In the fall of 1917 the war ministry judged the expected replacement situation in 1918 as follows: The monthly need is estimated at 160.000 men. With inclusion of those born in 1900(200.000 men) and monthly 60.000 convalesced men, with use of Gv men( suitable for garrison duty)to replace commandered kv men(suitable for war duty) in the troop units(300.000 men) and the employment of 200.000 deferred men, the replacements are sufficient until july 1918. From then on only 60.000 convalesced men are monthly available. Because the stock in the replacement batallions and the field recruit depots which could not be stated , was not counted, it was assumed that the replacement could be covered until september 1918. What was lacking needed to be covered by deferred men and older conscripts. A new calculation of 17 december 1917 used some different numbers, in that those born in 1900 was counted as 250.000 men and the monthly need was estimated at 150.000 men. This still resulted in a lack of 354.000 men for 1918, although replacement batallions and field recruit depots were counted. The birth year 1898 had already been employed in 1917 . The birth year 1899 was partially in the recuit depots in the east, partially in the replacement units in Germany, for a smaller part(the physically and mentally most mature) in the field recruit depots in the west. In the opinion of the OHL this birth year was not yet ready for the demands of the fighting in the west. The birth year 1900 could at the earliest be employed in the late fall 1918. One had already anticipated far with the employment of the 18 year old recruits of the birth year 1899. The OHL was therefore , before the start of 1918, informed of the difficulty of the replacements situation. ..... The OHL planned to employ 140.000-150.000 men of the recruit year 1899 in the recruit depots in the east. The commander in chief East should give a corresponding number of kv men in the age group of 20-35 to the west. The commander in chief East answered in a letter of 13 october 1917 which gives an insight in the conditions in the east. It says in this: " In the total combat strength of the front of 492.000 men(527.000 minius 37.000 gv) are comprised 85.000 men from the Alsace-Lorraine, around 17,5 percent. The transfer of 150.000 men of birth year 1899 would make up 30,5 percent of the beforementioned combat strength. After the putting into execution of these measures 48 percent of the whole front or around half would consist of men which more or less could only face combat under supervision and support by the other half. When one now takes into account that also this trustworthy half of the men for a large percentage consists of older men because only the best men in the age of 20-35 should be given to the west, then there must be reservations whether the absolutely necessary supervision of the untrustworthy elements for guard duty and combat is possible by the others, particularly because this supervision of man to man is made much more difficult by the extension of the combat sector. It is requested not to transfer to the command area more than 100.000 men of the birth year 1899." The OHL agreed with this. 30. 000-40.000 men of the bith year 99 , the strongest men with solid character would be employed in the recruit depot depots in the west. However, the war Ministry only made available 107.000 men because otherwise there would be no kv men in the home country. The War Ministry wanted to send a further 40.000 men in the field in february if the chief of the general staff was willing " in case of necessity to make available complete units of the field army for the eventuality of inner disturbances(War Ministry 10 january 1918)." The OHL drew everything which could be used from the recruit depots of the east. ..... Releases of kv men under 35, no Alsace-Lorraine men, were ordered: in september first 4500,then 1500, in october 2000. Commander in chief East reported in october that there were no more men suitable for the west in the recruit depots. 4000 men had already needed to be withdrawn from the front(18 october 1917). It is to be taken into account concerning these releases that the divisions destined for use on the western front first had to be filled up from the recruit depots....... All men from Alsace-Lorraine and all men not suited for the western front in these divisions had to be exchanged for usable men from the divisions that stayed behind. The recruits of the birth year 99 which were transferred to the recruit depots in the east could not be used in the front but each division which went to the west had to be given a recruit depot of 600 men. After the mass of the divisions to be transferred to the west had been transported, the commander in chief East reported to the OHL on 23 may 1918 that the individual armies had only weak redruit depots and that no men were available anymore which were suitable for the west and that the divisions in the east were for the largest part composed of 40 year olds.. Neverthelless, from may until the end of the war ten more divisions were withdrawn from the eastern front...... In may 1918 the field strengths of the east army were further generally reduced , to again free men, which were destined to replace all kv men still available in the rear in the west or in economical enterprises. The measure was executed although the Armygroup Eichhorn with reference to the situation in the Ukraine had urgently requested to desist from it. This way 43.000 men were gained. In july 1918 a reducing of the field strength of the Landsturm batallions in the east was used to replaced the kv men taken from the special units( air, signal, transport,....). At the end of august, the commander in chief East was asked by the OHL if with the severe lack of men, he could still help the west in some way. Again, the strengths of the batallions of the whole east front were reduced by 50 men(to 600).
The Ordnance Inspectorate compiled the orders , the ordnance office placed them and the activation plans were in turn prepared by still other offices. All the efforts of the interested agencies to coordinate the production of of spare tank parts with the production of new tanks were of no avail. Promises were made but only partially kept. Even in peacetime the officers of the Ordnance Inspectorate in charge of procurement viewed the problem of tank repairs in the case of war with great concern. They were, however, unable to gain a hearing. Thus, it happened quite often that spare tank parts did not reach the the tank ordnance offices until the type of tank had undergone so many technical changes that the tanks had to be inactivated because of the lack of spare parts, and consequently , the spare parts no longer fitted, could not be used and simply piled up in the tank ordnance offices. During the war the lack of spare tank parts was not at first as great as had been feared, because the campaigns in Poland,France and Yougoslavia were only of short duration and there were long intervals of time when the armored forces did not see any action. The production of tanks increased constantly from the end of the French campaign to the beginning of the Russian campaign, but again this was not accompanied by a corresponding increase in producttion of spare parts. Moreover, the subsequent changes in design of current tank models made it quite difficult to plan the suplly of spare tank parts. Even in the new series and new types which were brought out, the production of spare parts was in no proportion to the actual need. However, one improvement had at least been achieved, namely, that at the beginning of the Eastern campaign the tank units were given a fairly adequate supply of spare parts with their initial issue. However, the deficiencies which had not been noticed up to that time became glaringly apparent in the fall of 1941 , as already mentioned before. The protracted fighting led to an extremely high degree of wear and tear on the tanks which was altogether disproportionate to the production of spare parts.The organisational improvements in the tank maintenance service , which were immediately and energetically introduced at that time, have already been described. Efforts to bring about the urgently needed increase in the producion of spare tank parts did not have the desired effect. What was the reason this? In march 1940 Hitler appointed a "Reichs minister for armaments and munition". The latter was a civilian and directly responsible to Hitler . Military agencies could make their requests and wishes known to him. The Minister, however,only had to answer to Hitler himself. It was his duties to see to it that military requests(made by the Ordnance office) were fulfilled by the armament industry and if necessary to make use of the appropriate plenary powers to insure their fulfillment. Although the influence of the military ordnance office was somewhat curtailed by this measure it was nevertheless welcomed by the army. However, as the war went on and military requirements were increased, the Ministry for Armaments and Ammunition(later called Armament Ministry)assumed tasks itself which properly required the judgment of military agencies, such as determining the amount of prduction orders to be distributed, and finally the responsability for construction orders for weapons, etc.... This was only possible because Hitler desired to weaken the top-level military command positions for political reasons and because of his hatred for the officer caste of the army.The result was that tensions frequently developed betweehn the military agencies and those of Armament Ministry, particularly since things went finally so far that Hitler and his armament Minister took upon themselves to disregard the responsible military agencies and make arbitrary decisions co,ncerning the development and introduction of new weapons, concerning prduction requirements, and similar matters. From its very inception the armament ministry was confronted with very complex and difficult tasks.Since Germany was in no position with resect to armament in 1939, to wage a major war , there was an enormous demand for physical equipment in all fields. The expansion of industrial capacity in almost all these fields(ammunition, powder, explosives, weapons, motor vehicles, tanks etc....)had not as yet been even nearly concluded. With the extension of the war, the tank production programs were also steadily expanded. Added to this was the development of new types of tanks as a result of the practical experience gained up to that time. The production of spare tank parts, however, continued to be neglected. Unfortunately, the Armament Ministry faild to listen to the urgent pleas, which were made both by the Ordnance Office and the Army General Staff (Chief of Army supply and administration) and failed to insist that the armament plants should produce the required number of spare parts. Hitler himself urged that more new new tanks should be produced ; the responsible men in the Armament Ministry failed to realise the importance in spare tank parts in maintaining the fighting power of the troops and spent a disproportinate amount of energy in increasing the production of new tanks, as urged by Hitler. Even the severe crisis in the fall of 1941 at first failed to bring about any fundamental changes in favor of the production of spare tank parts. For the time being the organisational measures of the military agencies, as described above were the only thing which provided any relief for the tank maintenance service. With the beginning of the great offensive in 1942, in which approximately threefourths of all ther available tanks participated, the expected wear and tear on tank material began again.It was not until then that Hitler and the Atmament Ministry could be induced , to sanction the drastic measures which had been so urgently needed for at least a yeaz in order to increase the production of spare tank parts.However, the damage could no longer be prepared. Up to the end of the war the production of spare tank parts did not reach the necesary volume.Enormous losses in tanks,fighting power, labor,confidence and, last but not least, blood, were the results. Many tactical reverses at the front andmany defeats were caused by this now irrepareable mistake.Meanwhile the Armament Ministry had tightened its control of industrial production and had increased efficiency tremendously in many fields and for this purpose had called upon the country's last , unused resources. However, it now became all the more difficult , in the fall of 1942, to free additional resources for the purpose of increasing the production of spare tank parts. In may 1942, these difficulties had already induced the Armament Ministry to try the following solution: the manufacture of new tanks was slowed down somewhat so that more spare tank parts could be produced.However, the gain of spare parts achieved in this way was in gross disproportion to the drop in the production of new tanks; for evey extra motor, gear, etc.. which was produced by this measure one less new tank was being manufactured. On the other hand, the same number was produced of spare parts which was subject to very little wear and tear , for example, the tank hulls. Here is another example of a mistaken measure:after a long struggle , the Army finally won with its insistence that more tracks should be produced, since there was a particular shortage of these parts. The tracks were finally manufactured , and after a short time there was a two yeras supply of this highly critical item in stock , but the demand for tracks by the field units decreased considerably at the same time, whereupon the Armament Ministry complained about the foolish demands made by the army. The army in turn complained that production and delivery of this item had not begun after the tanks for which these tracks were needed had already become obsolete.However, it claimed that in spite of its requests the manufacture of these no longer usable tracks had not been discontinued in time. ..... The following steps were introduced:
1. The establishment of its own spare tank plants, as for example, a factory for transmissions in Passau and a factory for tank engines in Nordhausen . It is obvious that it would have been a very long time before these plants could have been completed and the field units could have benefited from their products. Although it was the only correct one, this measure proved unsatisfactory.When these plants began to produce-much tooo late-the production of new tanks had in the meanwhile been endangered.Enemy air attacks had destroyed the subsidiary plants of the tank factories , so that the products of the spare parts plants had to be utilised for the manufacture of new tanks. 2. The Armament Ministry organised socalled 'order sales' , which at times brought appreciable relief. At these sales individual parts were displayed which were definitely in short supply. Firms which immediately offered to produce such parts without prejudice to any of their own commit ments were given a higher priority. This had the advantage for them, that their workmen were protected against forced employment elsewhere and their manufactoring facilities were insured against requisitioning. In order to estimate the importance of this measure one must know that the Armament Ministry wield dictatorial and despotic powers over manpowerand machines in industry.The first 'order sale' was held on 26 october 1942. 3. Similar results were achieved by a number of projects undertaken by the 'Economic group of machine manufacturers( a cooperative association of machine toolfirms) which -in part by direct cooperation between tank and the machine tool factories- were able to fill the constantly changing gaps in the production requirements for individual parts with the aid of the wide variety of machines in their pool. For example, a factory was equipped with machine tool which had been released by some other plant so that it was able to manufacture tank transmissions for a tank maintenance plant in its vicinity. The abvementioned measures brought perceptible relief after 1943. By this time,however,the high tide of the German war effort had long been passed. ......... Despite these measures, more and more serious mistakes were made in actual practice. Thus for example, a new heavy tank, the Tiger, was sent into action at the front in 1942 although only one additional transmission, one engine,etc... for every tenth tank was manufactured for maintenance purposes. The result was, that almost all the tanks at the front were out of action in a very short time. In spite of this experience, the same mistake was repeated some time later in the manufacture of the new 'Panther type(43 tons). The tank was not even ready for frontline service when an order was given to manufacture the first series and the tank was put into active use. Numerous technical defects became apparent at the front, so that the first series of 325 tanks had to be withdrawn from the front and rebuilt. Gearshifts and steering mechanisms in particular, as well as side gears, had to be replaced by improved and newly manufactured units.This work was only made possible by the contruction at short notice of a special reconversion plant in may 1943 covering an area of almost 100.000 square meters at Falkensee near Berlin , and when it was completed,, it was noticed that the engine showed serious defects. A fully serviceable engine was not constructed untill the fall of that year. To be sure, this stupid procedure , which destroyed the confidence of the troops in this new and excellent weapon from the very beginning , was also due in considerable part to pressure from Hitler and his closest associates. The Panther too, was sent to the front with a completely inadequate supply of spare parts. Valuable equipment could not be used at the front because of the lack of the simplest spare parts and deteriorated because repairs were not made in time. The Armament Ministry tried to minimise the consequences of these mistakes by appointing a "Commissionar of the Armament Ministry for the tank maintenance program" . His work may have brought some temporary relief , but also resulted in an additional weakening of the overall afficiency of the armament industry. Government managementb eliminated personal initiative to great extent and began to overreach itself, thus weakening itss own structure. If the simple rule had been observed that the production of each new tank model had to be simultaneously matched by the production of an adequate number of spare parts, all special programs and alike would have been unnecessary. In march 1943, the position of Inspector general of the Armored forces was created in the Army High Command..
