Quote:
Originally Posted by bristol
Hi old man,
Whilst i concur with the sentiments expressed by Josquin and Russ---and do so most comprehensively---I must wonder about your 3rd. para. post 30, re. the impact of the CL class at this time.
Certainly during the great retreats of the allies during the early part of 1918 in the German offensives---when serious disruption and heavy casualties could have ensued---they were conspicuous by theoir absence--a British officer who went through that near disaster, Sidney Rogerson wrote----" It was a crowning mercy that (the Germans) they had no Cavalry. How many times during the retreat did we thank heaven for this! The sight of a few mounted men in the distance would at once start a ripple of anxiety......Cavalry was the one factor which would have smashed the morale of the defence in a twinkling"
'The Last Of The Ebb'---Rogerson.
What mayhem a seious onslaught by all the German air service could have wrought!
Instead 'the two-seater Schlachtstaffeln had been expanded to carry out ground attack and other support tasks---their effectiveness seems very low.IT IS HARD TO FIND IN ANY ARMY UNIT RECORDS ANY MAJOR INCONVENIENCES CAUSED BY THEIR ACTIVITIES' Sorry for the capitals, they are mine but not in the sense (it is so easy to seem arrogant in posts while not at all trying to)are they meant to be 'hammering home a point----just reinforcing it i assure you.
The last from 'bloody april--black september'
In all my many years---like yourself---of reading and studying i have not come across many accounts of British troops being very harrased---during daylight---by 'ground attack', conversley there are plenty of reports from the enemy of just this.
I suppose i'm claiming, at the end of the day, that the CL class, whilst being perfectly good aeroplanes, just were'nt that much of a problem!!!
Dave.
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All I can say, Sir, is that every account I have ever read of the aerial end of the German spring offensives allots the Schlachstaffel an important role in the German battle-plan for the 1918 attacks. The machines and the techniques had certainly proved themselves in the counter-attack at Cambrai, which was in some ways a sort of dress rehearsal of the battle-method employed the following spring. My understanding is that they were employed in direct battlefield support, sometimes within only a few yards of advancing German infantry. There might not be many English accounts emerge from the collapse of strong-points carried in that manner: in all instances the initial assaults were marked by great confusion and disorganization in the English front. Perhaps using the machines for exploitation behind the crumbling battle front, as light tanks rather than assault guns, so to speak, would have brought better results. Certainly the greatest successes of Allied fighter-bombers in the Second World War were gained by such an employment. But again, we are dealing with a time of experimentation and learning in regard to new weapons, when there really were no established patterns for their proper use as yet. My basic point is that since German doctrine and organization alloted the ground attack role to separate specialist units of two-seat machines, rather than to their fighter formations, the fact that the latter did not often engage in such operations should not be taken as indicating that the Germans did not engage in them, or that German fighter pilots were shirking in a way English fighter pilots were not.