The planning of Operation Hercules | Malta 1942

The title of yet another interesting monograph is "The Axis and the Intended Invasion of Malta in 1942: A Combined Planning Endeavor", by Major Alessandro Vivarelli, Italian Army. This monograph analyzes the Axis planning and preparations for intended invasion of Malta in 1942 from the perspective of a contemporary military planner of joint and coalition warfare, and seeks to identify relevant lessons for today’s practice of operational art and the conduct of military planning in a multinational and inter-service context.

A long way to go | The Russian Military Reform 1/3

This interesting memorandum, composed by a group of Swiss Officers at a meeting in Bern, Switzerland that took place today, November 9th, 2018. Supplemental information and an invaluable statistical overview of Russia's present forces has been provided as well. Note: All documents are in German, but one can easily use the freely available online translation services of various providers.  The Power-Point-Presentation is about 150MB, just to let you know.

Field Marshal von Manstein's Counteroffensive of Army Group South, February-March 1943

The Last Operational Level Victory of the Panzer Forces on the Eastern Front, a thesis by David A. Shunk, Major, USAF. This thesis is a historical examination of the Eastern Front battles in southern Russia during February-March 1943. Field Marshal von Manstein, Commander of the German Army Group South, defeated a Soviet two Front offensive with an exceptional counteroffensive. Von Manstein's counteroffensive concentrated all the available panzer (armor) and mechanized infantry divisions into two attack groups. Von Manstein then attacked the Soviets, after they had exhausted their offensive, with a double envelopment counteroffensive which destroyed two Soviet armies and regained the initiative for German forces in southern Russia.