As rearmament proceeded in the 1930's, the Germans paid particular attention to their frontier defenses. While German foreign policy embarked on international adventures, short-term military policy was mostly defensive. Building an instrument to wage aggressive war required years of preparation. In the meantime Nazi adventurism might provoke an invasion by some combination of France, Britain, Poland, Czechoslovakia, and the Soviet Union. To defend the country, the Germans fortified their most-vulnerable borders.

Germany built extensive fortifications to defend its borders. Part I of these designer's notes covered German fortifications on maps 37 and 13A, in eastern and northern Germany. The Germans also built major fortifications in western Germany. When the Nazis first came to power, they began to fortify western Germany, while obeying the letter of the Versailles Treaty by not building any fortifications in the Rhineland-the zone within 50km of the French border.

In 1934-36 they built two lines along river lines just barely outside the 50km zone. These were subsequently neglected and dismantled following the March 1936 remilitarization of the Rhineland. At that time, the Germans began to fortify their border with France (and, later, with Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands) in a massive project that became the Westwall. The Westwall was an in-depth fortified zone, as opposed to the mostly-linear Maginot Line of France.

It absorbed tremendous construction resources and was not completed until after the outbreak of war. At the start of the war, 216,000 men were employed building the Westwall; these were comprised of 58,000 RAID members and 158,000 other workers.

The Germans raised an array of organizations to man these fortifications and guard their borders. Supposedly, on all borders, the border militia (the Reinforced Border Surveillance Service) was to be formed by local conscription in case of war, joining the Army. In practice, this militia would be little more than armed mobs, and they were only used to guard safe borders--those with Denmark and Switzerland.

The Border Guard (Grenzwacht), consisting of trained, static formations, guarded the other borders. The basic border unit was the company, organized as needed into battalions of two to six companies and regiments of two to five battalions. The 0-1-4 and 1-4 border regiments in the First to Fight OB are the Border Guards.

Border Regiment Commands existed over the regiments in peacetime. On paper, the commands had a quasi-divisional status. In practice, however, the regiment was the important unit, and commands lacked the organization, training, and support troops to function in a divisional role. Accordingly, First to Fight ignores the commands. For anyone interested, they are shown below:

Supplementing the Border Guard, the Security Garrison (Sicherheitsbesetzungen) manned the border fortifications. The basic unit was the positional machine gun company, and positional antitank units also existed. In the Westwall, these forces also included positional gun, artillery, and AA units. For the most part, these forces are factored into the Border Guard in First to Fight, as this reflects how the Germans themselves allocated most of these formations. The three static MG regiments are the only Security Garrison troops directly shown in the game.

After the conquest of Poland, Border Guard and Security Garrison units were no longer needed along the former Polish border and were disbanded. Elsewhere, four border division headquarters were created: 521st (with the 51st and 61st Border Regiments) in East Prussia , 526th (with the 6th and 16th Regiments) in the west, and the 537th (with the 191st and 192nd) and 538th (with the 193rd, 194th, and 195th) for the southern border. These divisions were weak in artillery, and various border artillery units have been factored into them to make them self-supporting.

Border Regiment Commands
Command	WK	Regiments
1 Neustettin	II	32, 42
2 Deutsch-Krone	II	2, 12, 22, 52
3 Oppeln	VIll	58, 68, 78
9	VI	6, 16
10 Innsbruck	XVIII	191, 192
12 Kustrin	III	3, 13,23
13	VIll	108, 118, (138), (148)
14 Breslau	VIll	88, 98, (128)
15 (Allenstein)	I	1, 11, 21, 31, 41, 51, 61
20 Klagenfurt	XVII	193,194,195
30 Krems/Donau	XVII	300, 301, 302, 303
Aachen	VI	26, 36, 46, 56, 66, 76
Trier	XII	112, 122
Saarpfalz	XII	132, 142, 152
Oberrhein	V	(182)

Notes:

• Regiments 128, 138, and 148 are Security Garrison formations, not Border Guard regiments.
• Regiment 182 is only a battalion in September 1939. However, there were sufficient static and security units in its area to justify a full regiment.
• Regiments 41, 51, and 61 were detached from Command 15 and assigned to other headquarters in the Polish campaign.
• Krems/Donau is Krems-an-der-Donau.
• Many commands had the name of their station city as part of their designation.
• Three commands existed on the border with Czechoslovakia until its dissolution in 1939. At that time, the commands and regiments were disbanded, although there are some reports of the headquarters of Regiment 38 being used in the Polish campaign. These commands were: 4 (in WK VIII: with Regiments 8, 18, 28, 38, 48), 5 WK IV; Regiments 4, 14, 24, 34, 44), and 6 (WK VII; Regiments 7, 17, 27, 37, 77, 87). . Three other commands existed in the west: 7 WK V), 8 WK XII), and 11 WK XII). By 1939, none of these had any units assigned and thus were not called up when the war began.

The Border Troops (Grenztruppen) formed yet another frontier force. In 1938, the Germans recognized that the existing border forces needed to be stiffened with active troops. The Border Troops were formed, with infantry, artillery, and engineers, and allocated to the Westwall and Oder-Warthe Bend fortifications. In 1939, these troops were made more mobile, so that they could take the field as well as hold fortifications.

Fortress Division Kustrin in the east contained three border infantry regiments plus artillery support, while Fortress Division Trier in the west contained miscellaneous border troops and other assets. Both later converted to infantry divisions. There were also four independent regiments (125, 127, 128, and 129), of which two are shown in the OB: 127th and 129th. The 125th became regular infantry on the outbreak of war (and is shown as such). The 128th consisted of a single battalion without a regimental HQ-its assets are allocated to the other regiments.

The Fortress Troops (Festungstruppen) were Landwehr reservists allocated to man the Konigsberg and Lotzen fortifications in East Prussia. These troops reorganized after the Polish campaign. Brigade Konigsberg disbanded, while Brigade Lotzen (together with the units of Group Brand) formed the basis of the 311th Division. Technically an infantry division, this formation is shown as a fortress division, since it received special defensive training and was stationed to defend the Lotzen fortress.

[Note: John will continue with his designer's notes on the German forces in First to Fight in the next issue of the magazine. -Editor]

Inside Europa First to Fight Designer's Notes Part II, Section A Germany

Introduction
Army Re-armament and Manpower
Strategic Situation
Germany-Allies Strength Comparison
German High Command and the Government
Volksdeutsch Resettlement 1939-1942
The Wehrkreis System
Frontier Defenses and Border Regt Commands