The best general of the eastern front?

For as I know,Blaskowitz never was engaged on the East front.

 

LJ I believe you're right - my bad - I had his Czech/Austrian service listed as late war for some reason rather than 1939

 

Cheers Nigel, and those are good choices. I forgot about them. And you just got repped for them. Another ill add to the growing list (pardon the pun) is General der Kav soon to be GFM, Ewald von Kleist I have a great PK press pic of him in his command Pz.Spahwagon. Hes with an Artillery Major and an NCO. These guys are definately on the Eastern Front ;-))

 

Of course Paulus wasn't a 'von' since his family was not an aristocratic one.
Then why everyone calls him von Paulus? What is the reason for this?.....
I have read that this is because every person who takes the title Generalfeldmarschall in the German Army automatically takes also the title 'von'. Then maybe the "von" Paulus is correct!

 

Hi P/ nope thats not the case/ Look at Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel. Was he not a GFM? and he didnt automatically get a "von" added to his good name ;-))

"Smiling" Albert Kesselring is another I can think of who was a GFM in WWII and did not have the "von" added or given to his name.

A LOT of people mistakenly call him "von" Paulus due to mistakes and or wrongful ASSumptions that Authors and other historians have made for decades and never too the time to bother checking the true facts, but thankfully, that's FINALLY starting to change thanks to the efforts of good authors and historians.

 

there is also the fact that untill november 1918,there was NO German army,but a Prussian one,a Bavarian army,etc.
The list of FM is well known,but ,nevertheless:
A) the aristocratic ones all with von)
Blomberg
Bock
Brauchitz
Kleist
Kluge (from a very recently ennobled family:his father was an ennobled general)
Kuchler
Manstein (real name :Lewinsky,not to be confused with Clinton's one)
Reichenau
Rundstedt
Weichs
Witzleben
Richthoven
B) the special ones
Leeb and Greim :both were non noble Bavarian officers,who received the order of Max Jozef (the members are available on the Web) ,all members of the M-J order received automatically a non hereditary knighthood:thus Ritter von Leeb and Ritter von Greim.
C) the non aristocratic ones:
Busch
Keitel
List
Model
Paulus (from what I have read,his father worked on the railroad)
Rommel
Schoerner
Kesselring
Sperrle
Milch
+both Grand Admirals

 

other well known (?) knights of MJ:
General Oberst Eugen Schobert redecessor of Manstein as commander of 11th Army (died in an air crash)
General of Infantry Franz Epp :governor of Bavaria
General of the Panzertruppe Bruno Hauenschildt
General of the Gebirgstruppe Georg Hengl
General of the Panzertruppe Dr (to forget one's Doctors Title is a cardinal sin in Germany)Alfred Hubicki
General der Artillery (posthumously) Hermann Speck (KIA in France 15 june 1940)
General der Panzertruppe Wilhelm Thoma:commanding the AK,POW at Alamein
General der Panzertruppe Gustav VaerstOW in NA on 9 may 1943

 

Fr. Paulus was married an aristocratic lady. If i remember well it was a lady from Romania who her family had Byzantine (Eastern Roman Empire) origin. Maybe the 'von' is relative to his marriage.

 

The only top nazi who called himself "von" and others did not was Ribbentrop, I recall...

 

No,his wive became at her marriage simply mrs Paulus and lost her noble status .
Besides,the"von" was simply indicating that one belonged to a noble family.
A female"commoner" was ennobled when she married an aristocratic man,but a male"commoner" could not become ennobled by marrying an aristocratic woman .
If William of Wales is made duke of Cambridge at his marriage,Kate Middleton will become duchess.

 

thanks Carl - actually Blaskowitz wasn't the best choice to make the point I failed completely to make - my point was more that 'Best' means nothing - you could say that the most Gentlemanly general who had military success in the East was Blaskovitz (if you count Poland39 as eastern front). you could also say the best performance with the least resources against the greatest opposition was Mannerheim in Finland 39, if you count that. You could say that the General who saved the most lives was Heinrici - disobeying Hitler and trying to get as many soldiers and civilians to the West as possible instead of defending Berlin. You could say Zhuikov or Manstein commanded the highest formations respectively, and Manstein did better with less but lost. You could say Leeb in 1940 along the French Border was magnificent but in AG North on the eastern front was useless. perhaps the 'best general of the war was Giovanni Messe - he did more than expected in North Africa with less than needed for longer than expected without pissing anyone off, but he didn't fight in the east (edit: yes he did, apparently with some distinction, sorry, so he might well be considered).

and look at the Romanian and Hungarian commanders in 44/45 (sorry no names at moment) - they all had had their armies destroyed complete around 3 or 4 times in as many years, yet they slowed several mammoth soviet pushes for longer than they needed to with dwindling home support and no reserves...

What does anyone mean by the 'best' general? the best generals in Russia have always been generals January and February....

 

Soviet Konstantin Rokossovskiy, German Karl Rudolf Gerd von Rundstedt and my personal favorite Finnish Aaro Olavi Pajari
Romanian Constantin Constantinescu-Claps, Hungarian Gusztáv Vitéz Jány

 

Friedrich Wilhelm Ernst Paulus was also a great German commander.

 

thanks Eirk for adding names

 

Hello Spartan,

The above (IMO) would depend on what time frame we are speaking off. There were no Soviet Generals who had more to work with than the their counterparts in 41-42. What Zhukov accomplished at Leningrad and Moscow alone was simply remarkable and lets not forget Stalingrad.....

 

Hi Slonik - ur absolutely right in specific locations and operations, and we do tend to see defensive and retreating generals as less successful than their counterparts regardless of their skill in adversity.

If you are trying to pin down the most magnificent single, one-off piece of generalship, winning or losing side, regardless of advantages or disadvantages and forces at the general's disposal, then we all have our favourites. If you further combine that with the General in question's overall record, the way he was viewed by his leaders, his people, his soldiers and his enemies, and the absolute change of certain outcomes as a direct result of his being there instead of another general, then it is hard to choose, especially in the East where so many great generals failed despite their skill.

If a text book was written for future generals by any of the candidates, whose would be the best? and does that matter?

Several have mentioned Paulus - he is an interesting candidate perhaps - he had no experience above battalion level, took over an army, held a city for months with next to no supply and then knew when to quit. But I would never choose him myself, as I believe anyone could have taken his post without significantly changing events.

Zhuikov had the ability to make Stalin listen, as Manstein did with Hitler, so they were both certainly great men and very skilled, but they weren't necessarily the architects of the best pieces of military artwork or it's practice.

Mannerheim managed to get a higher percentage of his population of both sexes voluntarily engaged in fighting the enemy than even the japanese could have hoped for in the home islands with conscription, but his military successes were more due to Russian tactical incompetence and terrain advantages than any major generalship on his part.

Gariboldi perhaps should be considered - he was largely considered hopeless but nice, was given an army that didn't want to fight and hadn't the equipment to do so, and he still was able to get them to drive East nearly 1000 miles and then be destroyed almost completely without running away. That's (albeit a simplification) pretty good if you weren't one of them.

I still don't know what my answer should be, so I still prefer to go with those I believe I might have liked in command of me if I lived then and had a choice.

what's the 'best'?

 

Back to Fr. Paulus, the other students in the military school called him 'der Lord' because he took care too much his appearance (good manors, shinning shoes, ironned uniform etc.
Back to our thread I believe the best Russian general was G. Zhukov. I considered his whole career and performance. I think he was brilliant and talented. He has the strategic thought and also he was good in tactic. I think from the beginning of Barbarossa he proved his military merit till the end. In brief i will mentioned the defence in Smolensk, the defence in Leningrad, the defence and counterattack in Moscow. Those times the things were too difficult for the Red Army and he took over some hopeless missions and he accomplished everything with the best way. Needless to mention his performance in attack and in strategic plans later when the Russians took the control in the war.
Another Soviet General whom I respect his memory more than others is Cherniakhovskii. I think he was also talented and brilliant, more than the others. He was the one who placed Chuikov at Stalingrad.
About the Germans, I believe the best General was G. Heinrici. From East to the West his performance was excellent. I think he won all the battles he took part.
About his personality I will just mention that he refused to become a member of the Nazi party, he married a half-Jew wife, he refused to destroy/burn Smolensk during the retreat of his troops and he refused face to face to obey to General Jodl, to shoot his soldiers who showed low moral.

Karl Mauss also is another German General I could also recommend. Imagine that when he was 17 he took the Iron Cross 2nd class and when he was 18 the iron Cross 1st class (during WWI). Very brave man. The Soviet Military Inteligence gave special report to the soviet troops when they faced him opposite. They said ‘Attention, Mauss’. He received Knight's Cross with Oakleaves, Swords, and Diamonds!!
The third person I thought was ‘smiling Albert’, (also Knight's Cross with Oakleaves, Swords, and Diamonds) not only because of his performance in Luftwaffe but for the amazing defense in Italy also.
I think that the results of the action of a General are very important more than the fame or the aristocratic origin. Especially between the Germans there were many very good and gifted generals. It was really difficult to make a choice and maybe not fair. But after all the threads is an opportunity for discussion.

 

Damn Philosopher!

 

Konstantin Rokossovskiy
During Stalin's Purge while being interrogated he lost nine teeth, had three ribs cracked and had his toes smashed with a hammer also enduring mock shootings.
June 1941 Rokossovsky was serving as the commander of the 9th Mechanized Corps, where his command participated in the Battle of Dubno. He delayed Von Rundstedt's push into the Ukraine. His disobeying Zhukov's orders and saving his entire corps from being wasted by Zhukov's incompetency. He was given the unenviable task of cobbling together the remnants of D.G. Pavlov's Western Front, which had collapsed under the weight of the attack by the Army Group Center during the Battle of Bialystok-Minsk. With a limited force of 90 tanks and two rifle regiments, four artillery regiments and elements of the 38th Rifle Division he is credited with blunting the advance of FM von Bock at Vyazma and allowing numerous Soviet soldiers to escape encirclement. He kept many Soviet soldiers alive that Zhukov would have wasted, that would later be used to break the German Army.
This is just a little of how Rokossovsky served the Soviet Union
Zhukov killed more Soviets than the Germans!

 

Reading the above im not sure you fully appreciate of what was occuring on the Eastern Front. All forms of communication between the fronts and STAVKA had all but ceased to exist. The fact that the German advance was so rapid did not make it easier for the Soviet leaders to grasp what was happening; therefore, much info which the Soviet leaders were receiving and later orders which they were giving out were outdated. Confussion was rampant. You would be very hard pressed convincing any educated Eastern Front enthusiast let alone a historian that Zhukov was incompetent. Unlike Zhukov, Rokossovsky knew exactly what was occuring in front of him. It must also be mentioned that Rjabyshev unlike Rokossovsky listened to Zhukov and attacked with his 8th mechanized corps causing not only a delay but also heavy casualites to the 11th panzer division. Deep behind enemy lines and with no support (lack of Rokossovsky) the 8th mechanized corps was eventually surrounded and destroyed....

To claim that Zhukov did not care about his men and simply threw them into German panzers is a myth.

To claim that Zhukov killed more of his men than the Germans is just young.