German Orders of Battle
during the Battle of France, 8 June 1940

By May 1940, the number of divisions in the German army was as follows:

• 129 infantry divisions;
• 8 motorised infantry divisions (3 Waffen-SS);
• 10 panzer divisions;
• 3 mountain divisions;
• 1 cavalry division;
• 2 airborne divisions;

In addition the SS-Verfuegungstruppe (from April 1940, known as the Waffen-SS) provided three motorised infantry divisions and a brigade. There were now over two-and-a-half million men under arms in the German Army, of which the Waffen-SS contributed about 100,000.

For the invasion of France the German Army was organised into three army groups:
Army Group A (von Rundstedt) with 45 1/2 divisions including 7 panzer;
Army Group B (von Bock) with 29 1/2 divisions including 3 panzer, and
Army Group C (von Leeb) with 19 divisions.
Army Group C held a defensive position against the Maginot Line while the main offensive was launched by Rundstedt's Army Group A in the Ardennes with a subsidiary invasion of Holland and Belgium undertaken by Army Group B.
From 9 April (when German troops invaded Denmark and Norway) to the armistice with France on 25 June, the German Army confirmed the superiority of its organisation and tactics. Losses in Norway were 5,636 men; the invasion of France and the Low Countries cost 27,074 killed, 111,034 wounded and 18,348 missing. On some single days in World War I the losses were higher.

Unfortunatly, there is no German Orders of Battle available to me at this time for 10 May 1940, the attack in the West. Only for the Battle of France, which started after theDunkirk Evacuation on 5 June with the attack of Army Group B.

Overview of fully established and operational divisions of the Wehrmacht, Waffen-SS and Luftwaffe on 8 June, 1940:

Approximate organisation strength of the major types of the German Army divisions in 1940:

Known quantities of tanks in May 1940:

German Air Force (Luftwaffe) and Airborne Forces:

For the campaign in the West the Luftwaffe deployed 3,902 aircraft (1,482 bombers and dive-bombers, 42 ground-attack planes, 1,016 fighter planes and 248 Bf110 twin-engined fighters).
Colonel-General Kesselring commanded Luftflotte 2 with I, IV and IX Fliegerkorps in support of General von Bock's Army Group B.
Colonel-General Sperrle commanded Luftflotte 3 with II, V and VIII Fliegerkorps in support of General von Rundstedt's Army Group A.

The formation of parachute troops began almost simultaneously in both the German Army and Air Force. On 1 October 1935, General Goering's personal guard regiment, which originally had belonged to the Prussian Police, was transferred to the Luftwaffe as the General Goering Regiment. At the same time volunteers from the regiment were sent to Altengrabow training ground where the formation of the Luftwaffe's parachute rifle regiment was taking place.

Picture: German Paratroopers during the air landings in Holland in May 1940. The MG34 is ready to protect the landing soldiers.

In Spring 1936 the Army established an experimental staff with 15 officers and 80 other ranks, which was to become the Army's parachute rifle battalion. During the occupation of the Sudetenland the battalion came under the tactical command of the Luftwaffe, and on 1 January 1939, the battalion was transferred to the Air Force. From then on the Luftwaffe assumed total responsibility for the recruitment, training, equipment and operational control of parachute troops, and Germany became the only country in which parachute troops were exclusively part of the Air Force. Although paratroops were part of the Luftwaffe, the other component element of Germany's airborne forces, the air landing troops, remained as part of the Army. Air landing troops were infantry soldiers trained in the skills of rapid airborne landings (as indeed their name suggested) and equipped with a number of specialised lightweight weapons.
In July 1938 Major-General Student was transferred to the Luftwaffe from the Army, to undertake the development of the parachute troops, but by the time the Germans went to war in September 1939, the 7th Airborne Division was still in the process of formation.
After a winter spent in further specialist training an air landing corps was formed from the 7th Airborne Division and the 22 (Air landing) Infantry Division.
Germany's parachute troops played a small, though successful, role in the Norwegian campaign which included the relief of General Dietl's beleagured command at Narvik. Some of the 'paratroopers' dropped during this operation were mountain soldiers who had undergone a seven-day parachuting course. The invasion of Holland and Belgium in 1940 saw the most spectacular triumph of this new arm when paratroops under the command of Major-General Student captured the modern Belgian fortress of Eben Emael and the bridges over the Albert Canal, the key points in the line of Belgian fortifications.

• see also: Wehrmacht, the German armed forces of the Third Reich
• see also: Fighting power of the Wehrmacht

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  see also: Waffen-SS
• see also: Luftwaffe
• see also: Wehrmacht Orders of Battle for September 1939
• see also: Wehrmacht Orders of Battle for June 1940
• see also: Wehrmacht Orders of Battle for June 1942
• see also: Wehrmacht Orders of Battle for July 1943
• see also: Wehrmacht Orders of Battle for October 1943
• see also: Wehrmacht Orders of Battle for December 1943