blitzkrieg

blitzkrieg, (‘lightning war’) a German word, now Anglicized, which has been attributed to Hitler, and was probably coined for intimidation purposes. First used in the Polish campaign in September 1939 it combined air power, tanks, and subversive warfare actuated by dynamic command and control through radio and rapidly laid line communications. Simultaneous with air attacks upon enemy airfields and lines of communications, a campaign of lies and half-truths was aimed at the opposing side's morale as concentrated land forces, supported by bombing, either broke through or outflanked their defences. Sometimes, as in the Norwegian campaign in April and in the Netherlands in May 1940 (see FALL GELB), airborne warfare was also used when paratroops were landed at vital centres in the rear of the front and held them until relieved by deep penetration thrusts by fast-moving armoured columns (see Eben Emael, for example), so that the opposing forces were outpaced and enveloped. Such disorder was created that, in the fighting which led to the fall of France in June and in the Balkan campaign of April 1941, national resistance collapsed. But when the Nazis invaded the USSR in June 1941 (see BARBAROSSA) blitzkrieg failed because, for the first time, German logistics were unable to maintain their momentum to sufficient depth to achieve ultimate victory. Thereafter German blitzkrieg was countered by similar methods in which surprise, flexibility, and concentration of force were as potent in defence as attack.

Kenneth Macksey