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Bicycle-Mounted
Troops
Revised
by Jonathan Bocek
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Most of
the following was taken from the March 1945 issue of The
Intelligence Bulletin. This publication was
issued by the U.S. War Department to military
personnel with the intention of providing helpful
information concerning the enemy.
Newly
created Volksgrenadier divisions not only have a
bicycle-mounted reconnaissance battalion or company,
but also have an entire battalion of infantry mounted
on bicycles. This battalion was employed on
either reconnaissance missions or as a crack
divisional reserve unit. In addition, the two
engineer companies of the Division Engineer Battalion
are bicycle-mounted. It may be assumed that some
of the tactics employed by the bicycle-mounted company
in the reconnaissance unit (Füsilier Battaillon)
of the infantry division may also be used by the
bicycle-mounted elements of the Volksgrenadier
divisions. Here are several prisoner-of-war
comments on this subject.
A German
prisoner remarks that when a bicycle-mounted squad is
moving along a road as a point, anticipating contact
with a hostile force, the squad leader and a runner
are followed at a distance of about 50 yards by three
machine gunners with light machine gun, supported by a
sniper, a semiautomatic rifleman, and two riflemen,
one of whom is armed with a cup grenade discharger.
When the squad is fired on, the machine gun detachment
immediately deploys, while the remaining men drop
their bicycles under the nearest available cover and
take up firing positions.
The
leading squad of a platoon is said to move with a
rifleman, a semiautomatic rifleman, a machine gunner
with light machine gun, a sniper, the squad leader and
a runner, two machine gunners, and a rifleman armed
with a cup grenade discharger -- moving in that order.
Fifty yards behind, the platoon commander and a
runner, the platoon sergeant and a runner, a telegraph
operator and a medical aid man, and an antitank
rifleman follow -- in the order named.
A German
prisoner from another unit comments that in his
outfit, it was common practice to send two
bicycle-mounted scouts ahead of the point squad.
German
prisoners remark that bicycle-mounted companies are
expected to be able to cover up to 75 miles a day, but
that, in actual operations, the figure seldom exceeds
50 or 60 miles.
German
prisoners from certain bicycle-mounted companies say
that they have been trained mainly in infantry
tactics, and not primarily for reconnaissance
missions. One unit was trained to move forward
on its bicycles, leave them in farm buildings, and
then go forward on foot to fight as infantry.
In Russia
a company was detached from an infantry regiment,
equipped with bicycles, and formed into a
reconnaissance company. These men were given the
mission of protecting the regimental flank upon
contact with a hostile force.
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