ISBN 1-85367-359-5
463 pages

Introduction; Glossary of Terms; Bibliography

   George Nafziger has for years run his own private publishing business, mostly printing material he has written or translated himself and specializing in booklets about orders of battle and tables of organization and equipment. His latest effort is something of a departure. Published in the US by Stackpole Books and in the UK by Greenhill Books, it's a thick, oversized, hardcover book rather the kind of softcover booklet he generally self-publishes.
   The topic, however, is the same as his usual specialization: OB and TOE material, in this case focusing on German armored and artillery formations.
   Given that the Wehrmacht was not thoughtful enough to arrange all its units with utter consistency and symmetry, this is not the least studied aspect of the Second World War. Nafziger himself has published a series of OB booklets about the German Army with significant information on the panzer divisions. There have been many other specialized OB/TOE publications covering German forces, including booklets by Leo Niehorster and David Myers. Despite some flaws and mistakes, Hitler's Legions by Samuel W. Mitcham is an old standby on the TOEs and histories of German divisions, World War II: A Statistical Survey by John Ellis has an extensive section of OB/TOE data, and more recently Andris Kursietis delivered The Wehrmacht at War covering German ground forces during WWII. And of course Georg Tessin's venerable Verbande und Truppen remains the standard reference work for German units.
   So what is the intent of Nafziger's new book, what does it contain, and how does it compare to all the other German OB/TOE books?
   First and foremost, this is a book showing the exact organizational structures of German panzer and artillery formations. Following a brief (four-page) discussion of the organizational history of the panzer forces, Nafziger launches into a chapter entitled (somewhat misleadingly) "Tactical Organization of the Panzer Companies" in which, with a minimum of textual explanation, he presents lists of unit types and the theoretical compositions of those units. These are listed chronologically, beginning with the theoretical organization of panzer regiments, battalions, and companies as of 1 October 1938 and including reorganized structures as of 1 March 1939, 21 February 1940, etc. The units for which organizational structures are shown include not only tank companies, but also signals platoons, anti-tank battalions, pioneer battalions, medical services, etc. These lists segue into lengthy TOEs for the various incarnations of complete panzer divisions, usually listing the exact numbers and types of tanks assigned to each unit, sometimes listing numbers of other weapons (such as heavy machine guns, light machine guns, AT guns, etc), and occasionally listing numbers of officers, warrant officers, NCOs, and enlisted men. The sub-units are usually designated as partially motorized, motorized, or fully motorized (although these distinctions are not explained.) All these entries generally show generic units but on at least one occasion seem to use specific numbered formations as an example. This chapter amounts to about eleven pages and is shown strictly as text accompanied by one table ("Panzer Inventories 1935-39") but without any organizational diagrams (as used, for example, by Ellis and Myers).
   The third chapter is entitled "Divisional Histories," but it's important to remember these are organizational histories rather than operational histories. That is, unlike Mitcham's book, Nafziger provides little or no information about where the unit was or what it was doing at any specific time. Also, unlike Kursietis' book, Nafziger gives no information about unit commanders. Instead, on a unit by unit basis, this chapter reviews the structure of each panzer division as it is reorganized and as units are attached and detached. This material is quite detailed—often including field bakeries, butcher detachments, and field post offices—and is interspersed with tank inventories for particular dates.

   On 20 October 1940 the 2nd Panzer Regiment was reassigned to the newly forming 16th Panzer Division. On 6 November 1940 the 113th Schutzen Regiment was formed from the 3/1st Schutzen Regiment and assigned to the division. On 15 February 1941 the 2/69th Schutzen Regiment was used to form the 2/113th Schutzen Regiment. The 73rd Artillery Regiment formed a 3rd Battalion from the 2/56th Artillery Regiment. On 21 June 1941, the eve of the invasion of Russia, the division's panzer forces and their inventories were as follows:

1/, 2/1st Panzer Regiment
  1 Regimental Staff Signals Platoon
  1 Regimental Staff Light Panzer Platoon
  Each battalion had
    1 Panzer Staff Company
    1 Medium Panzer Company
    2 Light Panzer Companies
  PzMk II — 43
  PzMk III (59) — 71
  PzMk IV — 20
  PzBefWg — 11

   In this and the subsequent two chapters, "The Independent Army Panzer Brigades" and "Reserve and Replacement Panzer Formations", almost one hundred panzer divisions and independent panzer brigades are covered in considerable detail. Some of this information seems to be duplicated, though. For example, the 179th, 232nd, 233rd, and 273rd Reserve Panzer Divisions appear in two different chapters with similar if not identical entries.
   The sixth chapter, "Field Organization of Panzer Divisions," explains that each formation had three organizations: the standardized theoretical organization, the "authorized" variation due to local conditions or shortages, and "what actually existed in the field on any given day." Although never explicitly stated, apparently the previous chapters have presented the authorized TOEs. Now Nafziger delves into the field organizations. The first section outlines the field structures of nineteen panzer divisions as "Divisional Variations, 10 February - 15 May 1941." This section and the next section, "Divisional Variations, 16 May 1941 - 15 October 1942" (including twenty-five panzer divisions), are much sketchier than the previous chapters. Within the same chapter on field organizations, however, expanded OB data is given for "Authorized Organization, 10th Panzer Division in Tunisia, 17 May 1943" and "Organization of Panzer Divisions, September - October 1943" which includes twenty-two panzer divisions. This chapter proves to be a bit unclear and it's also a bit hazy why this information is presented in a separate chapter rather than integrated into the earlier entries for all the same divisions.
   In the ensuing chapters, similar kinds of information—theoretical organizations, "divisional histories" with what are apparently authorized organizations, and then assorted field organizations are shown for motorized divisions, panzer-grenadier divisions, light divisions, cavalry divisions and brigades, and miscellaneous units including a bicycle brigade, sturmgeschutz battalions, jagdpanzer and panzerjaeger formations, Tiger tank units, and Panther tank battalions. A further hundred pages is devoted to artillery units and flak corps, divisions, and brigades.
   Much of the basic information for the division-sized units is available elsewhere: Tessin tracks the comings and goings of subordinate maneuver units and Mitcham provides some skeletal notes on the composition of nearly every German division. However, Nafziger has far exceeded the organizational data compiled in any other English-language source and has added to that with amazing amounts of detail about exact numbers and types of weapons. Likewise, his compilation of field artillery, shore battery, flak, another artillery data is unmatched, going so far as to note the numbers, calibers, and origin (French, Dutch, Belgian, etc) of guns. In sum, this is the most complete single volume of OB and TOE information on German panzers and artillery we've ever seen.
   Despite this, there are, unfortunately, a few imperfections. The organization and layout of the material is sometimes confusing. Some of the text is repetitious and in some cases, as with the Panzer Reserve Divisions, entries are duplicated. Some of the information could have been better organized and integrated, and in some cases putting data into tabular format would have made it more accessible and comprehensible. As with most works of this kind, there are also inevitable gaps, although—rather than laziness on the author's part—this probably means that hard data is simply unavailable. A little more annotation, both to explain entries and to point out where reliable data is missing, would have been useful. It also appears that at least some parts of this might have been rushed to press with a little less polishing than might have been preferred.
   At the risk of quibbling, it also seems worth mentioning that the layout of the TOE data can be a little puzzling at times and there are occasional typos that can add to the confusion.
   The 1st Panzer Brigade of the 1st Panzer Division is listed thusly for 1 September 1939:

1st Panzer Brigade
  1st Panzer Regiment
    1 Armored Signals Platoon
    1 Staff Light Tank Platoon
    1st and 2nd Panzer Battalions, each with
      1 Armored Signals Platoon
      1 Staff Light Tank Platoon
      3 Light Panzer Companies
      1 (mot) Reserve Platoon
      1 (mot) Panzer Supply Company
    1 (mot) Maintenance Company
  1/, 2/2nd Panzer Regiment
    same as 3rd Panzer Regiment

   In this case it appears that the line "1/, 2/2nd Panzer Regiment" (meaning 1st and 2nd battalions of the 2nd Panzer Regiment) would probably be better rendered as "2nd Panzer Regiment" so that it could be seen that the regiment as a whole, rather than just the two battalions, had the same structure as its sister regiment. The line "same as 3rd Panzer Regiment" probably means "same as 1st Panzer Regiment" (although it seems to be true that the 3rd Panzer Regiment of the 2nd Panzer Division was at this time organized in the same fashion as the 1st Panzer Regiment)
   Sometimes it requires a bit of study to understand the indenting, as in this example from the 25th Panzer Division on 5 April 1943:

9th Panzer Regiment
    Regimental Staff
    1 Panzer Signals Platoon
  1st Battalion
    1 Regimental Staff and Staff Company
    3 Panzer Companies (22 PzMk IV each)
  2nd Battalion
    1 Regimental Staff and Staff Company
    3 Panzer Companies (14 PzMk IV each)
  1 Panzer Maintenance Company (2 platoons)

   This inconsistent indenting (the "Regimental Staff" and "1 Panzer Signals Platoon" being indented farther than "1 Panzer Maintenance Company" even though they all appear to be directly subordinate to the regiment), separation of identically subordinated units (two regimental subordinations at the top, then the battalions with their own organic units, then the final regimental subordination), and inconsistent use of bold text (sometimes battalions are shown in bold, sometimes not; sometimes units with subordinate units listed are shown in bold; sometimes not) wouldn't matter much except that the book's pages are laid out in two-column format and it can be a bit of a puzzler to figure out the subordinations from the bottom of one column to the top of the next.
   Although they do sometimes make it more difficult to actually extract specific sets of data from the text, none of these minor imperfections detract from the overall value of the information or the usefulness of the book. This is quite the powerhouse of OB and TOE material, and quite possibly the best work George Nafziger has ever done. OB specialists, wargamers, students of the German Army, and anyone excited by mountains of hard, cold facts will find this book indispensable.
   Available from online booksellers, local bookshops, or directly from Stackpole Books.
   Thanks to Stackpole for providing this review copy.