Dennis Showalter and the History of Armour during Second World War

After analyzing the writings of the German officers during the interwar 3 era in Hitler’s Panzers, Showalter ends the debate once and for all, by portraying the indigenous development of the theory of armoured warfare in Germany. [...] They have restored the fullest scope to the long established roles of mobile troops, which in the past have been similarly decisive in the classic periods of Alexander the Great, Hannibal, Chingiz Khan, Frederick the Great and the Napoleonic Wars. [...] While the armoured cars at high speed would move along the roads and maintain the lines of communications, the tanks moving across the valleys would provide flank protection to the baggage train and infantry moving along the roads. [...] Are we anticipating the order which Field-Marshal Walther von Brauchitsch issued to the Wehrmacht during the opening gambit of Barbarossa? In Small War, the objectives, emphasized Johnson, were not to merely defeat the lashkars (war bands of the Pathan tribes) but also to destroy the economic infrastructure of the rebelling tribes. [...] Especially in the post War Second World era, the doctrines of the Indian and Pakistani armoured units were shaped by the experiences of the tank units of the British controlled Indian Army.