Franz Bäke

Unfortunately that kind of writing is all too common and not limited to histories of German soldiers or units.

Here's my take so far.

* Bäke was a competent armored commander and I would go so far as to assume that he was very good at the echelons of regiment and below.

* His personal courage was exemplary.

* Probably because of his ability to successfully command small units (and maybe he was charismatic as well), he rose rapidly through the officer ranks.

* Units he commanded fought very well, and probably extremely well, in at least two occasions on the eastern front, even if the total kill claims may be exaggerated as many kill claims are.

* Like other eastern front veterans, he discovered too late that fighting the Allies in the west required quite different tactics. Hard to evaluate the rest of his career in the west other than that a different source (Stoves' Die gepanzerten und motorisierten deutschen Grossverbände 1935-1945) makes the claim that the 106. Pz Brigade "destroyed a U.S. tank battalion" (26 tanks and eight armored cars -- sounds more like a U.S. mech cavalry or mixed TF to me) near Oberkorn-Dippach. I'll have to see if I can find other verification of this, I've never even heard of this as a battle. He commanded the 106th Panzer Brigade from 13 July 1944 to 12 Jan 1945. I know that after it got whacked at Aumetz, it was moved south to near Belfort and subsequently spent time supporting both the 1st and 19th Armies. Stoves' book also mentions the brigade shooting 13 Shermans in November near Barr and a further 35 Allied tanks between November 28-30 north of Selestat, of which 7 are credited to a certain Corporal Fink using Panzerfaust AT rockets. Interestingly, Bäke left command about 10 days after the Nordwind counter-offensive started.

* How much all this distinguishes him from other German Panzer officers is unclear, although there can't have been that many with the Knight's Cross w/Oakleaves and Swords as an award. I consider it possible, given the example noted by Wolfy above, that his current notability may in part be due to authors cherry-picking certain aspects of his career while ignoring others like the events at Aumetz.

Cheers

BW

 

Whatever happened in the Oberkorn-Dippach area of Luxembourg is obscure. This area is SW of Luxembourg city and the action reported happened sometime between 7 and 11 September 1944. As far as I can tell, the U.S. major unit advancing in this area was (on edit: U.S. 5th Armored Division). Has anyone else heard of this action?

A curious aspect of this report is that the Aumetz battle occurred on 8 September. So, Bäke's brigade either fought the Oberkorn action just before that or right after -- the latter possibility seeming unlikely considering how badly the 106. Brigade got beaten at Aumetz. Problem is, I'm not sure U.S. forces had reached the Oberkorn area before 10-11 September. Something is odd about this information.

More selective writing at http://www.lexikon-der-wehrmacht.de/Gliederungen/PanzerBrig/PzBrig106.htm -- mentions the brigade going on the defensive near Briey on 7 September but no mention of what happened south of Aumetz the next day . . . biased history.

Cheers

BW

 

The Oberkorn - Dippach report does not square with the after-action report of the 5th Armored Division for 9 September (this report refers to the same geographical area, and was part of the 5th AD advance that liberated Luxembourg City the following day).

The AAR also claims that for the entire month of September, the 5th AD lost two M8 armored cars, six M5 light tanks, and eleven Sherman tanks, which indicates the information in Stoves' work is based on unverified claims of tank destruction. The 5th AD AAR for September can be read at After Action September 1944

Cheers

BW

 

Zaloga had this to say in Lorraine 1944: Patton vs. Manteuffel:

And according to Zaloga "the attack (on the 90th Division) was ordered for the night of 6 September, but was delayed by the late arrival of the 59th Inf. Rgt.", so it seems impossible they could have fought elsewhere the day prior to Mairy.

 

Not necessarily due to bad leadership. A lot of "fresh" German units in 1944 had limited training and lacked experience as a lot of the older commanders had been killed off. I would also say that they may not have been as fully equipped as they should have been and were certainly lacking the air support. I dont know details of the engagement, but I the terrain looked to favoured the American defence against the German counter-attack. It was not Panzer country where line of sight of greater distances gave the advantage to the Germans like in the East. That is not to say the US had it easy, because it would have still been a very hard fight.

 

Well, I don't want to beat a dead horse here, but I think this all does speak to poor leadership in this instance, accompanied by the other mitigating factors. I think it underscores that Bäke failed to appreciate the terrain he was fighting in, let alone the capabilities of his Western foes.

Here is a quote that in part implicates the German lack of radio communications in their tanks:

However, my take is that Bäke split up his forces as he had done effectively in the East in the past. He did not take into account the hilly terrain, let alone the type of forces and weapons he was against. Once things began to go awry, their was no effective communications between the units and they became lambs taken to the slaughter.

Luck played a part for the American artillery, at least IMHO with regards to the 949th FA Bn's successful strike in Mairy. The portion of the 106th main column attempting to infiltrate the village was on a "sunken road" (my father referred to it as a valley). The lead tank was disabled by infantry with a bazooka, setting the trap. It just so happened that Lt. J. Russell Major, FO of Battery B of the 949th, was on the high ground and saw this unfold before his eyes, called in the coordinates and 5 Panthers and 20 half-tracks were knocked out by over 300 HE rounds from the 155mm Howitzers. Again, I think the Germans/Bäke failed to appreciate the terrain, setting themselves up for this debacle.

 

Doc, my guess at this point is that the remnants of the 106th Brigade retreated north after being defeated south of Aumetz; and then found their line of retreat being approached from the west by the 5th Armored Division. Thus the action between Bascharage and Luxembourg City.

There is a curious gap in the U.S. official histories here. The Siegfried Line Campaign should be the volume to cover this action, but it only mentions actions north of Luxembourg City, while The Lorraine Campaign covers actions south of the Luxembourg-France border, so the actions around Luxembourg City itself apparently are not addressed in the official histories.

Cheers

BW

 

I fear I may have wandered too far off topic already, but I did run across an opinion about just how ill-conceived the Panzer Brigades were from their inception. It makes a lot of sense to me and certainly paints a picture that apparently doomed any of their commanders. Panzer-Brigades in the West 1944

 

Good read. It really shows how bad these formations were against Allied divisions. No Artillery, engineers, repair/recovery services, or Armored Recon, just poorly trained tanks and armored halftrack infantry haphazardly attacking multi-armed Allied formations.

On the other hand, their makeup really reminds me of KG Peiper in the Ardennes offensive. His outfit was more well balanced because it did have artillery and engineers but it was excessively tank heavy, infantry light, and lacking in Armored recon.

His behavior in the Ardennes offensive also seems very "East Front" style. Attacking headfirst with Armor and Mounted infantry with all weapons blazing.

 

I'm sure they were using what had worked for them in the past, though I guess all of these discussions carry a proviso to the effect of the state of the Wehrmacht at the time.

Has there been much written about this difference between East and West front warfare for the Germans, a need to change tactics based on different foes, terrain, etc? I know the Western Allies had studied what happened in the East as they made their preparations for invading the Continent and had for an example over-estimated the amount of AAA they needed, unable to predict how devastated the LuftWaffe would be at that point. I really don't know if there was other Allied doctrine that was forged from these observations or if they simply came to the fight with a different style than the Russians, based on their own war college dogmas.

 

I'm not sure if it's an equal comparison. The Panzer divisions were still very effective in Normandy and were combined arms formations adequately equipped with armored recon, artillery, motorized infantry, and engineers, unlike the Panzer Brigades.

Peiper's KG was meant to advance with two reinforced motorized infantry regiments and an armored recon outfit but they got separated and he just attacked forward on his own..

I think, as far as the German experience went, fighting an Allied Infantry division was more akin to fighting an "tank lighter and infantry stronger" armored division since Allied infantry divisions were fully mobile and had two battalions of armor. Not only that, but Allied Artillery and Air support was just stellar.

Those Soviet Infantry divisions were weak, slow foot and horse drawn units with little or no Armor that could be splattered more easily by aggressive Armor and mounted infantry assault. They often were understrength, always more lightly equipped, and often had half the personnel enjoyed by an Allied infantry division.

 

BTW, I've asked the sole Luxembourger I know if he can track anything down about the "destroyed US tank battalion". He said he'd look in the local libraries for detail on the liberation of the city -- perhaps something will emerge.

Also -- found the liberation of Luxembourg City in the U.S. official history. It is at the very end of Blumenson's Breakout and Pursuit, but does not mention any of the fighting the 5th Armored Division recorded in its AAR.

Cheers

BW

 

Please let us know if anything turns up. I've been looking at some online AARs and Googling around and think there must be some error in the reported units involved, as I can't find any correlation for the dates, units and location either.

 

Some more on the action in front of Luxembourg City:

Doesn't sound anything like the description in Stoves' work. This description is from Paths of Armor, the history of the division written immediately after the war. It can be seen online at http://www.5ad.org/Paths_of_Armor.html#All

Cheers

BW

 

Normally one battalion of tanks supported a U.S. infantry division. Until late in the campaign, towed 3-inch guns were as often the equipment of an attached TD battalion as self-propelled TD's. Sometimes, infantry divisions had only one of the assets attached or neither. The British Army operated differently. They had army tank brigades of three battalions that were used in support of their infantry divisions. The TD mission was performed by corps and division antitank regiments, of which about half the equipment was self-propelled. The French infantry divisions normally had a TD battalion (M10's) attached from army assets but the French did not have independent tank battalions in support of their infantry divisions like the U.S. did.

Also, "fully mobile" is not really accurate. Diverting trucks from other intended uses, a U.S. infantry division could fully motorize one regiment. The infantry in all Allied infantry divisions were expected to walk, although they had trucks to carry and tow their heavier equipment. A few French mountain infantry units used horses and mules, but that was by design and not necessity.

Cheers

BW

 

US infantry need quartermaster trucks (several companies?) to become fully mobile. In breakout operations, trucks would be attached the assault & exploitation Corps to fully motorize its infantry division(s), even though, as a rule, the American infantrymen's heavy weapons were motorized and that was a big factor in their effectiveness in defensive actions. Towed tank destroyer battalions outnumbered the SP ones even in Dec. 44, if memory serves. It was the lesson of the Ardennes that convinced the army to convert as many towed TD battalions to self-propelled TD Bn. as possible.

Bäke was in a tough spot really. The mentality and the well honed shock tactics that served the Wehrmacht so well in the East simply was not applicable. Apparently they believed that a panzer brigade could hit exploiting Red Army infantry so hard that it would be virtually unstoppable, and von Manteuffel, after a scathing review on the unsuitability and poor combat power of the pz. bde. at the Western Front, expressed confidence that this type of unit would be useful in the East.

Bäke's formation, again from my prematurely aged memory, was the kind of panzer formation typical of the new panzer brigades; it was full of troops that that been recently combed out or drafted with a sprinkling of Eastern Front veterans. This in its worst form combined the battle fatigue or arrogance of over-hardened troops with the inexperience and fragility of new recruits. They also had the misfortune of acting on bad intellegence. The 90th Infantry Division's performance in Normandy was downright uninspired, and two generals lost their jobs commanding the division. Unfortunately for the 106th Pz. Bde., the replacement, McLain, is an officer of undisputed drive and skill. It was basically a standard encounter for the 90th ID from what I have recalled; the rifle line was bent, the infantrymen called artillery strikes on target, and counterattacked. The choice of ground really wasn't Bäke's fault exactly if I understand the operational situation correctly: Patton's Third Army, so it would look to the Germans, was poised to blast its into Germany proper before the Metz line could be manned. The Seventh Army opposite to Patton was the strongest German army in NW Europe at that point and to stop Patton was so vital that the destruction of a Pz. Bde. in a hasty attack was probably viewed as a necessary price to deny the Third Army momentum.

Nor was pushing tanks and mounted infantry ahead in a frontal assault with all weapons firing a uniquely German practice. Patton thought the solution to the bocage stalemate was to push two columns of armor and fire the artillery over the lead tanks with airbursts; that was in effect what Collins did. This was also the tactic that made the 2d, 4th and 6th AD such fabulous units--firing on the move, attack attack attack. The difference of course was that the Americans had artillery and air superiority well covered.

 

Okay, the gentleman from Luxembourg that I contacted, who goes by the handle "Caranorn" on the internet, checked out the battle before Luxembourg City and had this to say about the battle and that of Aumetz between the 106. Panzer Brigade and the U.S. 90th Infantry Division.

It goes without saying that I am both humbled and touched by his willingness to go and research a battle because of a request that came out of the blue from the internet from someone who is essentially a stranger. A hearty THANKS! to Caranorn for contributing a Luxembourger's view and knowledge to this thread.
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Caranorn's comments on the action in front of Luxembourg City:

Caranorn's comments on the Aumetz action:

 

Thanks to both of you for that information. This still seems somewhat confusing to me that the 106. was engaged with the 90th Inf. in AuMetz on the night of the 7th, decimated the day of the 8th and then was engaged with the 5th Armored in Luxembourg on the 8th? Was this like a reserve of the 106. or what was left of them when they limped back?

 

Doc, my guess is that it was remnants of the 106. -- the action near Dippach took place on the 9th, not the 8th. They were probably withdrawing when the U.S. thrust into Luxembourg approached their withdrawal route from the west.

Cheers

BW

 

That makes sense. Yes, I see now you/he had indicated 9 Sep in the post. Thanks, again!