When we talk about history, we use data to speak, and when we talk about military, we use data to speak!
During World War II, could an infantry division of the German army do a class A division of the Japanese army?
Let's first analyze the scale of the establishment of both sides!
(Due to the attrition and reorganization in the course of the war, the scale of their establishment will be different in different periods, so we generally take the early stage of the war, which is more objective.) ）
First of all, the German infantry divisions!
The full strength of an average Wehrmacht infantry division is 17,200 (of course, there may be slight differences in the number of different divisions, but they all fluctuate up and down this number);
It includes a division headquarters, three infantry regiments, an artillery regiment, and battalions directly under each division, such as reconnaissance, communications, anti-tank troops, engineers, and divisional baggage troops.
Among them, the artillery regiment and the infantry regiment were the main combat forces of the division.
The full number of artillery regiments is 2,500, and its quota is equipped with 8 150mm howitzers, 36 105mm howitzers, 4 105mm guns, and external firepower for defense, that is, machine guns. and the corresponding horses, cars. Basically, it is possible to ensure a quick maneuver of the artillery regiment troops.
Each infantry regiment has a full strength of about 3,250 men, and its quota is equipped with light and heavy machine guns of 150 to 160, with a ratio of about 3:4:1, which is responsible for sustainable heavy firepower.
In addition, the German army is a large armored force, so it also pays great attention to the construction of anti-tank troops, not only each infantry division is equipped with a special anti-tank unit. There are also subordinate regiments. Roughly armed with anti-tank guns in the number of 25 to 30 pieces, as well as more than 10 anti-tank guns (generally 12 pieces).
In addition, the regiment is equipped with considerable heavy firepower, about 25 to 30 50 mortars (usually 27), 18 81mm mortars, and 75mm leIG18 light infantry guns (usually about 6 guns).
As well as two 150mm heavy infantry guns.
This is a rough regular formation of the first infantry divisions of the German army!
Let's take a look at the Japanese army's A division.
In fact, the division and regiment establishment of the Japanese army is not as systematic as that of the German army, and the construction of his A division has its own development direction, that is, the focus is different, so we can only talk about it in general terms, not positioning!
As we all know, the Japanese army's army building was largely based on learning from Germany. His division is actually equivalent to the infantry division of the German army.
So it's about the same in terms of the number of people, about 18,000 people. However, later the Japanese army carried out a "Ugaki disarmament" and implemented elite soldiers. The initial divisions and regiments were reorganized to form 17 standing divisions and regiments before the war, that is, what we often call "Class A divisions", and their numbers have been improved to a certain extent compared with before, and the combat troops alone exceeded 20,000.
Generally speaking, the full number of the first division in Japan was about 28,000 (of course, the difference between the different divisions is still relatively large, for example, the first division is almost 30,000, and the third division is more than 25,000).
It was higher than an infantry division of the German army. It adopts a four-member establishment, with two brigades and eight wings, which are four infantry wings under the brigade (some also have five wings, such as the first division), as well as the engineer wing, cavalry wing, artillery wing, and baggage wing in charge of logistics, as well as the division and regiment headquarters, brigade and regiment headquarters.
Generally speaking, in terms of numbers, the Japanese army's A division regiment is absolutely superior.
But it's a bit awkward to equip it!
Although the Division A was the best equipped in the Japanese army, it was still a bit inadequate in front of the German army. Take, for example, the 3rd Division. A friend has counted before:
In addition to the divisional and regimental direct wings, only the four infantry wings that are the main infantry force are not counted:
It has a total of 16 Type 41 75mm mountain guns, 16 37mm anti-tank guns, 24 70mm infantry guns, more than 500 light and heavy machine guns, and 432 50mm grenadiers.
Look at the German army again, we won't compare the number, the math and physical education teacher taught, not good (in fact, it's lazy), please refer to the above for yourself.
This is just a conventional gap, the artillery wing of the 3rd Division has 36 75mm field guns and 12 105mm howitzers.
Germans? There are no under 105!
This can't be helped, in the era of hot weapons, it doesn't depend on a lot of people!
Depending on the weaponry, the quality of the troops, the logistics and supply, and the mobility of communications, these German troops seem to be stronger than the Japanese army.
So I personally think that an infantry division of the German army can beat a division of the Japanese army!
And the most powerful thing is that the A division is already the most elite of the Japanese army. The infantry divisions were just ordinary formations of the German army, and there were motorized infantry divisions that were faster and dragged self-propelled guns everywhere, and armored divisions that drove tanks to blitzkrieg.
These are no longer matters whether a Class A division can fight against.
Of course, this does not mean that the gap between Japan and Germany is really huge, after all, the development of a country's military is often based on the geographical environment of its battlefield.
If it were on the great plains of Europe, the Japanese army would definitely be enough, but in the dense forests and mountains of Southeast Asia, the German army's equipment advantage was not great. And if it's a navy at sea, it's even more impossible to fight. A country that can fight the United States in the Pacific for several years still has his strength.