The popularly known "lightning war" alludes to the strategy of "maneuver warfare," its official name. This strategy was developed to a large extent during the Second World War in Germany, but I personally believe it owes its birth to the impeccable military deployment of Helmuth von Moltke. Now, to understand why, we must first provide context for the meaning of maneuver warfare, which is the main topic of this post.
The foundation of maneuver warfare is combined arms strategies. In the case of the Second World War, the idea of the tank had already become widespread, air force technologies allowed for much more versatility, and motorized units, cavalry, and mobility itself were much more present. However, it's not all about being faster or having more than the opponent. In this type of strategy, the goal is to disperse the army across the entire front at all costs. Despite having troops covering the flanks, the main army is divided into key points where the enemy's defense is easier to penetrate. This breaks the enemy's defensive line, forcing the opponent to concentrate troops in the main scenarios and causing a general advance on the other fronts that are now less protected by the enemy. This occurs in key stages of the battle:
Stage Zero: The enemy flanks are scouted, probing the terrain to find where to position the main combined force—a mix of armored, motorized/mechanized units, and artillery. The plan of action is formulated with lines of communication and a flexible command hierarchy that rewarded risk-taking, as Germany usually did (just as much as it punished failure).
The First Stage: A bombardment. The area to be attacked is bombarded by artillery and/or typically by the air force to lower enemy morale and pave the way by taking advantage of the disorganization caused by the bombing.
The Second Stage: The breakthrough. Like a spearhead, the armored units advance with artillery support to break the main battlefront where the attack was planned, aiming to open the enemy's defensive line.
The Third Stage: Once the front was penetrated, the armored units did not stay to support the attack to destroy the defense before it could reorganize. The tanks continued on their way towards command posts, supply depots, communication centers, and key logistical points of the enemy front to destroy them. This panic meant that generals did not have time to reorganize their defenses during the battle, increasing panic among the ranks and being especially effective against armies with rigid hierarchies that depend on orders to execute movements and do not allow for the individual initiative of their generals.
The Fourth Stage: While all this is happening, the foot infantry and motorized/mechanized units are responsible for annihilating the remaining enemy troops while the tanks create panic in the enemy's rearguard. These troops encircle, assault, and keep the enemy army divided while widening the combat front, taking advantage of the opponent's disorganization and their own army's good organization. Because the enemy troops at this point had no communication and few or no extra supplies, they were left at the mercy of either fighting to the last bullet without clear orders and only with the individual will of each group of soldiers, or surrendering. This destroyed the enemy divisions, either because they died in combat or were irremediably captured, with few able to retreat in time to reorganize with others, thus diminishing the enemy army more effectively and much more quickly than with a general (frontal) advance.
This doctrine carried great weight during the Second World War, where it reached its maximum splendor to date. Although Germany had already experimented with this idea in the First World War with the elite German divisions that arrived at the end of the war, the Stosstruppen—light divisions specialized in infiltration tactics to enter the flanks of enemy trenches and create chaos—their biggest problem was that they were on foot, were not numerous, and could not be resupplied fast enough to be decisive in breaking a front. They also lacked radiocommunications as well as the armored and air support that would become key to maneuver tactics. Now, why do I consider Helmuth von Moltke to be the first precursor of these ideas? The strategies this German general used during the Franco-Prussian War, taking advantage of railway lines to mobilize his troops and thus seize their communication points, would be the main basis for the effectiveness of maneuver warfare. Likewise, lacking armored or air support, he sought rapid advances, defeating the enemy flanks of France and then entrenching in favorable positions so that when France attempted to retake its communication points, it would be surprised by a combat on totally disadvantageous terrain. This allowed the French front to be divided and its main armies to become fragmented in the north and south. The use of technologies like the railroad was key. In turn, this marked the first important step towards a flexible hierarchy, where Moltke would issue mission-type orders using the telegraph, leaving basic orders with a certain freedom of application to avoid direct confrontation with the French army as a whole, instead enveloping, cutting off supply lines, and focusing on fragmenting the enemy army while making swift advances through France.
This translation was performed by Gemini, an AI from Google