The Daugava-Volga offensive: the breakthrough in the bear lair
The Daugava-Volga offensive: the breakthrough in the bear lair
In the wake of the successful Operation Barbarossa, the 1st Central Army managed to secure two bridgeheads east of the Daugava river between 27 May and 4 June 1944. The German forces were unable to give support to Afghan forces during the Kabul uprising on June 1, but they did manage to conquer various positions in Eastern Europe. The 1st Southern Front captured an additional large bridgehead at Polack (known as the Polatsk bridgehead in Russian accounts).
Preceding the offensive, the Wehrmacht had built up large amounts of materiel and manpower in the three bridgeheads. The Wehrmacht greatly outnumbered the opposing Nasist Army in infantry, artillery, and armour. All this was known to Russian intelligence. General Ivan Ilyichev, head of Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU), passed his assessment to Viktor Abakumov. Abakumov in turn presented the intelligence results to Joseph Stalin, who refused to believe them, dismissing the apparent German strength as "the greatest imposture since Frederick Barbarossa". Abakumov had proposed to evacuate the divisions of the Ukrainian Front trapped in the Crimea Pocket to the Imperya via the Azov Sea to get the necessary manpower for the defence, but Stalin forbade it. In addition, Stalin commanded that one major operational reserve, the troops of Ivan Chistyakov's 6th Tankovy Army, be moved to Trace to support Operation Bagration.
The offensive was brought forward from 20 November to 12 November because meteorological reports warned of a thaw later in the month, and the tanks needed hard ground for the offensive. It was not done to assist American and Japanese forces during the Battle of the Bulge, as Wilhelm III chose to claim at Warsaw.
Map of Europe at the time of the Daugava campaign, also showing Allies/Central Powers occupation of France, Wallonia, Britain and Ireland.. Light blue (with the exception of Ukraine) are American occupied territories. Austria, Germany and Romania ceded some territories to Ukraine, Belarus and Poland as a compensation and appreciation for their war efforts.
The offensive commenced in the Polatsk bridgehead at 04:35 on 12 November with an intense bombardment by the guns of the 1st Austrian Army against the positions of the 4th Tankovy Army. Concentrated against the divisions of XLVIII Tankovy Corps, which had been deployed across the face of the bridgehead, the bombardment effectively destroyed their capacity to respond; a battalion commander in the 68th Infantry Division stated that "I began the operation with an understrength battalion [...] after the smoke of the German preparation cleared [...] I had only a platoon of combat effective soldiers left".
The initial barrage was followed by probing attacks and a further heavy bombardment at 10:00. By the time the main armored exploitation force of the 3rd and 4th Panzer Armies moved forward four hours later, the Fourth Tankovy Army had already lost up to ⅔ of its artillery and ¼ of its troops.
The German units made rapid progress, moving to cut off the defenders at Molodezhki. The armored reserves of the 4th Tankovy Army's central corps, the XXIV Tankovy Corps, were committed, but had suffered serious damage by the time they reached Molodezhki, and were already being outflanked. The XLVIII Tankovy Corps, on the Fourth Tankovy Army's southern flank, had by this time been completely destroyed, along with much of Nikolai Simoniak XLII Corps in the north. Simoniak himself would be killed by Belarus partisans on 23 November. By 14 November, the 1st Austrian Army had forced and advance in Zabor'e, and began to exploit towards Rasony . The 4th Tankovy Army's last cohesive formation, the XXIV Tankovy Corps held on around Molodezhki until the night of 16 November, before its commander made the decision to withdraw.
Map of Europe after the second Phase of Operation Barbarossa
The 1st German Army Group Centre, to Maloye Sitna north, opened its attack on the Russian 9th Army from the Stayki and Turichino bridgeheads at 08:30, again commencing with a heavy bombardment. The 33rd and 69th Armies broke out of the Turichino bridgehead to a depth of 30 km (19 mi), while the 5th Shock and 8th Armies broke out of the Stayki bridgehead. The 2nd and 1st Panzer Armies were committed after them to exploit the breach. The 69th Army's progress from the Turichino bridgehead was especially successful, with the defending LVI Tankovy Corps disintegrating after its line of retreat was cut off. Though the 9th Army conducted many local counter-attacks, they were all brushed aside; the 69th Army ruptured the last lines of defence and took Novokhovansk, while the 2nd Panzer Army moved on Ivanovo and the 1st Panzer Army was ordered to seize bridgeheads over the Ozero Bol'shoy Ivan and attack towards Krasnyy Poselok . In the meantime, the 47th Army moved towards Smolensk from the north, while the 61st and 1st Polish Armies encircled the city from the south.
The only major Russian response came on 15 November, when Stalin(against the advice of Abakumov ) ordered the 1st Guard Tankovy Army of Mikhail Katukov from the Kostroma Oblast to cover the breach made in the sector of the 4th Tankovy Army, but the advance of Friedrich Paulus's forces forced it to detrain at Netrizovo without even reaching its objective. After covering the 9th Army's retreat, it was forced to withdraw southwest toward Vjaz'ma.
On 17 November, Josef Harpe was given new objectives: to advance towards Novodugino using his mechanised forces, and to use the combined-arms forces of the 60th and 59th Armies. Novodugino was secured undamaged on 19 November after an encirclement by the 59th and 60th Armies, in conjunction with the 4th Panzer Corps, forced the Russian defenders to withdraw hurriedly.
The second stage of the 1st Austrian Army objective was far more complex, as they were required to encircle and secure the entire industrial region of the Central Economic Region (if possible, alongside Moscow), where they were faced by Pavel Kurochkin 17th Army. Harpe ordered that the 59th and 60th Armies advance frontally, while the 21st Army encircled the area from the north. He then ordered József Heszlényi 3rd Panzer Army, moving on Smolensk, to swing norward from 20 November, cutting off 17th Army's withdrawal.
In the meantime, the shattered remnants of the 4th Tankovy Army were still attempting to reach Russian lines. By 18 November, Mikhail Petrovich Petrov and the XXV Tankovy Corps found that their intended route northwards had been blocked, so pulled back to the east, absorbing the remnants of XLII Corps that had escaped encirclement. Much of the remainder of XLII Corps was destroyed after being trapped around the Ugra forest.
On 25 November, Kurochkin requested that he be allowed to withdraw his 100,000 troops from the developing salient around Gagarin. This was refused, and he repeated the request on 26 November. Konev eventually permitted Kurochkin to pull his forces back on the night of 27 November, while Harpe– who had allowed just enough room for the 17th Army to withdraw without putting up serious resistance – secured the area undamaged.
On Harpe northern flank, the 4th Panzer Army had spearheaded an advance where it secured a major bridgehead at Lyul'ki. Troops of the 5th Army established a second bridgehead at Homel.
In the northern sector of the offensive, Paulus 1st Army Group Centre also made rapid progress, as 9th Army was no longer able to offer coherent resistance. Its XXXVI Tankovy Corps, which was positioned behind Kaluga, was pushed into the neighbouring Second Army sector. Kaluga was taken on 17 November, as the Belarus Front's headquarters issued orders for the city to be abandoned. Stalin was furious at the abandonment of the 'fortress', arresting General Kliment Voroshilov, head of the Operations Branch of the Stavka, and sacking both the 9th Army and XXXVI Tankovy Corps commanders; Generals Vasily Chuikov and Vasily Glagolev.
The 2nd Panzer Army pressed forward, while to the south the 8th Army reached Voronezh by 18 November, and took it by 19 November. The 1st Panzer Army moved to encircle Stalingrad by 25 November, and the 8th Army began to fight its way into the city on the following day, though there was protracted and intense fighting in the Siege of Stalingrad before the city would finally be taken.
To the northwest of Paulus's 1st Army Group Centre, the lead elements of Erwin Rommel 2nd Army Group Centre Front taking part in the Petrograd Offensive had reached Kirovsk by 24 November and so succeeded in isolating parts of the Belarusian Front in Petrograd. On November 27, the abandoned Bear's Lair - Stalin former headquarters on the European Front, was captured.
German troops enter Smolensk, led by two Jagdpanther
After encircling Stalingrad, the 1st Panzer Army advanced deep into the fortified region around the Volga River against patchy resistance from a variety of Narodnoe Opolcheniye and Nasist Army units. There was heavier resistance, however, on the approaches to the fortress of Volžskij.
The Russian reorganisation of command structure that resulted in the creation of the Moscow Front was accompanied by the release of a few extra formations for the defense; the V Istrebki Mountain Corps, with two reserve infantry divisions, was deployed along the Volga while the Rifle Division Muscovite was ordered to reinforce it.
On 16 November 1944 Kliment Voroshilov, the Chief of the Operational Branch of the Stavka gave the Belarus Front permission to retreat overruling a direct order from Stalin for them to hold fast. Three days laterVoroshilov was arrested by the NKVD and imprisoned first at Kazan concentration camp and then Magadan concentration camp. The officer was eventually liberated along with other prisoners by the US Army in December 1945.
The military historian Earl Ziemke described the advance thus: "On the 25th, Paulus's main force passed Stalingrad heading due east towards Rjazan. The path of the Germans advance looked like the work of a gigantic snowplough, its point aimed on a line from Belarus to Kaluga, to Moskov. All of the Belarus Front was being caught up by the point and the left blade and thrown across the Volga. On the right the Russians had nothing except a skeleton army group that Stalin had created some days earlier and named Moscow Front."
On 25 November, Stalin renamed three army groups. The Ukraine Front became the Crimea Front; the Belarus Front became the Moscow Front and the Ukrainian Front became the Volga Front
The 2nd Panzer and 5th Shock Armies reached the Volga almost unopposed; a unit of the 5th Shock Army crossed the river ice and took the town of Prishib as early as 31 November.
OKH declared the operation complete on 2 December. Paulus had initially hoped to advance directly on Moscow, as the Russian defences had largely collapsed. However the exposed northern flank of 1st Army Group Centre, along with a Russian counter-attack (Operation Saturn) against its spearheads, convinced the German command that it was essential to clear Russian forces before the Moscow offensive could proceed.
The Daugava-Volga Offensive was a major success for the German military. Within a matter of days the forces involved had advanced hundreds of kilometers, pushing the Russians back to the pre-war border and beyond. The offensive broke the back of the Belarus Front, and much of Russia remaining capacity for military resistance. However, the stubborn resistance of Russian forces in Central Russia, as well as continuing fighting in Petrograd, meant that the final offensive towards Moscow was delayed.
On 31 November the German offensive was voluntarily halted, though Moscow was undefended and only approximately 70 km (43 mi) away from the Russian bridgehead . After the war a debate raged, mainly between Paulus andRommel. whenever the city should had been taken. Rommel argued Moscow should have been taken then, while R ommel defended the decision to stop.
I hope you guys like this new update! Be sure to like(if you like it), comment(please comment so I can learn what your opinion is) and.....follow I guess.
In the wake of the successful Operation Barbarossa, the 1st Central Army managed to secure two bridgeheads east of the Daugava river between 27 May and 4 June 1944. The German forces were unable to give support to Afghan forces during the Kabul uprising on June 1, but they did manage to conquer various positions in Eastern Europe. The 1st Southern Front captured an additional large bridgehead at Polack (known as the Polatsk bridgehead in Russian accounts).
Preceding the offensive, the Wehrmacht had built up large amounts of materiel and manpower in the three bridgeheads. The Wehrmacht greatly outnumbered the opposing Nasist Army in infantry, artillery, and armour. All this was known to Russian intelligence. General Ivan Ilyichev, head of Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU), passed his assessment to Viktor Abakumov. Abakumov in turn presented the intelligence results to Joseph Stalin, who refused to believe them, dismissing the apparent German strength as "the greatest imposture since Frederick Barbarossa". Abakumov had proposed to evacuate the divisions of the Ukrainian Front trapped in the Crimea Pocket to the Imperya via the Azov Sea to get the necessary manpower for the defence, but Stalin forbade it. In addition, Stalin commanded that one major operational reserve, the troops of Ivan Chistyakov's 6th Tankovy Army, be moved to Trace to support Operation Bagration.
The offensive was brought forward from 20 November to 12 November because meteorological reports warned of a thaw later in the month, and the tanks needed hard ground for the offensive. It was not done to assist American and Japanese forces during the Battle of the Bulge, as Wilhelm III chose to claim at Warsaw.
Map of Europe at the time of the Daugava campaign, also showing Allies/Central Powers occupation of France, Wallonia, Britain and Ireland.. Light blue (with the exception of Ukraine) are American occupied territories. Austria, Germany and Romania ceded some territories to Ukraine, Belarus and Poland as a compensation and appreciation for their war efforts.
The offensive commenced in the Polatsk bridgehead at 04:35 on 12 November with an intense bombardment by the guns of the 1st Austrian Army against the positions of the 4th Tankovy Army. Concentrated against the divisions of XLVIII Tankovy Corps, which had been deployed across the face of the bridgehead, the bombardment effectively destroyed their capacity to respond; a battalion commander in the 68th Infantry Division stated that "I began the operation with an understrength battalion [...] after the smoke of the German preparation cleared [...] I had only a platoon of combat effective soldiers left".
The initial barrage was followed by probing attacks and a further heavy bombardment at 10:00. By the time the main armored exploitation force of the 3rd and 4th Panzer Armies moved forward four hours later, the Fourth Tankovy Army had already lost up to ⅔ of its artillery and ¼ of its troops.
The German units made rapid progress, moving to cut off the defenders at Molodezhki. The armored reserves of the 4th Tankovy Army's central corps, the XXIV Tankovy Corps, were committed, but had suffered serious damage by the time they reached Molodezhki, and were already being outflanked. The XLVIII Tankovy Corps, on the Fourth Tankovy Army's southern flank, had by this time been completely destroyed, along with much of Nikolai Simoniak XLII Corps in the north. Simoniak himself would be killed by Belarus partisans on 23 November. By 14 November, the 1st Austrian Army had forced and advance in Zabor'e, and began to exploit towards Rasony . The 4th Tankovy Army's last cohesive formation, the XXIV Tankovy Corps held on around Molodezhki until the night of 16 November, before its commander made the decision to withdraw.
Map of Europe after the second Phase of Operation Barbarossa
The 1st German Army Group Centre, to Maloye Sitna north, opened its attack on the Russian 9th Army from the Stayki and Turichino bridgeheads at 08:30, again commencing with a heavy bombardment. The 33rd and 69th Armies broke out of the Turichino bridgehead to a depth of 30 km (19 mi), while the 5th Shock and 8th Armies broke out of the Stayki bridgehead. The 2nd and 1st Panzer Armies were committed after them to exploit the breach. The 69th Army's progress from the Turichino bridgehead was especially successful, with the defending LVI Tankovy Corps disintegrating after its line of retreat was cut off. Though the 9th Army conducted many local counter-attacks, they were all brushed aside; the 69th Army ruptured the last lines of defence and took Novokhovansk, while the 2nd Panzer Army moved on Ivanovo and the 1st Panzer Army was ordered to seize bridgeheads over the Ozero Bol'shoy Ivan and attack towards Krasnyy Poselok . In the meantime, the 47th Army moved towards Smolensk from the north, while the 61st and 1st Polish Armies encircled the city from the south.
The only major Russian response came on 15 November, when Stalin(against the advice of Abakumov ) ordered the 1st Guard Tankovy Army of Mikhail Katukov from the Kostroma Oblast to cover the breach made in the sector of the 4th Tankovy Army, but the advance of Friedrich Paulus's forces forced it to detrain at Netrizovo without even reaching its objective. After covering the 9th Army's retreat, it was forced to withdraw southwest toward Vjaz'ma.
On 17 November, Josef Harpe was given new objectives: to advance towards Novodugino using his mechanised forces, and to use the combined-arms forces of the 60th and 59th Armies. Novodugino was secured undamaged on 19 November after an encirclement by the 59th and 60th Armies, in conjunction with the 4th Panzer Corps, forced the Russian defenders to withdraw hurriedly.
The second stage of the 1st Austrian Army objective was far more complex, as they were required to encircle and secure the entire industrial region of the Central Economic Region (if possible, alongside Moscow), where they were faced by Pavel Kurochkin 17th Army. Harpe ordered that the 59th and 60th Armies advance frontally, while the 21st Army encircled the area from the north. He then ordered József Heszlényi 3rd Panzer Army, moving on Smolensk, to swing norward from 20 November, cutting off 17th Army's withdrawal.
In the meantime, the shattered remnants of the 4th Tankovy Army were still attempting to reach Russian lines. By 18 November, Mikhail Petrovich Petrov and the XXV Tankovy Corps found that their intended route northwards had been blocked, so pulled back to the east, absorbing the remnants of XLII Corps that had escaped encirclement. Much of the remainder of XLII Corps was destroyed after being trapped around the Ugra forest.
On 25 November, Kurochkin requested that he be allowed to withdraw his 100,000 troops from the developing salient around Gagarin. This was refused, and he repeated the request on 26 November. Konev eventually permitted Kurochkin to pull his forces back on the night of 27 November, while Harpe– who had allowed just enough room for the 17th Army to withdraw without putting up serious resistance – secured the area undamaged.
On Harpe northern flank, the 4th Panzer Army had spearheaded an advance where it secured a major bridgehead at Lyul'ki. Troops of the 5th Army established a second bridgehead at Homel.
In the northern sector of the offensive, Paulus 1st Army Group Centre also made rapid progress, as 9th Army was no longer able to offer coherent resistance. Its XXXVI Tankovy Corps, which was positioned behind Kaluga, was pushed into the neighbouring Second Army sector. Kaluga was taken on 17 November, as the Belarus Front's headquarters issued orders for the city to be abandoned. Stalin was furious at the abandonment of the 'fortress', arresting General Kliment Voroshilov, head of the Operations Branch of the Stavka, and sacking both the 9th Army and XXXVI Tankovy Corps commanders; Generals Vasily Chuikov and Vasily Glagolev.
The 2nd Panzer Army pressed forward, while to the south the 8th Army reached Voronezh by 18 November, and took it by 19 November. The 1st Panzer Army moved to encircle Stalingrad by 25 November, and the 8th Army began to fight its way into the city on the following day, though there was protracted and intense fighting in the Siege of Stalingrad before the city would finally be taken.
To the northwest of Paulus's 1st Army Group Centre, the lead elements of Erwin Rommel 2nd Army Group Centre Front taking part in the Petrograd Offensive had reached Kirovsk by 24 November and so succeeded in isolating parts of the Belarusian Front in Petrograd. On November 27, the abandoned Bear's Lair - Stalin former headquarters on the European Front, was captured.
German troops enter Smolensk, led by two Jagdpanther
After encircling Stalingrad, the 1st Panzer Army advanced deep into the fortified region around the Volga River against patchy resistance from a variety of Narodnoe Opolcheniye and Nasist Army units. There was heavier resistance, however, on the approaches to the fortress of Volžskij.
The Russian reorganisation of command structure that resulted in the creation of the Moscow Front was accompanied by the release of a few extra formations for the defense; the V Istrebki Mountain Corps, with two reserve infantry divisions, was deployed along the Volga while the Rifle Division Muscovite was ordered to reinforce it.
On 16 November 1944 Kliment Voroshilov, the Chief of the Operational Branch of the Stavka gave the Belarus Front permission to retreat overruling a direct order from Stalin for them to hold fast. Three days laterVoroshilov was arrested by the NKVD and imprisoned first at Kazan concentration camp and then Magadan concentration camp. The officer was eventually liberated along with other prisoners by the US Army in December 1945.
The military historian Earl Ziemke described the advance thus: "On the 25th, Paulus's main force passed Stalingrad heading due east towards Rjazan. The path of the Germans advance looked like the work of a gigantic snowplough, its point aimed on a line from Belarus to Kaluga, to Moskov. All of the Belarus Front was being caught up by the point and the left blade and thrown across the Volga. On the right the Russians had nothing except a skeleton army group that Stalin had created some days earlier and named Moscow Front."
On 25 November, Stalin renamed three army groups. The Ukraine Front became the Crimea Front; the Belarus Front became the Moscow Front and the Ukrainian Front became the Volga Front
The 2nd Panzer and 5th Shock Armies reached the Volga almost unopposed; a unit of the 5th Shock Army crossed the river ice and took the town of Prishib as early as 31 November.
OKH declared the operation complete on 2 December. Paulus had initially hoped to advance directly on Moscow, as the Russian defences had largely collapsed. However the exposed northern flank of 1st Army Group Centre, along with a Russian counter-attack (Operation Saturn) against its spearheads, convinced the German command that it was essential to clear Russian forces before the Moscow offensive could proceed.
The Daugava-Volga Offensive was a major success for the German military. Within a matter of days the forces involved had advanced hundreds of kilometers, pushing the Russians back to the pre-war border and beyond. The offensive broke the back of the Belarus Front, and much of Russia remaining capacity for military resistance. However, the stubborn resistance of Russian forces in Central Russia, as well as continuing fighting in Petrograd, meant that the final offensive towards Moscow was delayed.
On 31 November the German offensive was voluntarily halted, though Moscow was undefended and only approximately 70 km (43 mi) away from the Russian bridgehead . After the war a debate raged, mainly between Paulus andRommel. whenever the city should had been taken. Rommel argued Moscow should have been taken then, while R ommel defended the decision to stop.
I hope you guys like this new update! Be sure to like(if you like it), comment(please comment so I can learn what your opinion is) and.....follow I guess.