The German Army began field trials of the first Sd Kfz 251 prototypes during 1938, and began general production of the vehicle from 1939. Initially, like most German vehicle production, manufacture of the Sd Kfz 251 commenced at a desultory rate. Consequently, by the start of the war in September 1939, the German Army could field just 69 Sd Kfz 251 half-tracked APGs: the vast majority of the motorised infantry within Germany’s six panzer divisions remained lorryborne. Construction of the mSPW continued slowly during 1940, when only 355 were delivered. The limited availability of APCs meant that the Germans authorised only one of the total of six panzergrenadier battalions fielded within a panzer division, to be equipped with APCs.
SdKfz 251/1
Crew; 12
Maximum road speed: 52.5km/h (32.5mph) Maximum range: 300km (186 miles)
Weight: 7810kg (17,2181b)
Armament: Two 7.92mm (0.31 in) MGs
This panzergrenadier battalion, identified from the other five by the suffix (gep) for gepanzerie, had an official war establishment of some 150 Sd Kfz 251 vehicles, usually split between five companies.
As the German war economy began to gear into action after the first set-backs in the Soviet Union, so production of the Sd Kfz 251 increased rapidly during 1943, before peaking in 1944, when some 7780 Sd Kfz 251 vehicles were produced, at a rate of 657 per month. By May 1945 the German Army had received as many as 16,300 of these medium APCs. Despite this burgeoning production, the number of mSPW vehicles operational in a panzer division at any given time remained relatively modest, as the number of mechanised divisions grew and as high battlefield losses made their mark. Even at the time that the strength of Sd Kfz 251 vehicles in German service peaked - some 6155 vehicles on 1 December 1944 - this amounted to approximately 120 units per division, since the Germans now deployed about 50 mechanised formations that fielded APCs (including 30 panzer divisions, 11 panzergrenadier divisions, and seven independent panzer brigades). Elite units, such as the Waffen-SS panzer divisions and the Wehrmachfs Grossdeutschland and Lehr Divisions, often fielded between 150 and 200 Sd Kfz 251 vehicles, thus manv ordinary German panzer and panzergrenadier divisions may have deployed just 60-80 of these vehicles: almost certainly, a proportion of these vehicles would also have been temporarily non-operational due to mechanical problems, so the number of APCs available at any given moment was even less than these figures suggest.
The increases in the production rates of the mSPW achieved during 1942-44 were accomplished in part by a series of modifications to the vehicle s design intended to simplify and speed the construction process. During the war, four main models of the Sd Kfz 251 emerged. The first two, the Models A and B, emerged during 1939-40. The Model C first entered service during mid-1940 and featured a single section nose plate instead of the earlier two-piece plate, designed to simplify manufacture. In 1942, the Sd Kfz 251 was completely redesigned to produce the Model D. This variant featured large single piece superstructure plates instead of the individual faceted ones possessed by previous versions. This redesign significantly speeded the manufacturing process, and the Model D remained in production without significant modification until the end of the war. Although examples of all four types continued to see service until the end of the war, the majority of the Model D vehicles served with select formations such as the Waffen-SS
Below: A Sd Kfz 251 demonstrates its ‘swimming’ capability whilst crossing a river in Poland. Even such a basic amphibious ability as this could save the panzergrenadiers time during an assault or pursuit, and help keep up the pressure on the enemy.
Panzer divisions, or the elite Wehrmacht ones, such as the Grossdeutschland Division.
As the war developed, the requirement for the Sd Kfz 251 to fulfil new, specialised, battlefield roles became increasingly apparent to the German High Command, as did the need for enhanced levels of protection and firepower. These Uvo requirements led ultimately to the emergence of no less than a total of 22 variants of the basic Sd Kfz 251 halftrack model over the course of World War II. These variants fall into a series of grouped functional vehicles that include gunarmed heavy weapons vehicles, non-gun-armed hea7 weapons vehicles, anti-aircraft APCs, command and control vehicles, and miscellaneous support APCs.
World History
