How Hitler Could Have Won World War II (11 page)

Although Moscow was the only target the Germans might have gained in 1941, neither Brauchitsch nor Halder was willing to confront Hitler on the point. They hoped, when the time came, they could convince him to keep the panzers in the middle, change his ideas about shifting them, and continue the drive on Moscow. They were wrong.

The concept of caldron battles appears on the surface to be a highly dangerous strategy—to rely on the enemy conveniently allowing German forces to wrap themselves around great concentrations of his troops, and forcing them to surrender. However, Stalin made this a feasible strategy because he lined up the vast majority of his forces along the frontier. Consequently, German breakthroughs at a few points would permit German forces to sweep past and behind large segments of the Red Army, blocking their retreat and creating a caldron.

Such encirclements were a part of German doctrine, advocated by German theorists as far back as Karl Clausewitz in the early nineteenth century. They modeled their ideas on Hannibal's classic destruction of a Roman army at Cannae by encirclement in 216 B.C. The greatest German victory up to the 1940 campaign in the west had been another—the encirclement of a Russian army at Tannenburg in East Prussia in August 1914.

The Russian campaign was not to be a repetition of the blitzkrieg of 1940 in the west. Rather it was to be a series of classic encirclements, accelerated only by using the panzers to swing around the enemy flanks to create caldrons.

In most wars, the inherent strength of the belligerents becomes more and more important once past the initial or opening campaign or phase. If a power is unable to achieve a decision with its original force, then long-term factors generally decide the war. Superior power exerted over time to wear down an opponent is called attrition. This is the single greatest danger that a weaker belligerent encounters.

This is what Adolf Hitler faced. The Soviet Union's resources were immense compared to Germany's. Its great size forced an enormous dispersal of German military strength. Its population was more than twice Germany's. It had unlimited quantities of oil, minerals, and power. Soviet war production over time would outstrip German production. In addition, the Soviet Union could tap the resources of the rest of the world, especially the United States, because the Allies controlled the seas and could deliver goods by way of Iran.

Hitler had to gain a quick victory or be forced into a war of attrition that he could not win. Hitler refused to see this, and it was the cause of his destruction.

For immediate use in the attack, Hitler assembled 107 infantry divisions, 19 panzer divisions, 18 motorized divisions, and one cavalry division, a total of three million men, with supporting troops. This represented the bulk of the total German strength of 205 divisions. The Barbarossa forces included 3,350 tanks, 7,200 artillery pieces, and 2,770 aircraft.

The great weakness of the panzer divisions was the condition of the roads. In the vast Soviet Union there were only 40,000 miles of paved highways. Most routes were dirt and turned into muddy morasses in wet weather. In a panzer division fewer than 300 vehicles were fully tracked, while nearly 3,000 were wheeled and largely restricted to roads. In the west this had been little problem, because of the abundance of all-weather roads. In Russia their relative absence meant that panzer mobility would end with the first mud.

The Red Army was not prepared for the German onslaught, in part because of the condition of its forces, in part because too many troops were positioned right against the frontier, but also in part because Joseph Stalin had guessed wrong where the main German onslaught would come and put a preponderance of his forces south of the Pripet marshes.

The Russians assembled 171 divisions in five army groups or “fronts” along the frontier. Behind the five forward fronts, separate groups of five field armies were being formed as a second strategic echelon. This Reserve Front was assembling on the line of the Dnieper and Dvina rivers, some 180 miles east and 100 miles northeast of the frontier. Before hostilities these forming reserves were virtually invisible to German intelligence.

Soviet authorities had ample warning of the attack, but Stalin hoped the Soviet Union could escape Hitler's wrath, at least for a time, and ignored plain evidence.

On March 20, 1941, Sumner Welles, United States undersecretary of state, informed the Soviet ambassador of the attack, picked up by the American commercial attaché in Berlin. Winston Churchill alerted Stalin in a personal note delivered on April 19, 1941, based on Ultra intelligence intercepts (which he didn't reveal to Stalin). American Ambassador Laurence Steinhardt informed Molotov of reports to U.S. legations pin-pointing the attack almost to the day. High-altitude Luftwaffe reconnaissance aircraft made more than 300 overflights of Soviet territory in the weeks leading up to D-Day, June 22, 1941. On June 16, the German embassy evacuated all but essential personnel. There were many more warnings.

Up to the last day, the Soviet Union continued to supply Germany with raw materials, including 4,000 tons of rubber, plus manganese and other minerals shipped from the Far East over the Trans-Siberian Railway.

But Stalin had actually been preparing for war. On May 6, he took over personally as chairman of the Council of People's Commissars, or prime minister, replacing Molotov, who remained foreign minister. It was the first time Stalin had taken a government office.

In April Stalin implemented readiness measures, including partial mobilization. He transferred forces from Siberia to the west, sent twenty-eight rifle divisions and four armies to the border, and began assembling a fifth army near Moscow. In late May he called up 800,000 reservists.

Nevertheless, the Soviet Union was not ready. Its forces were poorly arrayed, trained, and equipped. Soviet political leadership had been paralyzed by its fixation on maintaining peace. Hope clouded reality.

For example, when Mikhail P. Kirponos, commander of the Kiev military district, deployed some troops to the frontier in early June, the Kremlin countermanded the order, and told Kirponos flatly: “There will be no war.”

The purges had left a severe shortage of trained commanders and staff officers, unlike the German army with its long emphasis on officer quality, its experience in war so far, and its supreme confidence. Red Army officers had learned to keep a low profile. Any independent judgment might lead to a firing squad or a trip to a Siberian gulag.

Few troops were concentrated where most needed. Aside from more troops being stationed below the Pripet Marshes, they were spread evenly across the front, and not many were held back for counterattack. These dispositions played directly into German tactics of punching a few holes with overwhelming force, then sending powerful motorized forces rushing through the gaps into the rear.

The Soviets had about 110 infantry (or “rifle”) divisions along the western frontier. In theory they were about the same size (15,000 men) as German divisions, but in June 1941 they averaged only about 8,000 men.

The greatest fault of the Red Army was its organization of armored and motorized forces. It possessed fifty tank divisions and twenty-five mechanized (motorized) divisions, far more than the Germans, but Stalin had not accepted the German doctrine of concentration of armor. The largest armored formation was a mechanized corps of one motorized and two tank divisions. These corps were widely dispersed across the front, not massed as were German panzer formations. Furthermore, each corps's divisions were often a hundred kilometers apart. Some corps had the job of supporting local counterattacks. Others were held in reserve to take part in counterthrusts under front (army group) control. Soviet armor, spread out in small packets, thereby repeated the error that the British and French had made in the 1940 campaign.

9 FALLING BETWEEN TWO STOOLS

AS HITLER LEFT BERLIN BY TRAIN FOR HIS NEW HEADQUARTERS
WOLFSSCHANZE
(wolf's lair or entrenchment) near Rastenburg in East Prussia, Luftwaffe aircraft rose from airstrips at 3 A.M. Sunday, June 22, 1941, and bombed and strafed Soviet airfields, catching hundreds of planes on the ground and attacking any that rose into the air. Before the day was up, the Luftwaffe had destroyed 1,200 Red aircraft. Within days the Germans had driven most Soviet planes from the sky and achieved air supremacy.

German panzers massed at key crossing points broke across the frontier and drove deep into the interior. Everywhere they achieved almost total surprise and were successful, except in the south. Here the German infantry struck strong defenses west of Lvov (Lemberg) and on the Styr River.

Stalin's belief that Hitler would make his main effort into Ukraine had resulted in the Southwestern Front being especially strong in armor—six mechanized corps, with a larger proportion of new T-34s than elsewhere. The T-34 was a great shock to the Germans. It had good armor, good speed, a high-velocity 76-millimeter gun, and was superior to any German tank. Mikhail Kirponos, Southwest commander, mounted armor attacks on both flanks of the panzer thrusts of Kleist's Panzer Group 1. The 5th Army operating out of the Pripet swamps had a firm base for the assault. The 6th Army on the open steppe to the south did not. The fight was tough, but the two arms of the Russian pincers never met, and Kleist drove on to seize Lvov on June 30. From there the panzers swept past Rovno and Ostrog through the “Zhitomir corridor” toward Kiev.

In the extreme south, the 11th Army of Romanians and Germans attacked across the Pruth River into Bessarabia, winning it in a week, then moving on, with all-Romanian formations, to besiege Odessa along the Black Sea.

Army Group North pushed out of East Prussia, led by Panzer Group 4 (Hoepner), and pressed through the Baltic states toward Leningrad.

In Army Group Center, Guderian's Panzer Group 2 plunged across the Bug River at Brest-Litovsk, and Hoth's Panzer Group 3 drove out of East Prussia with Minsk, 215 miles northeast of Brest, as their initial objective. The Russian garrison defended the fortress at Brest, but it was hopeless because German infantry surrounded it and pounded it into submission in a week.

Since the Russians were surprised, Guderian's panzers got across the Bug easily, some of his tanks fording thirteen feet of water using waterproofing developed for Operation Sea Lion.

Two days later, while meeting with a group of panzer commanders at Slonim, a hundred miles northeast of Brest, two Russian tanks appeared out of the smoke, pursued by two German Mark IVs. The Russians spotted the officers.

“We were immediately subjected to a rain of shells, which, fired at such extremely close range, both deafened and blinded us for a few moments,” Guderian wrote.

Most of the officers were old soldiers who hit the ground, and were uninjured. But a rear-echelon colonel visiting from Germany didn't react fast enough and was badly wounded. The Russian tanks forced their way into the town, firing away, but were finally put out of action.

As the panzers moved eastward and enveloped both sides of the Russian forces around Bialystok, Field Marshal Bock ordered his infantry 4th and 9th Armies to encircle these bypassed Russians (twelve divisions) east of Bialystok. The first great
Kesselschlacht
began to develop.

By June 28, Guderian's panzers had reached Bobruysk on the Beresina River, 170 miles northeast of Brest-Litovsk, while Hoth's tanks had seized Minsk, eighty miles northwest of Bobruysk, thereby nearly closing off fifteen Russian divisions in another caldron west of Minsk.

The Germans learned that they could outmaneuver the Russians with their
Schnellentruppen,
or fast troops, but could not outfight them. Everywhere the Russians resisted stoutly. They were slow to panic and surrender when closed into caldrons. One German general described the first days of the campaign: “Nature was hard, and in her midst were human beings just as hard and insensitive—indifferent to weather, hunger, and thirst. The Russian civilian was tough, and the Russian soldier still tougher. He seemed to have an illimitable capacity for obedience and endurance.”

In both
Kesselschlachten
the Russians took advantage of the fact that the panzers had moved on, and German infantry had to close the circles. Many escaped, though in small groups. Those who remained fought doggedly, but made only limited efforts to break out. Part of the reason was the strong rings the Germans finally threw around the surrounded troops. Another was that Soviet commanders feared they would be shot if they ordered withdrawal—something that shortly did happen. Another was that the Russians had few vehicles and little means to escape. The Russians also were more willing to surrender in the first weeks of the war because they did not know the murderous treatment they would receive in captivity. These factors explain the stupendous numbers of Russians who passed into German POW cages during the summer of 1941.

It did not take the Russian people many weeks to realize they were facing an implacable, bloodthirsty foe, however. The anti-Bolshevik indoctrination of the German army had led to a feeling of intolerance of and superiority over Russian
“Untermenschen.”
Hitler directed that soldiers guilty of breaking international law were to be excused. This no-court-martial order released barbaric tendencies in many soldiers, and the “commissar order” caused some to feel any Red—commissar, or ordinary soldier—might be shot on the spot.

Only a few days after the start of the campaign, General Joachim Lemelsen, commander of Guderian's 47th Panzer Corps, complained that shootings of Russian POWs and deserters were not being done properly. He explained the correct method:

“The Fuehrer's instruction calls for ruthless action against Bolshevism (political commissars), and any kind of partisans [guerrillas]. People who have been clearly identified as such should be taken aside and shot only by an order of an officer.”

Since the Germans could label anybody a commissar or a partisan, Russians soon stopped surrendering and often fought to the death in desperate situations.

This was not true in the caldron battles around Bialystok and Minsk, and up to July 9 the Germans took 233,000 prisoners, including numerous generals, 1,800 cannons, and destroyed 3,300 tanks, but very few T-34s, which appeared only a few times and in small numbers. Even so, about as many Russians escaped from the German pincers as were caught within them.

Meanwhile Hoth's and Guderian's panzer groups, now formed into the 4th Panzer Army under Günther von Kluge, were already rushing 200 miles beyond Minsk for the third great series of encirclements near Smolensk. Since Army Group Center's infantry divisions were still miles behind the panzers, Kluge wrapped his tanks, half-tracks, and motorized divisions around three caldrons, two smaller ones east of Mogilev and west of Nevel, a greater one between Orscha and Smolensk.

After grim resistance the Germans shattered three Soviet armies, and by August 6 had taken 310,000 POWs, destroyed 3,200 tanks, and captured 3,100 guns. Nevertheless, about 200,000 Russians escaped to fall back and continue to block the road to Moscow.

In the other two army groups advances had been spectacular as well.

In Army Group South, Kleist's Panzer Group 1, with the help of 17th Army and a Hungarian corps, encircled two Russian groups around Uman, 120 miles south of Kiev, capturing 103,000 Russians.

Army Group North occupied Latvia. Panzer Group 4 (Hoepner) pressed through Ostrov, about two hundred miles southwest of Leningrad, while 18th Army (Küchler) penetrated into Estonia. The Finns, who had joined the Germans, moved down the Karelian isthmus but did not threaten Leningrad.

Because Stalin had made the colossal error of pushing most of his forces to the frontier, where they were largely overrun or captured in encirclements, the Germans, despite the widely diffused nature of their offensive, were within sight of victory. Indeed, both Hitler and Halder thought they
had
won. However, instead of taking advantage of Stalin's potentially fatal mistake, Hitler commenced a series of disastrous delays and vacillations that canceled out his victories.

The success in Army Group Center had been astonishing. There were few Soviet troops still guarding the Moscow road. A stunning opportunity had materialized. Guderian's and Hoth's tanks had advanced 440 miles in six weeks, and were only 220 miles from Moscow. The dry weather was certain to continue until autumn. Although tank strength had fallen to half that at the start, there was every reason to believe the remaining armor could reach the capital and drive a dagger into the heart of the Soviet Union.

The successes of the caldron battles had reinvigorated Brauchitsch and Halder in thinking that everything possible should be committed to the central front and capture of Moscow. Yet at this moment Hitler turned the campaign in a completely different direction—and thereby lost the one chance that the caldron battles had given him to seize Moscow. Ignoring the virtually open road to the capital, he issued a directive on July 19 ordering Hoth's panzer group to turn north to assist Leeb's advance on Leningrad, and Guderian's panzer group to swing south and help Rundstedt's army group seize Kiev.

Guderian went to a conference at Army Group Headquarters at Novi Borisov on July 27 to be informed of the new orders. Here he learned he'd been promoted to army commander and his group renamed Panzer Army Guderian, and he was outraged by instructions to halt the advance on Moscow.

Bock agreed with Guderian, but, like Brauchitsch and Halder, did not have the stomach to challenge Hitler. He and army headquarters (OKH) were willing to let the impetuous Guderian challenge Hitler alone and tacitly went along with a delaying operation Guderian set in motion to frustrate Hitler's orders.

The effort hinged on seizing the town of Roslavl, seventy miles southeast of Smolensk, at the junction of roads to Moscow, Kiev, and Leningrad. Roslavl was important as a jumping-off point for Moscow. But Guderian's principal aim was to entangle his forces so deeply in this operation that orders to assist Rundstedt would be canceled and he could resume his drive to Moscow.

The Russians inadvertently took part in the conspiracy. Stalin rushed reserves to Roslavl—raw units in training and militia outfits called into service, Stalin's only source of fresh troops. Hitler postponed the diversion of Hoth and Guderian on July 30 and agreed to visit Army Group Center on August 4 to see the situation for himself.

At this conference, Bock, Hoth, and Guderian separately told Hitler that continuing the offensive against Moscow was vital. Hitler then assembled the officers and demonstrated how little he could be moved by logic and military considerations. He announced that Leningrad was his primary objective, and he was inclined to select the Ukraine next because its raw materials and food were needed, Rundstedt seemed on the verge of victory, and the Crimea had to be occupied to prevent Russian planes there bombing the Ploesti oil fields.

“While flying back,” Guderian wrote, “I decided in any case to make the necessary preparations for an attack toward Moscow.”

He planned to concentrate his panzers on the Roslavl-Moscow highway, roll up the Russians along that road through Spas Demensk to Vyazma, about 90 miles east of Smolensk, and thereby ease the path of Hoth's panzers also heading toward Moscow on the north.

Meanwhile, on August 7, Jodl and Halder persuaded Hitler to renew the advance on Moscow. Three days later resistance at Leningrad caused him to change his mind again and order Hoth's tanks to help Leeb. Hitler now saw that OKW, Bock, and Guderian were prevaricating, lost his patience, reinstated the order that Guderian assist Rundstedt, and sent a wounding letter to Brauchitsch accusing him of a lack of “the necessary grip.” Brauchitsch suffered a mild heart attack. Halder urged him to resign, and did so himself, but Hitler refused it.

Everything came to a head on August 22, when Guderian got an alert to move his group south to help destroy Russian armies around Kiev. The next day at a commanders' conference at army group headquarters Halder announced that Hitler now had decided that neither the Leningrad nor Moscow operations would be carried out, and efforts were to be focused on capturing Ukraine and Crimea.

Everyone present knew this meant a winter campaign, for which the German army was not prepared, and the conflict would turn into a war of attrition.

Bock and Halder arranged a personal interview of Guderian with Hitler to try to get him to change his mind. Guderian flew back to Rastenburg with Halder. Hitler heard him out, but then launched into a verbal offensive.

His commanders “know nothing about the economic aspects of war,” he said. He insisted that the economic zone from Kiev to Kharkov had to be seized, and the Crimea captured to prevent Soviet aircraft bombing Ploesti. Since the other officers in Hitler's circle were in full support or were afraid to oppose him, Guderian realized it was pointless to argue.