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A HISTORY OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR 100 IN MAPS A HISTORY OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR 100 IN MAPS JEREMY BLACK The University of Chicago Press For Kaushik Roy The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637 Text © 2020 by Jeremy Black Images © The British Library Board and other named copyright holders All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles and reviews. For more information, contact the University of Chicago Press, 1427 E. 60th St., Chicago, IL 60637. Published 2020 Printed in Italy 29 28 27 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 1 2 3 4 5 ISBN-13: 978-0-226-75524-3 (cloth) ISBN-13: 978-0-226-75765-0 (e-book) DOI: https://doi.org/10.7208/chicago/9780226757650.001.0001 Published outside North and South America by the British Library, 2020. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Black, Jeremy, 1955– author. Title: A history of the Second World War in 100 maps / Jeremy Black. Other titles: Second World War in 100 maps Description: Chicago : The University of Chicago Press, 2020. | Includes PAGES 2–3: Detail from a set of German military bibliographical references and index. situation maps showing the dispositions of their Identifiers: LCCN 2020014429 | ISBN 9780226755243 (cloth) | ISBN forces on the Russian Front. The situation maps 9780226757650 (ebook) were produced on a day by day basis, and this Subjects: LCSH: World War, 1939–1945—Maps. | Military maps—History— map shows 2 July 1941. In the centre, the Germans had captured Minsk on 28 June. To the north, Riga 20th century. | Cartography—Political aspects—History—20th century. fell on 30 June, while east of that German forces | Cartography—United States—History—20th century. | Cartography— advanced toward Leningrad. In the south, German Europe—History—20th century. and Romanian forces had crossed the River Prut, while in west Ukraine Army Group South had taken Classification: LCC G1038 .B55 2020 | DDC 940.53022/3—dc23 heavy casualties before prevailing in frontier battles LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020014429 (see also pages 42–47 and 216–217). Contents Preface 6 Introduction 7 Chapter 1. Geopolitics 14 Chapter 2. Strategic 34 Chapter 3. Operational 58 Chapter 4. Tactical 104 Chapter 5. Reportage 158 Chapter 6. Propaganda 198 Chapter 7. Retrospective 230 Reference 246 Further Reading 248 List of Maps 248 Index 252 Picture Credits and Acknowledgements 256 Preface The Second World War was a uniquely difficult war to map, and therefore a particularly interesting one to cover. Fought across an unprecedented range and in all the elements, the war saw fleets with aircraft carriers in combat, major airborne assaults, and large-scale insurgency and counter-insurgency campaigns, none of which had been the case with the previous world war, during which the fighting in East Asia, the Pacific and the Indian Ocean had been more limited, and the range and fighting capabilities of aircraft were far less. Moreover, the greater tempo of campaigning in the Second World War created practical problems for mapmakers seeking to provide tools for the military, as well as those informing publics at home. The range of combined operations meant that mapping was required in a more comprehensive and multi- purpose fashion than hitherto. Furthermore, the attempt to win and retain support, domestic and foreign, helped lead to particular pressures for favourable reportage and effective propaganda, both of which we show in this atlas. This book, which is organised in terms of the key categories of mapping, provides guidance to the fascinating variety of maps produced during and about the war, illustrated by 100 significant examples of them. Countless more await your attention. This book is dedicated to Kaushik Roy, India’s leading military historian and a friend whose judgement I greatly value. 6 A HISTORY OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR IN 100 MAPS Introduction ‘Like bombers and submarines, maps are indispensable instruments of war.’ John Kirtland Wright, Librarian at the American Geographical Society, Geographical Review (1942). War inherently takes place in a spatial context and it is an activity was concerned, there was a collapsing of the distinction between that can only be conducted in that fashion. As a result, mapping is map and photograph, with the photograph from the world central to conflict, and at every level: from the most detailed (the wars serving as a form of map, and one that could be used for tactical) to the most general (the strategic). Combatants order immediate tactical purposes. This point underlines the difficulty of themselves in space, and have to maintain that sense whatever defining a map, but also, as a related point, the question of means the strains of combat; doing so orientates them in terms of goal versus ends in mapping. Thus, the trench maps of the First World and means, and does the same for both allies and opponents. War (1914–18) were substantially based on aerial photographs. This sense of space, moreover, is important to point-of-contact Returning to the point that not all places are equal, sites to engagement, however contested: whether hand-to-hand or by be fortified attracted particular mapping attention, not least in missiles and weapons at any range. order to plan how best to defend them. In this case, there was For most combat, we have no maps. Instead, mental mapping is again an overlap with other forms of illustration, notably in the the key, particularly in the shape of where is the enemy? Or where shape of diagrams and pictures. Although that contrast was very is cover? As, indeed, overwhelmingly remains the case today. important it was not as clear as might be presumed because many That point is not one found in discussion of the subject, but any maps included pictograms as devices. Moreover, some maps were emphasis on mental mapping leads to the conclusion that the simultaneously diagrammatic and pictorial, and each was regarded standard approach to war and cartography is teleological, in that it as enhancing the other. adopts a progressivist account, one predicated on the assumption The importance of maps for fortification was to be enhanced that producing maps in physical copy is the desirable outcome and in the twentieth century as comprehensive front-wide systems a necessary means. Instead, a needs-based assessment to mapping developed during the First World War. In that conflict, trench is appropriate, one that considers the idea of fitness for purpose warfare, to a degree, overwhelmed the strategic and operational in terms both of the maps and of their usage, and that is why this dimensions of war in tactical problems – and notably so on the book is organised in terms of the key categories of mapping. Western Front in France and Belgium – but that process also Such an approach, moreover, valuably complements that of encouraged the mapping of the entire system. In the Second World considering the survival of artefacts, not least by asking what War (1939–45, but 1937–45 in China) the fighting was less static in purpose is served? For maps in this context, there is the question place and method but location, nevertheless, remained a key issue, not only of why they were retained, but, in particular, linked to not least due to the continual importance of artillery. Indeed, that that, their potential value on a recurrent and/or long-term basis, was a powerful driver for mapping at the tactical level, for ballistics which is a crucial dimension of fitness for purpose. So also with the demanded a fixing of target location in order that the algorithms issue of accuracy, which is not a fixed, absolute value but a relative that determined the aiming of guns could apply. one to be gauged among other wartime pressures in terms of the Mapping therefore was clearly linked with capability, and the opportunity costs. Accuracy requires both effort and time, but a related requirement for maps for bombing was in effect another map that lacks relevant accuracy is not fit for purpose. form of ballistics. The precise location of the target, and an Not all places were equal in coverage and significance. Indeed, understanding of the routes to get there, were both crucial. That that is a major difference between, on the one hand, the mapping of meant that, in part, mapping for air warfare remained in effect the world, in whole or part, and the use of such maps for war; and, two-dimensional, rather than focusing on the three dimensions in contrast, on the other hand, more specific and detailed mapping that aerial conflict required. Instead, for a long time both for particular military purposes. The latter process is integral to the bombing and aerial conflict relied on the visual identification of point about places not being equal in mapping, both in terms of targets, although that changed greatly when radar became more which places are mapped and to what level of detail. significant, not least because it allowed effective night-fighting. Linked to that issue comes those of purpose and timing – in The First World War had made it clear that there would be a particular, maps produced prior to the period of immediate need, great need for maps in any future conflict. Not only in terms of the and those arising out of a national emergency with all the relevant overall availability of maps, but also with reference to the number pressures of need, production and timing. Indeed, as far as timing of types of fighting that had to be covered and with regard to the INTRODUCTION 7 THE SCALE OF PRODUCTION In Britain, the Ordnance Survey produced about 193,775,000 maps for the Allied war effort, 35 private companies produced another 148,640,000 maps for the War Office, and the Geographical Section of the General Staff also had its own Survey Production Centre. The Survey of India, a major cartographic agency in the British Empire, produced about 22 million copies in total (of 2,483 different maps) in 1945 alone, compared with 750,000 (of 1,580) annually before the war. The United States’ Army Map Service produced more than 500 million maps, and other branches of the United States military printed many more. After the Liberation from German occupation, in 1944 France’s Institut Géographique National (IGN), or National Geographic Institute, produced 28 million maps in less than a year for Allied forces. This was valuable, not least because conflict continued within France, in Alsace, into 1945. In comparison, Germany printed about 1,300 million sheets. Trends in production varied. By 1943, German production was declining, under the strain both of Allied bombing and of resource pressures, while that of the Allies was increasing. ‘WAR MAPS WHILE YOU WAIT’ FROM POPULAR MECHANICS, NOVEMBER 1943. 8 A HISTORY OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR IN 100 MAPS