The Leadership Factor in the Decline of Combat Efficiency of Wehrmacht Panzer Divisions on the Soviet-German Front

Polishchuk, A.A. (2026). The Leadership Factor in the Decline of Combat Efficiency of Wehrmacht Panzer Divisions on the Soviet-German Front. Bulletin of Nizhnevartovsk State University, (3(75)), 18-33.

In world historiography, there is a prevailing opinion that the Red Army achieved victory in World War II only by drowning enemy positions in corpses. However, German losses at the Soviet-German front accounted for 80% of their total wartime casualties – millions of soldiers – while their allies were effectively defeated exclusively on that front, with the exception of Italy, although Italy totally lost the 8th Army at Stalingrad.

In 1941, operating under the most ideal conditions of the entire war, the German high military command would never be able to defeat the Red Army and enslave the USSR, even though the Soviet regular army was almost completely destroyed in the battles of June-August 1941, and, from that point onward, the defense was maintained by divisions drawn from rear military districts and militia units. No less severe were the defeats of the Soviet forces in 1942 – the armies that had gained successful combat experience in the winter battles of 1941 were destroyed in the spring and summer of 1942 as a result of mistakes made by the Soviet strategic command, and the Germans reached the Volga and the Caucasus, where, due to errors of the German military high command, two army groups were defeated and significant forces of the Third Reich’s allies were destroyed [15]. Yet victory is forged not only in the upper echelons but also on the battlefield – and it was there that the role of a tank division commander was of most importance. In the author’s opinion, in the Wehrmacht, among the commanders of tank divisions, there were plenty of divisional commanders who made more mistakes than did the Soviet commanders they faced. Either those commanders themselves, despite their colonel and general ranks, fundamentally lacked the necessary skills to achieve victory at the Soviet-German front.

The practical significance of the knowledge gained about the appointment of personnel to senior positions in the Wehrmacht’s tank formations allows historians to draw more objective conclusions. By examining the organizational structures and the personalities of opposing commanders, they can draw more accurate conclusions about the causes behind the results achieved in combat.

During the war, the Germans formed 29 tank divisions [13]. We exclude from consideration those whose commanders did never fight on the Soviet-German front – such as the 15th and 21st Panzer Divisions (that fought in Africa [20] and Normandy), the 26th Panzer Division and the

“Training” Panzer Division (operating in Europe) – as well as those who only took command in 1945, including commanders of the “named” tank divisions created in 1945, when the outcome of the war was already predetermined.

About 120 colonels and generals served as divisional commanders on the Soviet-German front. Taking the above into account, on average, each division commander served for 7–9 months. Considering the high intensity of combat operations on the Soviet-German front, that period was quite sufficient to reveal an officer’s ability to command a tank formation and promote them further in service or, conversely, to end their career in a rear or administrative position. The problem is that over those months, due to unprofessional actions, several divisions could have been destroyed, several combat operations could have been disrupted and lost, and the situation at the front could have deteriorated dramatically.

It is worth noting that in both Russian and foreign history, there have been virtually no works devoted to the commanders of the operational and tactical level of the Wehrmacht. Russian historians, most notably K. Zalessky, published biographical reference works and encyclopedias on senior command personnel, as well as biographical directories of individuals, awarded the highest honors of the Third Reich ( Germany’s Military Elite, 1870–1945 [30], the officers of the Luftwaffe ( The Air Force of the Third Reich [28]), the Kriegsmarine ( The Navy of the Third Reich [27]), and the Wehrmacht ( The Army and High Command [29]). These publications, however, contain no analysis of the officers’ practical performance on the battlefield.

Western historiography, by contrast, contains a substantial body of literature devoted specifically to the holders of the Knight’s Cross and subsequent higher awards. Samuel W. Mitcham Jr. published several studies focusing on particular groups of officers. His book Panzer Commanders of the Western Front presents the biographies of five tank commanders, not all of whom had backgrounds in tank divisions [19]. He also published a general survey of all the Wehrmacht tank divisions ( Panzer Legions: A Guide to the German Army Tank Divisions of World War II and Their Commanders ), which includes lists of their commanders and brief biographical sketches [18]. Another specialized study – Rommel’s Desert Commanders: The Men Who Served the Desert Fox, North Africa, 1941–1942 – focuses on commanders who fought in General Rommel’s Africa Korps. However, the book examines only three generals, and just one of them held a tactical-level command during the period covered, although he did not command tank forces [20]. In another major work – Hitler’s Commanders: Officers of the Wehrmacht, the Luftwaffe, the Kriegsmarine, and the Waffen-SS – published in Russia under the title Commanders of the Third Reich , Mitcham likewise examines the biographies of officers and generals who fought in various theaters of war. However, he draws no analytical conclusions concerning the influence of the Wehrmacht’s overall system of appointments to command positions on the outcomes of battles [21].

By the time of the invasion of the Soviet Union, the German Armed Forces High Command (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, OKW) and the Army High Command (Oberkommando des Heeres, OKH) had established as a doctrinal imperative that the most effective means of achieving success in a campaign was to mass tanks, armored personnel carriers, and armored cars in tank formations placed under unified command at corps and army levels [8].

Theoretical research from the 1920s–1930s on the superiority of mobile formations armed with fast, armored vehicles over traditional types of troops was confirmed by battles in Spain, Poland, and France [12].

Charismatic figures of the military elite of the Third Reich such as Erwin Rommel, Walter Model, Erich von Manstein, Ewald von Kleist, and Ferdinand Schörner, earned their field marshals’ batons after having commanded tank units and formations. Their careers demonstrate how important it is to have the right person at the head of a tank formation or unit [12].

However, when examining the individuals who held command positions in the Wehrmacht tank formations, we must take into account one important nuance: the Third Reich, and the Wehrmacht along with it, ultimately suffered defeat in the war. Consequently, regardless of the successes achieved by German tank generals on the battlefield, the overall outcome was nevertheless a defeat. Yet, as it is well known, the victories and successes of some are often the result of the failures and mistakes of others. Therefore, the issue should be examined not through the lens of successful German tank generals who, by the end of the war, had become holders of the Knight’s Cross, Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds, which ultimately did nothing to help the Third Reich, but through the command performance of those generals who proved not to be “a man in his place” and who, despite the seemingly perfectly organized war machine of the Third Reich, failed in their respective positions.

It is important to determine how many such officers occupied key positions as commanders of tank formations and to describe the consequences of their command. In order to examine the underlying problems associated with filling command positions in Wehrmacht tank formations, we will begin with those commanding officers for whom the fighting at the Eastern Front ended in severe moral trauma and nervous breakdowns [11].

A striking example is Major General Walther Düvert [18, p. 181]. A promising officer who was expected to attain the highest positions in the Wehrmacht, he assumed command of the 13th Panzer Division in June 1941 and was awarded the Knight’s Cross as early as 30 July 1941. However, during the winter battles of 1941–1942, his nervous strain exceeded the tolerable limits, and he was relieved of his post following a nervous breakdown. After receiving medical treatment, he took command of the 20th Panzer Division on 1 July 1942, and on 12 August 1942 the division took part in Operation Wirbelwind. Within two days of the offensive, by approximately midday on 13 August, the division had lost 48 of the 79 tanks with which it had entered the battle. Factors affecting General Düvert’s career included the successful actions of the Southern Front and the liberation of the city of Rostov, from which the 13th Panzer Division had been driven out [2], as well as the subsequent defeat of the 20th Panzer Division under his command by Soviet forces during Operation Wirbelwind. From 11 to 31 August, the division suffered losses of 265 personnel killed, 1,262 wounded, and 31 missing [3]. As a result of these battles, General Düvert suffered another nervous breakdown and was permanently relieved of his command.

Something similar happened to Lieutenant General Horst Stumpff [18, p. 259], who invaded the USSR at the head of the 20th Panzer Division and was soon awarded the Knight’s Cross as well. However, in September 1941, he also suffered a nervous breakdown and was permanently removed from command positions in the field tank forces. Perhaps the Soviet units, which thwarted the “Blitzkrieg” with their resistance in Smolensk region [7], also had an impact on General Stumpff’s career. On 10 September 1941, Stumpff left his post as commander of the 20th Panzer Division. Two weeks earlier, on 25 August, the general had received a report on the condition of the division’s tank strength: only 88 tanks remained operational. At the same time, 104 tanks had been destroyed and 62 ones were undergoing repairs. Shortly before this, reports had indicated that since the beginning of the invasion of the USSR, the division had suffered losses of 724 personnel killed, 1,754 wounded, and 60 missing [3].

A similar situation occurred with Lieutenant General von Esebeck (Hans-Karl Freiherr von Esebeck) [18, p. 169]. On 24 August 1941, he assumed command of the 11th Panzer Division, but as early as 20 October 1941, during Operation Typhoon, he was replaced by Major General Scheller (Walter Scheller) [18, p. 158], apparently because he had become exhausted by the hardships of the Eastern Front. After a period of rest, on 17 February 1942 he was appointed commander of the 2nd Panzer Division, but on 1 June 1942 he fastly relinquished command to General von Lenski (Arno von Lenski) [18, p. 288-289]. He returned to command of the 2nd Panzer Division on 1 July, but on 20 October 1942 he again relinquished command for health reasons. Factors affecting General von Esebeck’s career included the Soviet forces, whose resistance thwarted Operation Typhoon: between 1 and 20 October 1941, the division lost 150 men killed, 618 wounded, and 36 missing [2]. In the summer, the 2nd Panzer Division found itself in the path of the Soviet offensive during the Pogoreloye-Gorodishche Offensive Operation and suffered losses of 1,953 men between 5 August and 10 September. At the same time, General von Esebeck performed well in July 1942 during Operation Seydlitz, when German forces destroyed the 39th Soviet Army commanded by General Ivan Maslennikov. However, even those individual successes could not offset the general’s demoralized state caused by the increasingly determined resistance of the Soviet forces.

Another example of an unsuccessful career as a Panzer commander was that of Major General Landgraf (Franz Landgraf) [18, p. 128-129]. On 15 September 1941, he assumed command of the 6th Panzer Division, but the battles for Moscow proved to be so physically and psychologically demanding for him that, in the spring of 1942, he was recalled to Germany following a nervous breakdown. There, he was given command of the 155th Reserve Division, and subsequently, on 1 October 1942, he retired from military service for health reasons.

The commander of the 17th Panzer Division, Major General Licht (Rudolf-Eduard Licht), likewise failed to cope with the hardships of combat at the Soviet-German Front [18, p. 213]. Having assumed command of the division in November 1941, he was permanently removed from the Panzer troops in December 1942, following the fighting in the Orel salient, and subsequently commanded only infantry formations. Factors affecting General Landgraf’s career included Soviet forces that first repulsed the German attack on Tula and then prevented the Germans from using the Orel bridgehead to launch an offensive against Moscow from the southwest, thwarting repeated attempts to advance and inflicting considerable losses on the enemy.

Another example of a brief period of “Panzer command” was Major General Hühner (Werner Hühner) [18, p. 146]. On 8 December 1941, he assumed command of the 8th Panzer Division following the wounding of General Brandenberger (Erich Brandenberger) [18, p. 145]. Brandenberger returned to command of the division on 20 March 1942, but during those more than three months of fighting, Hühner had become so severely exhausted that later he commanded only infantry divisions. General Hühner’s career was affected by Soviet forces that encircled the garrison of the town of Kholm, forcing elements of the 8th Panzer Division to conduct disadvantageous relief operations in forested and marshy terrain under winter conditions while suffering considerable losses.

Another of the most unsuccessful Panzer careers was that of Major General von Apell (Wilhelm von Apell) [18, p. 274]. He distinguished himself in the Balkans, for which he was awarded the Knight’s Cross in the spring of 1941. In September 1941, he was tasked with forming the 22nd Panzer Division, which he led to the Crimea in the spring of 1942. It should be noted that on 20 March 1942, the 22nd Panzer Division suffered a defeat in the Crimea as a result of successful defensive operations by the forces of the Soviet Crimean Front [14]. The division also performed well during Operation Wilhelm. However, the heavy fighting at the Soviet-German front must ultimately have left General von Apell psychologically shaken, and he subsequently acted with considerable indecision. There are reasons to suspect that he also suffered a nervous breakdown: in October 1942, he was sent to hospital and never commanded Panzer forces again.

A striking example of the rapid acquisition of common sense following the results of the battles at the Soviet-German front is the career of Lieutenant General Otto Kohlermann [18, p. 350]. Having been awarded the Knight’s Cross in the spring of 1942 for the successful management of the 129th Artillery Command (129.ArKo), in May 1942 he replaced General Eberhard as the commander of the 60th MD. At the head of the 60th Motorized Division, he managed to get awarded the Knight’s Cross in battles at the Eastern front and suffered from nervous strain, so in the future he commanded only infantry and reserve units. The 60th Motorized Division, under Kolermann’s command, held the northern flank of General Paulus’s 6th Army throughout the autumn of 1942, together with the 3rd Motorized Division and the 16th Tank Division, repelling attacks from General Konstantin Rokossovsky’s front. At the end of the battle, Kolerman was evacuated from the military cauldron and began restoring the 60th Motorized Division, which was renamed Panzer Division Feldherrnhalle. In December 1943, it was thrown into the fighting for Vitebsk, where it immediately found itself in the thick of battle against General Gordov’s 33rd Army [4]. Having lost about 4,000 men, almost all of its tanks and assault guns, the division achieved a temporary stabilization of the front and was soon redeployed near Leningrad. As a result, on 4 April 1944, he handed over command of the division and went to command coastal artillery units on the Western Front. One of the most inexplicable careers of tank commanders belongs to Mickl (Johann Mickl) [18, p. 170], who distinguished himself brilliantly in tank forces at the regimental level and distinguished himself both in Africa and on the Soviet-German front, becoming a holder of Knight’s Cross with Oak Leaves. However, on 24 May 1943, holding the rank of major general, he took command of the 11th Motorized Division, with which he went into battle on the Kursk Bulge. It is unclear what broke General Mikla morally – the losses of his division in July 1943 were not alarming – 493 men killed, 1,600 wounded and 73 missing [23], however, on August 10, he handed over command of the panzer division to General Wend von Wietersheim [18, p. 170] and was sent to command the 392nd (Croatian) ID in Yugoslavia, where he died of wounds in April 1945.

Another example is the career of Colonel Wilhelm Crisolli [18, p. 130]. In July 1941, he was awarded the Knight’s Cross in the ranks of the 8th TD. During his career, he commanded several different divisions, and finally, on 14 July 1943, he led the 6th TD, whose commander was killed by a Soviet sniper. Till 20 August 1943, Colonel Crisolli did not withdraw from combat, and apparently, the burden of the battles was too much for him. It can be noted that the actions of the Soviet troops in the summer of 1943 near Kharkov and Merefa led to the exhaustion of the 6th Panzer Division [24]. On August 21, Crisolli was transferred to the Führer’s reserve, and from November 1943 he made a dramatic career change, taking command of the 20th Division of the Luftwaffe in Italy. On 12 September 1944, fate caught up with him: Major General Crisolli was killed by Italian partisans.

The shortage of tank commanders at the Soviet-German front became evident as early as the spring and summer of 1942, as a result of which staff officers and administrators from the Wehrmacht’s rear-echelon units were sent into battle. Major General Bäßler (Johannes Baeßler) [18, p. 157] was that “staff” tank commander whose “tank” career ended before it even began. After serving throughout the first half of World War II in staff positions, on 15 April 1942 he was given tank division command, taking charge of the 9th Panzer Division. With it, he launched an offensive against Voronezh as part of Operation Blau and engaged in a fierce battle with the 5th Soviet Tank Army under General Lizyukov. On 25 July 1942, the general sustained a severe injury and got out of action for a long time. On 16 November 1942, having recovered, he took command of the 14th Panzer Division, which got encircled near Stalingrad, but just 10 days later he relinquished command of the division, got placed in the Führer’s reserve, and was transferred to infantry units at the Western Front, where then he was killed.

On 10 August 1942, another military administrator, Major General Eduard Metz, assumed command of the 5th Panzer Division [18, p. 117]. In 1941–1942, he headed the military mission in Romania and had never previously commanded tank units. On 12 February 1943, General Metz was wounded and never again commanded armored units at the front. It should be noted that General Metz led the 5th Panzer Division both during the summer battle for Rzhev (the division’s losses amounted up to 1,620 men) and in repelling the Soviet winter offensive, Operation Mars (the division’s losses amounted up to 1,887 men). In those battles, the plans of the Soviet command were thwarted; however, the losses suffered by his division affected the general to such an extent that, after leaving the front, he no longer wished to return.

General Metz’s wounding required an emergency replacement, and Colonel Johannes Nedtwig assumed command of the 5th Panzer Division [18, p. 117]. From 1940 to 1943, he commanded only a tank training school. His command of the 5th Panzer Division during the repelling of the Soviet 16th Army’s offensive against the town of Zhizdra was so unsuccessful, and the division’s losses were so unreasonably high, that he was ultimately relieved of his post on 20 June 1943. Until his capture in the summer of 1944, he never again commanded armored formations.

An interesting example of a military career is that of Major General Sebastian Fichtner [18, p. 147]. Till 15 September 1942, he served as head of the Armored and Materiel Department of the Army Ordnance Office. In this position, among other things, he was involved in launching Tiger tanks into production and argued with Hitler over their employment, which resulted in his removal from office. Having completed a course at the Panzer Troops School, Fichtner commanded the 8th Panzer Division from 28 November 1942 to 5 November 1943. In reality, however, he had relinquished command as early as September 1943, when he was hospitalized after being wounded. It should also be noted that his command of the 8th Panzer Division during the repelling of the offensive by General K.K. Rokossovsky’s Front from July to September 1943 was unsuccessful. By 1 October, the division had no operational tanks left, although on 13 July, when it entered combat during Operation Citadel, it had 111 tanks. From 13 July to 30 September, the division’s losses amounted to 663 killed, 2,584 wounded, and 551 missing [3]. Fichtner never again returned to command of tank units.

Another tank commander in an era of shortage was Major General Mortimer von Kessel [18, p. 260], who became the commander of the 20th Panzer Division in May 1943. From 1 July 1939 until 8 May 1943, he held various administrative positions in the Wehrmacht. On 8 May 1943, von Kessel was appointed the commander of the 20th Panzer Division. In this position, he performed well both during the Battle of Kursk and in the battles near Smolensk and Vitebsk, for which he was awarded the Knight’s Cross on 28 December 1943. Interestingly, on 16 October 1944, he received the Oak Leaves to the Knight’s Cross for the successful actions of the 20th Panzer Division in Belarus in the summer of 1944. This is rather strange, considering that the division was destroyed during Operation Bagration. Major General Mortimer von Kessel ended the war as commander of the VII Panzer Corps. It should also be added that General von Kessel saved the left flank of Army Group Centre from getting defeated by Soviet forces during the Gorodok offensive in December 1943.

Another example is Major General Ernst Felix Fäckenstedt [18, p. 118], who had held various staff positions in the III Panzer Corps and the 1st Panzer Army since 1939. However, in June 1943, he took an independent command and became commander of the 5th Panzer Division, which suffered a disaster in its very first battle during Operation Citadel on 13 July 1943. In one day of fighting, 45 tanks were irretrievably destroyed. Fäckenstedt was removed from the division and, until the end of the war, held staff positions in the VI and XII Army Corps, but he never commanded any formations again, not even infantry ones.

One of the most unsuccessful, but at the same time interesting, examples was the appointment of Lieutenant General Adolf von Schell [18, p. 296] as commander of the newly formed 25th Panzer Division. From 1938, he was head of the command group of the Army High Command (OKH), and later head of the Weapons Department for Panzer Troops, Cavalry and Army Motorization. In mid-November 1938, he became General Plenipotentiary for Motor Transport under the Four-Year Plan and Deputy State Secretary in the Reich Ministry of Transport. On 1 January 1943, he was appointed commander of the 25th Panzer Division. In the autumn of 1943, the division was transferred to the Fastiv direction near Kiev [16]. One of its battalions had not been re-equipped with Panther tanks, and Inspector General of Panzer Troops Heinz Guderian made sure that the division received the 509th Heavy Panzer Battalion equipped with Tiger tanks as reinforcement [9]. However, even with such strong support, the fully combat-ready division was defeated in its first battles because of incompetent command. On 7 November 1943, the division began to disembark from the trains, and already on November 15, General of Panzer Troops Georg Jauer, commander of the 20th Panzergrenadier Division, was forced by higher command to place both divisions under his command, as General Schell had suffered a nervous breakdown and was sent to the rear.

Another example of an unsuccessful personnel decision was the appointment of the Knight’s Cross holder Major General Richard Koll as commander of the 1st Panzer Division [18, p. 83]. From 1 July 1942 till the end of December 1943, he was in the Führer Reserve and even became head of the repair department at the Armed Forces High Command (OKW). Thus, for almost a year and a half, the Panzer officer was away from frontline service. On 1 January 1944, he took command of the 1st Panzer Division, but on 19 February 1944, he was removed from his position by General Hermann Breith, commander of the III Panzer Corps. To reveal the level of General Koll’s “achievements”, it should be added that within a month and a half, the division irretrievably lost 24 Pz.IV tanks and 58 Panther tanks without completing a single combat mission [23].

However, Koll’s replacement was also not particularly competent. The Knight’s Cross holder Colonel Werner Marcks [18, p. 83] took command of the 1st Panzer Division at the end of February 1944. While serving in Africa, he became ill in September 1942 and, after recovering, was assigned to the Special Staff for Panzer Troops under Inspector General of Panzer Troops Heinz Guderian. On February 20, 1944, he took command of the 1st Panzer Division from the disgraced General Richard Koll. General Marcks remained commander of the 1st Panzer Division till September 1944. It should be noted that during his command, the division was almost completely destroyed in the Kamenets-Podolsky pocket [5], better known in Western historiography as the Hube Pocket. Strangely enough, for that episode in Marcks’s military career, he was awarded the Oak Leaves to the Knight’s Cross.

One of the shortest careers as a tank commander was that of Major General Hans Junck [18, p. 111], who attempted to command the 4th Panzer Division between 15 January and 5 February

1944. Until 1943, he had served as a department head in the Army Personnel Office. Why he was assigned to gain command experience with the 4th Panzer Division remains a mystery; he ended the war as the commandant of the fortress of Saint-Nazaire. It should be added that during his brief period in command, the 4th Panzer Division was engaged in repelling the Soviet offensive during the Kalinkovichi-Mozyr Operation and suffered losses of 341 men killed, 1,051 wounded, and 200 missing. Fifteen Pz. IV tanks were destroyed by fire, while the other seven were damaged and sent for repair [23].

On 6 September 1944, Lieutenant General Martin Unrein, a Knight’s Cross holder with Oak Leaves, the commander of the 14th Panzer Division, fell seriously ill. On 15 September 1944, Colonel Oskar Munzel assumed command of the 14th Panzer Division [18, p. 94]. Prior to that appointment, he had spent more than a year and a half commanding various tank schools and, from early 1943, had served as the commander of tactical courses at the Panzer Troops School. As early as 16 October 1944, he was awarded the Knight’s Cross. It should also be noted that the division fought in the Courland Pocket, and the 14th Panzer Division’s losses in September amounted to [23]: 275 killed, 1,427 wounded, and 174 missing. During the fighting in September, the division lost seven Pz. IV tanks and twelve Panther tanks, which were destroyed by fire [23]. October was no less bloody for the 14th Panzer Division [23]: 237 men were killed, 1,151 wounded, and 139 missing. During the battles in October, nine Pz. IV tanks and nineteen Panther tanks were destroyed by fire [23].

Another official from the military administrative authorities took command of the 3rd Panzer Division in May 1944. Lieutenant General Wilhelm Philipps [18, p. 103], who had held various positions in the Armaments Office since 1940 but had no combat experience whatsoever, was unexpectedly appointed commander of the 3rd Panzer Division on 24 May 1944. Philipps relinquished his position as divisional commander as early as January 1945. At first glance, more than six months of service at the Soviet-German front might seem to be sufficient to earn him a well-deserved Knight’s Cross. However, the fact is that the 3rd Panzer Division did not enter combat until August 1944, and Philipps spent the preceding period rebuilding and restoring the division. In September, the division rested near Warsaw, while in November it was held in reserve by Army Group Centre. Interestingly, as soon as heavy fighting began in Hungary, Lieutenant General Philipps was immediately replaced by Colonel Wilhelm Söth [18, p. 103]. Philipps returned to his former field in February 1945, once again becoming head of the Armaments and Equipment Department of the Army Armaments Office. He was even awarded the Knight’s Cross in March 1945 for successful tank operations in Hungary.

One of the individuals who might appear to contradict the argument against appointing administrators to command positions in combat units was Major General Werner Friebe [18, p. 148]. His successful command of the 8th Panzer Division in the battles near Brody and Tarnopol resulted in his being awarded the Knight’s Cross. However, in July 1944, due to a personal error on his part, the 8th Panzer Division was virtually destroyed while on the march as a result of a series of Soviet air strikes during the Lvov-Sandomierz Offensive. In fact, his mistakes contributed to the failure of all German counterattacks and prevented the shattered front from being restored. General Hermann Balck, commander of the XXXXVIII Panzer Corps, got furious and relieved Friebe of his command [1]. From 14 July until the end of the month, the 8th Panzer Division suffered losses of 308 men killed, 1,153 wounded, and 900 missing; in addition, virtually all of the division’s armored vehicles were lost [23]. Werner Friebe ended his military career as chief of staff in one of the rear-area military districts.

It wasn’t always just the administrators and logistics personnel who performed poorly in commanding tank divisions and exacerbated the situation for the Third Reich on the battlefield. In addition to them, there were also a number of combat generals who had managed to build a decent military career but stumbled precisely when it came to commanding a tank division.

Thus, the commander of the 2nd Panzer Division, General Vollrath Lübbe [18, p. 91], who had been in command since 1 October 1942, eventually withdrew the division in December 1943 for reinforcement in Europe, where on 31 January 1944 he finally left service in the mobile troops and subsequently commanded only infantry divisions on several occasions. It should be noted that the 2nd Panzer Division, under the command of General Lübbe, successfully fought in extremely difficult battles, repelling the Soviet offensive in November and December 1942 during Operation Mars (the division lost 857 men). Throughout 1943, the 2nd Panzer Division also operated quite successfully against Soviet troops – first near Kursk (for which he received the Knight’s Cross), then near Smolensk and in Belarus. However, the hardships and deprivations at the Soviet-German front, as well as the constant retreats, seem to have broken General Lübbe’s “tank” character.

The aforementioned Major General Scheller (Walter Scheller) [18, p. 158] was also not a model tank commander. Initially, things were not bad – he commanded the 11th Panzer Division and the 9th Panzer Division in turn, and even, while leading the latter in the spring of 1943, he was awarded the Knight’s Cross. However, in July 1943, during the fighting in the Orel salient, he had insurmountable disagreements with Colonel General Model, and he was permanently removed from the tank forces.

One of the most incomprehensible careers was that of Major General Karl Freiherr von Thüngen [18, p. 221]. From January 1942, with some interruptions, he commanded the 18th Panzer Division, experiencing all the hardships of combat on the Rzhev-Sukhovichi axis; he distinguished himself in the Orel salient in the spring of 1943; in April 1943, he was awarded the Knight’s Cross for this, and… was sent to the rear as head of the military inspection in Berlin – later he was executed as a participant of the anti-Hitler conspiracy.

A very controversial career was that of General Erwin Menny [18, p. 222], who commanded tank units in Africa, where he was awarded the Knight's Cross. He was then transferred to the Eastern Front and until the winter of 1942–1943 served as commander of the 18th Panzer Division. Apparently, the intensity of the fighting at the Eastern Front made too strong an impression on him, and as a result, he “moved” to the infantry: first he took command of the 187th Infantry Division, then the 333rd Infantry Division, then the 123rd Infantry Division, and by the end of 1943, he also took command of the 72nd Infantry Division – four infantry divisional commands in a little over six months of service.

It is interesting that in the Wehrmacht there were divisions with a very strange fate for their commanders. In the 18th TD, its very first commander, Lieutenant General Walther Nehring [18, p. 220], achieved heights in the tank troops and at the end of the war commanded a tank army [22], but all the other commanders of the 18th TD after Nehring ended their careers very mediocrely – in the rear, in the infantry, or were even executed for participation in the conspiracy. To the collection of infantry generals, along with von Thüngen and Menny, one can also add the last commander of the division, General Karl-Wilhelm von Schlieben [18, pp. 222-223], who earned the Knight’s Cross in the spring of 1943 while fighting as part of the 208th ID, and it is not entirely clear why, on the eve of Operation Citadel, in which tanks were supposed to play a huge role, the tank general and the Knight’s Cross holder von Thüngen was replaced by the infantry general von Schlieben, albeit an equally deserving Knight’s Cross holder. As a result, von Schlieben led the division through Operation Citadel with noticeable losses, and after heavy losses in the Spas-Demensk operation he supervised its disbandment. He then took command of the 709th ID at the Western Front, ending the war (having been captured) as commander of the garrison of the port of Cherbourg.

Another interesting example is the Engineer General Hans Mikosch, commander of the 13th TD, the Knight’s Cross with Oak Leaves holder [18, p. 183]. Before his appointment he commanded engineer units, however, at the end of December 1943 General Hauser, commander of the 13th TD, got into an accident and ended up in hospital. On 26 December, already holding the rank of Major General, Mikosch took command of the 13th Panzer Division. Possibly, the successes of Soviet troops in the winter-spring battles of 1944 [26] and the constant defeats of the 13th Panzer Division resulted in the Wehrmacht command’s disappointment with General Mikosch’s skills, and in mid-May 1944 he was transferred to the Führer Reserve as a senior engineer commander.

Of roughly 120 tank division commanders of the Eastern Front, we have examined the combat biography of 29 of them – about 25% of the total. These commanders were examples of insufficient personal preparation and incompetent personnel selection: psychological instability, appointment to a post on the principles of loyalty to the regime or to one or another corporate military grouping, as well as the personal sympathy of the General Inspector of Tank Troops – all of this outweighed the professional skills of the candidates.

It turned out that no quality personnel reserve was created for the German shock divisions, which decided the outcome of battles on the battlefield and made up a small part (no more than 10% of the total number of Wehrmacht formations). 25% of the tank commanders at the Eastern Front is a fairly significant number for such a critically important front-line. It turns out that the Panzer troops were not only defeated on the battlefield by their opponents – the Soviet tank commanders – but also suffered greatly at the hands of their own rear-area bureaucrats [17].

At the same time, there were plenty of competent commanders in the tank forces, but for some reason, instead of promoting and advancing careers of, for example, successful tank regiment commanders, the Wehrmacht High Command opted for experiments with appointing rear-area general administrators to tank command positions. Thus, Colonel Franz Bäke, a highly honoured holder of the Knight’s Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords, the commander of the 11th Panzer Regiment, received command of a division only in March 1945. Colonel Hermann Leopold August von Oppeln-Bronikowski, no less honoured holder of the Knight’s Cross with Oak Leaves [18, p. 260-261], commander of the 204th and 22nd Panzer Regiments, took command of the 20th TD only in November 1944, but for the Third Reich, it was already too late [25]. The smartest tank commander Hyazinth Graf Strachwitz von Groß-Zauche und Camminetz, the holder of Knight’s Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds, a participant in more than 100 tank attacks, the commander of the tank regiment “Greater Germany”, who in April of 1944 was already Major General, never became the commander of a tank division, although he did command administrative tank units in various army groups [6].

It would seem that the experience of victorious campaigns, the mistakes made, and the successes achieved all indicated that at the head of tank formations there should be appointed the most highly trained commanders [10]. However, as we can see, the military bureaucracy and the rear-echelon careerists of the Wehrmacht had their own view on the criteria to select a candidate for the position of a tank division commander.

Abbreviations

TD – tank division

MD – a motorized division, a type of mobile formation in the Wehrmacht – from the autumn of 1942, all motorized divisions were renamed Panzergrenadier divisions

AFD – the Luftwaffe’s airborne field division, mass‑formed in 1942 from personnel of the Luftwaffe’s ground units

ID – infantry division