Germans withdraw behind Dnieper successfully

I have read the Forczyk Dnieper Osprey book.

He actually had a couple of sentences where he describes the possibility of withdrawing 17th army and using to it to hold the river line until the rest of the army crossed. I thought it an interesting alternative scenario and so posted the OP to get confirmation of its plausibility. The author though it plausible anyway. Sometimes I think Forczyk tries a little too hard to come up with alternatives and analysis (he has to make the book interesting after all, which he does in this case).

If you take 10 divisions of 17th army, put them on the river early before the withdraw starts, 4000 actual fighting men per division, 1348 miles, its 30 guys per mile watching the river, 3 machine guns per mile, its 700 meters across so it would be messy for rafts and small boats as the Soviets to to rush across forces closely following, until Soviet artillery gets set up opposite anyway.

Of course as the divisions of the rest of the German army get across the river they can fan out.
 

Deleted member 1487

I have read the Forczyk Dnieper Osprey book.

He actually had a couple of sentences where he describes the possibility of withdrawing 17th army and using to it to hold the river line until the rest of the army crossed. I thought it an interesting alternative scenario and so posted the OP to get confirmation of its plausibility. The author though it plausible anyway. Sometimes I think Forczyk tries a little too hard to come up with alternatives and analysis (he has to make the book interesting after all, which he does in this case).

If you take 10 divisions of 17th army, put them on the river early before the withdraw starts, 4000 actual fighting men per division, 1348 miles, its 30 guys per mile watching the river, 3 machine guns per mile, its 700 meters across so it would be messy for rafts and small boats as the Soviets to to rush across forces closely following, until Soviet artillery gets set up opposite anyway.

Of course as the divisions of the rest of the German army get across the river they can fan out.
Well if you pull back in July in Ukraine in general, you save AG-South a ton of casualties with 6th Army and the forces left holding the extended line south of Kursk/north of Belgorod after Zitadel. That and actually withdrawing before the Soviets break AG-South's line wide open in early September would prevent the Soviets from bouncing the river line and getting a bridgehead before German divisions could retreat back over the river would be a huge difference. Soviet additional strength wouldn't let their mobile forces beat a phased retreat. In fact it would make their job a lot harder as the mobile tank armies would have to fight the retreating Germans who are relatively intact without infantry support.

I forgot just how helter skelter the retreat to the Dnieper was, so beyond the 17th army, if you have AG-South start a phased retreat to even a non-existent Panther/Wotan Line in mid-July, you'd save them a lot of pain/losses on the Mius/at Belgorod/Kharkov and then in the OTL September retreat. Which means holding the Dnieper for a while gets a LOT more likely. The issue then is how long does it take for the Soviets to brute force the issue? Certainly it would cost them a bunch of casualties and the Germans could conduct an actual, thorough scorched earth/male population evacuation during the retreat, which screws up Soviet strategic aims. IIRC the western bank of the Dniepr is higher than the eastern so that would hurt the Soviets as well.
 
If their issue is misstating Soviet armor losses, the Osprey book has no problem then describing the situation with German armored and infantry forces accurately, which is what the discussion is about, the state of German forces upon reaching the Dnieper. BTW I'm going back into the Ukraine Summer book and it does describe the situation in September, which is when the major retreats started. But as it was the retreat on the Mius started in August and the author even describes how beat up 6th army was as it had to pull back; he states that had it been allowed to retreat in mid-July it would have been in a position to actually mount defensive operations on the Dnieper. As per usual Hitler waited too long in August to order a retreat, which resulted in an irreplaceable wasting of strength, both manpower and equipment of the divisions of 6th army. So the situation in Southern Ukraine by the end of August was a total shit-show for the Germans, as the mangled remnants fled west.

And yet, as your sources state, the bulk of German forces made it...

You do know there was major fighting in the region for years, right?

If by "years" you mean "autumn of 1941" and "autumn of 1943", sure. And if by "major fighting" you mean "rear guard actions".

And that the Soviets heavily conscripted the population during their advance,

Somewhere short of 500,000 people in the entirety of Ukraine from 1943-44. Out of a population of 30,000,000... <1.6%.

plus of course the heavy partisan conflict wasted a lot of the area.

The rural area, but the cities didn't see much partisan warfare. Helped wreck the transport nets, but the wreckage of the industry and associated mineral production was all on the Germans. The Germans also did their damn best to try and strip out the local population when they retreated, but generally failed to do so as the bulk of the locals, recognizing what the German withdrawal meant, simply fled into the countryside until it was safe. As a result, the Germans never succeeded getting more then 3% of the able-bodied populace.

Again, no. Not unless you're counting the entire July-December period post-Kursk or including a much wider area that includes forces that weren't at Kursk. Lying with stats is what that is called.

Given that the forcing of the D'niepr ultimately encompassed almost the entirety of the width of AGS's frontage, it is not at all lying with stats to compare AGS's personnel and equipment strengths during the Battle of the D'niepr with that of AGS's stats at the start of the Battle of Kursk personnel on September 24th amounted to 1-1.25 million, depending on the source and whether you include the Romanians or not. On July 4th, 1943 AGS's personnel strength was... 1-1.25 million, depending on the source and whether you include the Romanians or not. Even cutting out the forces in the Kustrin Bridgehead and Crimea still leaves the same totals. In both cases, AFV strength was around 1,500 (one source stated 3,850 which took me aback until I realized it was counting pretty much anything with a mounted gun on it). AGS's artillery strength was actually slightly higher on September 24th then it had been on July 4th (12,000 vs 10,000) although that number includes AT guns and mortars so it's possible that there had been a shift in the disposition of artillery.

Right, because the Soviets got to the Dniepr in a lot of places before the Germans or in areas where the Germans had so few troops they couldn't defend everywhere, so had to pick the most vulnerable areas to concentrate manpower to have a chance to hold.

And given the complexity of having to rush all over the west bank from a few points where they cross, while the Soviets will just cross wherever they arrive, was always going to be the case. Not to mention, the Germans already couldn't be strong everywhere by the start of '42, much less mid-'43. The Germans would have been spread pretty thinly on any line short of falling all the way back to Poland.

Or, as one of your own sources put it, "Contrary to experience so far-the dictator put too much trust in the natural obstacle value."

So, apparently, do you.

Actually yes it was, see the block quote above from the book cited earlier.

At no point does the book state that the lack of forces to allocate to the defense of the Lyutezh bridgehead was a factor in it's underdefense. Meanwhile, we have multiple accounts by the Germans themselves of how they didn't allocate enough forces there because they simply believed the bridgehead to be a non-threat, with Manstein himself regarding the existing defenses as adequate.

Plus, as your block quotes also allude too, the Soviets suffered plenty of additional losses. In all likelihood, the additional German strength, which is mainly qualitative, gets tied up dealing with the additional Soviet strength as the Soviets are able to advance to the river unhindered instead of losing plenty of their own strength on the way.

That and actually withdrawing before the Soviets break AG-South's line wide open in early September would prevent the Soviets from bouncing the river line and getting a bridgehead before German divisions could retreat back over the river would be a huge difference. Soviet additional strength wouldn't let their mobile forces beat a phased retreat.

Nah, simply launching a full-scale offensive would do that. The weakening of German defenses and reserves would leave them very exposed while doing so even compared to OTL. Even the OTL withdrawal took the entire month of September to pull back across, with the last German forces only going across on September 29th. A phased withdrawal would take much longer and the Germans would still be doing it when Rumyanstev comes down on them.

In fact it would make their job a lot harder as the mobile tank armies would have to fight the retreating Germans who are relatively intact without infantry support.

You mean besides all the infantry forces who did the main work of establishing those bridgeheads in the first place? Oh, and without the losses of Orel-Kharkov the Soviets have tons more infantry, including motorized infantry, to escort their mobile tank armies as well.
 
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Deleted member 1487

And yet, as your sources state, the bulk of German forces made it...
After Soviet bridgeheads were already established, but not with all or even most of their horse drawn equipment.

If by "years" you mean "autumn of 1941" and "autumn of 1943", sure. And if by "major fighting" you mean "rear guard actions".
That involved hundreds of thousands of men. Plus there was plenty of heavy fighting around Kharkov and East Ukraine in 1942 and again in winter 1943, then again in summer 1943. The Mius River is in East Ukraine too and that whole region saw heavy fighting that summer into autumn. Plus then of course along the Dniepr, which ripped up Ukraine as well, then as fighting continued on into west Ukraine into 1944 that ripped up that whole region as well, plus Soviet suppression efforts that really hurt that region, as did the forced population transfers of Poles. Ukraine was a war zone for most of the war and consequently suffered damage that would take over a decade to repair.

Somewhere short of 500,000 people in the entirety of Ukraine from 1943-44. Out of a population of 30,000,000... <1.6%.
Source? Plus is that 30 million actually who was there in 1943-44 or the pre-war population.
http://ukrainianweek.com/History/74746
This claims somewhere between 2.7-4 million people were conscripted in the 2nd draft after liberation.

This gives some interesting numbers too:
https://forum.axishistory.com/viewt...1559&hilit=ukraine+conscription+1943#p1761559
Conscription on Ukrainian territory for the Steppe/2 Ukrainian Front:
August 1943 - 8 266 men
Sept - 70 700
Oct - 71 700
Nov - 22 494
Dec - 39 200
January 45 - 21 748
Feb - 23 961
Mar - 108 946
Apr - 138 522
May - 18 170
Jun - 4 205
Jul - 902
Total year - 528 214 men.
https://pamyat-naroda.ru/dou/?docID=113723646

The numbers above pertain only to this front.
Just 1(!) front conscripted alone almost 530k men in Ukraine. There were 4 Ukrainian Fronts in 1943-44.



The rural area, but the cities didn't see much partisan warfare. Helped wreck the transport nets, but the wreckage of the industry and associated mineral production was all on the Germans. The Germans also did their damn best to try and strip out the local population when they retreated, but generally failed to do so as the bulk of the locals, recognizing what the German withdrawal meant, simply fled into the countryside until it was safe. As a result, the Germans never succeeded getting more then 3% of the able-bodied populace.
Where do you think the farming was? If the countryside is depopulated that would wreck farming. Cities were heavily fought over during the war; Kharkov 4 times, Kiev twice for extended periods, plus numerous other cities and towns. The Soviets also scorched earthed Ukraine in 1941-42 as they retreated. It is complete BS to say it was only on the Germans.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scorched_earth#World_War_II
When Germany attacked the Soviet Union in June 1941, many district governments took the initiative to begin a 'partial' scorched-earth policy to deny the invaders electrical, telecommunications, rail, and industrial resources. Parts of the telegraph network were destroyed, some rail and road bridges were blown, most electrical generators were sabotaged through the removal of key components, and many mineshafts were collapsed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dnieper_Hydroelectric_Station#World_War_II_and_post-war_reconstruction
During World War II, the strategically important dam and plant was dynamited by retreating Red Army troops in 1941 after Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union. American journalist H. R. Knickerbocker wrote that year:[7]

The Russians have proved now by their destruction of the great dam at Dniepropetrovsk that they mean truly to scorch the earth before Hitler even if it means the destruction of their most precious possessions ... Dnieprostroy was an object almost of worship to the Soviet people. Its destruction demonstrates a will to resist which surpasses anything we had imagined. I know what that dam meant to the Bolsheviks ... It was the largest, most spectacular, and most popular of all the immense projects of the First Five-Year Plan ... The Dnieper dam when it was built was the biggest on earth and so it occupied a place in the imagination and affection of the Soviet people difficult for us to realize ... Stalin's order to destroy it meant more to the Russians emotionally than it would mean to us for Roosevelt to order the destruction of the Panama Canal.

The tidal surge killed thousands of unsuspecting civilians, as well as Red Army officers who were crossing over the river.[8] It was partially dynamited again by retreating German troops in 1943. In the end the dam suffered extensive damage, and the powerhouse hall was nearly destroyed. Both were rebuilt between 1944 and 1949.



Given that the forcing of the D'niepr ultimately encompassed almost the entirety of the width of AGS's frontage, it is not at all lying with stats to compare AGS's personnel and equipment strengths during the Battle of the D'niepr with that of AGS's stats at the start of the Battle of Kursk personnel on September 24th amounted to 1-1.25 million, depending on the source and whether you include the Romanians or not. On July 4th, 1943 AGS's personnel strength was... 1-1.25 million, depending on the source and whether you include the Romanians or not. Even cutting out the forces in the Kustrin Bridgehead and Crimea still leaves the same totals. In both cases, AFV strength was around 1,500 (one source stated 3,850 which took me aback until I realized it was counting pretty much anything with a mounted gun on it). AGS's artillery strength was actually slightly higher on September 24th then it had been on July 4th (12,000 vs 10,000) although that number includes AT guns and mortars so it's possible that there had been a shift in the disposition of artillery.
It is lying with stats to claim that the relatively limited forces that attacked during Citadel had as much equipment as the entirety of AG-South, much of which didn't participate in Zitadel (same with AG-Center), while also encompassing a wide period that was technically considered the Battle of the Dnieper ranging from September-December when reinforcements, new divisions, and replacement equipment filtered in to replace the losses that happened during the fighting and retreats in July-September. There was no way that AG-South had 1500 AFVs on had at the Dniepr in late September during the bridgehead fight. They about that amount total including in repair shops as of August, but only about 1/3rd were operational according to the Osprey campaign book and most were lost in the retreat to the Dnieper as the non-operational equipment was blown up or just left behind in retreats. So to say at the fight for the bridgeheads over the river in late September there were 1500 operational AFVs on the German side participating is just fuckery of the highest order, because that number only refers to total, not operational, numbers in the zone of AG-South at the start of August.

What source is claiming that AG-South had 12,000 guns (mortars, AT guns, artillery) as of September 24th on the Dnieper, not left behind in retreats??? Does that also include late arriving reinforcements too?


And given the complexity of having to rush all over the west bank from a few points where they cross, while the Soviets will just cross wherever they arrive, was always going to be the case. Not to mention, the Germans already couldn't be strong everywhere by the start of '42, much less mid-'43. The Germans would have been spread pretty thinly on any line short of falling all the way back to Poland.

Or, as one of your own sources put it, "Contrary to experience so far-the dictator put too much trust in the natural obstacle value."

So, apparently, do you.

The Soviets achieved their multiple bridgeheads IOTL after a mad dash to the river, arriving in many places before the Germans and grabbing ground that they had a hard time reinforcing, but did not lose. Most German retreating units arrived after the Soviet armored spearheads and already grabbed their bridgeheads. The forces holding the natural obstacle of the Dnieper were also heavily worn down in the fighting and retreats of July-September, plus of course the Soviets arrived before most of the Germans even got there, while 17th army was locked down in Kuban until September-October and didn't participate in the fighting for the Dnieper until they were already cut off in Crimea.

Also that quote:
"Contrary to experience so far-the dictator put too much trust in the natural obstacle value."
refers to Hitler thinking it would hold AFTER giving retreat orders too late in September after AG-South forces were already retreating behind the advanced Soviet elements, which grabbed bridgeheads before they arrived to help. You're claiming that that OTL situation is just like an ATL situation in which the Germans pulled back and properly set up defenses, rather than the OTL situation of retreat only being ordered belatedly after the Soviets were breaking through and ahead in the race to the Dnieper.

At no point does the book state that the lack of forces to allocate to the defense of the Lyutezh bridgehead was a factor in it's underdefense. Meanwhile, we have multiple accounts by the Germans themselves of how they didn't allocate enough forces there because they simply believed the bridgehead to be a non-threat, with Manstein himself regarding the existing defenses as adequate.

Plus, as your block quotes also allude too, the Soviets suffered plenty of additional losses. In all likelihood, the additional German strength, which is mainly qualitative, gets tied up dealing with the additional Soviet strength as the Soviets are able to advance to the river unhindered instead of losing plenty of their own strength on the way.
Because the Soviets had already grabbed multiple bridgeheads and the Germans were containing something like more than 20 of them. The Lyutezh one was a minor one in comparison. In other sources they specifically state there wasn't enough strength to go around for all of the hotspots after the losses of the retreat, so they had to economize. The entire reason they didn't bother putting sufficient forces to guard it was because they were facing much more threatening ones. As it was though, the Soviets had already grabbed the bridgeheads during the September retreat, but couldn't expand them until later. In this ATL the river defense line would have been reached and set up before the Soviets could race out to establish bridgeheads all over, tying down German forces like IOTL.

How do the Soviets establish bridgheads all over the place and overload the Germans like IOTL, if in this ATL the defenses are set up and reached in a phased withdrawal before the Soviets break through on the Mius and at Kharkov, outracing the Germans to the Dnieper?

Nah, simply launching a full-scale offensive would do that. The weakening of German defenses and reserves would leave them very exposed while doing so even compared to OTL. Even the OTL withdrawal took the entire month of September to pull back across, with the last German forces only going across on September 29th. A phased withdrawal would take much longer and the Germans would still be doing it when Rumyanstev comes down on them.
The phased withdrawal would be ordered in July per OP, not ordered belatedly in September per OTL.

You mean besides all the infantry forces who did the main work of establishing those bridgeheads in the first place? Oh, and without the losses of Orel-Kharkov the Soviets have tons more infantry, including motorized infantry, to escort their mobile tank armies as well.
Infantry divisions weren't the ones that seized those bridgeheads, it was the infantry of mobile divisions that did. Infantry divisions would be left behind, meaning it would only be tank armies alone against an establish defensive line initially, so no bridgeheads seized on the march as per OTL. Later of course the Soviets would extend their logistics and be able to to brute force the river line, but that would take a while to really set up, but then German strength is intact to hold for a while, plus per OTL 17th army is helping man the line.
 

Deleted member 1487

If I may ask, what books does Forczyk list in the Bibliography/Further Reading of his Osprey title on the Dnieper/Dnepr?
FURTHER READING
Barratt, Stephen, Zhitomir-Berdichev: German Operations West of Kiev 24 December 1943–31 January 1944 (Solihull,
UK: Helion & Company Ltd., 2012)
Glantz, David M., The Soviet Airborne Experience (Fort Leavenworth, KS: U.S. Army Command and Staff College,
1984)
——, Forgotten Battles of the German-Soviet War 1941–1945, Volume V, Part Two (self-published, 2000)
Dunn, Walter Scott, The Soviet Economy and the Red Army, 1930–1945 (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1995)
Haupt, Werner, Die 8. Panzer-Division im 2.Weltkrieg (Eggolsheim: Podzun-Pallas Verlag, 1987)
Hinze, Rolf, Crucible of Combat: Germany’s Defensive Battles in the Ukraine, 1943–44 (Solihull, UK: Helion & Co.
Ltd., 2009)
Kumanov, Georgy A., Voina i Zheleznodorozhnyi Transport SSSR, 1941–1945 (War and Rail Transport of the USSR,
1941–1945)(Moscow: Nauka, 1988)
Kurkotkin, Semyon K. (ed.), Tyl Sovetskikh Vooruzhennykh Sil v Velikoi Otechestvennoi Voine, 1941–1945 gg (The Rear
of the Soviet Armed Forces in the Great Patriotic War, 1941–1945) (Moscow: Voenizdat, 1977)
Malinovski, Gleb V., Brigady Inzhenernykh Voysk Krasnoy Armii 1941–1945 (Engineer Brigades of the Red Army,
1941–1945) (Moscow: Patriot Publishing, 2005)
Moskalenko, Kirill S., Na Yugo-Zapadnom Napravlenii (In the South-West Direction) (Moscow: Nauka, 1969)
Nipe, George M., Decision in the Ukraine: Summer 1943, II SS and III Panzerkorps (Winnipeg: J. J. Fedorowicz
Publishing Inc., 1996)
Staskov, Nikolai V., ‘1943 Dnepr Airborne Operation: Lessons and Conclusions’, Military Thought, Vol. 12, No. 4 (July
2003)
Tsirlin, Aleksandr D., P. Biryukov, V. P. Istomin and E. H. Fedoseyev, Inzhenernyye Voyska v Boyakh za Sovetskuyu
Rodinu (Army Corps of Engineers in the Battle for the Soviet Motherland) (Moscow: Military Publishing, 1970)
 
FURTHER READING
Barratt, Stephen, Zhitomir-Berdichev: German Operations West of Kiev 24 December 1943–31 January 1944 (Solihull,
UK: Helion & Company Ltd., 2012)
Glantz, David M., The Soviet Airborne Experience (Fort Leavenworth, KS: U.S. Army Command and Staff College,
1984)
——, Forgotten Battles of the German-Soviet War 1941–1945, Volume V, Part Two (self-published, 2000)
Dunn, Walter Scott, The Soviet Economy and the Red Army, 1930–1945 (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1995)
Haupt, Werner, Die 8. Panzer-Division im 2.Weltkrieg (Eggolsheim: Podzun-Pallas Verlag, 1987)
Hinze, Rolf, Crucible of Combat: Germany’s Defensive Battles in the Ukraine, 1943–44 (Solihull, UK: Helion & Co.
Ltd., 2009)
Kumanov, Georgy A., Voina i Zheleznodorozhnyi Transport SSSR, 1941–1945 (War and Rail Transport of the USSR,
1941–1945)(Moscow: Nauka, 1988)
Kurkotkin, Semyon K. (ed.), Tyl Sovetskikh Vooruzhennykh Sil v Velikoi Otechestvennoi Voine, 1941–1945 gg (The Rear
of the Soviet Armed Forces in the Great Patriotic War, 1941–1945) (Moscow: Voenizdat, 1977)
Malinovski, Gleb V., Brigady Inzhenernykh Voysk Krasnoy Armii 1941–1945 (Engineer Brigades of the Red Army,
1941–1945) (Moscow: Patriot Publishing, 2005)
Moskalenko, Kirill S., Na Yugo-Zapadnom Napravlenii (In the South-West Direction) (Moscow: Nauka, 1969)
Nipe, George M., Decision in the Ukraine: Summer 1943, II SS and III Panzerkorps (Winnipeg: J. J. Fedorowicz
Publishing Inc., 1996)
Staskov, Nikolai V., ‘1943 Dnepr Airborne Operation: Lessons and Conclusions’, Military Thought, Vol. 12, No. 4 (July
2003)
Tsirlin, Aleksandr D., P. Biryukov, V. P. Istomin and E. H. Fedoseyev, Inzhenernyye Voyska v Boyakh za Sovetskuyu
Rodinu (Army Corps of Engineers in the Battle for the Soviet Motherland) (Moscow: Military Publishing, 1970)
Thanks so much man!
 
Manstein was not advocating for pulling back prior to Kursk. Instead, he was busy advocating for Citadel...

From what I've read, right after his successful counterattack of March 1943 Manstein proposed withdrawing to the Dneiper in the southern part of the front, with the bulk of the armor in the Kharkov area, ready to cut off the advancing Soviets from the north. This plan was finally rejected in early April.
 
From what I've read, right after his successful counterattack of March 1943 Manstein proposed withdrawing to the Dneiper in the southern part of the front, with the bulk of the armor in the Kharkov area, ready to cut off the advancing Soviets from the north. This plan was finally rejected in early April.

Manstein proposed no such thing, even according to himself. His foremost proposal in March of 1943 was essentially Citadel except launched immediately instead of later, a proposal that was in gross ignorance of the Soviet dispositions in front of him. He would stick to that proposal all the way until July 15th 1943, even if his support was more cautious at certain times then at others.

After Soviet bridgeheads were already established, but not with all or even most of their horse drawn equipment.

Only some of Soviet bridgeheads. Quite a number of Soviet forces were able to force their way across in spite of the Germans being able to set up on the other bank.

That involved hundreds of thousands of men. Plus there was plenty of heavy fighting around Kharkov and East Ukraine in 1942 and again in winter 1943, then again in summer 1943. The Mius River is in East Ukraine too and that whole region saw heavy fighting that summer into autumn. Plus then of course along the Dniepr, which ripped up Ukraine as well, then as fighting continued on into west Ukraine into 1944 that ripped up that whole region as well, plus Soviet suppression efforts that really hurt that region, as did the forced population transfers of Poles. Ukraine was a war zone for most of the war and consequently suffered damage that would take over a decade to repair.

With the exception of Kharkov and to a lesser extent the Central D'niepr, none of these regions were quite as heavily industrialized.

Source? Plus is that 30 million actually who was there in 1943-44 or the pre-war population.

The pre-war population was 40 million, a figure it didn't recover too until 1956, so obviously it's who was actually there during the war. Solid demographic data during the war is impossible to determine so I work backwards based on Wikipedia's 1950 data and the intervening and then rounded to the nearest 10 millionth. Not the most precise figure but should be inside the ballpark. It is the post-1939 borders though...

http://ukrainianweek.com/History/74746
This claims somewhere between 2.7-4 million people were conscripted in the 2nd draft after liberation.

This gives some interesting numbers too:
https://forum.axishistory.com/viewt...1559&hilit=ukraine+conscription+1943#p1761559

Just 1(!) front conscripted alone almost 530k men in Ukraine. There were 4 Ukrainian Fronts in 1943-44.

Those numbers sound like their counting troops which were formally conscripted long after the region was liberated in 1944 and 1945, which is arguably stretching the definition of "booty troops" to the breaking point. The territory liberated in 1943-44 ultimately added a million men to the number of boys coming of age to the Soviet Union's recruitment pool, on top of the 2 million men within the territories the USSR controlled at the start of the 1942 and 1943 summer campaign seasons.

Not to mention, you haven't demonstrated that the Germans would be any more effective in depopulating the region then OTL. The Soviets in 1945 found that only a few percent of eligible recruits within the territories were removed by the Germans.

Where do you think the farming was? If the countryside is depopulated that would wreck farming.

Well, there's a non-sequitur. We're discussing damage to the regions industry and transport infrastructure, not agriculture. Of course, even looking at agriculture, regional productivity dropped even further during 1943 as it had in 1942 and 1941, and didn't start to recover until 1944... so the Germans can still claim (and did claim) plenty of success in their scorched earth.

Cities were heavily fought over during the war; Kharkov 4 times, Kiev twice for extended periods, plus numerous other cities and towns.

The main industrial region of the Ukraine is the Donbass, which never saw such serious fighting. In 1941, the Soviets quickly blew up or moved whatever they could and left. In 1942, it never saw any serious fighting (the front never actually reached it). In 1943, the Germans quickly blew up or moved whatever they could and left. In neither case did they see much serious fighting as the prospective defenders, lacking serious forces, didn't even make the attempt. The areas further north (Kharkov), east (the Mius), and west (the D'niepr) of the Donbass did indeed see much more serious fighting, but these areas while important from an absolute standpoint, were not remotely as industrially significant as the Donbass.

The Soviets also scorched earthed Ukraine in 1941-42 as they retreated. It is complete BS to say it was only on the Germans.

Well, leaving aside the strawman that I never said it was only the Germans, that only suggests the region was even more effectively devastated... not less.

It is lying with stats to claim that the relatively limited forces that attacked during Citadel had as much equipment as the entirety of AG-South,

Well then it is a good thing that wasn't what I was claiming. I was only counting the entirety of AGS at the time of the Citadel, and not the forces that attacked at Citadel, and then comparing it to the entirety of AGS at the time of the D'niepr river battles, not counting a single force under the command of AGC in the process. You know, like what I explicitly said?

If I had been just counting the forces of AGS that were at Kursk, then my numbers would have been much smaller.

also encompassing a wide period that was technically considered the Battle of the Dnieper ranging from September-December when reinforcements, new divisions, and replacement equipment filtered in to replace the losses that happened during the fighting and retreats in July-September.

Mainly because appealing to that is a red-herring. If the reinforcements, new divisions, and replacement that filtered in to replace losses up until September 24th 1943 means AGS was quantitatively just as strong at the start of the Battle of the D'niepr as it was at the start of the Battle of Kursk, then guess what: that's my point. You can't claim the Soviet success was the result of quantitative losses if the Germans had managed to make good on their losses.

There was no way that AG-South had 1500 AFVs on had at the Dniepr in late September during the bridgehead fight.

Because it isn't like AGS was able to receive replacements and reinforcements during the course of August and September. :rolleyes:

What source is claiming that AG-South had 12,000 guns (mortars, AT guns, artillery) as of September 24th on the Dnieper, not left behind in retreats??? Does that also include late arriving reinforcements too?

It's everything AGS had on September 24th, 1943, so if any reinforcements are counted they were the ones which arrived prior to that date.

The Soviets achieved their multiple bridgeheads IOTL after a mad dash to the river, arriving in many places before the Germans and grabbing ground that they had a hard time reinforcing, but did not lose.

The Soviets didn't have a hard time reinforcing the bridgeheads at all. Soviet forces were freely able to move into and out of the bridgeheads from the eastern side of the river, with the only limitation being the size of the bridgehead itself. This was actually pretty important when it came to the breakout at Lyutezh as in order to do that the Soviets had to withdraw forces from one bridgehead and send them to another.

Most German retreating units arrived after the Soviet armored spearheads and already grabbed their bridgeheads.

In some cases, in some cases not.

The forces holding the natural obstacle of the Dnieper were also heavily worn down in the fighting and retreats of July-September,

Losses which were largely made good.

while 17th army was locked down in Kuban until September-October and didn't participate in the fighting for the Dnieper until they were already cut off in Crimea.

Which also tied down a half-million Soviet troops that could otherwise be crossing the D'niepr and the equipment and supplies to aid that. So that's basically a wash.

Also that quote:

refers to Hitler thinking it would hold AFTER giving retreat orders too late in September after AG-South forces were already retreating behind the advanced Soviet elements, which grabbed bridgeheads before they arrived to help. You're claiming that that OTL situation is just like an ATL situation in which the Germans pulled back and properly set up defenses, rather than the OTL situation of retreat only being ordered belatedly after the Soviets were breaking through and ahead in the race to the Dnieper.

No, it pretty transparently refers to the belief that a simple natural terrain obstacle will be able to alter the fundamental dynamics of the Germans not having adequate forces to be strong all along the line and the Soviets being able to strike anywhere without warning all along the line. The Battle of the D'niepr IATL, like IOTL, will follow the same dynamics as the other defensive attempts by the Germans in late-1943: the Germans, with too few forces to cover the length of their front, would race their formations one way or another to shore up the line against a Soviet attack only to be hit unexpectedly by the main blow in a location where they were too weak to stop it, forcing them to scramble, improvise, and ultimately withdraw.

Because the Soviets had already grabbed multiple bridgeheads and the Germans were containing something like more than 20 of them. The Lyutezh one was a minor one in comparison. In other sources they specifically state there wasn't enough strength to go around for all of the hotspots after the losses of the retreat, so they had to economize.

And given that the strength of AGS after the retreat was little different, the Germans were always going to have to economize. Hell, the Germans having to economize was nothing new: they had to do it for Kursk (both the offensive and defensive phases), for 3rd Kharkov, and even for Blau. It's just from Kursk on it no longer was enough to hold the line. That there wasn't enough strength to go around was not a new phenomenon by late-'43 and it won't be IATL either.

The entire reason they didn't bother putting sufficient forces to guard it was because they were facing much more threatening ones.

And that is liable to be the case IATL.

In this ATL the river defense line would have been reached and set up before the Soviets could race out to establish bridgeheads all over, tying down German forces like IOTL.

And it does that by basically pretending the Soviets would sit around and twiddle their thumbs until the Germans have completely finished their withdrawal and only then do they advance. It's the Eastern Front equivalent of Sealion proposals which have the Royal Navy just sit around and do nothing while the Germans conduct the entire invasion.

How do the Soviets establish bridgheads all over the place and overload the Germans like IOTL, if in this ATL the defenses are set up and reached in a phased withdrawal before the Soviets break through on the Mius and at Kharkov, outracing the Germans to the Dnieper?

Likely the same way they did OTL: by attacking before the defenses are set up.

The phased withdrawal would be ordered in July per OP, not ordered belatedly in September per OTL.

Yes, and so? The historical scramble of a withdrawal took most of September. A phased withdrawal would take much longer and leave the frontline forces much more exposed in the interim, vulnerable to the imminent Soviet counter-offensive. Hell, at Orel the Soviet counter-offensive is already underway so those forces can carry on pursuing the retreating Germans. Not to mention that it would still have to deal with the problem of having to converge onto just six crossing sights on the eastern bank and then spread back across the western before Soviet forces arrive... and the Soviets will still be right on their heels. There's also the question of if the Germans attempt to hold the bend of the D'niepr river or their historical line which is east of the southern D'niepr. If they try to go the former, then they'll be even more spread out then OTL as the bend creates a giant salient the Germans have to defend which wastes or possibly even outweights the extra strength. If they try to go the latter, then they don't have the supposed benefit of withdrawing behind the D'niepr.

Infantry divisions weren't the ones that seized those bridgeheads, it was the infantry of mobile divisions that did. Infantry divisions would be left behind, meaning it would only be tank armies alone against an establish defensive line initially, so no bridgeheads seized on the march as per OTL.
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Actually, quite a number of rifle divisions did manage to keep pace with the Soviet armor and conduct their own crossings that established bridgeheads on the other side. The crossing at Lyutezh was one such case, as it took place inside of a 70 kilometer stretch of river where no fewer then 4 rifle corps had arrived at roughly the same time as Soviet mechanized forces, but there were others.

Additionally, even where there were just the tank armies, the Soviets have an additional two tank armies to do it with and there were a number of instances where the Soviet tank armies were able to seize a bridgehead on the other side in spite of Germans already being there. Additionally, even with a phased withdrawal the Soviets are liable to attack and breakthrough the German lines before said withdrawal is completed, so you still have the situation where the Soviets arrive at the river before all German forces are established on the western side.

Later of course the Soviets would extend their logistics and be able to to brute force the river line

Which they started doing OTL by the start of October of 1943. Those twenty bridgeheads you keep going on about? By the time the Soviets managed to effect a breakout at the start of November that figure had doubled. Moving the figure backwards, and even going along with the inane idea that the Soviets will sit around and let it happen, if the Germans withdraw back across the river by the start of August, then the Soviets would be in position to start brute forcing it by mid-August. They'll have 20 bridgeheads by mid-September.
 
IIRC the western bank of the Dniepr is higher than the eastern so that would hurt the Soviets as well.

this is my understanding also (as general rule) but cannot find a good topographic map or records of historical flooding (which would give indication of what areas COULD be flooded if levees and/or dams destroyed)

the time to do anything possible to aggravate flooding would be March - April? after Third Battle of Kharkov maybe stalled Soviets?
 

FBKampfer

Banned
I'll stick my oar in the water.

I'd say this goes one of two ways, depending on whether or not Germany decides to adopt a defensive strategy or not.

Assuming at the beginning of 1943, they realize they're going to be in for it, and start planning and building like crazy.

Panther Line needs to be fortified like crazy, even while Manstein is smacking the Soviets around at Kharkov. Trenches dug, entrenchments for tanks dug, barbed wire laid, firing positions scoped out and crossings zeroed. All new formations sent East are stationed along the Panther line, and everyone else digs in at Wotan after the backhand blow.

Use the extra time to reorganize and pull back a lot of the heavy equipment behind the dnepier, with priority on heavy artillery (especially corps and Army level pieces, such as the 170mm K18, 150mm K18 and 39, etc), heavy AA guns, and the Panzer divisions. And then begin withdrawing from the forward defenses to the Dnepier, leaving screening forces as needed.

The last units are of course going to have to make a mad dash for the crossings, but everything else should be in place in good order. If they husband their air assets, and make good use of mobile reserves to deal with any air landings, the Soviets should be bashing their faces into that wall for months.


On the other hand, if it's done ad hoc in response to Soviets breaching primary defenses at Wotan, then odds are it will end up worse than OTL, as the Soviets will be stronger, and the Germans will still lose large quantities of material in their dash to reach Panther line.
 
Assuming at the beginning of 1943, they realize they're going to be in for it, and start planning and building like crazy.

Panther Line needs to be fortified like crazy, even while Manstein is smacking the Soviets around at Kharkov. Trenches dug, entrenchments for tanks dug, barbed wire laid, firing positions scoped out and crossings zeroed. All new formations sent East are stationed along the Panther line, and everyone else digs in at Wotan after the backhand blow.
So. Hitler's gone, right? 'cause I sure don't see him agreeing to that.
 
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