Oh balls, you're absolutely right, I mucked up badly on that one, but apparently their effectiveness as weapons of war was still highly suspect since they each cost as much as a German fighter plane, could only be used once, often failed to hit their targets, and even when they did they weren't attacking military targets, so if the resources had been used instead to make planes it would have been far more beneficial.Squilookle said:
As I understand it the Russians main tank was the T-34. They had experimented with a heavier version, but scrapped it. The T-34's were vulnerable to the 8.8mm cannon most German tanks used, and their smaller 7.5mm's couldn't pierce the heavier armoured German tanks. Their advantages were their reliability and high, speed, low weight and small size, whereas the German tanks were all about armour and weaponry, meaning they were huge behemoths that often got stuck in mud or rough terrain, and broke down often, with repairs being more compliacated and spare parts more difficult to supply. This was especially bad in the invasion of Russia where the genius of Soviet planning meant that half the main roads and highways on the German's maps either turned out to be rough dirt and mud paths, or didn't exist at all yet!Squilookle said:
But that's getting away from the point I was trying to prove with that statement. It's rather naive of me to outright state that the Germans had the best military tech in every field, since it was constantly changing and advancing. I suppose a more accurate way of saying it would be that their designs were of a really high quality, and they were often superior to the forces they were facing, but the problem they encountered was supplying their army with soldiers to fight, planes to fly, fuel to run them, tanks to command and spare parts to repair them. Especially since they went up against the combined forces of so many countries all working together and pooling their supplies to defeat them.
That was a typo, I meant to say the Nazi forces were 300 miles from Moscow, to make the point that the main attack force travelled 300 miles the first week, 300 miles the second, and were 300 miles away from Moscow at the beginning of the third, but then they were diverted up to Leningrad long enough for Stalin to arrange his defences. Although I've checked my facts and this is indeed wrong.Squilookle said:
Hmmm, then I've got my wires crossed here. I got this info on Operation Barbarossa from a book called "the devil's virtuosos" I read quite a while ago, so I'll have to look it up again and recorrect my knowledge. I'll type it out here, mainly just for my own benefit so I can get the situation right in my own head:Squilookle said:
(spoilered for size, because I am trying to accurately sum up one of the largest military operations in world history!)
Barbarossa began on 22 June 1941, at this point the Nazi front line was 600 miles from Moscow (not 900 as I had thought) In 5 days they had travelled 200 miles to Minsk(1/3 of the way to Moscow)
They rested here for 2 days debating the problem of the huge numbers of Russian troops behind their lines, who had refused to surrender, but had no supplies or communication to mount a proper assault on the German supply lines. They needed military forces to stay behind to keep these Russians subdued from overcoming their supply lines, but couldn't really spare any tanks or men from the frontlines to do this.
They marched on to the river Dnieper regardless (an advance of about 100 miles), reaching it by the 7th July. By this time resistance from the Russians was noticeably getting stronger by the day, and initial attempts to cross the river failed, causing a crisis where Hitler and the top German generals really wanted to go back to secure their supply lines but the frontline commanders knew that any delay would jeopardise their chances of advancing, so they charged on ahead in direct contradiction with their orders, excusing it as a "communication mishap" and only got away with it because of their success in advancing.
They fired on ahead, charging for Smolensk, meaning that in just 3 weeks they had travelled over 300 miles, and were more than halfway to Moscow. (again I got my timing and distances completely mixed up.)
Now comes the part I really got wrong:
At this point all three prongs of the German advance started to stutter. (the Northern prong attacking Leningrad, the middle going for Moscow, and the Southern assaulting Kiev.) They all needed more tank and armour reinforcement. The Nazi command had run war-games to predict what an invasion of Russia would involve, and knew this was coming. They had recommended that the pleas from the two secondary prongs should be ignored, because the most important assault was the one for Moscow, and German production was too limited to supply all three with armour.
This was where the mistake that really condemned Barbarossa happened, as Hitler decided against their advice and ordered that the other two prongs be supplied first with new armour to achieve their objectives, and then everyone could push towards Moscow.
He didn't order the main force to go to Leningrad, but did order them to halt and solidify their positions by taking care of the various divisions still active in the surrounding area: He wanted the Panzers to go South-west (Moscow was to the North-East) to put down an active Soviet division. The plan was that with the extra support Kiev and Leningrad would fall quickly, and by that time the central prong would have solidified their position enough to get restocked and rearmed for a charge over the last 200 miles or so against Moscow. It failed because the secondary prongs never managed to achieve their objectives, becoming a heavy drain on men and supplies, and there were just too many divisions coming in to attack the central prong that they could never secure their positions.
I originally condemned this as Hitler losing his nerve, and a completely stupid strategy, but apparently at the time it was a fairly reasonable move, and although it's easy to condemn with the power of hindsight, the Nazi generals really didn't know how powerful Russia was: (on 8th July one Nazi general reported that of 164 known Soviet army divisions, only 46 were combat ready. By the 23rd, 93 extra divisions had sprung up from seemingly nowhere, and three weeks after that the count was at 360 combat ready divisions! Holy crap, they really didn't have a clue!)
They rested here for 2 days debating the problem of the huge numbers of Russian troops behind their lines, who had refused to surrender, but had no supplies or communication to mount a proper assault on the German supply lines. They needed military forces to stay behind to keep these Russians subdued from overcoming their supply lines, but couldn't really spare any tanks or men from the frontlines to do this.
They marched on to the river Dnieper regardless (an advance of about 100 miles), reaching it by the 7th July. By this time resistance from the Russians was noticeably getting stronger by the day, and initial attempts to cross the river failed, causing a crisis where Hitler and the top German generals really wanted to go back to secure their supply lines but the frontline commanders knew that any delay would jeopardise their chances of advancing, so they charged on ahead in direct contradiction with their orders, excusing it as a "communication mishap" and only got away with it because of their success in advancing.
They fired on ahead, charging for Smolensk, meaning that in just 3 weeks they had travelled over 300 miles, and were more than halfway to Moscow. (again I got my timing and distances completely mixed up.)
Now comes the part I really got wrong:
At this point all three prongs of the German advance started to stutter. (the Northern prong attacking Leningrad, the middle going for Moscow, and the Southern assaulting Kiev.) They all needed more tank and armour reinforcement. The Nazi command had run war-games to predict what an invasion of Russia would involve, and knew this was coming. They had recommended that the pleas from the two secondary prongs should be ignored, because the most important assault was the one for Moscow, and German production was too limited to supply all three with armour.
This was where the mistake that really condemned Barbarossa happened, as Hitler decided against their advice and ordered that the other two prongs be supplied first with new armour to achieve their objectives, and then everyone could push towards Moscow.
He didn't order the main force to go to Leningrad, but did order them to halt and solidify their positions by taking care of the various divisions still active in the surrounding area: He wanted the Panzers to go South-west (Moscow was to the North-East) to put down an active Soviet division. The plan was that with the extra support Kiev and Leningrad would fall quickly, and by that time the central prong would have solidified their position enough to get restocked and rearmed for a charge over the last 200 miles or so against Moscow. It failed because the secondary prongs never managed to achieve their objectives, becoming a heavy drain on men and supplies, and there were just too many divisions coming in to attack the central prong that they could never secure their positions.
I originally condemned this as Hitler losing his nerve, and a completely stupid strategy, but apparently at the time it was a fairly reasonable move, and although it's easy to condemn with the power of hindsight, the Nazi generals really didn't know how powerful Russia was: (on 8th July one Nazi general reported that of 164 known Soviet army divisions, only 46 were combat ready. By the 23rd, 93 extra divisions had sprung up from seemingly nowhere, and three weeks after that the count was at 360 combat ready divisions! Holy crap, they really didn't have a clue!)
The first time I read this book, I was so shocked at the fact that the Nazis actually got so close, and did so well in the beginning, that I think I exaggerated in my own mind how much of a chance they actually had. After all, every history documentary and book I've seen before writes off the Russian campaign as a whitewash for the Germans, that they never had a blind hope of winning it, so hearing the facts of how far they actually did advance was a bit of a shock and I think clouded my judgement a bit. Reading it again I see that the German forces really were outnumbered, and it wasn't just Hitler's actions alone that condemned a great invasion plan, but a risky invasion plan that was condemned through indecision and the unwillingness to advance and desire to be too careful: they spent too long worrying about the Soviet forces behind their lines and North and South, instead of focusing on the only ones that mattered: the forces directly between them and Moscow. During all this dicking around and indecision the Summer passed and the Russian winter set in, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Hopefully that's an accurate summation of what actually happened, but at least it's definitely more accurate than my original understanding of the campaign. Ain't history fun!
