Despite the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact in 1939—in which Germany and the Soviet Union agreed not to attack one another—Hitler was quick to invade the Soviet Union. As Stalin’s natural political enemy, Hitler always viewed Stalin with suspicion and as a potential threat, but he also had his sights set on seizing land within Soviet borders for oil and permanent German occupation. With these motives, Hitler, in June of 1941, launched an invasion of the Soviet Union under the code name “Operation Barbarossa”. The invasion was one of the largest in history, with about three million German and other Axis Powers personnel involved. However, Hitler’s plan of invasion was reliant on the idea that the Soviet Union would collapse after having its capital captured—an idea that would lead the invasion to its failure.
Operation Barbarossa was initially successful, employing many surprise, blitzkrieg attacks that resulted in the destruction of thousands of Soviet airships and the death or capture of about 600,000 Red Army soldiers. However, upon approaching Moscow, Axis forces were met with an early Russian winter season, infamously known as “General Winter”. This devastated the invasion, as Hitler had planned to quickly capture Moscow before winter hit and had therefore left his troops unprepared to last through winter. With Moscow out of his reach, Hitler decided to instead aim for the industrial city of Stalingrad (present-day Volgograd), leading to what would become one of the most important battles of WWII.
This battle became known as The Battle of Stalingrad, and took place from August 1942 to February 1943. It began with a series of airstrikes launched by Germany’s Luftwaffe air force, mounting thousands of casualties upon the hundreds of thousands of Stalingrad residents that had not been evacuated from the city. Despite these casualties, Stalin ordered his troops to stand their ground while he initiated “Operation Uranus”—a successful operation that resulted in the encirclement and defeat of nearly 300,000 Axis troops. With this decisive victory against the Axis Powers, Germany halted its expansion and was forced to transition towards the defensive, changing the tide of war in favor of the Allies for the first time in WWII.
Another military strategy some attribute to the German defeat is Russia's scorched earth policy. A scorched earth policy is the intentional destruction and burning of crops and other resources that can potentially be used by the invading enemy. As the soviet's were forced into retreat, they dismantled and evacuated steel factories, burned bridges and crops, and destroyed or removed rail way cars. Though the Germans were still able to advance in spite of all these methods, the scorched earth policy did slightly hinder their invasion.
ReplyDeleteSources:
https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2011/07/world-war-ii-operation-barbarossa/100112/
https://www.britannica.com/event/Operation-Barbarossa#ref1119381
It was interesting to see how Operation Barbarossa initial success, but ultimate failure in capturing Moscow led to The Battle of Stalingrad and shift in favor of the Allies. Before, German was dominating the war and seemed to have total control over Europe. At The Battle of Stalingrad, Stalin's "Operation Uranus" destroyed the Germans. This operation was a two pronged attack where the Soviets would attack the Weaker Romanian and Hungarian armies that were protecting the German 6th army from getting flanked. After the Hungarian and Romanian armies were defeated, the Soviets surrounded the German 6th army and cut off their supplies. In the end the German 6th army was forced to surrender with no supplies.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Stalingrad
I found the dynamics between Hitler and Stalin very interesting because they were politically opposites, yet they attempted to reach an agreement and remain neutral. Something I found interesting is that Stalin nearly violated the pact before Hitler did, when he signed secret papers which said he would stop Germany from attacking Poland by deterring Hitler with military force. This makes me wonder if Stalin would have violated the Nonaggression Pact had Hitler not done it himself.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/3223834/Stalin-planned-to-send-a-million-troops-to-stop-Hitler-if-Britain-and-France-agreed-pact.html
Another operation that was part of Operation Barbarossa was Hitler's operation Edelweiss, aiming to take oil-rich fields in the Caucasus mountains area. German troops invaded southern Russia, and continued through Northern Caucasus to put the Nazi flag on Elbrus, the highest mountain in Europe. The Edelweiss operation was put on defensive once the Soviets won Stalingrad, and failed to reach oil fields in Azerbaijan.
ReplyDeleteOn a personal note, I lived in the Caucasus area when I was younger, and my city was occupied by Nazi forces for a year during WW2. Our city had to topple the Kazanskiy church tower, as to not give away the position of the city during Nazi air raids. It has recently been rebuilt this past spring to it's full height of 78 meters. My parents often went on long treks through the North Caucasus mountains, and once had to cross a glacier field where a Soviet army was snowed in during WW2. According to their account, they were able to see frozen copses in uniform, intact since the 1940s due to the perpetual cold. They said they even saw a few undetonated Stielhandgranate lying by the trail.
https://alchetron.com/Battle-of-the-Caucasus