Schwerpunkt has been translated as center of gravity, crucial, focal point and point of main effort. Schwerpunktprinzip was a heuristic device (conceptual tool or thinking formula) that was used in the German Army since the nineteenth century to make decisions from tactics to strategy about priority. None of those forms is sufficient to describe the universal importance of the term and the concept of Schwerpunktprinzip. Every unit in the army, from the company to the supreme command, decided on a Schwerpunkt by schwerpunktbildung, as did the support services, which meant that commanders always knew what was the most important and why.
The German army was trained to support the Schwerpunkt even when risks had to be taken elsewhere to support the point of main effort and to attack with overwhelming firepower.[1] Schwerpunktbildung allowed the German Army to achieve superiority at the Schwerpunkt, whether attacking or defending, to turn local success at the Schwerpunkt into the progressive disorganisation of the opposing force and to create more opportunities to exploit that advantage even if the Germans were numerically and strategically inferior in general. In the 1930s, Guderian summarized that as Klotzen, nicht kleckern! ("Kick, don't spatter them!")[2] [3]
- ↑ Sheldon, J. (2017). Fighting the Somme: German Challenges, Dilemmas & Solutions. Barnsley: Pen & Sword Military. ISBN 978-1-47388-199-0. pp. vi, 17.
- ↑ Frieser, Karl-Heinz (2005). The Blitzkrieg Legend: The 1940 Campaign in the West [Blitzkrieg-legende: der westfeldzug 1940]. trans. J. T. Greenwood. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 978-1-59114-294-2. pp. 89–90, 156–157
- ↑ Alexander, Bevin (2002) [1993]. How Great Generals Win (repr. ed.). London: W. W. Norton. ISBN 978-0-393-32316-0. p. 227