German infantry squad size

[Ts4EVER]

Hi
Presently German Infanterie Squads start out at 12 people, then in 1944 the number of men drops down to 10.

However, the Germans already adopted the 10 men squads in 1941, while still maintaining 4 squads per platoon.

http://www.wwiidaybyday.com/kstn/kstn131c1feb41.htm

The three squad per platoon organisation (called Inf Kompanie 44 ingame) was adopted in Spetember 1943 and had 9 men per squad.

http://www.wwiidaybyday.com/kstn/kstn131n1okt43.htm

Moreover, the Volksgrenadier platoon had only 8 soldiers per squad, as opposed to the 12 ingame right now:

http://www.wwiidaybyday.com/kstn/kstn131v1nov44.htm

You can also see that the rifle squad of the Volksgrenadier Platoon should probably receive the MG42 (2) weapon from the Panzergrenadier squads.

[Griefbringer]

On another note, the actual 1939 platoon structure seems to have actually consisted of three rifle squads of 13 men each (plus platoon HQ and mortar section):

http://www.bayonetstrength.150m.com/...0to%201942.htm

It might be worth keeping in mind that most of the German platoon/company TOEs in use in this game tend to integrate the 50 mm light mortars and their personnel into rifle squads, rather than featuring them as small teams of their own. This is certainly a pretty pragmatic approach, since moving individual 50 mm mortar teams around is pretty fiddly, and they are not very likely to achieve much on their own.

[DRG]

Every couple of years someone digs up those charts.

What we have in the game is as close an approximation of the number of men and NCO / officers available to an theoretical "by the book" unit as we can do under the game system and the way a formation is constructed.

You have to add the number of men PLUS the officers and NCO then rationalize that into a system that has be fit into transport and does not allow you to divide units up. A long time ago this was gone over by a German individual with a Ph.D who understood the game limitations and I am quite content that it's as close as we are going to get.



Don

[Ts4EVER]

Ahh I see. I thought the platoon leader units were conflated (is that a word?) with the company command units.