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Wiedrock wrote: Mon Jun 16, 2025 3:14 pm

MechFO wrote: Mon Jun 16, 2025 10:35 am Just want to add that the basic structure of Soviet and German Corps are the same. There is nothing in the German Corps which justifies the 250 Support Squads. One can imagine this includes the various rear area workshops, security etc. which soaked up a large amount of manpower, but then there is plenty in the Soviet structure that is missing as well.

German Corps HQs were certainly larger then these later Soviet Corps "HQ" structures since they had transporting, bridging pioneers, small stuff like clothing, police, post, ... and medical staff..and whatnot. 5k may be the upper limit, but ~3.5k should be a general average I'd say.
Meanwhile these later Soviet "Corps" were much smaller and only a base for coordinating the 3 Divisions+Artillery. The number of men doing all those Staff work needs to be figured out.

All attached (aside from maybe a small Feldjäger detachment and of course Nachrichten). By 1943 there was no real organic transport, supply, or pionier units. Everything was attached ad hoc from Army level. Even supply dumps and the units running them were "owned" by the Army. Russian and German organisation mirrored each other to a far greater extent then WA and Germans.

https://www.lexikon-der-wehrmacht.de/Gl ... orps-R.htm

Die Stärke eines Korps schwankre zwischen zwei und fünf Divisionen, meistens drei Divisionen.
Bei Kriegsbeginn hatten die Korps fest zugeteilte Korpstruppen (Nachrichten-Abteilung, Artillerie-Regiment, 2-3 Pionier-Bataillone, Versorgungstruppen, Feldgendarmerie). Nach 1940 hatten die Korpsstäbe nur noch die Nachrichten-Abteilung, schwache Versorgungstruppen und die Feldgendarmerie fest zugeteilt, alles andere wurde nur fallweise unterstellt.

The Kolonnenraum even for Panzerkorps seems to have been not much more than 30t by mid 43, judging from the Qu KTB for Panzerkorps XXXXI during Zitadelle. (T314 Roll 986)


Just to be clear, I'm not advocating that we go down the rabbit hole of trying to model each rear area unit, but both sides should have the same methodology applied to them.

As mentioned, the numbers 5k used seem to be a rather generously large guess. There's also no reason to have the same size for Mot./Pz. Korps and regular Corps I suppose...

I once calculated the manpower ...IIRC it was smth like 3.5k (may have also been 2.5k...it's been a while) when adding ALL THE STUFF possibly attached (e.g. using 90ton + 120ton column ALL together and so on) and more of everything on top (e.g. Bridging, and so on).

You may have a look at Niehorster's book: http://niehorster.org/011_germany/books ... .09.08.pdf
General Korps Staff/Units: p.24 ~300 (lazy supersized guess)
Transport: p.28 90t = ~100Men
Communication: p.30 ~150Men per Company, so ...~700-900 total I'd guess

Sometimes/Later on you also have "Begleit Kompanie"-type formation attached directly to the HQ for defence and further (or included) AA for the HQ. As can be seen in the following: Now in this example you see that SS HQs had supposedly also a direct medical assignment, I guess this feed sfurther into possible confusion.

Part for the decision to go that high may be influenced by all the hidden "better HQ rolls when more Support" or the "Support helps with Fort Construction and also X, Y and Z" - so Germans just got massive surplus while Soviets lack Support numbers (have vs need). Just since noone knows how/if those "bonuses" are actually working one sees those men as complete waste.
...or someone just took the largest number found (including multiple SUs).

That's something I'd like to work on. I could imagine 150 Support for German Corps with +50 for Panzer Corps while Axis minor units will be reduced to 100.
Armies will be the size of two corps so 300 with +100 for Panzer Army and for Axis minors this would be 200 and +50 for Tank Corps (if they have those)
Army Groups could also be reduced to ~750 for Germany and 500 for Axis minors (also suitable for their High Command HQ). This would need a new German High Command HQ OB with 1k.
All Axis Air HQ should be cut at least in half
To reduce stress on these air HQs I could increase support in airbases a little, maybe 3 Squads