The Eastern Front

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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.