It’s an old German military adage that Schweiß spart Blut (“sweat spares blood”), which means that a rigorous training program ensures that battle-inexperienced troops have a better chance of survival in their baptisms of fire. The German Army also practiced that adage, and its training programs were probably second-to-none in the prewar years. It was superior German training, coupled with flexible leadership and well-defined doctrine, that allowed the Germans to compensate for inferior numbers and occasionally inferior equipment. As the war lengthened and expanded in scope, the Germans were unable to sustain the rigorous training pace of the peacetime army. In addition, the continued attrition of the leadership ranks, particularly at the junior level, virtually assured a continuous decline in quality that also contributed in part to the inevitable downfall. Those factors also weighed heavily on the reconnaissance force, but because it and the other mechanized and armored forces shared a certain élan, they were called upon to be the backstop for the less mobile elements of the army and were often able to achieve far more than their mere numbers would indicate. The training for the force could be geared toward the individual soldier, the crew, the section, the platoon, and higher levels of command and also toward other service branches, but the end effect was directly related to the quality of the instruction and the instructors. The Germans insisted on after-action reports, thorough discussions of what transpired, and a debriefing of the entire unit or formation. In this image, a reconnaissance officer talks to some of his soldiers at the Bruck Training Area in modern-day eastern Austria in 1943.
Source :
Book "Scouts Out: A History of German Armored Reconnaissance Units in World War II" by Robert Edwards
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