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The Battle of Britain in many ways changed the course of the War. An invasion of Britain was impossible without air superiority. Hitler, fearing a cross-Channel invasion, decided that the only way to force the British to seek terms was to destroy the Soviet Union. He began shifting the Wehrmacht eastward to face the enemy that he had longed to fight from the onset--Soviet Russia. The nature of the War changed decisevely in the second half of 1941. The Germans invaded Russia in June 1941, launching the most sweeping military campaign in history. It is estimated that on the eve of battle, 6.25 million men faced each other in the East. The Soviets were surprised and devestated. Stalin ignored warnings from the British who as a result of Ultra had details on the German preparations. Stalin was convinced that they were trying to draw him into the War and until the actual attack could not believe that Hitle would attack him. The attack was an enormous tactical success. The Soviets were surprised and devestated. The Soviet Air Force was destoyed, largely on the ground. The Germans captured 3.8 million Soviet soldiers in the first few months of the campaign. No not knowing the true size of the Red Army, they thought they had essentally won the War. German columns seized the major cities of western Russia and drove toward Leningrad and Moscow. But here the Soviets held. The Japanese decission to strike America, allowed the Sovierts to shift Siberian reserves and in December 1941 launch a winter offensive stopping the Whermacht at the gates of Moscow--inflicting irreplaceable losses. The army that invaded the Soviet Union had by January 1942 lost a quarter of its strength. Hitler on December 11 declared war on America--the only country he ever formally declared war on. In an impassioned speech, he complained of a long list of violations of neutality and actual acts of war. [Domarus, pp. 1804-08.] The list was actually fairly accurate. His conclusion, however, that actual American entry into the War would make little difference proved to a diasterous miscalculation. The Germans who months before had faced only a battered, but unbowed Britain now was locked into mortal combat with the two most powerful nations of the world. The British now had the allies that made a German and Japanese victory virtually impossible. After the Russian offensive of December 1941 and apauling German losses--skeptics began to appear and were give the derisory term " Gröfaz ".
The Battle of Britain in many ways changed the course of the War. An invasion of Britain was impossible without air superiority. Hitler, fearing a cross-Channel invasion, decided that the only way to force the British to seek terms was to destroy the Soviet Union. He began shifting the Wehrmacht eastward to face the enemy that he had longed to fight from the onset--Soviet Russia. Stalin beginning May 1937 began a drastic purge targetting all potential political opponents. The Army because of its potential power was a priority target. Stalin's purge decimated the officer corps and greatly impaired the morale and efficiency of the Red Army. So confident was Hitler of success in the Battle of Britain that on July 21, 1940 he told his top military commanders in great secrecy that he planned to invade the Soviet Union, perhaps motivated by Stalin's annexation of the three Baltic Repyblics on that day. He ordered General Enrich Marcks the next day to prepare the attack paln. World War I had shown the Germans that they lacked the resources for a long drawn out campaign. The Royal Navy's command of the seas allowed them to import resources from America and its overseas Dominions. The NAZI conquest of Western resources had provided Hitler with substantial new resources and industrial capacity, but it was only in the East (Russia) that Germany could obtain the resources to fight a protracted war. Economic factors were also involved. Not only were the resources of the East needed by the German war machine, but it was extremely costly to maintain Germany's immense army. After the fall of France and te expulsion of Briatin from the Continent, this army had sat largely iddle. An army of this size was a huge drag on the economy of the Reich. Mussolini attacked Greece October 28, 1940 through Albania. Although often ommitted in studies of the World War II, this was to prove perhaps the greatest blunder of the War by the AXIS. Mussolini's 1940 invasion of Greece had two serious consequences. First it complicated the time table for Barbarossa. Second it resulyed in tieing down substantial AXIS forces in the Balkans, estimates run as high as 1 million men, that could have been employed in Barbarossa.
The nature of the War changed decisevely in the second half of 1941. The Germans invaded Russia in June 1941, launching the most sweeping military campaign in history.
Hitler assembled what Goebbels claimed was the greatest concentation of forces in world history. They were correct. The Germans invasion force totaled 153 divisions and more than 3 million men. It was the high point of the NAZI war effort. It was a much more powerful force than had struck in the West. And Hitler would never again be able to assemble a force of such magnitude. The Axis divisions were equipped with 600,000 million motorized vehicles, 3,580 tanks, 7,184 artillery pieces, and 2,740 air planes. Finish, Hungarian, and Romanian divisions accompanied the Whermacht and were soon joined by Italian divisions and the Spanish Blue Dvision. Hitler had wanted the French to participate, but Petain had refused. Even so, it was the most powerful military force ever assembled up to that time. And the heart of the force were the German Panzer forces, capable of rapidy driving deep into enemy lines and surrounding string points. The Luftwaffe was at the time the most powerful air frce in the world. The Barbarossa strike force included 2,000 planes. The Luftwaffe was, however, to be less of a factor on the vast battlefield in the East. There the Luftwaffe's size meant that it would not prove as critical as it had on the smaller battlefields in the West. The NAZI force, however, had an even more serious weakness. Despite the superb Panzer divisions, the Germans did not have a fully motorized army. And the trucks and other vehicles cobbeled together from all over Europe werevof many different types, greatly complicating logistics and maintenance. Even worse, many units were not not yet motorized. Entering the Soviet Uniion with the Germans were 750,000 horses. Horse power still played an importat role in the Wehrmact, both for transport and artillery. And as the weather turned cold, the Germans discovered that their horses did not have the stmina for the rigors of the Russian winter.
Cooperation with Hitler had allowed Stalin at little cost to acquire emense territory. Stalin moved west at the expense of Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland. Czecheslovakia, and Romania. Coopderation with Hitler had thus returned emense dividends. Stalin rejecting the advise of his generals had moved the Red Army west to occupy Poland. Substantial elements of the Red Army was deployed along the new western border without the benefit of prepared defeneses. This left important elments of the Red Army especially vulnerable to the Wehrmacht. Stalin even refused to allow defensive measures by front line troops afraid of provoking Hitler. The only steps he took on the advise of his generals was to mobilize reserves in rear areas. Stalin received warnings from British intelligence as well as Soviet inteligence. He was convinced that Hitler would not be so foolish as to invade and that British intellience was trying to draw him into a war with the NAZIs. As a result, Stalin avoided any kind of action that might bring his cooperation wiyth the NAZIs in question. After the war, Churchill wrote, "War ismainly a catalogue of blunders, but it may be doubted whether any mistake in history has equaled that of which Stalin and the Communidst Chiefs ere guilty when they ... supinely awaited or were incapable of realizing, the fearful inslaught which impended over Russia."
The NAZI invasion came as a huge shock to Stalin. This was not because he was not warned. Those warnings came from several sources. Soviet intelligence obtained substantial informatioin on NAZI intensions and preparations. British Ultra intercepts obtained detailed information on German planning. America Magic intercepts of Japanese diplomatic traffic revealed details on NAZI intentions. Japan's Ambassador in Berlin (Oshima Hoiroshi) was close to Hitler and other NAZI luninaries and his reports to Japan were decoded. Goering briefed Ambassador Oshima on the NAZI plans and provided him details on the number of planes as well as the divisions being readied. [Boyd, p. 21.] Both Britain and America provided information to Stlalin who dismissed them as efforts to draw the Soviet Union into a war with Germany.
We do not yet have full details as to the timing of Barbarossa. Given how close the NAZIs came to taking Moscow, the timing seems critical. We are not yet sure if a firm earlier invasion date was set. Of course the Germans had to wait for good weather. It does seem they could have launched the invasion in late May or early June. Military historians generally agree that given a few more weeks of good weather that the Germans could have taken Moscow which would not only have been of propaganda impotannce, but was a critical coomunications center. Many historians point out that the need to invade the Balans to resolve the mess created by Mussolini delayed the invasion 6 critical weeks. This may have well been the case, but some historians cintend that the Germans did not really plan to invade muchearlier anyway.
The nature of the War changed decisevely in the second half of 1941. Hitler invaded the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, launching the most sweeping military campaign in history. The Soviets were surprised and devestated. The Luftwaffe destroyed about half of the 10,000 Red Air Force plains on the first day. [Fest, p. 648.] Panzers penetrated deep into Soviet territory. Stalin had ignored warnings from the British who as a result of Ultra had details on the Germna preparations. Stalin was still convinced that they were trying to draw him into the War and until the actual attack could not believe that Hitler would attack him. The attack was an enormous tactical success. The Soviets were surprised and devestated. The Soviet Air Force was destoyed, largely on the ground. German armies slashed into the Spviery Union in three gigantic formations. Army Group North from East Prussia attacked into the former Baltic Republics aiming for Lenningrad. They were supported by the Finnish Atmy to the north attempting to regain the territory seized by Stalin in 1939. Army Group Center moved through what was formerly eastern Poland toward Moscow. Army Group South moved into the Ukraine.
Hitler made it very clear that the campaign in the East would be conducted differently than any other modern campaign--it ws to be a war of extermination. Mass executions of Jewish men, women, and children as well as Communists are carried out. The Einsatzgruppen from the SS are responsible for most of the killings, together with local collaborators, but the numbers of Jews encountered are so large that regular Wehrmacht units also participate in the killing. It was not just the Jews that were killed, but also Communist Comisars in the army army and Communist officials. Eventually large numbers of Slaves were to be killed to clear land for German colonization. In the end this war of extinction may have doomed Operation Barbarossa because it precluded the effective utilization of anti-Communist Russians abd Ukranians to fight the Red Army.
We notice large numbers of photographs that the Geran soldiers took of Soviet civilans. Most of these photographs were taken rural areas rather than in the cities. Many of these photgraphs come from the Ukraine, although they may not have been taken there. Soviet armies overran the Wehrmacht in five major offensives during 1944. This leads us to the question of how German photographs came into Soviet hands. Perhaps the personal affect of German soldiers were obtained in these offensives. Or perhsaps Soviet soldiers brought back German war albums as personal war booty. German soldiers were no susosed to have personl cameras and take photgraphs. But apparently many did. I think this ould have mostly been officers. We are not entirely sure of their motives. The fact that they mostly took photographs in rural areas, commonly of ragged men and children suggests that they were recording the poverty and backwardness of the society tht they were destroying. These images seem to cofirm many of the basic NAZI prejudices about their superiority and Soviet and Slavic backwardness. The expressions on the faces of the civilins do not seem to be one of fear. Rather the impression ne gets is tht the civilians had not idea what the German goals were. It should also be remembered that only near the final phase of Barbarossa did the Germns move into areas populsated by ethnic Russians. One notable observation is that the Soviet rural population looked ragged, they were often dressed warmly--something that could not be said about the invading Germans.
Hitler predicted, "The world will hold its breath." He was correct. The Luftwaffe scored a major victory in essentially destroying the Red Ait Force during the first 2 days of the Operation Barbarossa. German panzer armies penetrated deep into Soviet lines, moving rapidly into the Soviet Union and taking large numbers of prisoners. The Germans drove toward Kiev and the Dnieper in the south and the Baltics and Leningrad in the north. Stalin was at first stunned and did not even speak on Radio to the Soviet people. Stalin announced a scorched earth policy to confront the NAZIs in a radio broadcast (July 3). The most important of the German Panzer comanders, General Guderian, presses the attack of Army Group Center. General Kluge attempted to restrain him. The Germans cross the Dnieper River (July 10). Driving toward Moscow, they seized Smolensk (July 15). Another 300,000 Soviet soldiers are taken prisioner--over 40 Soviet divisions. Hitler concerned about the lack of progress in the south took control of Barbarossa away from the generals. He was convinced that he understands tactics and strategy better than the generals. He ordered Guderian to drive south toward Kiev. The Germans achieve a spectacular success in the south, taking Kiev and 650,000 Soviet prisoners. The delay buys time for the Soviets. Stalin placed Marshall Zukov in charge of the defense of Moscow. The Japanese decide to strike at America rather than coordinating an attack on the Sovoiets with the Germans. Siberian troops rushed west mount a massive Winter offensive which not only stops the Germans, but devestates the Wehrmacht.
NAZIs prppaganda attempted to make Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union into a crusade by civilized Europe against Bolshevism. He attempted to get Vichy France and Franco's Spain to joint tge crusade. Both refused, although Franco did authorize a volunteer division to be raised. Mussolini did joint the campaign. Finland joined, but with the limited goal of regainningthe territiriy seized by Stalin in the Winter War (1939-40). NAZI allies in central Europe joined (Hungary and Romania), although Bulgaria refused. The NAZIs also raised units made up of Fascist volunteers in the occupied countries.
The Ukraine was one of Hitler's primary objectives when he unleased Barbarossa. He saw the Ukranine as the future German breadbasket and a needed area for Lebensraum. Army Group South was assigned the task of seizing the Ukraine. The Germans, however, encountered problems in the south. Several factors were involved. There were important Soviet formations deployed there, some armed with the new T-34 tank which shocked the Germans when they first enountered it. In addition, the Romanian allies proved less reliable than hoped. Hitler, anxious to lay his hands on Ukranian resources, diverts powerful Panzer units driving on Moscow from Army Group Center. The results are a spetacular victory at Liev, but in the end the drive toward Moscow fails. Soviet forces badly maul the Romanians at Odessa. The NAZI Eisatzgruppen begin the wholescale murder of Jews. Thhey also suppress Ukranian nationalists and begin mass killings of non-Jewish Ukranians.
The NAZIs had in the Soviet Union the possibility of being received as liberators by substantial elements of the population. This was not just the case in the Baltics, but especially in the Ukraine. Stalin's oppresive regime had alientanted large numbers of Soviet citizens. The NAZIs in their lust for boody and hatred of the Slavs chose not to take advantage of this opportunity. A wide range of NAZI policies turned those opposed to Stalin and and the Soviet regime against the NAZIs. Unlike in Western Europe, the NAZIs did not even an attempt to disguise their intententions. The Soviet prisonors of war were horribly mistreated. Some 3.5? million are believed to have died in NAZI captivity. These include large numbers who may have been enduced to fight with the Germans are as leat have been used as labor in the German war economy. The mass murder of the Einsatgrupen whichb focused on Jews were not limited to them. Much of the Einsatzgrupen killing was doine openly, not behind barbed wire in camps. The administratioin of seized territory in the Soviet Union was in the hands of men like Alfred Rosenberg, Minister for the East, Erich Koch, Commissioner for the Ukraine. These were men who saw the East as a area to be looted and were desorous of reducing the Slav population. The Germans made no attempt to maximize the production inoccupied, Eastern areas. In large measure, they seized what the retreatting Soviets did not destroy and shipped it back to Germany. The civilian popukation was left to fend for itself. Rather than capitalizing on the disaffected Soviet population, they instead built support for Stalin and generated the War's most partisan movement
The stunning German victories netted emense numbers of Soviet prisoners of war (POWs). The Germans captured 3.8 million Soviet soldiers in the first few months of the campaign. [Hoffman, p. 131.] It is easy to see why the Germans and Hitler were at first so confident of victory. No not knowing the true size of the Red Army, they thought they had essentally won the War. German columns seized whole Soviet armies and the major cities of western Russia in giagantic encirclements. Neither camps or supplies exxisted to handle the huge numbers of captured Russian soldiers. The Germans in the East at Hitler's orders were not to follow the internatioanl conventions they had generally adhered to in the treatment of POWs in the West. Admiral Canaris, head of the Abwer, attempted to interceed with Keitel. [Hoffman, pp. 336-337] Keitel knowing fullwell Hitler's plans did not pass on Canaris' concerns to Hitler.
Soviet Dictator Joseph Stalin was stunned by the German attack. He had been convinced that Hitler, afraid of a two-front war, would never attack until the British had been defeated. He had been warned by Churchill who had detilas from Ultra intercepts as well as his own inteligence service. After the attack, Stalin was silent for 12 days, apparently stupified by the force of the German attack and dessimation of Red Army forces. Finally he spoke to the nation and it was not about Communism, but the defense of the Russian motherland. The lengendary Great Patriotic War had begun. Stalin also began to deal ruthlessly with Soviet commanders who would not fight or performed poorly. He considered commanders and soldiers who surrendered deserters. Commanders who retreated or deserted faired little better. A series of defeated Red army commanders were shot in July. [Davidson, p. 438.]
Churchill was awaken at 8:00 am with news of the NAZI invasion. (He had standing orders that he not be awaken earlier unless Britain was invaded.) He immediately announced he would speak to the nation that evening. Churchill spent day working on his major addresses. This time he only had hours. He began by reminding the British people of a lifetime of opposition to Communism. Then he expalined, "But all this fades away before the spectalewhich isnow unfolding .... Can you doubt ehat our policy will be? .... We are resolved to destroy Hitler and every vestige of the NAZI regime. From this nothing will turn us--nothing. .... Any man or state who fights on against Nazidom will have our aid. ... It follows, therefore, that e shall give whatever help we can to Russia and the Russian people." President Roosevelt was at first uncommital. Some of his advisers urged him to rush support to the Soviets. His militay advisers, including General Marshall, were convinced that the Soviets could not withstand the NAZI onslaught. They advised against rushing aid to the Soviets when America's expanding new army was still not equipped and Britain still in danger. [Goodwin, p. 255.]
One of Hitler's major goals in the invasion of the Soviet Union was the muder of Russian Jews. Preparations were laid formurdering Jews as part of the invasion. The NAZIs in 1939 had not yet worked out what was to be done with the Jews. As a result, while there were many killings, most were rounded up and confined into ghettos. The success of the
Wehrmacht in 1939-40 had convinced Hitler and other NAZIs that they could begin the mass slaughter of Jews. There ws no written document, but Hitler some time in late 1940 or early 1941 must have ordered Himmler to prepare for mass killings with the invasion of the Soviet Union. The NAZI genocide had not yet been perfected and large scale gas chambers were not yet operating at Auswitz and other Polish concentration camps. The SS created four Einsatzgruppen to accompany the Wehrmacht and kill Jews in large numbers. Full details are not available, but we know from the similarities in many of the killing actions that the Einsatzgruppen were well trained and procedures developed for maximum efficency. Heydrich was in overall command of these killing machines and he was known for his meticulous planning.
The Resistance was especially important in the Soviet Union where guerrila groups disrupted German supply lines. The Soviets created the largest and most important Ressistance effort. This was possibly primarily because of the genocidal NAZI policies in the East. Ironically, the Soviet Union was the one country that the NAZIs invaded where they could have developed considerable popular support. The early successes of the Germans staggered the Red Army and Soviet society as a whole. Red Army soldiers surrendered in staggering numbers. Only slowly did anti-NAZI partisan units begin to form. Many of the partisans units were formed from men left behind as the Red Army retreated east. Later the Soviets dropped men and supplies to reinforce the partisan units. Other partisan units were formed by civilians. They Soviet partisans were an important part of the Great Patriotic War. Partisans killed thousands of German soldiers, but the major contribution was in disrupting Wehrmacht supply lines. Not only did this make supplying front line troops difficult, but it forced the Wehrmact to deply an important part of its combat
strength in rear areas to secure supply lines. This was especially important in 1941-43. As the tide turned on the Eastern Front, the importance of the partisans declined as the Red Army became an effective fighting force. The partisans even in the later phases of the War was still significant and were a cotinuing drain on the Wehrmacht as it retreated west.
The Germans had very effectively estimated the strength of front line Red Army units and located these units and their defenses. The attacks on ther opening of Barbarossa devestated these units. German tactical intelligence through Luftwaffe reconisance was excellent. The German strategic intelligence capability was weak and they failed to accurately estimate either the strength of Russian reserves in the rear. [Glantz, p. 23.]
Stalin's purges of the Red Army and German successes in the initial months of Barbarossa had resulted in the losses of huge numbers of trained officers. Stalin's refusal to allow a ratioanl deployment of the Red Army and insistence that there be no retreat were also major factors in the stunning German victories. In the end it was the stuborness and tenacity of the average Red Army soldier that manged to stop the better trained and more professional German Wehrmacht before Lenningrad and Moscow. The savagery of the German assault and appeals to Russian patriotism were major factors in the stiffening of Russian resistance.
The NAZIs on the Eastern Front did have allies. NAZI propaganda sought to depict the invasion of the Soviet Union as a modern European crusade against Bolshevism. Unsaid of course was that the invasion was not only against the Bolsheviks, but an imperialistic war to seu=ize German Lebensraum and a genocidal campaign to muder millons of Slavs. Hitler did have allies or his campaign. The most important were Italy, Hungary, and Romania. The Romanians to curry Hitler's favor provided the largest contingent. All of these forces proved unreliable in combat, in part because the Germans did not properly equip them. The Spanish volunter Blue Division proved effective but was only one division. There were other allies. The Germans recruited men from the occuoied countries. Most were members of local Fascist parties or youths who were recruited from Fascist youth groups. At the time of Barbarossa the NAZI victory looked assured. As the war progressed that victory proved increasingly unlikely and volunteers more difficult to recruit. The Germans also recruited anti-Bolchevick Soviets, but here were limited because of their genocidal policies.
The Ally that as Barbarossa bogged down, the NAZIs most wanted was Japan. Germany's Axis ally in many ways held the key to the success or failure of Operation Barbarossa. It was not immediate apparent to Hitler and the Wehrmacy OKW such their euphoria with the early successes of Barbarossa. The NAZIs assumed that the Japanese would evenbtually join their anti-Communist campaign. Hitler hinted to Japanese diplomats in early 1941 that war was likely with the Soviet Union. Japanese diplomats gave Hitler reason to believe that the Japanese would join him if war broke out. Foreign Minister Matsuoko visited Germany and met with Hiter several times (March 27, 1941). Hitler hinted at war with the Soviets. Matsuoko offered his personal opinion that he could not conceive of Japan not striking at the Soviets if war broke out. [Boyd, p. 19.] The Japanese situation, however, became more complicated when Matsuoko return home from Berlin signed a neutrality treaty with the Soviets (April 13). Although there were informal diplomatic exchanges, the AXIS partners never coordinated their strategy. Hitler did not consult with the Japanese about invading the Soviet Union and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor came as a surrise to Hitler (and the Japanese diplomats in Berlin). Ambassador Oshima in Berlin was briefed in detail about the progress of Barbarossa. He met with Hitler in his Rastenburg Headquarters and visited the Eastern Front. Oshima reported the progress of Barbarossa to the Foreign Ministry. The reports contained an accurate picture of the extent of the German victories. Japan did not, however, take advantage of the opportunity presented to strike north and deliver the coup d'grace to the Soviet Union. This decession appears to have been taken before the extent of the Soviet debacle was clear. The Japanese replaced Foreign Minister Matsuoka (Who favored a strike at the Soviets) with Admiral Toyoda Teijiro (who favored the southern advance) (mid-July 1941). Ambassador Oshima urged Tokyo to strike at the Soviets from Manchukuo (occupied Manchuria). Tokyo did not answer many of the Ambassador's queries. Because of Magic intercepts, America code breakers were reading these messages. We do not fully understand why the Japanese decided to strike south (against America and Britain) rather than north against the Soviets. We suspect that the Army generals who dominated the Japanese government did not after the 1939 border war were not anxious to engage the Soviets again. The British looked weak after a series of defeats at the hands of the Germans. Japan's leaders were highly insular men. Most looked on America as spirtually weak and unwilling to resist Japan in a major war. Another factor may have been the Roosevelt Administration's policy of resisting Japanese aggrssion in China and Indo-China. The diplomatic measures and boycotts had a limited affect, but America was standing up to Japan while the Soviets were silent. I do not yet know, however, of a detailed study of the Japanese decession making process that led to Pearl harbor.
Japan and the Soviets fought pitched battles along the Manchrian border in 1939. An offensive by Marshall Zukov forced the Japanese to ask for an armistace. Still the Soviets kept important forces on the border. Japan in late 1941 was poised for a military strike to take advantage of the fighting in Europe. There were two basic options: strike north at the Sovierts or South at the resources of Southeast Asia. The decission was to strike south. Here the only force to oppose the Japanese was the U.S. Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor. A Japanese carrier taskforce on December 7, 1941, executed a surprise attack on the American Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. It was a brilliant tactical victory for
Japan, but perhaps the greatest mistake in modern military history as it brought a suddenly united America with its vast industrial capacity into the War.
The Japanese decission to strike America, allowed the Sovierts to shift Siberian reserves. A Japanese spy in Tokyo had informed Stalin well before the actual attack on Pearl Harbor. These troops, well trained in winter warfare, on December 6, 1941 launched a winter offensive stopping the Whermacht at the gates of Moscow--inflicting irreplaceable losses. The Wehrmacht was stuned at the extent of the Soviet offensive, assuming that the staggering victories in the Summer had crippled the Red Army. There were no preparations made such as winter clothing or assessing the performance of weapons in extemely cold winter conditions. Hitler had assummed that the camapign would defeat the Soviets in a summer campaign before the onset of Winter. Hitler demanded that the Whermacht stand and fight. This probably saved the Wwhrmach from an even greater dissater than what ocurred. An entire Germany Army, the 16th Army of more than 90,000 men, was essentially cut off and only supplied with an enormous effort by the Luftwaffe. A land corridor was not restablished until April 1942. The massive Axis army that invaded the Soviet Union had by January 1942 lost a quarter of its strength amd huge quantities of tanks, artillery, and supplies. These losses of men and material by the Wehrmacht were especially grevious and Germany did not have the manpower resources or industrial capacity to fully repace and reequip a new army. Most accounts of World War II point to Stalingrad as the turning point of world war II. The Soviet stand before Moscow may have been the decisive action of the War. It certainly meant that Germany had lost its best opprtunity to destroy the Soiviet Union and Red Army. What many historians fail to note is that while the Wehrmct had occupied large areas of the Soviet Union, they were still, on the perifery of Russia. What they had occupied was the Baltics, Poland, Belarus, and areas of the Ukraine. Russia, much of the Soviet arms industry, and key resources like oil was still in Soviet hands.
Many assessments of World War II focus on the German Panzers. The NAZIs assumed that the Soviet Union was a backward country incapable of producing the same high quality as Aryan supermen. The appearance of the T-34 tank on the battlefield in late 1941 was a shock to the Wehrmacht as it was in fact superior to the German Panzers. The T-34 tank in fact is considered by many to be the finest tank of the War. The T-34 was the perfect balance of mobility (wide tracks, excellent speed), firepower (76mm or 85mm cannon) and armour protection (low profile and inovative sloped armour). The T-34 tank was also relatively inexensive to build and easily mantained. This was in sharp contrast to the much more complicated German tanks. Unbeknown to the Germans, even as the Wehrmacht was driving into the Soviet Union during the Summer of 1941, T-34 tanks were rolling out of production lines in far greater numbers than German tanks.
Stalin had built an industrial base capable of produycing war material on amn immemse level. The Germans were not aware of the full Soviet potential, neither the quantity or the quality of Soviet production. The Soviets managed to pack up and move whole factories east, where they could not be reached by the Luftwaffe's tactical bombers. Production at many of these factories were not back to full production until 1943. Even so the output of these Soviet factories alone exceeded German production. Thus when British and American production were added, it is clear to what extent Barbarossa had changed the strategic ballance. And it was not just uin quantatative terms. Soviet war productin was rationalized. Production of osolete weaponsas terminated and that of more effective weapons like the T-34 tank expanded. Soviet artillery was of a high standard. While the Red Air Force was devestated at the onset of Barbarossa because of obsolete planes, new planes like the Yak fighters (Yak 1, 7, and 9s) and the IL-2 Stormovek were high quality planes that in capable hands could and fid taken on the Luftwaffe. These planmes were also produced in enormous numbers. More than 37,000 Yaks were produced by the Russians, more than any other fighter in the War. As the Allied air assualt on Germany intensified in 1943 and the Luftwaffe had too pull back to defend German cities, the Germas also began loosing their advantage in the air that they had during Barbarossa.
Perhaps the fatal wakness in Barbarossa was Hitler himself. His racial hatred and penchant for mindless viloence turned large numbers of Soviet citizens who hated Stalin and the Comminists and were potential allies against the Germans. Millions of Russians and Ukranianns embraced the Wehrmact viewing them as liberators. Many Russian soldiers willingly surrendered to the Germans. Hitler's barbaric plans for the occupied East were soon evident to these potential allies. Hitler's War was not just a war against Communism, but in fact war against the Soviet people themselves. Hitler's avarice was another factor. Soviet resources offeered so much to the German war effort that Hitler kept changing his priorities. The Panzers made graet progress in moving rapidly toward Leningrad and Moscow. When victory may have been within his grasp, he tirned the Panzers south toward the resources of the Ukraine. Then he focused on Moscow again, but the weeks lost were just enough for the Soviets to organize a defence before the onset of Winter. (Hitler's inability to set reasonable goals and priorities and stick to them would also doom his 1942 Summer offensive.)
Hitler on December 11 declared war on America--the only country he ever formally declared war on. In an impassioned speech, he complained of a long list of violations of neutality and actual acts of war. [Domarus, pp. 1804-08.] The list was actually fairly accurate. The NAZIs had considerable reason for believing that America was a hostile country. Despite neutrality laws, President Roosevelt had not been neutral and had taken a series of steps to take on the isolationists and assisst Britain. His conclusion, however, that actual American entry into the War would make little difference proved to a diasterous miscalculation.
The Germans who months before had faced only a battered, but unbowed Britain now was locked into mortal combat with the two most powerful nations of the world. The British now had the allies that made a German and Japanese victory virtually impossible. After the Russian offensive of December 1941 and apauling German losses--skeptics began to appear and were give the derisory term " Gröfaz ".
Barbarossa had achieved some starteling successes. Panzer arimies had spaerheaded ememse encircling maneuvers that had killed or taken over 6 million Red Army soldiers. Great quantities of military equipment had been destroyed or captured. An emense swath of European Russia was in German hands. Even so, it had failed in its principal objective. It did not destroy the Soviet Union. The Red Army had not been destroyed and Russian war industries continued to produce. As a result. The Wehrmacht by the beginning of 1942 had been seriously weakened. It was the failure of Barbarossa to destroy the Red Army in a swift, Summer campaign that doomed NAZI Germany. Htler's strategy was to destroy his opponents piecemeal before they were prepared and before an effective coalition could organize. The Soviets by defearing Barbarossa accomplished three critical goals. First, more than anything they bought time. This allowed them to move critical war industries and begin to set up for expanded production. Second, they succeeded in badly mauling the Wehrmacht. Third it helped the Red Army begin to learn how to fight the NAZIs. Once the Wehrmacht was bogged down in Russia, the Western Allies (principally the United States, Brirain, and Canada) had the time to build an effective military that could enter the European continent and attack NAZI Germany from the west. Not only did Hitler now face the prospect of a two-front war, but a war against opponents with far great resources than the Reich. The failure of Barbarossa also left the Wehrmacht in aposition to launch a much less powerful offensive in 1942, one that could only be conducted with force in the South and which culminated at Stalingrad.
Boyd, Carl. Hitler's Japanese Confidant: General Oshima Hiroshi and Magic Intelligence, 1941-1945 (Lawrence: Kansas University Press, 1993), 271p.
Bullock, Alan. Hitler: A study iun Tyranny (Harper & Row: New York, 1962).
Davidson, The Unmaking of Adolf Hitler (The University of Missouri Press: Columbia, 1996), 519p.
Domarus, Max. Hitler Reden und Proklamationen 1932-45 Vo. 1-2 (Neustadt a.d. Aisch: Velagsdruckerei Schmidt, 1962-63).
Fest, Jaochim C. Hitler (Vintage Books: New York, 1973).
Gilbert, Martin. A History of the Twentieth Century Vol. 2 1933-54 (William Morrow and Company, Inc.: New York, 1998), 1050p.
Glantz, David M. Soviet Military Deception in World War II (F. Cass: London, 1989).
Goodwin, Doris Kearns. No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World WarII (Simon & Schuster: New York, 1994), 759p.
Hoffman, Joaquim. Die Geschichte der Wlassow-Armee (Verlag Rombach: Freilburg, 1986).
Reese, Roger Roi. "The Red Army and the Great Purge," in J. Arch Getty and Roberta Manning, eds., Stalinist Terror: New Perspectives (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 198-214.
Reese, Roger Roi. Stalin's Reluctant Soldiers: A Social History of the Red Army, 1925-1941 (Modern War Studies), 272p.
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