German Losses

Southland Times, Issue 24986, 24 February 1943, Page 4

German Losses

IN HIS order of the day to the Red Army, issued on the 25th anniversary of its foundation, M. Stalin declared that German casualties in 20 months of war totalled 9,000,000. Of these, at least 4,000,000 men were said to have been killed, including 700,000 in the past three months. These are staggering figures. Perhaps they are too high to be accepted without reserve. And indeed it is not necessary to accept them to be able to see that German man-power resources have been heavily depleted. Great battles of the kind that have raged along a thousandmile front must inevitably swallow masses of troops. The earlier German victories were won with small losses because the enemy was allowed to exploit a revolution in tactics based on the use of mechanized forces. In Russia the Germans had to face, for the first time, a mass army which had been trained in mobile warfare. The clash of giants destroyed the fallacy that tanks and planes must always win cheap victories: the theory holds good only while the tanks and planes are confined almost exclusively to one side. But if M. Stalin’s figures seem to represent too high a claim there are other- statements which confirm his belief that Germany’s strength is waning. A correspondent of The Times quotes a German estimate of 4,800,000 plus nearly 700,000 lost in January—a total of 5,500,000. This is much higher than the figure quoted by the United States Undersecretary for War, who mentioned 4,000,000 dead, captured or permanently disabled. Moreover, he attributed these losses to “the Nazis and their satellites.” Unless the Germans want their losses to be overestimated by the Allies they are more likely to conceal the real figures than to exaggerate them. In the meantime it may be safer to assume that the Germans have suffered severe but not mortal wounds. The vigour of the offensive in Tunisia does not suggest the mood of a completely exhausted enemy. In the last war German casualties were 2,050,466 killed and 4,202,028 wounded out of a total of 11,000,000 men mobilized. If, as seems probable, these figures have already been exceeded in the present struggle the Germans can be in no position to face many more battles comparable with Stalingrad. It is true that they have reached a state of organization unknown in 1914-18, and that the wider use of machines in industry has released larger reserves in manpower. But the Germans have to prepare for more than a new campaign in the east. Against them in the west are armies that so far have had comparatively small losses. The ultimate result is inescapable. But the. Germans have not yet shoyyn a