Blitzkrieg

Blitzkrieg (German, literally "lightning war") is a popular name for an operational-level military doctrine which employed mobile forces attacking with speed and surprise to prevent an enemy from implementing a coherent defense. The doctrines resulting in the blitzkrieg effect were developed in the years after World War I as a method to help prevent trench warfare.

References

• {{note|TIMEety}}"Blitzkrieger" in TIME Vol. XXXIV No. 13, 25 September 1939. http://www.time.com/time/archive/preview/0,10987,761969,00.html
• {{note|1}}James S. Corum, The Roots of Blitzkrieg: Hans von Seeckt and German Military Reform (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 1994), 37
• {{note|2}}Corum, op. cit., 23.
• {{note|3}}Corum, op. cit., 7.
• {{note|14}}Argued by Corum, Edwards, and House. This is not to include theories which were not adopted as actual doctrine, on which there are varied views.
• {{note|4}}Roger Edwards, Panzer: A Revolution in Warfare, 1939-1945 (London: Brockhampton Press, 1998), 23.
• {{note|5}}Guderian's remarks are from an unnamed article published in the National Union of German Officers, 15 October 1937 as quoted in Panzer Leader, pp. 39-46. Italics removed — the quoted sections are all italics in the original.
• {{note|6}}Heinz Guderian, trans. Constantine Fitzgibbon, Panzer Leader (New York: De Capo Press, 2002), 46.
• {{note|7}}Edwards, op. cit., 24.
• {{note|8}}Edwards, op. cit., 145.
• {{note|9}}Edwards, op. cit., 25.
• {{note|10}}Alan Clark, Barbarossa: The Russian-German Conflict, 1941-45 (New York: Quill, 1965), 78.
• {{note|11}}Richard Simpkin, Race to the Swift: Thoughts on Twenty-First Century Warfare (London: Brassey's, 2000), 34
• {{note|12}}Charles Winchester, "The Demodernization of the German Army in World War 2", Osprey Publishing. http://www.ospreypublishing.com/content2.php/cid=68
• {{note|13}}Jonathan M. House, Toward Combined Arms Warfare: A Survey of 20th-Century Tactics, Doctrine, and Organization. (U.S. Army Command General Staff College, 1984; reprint University Press of the Pacific, 2002). http://cgsc.leavenworth.army.mil/carl/resources/csi/House/House.asp