Ostkrieg

by Stephen G. Fritz

  With time short, and facing the imminent transfer on 18 November of part of Luftflotte 2 to the Mediterranean, Army Group Center hastened preparations to resume the offensive. As it was considered virtually impossible to envelop Moscow, the plan now called for the Ninth Army and the Third Panzergruppe in the north to advance to the Volga reservoir and the Moscow-Volga Canal, then turn south toward the capital. In the center, the Fourth Panzergruppe and elements of the left wing of the Fourth Army would strike toward the northwest suburbs of Moscow, although Kluge opposed the idea of attacking with his right wing. To the south, the Second Panzer Army was to swing north through Tula and Kolomna. The pitifully weak Second Army was to protect the southern flank of the army group while also thrusting to the Don and capturing Voronezh, even though it could expect no help from the Sixth Army of Army Group South. Even this limited attack, which Bock dismissed as “no great strategic masterpiece,” had little chance of success since the mobile forces on the wings were too weak to meet at Moscow and the troops to be used in the frontal assault were no longer considered capable of attack. Moreover, to succeed, the operation would have to be launched simultaneously in every sector to prevent the Russians from shifting forces to imperiled areas. The Fourth Army’s inability to attack with most of its units, however, meant that it would be incapable of tying down enemy troops. Moreover, the attacking units faced crippling shortages of men and materiel, with infantry companies down to fifty to sixty men. Since the start of Operation Typhoon, Army Group Center had suffered 87,000 casualties, which brought its total to nearly 317,000 men, or almost half of all the casualties in the Ostheer to date. Despite this, the army group had received no replacements since the beginning of October and had been forced to transfer four divisions. In literally throwing his last battalion into the battle in hopes of tipping the balance, Bock had to remind his commanders at the outset that they were on their own since the army group had only a single division in reserve.85

  Serious logistic problems that went from bad to worse compounded the critical manpower shortage. Trucks moving supplies from the railheads had long since gotten stuck to their axles in the deep mud. When the weather froze in mid-November, the trucks were hauled out, but many suffered severe damage in the process: the Fourth Army had been reduced to barely a tenth of its original complement of trucks, while 50 percent of Army Group Center’s truck fleet was out of action. Even those vehicles that remained were frequently immobilized by a lack of anti-freeze. “What stupidity is this,” exclaimed one soldier, “starting an attack with units whose trucks will not move?” Resupply by rail, now vital to sustain any further advance, continued to deteriorate as well in the freezing conditions. As the temperatures plummeted, some 70–80 percent of German steam locomotives, whose water pipes, unlike those of Russian engines, were outside their boilers, froze and burst, contributing to a supply crisis that reached epic proportions. Only five fuel trains reached the Ninth Army between 23 October and 23 November, but this dwarfed the number arriving at the Second Army, which received only one fuel train and virtually no supply trains from the end of October. Often, the contents of even those trains that did arrive could not be distributed since many trucks lacked fuel. Little wonder, then, that, when the chief of staff of the Second Panzer Army saw that it had been assigned the task of seizing Gorky, some three hundred miles east of Moscow, he burst out in frustration, “This is not May again and we are not fighting in France.” He succeeded in altering the immediate objective to Venev, just thirty miles beyond Tula, but doubted that even that could be reached. In a moment of rare strategic reality, even Halder admitted privately, “The time for spectacular operational feats is past. . . . The only course lies in purposeful exploitation of tactical opportunities.”86

  The Wehrmacht had also sacrificed the element of surprise since Moscow was the only objective left of any merit. Once Typhoon had come to a standstill in late October, the Soviets had busied themselves with extensive reinforcements to their field positions, constructing defenses in depth, laying a sizable number of mines, creating hundreds of kilometers of antitank ditches, and preparing bunkers, strongpoints, dugouts, and artillery positions. Workers’ battalions, the civilian population of Moscow, and even the fighting troops toiled away at the defenses around the city, all designed to delay a German attack by forcing it to continue breaking through new positions until, ultimately, it exhausted itself. The hilly and wooded terrain also aided the defenders, as did the proximity of the Moscow supply base and the extensive system of intact railways, which allowed rapid delivery of troops and supplies to any sector of the front. Additionally, while German air support had noticeably slackened, the Red Army benefited from the large number of well-placed airfields around the city. A steady stream of reinforcements also arrived during November, divisions from Siberia, Central Asia, and the Far East as well as hastily raised and trained units. On top of this, the Soviet command hustled wounded soldiers back to the front in order to reemploy battle-experienced men. While German numbers were seriously depleted, therefore, the Stavka now managed to array eighty-four divisions and twenty brigades against the seventy-three divisions left to Army Group Center. The Soviets had made it clear that they intended to fight for Moscow. “Russia is big,” went Zhukov’s exhortation to the defenders, “but there is no room to retreat. Moscow is behind us.”87

  When the Ninth Army opened the final phase of Operation Typhoon on 15 November, followed the next day by attacks by the Third Panzergruppe and elements of the Fourth Panzergruppe to the north of Moscow, progress was surprisingly good. Despite tough initial resistance, the Germans had by the eighteenth broken though Soviet lines south of the Volga reservoir and moved on Klin. Almost by chance they had struck at a vulnerable spot in the Russian defenses created by Stalin’s insistence on the thirteenth that Zhukov launch a series of spoiling attacks. The Soviet forces had sustained heavy casualties, which contributed to a weakness in the Soviet defenses that the Third Panzergruppe now exploited. Although, for a time, it appeared that Zhukov’s entire right flank might collapse, the Russian attacks had not been entirely a failure since they had convinced Kluge, commanding the Fourth Army, to halt his attack and go over to the defensive, thus creating a pocket in the center between the two enveloping panzer prongs. To the south, the Second Panzer Army, with only 150 tanks remaining of the 400 it had in September, on the eighteenth pushed around Tula, where it had been tied down for weeks, in the direction of Kolomna. Guderian’s forces broke through Soviet defenses in the face of stout resistance, but the failure of the Fourth Army to advance caused a salient to form based on Tula that immediately threatened the inner flank of the Second Panzer Army’s left wing. Since the Second Army, on the army group’s southern flank, was heading east toward Kursk and Voronezh, it could offer little support to Guderian. Despite these early gains, a shortage of fuel that halted operations in some areas as early as the eighteenth meant that the German attack increasingly resembled a feeble thumb and finger unlikely ever to meet at Moscow.88

  By now, the sputtering offensive had assumed a distinctly surreal quality since it was apparent to commanders at the front, if not to the OKH, that they lacked strength to go on—and in persisting only put their troops, and perhaps the entire Ostheer, at risk. Seemingly in his own fantasy world where wishful thinking clouded hard realism, Halder dismissed reports about the poor condition of the troops, writing on the twenty-first, “It is true, they did have to fight hard and a very long way; and still they have come through victoriously. . . . So we may hope that they will be able to fight on, even against the repeatedly reinforced enemy until a favorable closing line is reached.” This last task, however, was clearly beyond their abilities. By the twentieth, the German offensive in the south had largely run its course. That day, Guderian informed the army group that his attack northeastward would have to be suspended because of the serious threat to his flank, continuing fuel shortages, heavy casualties, and the exhaustion of his troops. The next day, Bock noted gloomi
ly, “Many second lieutenants are leading battalions, one first lieutenant leads a regiment, regimental combat strengths of 250 men, also the cold and inadequate shelter . . . , the overexertion of units. . . . It is doubtful if we can go any further.” Nonetheless, Bock urged Guderian on; his forces did make further gains over the next two days, but on the twenty-third he met with Bock to impress on him the reality of the situation. His troops could seize a few more objectives, Guderian stressed, but none would have any decisive impact, while his army, bled to death, would be left “hanging in the air” with open flanks on both sides. Bock, sobered by this pessimistic assessment from the usually optimistic Guderian, now realized the full gravity of the situation: “the eleventh hour” was approaching, and troop strength had been reduced to such a degree that his troops would be unlikely to mount any resistance in case of Soviet attack.89

  The consequences of the massively costly victories were all too apparent at the front, where the symbols that the OKH pushed around on a map had little relation to the actual combat value of individual units. Without significant resupply, the provision of winter clothing and equipment, and meaningful reinforcements, the fighting power of most German divisions had been reduced to little more than raiding parties. Nor could the dispatch of specialized troops to the front remedy the situation since most had not been trained for infantry combat. As one general admitted, “We wound up with valuable tank crews fighting . . . in the snow as infantrymen—and being totally wasted.” As these men discovered, living in foxholes and fighting in ice and snow were not comparable to life in a tank; some 70 percent of losses were from frostbite. Employment of Luftwaffe crews and maintenance personnel at the front also proved catastrophic: not only were they ineffective in combat, but they were also then lost for the tasks for which they had been trained. Moreover, with the high rate of losses suffered by officers, the very structure of the Wehrmacht was disintegrating. In the absence of experienced veterans, both morale and operational effectiveness declined as German tactical expertise could no longer compensate for inferior numbers or tanks. In the icy cold and snow that reduced German mobility, a sense of vulnerability began to take hold as Landsers realized that their only effective defense against the T-34, the fearsome eighty-eight-millimeter antiaircraft gun, was often too cumbersome to bring into action in the Russian winter. As temperatures plunged, machine guns, rifles, artillery, and vehicles froze, further contributing to a sense of helplessness, especially as spare parts were lacking to make them operable.90

  Nor could men keep warm since winter clothing failed to arrive; on average, only one man in five had a greatcoat. The bottlenecks in the German transportation system meant that trains loaded with winter gear had to be shunted aside in favor of higher-priority ammunition and fuel trains. To make do, German soldiers looted Russian homes of coats, boots, blankets, white sheets—anything that would provide protection from the numbing cold. Simply struggling through the deep snow burned considerable energy that could not be made good by the inadequate rations reaching the front. Daily life was a constant struggle. “Bread had to be chopped with hatchets,” noted one soldier, “gasoline froze . . . , and the skin from hands remained frozen to rifles. The wounded froze to death within minutes.” Infantry companies down to thirty men found it taxing to post sentries since men had to be relieved every thirty minutes or so in the biting cold, making it nearly impossible to get any rest. “Our people are kaputt,” admitted Wilhelm Prüller. “One hour outside, one hour in the hut, watch, alarm sentry duty, listening duty, observer duty, occupy the MG [machine gun] posts. . . . For weeks and weeks one hour of sleep, then one hour of duty.” Even going to the toilet was a chore, as one Landser remembered: “You try coming out and dropping your trousers when it’s 40° below zero!” Behind this sardonic comment was a troubling reality, however, as frostbite claimed many men suffering from dysentery. Drugged by the cold, poorly nourished, numbed by fatigue, Landsers succumbed to lethargy as morale plummeted. “Our best strength was murdered here on these snow fields,” Harald Henry wrote bitterly in early December while lying in front of Moscow, then added, “A tremendously deep hatred, a resounding ‘No’ collected in our breasts.” Another Landser conceded that many a man, “when it came to the decisive moment, opted not to stick his head out as far as he might have done otherwise.” Brutalized, demoralized, and overwhelmed by the savage winter conditions, Landsers had reached the limits of their endurance. “We are all so tired of Russia,” lamented Klaus Hansmann, “tired of the war.”91

  Hitler, too, was noticeably uneasy about the offensive, remarking to Halder on 19 November that he expected a negotiated peace since “the two belligerents cannot annihilate each other.” On the twenty-fourth, General Fromm, the head of the Replacement Army and chief of Military Armaments, warned that the “catastrophic worsening” of the situation in the armaments economy made an imminent peace a “necessity.” The next day, according to his adjutant, Major Gerhard Engel, Hitler expressed great concern about the Russian winter, fearing, “We started too late.” Time, he mused, was “his greatest nightmare.” Two days later, on the twenty-seventh, Quartermaster-General Wagner told Hitler, “We are at the end of our personnel and material strength.” As if sobered by this, Hitler let slip that same day a revealing remark to the Danish foreign minister: “If the German people are no longer strong enough and ready to sacrifice their own blood for their existence, they should perish.” Two days later, Hitler received yet another jolt of bad news, this time from one of his most trusted and able advisers, the ardent Nazi and minister for armaments and munitions Fritz Todt. Along with Walter Rohland, the head of the tank production program, Todt met with Hitler on the twenty-ninth and painted a disturbing picture of supply problems, materiel deficiencies on the eastern front, and the superiority of Soviet tank production, then observed: “This war can no longer be won by military means.” Hitler listened without interruption, then asked calmly, “How, then, should I end this war?” Todt replied that it could be concluded only politically, a path already pondered by Hitler in August, to which the Führer responded simply, “I can scarcely see a way of coming politically to an end.” Although that same day, in separate discussions with Goebbels and Ciano, the Italian foreign minister, he projected an optimistic facade, Hitler surely realized that his plans for Russia could no longer be realized.92 With no clear way out of his dilemma, however, he had little recourse but to pursue some sort of military solution, even if it would not result in the complete triumph he had originally expected.

  As a result, the Führer did not intervene when both Brauchitsch and Halder insisted that the Second Panzer Army keep attacking to inflict as much damage as possible on the enemy, despite the obvious fact that the Germans, too, would suffer heavy casualties for which they had no replacements. Halder conceded in a meeting on the twenty-third that the means for continuing the war were limited, that Germany would never again have an army like it had in June 1941, and that the main effort had now shifted to sustaining morale and holding out economically. Amazingly blind to reality, however, he still hoped to reach the Caucasus oil fields by the end of the year as well as sustain pressure on the enemy everywhere else on the vast front line. Moreover, his injunction to accomplish this without proper winter quarters or supplies, all the while maintaining “frugality in the employment of our forces and arms and ammunition,” must have seemed a mockery to front officers, as did his assurance that Soviet forces were cracking under the German attack. “We are in a situation like the battle of the Marne,” he claimed, once more invoking the historic memories that had such deep significance for German leaders. Despite Halder’s exhortations, the gap between rhetoric and reality was now unbridgeable. Guderian had to halt his advance toward Kolomna on the twenty-fifth because of fierce enemy counterattacks, while the attempt to seize the key city of Tula failed. By 5 December, with temperatures plummeting to –30° F, virtually no fuel, vehicles and weapons inoperable in the bitter cold, and fewer than forty tanks in the entir
e army, Guderian suspended the offensive. It was, he emphasized to the army group, more important to preserve his remaining fighting strength than to continue the attempt to seize Tula.93

  To the north, Landsers struggled forward, not so much out of belief that Soviet forces were near collapse as out of the hope that the capture of Moscow would bring some respite. For the troops, the campaign had become a search for shelter, a fight for self-preservation. Panzer thrusts were little more than probing raids, and the offensive as a whole had degenerated into a series of confused, hotly contested engagements conducted with pitiless ferocity. As they inched nearer to Moscow, German troops were stunned to find, if anything, that Russian resistance grew more fanatic. By 27 November, the Third Panzergruppe had taken Klin, while spearheads of the Fourth Panzergruppe had pushed to within twenty miles of the Kremlin, but, in the absence of an attack in the center by the Fourth Army to prevent the Soviets transferring troops to the wings, they stood little chance of reaching the city. In the early morning hours of the twenty-eighth, a battle group of the Seventh Panzer Division of the Third Panzergruppe seized an intact bridge spanning the Moscow-Volga Canal at Yakhroma, a mere eighteen miles to the north of the capital, an action that raised German hopes and Soviet fears that the entire Soviet northwestern front might collapse. The Germans, however, lacked fuel to rush troops to the bridgehead, while the Soviets immediately dispatched units of the First Shock Army, which had assembled in secret behind the front, to the threatened area. Under pressure from fierce Soviet counterattacks, “Kampfgruppe Manteuffel” had to abandon the bridgehead after midnight on the twenty-ninth, an action that shattered the belief, which had sustained the German forces, that the capture of Moscow was imminent.94