Can someone please explain why so many people cream about Rommel?
How brilliant of a tactician/strategist/commander was he? What battles stand out?
I never heard of anything concrete that demonstrates his over-hypeness.
Check out The Great War's episode on his actions in WWI, he's pretty based
>>985820
He is mainly over hyped because he launched his invasion of Egypt early, in summer 1942, when he was supposed to wait 3 months so that the Axis could capture Malta, better securing Axis supply lines in North Africa. Instead, he decided to press his advantage and invade Egypt. After his gamble failed, he whined a lot about how his troops weren't getting enough supplies and he needed more tanks and oil, even though the Axis was trying to get these to him, but the ships were being sunk because.... the paratroopers that were going to be used to capture Malta had to be diverted to help Rommel, and the supply lines couldn't be secured.
He was a very good general, as shown during the battle of France and the North Africa campaign. Every general makes mistakes though, so yeah.
>>985820
He was a top 10 German general, but not a top 5. Overall overrated.
>>985820
le good german meme
>>985832
that show is great despite falling into lions lead by donkeys bc they have to say something every week, but that rommel episode was like fucking bone splinters
>>985820
you're preaching to a chore, it's cool to hate Rommel on /his/
>>985857
*choir
fuck i'm sleepy
because Heinz Guderian existed.
>>985820
Rommel was actually really fucking good with small unit tactics, and understood exactly how to use them in battle, but couldn't >logistics for shit.
>>985820
He is the best example of the peter principle in history.
a decent commander but one of the most overrated military leaders in history along with Lee (Jackson and Forrest were both better on the CSA side, Grant and Sherman were both better on the Federal side), Wellington and Washington
>>985820
>Can someone please explain why so many people cream about Rommel?
Two main things. One, he's a "clean" Nazi, his conduct in his most famous campaign was humane and professional, especially by the somewhat savage backdrop of WW2. Two, he's considered a great and romantic general, for lack of a better word.
>How brilliant of a tactician/strategist/commander was he? What battles stand out?
This is where it gets complicated. Undoubtedly he was an excellent tactician. He had instinct, he had initiative, he had a flair for lining up the right troops in the right places to do their jobs. The rest of it? Not so much. He had no head or care for logistics, he was indifferent to operational realities, he was impatient as all hell, and he had a tendency to try to politick to get around orders that he didn't like.
Personally, I think he was actually a pretty bad general, although I think he was an excellent captain, in a position where he had responsibilities that weren't frontwide. His handling of the North African campaign is about as pure of an expression of both his strengths and shortcomings as you can get. If you look at the forces arrayed at Gazala, on paper, he should have been in deep trouble. He won, handidly. On the other hand, he only got to Gazala by overrunning his supply lines, and then used the fuel and stocks he captured there to continue his advance still further, and surprise surprise, he got himself into a lot of trouble, sticking himself so far out that he couldn't even easily withdraw, and couldn't advance further, while the British built up for a month before kicking his teeth in.
>>985917
>One, he's a "clean" Nazi
no such thing
>>986032
Of course there's no such thing. And Rommel's popular image of his relationship with the nazi party of being quietly against it bears little resemblance to the man who volunteered to head Hitler's bodyguard when he went traveling as Chancellor, or who shot propaganda films after the fall of France.
But one of the reasons he stands out far more than guys like Bock and Leeb and Rundstedt and Kesselring is that there's this popular image of Rommel being the lone decent man in a horrible regime, who eventually died opposing it.
He wasn't a great strategist but his small unit tactics and decisive leadership made him an incredibly talented and respected officer
You'd want him on your team, not leading it
>>986063
At one point, yes. He got promoted, more than once, actually.
>>986063
Yes, in World War I. We're talking his skill as a commander in the North Africa campaign. Get your head out of your ass.
>>986063
He was a baby, moran.
>>986044
I would go so far as to say that most of his popularity comes from deliberately exaggerating his image as a "decent" Nazi so people who want to be edgy can openly praise a Nazi. At least based on what I see when he gets praised.
>>986079
Italians were the commanders in north africa meme boi
>>986095
>Implying the Italians had a higher say in the war than the Desert Fox
>Implying that a Field Marshal shouldn't be considered a commanding officer
Okay senpai, whatever you say
>>985833
>every general makes mistakes
No...not every general
>>986118
Graziani was a Field Marshal as well.
>>986118
6 star general rommel, commander of operation Barbarossa, the french invasion, and the final solutions single handledly ordered foreign untermesch shitalian forces in their own war because they were so incompetent. He lost though because italians were more shit at war than he was good, which is a lot. 10/10 commander up there with napoleon III and wilhelm
>>986141
top kek
>>985907
>Sherman
>good general
>>986141
>italians were more shit at war than he was good, which is a lot
where is the lie
WHO
>GUDERIAN
HERE??
>>986392
Guderian's an overrated shit, mostly because people take his bizarre exaggerations at face value. First to the North Sea =/= First to the Atlantic.
Kesselring, now there's a general.
>>986363
fucking this, guy was a bipolar maniac
>>986363
>t. buttblasted southern shit
>>986402
This is bait
>>986412
No, it's dead serious. Guderian isn't half the general he makes himself out to be in his memoirs, and he exaggerates like a mofo.
Kesselring was a way better general, in part because he actually got the tough assignments instead of the gloryhound ones.
>>986418
Tell me what, exactly, did he exaggerate in Panzer Leader?
>>986418
nigga, the only reason he did so well in Italy was because the allies were flat-out incompetent.
>>985820
Because he's the only Nazi general that it's socially acceptable to like just because he tried to kill Hitler
>>986418
Guderian was gigantically fucked over by Hitler.
>>986443
was the italian campaign an allied success? Apologists have tried making the case to me based on >K:D bullshit several times, although it seems rather idiotic
>>986430
Well, let's start with his repeated intimations that it was him and really only him that was pushing for the development of effective armored doctrines, resources to the armor corps, and the building of Germany's tank armies. You won't see a single mention of Oswald Lutz, even though he was the man who gave the orders in the late 20s early 30s to motorize, and in fact was the one who sponsored and ordered Guderian to write Actung! Panzer! (Which, incidentally, you won't see too many citations to Der Kapmfwagenkrieg despite ripping ideas left, right, and center from it)
And then of course, we have his repeated claims both in here and in Acthung Panzer, that armored columns by themselves can decide modern wars, even without artillery/infantry/etc support. This was of course, rejected, and one of the big advantages that the Germans had throughout the ublk of the war was better infantry support for their armor than their foes, but you won't see Guderian talking about his infantry, even though his command in France, the XIX corps, was 2 infantry divisions to his one panzer division. I've mentioned the flat out lie where he claimed he was the first to the Atlantic. Calais isn't exactly on what most people think of when they say the Atlantic.
If you really want to go into it in depth, I would recommend Guderian: Panzer Pioneer or Myth Maker, by Russel Hart. (not Liddel Hart)
>>986443
It's funny then, how almost as soon as he was transferred out, the Allies started making enormous gains.
>>986477
Depends on how you define "success". It was a slow, grinding advance, and cost way more per mile gained than a lot of places on other fronts. OTOH, the Allies killed more than they lost, and forced the deployment of an enormous number of German troops to theaters which never saw combat on the risk that they'd try successive landings outward from Italy.
Furthermore, it led to the collapse of the Italian government and mostly withdrawing from the war. While I'm not going to pretend Italian soldiers were good, they were able to perform a lot of second-line duties which Germany had to take up, taxing manpower even more.
Personally, I'm inclined to rate it an allied success, albiet one that could have been considerably greater if not for operational and tactical failures.
>>986492
>You wont see a single mention of Oswald Lutz
14 mentions of lutz in Panzer Leader actually, including this gem:
>In the years to come I was to work closely with this officer, for whom I was to have a great respect and who was always most helpful and kind in his attitude towards me.
You also really do not understand the logic of his theory of tank warfare. It was for each branch to be supportive of the other, but with the focus to be on the tanks to do the thrusting - just as cavalry previously. He at no point said or alluded to armored divisions on their own deciding wars - in fact he went out of his way to approached a luftwaffe commander (actual copy of book isn't in front of me at the moment so I don't have his name, give me a few hours when I get home and I'll pull it up) and underwent drills with him and worked directly with him on how best to use his forces to support guderians tanks, including using strategic bombings instead of bombings over a wide area which was the norm. He even told his armored troops that they are the cavalry in operation. He never said they decide battles on their own - hell, in poland he lamented on the lack of more air support.
How about you actually read his fucking book and form your own opinions?
>>985820
All the fucking hype the Allies dogpiled onto him?
Not even kidding.
Rommel himself? He kept the North African front relatively free of atrocities. He was a great tactician and a passable strategist who really should have gone through staff officer training. Unfortunately, most of the generals thought he was some young upstart who sucked Hitler's dick to get where he was. As a commander, he was loved by his men and feared by his enemies.
Sadly, he did not know about Barbarossa. Which is very odd to begin with.
>>985820
He was the first desert warfare general. He was good at it.
He was kind to POWs. He was ordered to kill them all before his retreat, but he let them go free to the allies.
He opposed hitler, and thought that they would lose the war unless hitler was killed and a diplomatic resolution was sought.
He backed a ploy to kill hitler. Hitler found out and offered Rommel suicide so that Hitler would spare his family.
Rommel committed suicide and saved his family. Germany loses the war.
He was the smartest leader of Nazi germany. If things had gone differently, he may have saved a lot of lives.
(he was aware of the genocide, and couldn't make up his mind on what to do about it)
