History of the Second World War (28 page)

The German offensive had its centre of gravity on the left centre. Here Bock was entrusted with the leading role for which he had been originally cast in the invasion of the West, only to see it transferred from his army group to Rundstedt’s. For his decisive mission he was given the larger part of the armoured forces, two panzer groups under Guderian and Hoth, while the other army groups had one apiece. Bock also had the 4th and 9th Armies, each of three infantry corps.

The panzer groups (later redesignated panzer armies) each comprised four to five panzer divisions, and three motorised divisions.

While all the German leaders agreed that the issue would turn on the use of these panzer groups, a conflict of opinion arose as to the best way of using them. This ‘battle of theories’ was of far-reaching importance. Some senior commanders wanted to destroy the Russian armies in a decisive battle of the classic encirclement pattern, to be brought off as soon as possible after crossing the frontier. In framing such a plan they adhered to the orthodox theory of strategy that had been formulated by Clausewitz, established by Moltke, and developed by Schlieffen. They favoured it all the more strongly because of their anxiety over the risk of pushing far into Russia before the main Russian armies were beaten. To ensure the success of the plan they insisted that the panzer groups must co-operate with the infantry corps in the battle by wheeling inwards from either flank, as pincers, and closing round the rear of the enemy forces to complete the ring.

The tank experts, headed by Guderian, had a different idea. They wanted the panzer groups to drive as deep as they could as fast as they could — following the course that had proved so decisive in France. Guderian argued that his group and Hoth’s should lose no time in exploiting their cut-through in the direction of Moscow, and at the least reach the Dnieper before wheeling in. The sooner they gained that line the more likely that the Russians’ resistance would be dislocated as that of the French had been, and the more chance that the Dnieper might serve the same anvil purpose that the English Channel had fulfilled in 1940. In Guderian’s view, the encirclement of the Russian forces in the space between the two panzer thrusts should be left to the infantry corps, helped by relatively small detachments which the panzer groups might switch inward as they raced onward.

The ‘battle of theories’ was decided in favour of orthodoxy — by the decision of Hitler. For all his boldness he was not bold enough to stake his fortunes on the card to which he owed his previous coups. His compromise with conservatism turned out more adversely than in 1940. Although the tank experts themselves were given a higher place than in 1940, they were refused the chance of fulfilling it in the way they considered best. Hitler’s decision was influenced not only by his doubts of their way but by his vivid imagination — his mind was filled by a vision of rounding up the bulk of the Red Army in one gigantic ring.

That vision became a will-o’-the-wisp, luring him deeper and deeper into Russia. For the first two attempts did not succeed. The third brought a bigger bag of prisoners, but carried him beyond the Dnieper. At the fourth attempt over half a million Russians were trapped, but winter weather intervened to check the Germans’ exploitation of the yawning gap in the front. Each of the staged battles had consumed time in the process of opening and closing the pincers, with the result that the strategical object was missed in trying to complete the tactical design.

Whether Guderian’s method would have proved more successful remains an open question. But it was supported even at the time by some of the ablest members of the German General Staff who did not belong to the tank school of thought, and in retrospect their judgement was still more definitely in its favour. While recognising the difficulties of reinforcement and supply to such a deep-thrusting advance they felt that these could have been overcome by making full use of the available air transport and by stripping the panzer forces of impedimenta — pushing forward their fighting elements, and concentrating on the maintenance of these, while leaving the accessory motorised columns to follow on. But that idea of moving light in Sherman style was too contrary to the convention of European warfare to gain general acceptance at this stage.

The ‘battle of theories’ having been settled in favour of orthodox strategy, the plan was designed to produce a vast encirclement that should net, and ensure the annihilation of, the main Russian forces before the Dnieper was reached. To increase the chances, the plan for Bock’s front embraced a short-range encircling manoeuvre by the infantry corps of the 4th and 9th Armies and a longer-range manoeuvre outside it by the panzer groups, which were to drive deeper than the former before wheeling inwards. That telescopic pattern went some way, though not far enough, to meet the views of Guderian, Bock and Hoth.

The axis of the advance was along the great motor-road to Minsk, and Moscow. This tan through the sector of the 4th Army, under Kluge, to which Guderian’s panzer group was attached. The entry was barred by the fortress of Brest-Litovsk, which itself was covered by the River Bug. Thus the initial problem was to secure a bridgehead over the river and clear away the fortress obstacle, so that the subsequent advance could gain momentum from the use of the motor-road.

In weighing the problem, the question arose whether the panzer divisions should wait until the infantry divisions had made a gap, or whether they should co-operate in the breakthrough, alongside the infantry divisions. The second course was adopted, to help in saving time. While infantry divisions were used to capture the fortress, they were flanked by a couple of panzer divisions on either side. After forcing the passage of the Bug, these swept round Brest-Litovsk and converged on the stretch of the motor-road beyond it. As another aid to celerity all the forces engaged in the breakthrough were temporarily placed under Guderian’s executive control. And when the breakthrough was achieved the panzer group sped forward independently — like a shell from a gun.

Through the wideness of the front and their by-passing tactics, as well as the suddenness of the attack, Bock’s armies made a deep penetration at many points. On the second day the armoured forces on his right wing reached Kobryn, forty miles beyond Brest-Litovsk, while his left wing captured the fortress and rail-centre of Grodno. The Russian salient in northern Poland — the Bialystok salient — was visibly changing its shape and being pinched into a wasp-waist. The pinch became more severe in the following days as the wings converged on Baranovichi threatening to cut off all the Russian forces in the forward zone. The progress of the manoeuvre was helped by the ineffectiveness of the Russians’ numerically strong tank forces.

But the Germans’ progress was retarded by the extremely tough resistance of the Russians. The Germans usually out-manoeuvred their opponents but they could not outfight them. Surrounded forces were sometimes compelled to surrender, but this often came only at the end of prolonged resistance — and their stubbornly slow reaction to a strategically hopeless situation and the delay put a serious brake on the attacker’s plans. It counted all the more in a country where communications were sparse.

The effect was first seen in the opening attack at Brest-Litovsk. Here, the garrison of the old citadel held out for a week in spite of intense bombardment from massed artillery and from the air, exacting a heavy price from the assaulting troops before it was at last overwhelmed. That initial experience, repeated at other points, opened the Germans’ eyes to what was in store for them, while the stiff opposition that was met at many road-centres put a brake on their by-passing movements by blocking the routes needed by their road-bound supply columns.

The dawning sense of frustration was deepened by the character of the country that their invasion traversed. The impression it made was aptly expressed by one of the German generals:

The spaces seemed endless, the horizons nebulous. We were depressed by the monotony of the landscape, and the immensity of the stretches of forest, marsh and plain. Good roads were so few, and bad tracks so numerous, while rain quickly turned the sand or loam into a morass. The villages looked wretched and melancholy, with their straw-thatched wooden houses. Nature was hard, and in her midst were human beings just as hard and insensitive — indifferent to weather, hunger, and thirst, and almost as indifferent to life and losses, pestilence, and famine. The Russian civilian was tough, and the Russian soldier still tougher. He seemed to have an illimitable capacity for obedience and endurance.

The first attempted encirclement reached a climax around Slonim, a hundred miles beyond the original front, where the inner pincers almost closed round the two Russian armies that had been assembled in the Bialystok salient. But the Germans were not quick enough in completing the encirclement, and about half of the enveloped forces managed to escape, though in small and uncoordinated groups. The preponderance of un-mechanised troops in the German 4th and 9th Armies was a handicap on the fulfilment of the design.

The main armoured forces on the wings drove more than a hundred miles deeper, crossed the 1939 Russian frontier, and then wheeled inwards beyond Minsk — which was captured on June 30, the ninth day. That night one of Guderian’s wide-flung spearheads reached the historic Beresina river near Bobruisk — ninety miles south-east of Minsk, and less than forty miles from the Dnieper. But the effort to close the ring failed, and with the failure of their grand encirclement Hitler’s dream of a quickly decisive victory faded. Sudden rain — for which the French had prayed in vain the previous summer — came to the rescue of the hard-pressed Russians. It turned the sandy soil into mud.

That was far worse a handicap in Russia than it would have been in France, since it not only cramped tactical manoeuvring across country but held up strategic road movements. For the one good tarred road in the whole area was the new highway that ran past Minsk direct to Moscow, and that was only of partial service to Hitler’s plan — which contemplated, not a race for Moscow, but a widecast encircling manoeuvre that had to use the soft-surfaced roads on either flank. Following the rainstorms of early July, these ‘quicksands’ sucked down the invader’s mobility, and multiplied the effect of the stubborn resistance offered by many isolated pockets of Russian troops within the area that the Germans had overrun. Although over 300,000 prisoners were taken in the double battle of encirclement around Bialystok and Minsk, roughly the same number was able to slip out before the net was drawn tight. Their extrication was of importance in providing a means of stiffening the next defensive line — which ran in front and behind the Dnieper.

The nature of the country also became an increasing brake in this crucial stage. South-east of Minsk lies a vast stretch of forest and swamp, while the Beresina is not a clear-cut river-line but a bunch of streams winding through a black peat marsh. The Germans found that only on two roads — the main highway through Orsha, and the one to Mogilev — were the bridges built to carry heavy loads. On the other roads they were rickety wooden structures. Although the Germans had moved fast, they found that the Russians had blown up the bridges that mattered most. The invaders also began to come upon minefields for the first time, and suffered the more delay from these because of the way that the advance was confined to the roads. The Beresina was almost as effective in checking Hitler’s advance as in wrecking Napoleon’s retreat.

All these factors multiplied the impediment to the intended process of closing the trap round the Russians in the area west of the Dnieper.

The frustration of the grand encirclement now drew the German Command into that advance beyond the Dnieper which they had hoped to avoid. They were already over 300 miles deep into Russia. The pincers opened out again to execute the design of a fresh encirclement, aimed to close in behind the Russians on the line of the Dnieper, beyond Smolensk. But the first two days of July had passed in the process of trying to close the Minsk trap and in bringing up the infantry corps of the 4th and 9th Armies — some of which marched twenty miles a day for two and a half weeks in coming up to help in breaking through the Stalin line.

This assault proved easier than the German Command had anticipated, as the retreating Russians had not time to reorganise for a proper stand nor to improve the defences, which were far from complete. The Dnieper itself was the biggest obstacle, but Guderian’s armoured divisions overcame this by swift surprise attacks at a number of points away from the main crossings. By the 12th the Germans had breached the Stalin line over a wide front between Rogachev and Vitebsk, and were racing for Smolensk. The ease of the breakthrough suggested that there would have been more gain than risk in allowing an armoured force to push ahead in the first place, as Guderian had wished.

The difficulties of the country, as increased by the bursts of rain, were a greater check than the disorganised opposition. In these circumstances a heavy forfeit was paid for the time lost in the pause. For each heavy shower temporarily reduced the invaders’ mobility to stagnation. From the air, it was a strange spectacle — stationary ‘panzer’ blobs strung out across the landscape for a distance of a hundred miles and more.

The tanks might have continued to advance, but these and the other tracked vehicles formed only a small part of each so-called armoured division. Their supplies and their massive infantry element were carried in wheeled vehicles of a large and heavy type, which could not move off the road, nor move on it if the surface turned into mud. When the sun came out again, the sandy roads dried quickly — and the procession then moved on. But the cumulative delay was a serious handicap on the strategic plan.

This was not outwardly apparent because of the relatively rapid advance by Guderian’s panzer group along the main highway to Smolensk — which was entered on the 16th. The stretch of over a hundred miles between the Dnieper and the Desna was covered within a week. But Hoth’s panzer group on the northern wing was delayed by the swamps as well as the rainstorms, on its course. Its slow progress naturally affected the fulfilment of Hitler’s encirclement plan, and gave the Russians more time to rally their forces around Smolensk. Stiffer resistance on both flanks was met in the final stage of the effort. Indeed, the resistance was almost too stubborn, for the pincers came within ten miles of closing, and the Germans reckoned that half a million Russians were caught in the trap. Although a large part were extricated, a further 300,000 nevertheless went into captivity by 5 August.