Could the Russians have avoided Tannanberg?

[Desert Journeyman]

Need some help with an alternate WW1 scenario.

Want to draw off German resources in the West to the Eastern Front. Any chance for the Russians to turn Tannenberg into a draw at least, then to attack simultaneously at First Masurian Lakes?

 

[naraic]

Two main options to improve Russian performance at Tannenberg.

Change the Russian generals. Consolidate 1st army and 2nd army instead of facing the Germans one at a time.

Build a warehouse prewar at a position further forward so that Russian troops arrive and pick up ammunition (rather than hauling it from their mobilisation trains well behind the border). Russian logistics were very stretched at Tannenberg. The Russian generals reported logistics problems on 21 August; 5 days before the battle and it got worse by the battle.

 

[Aslangeo]

It would have helped if they had different commanders

Remnenkampf and Samsonov hated each other and the German chief of staff, Hoffmann actually witnessed the pair brawling on a station platform in Mukden Manchuria during the Russo Japanese war, when Hoffmann was the German military attaché. Hoffmann therefore knew that they would never support each other and could be defeated in detail

having a single commander in charge would also have helped

 

[CaptainCalvert]

It would have helped if they had different commanders

Remnenkampf and Samsonov hated each other and the German chief of staff, Hoffmann actually witnessed the pair brawling on a station platform in Mukden Manchuria during the Russo Japanese war, when Hoffmann was the German military attaché. Hoffmann therefore knew that they would never support each other and could be defeated in detail

having a single commander in charge would also have helped

I agree. Whoever put such an ill-matched pair in charge was wrong. And to borrow (approximately) from Churchill:
It's not a matter of which general is better but that one general is always better than two generals.

 

[Aslangeo]

True b

I agree. Whoever put such an ill-matched pair in charge was wrong. And to borrow (approximately) from Churchill:
It's not a matter of which general is better but that one general is always better than two generals.

true but Rennekamf did have a most splendid moustache

 

[NoMommsen]

... Change the Russian generals. Consolidate 1st army and 2nd army instead of facing the Germans one at a time. ...

It would have helped if they had different commanders

... erhm ... and who would you put in charge instead? ... aka 'switch' the armycommand?
... from 3rd army Ruzsky the cunctator who almost had to bee forced by threat of dismissal (if not charge of treason) to help out 4th and 5th army with attacking the austrian wiiiide open flank due to his very personal ambition being the one capturing Lwiw
... from 4th army senile(?), at least by his tasks against by marching short of exhausted austrian 1st army grossly overstrained von Saltza ?

...
Build a warehouse prewar at a position further forward so that Russian troops arrive and pick up ammunition (rather than hauling it from their mobilisation trains well behind the border). Russian logistics were very stretched at Tannenberg. The Russian generals reported logistics problems on 21 August; 5 days before the battle and it got worse by the battle.

... what I somehow doubt would have gone unnoticed - and unaccounted for - by the germans prewar given the ... oh-so 'capable' and 'speedy' infrastructral abilities of Russia in these regions.

...
having a single commander in charge would also have helped

...
It's not a matter of which general is better but that one general is always better than two generals.

May I remind that there actually WAS one single commander for russian 1st and 2nd army?
... which formed the "Northwesetern Front" under the command of former Chief of the russian General Staff Yakov Zhilinsky whom the generals Rennekampff and Samsonov so willingly obeyed and followed?


However...
IMHO the only way how the russians might have been able to avoid a/the Tannenberg desaster would have been ... a VERY to completly different overal operational plan - aka no Plan 1912 - at all (Plan "A" was as useless as Plan "G").
But that would have needed in 1911/1912 a very different strategical/operational doctrinal thinking as was prevalent then. ... worldwide
Despite the russian had made the 'ultimate' experience of superiority of defense at that time in the war with japan its lessons nobody wanted to accept.

 

[CaptainCalvert]

... erhm ... and who would you put in charge instead? ... aka 'switch' the armycommand?
... from 3rd army Ruzsky the cunctator who almost had to bee forced by threat of dismissal (if not charge of treason) to help out 4th and 5th army with attacking the austrian wiiiide open flank due to his very personal ambition being the one capturing Lwiw
... from 4th army senile(?), at least by his tasks against by marching short of exhausted austrian 1st army grossly overstrained von Saltza ?

... what I somehow doubt would have gone unnoticed - and unaccounted for - by the germans prewar given the ... oh-so 'capable' and 'speedy' infrastructral abilities of Russia in these regions.



May I remind that there actually WAS one single commander for russian 1st and 2nd army?
... which formed the "Northwesetern Front" under the command of former Chief of the russian General Staff Yakov Zhilinsky whom the generals Rennekampff and Samsonov so willingly obeyed and followed?


However...
IMHO the only way how the russians might have been able to avoid a/the Tannenberg desaster would have been ... a VERY to completly different overal operational plan - aka no Plan 1912 - at all (Plan "A" was as useless as Plan "G").
But that would have needed in 1911/1912 a very different strategical/operational doctrinal thinking as was prevalent then. ... worldwide
Despite the russian had made the 'ultimate' experience of superiority of defense at that time in the war with japan its lessons nobody wanted to accept.

That is a truly awful selection. I had never realised it was that bad. It sounds like next door's cat would have been more use.

 

[Coulsdon Eagle]

It would have helped if they had different commanders

Remnenkampf and Samsonov hated each other and the German chief of staff, Hoffmann actually witnessed the pair brawling on a station platform in Mukden Manchuria during the Russo Japanese war, when Hoffmann was the German military attaché. Hoffmann therefore knew that they would never support each other and could be defeated in detail

having a single commander in charge would also have helped

The brawl is a myth. Hoffmann was never above a bit of self-promotion.

The two generals had different "sponsors" in GD Nicholas and Minister for War Sukhomlinov, who had their own bitter feud, and their proteges just carried it on.

 

[Desert Journeyman]

What if Samsonov dismounted the greater portion of his cavalry, sending the horses back behind the lines, and had received a codebook, allowing him to communicate with the front commander and Rennenkampf in secret?

 

[marathag]

Best thing for the Russians would have been to have a totally different mobilization plan.
But they were tied into attacking both the Germans and Austrians ASAP at the start of a conflict where the Germans attack France.
A slower buildup would go against those plans

 

[phx1138]

As I understand it, there was a serious Russian comsec problem: they were sending orders in clear. German intercept stations were sending the information to the local commander.

Unless you can fix that, you're spitting into the wind, & I'm betting your name isn't Slim.

 

[Desert Journeyman]

Appreciate the Jim Croche quote! Yes, I’ve written in a solution to the codes issue.

 

[NoMommsen]

As I understand it, there was a serious Russian comsec problem: they were sending orders in clear. German intercept stations were sending the information to the local commander.
...

To be fair :
The germenas weren't too much better. The german radio-interceptions teams recorded german radio transmissions in clear not very much less.
Radio as a mean of communication was brand new to everybody and familiarity with the necessary 'disciplines' by the troops wasn't well developed yet.

The difference in OTLT in East Prussia was that the russians were abysmal in detecting, translating and esp. then passing on german transmissions.