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Europa Games and Military History

Tag: CARL

In Memoriam Ike Skelton

January 2, 2026 / / 0 Comments

And another small round of additions, this time based on another visit of the Ike Skelton Library Website, after a couple of google results showed us documents we had overlooked at our first trawl. The following manuals have been added:

FM 19-20 Criminal Investiation (1945)
 FM 44-95 Service of the Piece Multiple Gun Motor Carriages M15 and M15A1 (1944)
 FM 6-100 Tactics and Technique of Division Artillery and Higher Artillery Echelon (1944)
 FM 6-105 Armored Division Artillery (1944)
 FM 6-120 Field Artillery Observation Battalion (1945)
 FM 6-130 Field Artillry Intelligence (1945)
 FM 6-135 Forward Observation (1944)
 FM 6-195 Service of the Piece. 8-inch Gun M1 and 240-mm Howitzer M1 (1946)
 FM 6-77 Service of the Piece, 4.5-inch Gun M1 (1944)
 FM 6-77 Service of the Piece. 4.5-Inch Gun M1 (1941)
 FM 6-95 Field Artillery Field Manual. Service of the Piece. 240-mm Howitzer, M1918 (1940)
 FM 6-120 The Field Artillery Batallion (1952).pdf
 FM 6-122 Artillery Sound Ranging and Flash Ranging (1957).pdf
 FM 6-130 Field Artillry Intelligence (1948).pdf
 FM 6-20-2J Division Artillery, Field Artillery Brigade, and Corps Artillery Headquarters (1984).pdf
 FM 6-30 The Field Missle Battalion Corporal (1959).pdf
 FM 6-38 Field Artillery Missile (Sergant) (1962).pdf
 FM 6-50 Tactics and techniques for the Field Artillery Cannon Battery (C1) (1990).pdf
 FM 6-91 Service of the Piece 8 inch Howitzer, M2 Truck-Drawn  (1948).pdf
FM 101-10 Staff Officers Field Manual. Organization, Technical and Logistical Data (1945)
FM 101-10-2 Staff Officers’ Field Manual. Organizational, Technical and Logistical Data (1965)
FM 21-30 Concentional Signs, Military Symbols, and Abbrievations (1943)
FM 21-45 Protective Measures, Individuals and Small Units (1942)
FM 21-50 Military Courtesy and Discipline (1942)
FM 23-50 Browning Machine Gun, Caliber .30, HB, M1919A4 (1942)
FM 24-75 Telephone Switchboard Operating Procedure (1944)
FM 25-6 Dog Transportation (1944)
FM 30-15 Examination of Enemy Personnel Repatriates Documents (1940)
FM 30-25 Military Intelligence. Counterintelligence (1940)’
FM 31-25 Desert Operations (1942)
FM 31-50 Attack on a Fortified Position and Combat in Towns (1944)
FM 44-59 Service of the Piece–Multiple Gun Motor Carriage M15 and M15A1 (1944)

This brings the World War II manuals up to 403 manuals and 75% of all manuals known to us as existing. Happy New Year everyone! 

P.S.:

The Missing List has been updated, as well as the document summary. However, there are currently still a lot of errors in my master List (shouldn’t try doint this late at night all the time), so the missing list is not really reliable right now. We’re working to get things in order.

Screenshot CARL digital library
Screenshot of the CARL digital library in Ft. Leavenworth, taken 2012-09-20

The CARL digital library

October 19, 2012 / / 1 Comment

A recurring theme of pages listed under these bookmarks seems to be that their design somehow harks back to the late nineties, but their content is much richer than a first look would surmise. CARL contines this trend: benhind an awkard and slow interface lingers a host of historical documents. CARL is short for “Combined Arms Research Library” and describes the library on Fort Leavenworth, which is in turn not only one of the oldest forts in the US still operational, but also counts the United States Army Combined Arms Center amongst its tenants. Fort Leavenworth prides itself to be the “intellectual center” of the US Army, and the sheer volume of documents available online certainly dwarf the Army’s Historical Center (history.army.mil).

Amongst the documents hosted are essays and thesises prepared by the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College (CGSC), but also a lot of operational reports, old field manuals and all kinds of other documents related to the military history of the US. In these the second world war features prominently, as is to be expected. Especially the After Action Reports from the divisional and corps level make an interesting reading for EUROPA afficinados.

The cumbersome interface of the website has been mentioned already, although the collections are searchible, the structure is unintuitive and purly organisatorical, the website responds slow and makes it close to impossible to get an overview about the hosted documents. An overhaul has been announced for some time now, but even now the uniqueness and historical wealth of the documents found place CARL amongst the first websites relevant for modern military history.

Date: October 19th, 2012

URL: http://usacac.army.mil/organizations/cace/carl

April 23, 2012 / / 4 Comments

Before the advent of the Web, the name of George F. Nafziger was already a staple in wargaming circles. His work on the wars of the French Revolution and his collection of well-researched Orders so Battle, especially for the Napoleonic area, made him the first adress for anyone wargaming that time. Nafziger started to make single OOBs available via the Internet in the Mid-Nineties, and his now rather dated looking website enabled visitors to order print-outs of selected battles and campaigns.

In 2010 Nafziger retired from publishing those OOBs and donated his whole collection to the public domain. It is currently hosted at the US Army’s CARL website. Additionally Alternatewars.com culled the complete archive and made it available as a collection of zipped archives for quicker access.

The Nafziger Collection itself contains orders of battle from 1600 to 1945 with over 7000 individual pdf files. What makes those files special is that the majority of them is based on archival sources, which are not easily accessible for mortal souls like us. Its depth and scope are unparalleled anywhere, and it still remains one of the most reliable, best sourced and detailed adress for order of battle research.

Date: April, 23th 2012

URL: https://cgsc.contentdm.oclc.org/

Updated: March 18th, 2020: CARL has a new URL.

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