Mechanized Warfare

Paper Summary:

The paper discusses how war machines date back to ancient times, with the development of the Roman helepolis. The paper examines how the reality of mechanized warfare entered the modern conscious with the development and deployment of tanks in the two World Wars. The paper explores how, in the World Wars tanks were important, not merely because they represented an important technological advance, but more importantly because they allowed a shift from attrition tactics to maneuver tactics. The paper concludes that the invention of highly lethal and well armored cavalry-like units allowed modern warfare to embrace many of the ancient tactics which, became the basis of the 'revolutionary' Nazi blitzkrieg warfare.

From the Paper:

"Tanks particularly served to enable an increase in the operational tempo of the European arena at the end of the first World War and the beginning of the second. It was this shift in tempo that was directly responsible for the devastating victories by the German forces which nearly left Europe entirely in Nazi hands. Though tacticians have long understood that Germany's victories were due to a shift in military paradigm relative to that of the beginning of World War I, it was not until recently that the term "operational tempo" came into use and that the influential work of retired Air Force Colonel John Boyd pointed out that the success of this movement stemmed as much from its effects on the psyche of the adversary as from its own brute force."

Sample of Sources Used:

• "Helepolis" Wikipedia Free Encyclopedia. 7 March 2006, available from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helepolis; Internet; accessed 7 March 2006.
• Patrick Wright, Tank: The Progress of a Monstrous War Machine, (New York: Viking Adult, 2002), 2.
• William S. Lind, Colonel Keith Nightengale , Captain John F. Schmitt, Colonel Joseph W. Sutton, and Lieutenant Colonel Gary I. Wilson. "The Changing Face of War: Into the Fourth Generation," Marine Corps Gazette October 1989, 22-26. Available from http://www.d-n-i.net/fcs/4th_gen_war_gazette.htm; accessed 7 March 2006.
• John Boyd. Patterns of Conflict, 5. Dec 1986, available from: http://www.d-n-i.net/boyd/pdf/poc.pdf; accessed 7 March 2006
• Karl Lautenschlager. "The Tank as RMA: A Case Study in Real World Technical Revolution." Los Alamos National Laboratory. 5 September 2001, available from: http://web.mit.edu/ssp/fall01/lautenschlager.htm; 7 March 2006

More papers on Mechanized Warfare:

• Research Paper # 15463 : "Mechanization of 20th Century Wars"
• Essay # 58705 : "Modernization and Mechanization"
• Research Paper # 26594 : "The Shock of Speed"

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