Schematic plan · World War II (Italy 1943-1944)

Battle of Sele-Calore Corridor

11 September 1943
Italy
Victory for Germany

A schematic plan, generated from the statistics of the CAA Database of Battles: the armies' size and width, the hours of fighting, the plan of attack and the outcome are as recorded; the ground and the positions are not.

USA (US 45th Inf Div, 12,447 men under Mg Middleton) attacked Germany (Ger 16th Pz Div (Elms), 8,390 men under Mg Sikenius) in Italy. The CAA Database of Battles records 14 hours of fighting on a front of 11 km, a frontal attack against hasty defense and prepared defense, and that Germany held. Losses: USA 251 (2%), Germany 60 (1%).

This plan is generated from those figures. It shows the shape of the battle the database describes: the size and width of the armies, the plan of attack and the outcome. It does not show where the units actually stood.

The armies

USA

Mg Middleton

Unit	Arm	Men
USA left wing	Infantry	2,565
USA centre	Infantry	3,420
USA right wing	Infantry	2,565
USA reserve	Infantry	2,137
USA artillery (82 guns)	Artillery	1,230
USA armour (106 tanks)	Armour	530
Mg Middleton	Commander	—
In this plan		12,447

Germany

Mg Sikenius

Unit	Arm	Men
Germany left wing	Infantry	1,618
Germany centre	Infantry	2,157
Germany right wing	Infantry	1,618
Germany reserve	Infantry	1,348
Germany artillery (90 guns)	Artillery	1,259
Germany armour (78 tanks)	Armour	390
Mg Sikenius	Commander	—
In this plan		8,390

What the sources report

	USA	Germany
Strength, this plan	12,447	8,390
Losses, this plan	251	60

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 396, “Sele-Calore Corridor”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting: 14 hours
Winner: the defender
Terrain: Rolling, Mixed
Weather: Dry, Sunny, Temperate, Autumn, Temperate
Defender’s posture: Hasty defense, Prepared defense
Front width: 11 km (attacker), 11 km (defender)

Force	Strength	Losses	Horse	Guns	Plan and outcome
USAattacker	12,447	251	0	82	Frontal attack; Penetration; Stalemate
Germanydefender	8,390	60	0	90	Defensive/offensive plan

Attacker’s advantages initiative +1 · surprise +1 · air superiority +1

CDB90 (US Army Concepts Analysis Agency, 1990), tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold; data under ODC-BY 1.0.

Notes

On this reconstruction

Generated automatically from the statistics in CDB90. Frontages, depths, distances, the order of events and the terrain are schematic: they follow the recorded strengths, front widths, hours of fighting, tactical plan and outcome, not maps or accounts of the battle. The sources give no hours; the timing is conjectural.

Sources

US Army Concepts Analysis Agency; tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold, CAA Database of Battles (CDB90), no. 396 · ODC-BY-1.0Strengths, losses, front widths, hours of fighting, tactics and outcome.

Facts gathered from Wikidata (CC0), Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0) and Wikimedia Commons (licence per file); the plan and its text are timeastra’s own.