Come October1944 there were no infantry units left in Cheshire at all and in case of German prison riot/ breakout the back up was to be provided by the Chester Machine Gun Training Centre.
I think this raises some questions about British wartime strategy. The British pushed the Americans to adopt a "Germany First" Strategy. But in 1944 the British did not supply the manpower to fully man 21st Army group, disbanded formations after the first act and demanded American support to sustain their campaign. All the while the worlds largest volunteer army sat in India, mainly maintaining order and the Fourteenth army fought a gallant campaign in what was ultimately a minor sideshow. Churchill was busy planning fanciful campaigns to seize Sumatra and recapture Malaya. Americans might reasonably consider that they had been shortchanged, left with a disproportionate share of the fighting and casualties. From a military manpower point of view Britain was not a small island with a population of tens of millions, but ruled an empire of some 300 million. The French drew on its African colonies in both world wars. The British could have done the same, drawing on the West indies or even the Indian subcontinent as well. The key shortfall in 1944 was in infantrymen, who did not need high levels of technical training that hampered efforts to mechanise the Indian Army. Africans and Asians proved themselves to be very good infantrymen. There was no real reason why the BLA of 1944 could not have included, say a colonial infantry corps or even an imperial battalion in each brigade.
The manpower of the Empire could have done so much more. Indeed, it was willing to do so. Whenever, the recruiters went out looking for volunteers in Africa for front line units or as pioneers (labourers) the response was greater than need and people were turned away. I suspect it was the same elsewhere. We know India managed to persuade a few to sign up too. The strategy in London was to use as few as possible and to geographically limit their operational opportunities. The reasons for that are numerous, complex and, perhaps, not always entirely honourable. But, as history evidences, it was a strategy that didn't usher in an unnecessary defeat. One interesting snippet of historical data is that, in September 1944, the Royal Artilery had more men in uniform than all the line infantry regiments combined. A shortage in one capbadge is not necessarily proof of a shortage in manpower.
The AA Arm was seen as a reserve of manpower. Light AA units were combed through to supply individual reinforcements. Twenty battalions of infantry had been converted to Light AA in 1942 to form the divisional Light AA Regiments. Whole units were also deployed in an infantry or other combat role. One AA Brigade in Italy seems to have been used to hold the line with Light AA as infantry and Heavy AA as its field artillery. Some Anti tank units ended up in 1945 as a motorised infantry/ SP gun battlegroup. The German V1 offensive kept a lot more men in AA Command in 1944.
American historian Jim Sheehan once said military history is the story of cruel disappointments and tragic irony. What exactly did the Burma campaign achieve?
Indeed. The reroling of RA into infantry during the latter stages of the war was commonplace. It was a reversal of what had gone on before. Pre-war, a large proportion of the Yeomanry cavalry was reroled into RA, as well as numerous territorial infantry battalions into anti-aircraft duties or RTR. As you point out, that latter trend continued into the war too as yet more infantry battalions moved into RA or RAC. The point being that there had been a significant shift in the balance of manpower within the army. A deliberate shift based upon assumptions of what was needed and where. By the latter half of 1944 that had produced an army with more RA than INF. A balance which turned out not to be optimal. I don't believe there was a manpower 'crisis' in 1944 as some (historians and commentators) would have us believe. There was a shortage of INF bodies against the ORBAT as a consequence of previous choices and decisions made. No crisis, just a rebalancing of bodies in roles.
It was a reflection of three things 1. The great expansion of anti aircraft and anti tank artillery in response to the part played by Germans aircraft and tanks in their conquest of mainland Europe. In some countries other services picked up these roles. In Germany the AA arm was split between the army and air force and anti-tank troops were part of the "schnelltruppen". The USA created a separate tank destroyer arm. In Britain these were the province of the Royal Artillery. 2. The British chose to make war with steel not flesh in a desire to avoid the bloody attrition of the Great War. By 1943 there was a high proportion of armour and artillery compared to other armies. One concept was for SOE to set Europe ablaze and recruit infantry from the resistards.. By 1945 there were significant French and Italian forces in the field. 3. Casualties in the Normandy campaign were much higher than anticipated. From the British government, and public's point of view it may not have been a bad thing. After Normandy the Americans were always going to be in the dominant partner in the alliance. Suppose enough infantrymen had been available to maintain the 50th and 59th Divisions. Would it have made any difference to the outcome of the war or Britain's role in it? The British were reserving forces to stake their claims in reclaiming colonies in the Far East. Alanbrooke's diaries document countless debates at COS level about the Middle East, Asia and the Pacific in mid to late 1944. It may have been convenient to show cupboards empty at this point.
This was Mel’s opening post and I noted the comment about the soldier being blind in one eye, being an issue. I have also noted the comments about the numbers of troops available to the USA compared to poor old Blighty. The father of one of my American friends served in NW Europe in very late 1944 and 1945. When the USA entered the war, like his friends, he tried to enlist but was refused because he was blind in his right eye. He didn’t look blind, but blind he was. He regularly tried to enlist and each time he was refused. Eventually, the recruiters were not so fussy as they needed manpower and it was difficult to find, so he tried again in a different town, didn’t mention he was blind in one eye and passed his medical; the Doctor taking one look at this big athletic looking guy and telling him he was in without actually giving him a medical examination. In basic training, he taught himself to shoot left handed and was his sections BAR man. He got to NW Europe fighting with the US/Free French forces in the Colmar pocket. He was in the US 75th Infantry Division. Being blind in one eye didn’t hold him back. He was promoted in the field to Sergeant and was awarded the Bronze Star. Although wounded early in a critical action, he stayed in the field, rallied his men, getting them onto and consolidating their objective in very difficult circumstances. So what about him being blind in one eye. He did his job and he did it very well. We Brits had plenty manpower, just some of it never volunteered and was never called-up (one of my grandfathers fits into this category and he was fit, healthy and perfectly capable - reserved occupation), or the armed forces were too fussy. One of my great grandfathers was badly wounded twice in WWI, but still found his way to the front for a third time at the age of 36. It is certain that in late 1944 the manpower we Brits needed wasn’t in the right place at the right time, but it could and should have been.
I don't disagree with what you write. On many occasions I have severely criticised, and will continue to, the choices, decision-making and effort of the British Army. Criticism which I believe is well deserved. This is not the case here. Predicting the best balance of arms needed is an imperfect science at the best of times and a constantly moving target. Having more bodies in RA than INF at a certain point in time is evidence of expectation not error. The choice to not fully mobilize the manpower and economic potential of the Colonies and India indicates London was working to an even grander strategy than the defeat of Nazism. It was a choice that could have gone horribly wrong, but it didn't. In the latter part of 1944, the British Army found itself short of infantry replacements to keep its infantry units constantly up to establishment. An ideal that is practical impossible for all armies whilst in combat. Nevertheless, that fact has repeatedly been spun as a 'manpower crisis' by ignorant or mendacious authors and/or commentators to push a/their given agenda.
I think you will find that the US Army had exactly the same problem, a shortage of trained riflemen. Patton was absolutely fulminating on the issue. The US trained men for a purpose like the British and simply did not get the ratios right so 'repple depples' replacement depots in Britain were full of AA gunners cooks engineers and other less ravaged elements of the army, but not infantrymen. In the end they had to do exactly what we did, and convert these others into infantrymen. Just like the British the US lost so many infantrymen in the rural fighting of Normandy, but broke the back of the German defence, but both hit the next problems in eastern France when the weather and the terrain combined. US divisions had nearly as many men with frostbite and trench foot as there were casualties from battlefield weapons. And who were those non combat casualties? Largely infantry divisions with men in freezing trenches wet boots and socks who could not change because supplies were not getting through (despite Patton, for instance, making this a priority). The western Allies got the balance wrong and hit more weather related casualties that they may not have computed as winter 1944 was a bit more spicy. Mind you, many winters during WW2 and the 1940s were pretty bad at time. .
The reality is that the Allies under-estimated the intensity of fighting in Normandy which caused a temporary contraction in their fighting power. By March 1945 there was enough Allied infantry to win the war. There is a persistent idea that WW2 could have been ended in 1944 if only X Y or Z had happened. This might be a chimera. Even after the German collapse in France and Belgium the 35 divisions ashore were never going to be enough to subdue the whole might of Germany, which could call on around 200 divisions. Nor did the allies have the logistic capacity to advance to the Ruhr or beyond on any scale. The aim of Op Overlord was to establish a lodgement on the continent of Europe into which a force of around 100 divisions, with its logistic support could be assembled to defeat the German armed forces. The allied 1944 summer offensive ran out of steam the same way the German and Red army offensives. The Nazi regime intended to avoid the Durchstoss of 1918 and eliminated any potential opposition. There was little alternative to faith in the Fuhrer. The third Reich Nazi was much less likely to collapse in 1944 like the Kaiser's Army did in 1918. Indeed the Germans carried on fighting to the very end. The intensity of combat in Normandy was unexpected, but probably was a result of German determination to fight for every metre. Allied planners had expected that the Germans would trade space for casualties resulting in a D+90 line along the Loire and Seine. Instead there German fought a ferocious battle of attrition in Normandy. This resulted in higher allied casualties than expected - and defeat in detail of the Germans in Normandy.
I think everyone could agree that there was a manpower problem and in theatres like Italy there were none to be had, which was fundamentally why units like 1st Infantry Division retired to Palestine to train up recruits to return to Italy if the war was to carry on. Even then they found that they were getting men who were not only inexperienced but unfit for the terrain in which they were expected to fight. After the war was over the Regular Regiments had difficulty finding fresh fit recruits to fill the vacancies in the Regular Battalions, spending much time trying to persuade the experienced TA men due to return home to enlist as regulars. (ref: Ubique by A M Cheetham 2nd Field Regt RA.) At the start of the war many TA Regiments formed second line Regiments partly as there were too many inexperienced recruits, partly as there was a shortage of equipment to arm them and partly as they were not Class A fit for immediate combat. By June 1944 they were running short of men trained in these units having replaced combat casualties and were faced with using semi fit personnel in second line support units who if nothing else required fitness training and motivation. This was not new as a similar situation arose in 1918 where wounded men were requested to re-enlist for active service.
I have seen/heard the so-called "manpower crisis" in the British Army late 1944 deployed to "prove": 1) the SS were such brilliant soldiers a handful of their divisions where a gnat's whisker from defeating the (entire) British Army in Normandy; 2) the Germans were a hair's breadth away from turning Overlord into a defeat in detail; 3) Perfidious Albion tricked the US into 'Germany First' and Overlord; 4) the British were completely useless and a waste of rations compared to the Americans; and so on.... "Manpower crisis" clearly has a better ring and sounds a more convincing argument than "mundane regrouping of formations" or "mundane rebalancing of capbadges", doesn't it? Some official stats to ponder: Total manpower British Army June 1944 = 2,742,000 Total manpower British Army September 1944 = 2,757,000 Total manpower British Army June 1945 = 2,931,000 Crisis? Temporary shortage at a given point in time in one strand of the army due to ongoing operations is hardly a crisis.
Britain in WW2 was pretty much fully mobilised - man- (and women) power. Industrial warfare called on skilled people running the economy as well as fighting in the army. If your grandfather had not been carrying out work deemed essential he could have been conscripted where needed. Britain also chose to commit a substantial proportion of its population to waging a strategic bombing offensive. One figure that sticks in the mind is around one million people engaged in building maintaining and flying just one type of aircraft - the Lancaster Bomber.
Indeed. The mobilization of Britain's adults for the war effort was a far grander effort than simply taking all the men over 18 and issuing them a uniform and a rifle. From the very beginning, careful planning was conducted to divvy up bodies into the various roles needed and special attention was given to not taking workers in particular industries or with specific skills out of their jobs. Very precise calculations were made on the allocation of labour not just between civilian or military, but which exact industry labour would be allocated. Throughout the war the armed services as a whole knew the upper limit of bodies they would receive/be allocated, and how they would be divvied up between the three. Moreover, they also were aware of the split required between various theatres. From those general limits it was the Army leadership who decided how many bodies to filter into which capbadges and which roles. It was the Army leadership who decided how to populate a unit (ie how many bodies doing which role) and which units populated a division and so on. All of that was based upon assumption of how the fighting may turn out. If you think the Luftwaffe is going to put up a real fight, you allocate alot of chaps to AA. When the Luftwaffe fails to show up, you have alot of idle gunners. If you expect the German strategy in France is to buy time by conceeding territory, you assume a steady flow of infantry reinforcements. If the Germans decide to front load their effort the leg it after failure, the steady flow becomes an immediate draining of the reserve pool. And so on.
