Almost collapse of the Eastern Front: “Moscow was the great turning point in the war”

At the end of 1941, Hitler’s armies failed in Moscow. The historian Christian Hartmann describes the winter battle for the metropolis as the turning point of the Second World War. He says: With the right strategy, the Red Army could have ended the war victoriously even then.

The memory of the German attack on Moscow is still present in Khimki. Three oversized anti-tank barriers mark the furthest advance by German troops in the suburb on the northwestern edge of the Russian capital, before the Red Army threw back the Wehrmacht in the winter of 1941 and thus failed Hitler’s plans for conquest.

The World War II Memorial in Khimki is about 26 kilometers from Moscow’s Red Square.

(Photo: AP)

“Back then, the Red Army missed the chance to destroy the German Eastern Army and end the war before Moscow,” historian Christian Hartmann told ntv.de. The research assistant at the Center for Military History and Social Sciences of the Bundeswehr describes the battle for the Soviet capital as the turning point of the war. He says: “The victory of the Soviets was then within our grasp.”

The German attack on the Soviet Union started six months earlier under completely different circumstances. After the occupation of half of Europe, Hitler wanted to realize his omnipotent fantasy of “living space in the East” with another “Blitzkrieg” and thereby destroy “Jews, Bolsheviks and Slavs”.

In the bloody battle of the summer, the Soviet Union lost hundreds of thousands of soldiers. But Hitler’s armies seemed tired of being victorious in the endless expanse of the theater of war. In the first three months of the campaign alone, the Germans lost half a million men to death and wounding. The Wehrmacht had ever greater problems to make up for the massive losses of people and material.

“As a result, a process of disillusionment set in in the German leadership,” says Hartmann. Actually, the “Operation Barbarossa” should be decided in four months. But the Red Army continued to offer fierce resistance. Thereupon a dispute broke out in the “Führer Headquarters” about the further strategy. “Hitler was fixated on conquering the economic centers in Ukraine and the oil areas in the Caucasus,” says Hartmann. “The army command, on the other hand, followed a more traditional approach. They considered the gigantic empire to be defeatable only if the headquarters were switched off, in other words Moscow.”

64535542.jpg

Christian Hartmann is head of the Deployment research department at the Bundeswehr Center for Military History and Social Sciences in Potsdam.

(Photo: picture alliance / dpa)

Hitler initially disregarded the advice. Only when the conquest of Kiev did not lead to a decision did the dictator agree with his advisors. At the beginning of October the already weakened Eastern Army opened the storm on Moscow. 78 divisions with almost two million soldiers set in motion in the middle section of the front for the “last mighty blow”. After the double battle of Vyazma and Bryansk, in which more than 600,000 Red Army soldiers were captured, the way to Moscow seemed clear. While the Soviet dictator Josef Stalin had authorities and industrial companies evacuated from the city in a hurry and imposed a state of siege, the German press was already cheering for the “total victory”.

The Germans had underestimated the effects of the weather. The autumn rains turned the runways into a deep bog in which supplies got stuck and entire armies sank. Although the frost period that began at the beginning of November made the roads drivable again, the temperatures quickly fell below 20 degrees Celsius. Machine guns and carbines froze or failed because the Wehrmacht did not use the right weapon oil. Because of the poor visibility, the air force often had to stay on the ground. In addition, the army command had only provided winter clothing for a small occupying army. Many soldiers were still fighting in their tattered summer uniforms. Frostbite was the order of the day and soon more than doubled the combat losses.

AP_229828011760.jpg

It wasn’t just the soldiers who suffered from the cold. The draft horses of the Wehrmacht were not used to the extreme temperatures and often did not get enough feed.

(Photo: AP)

The slow advance gave the Red Army time to reinforce Moscow’s defense. Agent Richard Sorge had learned that the Japanese were planning an advance in the Pacific instead of attacking the Soviet Union. Intercepted radio messages confirmed his information. This enabled Stalin to move fresh divisions from the Far East to Moscow by rail.

When the Soviet metropolis came within range of the German artillery on December 1st, the thermometers showed almost 40 degrees below zero. Four days later the Soviet Army counterattacked. Battalions on skis and Siberian divisions, perfectly prepared for the winter war in quilted jackets and white camouflage suits, met the completely exhausted Germans in a critical phase, that of an offensive that had stopped.

Due to the force of the onslaught, some formations were thrown back up to 300 kilometers to the west. Some units found it difficult to escape encirclement. On December 12, 1941, Panzer General Erich Hoepner noted: “The mass of Russians is crushing us. Their morale is low. But our people are overtired, fall asleep standing up, and are so dull that they no longer throw themselves down when shooting.”

imago0054024258h.jpg

The Siberian divisions of the Red Army were well prepared for the winter war.

(Photo: imago stock & people)

“Hitler was terrified that Napoleon’s retreat of 1812 would be repeated,” says Hartmann. “That’s why his motto was: ‘Hold at all costs’.” The dictator categorically forbade any retreat and forced his commanders to fanatically persevere on the spot. “Psychologically and militarily, that was probably still the better alternative. Because of the vastness of the area, it is questionable whether the German armies could have been withdrawn in an orderly manner,” says Hartmann. “Seen in this way, Hitler’s insanely brutal order was the only possible reaction to this militarily and politically already muddled situation.”

The main reason that the Eastern Front did not collapse was due to the mistakes of the Soviet High Command. “This did not succeed in concentrating the forces on a few decisive goals,” said Hartmann. “As a result, the attacks frayed more and more.” The beginning of the muddy season in the spring of 1942 nipped all fighting in the bud and gave the Wehrmacht a respite to reorganize.

imago0109502191h.jpg

A cemetery for German soldiers who fell in retreat.

(Photo: imago images / UIG)

“The Battle of Moscow was the great turning point in World War II,” says Hartmann. It was clear to Hitler that the “idea of ​​his World Blitzkrieg had failed”. In general, the battle is taking place at the time of a “world-historical upheaval” that is concentrated in a relatively short period of time. Two days after the Soviet counter-offensive began, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. Shortly thereafter, Nazi Germany declared war on the United States. The balance of power finally shifted in favor of the Allies.

“Still, Hitler stubbornly and suicidally tried to win the war, albeit with diminishing hope,” says Hartmann. “At the same time there was another radicalization in the form of the so-called ‘final solution to the Jewish question’, which is now beginning.” The date of the Wannsee Conference in January 1942 was no accident. “Hitler’s calculation was: ‘If we don’t win the war, at least we will murder the Jews’.”

With the Battle of Moscow, the Wehrmacht lost its aura of invincibility. Experts estimate that around 600,000 Germans were killed, frozen, wounded or captured during the fighting. The Red Army’s losses are estimated at around one million. Despite the outcome, Hitler continued to seek salvation in the attack. In the summer he put his troops on the march in the southern section of the Eastern Front. The operation ended disastrously in early 1943 with the annihilation of the 6th Army in the Stalingrad pocket. It took two more years before the German Reich was finally defeated.

.
source site-34