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Post by quincannon on May 3, 2015 14:53:01 GMT -6
There is only one type of strength figure that matters, that being your present for duty strength when the shooting starts.
Of those strengths we refer to, the Required Strength is the number of personnel necessary for a unit to be completely capable of performing its "designed for" mission in time of war. The Authorized Strength is the number of personnel Congress will fund, and in peacetime it is rare that this number and required strength are the same. As Fred has pointed out with his post, the "assigned" strength matters little. It is the present for duty strength that matters.
The reason that this is important from my point of view is if the authorized strength is below acceptable standards, then your assigned and present for duty strengths, which you expect to be lower as a given, goes far below what can reasonably be expected of any unit to perform in combat. If you start out trying to organize on the cheap, as we see here with the authorized strength of 1876, then all you are going to get is war on the cheap, which said another way means needless expenditure of life, where no lasting positive result can be obtained.
How does this relate. Reno with three full companies could have made a difference. Benteen with three full companies could have made a difference. Keogh with three full companies could have made a difference. Yates with two full companies could have made a difference. That's how it relates, because the things they tried with less than half strength just might have been pulled off if those units were at or very near full. The tactical manuals assume full strength or very near it when they outline the bag of tricks.
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Post by Beth on May 3, 2015 15:14:17 GMT -6
I know that the 7th traveled with farriers but what about vets? VET SURG Carl A. Stein—b. Germany. Left at Powder River camp. Joined regiment in March 1876, resigned September 1, 1876. Studied vet medicine at Military Vet. School, Berlin. Served in 1st Prussian Dragoons Regiment. Appointed to 7th Cavalry on July 7, 1875. As noted, Stein was the regimental vet and he was left behind at the Powder River Depot. Any horses beyond that were deemed expendable I guess. Best wishes, Fred. Or Custer didn't want to have the vet nagging him that the horses needed rest or attention. Beth
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Post by Beth on May 3, 2015 15:22:49 GMT -6
I look at the farrier as one who had a good back. I use to be able to take care of my own but prefer to spend the money rather than the time. In general the cavalry trooper depended upon his horse for transportation and taking care of your own horse seems important to me. I can imagine soring among the new pack mules but the horses had walked a long was from FAL and must have been taken care of to a reasonable degree. When we trapped black bears in the Grahams we would occasionally sore up a horse due to the up and downs of the mountain. That horse would be taken out of service. If that was your only horse than you should do everything possible to keep from being on foot. Regards AZ Ranger Aren't horses more prone to sores as they lose weight and the saddles no longer fit the same? I believe that the 7th did the best they could for their horses (not to sure on the mules) but horses require a lot of forage to stay at their best and I believe they didn't care enough with them nor. because of Custer's long rides, were they given enough time to be out from under their saddles and graze one whatever the could find available--not that that would replace good oats and hay. Beth
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Post by mac on May 4, 2015 3:04:57 GMT -6
The notion of the German army as technologically superior is, as Ian has shown, false. At the top end great...the rest.. ordinary and horse drawn. Not much blitzkreig in a horse! Don't be fooled, however. Their equipment was far better. Much of it, however, was rushed into battle too late, i. e., Mark V Panthers at Kursk... which a little later became the world's finest battle tank. The T-34 shocked them and that's when they began upgrading the main gun on their Mark IV's and when suddenly they realized the importance of their 88mm gun. Part of Halder's issue with outstripping the main advance was precisely that: how do you supply units that have been too successful? Best wishes, Fred. Just to finish the thought. The German stuff was,and is still today, beautifully engineered which adds up to slow build time. Russia could knock out T34's,which were terrific, much much faster. Cheers
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Post by Yan Taylor on May 4, 2015 3:57:26 GMT -6
Mac here is what the German’s thought of the T-34; linkHere are some totals on the losses accured in WW2; One source says that the Russians produced 58.000 T-34s (all models) during the whole of WW2 and ended the war with only 6000. The USA produced 51.000 M4 Sherman’s and at the end of the war there were 9.500 left (including the ones in allied service) Losses in tanks during WW2; Germany: production 30.000 (1935-45) losses in combat 26.000 (up to Dec 1944) Russia: production 108.000 (1935-45) losses in combat 86.000 The British lost 4.500 in France and 2000 in Italy during the period of 1944-45. Ian.
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Post by fred on May 4, 2015 5:32:59 GMT -6
Just to finish the thought. The German stuff was,and is still today, beautifully engineered which adds up to slow build time. Russia could knock out T34's,which were terrific... Russian equipment, then and now, was and is, garbage. Yes, it is effective garbage, but garbage nonetheless. Their planes, even during the Cold War, were still built using rivets, long after the West went to more sophisticated ways of manufacturing. You see the difference in the Kalashnikovs, their planes, their tanks, and their ships. Sure, the stuff can still kill you, but I would still prefer to ride in a tank I know will get me somewhere than in something that is essentially a possible coffin. Look at the performance of the M-1 Abrams versus Russian-built crap in Iraq, whether it was 1991 or 2003. Soldiers I have spoken to, both recently and post-Vietnam, almost invariably prefer the upgraded M-16-- or whatever the nomenclature is today-- to the Russian counterpart. And planes? No one builds better planes than the U. S. I have heard... read, seen on TV, whatever... the German Leopard II tank is even superior to the American M-1. And do not short-shrift the British equipment, either. I will take anything the British build to anything built by the Russians. Best wishes, Fred.
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Post by AZ Ranger on May 4, 2015 6:19:30 GMT -6
I look at the farrier as one who had a good back. I use to be able to take care of my own but prefer to spend the money rather than the time. In general the cavalry trooper depended upon his horse for transportation and taking care of your own horse seems important to me. I can imagine soring among the new pack mules but the horses had walked a long was from FAL and must have been taken care of to a reasonable degree. When we trapped black bears in the Grahams we would occasionally sore up a horse due to the up and downs of the mountain. That horse would be taken out of service. If that was your only horse than you should do everything possible to keep from being on foot. Regards AZ Ranger Aren't horses more prone to sores as they lose weight and the saddles no longer fit the same? I believe that the 7th did the best they could for their horses (not to sure on the mules) but horses require a lot of forage to stay at their best and I believe they didn't care enough with them nor. because of Custer's long rides, were they given enough time to be out from under their saddles and graze one whatever the could find available--not that that would replace good oats and hay. Beth I am probably not the person to ask on forage. In Arizona we have areas that have 7 sections per AUM (animal unit month). When I visit Wyoming and Montana the feed is everywhere and don't see the problem. As far as the saddle the McClellan seems adaptive to size and it is made for narrow horses. I would think the grain was for energy expenditure rather than maintenance. When we trapped bears we grained the horses at 3 AM and they were full of it for the first hour or so. I believe they stopped early in the day to allow the horses to graze starting at the longest distance away and working in by night. I would think there may have been issue with the riders and keeping the load balanced but that would be guessing. Those horses are not commonly available and the horses of today are wider. I would like to find one. My Tennessee Walker named Custer is as close to one of those horses as I have ever owned. He walks at 9 mph and never stops. He is great for checking waters but sucks when looking for deer or elk. Regards Steve
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Post by montrose on May 4, 2015 8:03:37 GMT -6
Frederick the Great of Prussia had several observations on cavalry.
Remember, he had major desertion problems, so sustaining readiness was a top concern.
He stressed repeatedly the need for horse and rider to train together. "How could even mounted men defeat te enemy if they ride faint hearted and uneasy in the saddle?"
He also believes that patrolling is a special skill requiring additional training.
Frederick served as his own cavalry inspector, personally putting units through their maneuvers on an annual basis.
One of my observations on GAC is that he ignored regimental elements not on the same post as himself. Mackenzie, Gibbon, Crook, Miles always remained interested in their sub units, no matter where they were stationed. Fort Rice is near FAL, easy to get to except in winter. But it could have been in Alaska s far as GAC was concerned. Because we focus on LBH, there is a belief that GAC was the normal regimental commander. He was an outlier. Lazy, arrogant, obsessed with his own comforts and privileges at the expense of his soldiers, he a very bad commander.
The regiment conducted individual, company, and regimental drills when established in 1866. But their was no sustainment training. Everything was left to company commanders with no regimental control or supervision. The major day to day activity of the 7th was post support activities. Maintaining the post, construction projects (soldiers built every single building and installation, wood gathering, water details, forage details, taxidermy assistants, dog handlers, care and maintenance of GAC, snow details, road details, bridge details etc. They even ran their own farms to augment their rations.
Every one who served knows all about the "Hey, You" roster. You get on the wrong side of a first sergeant and welcome to a summer of latrine duty, burning or burying the refuse.
Some officers tried to manage support details to allow occasional training, especially in the spring and summer. Others did not.
The Army didn't help. During this time the Secretary of War ran the administrative part of the Army, including the Inspections Department. Relations between the Secretary and the Chief o Staff of the Army were not bad, they were damn near non existent. Sherman left Washington and moved Army HQ to Chicago, so he would not have to deal with the secretary and his minions. It was not until the Upton reforms of the 1880s that the Army starting changing from amateurs to professionals. They started developing individual and unit training standards, and started enforcing that minimum goals were met. This didn't help the 1876 Army.
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Post by jodak on May 4, 2015 9:50:30 GMT -6
When companies were dispersed to different posts, what was the command relationship between regimental vs. post commanders? I realize that in many cases the company commander or senior company commander and the post commander were one and the same, but sometimes they were not. In those situations, who was most responsible for the overall fitness of the units in question - the commanders of their home regiments or of the posts to which they were assigned? Did units from different regiments, say cavalry and infantry, at a given post train together in operational performance?
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Post by Dark Cloud on May 4, 2015 10:33:51 GMT -6
Sherman took the Army Headquarters to St. Louis, not Chicago, although that was the command center for Sheridan's Department of the Missouri, as I recall. Made sense, with the Mississippi as his highway and nearer the 'enemy' from Mexico to Canada and the Department and Division headquarters at issue. I find it difficult not to like Sherman.
Think it difficult to compare the cavalry of Frederick the Great to Custer's 7th. Absent horses, they didn't train for remotely similar activity on remotely similar landscapes with vastly different logistic issues, and Custer's barely trained at all. The 7th were used as police and mounted infantry, for all intents, and rarely did they operate as formal units in the field as the Indians were rarely in large assemblage. They are both called 'cavalry', but are different enough to defy easy assumption of much actual similarity. Understood that soldiers like to see direct lines of DNA descent from previous armies but I truly think it more misleading than helpful, and as a result enthused plantlife looks at a six man patrol under attack by ten Sioux as similar to some German Army Group of thousands under a four week attack by Soviets with planes and tanks from which Memorable Sayings can be acquired. If you use the same words, they can think it the same enough to nod sagely and draw handy aphorisms to exchange with their ilk on these boards.
In a way, it's like a practical joke vets play to allow these weird conclusions to be accepted and used again and again and so distinguish the combat vets from the inexperienced. It distinguishes vets of combat from all others, in that combat vets don't find the comfort in jargon and quotes of dead generals as others do.
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Post by fred on May 4, 2015 11:39:53 GMT -6
I find it difficult not to like Sherman. I agree completely. This is a very interesting comment, for I find it very, very true... at least in myself. I often wonder if it is because of those combat experiences or because as I get older, I can stand less and less bullshit, less and less pedantry, less and less of the "jargon" nonsense. I would assume Montrose feels much the same, but I can only recall my disdain for so much of the nonsense and my emphasis on proper soldiering, on performing the mission, and on getting those men home safe and sound. I spent my last two weeks in Vietnam as a brigade assistant S-4 and the guy I worked for was a charts-and-graphs West Pointer... and a certified ass****. A couple lieutenants and I-- who were in-country before this clown and therefore served with Bill DePuy, used to laugh and say that if this guy ever flipped those charts in front of DePuy, he would have been fired. Best wishes, Fred.
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Post by quincannon on May 4, 2015 11:39:55 GMT -6
Could not agree more DICK. By the way speaking of ignorant plant life did you ever figure out who Andrew Gordon was on that film WO posted?
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Post by fred on May 4, 2015 11:45:38 GMT -6
When companies were dispersed to different posts, what was the command relationship between regimental vs. post commanders? Jodak, If I remember correctly-- and I believe this was similar to when I was in the army-- a post commander is responsible for the post's physical plant, nothing else. Troop commanders are responsible for their own men, their own units, etc. When I was in the infantry in Schweinfurt, Germany, we had two full battalions stationed at Ledward Barracks. Each battalion, of course, had its own CO, but the post facilities themselves were the responsibility of the post commander, a completely separate organization, not even under the aegis or command of the 3rd Infantry Division. That guy ran the post PX, the commissary, the Class-6, the post QM, etc. I would think it was the same back in Custer's day. Best wishes, Fred.
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Post by montrose on May 4, 2015 12:45:19 GMT -6
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Post by montrose on May 4, 2015 12:55:07 GMT -6
Fred and Jodak,
The post organization was a real mess. Posts could and did consist of a mix of companies from different regiments, freely intermixing all 3 branches. The problem is that you know had 2 chains of command.
The operational relationship was post to department to division.
Administrative relationships remained company to regiment to Army. In practice, things remained muddled. The good commanders remained involved with their units. The bad ones did not. This led to the Army being aForrest Gump's box of chocolates. Their was enormous variation in the skills and abilities of the various regiments. It was less a bell curve and more a flat line.
This organizational design made the companies the building block of the Army. There was no institutionalized process to train and enforce standards in any unit higher than company.
The department and division headquarters had teeny tiny staffs, incapable of providing appropriate command and control of their companies.
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