THE FIELD ARTILLERY OF THE WEHRMACHT DURING THE SECOND WORLD WAR

Furthermore, all development of new equipment was prohibited, and to remove any temptation, its stock of specialised machine tools was reduced to a bare minimum and placed under the surveillance of particularly fastidious inspection commissions. At this date, Germany no longer existed as a military power.

On 1 September 1939, at the opening of hostilities with Poland, the Wehrmacht fielded nearly 11,000 field pieces grouped in 122 artillery regiments. The rigour of the clauses imposed in 1919 had at least two advantages: Germany did not have to maintain, during the interwar period, a plethora of ageing pieces as France or Great Britain did, and was thus able to assemble a modern artillery park — with one notable shortcoming: a recurring lack of dedicated tractors, which would force it to rely primarily on animal traction until the end of the Second World War!

Loïc Charpentier, a well-known author of the éditions Caraktère, presents the fruit of several years of research on the Feldartillerie of 1939–1945 in this 180-page book, which sets out to describe each piece used by the Wehrmacht during the Second World War.

Analysed in every detail through a history reconstructed from archival sources, all the howitzers, field guns, mountain pieces and heavy mortars put into service by the Germans are covered with a detailed technical data sheet, a colour profile, numerous photographs and technical drawings.

Captured guns, the various types of ammunition used, doctrine of employment, organisation of combat formations from battery to division, half-tracked tractors, and the logistical units gravitating around the Feldartillerie are all subjects treated exhaustively by the author!

A book that is simply indispensable, thanks to which you will know absolutely everything about the field artillery of the Wehrmacht.