Paulus breaks out

jeffking

Banned
WHat if Hitler wasn't a completely insane kleptomaniac and had allowed Paulus to break 6th Army out of the trap at Stalingrad and been able to link up with Manstein's Army Group B with the sole objective of taking the Causasian oil fields? Could the Nazis still win the war at that point?
 
WHat if Hitler wasn't a completely insane kleptomaniac and had allowed Paulus to break 6th Army out of the trap at Stalingrad and been able to link up with Manstein's Army Group B with the sole objective of taking the Causasian oil fields? Could the Nazis still win the war at that point?

The Nazis lost the war the minute they crossed the Soviet border.

If Paulus breaks out then it depends on when he does it. There were German forces retreating from the Caucasus and if he did escape he would probably have to leave most of 6th army equipment and he would still lose a hell of a lot of men. Hitler was not entirely stupid when he ordered Paulus to stay. Callous yes but stupid no.
 
WHat if Hitler wasn't a completely insane kleptomaniac and had allowed Paulus to break 6th Army out of the trap at Stalingrad and been able to link up with Manstein's Army Group B with the sole objective of taking the Causasian oil fields? Could the Nazis still win the war at that point?


Manstein didn't command Army Group B; he commanded Army Group Don; B was still commanded by Weichs.

Without other POD's Paulus' only chance to breakout was immediately once the Soviets linked up at Kalach. He could have massed his forces (in conjunction with relieving attacks from the north and south that would have had to be arranged) to overwhelm the relatively small number of Soviet units on his southwestern supply lines; once his troops retake Kotelnikovo and his supply lines are reopened, he can conduct a slower and more orderly retreat back to the Don, carefully screening army group a's withdrawal

Otherwise, not happening without other POD's
 
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