WW1 OOB (1914) needed!

[Boco]

A couple of points about the Turks (lifted from Erickson's book). On the plus side:

1) They were almost always outnumbered in their battles, particularly in heavy weapons.

2) Ethnic Turks showed high morale and capable tactics.

3) They could endure far more adversity than their opponents in battle and on the march. That lack of heavy weapons lent itself to a remarkably short logistical tail.

4) On the strategic level, the Turk army repeatedly reorganized after disastrous defeats to come back pheonix-like and defend again without significant help from Germany.

5) Kemal wasn't their only able commander. Esat, Sevki, Halil, Fevzi, and Vehip also led well. Unfortunately, Enver, Jemal, and Jevit were simply awful.

6) Turks committed atrocities against civilians and POW's. They weren't the only war criminals in this theater, but they were the largest.

Negative:

1) Political leadership was terrible from day 1. The Turks should never have entered the war.

2) There was no check on Enver and his amateurish schemes.

3) No strategic priorities were set at critical times. This often led to weak uncoordinated attacks when the Turks did have the initiative.

4) Ethnic Arab units fought poorly from 1916 onward. Iraqi units never fought well.

To call their performance crap is to set a high bar. Russians, Austro-Hungarians, Italians, most colonial armies, and at times the French would also fall in the crap pile. True, the 'Sick Man of Europe' was in serious decline, but they were constantly underestimated by their opponents and managed to hang on until October 1918. This was a tough war to fight: 20th century firepower with 19th century communications.

[Palaiologos]

That pretty much sums it up Boco.
But why is the "atrocities" argument on the plus side?

When we speak(at least i) of the Ottoman army we do no mean only the ethnic Turks. An army is a whole institution with many parameters. Equipment, morale, training, military dogma, logistics, officer corps etc. Simply because troops of particular units exhibit endurance to hardships, bravery and ussually fight outnumbered doesn't make that army good.

Overall the Ottoman army failed to realize a decent strategic offensive, and apart from occupying allied troops did nothing noteworthy.

Remember we are talking about the Ottoman Imperial army here, not the Bolivians or something. The descendants of an army that once terrorized Europe and Asia. And don't forget their previous wars were disastrous. They were heavily defeated by the Italians in Tripolis(so i guess the Italians were better), and the Balkan states had a walk in the park during the first Balkan war.

The colonials and Russians were no better.Actually i think that the only decent armies of WWI were the German, the armies of the Balkan states and the British and Commonwealth. Maybe followed by the French.

Austria-hungary, Russia, Turkey were on their decline and that affected their armies overall.
I mean in equipment, morale, strategic and tactical thinking and training.

While the French and Italians simply don't have it in them.

[Boco]

But why is the "atrocities" argument on the plus side?

Oops, a last minute edit that I put in the wrong section.

I wouldn't elevate all the Balkan armies above your 'crap' level. They largely met two of your own criteria: ill-equipped in modern weapons, no strategic value except to tie up Central Powers troops.

Armies that did largely nothing but defend their own lands still contributed to the outcome. That feeble Turk attack on the Suez in 1915 was logistically impressive, tactically feeble, and strategically brilliant. It shocked the Brits into establishing a large garrison in a region they would have preferred to ignore. On other fronts, the 'crap' armies of Russia and France played absolutely vital roles in the Allied victory.

True the German and British/ANZAC/Canadian armies were a notch better throughout much of the war, but 'crap' for the others? That's harsh and shallow.

[fairline]

An awful lot of 'crap' Frenchmen charged to their deaths in Verdun. Had they been poor quality troops I'm sure they wouldn't have bothered getting out of their trenches. The French army's problem was that they had a doctrine of attack at all costs, regardless of the consequences. The same applies to the many Italians who fought bravely and died during WW1.

I think if you look objectively at the hardship and suffering that troops of all sides put up with in WW1, it's crass to single them out as being 'crap'. There were plenty of 'crap' generals who sent these poor bastards to their deaths, mind you.

In terms of training, equipment and professionalism, then the BEF of 1914 was probably the 'best' army. This wasn't anything to do with dodgy notions of national superiority, but the consequence of Britain maintaining a small, mainly professional army that had garnered a great deal of experience through colonial wars, most notably the Boer war which had led to a huge revision of tactics and equipment. Germany and France had huge armies of conscripts, by contrast. There's an argument that British troops should be downgraded by events during a WW1 scenario as Kitchener's volenteer army took the place of the fallen BEF troops.

[Palaiologos]

It seems i was misunderstood gareth. When i say that an army is "crap" i don't mean it doesn't have brave men.
I have the utmost respect of WW1 fighters. They fought under unconceivable hardships, their high command caring not for their lives and the atrocities of WW2 were avoided. They were gentlemen.

But bravery as i said before is not something to elevate by itself an army's standard of quality.

Crap generals are a part of the army. So is a bad military dogma(attack at all costs), inability to exploit tactical successes, failure to adopt to modern tactics etc...
The Polish army of WW2 had the best cavalry ever fielded in europe. Exquisite training, excellent fighting spirit, using a highly sophisticated cavalry engament dogma. So what? It was still an obsolete weapon and the army, not the men in uniforms-but the army as a whole, was 'crap'. Lack of efficient communications, no motorized transportation, wrong use of the airforce etc.

As for the Balkan armies Boco you are more or less mistaken. Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia(in that order) had among the best armies of Europe at the time. A large modernization had taken place in preperation for the war against Turkey. The Bulgars in particular were considered the "Prussians of the Balkans".
The germans constantly wanted to have the Bulgars on their side in a future war since they believed their great armed forces would be a great addition.As events proved however it was the Greeks, not the Bulgars that had the finest army.(Actually the Greek army was perhaps the world's best of its time-but that is another matter)
The Balkan wars are a unknown part of european history in the west, but they formed the modern Balkan states.

[jim panse]

Dudes, I don´t want to interrupt you but I want to ask you 2 things: (1) If you want to discuss this matter you should watch Kubrick´s "Paths of Glory"; and (2) please refer to the Off-Topic Section as this is the Scenario Creation Section. ;-) Thank you all.

[Palaiologos]

Sorry i guess we just got carried away.


Excellent movie BTW.

[Case]

Sorry Jim - I just want to squeeze my $0.02 in

Originally posted by Boco
To call their performance crap is to set a high bar. Russians, Austro-Hungarians, Italians, most colonial armies, and at times the French would also fall in the crap pile.

...not to mention the British army's many failings. The pathetic ****-up at Sulva Bay in 1915, the seige of Kut in 1916(15?) and the collapse of the 4th Army in 1918 were all due to a combination of bad generalship and poor quality soldiers.

Nationalist chest beating aside, the Australian Army had it's share of total disarsters - the army peformed bravely, but badly in 1916 and suffered appaling losses as a result. In fact, despite the repution the Australians ultimatly gained, IMO they weren't really better then average until 1918 when they were lucky enough to be both the last all-volunteer army and the one with probably the best field commander of the war in the form General Monash.

This was a tough war to fight: 20th century firepower with 19th century communications.

I've always liked Norman Dixon's description of WW1 as being a war faught between '20th centrury warheads propelled by 19th century delivery systems'.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Galvatron
Germany


Great Britain
Inf.Div = 68

1 in Egypt
3 in India
The rest on the West Front

Cav.Div = 4

.

68 UK divisions?!?!?

That cant be for 1914 - when only a 6 division BEF went to the western front (Keegan) this must either be later in the war, when Kitchener division were raised, or perhaps its Indian army in India (but was even the Indian army that large)

I'll need to check the order of battle sites, but something seems wrong.

[lord of the mark]

yup, i checked the orbat site - lots of divisions formed in august/september 1914. Are you counting those. They would have needed time for training - werent available to fight in 1914. So i guess it depends on definitions. In game terms a unit being "built" in a city is presumably training, so unit availble when the game begins should be fully trained and deployable.

[fairline]

Re: Sorry Jim - I just want to squeeze my $0.02 in

Originally posted by Case


...not to mention the British army's many failings. The pathetic ****-up at Sulva Bay in 1915, the seige of Kut in 1916(15?) and the collapse of the 4th Army in 1918 were all due to a combination of bad generalship and poor quality soldiers.

Well, The whole of the Dardanelles operation really, and the slaughterhouse of the Somme and no end of other pointless and bloody stuff-ups. I would argue that the blame for these lies with Kitchener, Haig and the other thick-skulled nitwits who passed for Generals in WW1. Perhaps the only British General who comes out of it with any kind of reputation was Allenby in the Middle-East. What was the expression, 'Lions led by donkeys' ?

I don't think this changes the fact that the BEF (not the later, volunteer, British Army!) in 1914 were the best trained and equiped troops at the start of WW1, and were a significant factor in preventing the Germans pulling off the Schlieffen plan in the first instance, and later outflanking the French in the race for the sea later.

Lord of the Mark: your right, the BEF was only a handful of divisions supported by Territorial divisions in 1914. The British Army was massively expanded by the Minister of War, Kitchener, and these troops weren't ready until 1915.

[Galvatron]

Originally posted by lord of the mark
68 UK divisions?!?!?

Well I think Ellis book can be more trusted than any internet site

I checked again and yes 68 divs are right. They were officially Pre-War formed. Of course they were not all part of the BEF. Most of them began to be supplied and readied to be equipped but the formation was pre-war and most of the men were already in the barracks and ready to be shipped abroad

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Galvatron

Well I think Ellis book can be more trusted than any internet site

I checked again and yes 68 divs are right. They were officially Pre-War formed. Of course they were not all part of the BEF. Most of them began to be supplied and readied to be equipped but the formation was pre-war and most of the men were already in the barracks and ready to be shipped abroad

Ellis, WW1 Databook. I'll take a look.

From Keegan, I recall a certain number of territorial and Indian army divisions, but nothing like 68. And one of the principal concerns in August 1914 was keeping the core BEF alive to serve as cadres to train the new divisions that would be recruited for 1915. The implication being that there were NO OTHER trained regular divisions available. Period.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Galvatron

Well I think Ellis book can be more trusted than any internet site

I checked again and yes 68 divs are right. They were officially Pre-War formed. Of course they were not all part of the BEF. Most of them began to be supplied and readied to be equipped but the formation was pre-war and most of the men were already in the barracks and ready to be shipped abroad

68 divisions - thats something like a 1.5 million man army. Everything Ive read about Britain of this period indicates they had a small, long service army. Where did they get these 1.5 million men from, given that they had NO CONSCRIPTION prior to WW1? The Kitchener Divisions were volunteers, but that was during the patriotic fervor of the war.

[lord of the mark]

lets see if we can make sense of this.

the BEF was what, seven divisions including cavalry?

Indian army was about another 12 divisions (per orbat, quoting graham watson)

There were reserve divisions, consisting of retired long service regulars. How many?

There were territorial divs, what about a dozen?

Could we be up to 40 divisions?

a few more divisions or equvalents in colonies other than India.

Dominion troops (As of 1914)

Maybe.