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It’s surprisingly interesting to a historian, that if not for the painful scope of the German defeat before the gates of Moscow, one of Germany’s finest generals could have merely went on as a man with a reputation of skilled command and faded into obscurity.As it was, fate had other plans.Model’s career in the Second World War began in the corps staff of the IV Armeekorps, in the Invasion of Poland, and then as a staff officer in the 16. Armee in France. It was in the month of November, 1940, that he got his first field command: taking over 3. Panzer-Division from Generalmajor Horst Stumpff, who was moved to the command of the newly formed 20. Panzer-Division.At first, he came across as a complete eccentric. Walter Model had exactly zero respect for protocol and niceties and utterly despised formality, and was often brash and abrasive, quickly alienating his divisional staff. On the top of that, since having commanded a company in 1917, he had been a complete staff officer instead of a field commander, and trust in him was not stellar.Further adding to the belief in his eccentrics was the training methods he implemented. A good amount of divisional training was, essentially, a complete cross-unit exercise: Model would throw pieces of completely unrelated units into the field and make them work together for the same exercise. There were recon units fighting alongside AT batteries, division’s tanks along with its engineers, and any combination one could imagine, formed into ad hoc groups and given an exercise.If that makes you nod in recognition, reader, yes. Model was performing the famous German Kampfgruppen tactics before the German Army had started doing so officially.Then came Operation Barbarossa, and his first test in fire.Model’s division, driven forward by their vigorous and aggressive commander and bolstered with the most extensive ad-hoc operation practice in the entire Wehrmacht, became the blazing spearhead of Guderian’s advance. It was Model’s 3. Panzer-Division that forced the crossing across the Dnieper, and it was his division at the very lead during the drive at Kiev, meeting with the 16. Panzer-Division at Lokhvitsa and sealing the trap that caught seven hundred thousand men.The first of those earned him a Knight’s Cross. The second, a promotion to General der Panzertruppe and command of the XXXXI Panzerkorps, whose commander Otto-Ernst Otterbacher was severely wounded when his staff plane was shot down.July 1941, Soviet Union. Model in the center, talking to Panzer officer Oberleutnant Ernst-Georg Buchterkirch(left).The hard times came when winter arrived, and just as the German forces decided to halt along the whole front, the Soviets launched their winter counteroffensive.Just as he had always been the spearhead of the advance, now Model and his corps found themselves the ones covering the retreat against overwhelming Soviet forces. The men were tired, undersupplied, freezing and worn out. Weapons and vehicles were freezing solid, men were dying of frost every night. Disaster hung above the XXXXI Panzerkorps, and with them, the entire Panzergruppe 3, whose position as the farthest of all German army-level formations made them especially susceptible to destruction.But Model was there.No matter how terrible the situation got, Model never yielded an inch. Even in starvation he was a whirlwind of energy, touring every piece of the front and extolling the troops to even greater feats, driving his officers on with the harsh, uncompromising leadership that was characteristic of him. He demanded the utmost from his troops and himself, and read the Soviet offensives like a book.The Germans retreated, and retreated, but like their uncompromising commander, starving himself on rations no better than what the Schützen at the front ate, they held: and it never became a rout.By the end of the Soviet offensives, his corps were decimated. The 6. Panzer-Division, the most depleted of his formations, measured merely a thousand men by the end. But they had held, and saved the entire Panzer Group, arguably the entire army group, from destruction.This had become truth for reasons more than sheer determination and energy, though. Model’s observations had realized that the Soviet attacks, consisting of shock blows delivered by massed troops, with poor tactical command and coordination, were most successful against strongpoint defences instead of continuous lines. Moreso, the horrendous state of Soviet logistics and that the lack of organic support chronic in their mobile units[1] meant that compared to the vigorous German exploitation of any and all openings, Soviets were notoriously sluggish in exploiting breakthroughs and thus a breakthrough did not mean an immediate crisis. Thus, Model’s defensive philosophy was founded on five fundamental ideas: centralized artillery command, up to date intelligence dependent on reconnaissance and front line sources instead of rear analysis, multiple fortified lines, a continuous front line, no matter how thinly held, and a mobile reserve, no matter how small.His skills were soon about to be tested again.The winter advances of the Red Army had left the German 9. Armee, under the command of Generaloberst Adolf Strauß, holding a perilous salient in Rzhev, a knife pointing straight towards Moscow. That realization was also found by the Soviets, who on 8 January started a massive offensive involving seventeen armies to crush Strauß and grind his army to dust and blood. Within a week, the Kalinin Front had broken through the German front, and was threatening the destruction of the entire army. The situation at Rzhev was critical: it needed a miracle to save it. Luckily for the Germans, they had exactly the right miracle.Model was flown directly west, from the headquarters of his panzer corps, and was appointed the commander of the 9. Armee in place of Strauß by the Führer himself. He had leapfrogged over fifteen more senior candidates in the Army Group Center alone. It is said that as Model, having received his assignment, left the room, Hitler turned towards Rudolf Schmundt, his personal adjutant, and confided:Did you see that eye? I trust that man to do it, but I wouldn't want to serve under him.Hitler had a point. Model would soon go on to make Rzhev a hell on earth, for himself, his staff, and his army. However, a hell was exactly what the Germans needed.Over the year, Model wrestled thrice with the Soviets over the Rzhev Salient, against utterly overwhelming forces every single time, and brutally snuffed out each assault. He broke down divisions all the way down to the company level if need be to reinforce different pieces of his complex network of defense, formed battle groups out of anything and everything to bolster his reserves and front lines. He visited regularly every part of the front and gave them exactly as much reinforcements as it was their need to keep on holding, and waged the greatest battle of attrition in recent history, exhausting a force far larger and far more heavily equipped than him.The year-long Rzhev Meat Grinder cost the Soviet Union over two million casualties, Zhukov the greatest and most humiliating defeat of his career, and got Model a promotion to Generaloberst, the Oak Leaves and Swords both to his Knight’s Cross, and a nickname: Löwe der Abwehr.Lion of Defence.Soviet tanks destroyed near Rzhev, 1942 spring.Eventually, the salient on which so much blood was shed would be evacuated during Unternehmen Büffel, part of a general shortening of the front. Model’s next feat would come in the immediate aftermath of the failed Kursk offensive: with the German attack called out, the Soviets unleashed their own. Model’s army was holding the extended Orel salient, along with the 2. Panzerarmee, against a Soviet force outnumbering them well over four to one in men and materiel. Such was the wrath of the Soviet offensive, Operation Kutuzov, that Stavka projections were in favor of entering Orel itself within 48 hours and thus splitting the German forces into three.It took three weeks of rigorous combat, close to half a million casualties, and 2500 tank losses to enter Orel. It was another three until Model enacted his orderly withdrawal from the rest of the salient, leaving behind a heap of Soviet corpses and burning tanks as his forces pulled back to the Dnieper.Such was Model’s reputation that by the end of the year he was removed from the command of his army: instead, Hitler wanted him on standby, to be sent wherever the situation became critical. He had become the Führer’s Fireman, facing the worst of infernos.On 31 January 1944 he would return to the front, replacing Georg von Küchler in his command of Army Group North, whose siege over Leningrad was broken and front had effectively dissolved. He vigorously extricated it all the way to the Panther Line in Estonia, fighting every step of the way, meeting every Soviet advance with a counterattack that threw the Red Army off-balance. His withdrawal was complete on 1 March, with all noteworthy units of the army group intact. The same day, a marshal’s baton arrived at the front destined for him.It had taken him a mere six years to rise from colonel to Generalfeldmarschall.By the end of the month, he went across the front, to Ukraine, where he was to be a replacement of another field marshal: Erich von Manstein, Germany’s finest, sacked over relieving first the Korsun Pocket, then the 1. Panzerarmee, against Hitler’s wishes. It would be a tall bargain for any man to measure up to the titan of the German military, but if there was anyone up to the task it was Model. He prosecuted the defense of right bank of Dnieper with the same vigor and tenacity Manstein used to, and together, the effort of two generals cost the Red Army another five thousand tanks and over one million men for their Ukrainian gains.German forces, in the muddy ground of the Korsun Pocket.His next assignment was Army Group Center on 28 June, which was torn apart by Operation Bagration having started one week prior. The brainchild of Konstantin Rokossovsky, launched with an overwhelming superiority of four to one in men, eleven to one in tanks and assault guns, ten to one in artillery, and eight to one in aircraft, it was also the most overwhelming Soviet victory of the war. Model’s timely intervention barely averted unprecedented disaster threatening to end the war right then and there, stabilizing the front line east of Warsaw. Hitler would heap all forms of praise on him for that, naming him ‘his best Field Marshal’.He was given the Diamonds for his Knight’s Cross, and hurried West to take over Army Group B. He would never again return to the Eastern Front.He arrived on a scope of disaster. The German front in Normandy, eroded over two months until breaking point, had collapsed, and Falaise was threatening to swallow an entire army group. Model set to work with his usual vigor: forcing the evacuation of significant forces from the closing Falaise Pocket, he led his Army Group safely eastwards, and in the lull of September formed the bleeding defense in the West into a crust.The crust would hold on well, foiling first Montgomery’s ambitious dreams of striking the heart of Germany in Operation Market Garden, and then breaking the dreams of Courtney Hodges and his First Army to break through into Germany in the Battle of Hürtgenwald. Further to the north, in the streets of Aachen, eighteen thousand Germans, one-third being Volkssturm, held off an American force five times their size for three weeks.It was Model’s last victories.Model visiting the 246. Volksgrenadier-Division in Aachen.Afterwards, he would be the person chosen to enact Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein, soon to become what was called the Battle of the Bulge. It was a plan he despised to the bone, declaring that the plan ‘did not have a damned leg to stand on’, however, as a man who earned his successes and fame by his refusal to permit defeatism, he could not let himself to fail the strict standards he held all his subordinates to.So Model fought, first at the Battle of the Bulge, then in the defensive operations afterwards, until the ruined remnants of his army group, not even an army by that point, were encircled in the Ruhr. Even then he fought, until resistance became impossible and he was faced with the ugly dilemma, between the honor of a field marshal forbidding surrender and his conscience opposing the senseless slaughter, he took a third way out. He officially dissolved his army group. Ordered the Volkssturm men and Hitlerjugend auxiliaries to return home, while giving the regular units leave to surrender, fight on, or try to break out.As he personally said to a platoon of Wehrmacht personnel asking for orders, their war was over.A handful of days later, on 20 April, Goebbels gave a speech: the last birthday Hitler would celebrate and the last speech Goebbels would give in its honor. In that speech, he declared the entire Army Group B traitors to the Reich. It is said that, Model turned towards his adjutant, Colonel Theodor Pilling who was listening to the speech from the radio along with him, and uttered the words that finalized his transformation from a determined officer to a broken man.I sincerely believe that I have served a criminal. I led my soldiers in good conscience... but for a criminal government.It left Model a broken man.The next day, the most indomitable of Germany’s field marshals, a man of a will unbreakable until that point, woke up in the earliest of the morning hours. He talked to one man, Major Winrich Behr, of his intelligence staff.Behr, I cannot imagine that I, as a Field Marshal, the one who out of conviction in victory for my country am responsible for the deaths of hundreds of my soldiers, should now emerge from these woods to approach Montgomery, or the Americans, with my hands in the air and say 'Here I am. Field Marshal Model, I Surrender.'This was what he said to Behr, when he opened the subject of what he was to do: after all, Model had solved the solution of his army group, but what about him? Well, by that point, the Field Marshal had decided already.Those were his last known words. Less than a hour later, he drove his staff car into the woods near Ratingen and shot himself[2].So, in light of everything, his performance and his life, the conditions and the struggle, how good was Walter Model?Very.Where Model is present, nothing can go wrong.Common German saying in the Eastern Front.Footnotes[1] Cem Arslan's answer to How did a US, German, and Soviet armored division compare with each other in 1944?[2] Cem Arslan's answer to Who killed German Field Marshal Walter Model near the end of WW2?

Tl;dr — United States divisions were numbered semi-sequentially, which meant that the unit known as the 82nd Airborne (originally the 82nd Infantry) got the 82nd “slot.” However, due to the numbering system, which set aside blocks of numbers for different divisional origins (1–25 for Regular Army, for instance), the 82nd Infantry didn’t mean that there were 82 other divisions behind it. It belonged to the block of numbered divisions that were manned by draftees, which started with the 76th Infantry Division and worked its way upward sequentially (76th, 77th, and so on).The idea and reasoning of divisional numbering itself came out of French military theorists who, a) proposed a new unit organization above the then-standard regimental or brigade level, and b) began to turn away from the traditional method of naming units based on the commanding officer, a discussion that was simultaneously happening in Britain regarding British regimental precedence. Some experiments were done with the new unit in the last half of the 18th century, but it wasn’t systematic. It took until the French Revolution for the division to be applied systematically, at first within the French Revolutionary Army, and then later by Europe as a whole. As France had done away with the traditional regiments of the ancien regime, they began to simply number all of their units—including divisions. As such, when divisions were adopted by other nations, they too were numbered.In the United States, divisions tended to be ad-hoc, secondary organizations organized as needed, since the U.S. Army was fairly small. During the Civil War, the regiment remained the basic unit of the army, and the corps was the focus of operational command—hence, divisions existed only as an intermediate unit between the regiment (or brigade) and division, and didn’t tend to have unique numbers, but were instead simply the 1st Division of I Corps, 1st Division of II Corps, and so on. It took until WWI for the U.S. Army to shift its basic unit to the division, whereupon permanent divisions were numbered and established according to the sequential block system mentioned in the first paragraph. In subsequent wars and eras of peacetime, various divisions were deactivated, reactivated, turned into brigades, and merged, leaving only a few divisions with large gaps between them.The simple answer, as others have said, is that the gaps represent deactivated divisions—though it’s a bit more complicated than that. In this case, they’re a little bit like a baseball player’s number—if a player retires, people don’t automatically move up or down a number, it just remains inactive until someone else is assigned it. Just like with baseball jersey numbers, some numbers are inexplicably never assigned, and others are “retired,” and unlikely to be used again.That said, I’ll go a little bit into just why divisions are numbered and how it came to be that we refer to divisions by a number rather than some other form, especially when, in previous eras, it was far more common to name a military organization by region or commander.Until about the 18th century, the primary unit of command was a regiment. Many armies also used brigades, which, depending upon the army, could be combined arms units (say, consisting of an infantry regiment, artillery battery, and some cavalry), or they could just be a small cluster of regiments from the same branch (say, two or three regiments).As armies grew larger and as states began to field larger forces in increasingly intense wars, this system began to break down. A general can effectively command, say, ten or twenty regiments or just so many brigades, but once field armies begin consisting of, say, sixty or even seventy regiments, that’s just too much for a single general to keep track of. The brigade system helped, but not by enough.Enter Marshal Maurice de Saxe.De Saxe saw the ballooning of European armies first hand. Rocroi in 1643 had only some 20,000 men on each side and was a major battle. The Battle of Malplaquet in 1709, just fifty years later and which De Saxe participated in as a young man, involved 86,000 Allies and 75,000 French troops, with a little under 200 guns.He was aware that the increasing size of the French Army had a number of drawbacks. In the past, it was relatively simple to get the number of officers you needed since, of course, you didn’t need quite as many. As the number of regiments grew, you had to increasingly scrape the bottom of the barrel for officers and, often, a good officer’s influence extended only to his own regiment. In addition, regiments varied wildly in quality and veterancy to the point that (to Saxe’s dismay) only a relatively small number of regiments were really useful—and those, predictably, got the most use. He was especially against grenadier regiments, which he saw as sucking up all the good soldiers and leaving the line regiments to get the dregs.De Saxe’s response to that is something he called a legion and which we today would call a division. It was to be a combined arms formation based on the legions of Rome, each consisting of four regiments, with each regiment consisting of four centuries. Each century, in turn, would be accompanied by a half-century of light-armed infantry and a half-century of horse. Each company would also include an amusette, a light field cannon of De Saxe’s own design. This higher level of command would allow good soldiers to rise up to administer and command several regiments rather than just a single regiment, spreading out some of their expertise and ability and allowing their talents to make a bigger impact on the field.Importantly for Saxe, these legions would be formed around cadres of veteran soldiers dispersed around the formation. Unlike in the previous system, where one regiment might be full of veterans and another might be entirely filled with new recruits, Saxe wanted to distribute those veterans evenly between the regiments in his legion. In peacetime, the legion would consist of only these veterans, leaving the legion at reduced strength. During times of war, however, the legion would take on new recruits who would serve alongside these veterans, with the veterans acting as teachers and “corset stiffeners” for the recruits. They would also provide a ready source for NCOs and even officers.More pertinent to the question, De Saxe also advises against the standard naming system of regiments in his day. Regiments in the first half of the 18th century (and before) were often known not by a number, but rather by the name of their colonel, especially if that colonel had a hand in raising and outfitting that regiment. De Saxe knew that soldiers were less likely to be attached to a unit that was simply known by the name of its colonel—what if they hated their colonel?—than to a more abstract form, whether that be a geographical entity or simply to a number. De Saxe, therefore, preferred his regiments and legions to be known by a number—both of which were to be affixed to the soldier’s uniform—rather than the name of their commander.You can read De Saxe’s thoughts on the “legion” form of organization here, in his book Mes Reveres, pp. 33–57.In a British context, a similar matter came to the fore. Regiments in those days had a confusing system of rank and precedence: a new regiment was less prestigious than an old one. This rank and precedence influenced the order of battle, with the most prestigious regiments at the right of the line. The traditional system often led to arguments—was, say, an Irish regiment raised in 1653 higher ranked than an English regiment raised in 1655?—and that led to the creation of a numbering system that settled questions of rank.In response, a formal numbering system was established within the Royal Warrant of 1st July 1751, which standardized each regiment’s colors and precedence. Each regiment was numbered according to when it was raised and came within the system: each English regiment was numbered according to the date when it was raised, while Irish, Scottish, or foreign regiments were numbered from when they arrived in England. The Earl of Bath’s Regiment became the 10th North Lincoln Regiment of Foot, since they were the 10th regiment in precedence and recruited from the North Lincoln (or Lincolnshire) region. So the move towards numbering was occurring in places other than France, even if French officers were the ones to begin talking about organizing those regiments into divisions.De Saxe, however, died early and didn’t have an opportunity to create his legions. During the Seven Years War, the Duke de Broglie conducted a number of successful experiments using De Saxe’s regimental system, but it was unsystematic and rather ad-hoc.It took until the French Revolution for the division to catch on systematically.The foundation of the French Army had been all but destroyed during the revolution. Experienced officers, who were often noblemen, tended to leave the army (or join Royalist forces). The French Revolutionary Government, meanwhile, wanted to tear down the aristocratic regimental system—eventually, they were to (briefly) retire even the word regiment and replace it with the term “demi-brigade.” The government viewed the ongoing war as a people’s war and, accordingly, created massive armies of fresh, often untrained, recruits.Predictably, the French Revolutionary Army did poorly against the professional armies of the other European nations. As defeats mounted, morale fell, which in turn led to a manpower crisis in the French Revolutionary Army—which, basically, only had numbers going for it.Enter Lazare Carnot.The son of a judge, Carnot was a mathematician and military engineer who entered politics during the Revolution and made his first mark in his push for public education and education reform. Eventually, he was elected to the Committee for Public Safety—which oversaw the ongoing war.Ever the reformer, Carnot began rebuilding the French Army. Educated in a military academy, Carnot turned toward the works of De Saxe and the experiments of de Broglie. Carnot believed in the idea of a People’s War, but recognized that recruitment numbers were flagging. In response, he introduced the levee en masse—he introduced conscription.Like De Saxe, he saw that some regiments were full of veterans, while others—the masses of new revolutionary brigades—were filled with barely-trained recruits. And, like De Saxe, his solution was to separate out the veterans and to embed them within these new brigades to teach and guide these recruits on the art of war.Most importantly, he embraced De Saxe’s general idea of the division. The mass forces of the Revolutionary Army were difficult to control and often unwieldy—the entire theory behind the Revolutionary Army was, after all, numbers. Carnot solved this by creating the first systematic divisions: demi-brigades (regiments) would be combined into brigades, and brigades would be combined into divisions. Later, under Napoleon, divisions would be combined into corps.This solved a great deal of the command and control problems within the Revolutionary Army. Suddenly, you had an intermediate level of control between the overall general and the brigade commanders. Those division commanders could take the initiative with their substantial forces while also remaining maneuverable and easy to control. Carnot’s embrace of the idea of the division meant that the Revolutionary Army became, paradoxically, an army of both mass and maneuver—the field army was large, but it was divided up into manageable segments that allowed it to move faster and more decisively than their enemies, who were still commanding at regimental or brigade level. Moving rapidly in column formation—which was easier to train and easier to learn than a line formation—the French forces quickly assumed their positions and then were able to rely on shock and weight of numbers to defeat their opponents.French infantry at the Battle of Eylau. The infantry line formation is on the left, and was favored for veteran troops because of greater frontage. The infantry column formation is on the right, favored for greener troops because it was easier to train and more maneuverable, though lesser frontage meant columns often relied on shock rather than fire.As for names, while the French regiments used a precedence system similar to the British, the idea of naming regiments entirely based on their seniority never caught on. During the Seven Years War, for instance, regiments continued to be named after their colonels or the region in which they were (supposedly) raised.The French Revolutionary Government, however, was both anti-aristocratic and heavily centralizing. That meant that the old system of regiments—as well as naming regiments after their commanders—was retired as a remnant of the ancien regime. The French Revolutionary Government also didn’t like the idea that units were named after regions of France: these were forces raised by and for the nation. In addition, the massive expansion of the Army all but precluded specific names.The Revolutionary Government, therefore, simply numbered these new units. While there were arguments in De Saxe and later on for the principle of numbering—after all, the Roman legions were numbered—chances are that this was mostly an administrative convenience. And, as in the old system, these numbers reflected seniority: just as the Earl of Bath’s Regiment became the 10th Regiment of Foot because it was the 10th in seniority, the (say) 15th Demi-Brigade was the 15th Demi-Brigade raised.Artist’s depiction of a soldier of the French Revolutionary Army, bearing the banner of the 30th Demi-Brigade.In any case, just as the demi-brigades and brigades of the new Revolutionary Army were numbered, so were the divisions.Napoleon, as was often the case, eventually refined the divisional system as we know it today, especially after he began grouping divisions into corps. Corps were another idea discussed during the ancien regime but never really implemented, as well as the concept of the battalion carre, which featured four corps moving in a mutually-supporting diamond formation that was able to deftly pivot in any direction.For instance, Napoleon’s Grande Armee entered Russia with 17 corps, including the Imperial Guard. One of those, II Corps, consisted of three infantry divisions and assorted regiments of cavalry. These included the 6th Division, the 8th Division, and the 9th Division. In, say, the 6th Division, you had the 26th Light Infantry Regiment, the 56th Line Infantry Regiment, the 19th Line Infantry Regiment, the 128th Line Infantry Regiment, and the 3rd Portuguese Regiment, along with cavalry. If the regiment in question had two battalions, it was paired with another two-battalion regiment to create a brigade—if, on the other hand, the brigade was double-strength (four battalions), the brigade and regiment were coterminous.All this represented a gradual refinement and increasing standardization of the division from the Revolutionary Days.As it indeed became more defined and successful against the existing armies in Europe, other European nations began adopting the divisional organization.Wellington, for instance, created the first British divisions in 1809 for the Peninsula campaign: the 1st Infantry Division under General Hope, for example, or the 3rd Infantry Division under Pakenham. As early as 1797, Austrian divisions (though about half the size of the French) appear as formations, such as the one commanded at Rivoli by Peter Quasdanovich. Russian divisions appear as early as Suvorov’s invasion of Italy. And, just as divisions on the French model became standard, so did corps, although generally the French utilized both formations more effectively.The United States, meanwhile, was relatively separate from developments in the Napoleonic Wars. It did, however, have what could be argued was a “division-sized” unit: the Legion of the United States. As with De Saxe’s ideas, the Legion was organized into four “sub-legions” (effectively brigades), which were combined arms combat teams with their own cavalry, infantry, and artillery. They were meant to operate on their own in the western wilderness, fighting against Native American tribes.Soldiers of the Legion of the United States. The soldier on the right wears the iconic bearskin “roundtop” hat of the legion.Such an organization was not to last, however, and by 1800, the Legion was disbanded and the sub-legions converted to standard infantry regiments—the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Infantry Regiments, after the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Sub-Legions. The United States, at the time, maintained a fairly small army, and its numbers were such that no permanent division-level commands were necessary. In large engagements, such as battles during the War of 1812, brigades and regiments were often grouped together as needed, but had little to no permanent basis. During the Civil War, the temporary regiments raised by the states were similarly grouped into divisions as needed, but the basic, permanent unit remained the regiment. Divisions then were merely subunits of corps—so you’d have the 1st Division of II Corps, but also the 1st Division of I Corps. In this case, the division was merely an intermediary between the primary tactical unit (the regiment) and the primary operational unit (the corps), and served to streamline command rather than stand as a permanent, independent organization.It took until 1917 for the United States to formally order its regiments into standing divisions. This represented a shift of the basic unit from the regiment to the division—a shift that most European armies (save perhaps the British) had undergone many years before.The First Expeditionary Division—later the 1st Infantry Division—was created in May and shipped off to France. The 2nd Infantry Division was created in October and organized in France. The 3rd Infantry Division was created in November. The mobilization went up to, as in the question, the 82nd Airborne Division (at that time, simply the 82nd Infantry Division).U.S. infantry uniforms during WWI—the 82nd Infantry Division’s uniform is in the middle, with the red and blue patch. From right to left: the 42nd, 1st, 82nd, 77th divisions, a member of the U.S. tank corps, and finally the 91st Infantry DivisionNow, this would suggest that, for the 82nd Airborne, there were 81 divisions that preceded it—which is on the right track, but not quite true. There were still some gaps—for instance, there’s no 21st Division, and the list of US divisions seems to skip between 20th and 26th.The reason for that is that certain numbers were reserved for certain parts of the Army. The Regular Army, for example, had divisions numbered from 1 to 25—but there were only 20 divisions in the Regular Army. The next were National Guard divisions, numbered 26 to 49—those numbers start sequentially at 26 and go up to 42. The next regiments pick up at 76, which is where the drafted divisions begin—i.e., divisions filled by American conscripts. This includes the 82nd. The number tells you that the 82nd got its start as a military unit manned by draftees. There is, as you might have noted, a big gap between 49 and 76—I’m not quite sure what they were meant for (I’ve heard they were meant for cavalry divisions the U.S. didn’t end up raising), but they went unorganized.So, in the U.S. context, many of the numbers we see that are now fully Regular Army came about because the Army divided divisional numbers based on the unit’s provenance—that is, whether it was manned by the Regular Army, by the National Guard, or by draftees. The highest numbered division that was fielded in WWI was the 102nd, but the U.S. didn’t actually field 102 divisions. They were, instead, numbered sequentially based on that provenance: the 82nd was the seventh U.S. division organized for draftees (following the 76th, 77th, 78th, 79th, 80th, and 81st).With WWII, things become even more complicated. Some divisions were fully deactivated, while others remained active, and others (like the 82nd) were moved into organized reserves. Some were revived when the U.S. went to war—for instance, the 82nd was put into active service and retermed the 82nd Airborne. Some simply folded back into their peacetime units—the 28th Infantry Division, for instance, reverted back into being the Pennsylvania National Guard and the numerical designation fell into abeyance only to later be revived as a unit unaffiliated with its WWI counterpart, just as the 28th Infantry Division wasn’t from the Pennsylvania National Guard in WWII.The 14th Infantry Division, meanwhile, was created, but didn’t go overseas, and was eventually disbanded. It, too, was eventually activated during WWII by SHAEF, but it was never manned and eventually disbanded. The 17th Infantry Division was activated in 1917, but, being a National Guard division, was rebranded the 38th Division (because numbers 26–49 were for National Guard war service divisions), but then was recreated in 1918, still as a National Guard division, but didn’t see service. It was reactivated in 1943, but only as a “phantom division”—a fictitious division that was to “take part” in the equally fictitious Pas de Calais landings.Meanwhile, some divisions were reorganized and “demoted” to brigades and linked to another division. For instance, the 41st Infantry Division was “demoted” to the 41st Infantry Brigade, then it was relegated to the Oregon National Guard, then it was attached to the 7th Infantry Division. Then, when the 7th Infantry Division was inactivated in 2006, the 42nd Infantry Brigade continued on as an independent brigade of the Oregon National Guard and served in Iraq and Afghanistan.Some units were simply never organized. For instance, I don’t believe a 72nd Infantry Division was ever activated, even though we have the 82nd.Then you had different forms of divisions, each of which could be numbered independently. So, for instance, you have the 1st Infantry (Big Red One), the 1st Armored (Old Ironsides), and the 1st Cavalry.And then, you have old infantry divisions that no longer function as infantry divisions. The 75th Division, for example, got deactivated in 1957, then reactivated in 1993 as a training support division in the Army Reserve and helped train Reserve and National Guard units going over to Iraq and Afghanistan, and then it got its training units removed to the 84th Training Command and was rebranded the 75th Innovation Command.So… it’s complicated and a lot has gotten lost in the shuffles over the years. The basic logic of why the 82nd is the 82nd, however, is that U.S. divisions were numbered sequentially, but the numbers were assigned “blocks” to designate that unit’s origin, with numbers 76 and up for divisions manned by draftees. The 82nd was the 7th U.S. division manned with draftees, so it was numbered, sequentially from 76, the 82nd Infantry Division. In WWII, it was deemed an Airborne Division, a designation that continues to the present day.

I believe, in tonnes!Have great respect for them.Some of the badass Rajputs, I have heard of, r listed below:• MAJ. SHAITAN SINGH BHATI, PVC-PARAM VEER.With his 123 veer Ahir soldiers, they stood like a fortress, defending Rezang La from the Chinese human wave attack; killed 1300 Chinese!!!Maj. Bhati’s body was later found among his fellow soldiers and he was still holding his rifle in his hand, aimed in firing mode, as in live combat!• BRIG. HIS HIGHNESS SHRI SWAI BHAWANI SINGH, MVC, 10 SF, ADC -Brigadier. Bubbles!!!The Last King of Jaipur.Former Tiger/CO of 9 & 10 SF.Volunteered and carried out high altitude Para Jumps in Leh at 20,000 ft without the help of oxygen in the 60’s.War hero of 1971 war with Pakistan.Trained Mukti Bahini before the Bangladesh Liberation War.The legend leading his men from the front in 1971!Maha Vir Chakra Citation:The 10th parachute regiment (special forces) on the night of December 5,1971, led by Lt Col.Bhawani Singh, entered deep into the enemy territory in the Sindh desert. For four days and nights, in complete disregard to his own safety, he led skilful and relentless raids on posts held by the enemy's army at Chachro and Virawah. He inspired the jawans through personal leadership and courage and captured large area of enemy's territory and in sheer panic and confusion the Pakistani army fled. He also captured large amount of ammunition during the successful raids. He was awarded the second highest gallantry award of India, the Mahavir Chakra. While the Indian Army was in action in Sri Lanka under Operation Pawan, the Prime Minister requested him to go to Sri Lanka and boost the morale of his old unit (10 Para). He was successful in this venture and, for this; the President bestowed upon him the rank of Brigadier. This is a rare honor when army personnel has been given a promotion in rank after retirement.• COL. SANGRAM SINGH BHATI(Late), SC, SM, 10 SF/DESERT SCORPION-Col. Sangro aka the legendary Masth Bull!18th Tiger of the Desert Scorpions.Kargil War Hero.A 3rd generation army officer, Sangram was from Tapu village of Jodhpur. He was commissioned into RAJ Rif in 1994 from Officers Training Academy, Chennai. His father Col. Shyam Singh Bhati was a war hero of 1965 and 1971 wars while his grandfather had fought in WW2.During the initial days of Kargil War, Sangram and his small SF team was launched in Batalik Sector for intel gathering; the action is mostly classified. He was awarded Sena Medal (Gallantry) for this.Sangro during one of the covert Ops!Sangro was a man who clearly knew the mandate and scope of SF and used his skill as well as his men’s to the fullest. He led scores of Black OPs in north-east India, PoK, and in Paksitan in 1990’s and in 2000’s. He spectacularly decimated Lashkar-e-Taiba in a Black OP conducted in the late 1990’s which he planned and led from the front! Not much info is available about these Black Ops (it should remain so) except that Lashkar has never been the same, since Sangro’s raids!Sangro also led countless CI/CT ops in terrorist infested Kashmir. He was awarded Shaurya Chakra and Sena Medal and multiple citations for his incessant and audacious attacks on Jihadist masterminds, often neutralizing the terror leaders than underlings.Just keep in mind that, at that time, India’s SF lacked high tech weapons, resources and even govt approval for Ops. Many times our SF units conducted Ops without giving a clue to their seniors in Delhi and in Udhampur! This is the reason why I rate our Army SF sky high.Honest officers like Sangro had to battle the army seniors who had no clue regarding SF mandate and those who turned a deaf ear to the advise of senior/junior SF officers and SF requirements. Then there was apathy and corruption in the higher echelons which these guys had to overcome! Despite all this, ethical men like him got the job done! That’s why Col Sangram is highly respected in the SF community. What he has done remains unparalleled!Shockingly, at the age of 45, this great Son of India passed away in Delhi RR Hospital in 2018, due to multiple organ-failure after illness.The Scorpions giving their final salute to their legendary CO!!!His body was taken to Jodhpur, accompanied by his family, Unit CO and other officials and was cremated with full military honours.The 10’s Commanding Officer, Col. Varun Chhabra, saluting the father of Sangro, Col. Shyam Singh Bhati(Retd).Sangro’s shoes can never be filled!May he attain Moksha.• GEN. V.K. SINGH, PVSM, AVSM, YSM, ADC-CHIEF OF ARMY STAFF INDIA (Retd.)Top notch Infantry Commando.Famous for being an ethical and honest officer.Spoke out on the corruption in the UPA govt and its arms dealers.Graduate of the Defence Services Staff College India; Honours Graduate of the United States Army Infantry School; Graduate of the Rangers Course at Fort Benning and the United States Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.V.K. headed OP Raahat in Yemen during which he famously refused to leave the conflict zone till every single Indian was rescued from the war zone!• COL. SAURABH SINGH SHEKHAWAT, KC, SC, SM, VSM, 21SF -Indian Army Special Forces LEGEND!!!Former Tiger of 9 & 21 SF’s.Shekhawat is top in the hit list of every single terror group active in India, Myanmar & Pakistan, yet none has been able to even put a scratch on the man!!! A CT & CI expert, he has served in the Special Groups. Also served as United Nations Military Observer in the Democratic Republic of Congo. An alumnus of the Defence Services Staff College, he has an MPhil from Osmania University, Hyderabad. Formerly, a Research Fellow at IDSA.Became one of the youngest officers who was awarded the most number of gallantry awards: Kirti Chakra, Shaurya Chakra, Sena Medal Gallantry and still alive, is one of the most decorated, if not the most decorated, serving officers of the Indian Army. He was awarded VSM as well for exceptional service.He is a brilliant athlete, and a renowned mountaineer who has climbed 17 peaks till date/3x Everest summitter; also an excellent horseman and an expert combat freefaller!Then Lt.Colonel. Shekhawat famously cleaned up all terrorists from Loktak Lake in Manipur which is now a popular tourist spot. The raid known as OP SUMMER STORM; killed all 15 terrorists in just 4 minutes!!! The OP became famous for zero collateral damage, civilian or soldier casualty, and he led the OP from the front as per Indian Army tradition.Shekhawat, a man of principles, opposed and spoke up against his superiors when a civilian house was attacked during a messed up OP in the NE by a military intelligence unit headed by then Lt.Gen. Suhag & Lt. Gen. Abhay Krishna. Shekhawat refused to cover up the incident disobeying direct orders even though he was threatened with dire consequences. His promotions were blocked since 2011 despite having a stellar operational record, was removed from multiple military assignments and postings. When Bikram Singh became the General(close friend of Suhag) Shekhawat’s superiors were forced by Gen. Bikram Singh to give Shekhawat a bad ACR which affected his promotions. The pressure became worst when Suhag himself became the COAS; Shekhawat was forced to go on leave due to the harassment he got from the higher echelons of the army. Shekhawat still refused to lie, bow down to pressure or change his testimony and now has won the case in the Military Court.And through his ethics, leadership and daredevilry, Shekhawat has earned a cult like status in the SF, the Indian Army, as well as among us, civilians.• LT. GEN. PRAKASH CHAND KATOCH, PVSM, UYSM, AVSM, SC, 1SF-Former Deputy Chief of Army StaffFormer SF TigerFormer “Colonel” of the Parachute RegimentAn ethical soldier, exceptional combat leader and one of the highly respected Generals of India.A no-nonsense SF veteran who has fought and led in 1971 & 1999 wars, OP Bluestar, IPKF, and so on. Katoch, alongside Lt.Gen. HS Lidder, has continuously spoken up for the welfare of SF operators as well as soldiers. A prolific writer and public speaker who is well-known as brutally honest and outspoken!Katoch, as a Brigadier, is famous for writing a blistering (& sacrilegious) letter to his seniors and the then VCOAS, stating that, “if all of you cannot provide the necessary weapons to the SF units then its better to shut us down!”This letter prompted in bringing in a bit of relief for SF units who were compelled to fight with whatever bare minimum ammunition they had!Katoch was awarded the PVSM, UYSM, AVSM and SC for his service and bravery.His Shaurya Chakra citation:SO ARMY RAJPUTS = TOTAL KICKASSES!!!The pics are all from Google search and I do not own any of them.Due credit to the original owners!