The mobility of bluffing
Appearing to have something one doesn't, or to not have something one does: this is the art of the bluff. The bluff is the bigness of an argument, backed up by a certain fear on the side of the adversary. It's the rhetoric of drawings circulated in the press to stake out territory that may or may not be occupied. Bluffing is a necessary component of war: it can save the need to produce or destroy, provide it is effected properly -- and this is always the gamble, because a bluff can be called. Two moments of interaction between Germany and the Allied forces in World War II bring aspects of the bluff to light: the National Redoubt and the West Wall. They existed in psychological space as well as physical space, but their nature as bluff allowed them to occupy less physical space than their opponents believed.
The area to which remaining forces will withdraw after losing the key battle is called a national redoubt. It has a particular distinction in World War II: National Redoubt is the idea that, in the final days of the war, Germany might withdraw to Bavaria and its surrounding alpine areas, where their forces would hold out for a final stand. Although criticized by Churchill, Eisenhower believed a March 1945 Allied intelligence report that supported the idea of the National Redoubt and directed troops toward the southwest. It was a credible idea, write Keith Mallory and Arvit Ottar in their 1973 Architecture of War, given the "German obsession with bomb-proof construction." [1: p. 265]
Yet it was a bluff. In reality, the National Redoubt conceived by the British was a "Propaganda Wall" of Goebbels' devising, not a real Alpine fortress. As a result of the bluff, the Russians beat the English and Americans to Berlin, the ramifications of which would eventually divide the city and the country for decades. But at the same time, the concept of this fortress wasn't imaginary, either. Just 160 km from Berlin in the Harz Mountains, the National Socialists planned a central facility of tunnels and underground factories to produce liquid oxygen, jet engines, synthetic oil, and missiles.
In the earlier days of World War II, the Westwall (or Siegfried Line) also served as a propaganda wall. Its dragon teeth--anti-tank barriers--extended along the Swiss, French, Dutch, Belgian and German borders, north of Aachen and toward the Ruhrgebiet, south along the Rhine to Basel. The Nazis published maps in the late 1930s, showing a thick line of army defense, supported by additional air reinforcement as far east as Düsseldorf and Koblenz.
Write Mallory and Ottar, "The actual West Wall as planned and built... though brilliant in its design, had nothing of the strength painted by Goebbels. The huge difference between the propaganda wall and the real West Wall is best described by the fact that General von Rundstedt simply 'laughed' when he saw it." [1: p. 115] Where Nazi propaganda suggested the Westwall extended 10 to 25 km, it was merely a skinny line.
The bluff performed by the West Wall staved off a French attack under Marshall Pétain in 1944. It dissuaded Eisenhower from attacking, instead causing him to first seek reinforcements. Both results may have extended the war into 1945 -- unnecessarily, say many, write Mallory and Ottmar.
In both cases, Germany's strategy was to make itself look fortified. In reality, it adopted a dynamic propaganda machine to maximize its resources. The Westwall as propaganda was a mobile machine, deployed through publication. The Allies believed in the appearance of the massive stasis, believed that what was on the surface penetrated much further beyond. The bluff allowed Germany to create the illusion of insurmountability out of a laughable--lächerliche--line. The bluff is the quintessential force of mobility.
[1] Mallory, Keith, and Arvid Ottar, The Architecture of War, New York: Pantheon Books, 1973, 108-123 and 238-265. These pieces have informed the content about the Westwall and the National Redoubt.
[2] Thanks to the Old Hickory 30th's pictures of the Siegfried Line and the Watch on the Rhine.
[3] A mildly embarrassing debt to Wikipedia for its national redoubt discussion and its Siegfried Line imagery.
The area to which remaining forces will withdraw after losing the key battle is called a national redoubt. It has a particular distinction in World War II: National Redoubt is the idea that, in the final days of the war, Germany might withdraw to Bavaria and its surrounding alpine areas, where their forces would hold out for a final stand. Although criticized by Churchill, Eisenhower believed a March 1945 Allied intelligence report that supported the idea of the National Redoubt and directed troops toward the southwest. It was a credible idea, write Keith Mallory and Arvit Ottar in their 1973 Architecture of War, given the "German obsession with bomb-proof construction." [1: p. 265]
Yet it was a bluff. In reality, the National Redoubt conceived by the British was a "Propaganda Wall" of Goebbels' devising, not a real Alpine fortress. As a result of the bluff, the Russians beat the English and Americans to Berlin, the ramifications of which would eventually divide the city and the country for decades. But at the same time, the concept of this fortress wasn't imaginary, either. Just 160 km from Berlin in the Harz Mountains, the National Socialists planned a central facility of tunnels and underground factories to produce liquid oxygen, jet engines, synthetic oil, and missiles.
In the earlier days of World War II, the Westwall (or Siegfried Line) also served as a propaganda wall. Its dragon teeth--anti-tank barriers--extended along the Swiss, French, Dutch, Belgian and German borders, north of Aachen and toward the Ruhrgebiet, south along the Rhine to Basel. The Nazis published maps in the late 1930s, showing a thick line of army defense, supported by additional air reinforcement as far east as Düsseldorf and Koblenz.
Write Mallory and Ottar, "The actual West Wall as planned and built... though brilliant in its design, had nothing of the strength painted by Goebbels. The huge difference between the propaganda wall and the real West Wall is best described by the fact that General von Rundstedt simply 'laughed' when he saw it." [1: p. 115] Where Nazi propaganda suggested the Westwall extended 10 to 25 km, it was merely a skinny line.
The bluff performed by the West Wall staved off a French attack under Marshall Pétain in 1944. It dissuaded Eisenhower from attacking, instead causing him to first seek reinforcements. Both results may have extended the war into 1945 -- unnecessarily, say many, write Mallory and Ottmar.
In both cases, Germany's strategy was to make itself look fortified. In reality, it adopted a dynamic propaganda machine to maximize its resources. The Westwall as propaganda was a mobile machine, deployed through publication. The Allies believed in the appearance of the massive stasis, believed that what was on the surface penetrated much further beyond. The bluff allowed Germany to create the illusion of insurmountability out of a laughable--lächerliche--line. The bluff is the quintessential force of mobility.
[1] Mallory, Keith, and Arvid Ottar, The Architecture of War, New York: Pantheon Books, 1973, 108-123 and 238-265. These pieces have informed the content about the Westwall and the National Redoubt.
[2] Thanks to the Old Hickory 30th's pictures of the Siegfried Line and the Watch on the Rhine.
[3] A mildly embarrassing debt to Wikipedia for its national redoubt discussion and its Siegfried Line imagery.
So was the National Redoubt really a bluff or was it a matter of the Nazi leadership kidding themselves? Bear in mind that at that time, they were issuing actual orders to entire army divisions that only existed on paper.
I'm thinking that bluffing and self-delusion might have been indistinguishable from each other, particularly at that time.
This is just one of many similar examples during a second world war. My favorite was British hoax during the German bombardment when the whole artillery divisions and even airport was artificially "constructed" with inflated tanks and airplanes dummies...
Strangely there is still no Hollywood movie about this..
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