Time Astra

Schematic plan · World War II (European Theater)

Battle of Metz

All battles
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.
Rolling, Mixed groundCentreLeft wingRight wingCentreReserveLeft wingRight wingReserveGunsGunsArmourArmour05 km10 kmN

USA (US 20th Corps, 60,794 men under Mg Walker) attacked Germany (Ger 1st Army(-), 39,580 men under Gen Knobelsdorf) in France. The CAA Database of Battles records 12 hours of fighting on a front of 25 km, a frontal attack against fortified defense, and that Germany held. Losses: USA 359 (1%), Germany 210 (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 Walker

UnitArmMen
USA left wingInfantry12,959
USA centreInfantry17,278
USA right wingInfantry12,959
USA reserveInfantry10,799
USA artillery (296 guns)Artillery4,440
USA armour (472 tanks)Armour2,360
Mg WalkerCommander—
In this plan60,795

Germany

Gen Knobelsdorf

UnitArmMen
Germany left wingInfantry8,501
Germany centreInfantry11,334
Germany right wingInfantry8,501
Germany reserveInfantry7,084
Germany artillery (248 guns)Artillery3,720
Germany armour (88 tanks)Armour440
Gen KnobelsdorfCommander—
In this plan39,580

What the sources report

USAGermany
Strength, this plan60,79439,580
Losses, this plan359210

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 466, “Metz”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting
12 hours
Winner
the defender
Terrain
Rolling, Mixed
Weather
Wet, Light precipitation, Temperate, Autumn, Temperate
Defender’s posture
Fortified defense
Front width
25 km (attacker), 25 km (defender)
ForceStrengthLossesHorseGunsPlan and outcome
USAattacker60,7943590296—
Germanydefender39,5802100248—

Attacker’s advantages 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

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.