Was German success in the Caucasus possible?

One of the things I've always wondered about Operation Blue (and I'm guessing there have been threads similar to this done before), is what could've happened had the Germans stuck to their primary objective of taking the Caucasus oil fields, instead of allowing themselves to become bogged down in Stalingrad?

I recently watched an episode of a Russian documentary "Soviet Storm" on Youtube, about the Caucasus campaign, in which it stated that Field Marshall List's original intention was to have von Kleist's 1st Panzer Army take an old, Georgian military road through the central Caucasus in a direct route to Maikop, but Hitler vetoed it for an attack through the western passes, with the objective here being the bases of the Black Sea Fleet (not the Oil Fields?); I also know that von Manstein wanted the 11th army to cross the Kerch peninsula in support of Army Group A, instead of being stripped of units and sent to Leningrad. Had 11th army crossed over to Kerch, it could've avoided the mountains and most major soviet units and continued on to the ports, thus allowing von Kleist to take the direct route. Are any of these possibilities feasible, and could they have turned the tide in favour of the Germans?

I also did some reading on Operation Shamil (named after Imam Shamyl, the 19th century Caucasus rebel), whereby the Germans were planning to send in an SS guard regiment, a Cossack regiment, and a unit of Muslim commandoes organized and led by the Brandenburgers, behind Soviet lines to capture important objectives; in the end, only Maikop was captured, and it had been very thoroughly destroyed by the Soviets. I also recently purchased a book called "Hitler Triumphant!: Alternate Histories of WWII", edited by Lt. Col. Peter G. Tsouras, USAR (ret.), consisting of scenarios written by various writers and historians, all of which are ways in which Nazi Germany could've won, or at least survived WWII; one scenario surrounds a much more successful and less bloody Germany capture of Crete, resulting in greater faith being placed in airborne ops. by Hitler, ending in a series of Airborne landings in the Caucasus to capture the oil fields and hold them till 1st Panzer Army arrives. Now, I have my doubts about this scenario, which involves the 7th Flieger, 22nd Luftlande, 5th & 6th Gebirgs and 99th Jager divisionen, as well as the Luftlande sturm regiment being flown in to Maikop, Grozny and Baku in the span of two weeks, and holding till relieved, but on a less grandiose scale, could airborne operations have succeeded in supporting the German drive on the Oil Fields?

There are also other events, such as the destruction of the Terek river dam (after it had been seized by the Brandenburgers) by the soviets, which slowed down the German advance, and the diversion south of the 4th Panzer Army, which exacerbated logistical problems, slowed 1sr Panzer armies' advance and weakened army group B's drive on Stalingrad. Had one or both of these events never taken place, or had been prevented, could the speed of the German advance have been maintained?

Basicly, my question is, wass there anything that could've happened, or that the Germans could have done that could've led to a German success in the Caucasus? More importantly, If the Germans HAD succeeded in the Caucasus, how would they exploit this success? Any feed back or info would be very much appreciated (sorry if my intro is very long:eek:).
 

sharlin

Banned
Thing is you can't leave Stalingrad alone, it would sit right on your flank and be a fine place for troops to mass so attacking it made sense, but not the way it was attacked or the importance placed on it by Hitler and co.

The Germans are still basically at the end of a badly fraying logistics tether and there's mountains in the way before they get to the oil fields, which had been rigged to blow if they were attacked which was something that Stalin made very sure of. the cheif of the Soviet oil industry was told that if one gallon of fuel fell into Nazi hands he and his family would be shot so you can bet that preperations were made.

Also you've got to go a fair bit further south, winters still coming and your supply line is close to complete collapse with tired troops and machines with very good morale.
 
Shapur2

Most of what I've read makes it sound very unlikely. Apart from the opposition there is the simple question of distance. Doubt there would be much capacity to reach the oil-field before the forces trying to do so ran out of supplies.

Also in terms of the oil it would be very difficult to see the Soviets not destroying the oilfields. If the Germans tried any very long ranged airbourne missions then the lightly armed paras are likely to get squashed prior to any relief forces arriving.

Similarly, even if somehow the Germans captured the oilfields intact or managed to hold them long enough to restore any production they would have to ship the oil out, which isn't going to be easy. With the huge eastern front, considerably increased in length by an advance to Baku this is going to be a bloody difficult position to hold.

I think the only way the Germans can get any real victory out of Operation Blue might be the reverse of what you propose, i.e. they forget about Baku and capture Stalingrad, which they might be able to bounce before it was too heavily defended if they put everything into it. Then holding a section of the lower Volga, although as far as the delta would be quite a stretch this seriously disrupts trade along the river, which was important to the Soviets. Also it might disrupt the Soviets getting oil from Baku for their own forces, which is potentially the big gain for them. [By cutting overland routes and being close enough to air interdict shipping on the Caspian].

It still won't win the war for Germany even if they achieved all that and Hitler suddenly had an attack of intelligence and judgement. However it might make things a lot more difficult for the Red Army in the march back westward.

Steve
 
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