Was Air Power decisive in the two battles of El Alamein?

[Shortround6]

don't get too carry away with the M7, nice bit of kit. But.......
A four hour barrage firing at even one shot per minute is 240 rounds per barrel.
M7 carried 73 rounds of ammunition.

Artillery needs a crap load of logistic support.
fire rates for the US 105mm
1st 1/2 minute..................8rpm
first 4 min...........................4rpm
first 10 mi...........................3rpm
sustained..........................100 rounds/hour.

You could fire faster at times, however you are juggling barrel life with rates of fire and with charge loads (range)
US 105 barrel was good for around 10,000 rounds.
In NW Europe in 1944 they were replacing barrels in 5,000 rounds. warn barrels are not accurate and they don't give the expected range.
If worn enough they can give "pre-matures" (round going off in the barrel, ruins everybody's whole day)

 

[SaparotRob]

I also have Jutland.

 

[Shortround6]

The Hummel was my favorite piece in the board game "Panzer Blitz ".

Hummel carried 15-18 rounds of main gun ammo.
needs a crap load of half tracks/ trucks in support.

 

[Shortround6]

Artillery, as a general rule of thumb and averaging a lot of battles together is estimated to have caused about 1/2 of all battle field casualties.
Artillery is also very logistic intensive.
This was the cause of the British cheap shell history.
In 1914 the Field guns of both the British and French were firing at unheard of rates per day.
This was the first war with "rapid fire" guns, or at least the first big one.
Rapid fire guns had recoil systems that allowed the gun to fire and stay in one spot on the ground so the gunners could reload and fire again in a matter of seconds.
There were breech loading guns but they tended to move several feet when recoiling and needed to be pointed at the target with each shot. They also often had no traverse and so even though the breech could be operated fairly quickly the firing cycle was rather long.
The French 75 and British 18lbs could be fired at over 20 rpm in very good conditions. They were burning up ready stocks in just days, reserve stocks didn't last long. 2nd tier stuff (empty shells that needed to filled) was finished using extra manpower/shifts and still there wasn't enough. Guns were going though 400-500 shells a day in some battles.
What didn't help was that they had shells for the wrong war, No or very little HE. the rounds of choice were Shrapnel. These were filled with small balls that were fired out the front of the shell by a small charge (which didn't even burst the whole shell body), like giant shotgun shells being fired just ahead if the enemies troops. Devastating if the troops were tightly bunched up in the open. Against dispersed troops hiding behind walls and in ditches........not so much. Which lead to more rounds being used.
A whole bunch of companies were given contracts (most of which had never made an artillery shell before) by what even means and materials they had at hand. When this "stuff" got to the front the newspaper headlines changed from not just "shell shortages for our boys" to stories of blown up guns, decimated gun crews, accusations of incompetence, maleficence, bribes and so on. This lasted for weeks (longer news cycle then, and there were hundreds of blown up guns).
By some time in 1915 more reliable shell suppliers had geared up, the incompetent ones gotten rid off (a bit more fire discipline helped) and that crisis faded into the general mess that was WW I tactics and battles.
However it seems that the idea of cheap, easily produced but reliable ammunition had lodged itself into the British high command mindset.
Might have made sense if WW II had stayed just across the channel in France. Once you are shipping tens/hundreds of thousands of rounds around Africa to Egypt and to Asia cheap ammo starts getting rather expensive in a number of ways.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

View attachment 701622

Are those 'Decons'? yeah this was tried but I think not so successful. They were used on the Mareth line in 1943. There were a lot of early attempts at stuff like that, this was an early US ... thing (M6 GMC, with a 37mm gun), which they amazingly made 5,000 of:

These saw action in Tunisia but were not very well liked though and quickly taken out of the front line after getting slaughtered at Sidi Bou Zid, though they did use them in the Pacific somewhat where the He and especially cannister round on the 37 mm could be useful. I gather in many cases they just took the gun off in the field, the 37mm was small enough that it could be manhandled by an infantry squad.

As I'm sure you know, this is the M3 GMC - self propelled light (WW I type) field gun. They could use the same 75mm ammunition as the M3 and M4 medium, so they had decent penetration and could kill German medium tanks, while also having some utility against AT guns or other crew served weapons. They were used as "Tank Destroyers" and got some tank victories at El Guettar in 1943, but losses were prohibitive and they were swiftly relaced by M10s like most of these Allied 'mobile AT guns'. The M3 GMC was more useful as an indirect fire support weapon, (arguably with a bit more agility in rough terrain than an M7?) in which mode they were actually used with some success in Tunisia and later in Sicily and Italy.

The chief defensive advantage of the smaller caliber AT guns was their small size and silhouette compared to tanks, making them easy to hide and put into a cunning ambush. Obviously with these kinds of rigs that went out the window - it's a big fat and all to soft target. The problem with all these was they were too vulnerable. Although the M3 halftrack had some armor, in practice they were not immune to German machine guns which would often be in range of them when used, were vulnerable to light mortar fire, and any kind of AT gun or AA gun would kill them quickly.

The Germans too had a variety of halftracks with AT guns and field guns, and used them with some success but they took heavy losses.

There were as we know many different approaches to how much to armor mobile AT guns, the Germans tried various options, probably their most successful was the StuG III, which had enough armor to protect against anything up to a high velocity AT gun, at least on the front. The US answer was the also successful M10, which had enough armor to protect against MG 42s and probably light AA guns, and at range maybe even the lighter AT guns, but relied on ambush and 'shoot and scoot' tactics beyond that. M36 or Biritsh M10 hack "Achilles" relied on having a big enough gun to 'kill anything that moves', while arguably the most successful Allied TD was the Hellcat which basically had just enough armor to protect from machine guns and mortar fragments, but a very high mobility (plus the controversial open turret for increased situational awareness).

don't get too carry away with the M7, nice bit of kit. But.......
A four hour barrage firing at even one shot per minute is 240 rounds per barrel.
M7 carried 73 rounds of ammunition.

Artillery needs a crap load of logistic support.
fire rates for the US 105mm
1st 1/2 minute..................8rpm
first 4 min...........................4rpm
first 10 mi...........................3rpm
sustained..........................100 rounds/hour.

You could fire faster at times, however you are juggling barrel life with rates of fire and with charge loads (range)
US 105 barrel was good for around 10,000 rounds.
In NW Europe in 1944 they were replacing barrels in 5,000 rounds. warn barrels are not accurate and they don't give the expected range.
If worn enough they can give "pre-matures" (round going off in the barrel, ruins everybody's whole day)

I wouldn't compare it to a HIMARS, but I think it was a pretty big step forward in 1942. All armored vehicles had to be resupplied quite often, they will be bringing ammunition up at least every day when they are in action and probably more like 3 or 4 times a day during a major battle like either El Alamein engagement. But this thing could move around quickly. 73 rounds was actually a lot of 105mm (compare to Wespe with 40 rounds, Hummel with 18 rounds, Bishop with 32 rounds of 88mm. Sexton had a respectable 105 rounds.

M7 also had some armor, and even with the open top probably enough to protect against those pesky German machine guns and light mortars, shell fragments etc., probably enough to get out of trouble unless faced with a tank or AT gun.

The lighter field guns (75 and 105mm) and medium mortars (81, 82 or 85mm) were sometimes more useful in battle than the really big (4-5-6" on up) guns, precisely because they did carry more rounds (this is true for towed guns too because they don't keep an infinity of ammunition next to each artillery piece). The vast majority of artillery rounds expended in any war don't hit anywhere near their intended target. So you want to be able to shoot a lot of rounds and shoot again and again as your spotter directs and corrects. The 25 pounder is a pretty good compromise with a high rate of fire (from 6-8 down to 3 rounds per minute, similar to the M7) but the 105mm M1 / M2 howitzer has that same rate of fire with nearly twice as much explosive. So 4-5 rounds per minute with a substantially wider kill radius for each round.

These days most armies around the world have gone to towed or self propelled 155mm guns, which do have a much bigger bang, (the Russians stuck largely though not entirely to 122mm which seems to be causing them problems in Ukraine) and good range, but those are big shells to carry around and big rigs to shoot them. I suspect there could still be a niche for a good fast firing 105mm even today.

 

[Shortround6]

I would note that the M7s and Bishops contribution was that they "could keep up with an advance". But that is a lot slower than what is being portrayed.
This is WW II, no gps
M7 battery could "mount up" and drive off in minutes, not seconds. Depending on how things were going, the battery would go to one pre-selected site or another. Pull off the trail/track and deploy. Align the barrels in the direct of expected fire, space the vehicles out in the expected pattern ( so the impact area would correspond to some extent), Ammo vehicles would pull up to the gun vehicles, phone wires would be laid at times. Gun captains would lay out marker stakes (gun sights were aimed at stakes set at certain distances so when an order for 200 ydrs right came in they could move the sight the precise distance needed to get the result. it could take up to 30 minutes from 1st vehicle stopping to first round range.
However this was several hours quicker than a towed battery. That was when the advancing tanks could get beyond the range of the guns and it took hours to move the guns and set them up again. The M7s could also traverse ground that trucks got stuck in even if all the batteries vehicles couldn't do it and needed to go around. Some fire support was better than none. The Artillery batteries would move leap frog style tying to keep a least few batteries with in range.

The M7s were not firing over open sights in the desert at any range to engage anti tank guns, unless they really goofed. They should be firing indirectly at targets under observation by a forward observer.

this was also a limit for the 8th Army as they had so few long range guns. More long range guns could give cover as the short ranged batteries moved up.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

What didn't help was that they had shells for the wrong war, No or very little HE. the rounds of choice were Shrapnel. These were filled with small balls that were fired out the front of the shell by a small charge (which didn't even burst the whole shell body), like giant shotgun shells being fired just ahead if the enemies troops. Devastating if the troops were tightly bunched up in the open. Against dispersed troops hiding behind walls and in ditches........not so much. Which lead to more rounds being used.

The US had this (which they call 'cannister') on some tank guns in WW2, they had them for sure on the 37mm guns on M3 / M5 light tanks, M8 armored cars and others. Quite telling in some situations both in Europe and (I think especially) in the Pacific. Today they have a cannister round for the 120mm gun on an M1 tank (and other similar tanks) too. That would not be fun to be in front of.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OElKpZt5ZF0

A whole bunch of companies were given contracts (most of which had never made an artillery shell before) by what even means and materials they had at hand. When this "stuff" got to the front the newspaper headlines changed from not just "shell shortages for our boys" to stories of blown up guns, decimated gun crews, accusations of incompetence, maleficence, bribes and so on. This lasted for weeks (longer news cycle then, and there were hundreds of blown up guns).
By some time in 1915 more reliable shell suppliers had geared up, the incompetent ones gotten rid off (a bit more fire discipline helped) and that crisis faded into the general mess that was WW I tactics and battles.
However it seems that the idea of cheap, easily produced but reliable ammunition had lodged itself into the British high command mindset.
Might have made sense if WW II had stayed just across the channel in France. Once you are shipping tens/hundreds of thousands of rounds around Africa to Egypt and to Asia cheap ammo starts getting rather expensive in a number of ways.

Hahahah spoken like a true S4 guy

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

I would note that the M7s and Bishops contribution was that they "could keep up with an advance". But that is a lot slower than what is being portrayed.
This is WW II, no gps
M7 battery could "mount up" and drive off in minutes, not seconds. Depending on how things were going, the battery would go to one pre-selected site or another. Pull off the trail/track and deploy. Align the barrels in the direct of expected fire, space the vehicles out in the expected pattern ( so the impact area would correspond to some extent), Ammo vehicles would pull up to the gun vehicles, phone wires would be laid at times. Gun captains would lay out marker stakes (gun sights were aimed at stakes set at certain distances so when an order for 200 ydrs right came in they could move the sight the precise distance needed to get the result. it could take up to 30 minutes from 1st vehicle stopping to first round range.

Yes depending on a variety of circumstances. I've seen M107s move shoot and deploy again inside 10 minutes during military exercises.

But even half an hour is a big improvement as you note, and maybe just as important, if the M7 battery is targeted by counterbattery fire, or in some other similar emergency, they can turn the engine on, put the thing into reverse and LEAVE in a few seconds ... which can be real important. Counterbattery wasn't as sophisticated in WW2 as it is today with radar / computer controlled firing solutions but it was definitely a thing in WW2.

However this was several hours quicker than a towed battery. That was when the advancing tanks could get beyond the range of the guns and it took hours to move the guns and set them up again. The M7s could also traverse ground that trucks got stuck in even if all the batteries vehicles couldn't do it and needed to go around. Some fire support was better than none. The Artillery batteries would move leap frog style tying to keep a least few batteries with in range.

The M7s were not firing over open sights in the desert at any range to engage anti tank guns, unless they really goofed. They should be firing indirectly at targets under observation by a forward observer.

this was also a limit for the 8th Army as they had so few long range guns. More long range guns could give cover as the short ranged batteries moved up.

Even in the desert, line of sight wasn't infinite. As I think you noted earlier, dust was a big factor, haze in the air and sometimes rain (yes it does rain there). A lot of the fighting on the front line and it's support elements (like the deadly German 88s and their medium artillery and mortars) was within range of the M7 or the 25 pounder. The bigger guns were useful for more specialized missions.

 

[EwenS]

Are those 'Decons'?

No. Those were portee carried 2pdr on a 15cwt truck. The gun could be unloaded from the back of the truck.

This is the Deacon. Minimal use in North Africa

Deacon (artillery) - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

There were similar arrangements for the 6pdr. Just used a bigger 3 tonner.

 

[SaparotRob]

Hummel carried 15-18 rounds of main gun ammo.
needs a crap load of half tracks/ trucks in support.

Long enough for a game of Panzer Blitz.

 

[Shortround6]

I would hazard a guess that the German artillery park was more powerful on a per gun basis.
I would also very strongly suspect that they didn't have near the rounds per gun the British had at the start of the battle.
Very little about the Africa Korps was standard but the German's standard field howitzer was a 10.5cm. (less range the 25pdr) but they had a selection of 10.5cn guns (equal to the 4.5in) and 15cm howitzers (equal to the 5.5in) that should have been around in fair numbers. I am ignoring the real odd ball stuff.
They also had some captured French stuff but I don't know in what numbers. A few guns or a few batteries.
British only had a few batteries of anything that wasn't a 25pdr.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

The real issue though, and biggest tactical target for the DAF, was the 88s though. Those 88mm AT guns basically blocked any significant advance by the 8th Army. That is what I kind of want to dig into next.

 

[Shortround6]

Please remember that the 88mm AT guns were just that, AT guns.
Most of them were no longer AA guns. You could elevate them and fire them into the sky.
But most had their AA sights removed, and/or the fuse setters removed, and/or the connections for the AA director.

one guy turned the crank wheel to align the pointers on the left and the other guy turned the crank wheel to align the pointers on the right.
One for elevation and one for traverse. There are a few different styles.
Fuse setter

Shells go nose down into the box closest to the base, Cranking the handle on the box sets the fuse according the settings passed on from the director.
Cable from the director had 104 contact pins.
Many 88s if the Luftwaffe ever recovered them, and some or all of the AA equipment stripped away and were useless as AA guns unless (if ever) refitted.

There is an argument that Rommel might have done better to leave more 88s around the harbors/supply areas rather than use them as AT guns,

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

Yeah like most static defenses, the 88 mm AT guns were devastating... until somebody figured out where they were exactly. Then, assuming you have something that can reach that area, like a tank gun or (hopefully) some effectively spotted artillery, their lifespan is measured in minutes.

Those Flak 18 (etc.) had a range in miles, so that was another problem for the tanks which couldn't shoot nearly that far.

But one of the things about the desert was, as you say, dust, and spotter planes could see the dust from these big guns firing, and that is where the fighter bombers would drop bombs. Even when covered by camo nets they often did get them it seems.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

Something struck me as odd about the Kittyhawk variants noted above in that OOB. Halley "Squadrons of the Royal Air Force & Commonwealth 1918-1988" has this:-

2SAAF - Kittyhawk I 4/42-6/43 then Kittyhawk III
4SAAF - Kittyhawk I 6/42-7/43
5 SAAF - Tomahawk IIB 2/42-1/43, then Kittyhawk III to 12/43

That's actually news to me that 2 and 5 SAAF got Kittyhawk III, good for them. These may have been P-40M

260 - began to receive Kittyhawk III in Dec 1942

260 was using Kittyhawk II from Sept 42

3 RAAF - No Kittyhawk III until 4/43

I show 3 RAAF making a claim with a Kittyhawk III and also losing one in Oct 43, though they too were switching to Kittyhawk II/ IIA

450 - Kittyhawk III from 9/42 replacing Mk.I
250 - Kittyhawk III from 10/42 replacing Mk.I
112 - Kittyhawk III from 10/42 replacing Mk.I

So at El Alamein only 3 squadrons with Mk.III

Plus one of the 57th FG squadrons., I think 64th

According to that reference the only RAF/Commonwealth users of the Kittyhawk II were
250 - 4/42-10/42 alongside Mk.I
260 - 2/42-5/43 alongside Mk.I with Mk.III joining the mix 12/42

260 was almost all Mk II in this period, I have a little book specifically on the British use of Kittyhawk II.

3 RAAF - 11/42-3/44 alongside Mk.I 11/42-12/42 and then Mk.III from 4/43

They were also mostly converted to Mk II for a good while, I'll go find the book

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

The Hummel was my favorite piece in the board game "Panzer Blitz ".

Whenever I saw a Wespe on "Allied Generals", I took it out ASAP if I could. Mobile arty is of the Devil.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

Please remember that the 88mm AT guns were just that, AT guns.
Most of them were no longer AA guns. You could elevate them and fire them into the sky.
But most had their AA sights removed, and/or the fuse setters removed, and/or the connections for the AA director.
View attachment 701658
one guy turned the crank wheel to align the pointers on the left and the other guy turned the crank wheel to align the pointers on the right.
One for elevation and one for traverse. There are a few different styles.
Fuse setter
View attachment 701659
Shells go nose down into the box closest to the base, Cranking the handle on the box sets the fuse according the settings passed on from the director.
Cable from the director had 104 contact pins.
Many 88s if the Luftwaffe ever recovered them, and some or all of the AA equipment stripped away and were useless as AA guns unless (if ever) refitted.

There is an argument that Rommel might have done better to leave more 88s around the harbors/supply areas rather than use them as AT guns,

88s were used as field arty on plenty of occasions too.

 

[SaparotRob]

Whenever I saw a Wespe on "Allied Generals", I took it out ASAP if I could. Mobile arty is of the Devil.

That was my number two choice. To quote Napoleon Bonaparte "All I require is volume of fire" or something.

 

[Shortround6]

That's actually news to me that 2 and 5 SAAF got Kittyhawk III, good for them. These may have been P-40M

Since both the P-40K and the P-40M were known as Kittyhawk IIIs we have to be very careful figuring out who actually got what.
Now somehow the British decided that P-40Ls would be called both KIttyhawk IIs and IIIs, but since the first P-40L left the factory in Jan 1943 it doesn't show up for El Alamein either.

Curtiss records show where the planes were shipped but what happened to them once they got there may be lost. The US got planes that were originally allocated a and shipped to the British at times.
For El Alamein forget the P-40Ms. Didn't happen, now way, without a time machine.

For Alamein you have P-40E Kittyhawk Is and Kittyhawk IAs (P-40E-1s)
You have the P-40Fs operating with the US forces.
The British only got a few P-40Ks.

Something of note is that the US Army gave the British 47 modified Allison V-1710-73 engines with a unique oil line from a breather cap to the and special adapter to the oil pump drive for installation on RAF P-40E and E-1 aircraft which would turn them into ersatz P-40Ks. This was done on Aug 11th 1942. I have no idea if they relabeled them.

Now for the first 600 or so P-40Ks which starting leaving the factory May 20th 1942.
The British commonwealth got at least 182
The Soviet Union got at least 87, from the factory.
At least 86 went to code name Cheroke (India) while 64 went to Hazel (India) and at lest 74 were diverted to Pact (Chungking China)
At least 92 went to Hawaii and 24 of them were passed to Midway. Some these later returned to to the US
Bronze (Alaska, 11th Air Force) got 47
Pewter (Iceland) got 11.
Africa/mid east got 59, 13 of which went to Cairo. Others went to China
Small numbers went to Australia, New Guinea, New Caledonia and other places in the area.

The First P-40K-5 came off the line in Sept 1942 (or Aug 31s?) and it is getting rather tight to get the planes from Buffalo to Egypt in time for El Alamein.
162-192 of this batch (K-5s, K-10s, K-15s) went to the British Commonwealth, 40 more to Australia, 10 more to New Zealand, Canada got 15 starting in Jan 1943.
Small numbers went to China, Brazil and other places and at least 37 were lost in training accidents in the US.

 

[Shortround6]

Whenever I saw a Wespe on "Allied Generals", I took it out ASAP if I could. Mobile arty is of the Devil.

Especially in war games/computer games, sometimes unlimited ammo, doesn't need to reload, sets up and breaks down in seconds. Towed stuff is even worse, nobody wants to spend 15-20 turns setting up.

In some games you could drive up with this and fire the next turn