Thread: Colonels leading German divisions in the Battle of the Bulge.

Oberst was the nest rank after major general so when the commander of the division was replaced, the officer commanding one of the regiments was the obvious choice.
not certain about the VG divisions.

Oberst was the nest rank after major general so when the commander of the division was replaced, the officer commanding one of the regiments was the obvious choice.
not certain about the VG divisions.

Originally Posted by Triple C

Why were so many division commanders in the Wehrmacht colonels in Dec. 1944? The commander for the 5th Parachute, the 2d Panzer, and almost all of the Volksgrenadier Divisions were colonels

In December?

2. PzDiv was commanded by Major General Schönfeld until just before the battle. He "voluntarily retired" from his post one day before of the battle, with one of the colonels under him taking over, four months later being promoted to major general himself.
5. FsJgDiv was commanded by Major General Heilmann.

The VG-Div were SS. And mostly commanded by Major Generals too. A few only by two-star Lieutenant Generals. Some were commanded by colonels, e.g. the 462nd for four weeks (Nov-Dec 44) between its general being captured and the division being destroyed.

Originally Posted by kato

In December?

2. PzDiv was commanded by Major General Schönfeld until just before the battle. He "voluntarily retired" from his post one day before of the battle, with one of the colonels under him taking over, four months later being promoted to major general himself.
5. FsJgDiv was commanded by Major General Heilmann.

The VG-Div were SS. And mostly commanded by Major Generals too. A few only by two-star Lieutenant Generals. Some were commanded by colonels, e.g. the 462nd for four weeks (Nov-Dec 44) between its general being captured and the division being destroyed.

Not according to the Battle of the Bulge's Order of Battle in Wikipedia or Charles MacDonald's a Time for Trumpets. The rank of Heilmann is listed as Colonel by both sources. For the Volksgrenadiers Divisions, I am seeing a lot more colonels than major generals. A rough count: In the Fifth Panzer Army five out of six VGDs had colonels as commanding officers. In the Sixth Panzer Army, two out of four, and in the Seventh three out of five.

5th Pz-Army
2 of them were promoted in dec 44, another 2 in jan 1945.

In most cases the VG-Divs used in the Ardennes Offensive were rather quickly formed from either halfway destroyed divisions or from Navy or Air Force personnel - between September and November '44. The colonels leading them (not commanding them, there's a difference!) were either commanders of those regiments absorbed into the new units that remained intact (i.e. the "core units" of the new divisions) or were assigned leadership of a "strange" unit (for the units with LW/KM personnel) with previous experience usually being general-staff-level commanders of army schools. The latter is the case e.g. with the 560th, 167th, 26th or 18th VGDiv.

Ludwig Heilmann was assigned leadership (not command!) of the 5th FsJgDiv on November 17th 1944 and was promoted to Major General and assigned command of the division on December 22nd 1944, immediately before committing the unit to combat. The unit got stuck in its first major combat at Martelange two days later, and was subsequently moved back into a defensive position.

Certainly a measure of how the Heer had really fallen apart by this time.

Few of the 1st SS Panzer Division's replacement crews for the Battle of the Bulge had ever previously been in a tank, and there was only one live firing exercise (in November) before the offensive started.

The Luftwaffe was similarly depleted, and for its Operation Bodenplatte on New Year's Day in 1945 many pilots lacked navigational skills and had to follow flight leaders to the targets.