action, tankers would fight ‘buttoned up’, that is with their hatches firmly
shut, relying on vision slits and periscopes to observe the battlefield.
This meant that the very armour that protected them also isolated them
from the infantry outside.
A typical example of the problem
comes from an account by an American Ranger officer during the early days of the
Normandy campaign. His company was
pinned down by accurate artillery fire that he believed was being guided in by a
spotter in a nearby church tower, and his men had no weapons with which they
could engage it. A Sherman was in
the same area, mounting a 75mm main gun, a .50 cal heavy and two .30 cal light
machine guns, more than ample to deal with the problem.
Attempts to gain the attention of the crew went unanswered until, during
the middle of an artillery barrage, he was forced to stand up in front of the
tank and wave at them! He motioned towards the church and signalled his desire for
them to open fire, which after a short delay they did with most of the weapons
at their disposal. The German
shelling ceased thereafter.
Such extreme forms of
communication were in some cases the only means available, and familiar to those
in several armies. Radio
communications between tanks and infantry were patchy at best.
Battalion commanders would usually be able to link up with a supporting
tank company net, perhaps even rifle company commanders, but this opportunity
was not available for platoon leaders. A
series of scripted hand signals usually existed to convey simple messages from
infantry to tank crews, but these could never cover all eventualities and a
number of alternatives were developed, largely in the field.
One of the most important involved mounting a field telephone on the
outside of a tank, normally at the rear, and was used by the western allies.
This allowed an infantryman to speak with the tank commander and relay
details of the situation to him, without requiring either man to expose
themselves unnecessarily to enemy fire. Other
low-tech solutions saw infantry mark targets not visible to the tanks with smoke
or flares, or even tracer fire from machine guns.
Such solutions could only be
found where tank crews and infantrymen were able to discuss the problems they
faced. Yet the time to build the
necessary working relationship was often denied, not by the enemy but by their
own commanders. Infantry divisions
(aside from the short lived British Mixed Division) did not contain an organic
tank unit, the British, American and Red armies using independent tank or
armoured units. The theory behind
this was that the tanks could be assigned to whichever infantry formation
required them for specific operations, ensuring that this valuable commodity was
rarely idle. Of more consequence
though was that it meant that the understanding between tanks and infantry had
to be almost constantly rebuilt before every action.
That effective tank-infantry
tactics were devised is testament to the determination of the troops involved.
Their conclusions often flew in the face of perceived wisdom, and even
recent combat experience. For the
British and Americans particularly many lessons had been learned against Axis
forces in North Africa, but the doctrines developed did not transfer easily to
the claustrophobic terrain of Italy and Normandy.
The introduction in vast numbers of the Panzerfaust and Panzerschreck in
1944 also had a profound impact, the Red Army losing an increasing number of
tanks to these weapons as their armoured spearheads found the vast steppes
giving way to close country and the rubble choked streets of urban warfare.
The nature of the machines
supporting the infantry also evolved as the war progressed.
Both the British and Red armies fielded infantry tanks, the British
retaining faith in them throughout, the Russians forgoing the concept mid-war as
they adopted the German style assault gun.
They were extremely well armoured, the notable reduction in speed this
brought about being of no consequence as they were only intended to accompany
riflemen at walking pace. Ironically,
this seeming imperviousness to German fire lead to tanks such as the British
Matilda and Russian KV1 being pressed into use in an armoured breakthrough role,
a task they were never designed for. While
resistant to 3.7 cm and even 5 cm German anti-tank guns, neither machine could
withstand the 8.8 cm Flak, which was seeing increasing use in the ground role.
Uniquely, the Germans had no
equivalent to the allied independent tank units. German doctrine called for Panzers to be used only in their
own formations, with supporting infantry, engineers, artillery and
reconnaissance all motorised to enable them to keep pace with the tanks.
This concentration of armour served the Germans well during the opening
years of the war, allowing them to achieve local dominance against weak points,
even when the opposing forces enjoyed an overall numerical superiority in
armour. It also meant that if the
average German infantry division were to work with armoured support at all, it
would not be in the form of the Panzer but the StuG.
The Sturmgeschutz, or assault gun, was developed as a fire support
vehicle for motorised infantry units, but by 1944 it was fulfilling a multitude
of tasks. Unlike the Panzer, the StuG used a fixed forward firing
armament, not a turret mounted weapon, which had obvious disadvantages in
reaction times. Rather than aiming
the gun it was a matter of aiming the vehicle, placing an even greater burden on
the driver. In defensive operations
however, the StuG enjoyed a lower profile making it far easier to conceal than a
tank. Independent StuG units were
maintained for general support, and some infantry divisions also deployed a
company of such weapons in their Anti-tank Battalion.
Other armoured vehicles that
found themselves in the infantry support role were the US Army’s M10 and M18
tank destroyers. The theory behind
the ‘TD’ force proved to be a flawed one, and its battalions found
themselves parcelled out to support the infantry divisions, which had relatively
limited anti-tank capability. As is
often the way, the troops soon found themselves thinking of other ways to employ
these self-propelled artillery pieces. The
tank destroyer had not been designed with infantry support in mind, it was
poorly armoured and had an open topped turret rendering it vulnerable to shell
bursts. It did however mount a high
velocity 76 mm gun (90 mm on the later M36), which proved extremely effective
against strongpoints. It could not
lead an attack, but it could provide valuable fire support during one,
especially if working in concert with tanks.
The question of how many tanks
or tank units would be deployed to support a particular size of infantry
formation is a somewhat vexed one. In
1940, the British Expeditionary Force had just two Battalions of infantry tank
to support nine Divisions in France. By
late 1944, 21 Army Group had four independent armoured or tank Brigades to
support seven or eight Infantry Divisions.
Ideally, one Brigade would be assigned to a Division, allowing a single
Squadron to directly support each Infantry Battalion.
Where there was just a single tank battalion available to a division, as
was often the case with the US, one Company would probably have to provide
support for a full Infantry Regiment. In
both cases, rather than diluting the tanks further, the preferred option was to
deploy a full tank company or squadron in support of a leading rifle company.
The British and French had tried the ‘penny packet’ system of using
individual tank platoons to support infantry units in 1940, where it had failed
miserably. In reality there was no
precise ratio of tank to infantry units; the availability of tanks, restrictions
imposed by terrain, and the particulars of the job in hand always having an
effect.
By their very nature, tanks did
not lend themselves to defensive operations.
For the infantry, defence usually required digging in, while for tanks
remaining stationary simply rendered them an easier target.
Doctrine usually called for tanks supporting infantry in defensive
actions to be retained as a mobile reserve, particularly in local
counterattacks. Despite this, it
was not uncommon for tanks to become bogged down in desperate defensive actions,
acting as little more than a pillbox. This
was especially true of the Germans, who increasingly relied on a handful of
tanks or assault guns operating from well camouflaged positions to ambush
advancing allied troops. One of the
more extreme accounts saw a Panzer IV ‘walled-up’ into the ground floor of a
building in Monte Cassino.
While there can be no doubting
the benefits of tank-infantry cooperation, the practice was not without its
drawbacks. Some argued that by
1944, the desire to hammer home the need for combined arms operations had
persuaded a generation of infantry commanders that they were unable to operate
without tank support. This did on
occasion lead to lost opportunities as infantry units found themselves waiting
for armour to catch up, rather than exploiting weaknesses in the enemy line
before they had an opportunity to regroup.
Equally, the need for tanks to wait for foot slogging infantry to support
them could rob armour of its ability to act as the cutting edge of an advance,
harking back to its old cavalry roots.
Of the many aspects of warfare, few underwent such extreme transition as tank-infantry cooperation during the Second World War. The tactics of such operations underwent continual refinement and reassessment as the war progressed, laying the foundations for the tank-infantry teams of today’s armies, which have become a fundamental part of ground war.
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