World War II: Blitzkrieg and the Eastern Front

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World War II Blitzkrieg and the Eastern Front

• Lsn 23

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ID SIG

• Ardennes, aufstragtaktik, Barbarossa, Battle of
  Britain, Dunkirk, Eastern Front, Maginot Line,
  Moscow, Stalingrad, Vichy France, Zhukov

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French and German Plans forthe Battle of France
1940

• French anticipated the Germans attacking through
  the north as they did in World War I so they
  developed the Dye Plan to counter such an attack
• Built the Maginot Line in the south to protect
  the border (recalling the trench warfare of WWI)

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Maginot Line

• A line of concrete fortifications, tank
  obstacles, machine gun posts and other defenses
  which France constructed along her borders with
  Germany and Italy
• The fortifications did not extend through the
  Ardennes Forest which was considered impassable

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Surprise in the Ardennes

• On May 12, 1940 Germany attacked through the
  weakly held Ardennes region
• Penetrated Allied defenses and then began to
  envelop them

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Guderian Breaks Through at SedanBattle of
France May 14, 1940
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Hoth Breaks Through at DinantBattle of France
May 14-15, 1940
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Penetration

• With Hoths and Guderians successes, the Germans
  had a 40 mile breakthrough from Dinant to Sedan
• Pushed through seven armored divisions toward the
  English Channel

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The Panzers Race To The ChannelBattle of France
May 14-24, 1940
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Dunkirk was the last evacuation port available to
the Allies.
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Dunkirk
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Moving in for the Kill

• German forces pressed the Allied armies trapped
  in the north, from south and east, into the
  English Channel.
• Meanwhile, German infantry divisions reinforced
  the southern flank of the German penetration.
• But.

Dunkirk Harbor ablaze from German bombing
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Halt Order

• Hitler halted the German armor
• German armor had suffered heavy losses and would
  be needed to conquer the rest of France
• Luftwaffe called upon to finish the job
• Luftwaffe unable to destroy the British and
  French
• Bases in western Germany were further away from
  Dunkirk than British planes were from their bases
  on the British Isles
• 340,000 Allied troops were evacuated

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The Weygand Line CollapsesBattle of France June
4-14, 1940
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Italy Joins the Axis

• On June 10, 1940, Mussolini declared war on
  Britain and France and four months later invaded
  Greece
• Mussolini will end up being a troublesome ally
  for Hitler

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French Surrender and Vichy France

• On June 16, the French asked for an armistice
• In July, France was divided into two sections
• One was ruled directly by the Germans
• The other was led by the Vichy government that
  collaborated with German plans including the
  plunder of French resources and the forceful
  deportations of tens of thousands of French Jews
  to concentration camps across Europe

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Auftragstaktik

• German interwar doctrine emphasized
• decentralized, mission-oriented orders
  (Auftragstaktik)
• speed and exploitation of enemy weaknesses
  maximized by troop commanders taking the
  initiative (understand commanders intent)
• close integration and cooperation between combat
  branches (mobile warfare required armor,
  infantry, and artillery)
• leadership from the front

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Battle of Britain

• The Germans developed two plans to take Britain
• Operation Sea Lion, an amphibious landing on the
  British coast
• A great air offensive to gain air superiority and
  destroy the British industrial base
• Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties
  and so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire
  and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years,
  men will still say, This was their finest
  hour. (Winston Churchill)

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The Eastern Front

• Hitler had strategic and ideological reasons for
  invading Russia
• Strategically he knew that the Soviet Union and
  the US were critical to Britains willingness to
  keep fighting
• He also felt he needed the agricultural and raw
  material resources of Eastern Russia
• Ideologically he viewed the Soviet Union as an
  amalgamation of his greatest enemies, the Jews
  and the Slavs

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Operation Barbarossa

• Hitler based his plan on the assumption he could
  destroy the Soviet Union within one year
• Critical to his success would be to catch and
  destroy the Soviet Army at the border areas
• If that did not occur, the Russians could use
  their vast territory to trade space for time and
  cause the Germans huge logistical problems

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Operation Barbarossa

• On June 22, 1941, Hitler invaded Russia in
  Operation Barbarossa
• The operation encompassed a total troop strength
  of about 4 million men, making it the biggest
  single land operation ever
• Benefiting from initial surprise, by the end of
  July Hitler had occupied a portion of Russia
  twice the size of France

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Operation Barbarossa Battle of Moscow

• With the Germans successes in the north and
  south, Hitler assumed that Stalins regime was on
  the verge of collapse
• He authorized an advance on Moscow before the
  onset of winter
• Already however the Germans were suffering from
  serious supply shortages
• By September the supply system was only meeting
  current tactical consumption needs
• No supply stores for the winter season were being
  built

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Operation Barbarossa Battle of Moscow

• The Germans caught the Russians unprepared and
  made great advances
• The Soviet Army seemed on the verge of collapse
• At this point the weather broke and autumn rains
  turned the roads to mud
• The German advance stalled, allowing the Russians
  to hurry reinforcements from the interior

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Operation Barbarossa Battle of Moscow

• Despite dropping temperatures and critical supply
  shortages, the German high command pressed on
  with the attack
• The German soldiers were still in summer uniforms
  and suffered terribly

German soldier during the battle of Moscow
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Operation Barbarossa Battle of Moscow

• Stalin responded to the crisis by rushing his
  best commander, Georgi Zhukov, to defend Moscow
• Zhukov waged a delaying defense in front of
  Moscow the first time the Soviets took advantage
  of their ability to trade space for time
• In the meantime he pulled reinforcements from as
  far away as Siberia to defend Moscow
• Zhukovs plan was to allow the Germans to exhaust
  themselves and then go on the offensive

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Operation Barbarossa Battle of Moscow

• By Dec 4 the Germans had clawed their way to
  Moscows outskirts, but they could not continue
• That night temperatures were -25 degrees
  Fahrenheit
• One infantry regiment suffered 300 frostbite
  casualties
• On Dec 6 the Soviets counterattacked

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Operation Barbarossa Battle of Moscow

• Rundstedt, the German commander of Army Group
  South, ordered a retreat and Hitler fired him
• Field Marshall Walther von Reichenau replaced
  Rundstedt and confirmed the withdraw order and
  then suffered a heart attack
• Hitler was in the midst of a high command crisis
  and lost confidence in his generals

Field Marshall Walther von Reichenau
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Strategic Situation

• On Dec 7, 1941, Japan attacked the US at Pearl
  Harbor
• In spite of his troubles in Russia, Hitler
  decided to support Japan and also declare war on
  the US
• Now the US would join with Britain to adopt a
  Europe First strategy that would destroy Hitler

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Operation Barbarossa Battle of Moscow

• As the Russians pushed forward, Hitler refused to
  allow a retreat and relieved or court-martialed
  generals who did so
• Hitler named himself commander-in-chief of the
  army
• Each military service began to operate
  increasingly independently and Germany suffered
  from a lack of an overall strategy

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Operation Barbarossa Battle of Moscow

• On the Eastern Front the Germans stiff
  resistance and control of crucial roads and
  supply centers slowly took the punch out of the
  Russian counterattack
• The German Army survived but it suffered losses
  from which it never recovered
• Both sides licked their wounds and prepared for
  renewed operations in the spring

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Stalingrad

• As spring 1942 approached, German commanders
  recommended remaining on the defensive but Hitler
  believed the Germans must destroy Soviet military
  potential before the American industrial power
  could come into play
• Hitler developed a plan to capture Soviet oil
• At first Hitler considered Stalingrad of little
  importance other than the fact that its capture
  might block the movement of petroleum up the
  Volga River

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Stalingrad

• On June 28 the Germans launched their summer
  offensive
• The Germans made good headway with one advance
  moving east toward Stalingrad and the Volga River
  and another moving south into the Caucasus
• In August Hitlers erratic attention swung from
  the Caucasus to Stalingrad

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Stalingrad

• On Aug 24 the Germans attacked Stalingrads
  suburbs and began fighting their way into the
  city
• Hitler began shifting forces from the Caucasus to
  Stalingrad
• The nature of the urban fighting favored the
  defenders and the Soviets mounted a stubborn
  defense
• Stalingrad began to drain the German army but
  Hitler would not back off

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Stalingrad
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Stalingrad
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Stalingrad
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Stalingrad
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Stalingrad
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Stalingrad

• On Nov 19 the Soviets launched a massive
  counterattack north of Stalingrad
• Hitlers overly centralized and completely
  out-of-touch command system broke down in the
  face of the Soviet onslaught
• The Soviets encircled Stalingrad and Hitler
  ordered his commanders to stand fast anyway
• By this point in the war, no one was willing to
  confront Hitler

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Stalingrad

• All attempts to breakout or break through failed
  and on Feb 2 the Germans surrendered
• Out of 250,000 soldiers trapped in the Stalingrad
  pocket, approximately 90,000 became prisoners
• Barely 5,000 survived the war

German POWs
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Greatest Extent of Axis Control
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The Eastern Front

• Ultimately enormous logistical shortcomings made
  Barbarossa a failure
• Germany proved capable of fighting battles very
  well, but was less capable of fighting a war of
  prolonged duration
• In the total four years of fighting on the
  Eastern Front, an estimated 4 million Axis and 9
  million Russians were killed in battle
• 20 million Soviet civilians were killed as a
  result of extermination campaigns against Jews,
  communists and partisans, casual massacres,
  reprisal killings, diseases, and (sometimes
  planned) starvation.

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