Questions for the Eastern Front pros here

burmafrd

Banned
Over the years I have made my specialty the ETO and PTO while not studying the Eastern Front all that much with the exception of Kursk and Stalingrad somewhat, and a little on the Battle in front of Moscow.

So my questions are thus:

1) Would the germans have done better to have fainted as much as possible towards Moscow to make Stalin think they were going after him and the government, then when the Bulk of the reserves are in position make an all out push to grab or at least interdict the oil in the Baku area/Caucasus Mtns?

2) Could the attack have come sooner then June 22? I know about the business with waiting for things to dry but with the Russian army as badly outclassed as it was and with virtual total surprise, would an extra few weeks have made a big difference with how soon that year the Russian winter came? You were going to be confined to roads pretty much as it was and with so much of the mechanized forces in relatively light vehicles compared to later on, and so much horse drawn, was it really that important to wait as long as they did?

3) did Greece and the fun and games in the Balkans really delay the attack?
 
In 1941 moving armies hither and thither isn't going to bring victory, there were far deeper problems.

Some first line divisions for Barabrossa didn't receive their allocation of motorised transport until 10 days before the offensive began. If Barbarossa had started any earlier large numbers of divisions would have had no motorised transport and thus no logistical support.

Barbarossa had somthing like 150 divisions, the Balkans had something like 30. About 10 of the Balkan divs were not allocated to Barbarossa, another 10 arrived in good time, only to have to wait for their trucks, leaving 10 or so unaccounted for. I don't think Barbarossa failed because these 10 divisions weren't at the start line. There was an entire army in reserve for Barbarossa, including 2 panzer and 2 mot inf divs. If the attacking armies needed 10 divs they could have gotten them from this reserve and the 10 divs in the Balkans sent to the reserve army where their late arrival wouldn't matter too much.

How's that?

Source; Hitler's Strategy 1940-1941: the Balkan Clue, Cambridge University Press, 1973
 
No, sorry. Apparently the Soviets had enough oil in storage that if the Caucus oilfields had been taken in mid 1942 they would be able to fight without concern until late 1943. But that's immaterial, Germany lost the eastern front at the very top, Stalin was just more competent than Hitler. Stalin did the work that needed to be done, himself, and didn't pass the buck and avoid the hard things like Hitler did.
 
2) Could the attack have come sooner then June 22? I know about the business with waiting for things to dry but with the Russian army as badly outclassed as it was and with virtual total surprise, would an extra few weeks have made a big difference with how soon that year the Russian winter came? You were going to be confined to roads pretty much as it was and with so much of the mechanized forces in relatively light vehicles compared to later on, and so much horse drawn, was it really that important to wait as long as they did?

3) did Greece and the fun and games in the Balkans really delay the attack?

Both questions have the same answer: not really. The Balkans were certainly a delay but the spring rains and the need to reallocate the luftwaffe were more important.
 
Here's a related question, what would be the best time for a Wehrmacht 'Operation Guillotine' to take down Hitler and his more incompetent cronies? Late 1941, as the panzers are driving for Moscow? 1942, before the Soviet encirclement of Stalingrad? 1943, before Citadel?
 
Actually the real problem with Barbarrossa is simple logistics, if you disband the Red Army in 1941 (keeping the Partisans) Germany would have had serious trouble reaching the Urals or much past the Volga. Simply put Russia was too big, too hostile, and too poor a road network and Germany didn't have GM and Ford churning out trucks.

Germany could control France with 250,000 men because:
a. It was dense populated with a good road network and close to the Reich enabling quick concentration of forces.
b. They simply took over an existing government structure, i.e. the French police force and French state.

Neither applied in Russia making conquest impossible, Germany's only hope was to terrify the Soviets into giving them Brest-Litvosk 2.0
 
Not to mention 40% of France wasn't occupied, the German garrison could also call on non-garrison units on the coast and elsewhere and the remaining French military and the French police/establishment counted as part of the occupation force.

Which means an occupation of even a portion of the USSR is going to require a substantial number of troops.
 
To clarify an earlier point, attacking in April or May of 1941 would probably have ended up making less progress than OTL, due to washed out roads and mud.

One possible POD that I haven't seen examined, that, IMO would materially assist Germany, is if the Winter War never happened, or happened in such a way that the Finns did not lose the strip of land on the Finn/Soviet border? I suppose the war would still have to happen in order for the Finns to consider a "Continuation War", but then again, without losing that territory, would they have had a reason to go to war? Perhaps not. Either way, with Finn forces that much closer to Leningrad, do you think Armeegruppe Nord could have taken Leningrad, thus freeing up hundreds of thousands of men? While that wouldn't change anything in 1941, could that have provided additional success in 1942?

I'm kinda reaching with this one, but as I say, I've never seen it examined in depth.
 

Cook

Banned
There was nothing actually wrong with the planning or timing of Operation Barbarossa. Starting the attack on June 22 was the perfect time.

What lost the battle was turning diverting half of Army Group Centre southwards to assist Army Group South in destroying Soviet forces in Ukraine and halting the other half.

If instead Army Group Centre had driven with all its forces straight to Moscow it would have arrived well before winter and while the defences around Moscow were still unprepared
 
If the transport had been available then Barbarossa could have started earlier, even a couple of weeks would have been beneficial, but without the trucks it's a moot point.
 
There was nothing actually wrong with the planning or timing of Operation Barbarossa. Starting the attack on June 22 was the perfect time.

What lost the battle was turning diverting half of Army Group Centre southwards to assist Army Group South in destroying Soviet forces in Ukraine and halting the other half.

If instead Army Group Centre had driven with all its forces straight to Moscow it would have arrived well before winter and while the defences around Moscow were still unprepared

Except, you know, leaving an intact enemy army in your flank in a theater the size of Russia doesn't work well. If Unthinkable happened, Patton would have made the exact same mistake.
 

CalBear

Moderator
Donor
Monthly Donor
Any early coup attempt in Germany resulted in some sort of civil war.

Which, in the final analysis, might have been far better for the German people than what did happen (this of course really isn't much of a statement since it would difficult for it to be worse than IOTL)
 

burmafrd

Banned
Those figures about oil in storage if I recall were for peacetime requirements which are a whole lot less then wartime. The russian oil fields were not well run and their production was very ineffecient. When the germans got close as they did to the oil I have seen references that the Soviets only had a 3 month full supply of oil on hand to meet the current requirments of full scale battle.
 
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