The best WW2 infantry squad or Platoon, choose, construct compare.

[Juha]

Soren,
in the picture we see 2 men carrying one radio, an AM radio divided to two packs. And as Davebender wrote, these were normally company level equipment. That was a great weakness when combared to US army, which had radios down to platoon level, SCR-536s. Companies had SCR-300 man-portable FM radio, ie one man was needed to carry it. So US Army had more and better radios, so at least in theory better situational awarness and much easier to get arty support and arty was the big killer.

Juha

 

[Soren]

Better radios ? I beg to differ Juha.

I think you need take a look at this site:
WWII German Radio Page

The Germans were the only ones who had High fidelity radios during WW2.

 

[Soren]

Actually the FJ's on the picture are carrying the pieces I listed, and one of them is part of the Torn. Fu. b1.

 

[Juha]

Soren
you must have added the extra info while I was typing my message.

And
Quote:"The Germans were the only ones who had High fidelity radios during WW2"

Are you sure? Their "Tornister" radio was a HFradio but that means High Frequency. SCR-300 was VHF, V= Very, it operated between 40-48mHz.

Juha

 

[Soren]

The Tornister E. b wasn't a high fidelity piece, it was a regular high frequency radio. The Germans however, as the only ones in the world, had high fidelity radios. The Allies captured them after the war and were astounded at the sound quality. Hitler also had his own home version.

You should look up the Köln E52b, it was the best short wave reciever of WW2, so good that the US used a direct copy throughout the 50's 60's.

 

[Juha]

Thanks for the Köln E52b lead, but what I found in net is that it was Air to Ground receiver, all pages which mentioned where a set was captured, says that it was vehicle mounted and it seems that only some 2500 were made. So it seems that in itself not much fun for infantry in combat, maybe for a air nut who only wants to hear what the airboys were talking about but IMHO all normal soldiers would have prefered portable trasceiver. I have thought that Tornister was Heer's standard infantry radio.

British infantry radios were smaller than Tornister, weighting 15kg (Type 18 ) or 10Kg (Type 38 ) and while using a bit higher frequencies than Tornister were still HF radios. British efforts to produce portable Infantry VHF radios failed.

Juha

 

[davebender]

A nice site!

It's my understanding that the German Army emphasized the use of dedicated artillery forward observers who were attached to combat units they were supporting. That's an inherently superior way to adjust artillery fire. The typical platoon leader is too busy to do a proper job directing artillery even if he has the skills to do so. The artillery forward observer will obviously have the best available communications equipment.

 

[Juha]

Hello Dave
I don't know army which didn't prefer arty FO teams to adjust arty fire, but because in every army there were only limited number of these it was still much better to have someone with radio at platoon level than not.

Juha

 

[Soren]

Well Juha you just made the claim that the Germans didn't carry around as many radios as the Western Allies. Now I'm not sure wether this was actually the case, but I'd like some info on it if you have it.

As for the Köln E52b, I didn't mention it because that's what I was proposing for my infantry unit, I mentioned it to show to you that the Germans infact made better radios than anyone else.

For my platoon I'd probably use something like the Kleinfunksprecher d two way radio reciever or the Torn. Fu. d 2 Portable VHF tranceiver (17 kg only!). There's also the 15W.S.E.a HF transceiver.

Btw, on the issue of high fidelity sound:
Magnetophon - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

And here another picture from the archive:

 

[parsifal]

It is true that the germans attempted to introduce VHF frequencies for their battlefield comms. It is not true that this development pre-dated or superseded the allied efforts, particularly the british.

British engineers had developed workable designs for VHF comms in the early part of the war. These were developed postwar into the Larkspur series of comms devices. They were not introduced into the british Army until after the war, because such a conversion would take time, and money, both of which were in short supply during the war years. It should also be noted that HF frequencies maintain a better level of communication over VHF frequencies over longer distances, but VHF provides clearer, more secure communications in a battlefield environment (ie over shorter ranges).

The Germans were more advanced in achieving engineering solutions for their VHF technologies at the end of the war, but the development of the technologies themselves lagged behind the British by about two years.

The reason why the US adopted German technologies after the war had nothing to do with its superior performance. Compared to the British Larkspur series (and derivatives) it is a decidedly inferior system, in fact. The US adopted simply because it was already developed, and could be obtained for free, as war booty essentially

Plus, I am not at all convinced that the US did not have VHF technologies available to it during the war iteself. This site, indicates that in fact they posesed quite a range of VHF sets, issued at a scale far in excess that enjoyed by the Germans

Here is the link for those that are interested

U.S. Military Portable Radios

 

[Soren]

I don't see any WW2 sets on that site which come close to the German VHF sets.

 

[Juha]

Hello Soren
on the level of where radios were distibuted, last time saw that in Zaloga's Lorraine, have seen same also earlier, US down to platoon level, SCR-536 HF/AM hand held radios, at company level SCR-300 VHF/FM one man back radios. Tech. specs, see Parsifal's link. Heer only to company level. British, no time to check but their HF radios were lighter than Germany's See my #26 vs your messages, but were they better,maybe better (or not) than Germany's HF but IMHO not as good as Germany's VHF radios.

Juha

 

[Soren]

Take the Torn. Fu. d 2 portable VHF tranceiver, 17 kg all together, and see if you can find anything Allied that came close, I can't. (And btw, the design is from 1936, so Parsifal's claim that the Germans were behind to begin with seems incorrect)

Lo1UK35 tranceiver, German WWII, WW2

As for the level of distribution, again I'm not sure how low it went in the Heer compared to the US Army or Commonwealth forces, but I'm pretty sure the FallschirmJaeger GebirgsJaeger's were issued with radios down to squad level, and later on with the extremely light Dorette types.

 

[parsifal]

We should not get too side tracked, but this is an interesting discussion.

I wuld concede that the german set mentioned by Soren is a good one, but I do draw issue that it was the best by far.

I never said, incidentally that the british were ahead in all fields of radio, simply that their research during the war was ahead of the germans, regarding VHF technologies, because of their developments various conductors, and some other areas that I have since forgotten. Evidence of that can be found in their "larkspur" series of transceivers, which I consider to be years ahead of anything else in that genre. However these high quality transceivers wqere not introduced until after the war, for reasons of economy and time, which I have previously alluded to.

But returning to the issue of the German equipment versus the Allied equipment. I think firstly I should provide some information that I do have.

Here are the links to firstly, the British military radios of the period. Britain did not convert to VHF frequencies until postwar, so their short range radio equipment was not as good as the germans during the war. However, HF is superior to VHF over longer distances, and in this area I believe the British held an advantage.

Anyway here is the best link I know of that summarises the British transceivers of the period....

Wireless Sets. List of technical data on vintage British Army Wireless Sets.

The other piece of information that I have is the TM-11-242, which is the instruction manual for the chief US man-portable set of the war (and most comparable to the german equipment. This is the link for you to have a look at

http://www.scr300.org/jpgs/SCR-300-A-003.jpg


I dont see any great advantage for the german equipment in this comparison. The German set was a 1 watt transmitter (very powerful) operating in AM frequency with an output of 33.8 mhz thru to 38.0 mhz frequency. The frequency is important because the shorter the wavelength, the clearer the signal. However the fact that it operated in the AM mode must have affected its clarity to a degree. How much I dont know. It weighed 17.2 Kg, or about 38 lbs.

By comparison, the SCR 300 were only a 0.3 watt output, but has a sensitve receiver capability at only 0.2 milliwatts.....meaning it could receive quite weak signals. The US equipment operated in the FM band, with an out put of 40-48 Mhz. To be honest I dont know which set would be clearer, each one has advantages and disadvanatages. The US set was lighter than the German equipment at 33.2 lbs (although this could go up to 38 lbs if a heavier battery was used....generally the lighter weight battery was used in Infantry formations.

Make of this what you will, but I dont see any clearcut advantage for the German equipment. I know also that the British became worls leaders in the postwar era, up until the '70s and were not using German derived technology

 

[parsifal]

A couple of further observations that I forgot to mention. The SCR 300 had a nominal range of about 20 miles, according to one source I could find.

SCR 300 was a device issued at Company to Platoon level, with more than 50000 produced for the US Army. The SCR was dubbed the "Walkie Talkie" by the forces using it. It entered general usage in 1943, after Torch, but before Sicily.

The Platoon to Squad level device was the SCR 536, known as the "Handie Talkie" (but often mistakenly referred to as the "Walkie Talkie") was the famous hand held sets we see in movies and such. Most front line American Infantry Squads would have had access to them , as more than 150000 were delivered to the US Army, to equip about 70 Infantry Divisions or so. To give a handie talkie to each Infantry Squad in a Division, which is roughly 300 sets per division. To equip all 70 divs with the SCR 536 (as it was officially callied) would require 210000. There were other radio sets in use in the US army, so very roughly it appears in my opinion to be possible for the "handie Talkie" to be considered a squad level comms device.

I dont think there was anything comparable in any other army, but I will stand corrected if alternative evidence can be presented. Certainly the Torn.FU.d2 series, and every other German man portable radio I have seen are more Platoon or Company level devices.

The SCR-536 was much more limited in its capability compared to the SCR-300. It weighed 2.3 kg and had a range of about one mile, and similar to the German sets, used AM technology.

 

[parsifal]

And a few pictures of allied squad/platoon/company level comms devices in the Allied Armies...

First up is the SCR 300

 

[parsifal]

Here I have a couple of shots of the SCR 536

 

[parsifal]

Finally I have a couple of Shots of British equipment. The first is the general issue W-18, issued from 1940, the next is the W-38 II issued from 1941, and the last is a W 48, issued from 1942. The specs for these sets are in the link that I gave you guys

 

[Juha]

Hello Soren
On German armed forces
Even Motorized Infantry Coys didn't have radios in Summer 42, see KStN 138c and KStN 1114(Afr). At Battalion (Mot. Inf) level there were 4 Pack Radio Sect d. In 90.leichte Afrika D 2 Pack Radio Sect d and 2 Lt Armd Radio Sect d.

And same to SS Inf Coy (mot) in Summer 44, they still follow KStN 138c. Battalion level as above, Sources Leo Niehorster's series of German WWII organizations

Parsifal
Nice photos, Thanks!

Juha

 

[Soren]

Parsifal,

Did you read about the "Dorette" ? This was a squad level radio. Here it is again:
15W.S.E.a transmitter and receiver, German WWII, WW2

Now how does that compare to the "Handie Talkie" ?

I believe the FallschirmJaeger GebirgsJaeger were equipped with this piece at squad level. I'm not sure enough were made to equip the Wehrmacht Waffen SS though, so they were relying on the Torn.Fu.d 2 and the like at Companie level mostl likely. But so far I've seen no data to suggest that the Western Allies were equipped with more radios, or that they were equipped at squad level.