Strength and loss data Eastern Front – part 1

I have the following table from Axis History forum user Qvist :

	Quarter	German Istarke		Soviet Fronts		Ratio
1941	3q41	2,800,000		3,334,000		1.2
	4q41	2,675,000		2,818,500		1.1
1942	1q42	2,525,000		4,186,000		1.7
	2q42	2,600,000		5,060,300		1.9
	3q42	2,825,000		5,664,600		2.0
	4q42	2,900,000		6,343,600		2.2
1943	1q43	2,800,000		5,892,800		2.1
	2q43	2,850,000		6,459,800		2.3
	3q43	2,850,000		6,816,800		2.4
	4q43	2,575,000		6,387,200		2.5
1944	1q44	2,406,750		6,268,600		2.6
	2q44	2,409,750		6,447,000		2.7
	3q44	2,076,250		6,714,300		3.2
	4q44	1,900,800		6,770,100		3.6
1945	1q45	1,800,000		6,461,100		3.6
	2q45			6,135,300

Explanation for Iststarke :Actual strength, includes all men that are part of the unit's composition. Men on leave or temporarily detached to other units are included. Also men sick or wounded are included if they are assumed to return to service within eight weeks. Thus, despite its name, this strength category does not give the actual number of men available for service with the unit at the given time.

Source : Zetterling, Niklas and Frankson, Anders(1998)'Analyzing World War II eastern front battles',The Journal of Slavic Military Studies

The data for the Soviet Forces comes from Krivosheev, Soviet Casualties and Combat Losses in the Twentieth Century..

More data for German forces can be found in Kursk 1943: A Statistical Analysis ,by Zetterling and Frankson.Specifically pages 2 and 5:

On 1 July 1942 German forces in the East were 2.635.000 plus 150.000 in Finland and 212.000 in rear occupied areas of Eastern Europe.Total 2.997.000.

On 1 July 1943 German forces in the East were 3.138.000(Waffen SS and ground combat units of the Luftwaffe are included) plus 80.000 on Finnish front.Total 3.218.000.

The same authors in ‘’Analyzing World War II Eastern front battles’’ give for 1 June 1944 a German Istarke of 2.089.559 in the East. This figure does not include non-combat GHQ units and units directly under command of OKH (which were quite numerous).If those units are included the total is 2.557.000

At the start of Barbarossa the German had 2.5 mln troops in action and 500.000 as reinforcements .Also ~150.000 were based in the Far North theater .So total ~3.2mln.This is mentioned by many authors,including Ziemke.

What about casualties? Here is a table using Krivosheev for Soviet forces and Axis History Forum for German losses ( both sets of data refer only to only KIA,MIA,WIA ):

		East Front Casualties
		Losses By quarter
	Quarter		German		Soviet	Ratio
1941	3q41		551,189		2,795,638	5.07
	4q41		279,861		1,598,456	5.71
1942	1q42		280,238		1,686,355	6.02
	2q42		220,291		1,395,335	6.33
	3q42		383,750		2,371,162	6.18
	4q42		177,050		1,281,085	7.24
1943	1q43		498,795		1,908,052	3.83
	2q43		110,139		444,858	4.04
	3q43		533,025		2,633,522	4.94
	4q43		381,725		1,939,845	5.08
1944	1q44		423,715		1,859,810	4.39
	2q44		352,831		1,021,576	2.90
	3q44		879,127		1,771,879	2.02
	4q44		297,782		1,086,807	3.65

Author Zetterling in ‘’Normandy 1944’’ gives slightly higher losses for the Germans :

German Losses -Zetterling
1941		831,050
1942		1,080,950
1943		1,601,445
1944		1,947,106

Accurate data on German losses are not available for 1945.

In order to make this comparison complete we should include the strength and losses of the German allies.

From various sources I have the following strength data at the start of Barbarossa campaign (all approximate):

Rumanian 340.000 , Finnish 250.000 , Italian 60.000 , Hungarian 44.000 , Slovak 45.000 .

Sum : 739.000 .Not all participants joined combat at the start of the campaign though.

From ‘’Kursk 1943’’ : 1 July 1942 – German satellites 648.000 , Finnish forces 210.000

1 July 1943 -German satellites 225.000 , Finnish forces 230.000.

Finally regarding losses ,this thread in AHF has information .

Using various sources I made this table :

Axis Allies Casualties Eastern Front
		KIA	MIA	WIA	Total
Rumania 1941-August 1944		71,000	163,000	243,000	477,000
Don Battles					155,000
Italy		30,000	54,000	34,000	118,000
Finland Continuation War		52,554	2,377	161,217	216,148
Hungary 41-5/45		120,000		200,000	320,000
Don Battles		8,718	79,870	16,497	105,085
Blue Division		3,938	300	8,466	12,704
Slovakia 41-March 44		1,235	2,537	3,198	6,970
Division Wallonien		2,500			2,500

All this information is valuable for assessing the true nature of the war in the East.