From: G Shaw (milspectruck@verizon.net)
Date: Wed Nov 30 2005 - 16:09:28 PST
Hi Steve
Regards
-----Original Message-----
Hi Glenn,
> For every combat infantryman it takes X number of rear area support
In WWII the US had between 3 and 4 non-combat capacity soldiers for
WIA, KIA, non-combat "injuries" (like the large amounts during Winter
Definitely makes sense. Those poor US Army soldiers that were actually in
combat units and did the African campaign, then Sicily and beyond really
were in for it, but even then not equalling what the Brits, Soviet, Polish
and German soldiers went through, assuming they lived that long, which is a
big if. Those guys sure were in for the long haul.
Glenn
From: Steve [mailto:steve@battlefront.com]
Sent: Wednesday, November 30, 2005 6:08 PM
To: G Shaw
Cc: Military Vehicles Mailing List
Subject: Re: [MV] Korean war casualty count and related
> personnel.
each division. The US military also had extremely large amounts of
manpower in non-divisional elements, non-combat elements. If they
averaged those guys in, the average days for each combat soldier at the
front would indeed be very low. I don't remember what the ratio was in
Vietnam, but it was likely closer to 2-3 support for every one combat.
Then of course, the notion of "combat" has changed significantly, and
is evolving even more as we speak due to the situation in Iraq and
Afghanistan.
44/45 from illness) also lower that number greatly. Casualties in WWII
were very high, so the chances of surviving a day in combat was
statistically lower than other conflicts. Some combat units also spent
little time at the front because they were introduced only at the end
of the war. A fair number, but not as many as you think, spent
considerable uninterrupted time at the front. The US had the luxury,
more often than not, to rotate units out of the front (either in part
or in whole).
Of course if this was for the full war, averaged together, you're going
to get really skewed numbers because huge portions of the US' active
military force sat around waiting (either in the US, Great Britain, or
various staging areas in the PTO) for combat.
Another thing to consider is that the largest amount of simultaneous
ops were conducted starting in the summer of 1944 and into the spring
of 1945. This counts as two calendar years, though in reality it was
about 10 months of elapsed time. This would mean 80 days out of 300,
which is actually a pretty large percentage considering this is an
average.
Anyway... I have no idea of that 40 days of combat per year figure is
accurate, but I wouldn't dismiss it out of hand without knowing more.
Which is why talking head statistics without any context like this one
are pretty much useless :-)
Steve
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