• jagged_circle@feddit.nl
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    2 months ago

    Wasn’t Blitzkrieg like a brilliant strategy at the time that devastated their opponents?

    • mkwt@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      Blitzkrieg was like the American football play of the same name. If you don’t win real fast, you tend to find out that your motorized units are beyond reach of your supply lines. Then they get cut off, and the whole thing can collapse rapidly.

      The Ardennes offensive was pulled off in 72 hours by using the powers of methamphetamine. Seriously, the German army issued a lot of meth to the troops. Imagine what would happen to the combat effectiveness if they had to keep fighting at that pace for a while.

      • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
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        2 months ago

        Yeah it hasn’t really seen use since because it relies a bit on surprise and can’t handle an opponent that knows how to counter it and is prepared to do so. You buy yourself time. All the time you can. And while you’re doing that you attack their supply lines. They’re sprinting, make the fight a marathon.

        Part of why the blitz worked was that it went against all understood military doctrine. It is both literally and metaphorically the fighting strategy of a meth addict.