Stalingrad 1942–43 (2): The Fight for the City (Campaign)

97 Pages·2021·21.165 MB·English

by  Robert Forczyk

STALINGRAD
1942–43 (2)
The Fight for the City
ROBERT FORCZYK ILLUSTRATED BY STEVE NOON
CAMPAIGN 368
STALINGRAD 1942–43 (2)
The Fight for the City
ROBERT FORCZYK ILLUSTRATED BY STEVE NOON
Series editor Nikolai Bogdanovic
CONTENTS
ORIGINS OF THE CAMPAIGN 5
CHRONOLOGY 8
OPPOSING COMMANDERS 9
Axis Soviet
n
OPPOSING FORCES 13
Axis Soviet Order of battle, 1 September 1942
n n
OPPOSING PLANS 24
Axis Soviet Terrain and weather factors
n n
THE BATTLE OF STALINGRAD 29
The battle begins, 3–12 September 1942 6.Armee advances into Stalingrad, 13–17 September 1942
n
Slugging it out, 18–22 September 1942 Once more into the breach, 23–30 September 1942
n
Autumn stalemate, 1–11 October 1942 Seeking a decision, 12–30 October 1942
n
Staring into the abyss, 1–18 November 1942
ANALYSIS 88
THE BATTLEFIELD TODAY 92
FURTHER READING 94
INDEX 95
Situation map, 1 September 1942
X
X
N XX XX
X 1
XX X XX 5
agloV XX XX
X
South-Eastern XXXX gradXX Volga 57
XXXXX Stalingrad XXXX 4XXXX 1 Gds Kotuban 3607616XXX389V295XXX71LI6224 Stalin14XXX29XX 64297 XXX371 2 XXX1TingutaVI XXXX 4 4
Frolovo X 384 305 XXX VIIIXI Karpovka XXXXVIII IV
XXX 21 Kremenskaya 37610044XXX XI XXXX 6 Kalach Mainsupplybase
aya on
Serafimovich 113 Kletsk urovikino Chir Stati noD
S
22 XXX
9
XXX 7 XVII
X
3
6
Celere Sforzesca 298 Chir ozovsk
or
M
bio XXX
u
Pas XV
X
X
ps
Cor
noD XXX62X XXXX et Infantry/Rifle Division Cavalry Division Panzer Division/Tank Italian RomanianFront line 25 miles 25km
XXI 8 ovo Sovi
Miller Axis 0 0
ORIGINS OF THE CAMPAIGN
When Adolf Hitler talked of obtaining Lebensraum (living room) in the
East back in the 1930s, he never expected that one day the fate of his
Third Reich would be determined by a six-month-long urban battle in the
ruins of a bombed-out city on the Volga, deep in the Soviet heartland.
Instead, Hitler always envisioned that the inevitable clash between his
expansionist Germany and the Soviet Union would be decided in a single,
short, brutal campaign. However his vision – which evolved into Operation
Barbarossa in June 1941 – failed to knock out the Soviet Union in a single
campaign. Indeed, the Soviet Winter Counter-Offensive in 1941/42 drove
the Wehrmacht back in places and shattered the myth of the Wehrmacht’s
invincibility. Consequently, Hitler was obliged to mount another major
offensive in the East in the summer of 1942, known as Fall Blau (Case
Blue). The objectives for the new summer offensive were spelled out
in Führer Directive No. 41, issued on 5 April 1942. Heeresgruppe Süd
would conduct the main effort, aiming to occupy the Soviet oilfields in
the Caucasus, while a supporting effort was made by pushing towards
Stalingrad on the Volga. If the plan succeeded, Germany would gain access
to the Caucasus oilfields, while the Soviet war effort would be handicapped
by the loss of roughly two-thirds of its oil supplies. The loss of industrial
facilities in Stalingrad would also reduce Soviet armaments production, as
well as severing river traffic on the Volga. From the German point of view,
Fall Blau was an efficient plan that could achieve real progress toward the
Endsieg (final victory).
Fall Blau began on 28 June 1942, with the northern wing of Heeresgruppe
Süd (General der Panzertruppe Friedrich Paulus’ 6.Armee and Generaloberst
Hermann Hoth’s 4.Panzer-Armee) attacking the boundary between the
Soviet Bryansk and South-Western fronts. In just a week, Hoth’s Panzers
split the Soviet front wide open and succeeded in capturing Voronezh on
6 July. Soviet counter-attacks, which included the 5th Tank Army, were
repulsed with heavy losses. For once, Stalin listened to his military advisors
and allowed threatened armies to retreat rather than be surrounded by the
German pincers, which reduced the scale of the initial German victory.
On 9 July, the northern wing of Heeresgruppe Süd was redesignated as
Heeresgruppe B, while the southern wing, which was advancing upon
Rostov, was renamed Heeresgruppe A. The Soviets also regrouped,
redesignating remnants of the South-Western Front as the Stalingrad Front
and transferring three reserve armies from Stavka’s reserve (RVGK) to create
a new line west of the Don.
5
Barge traffic on the Volga
River prior to the German
invasion. Stalingrad was an
important strategic objective,
due not only to its armaments
industry, but its utility as a
trans-shipment centre for
movement of bulk petroleum
from the Caucasus oilfields
into the interior of the USSR.
The loss of Stalingrad would
be a key blow to the Soviet war
economy. (Author)
Soviet prisoners captured
near the Don sit in the steppe
grass near a platoon of PzKpfw
II light tanks, mid-August
1942. In the opening stages
of Case Blue, the 6.Armee and
4.Panzer-Armee were able
to advance to the Don and
smash Soviet forces west of
the river. However, the Red
Army was able to delay the
invaders enough to disrupt
their operational timetable
and prevent them from
seizing Stalingrad in a coup de
Although the German pursuit of the retreating Soviet armies was
main. (Süddeutsche Zeitung,
Bild 00110828) hindered by fuel shortages and periods of rainy weather, 6.Armee was
able to breach the new Soviet line west of the
Don on 24 July. In response, Stalin authorized
the Stalingrad Front to prematurely release its
armoured reserves – including the 1st and 4th
Tank armies – into an ad-hoc counter-offensive
to stop the German advance upon Stalingrad.
For 12 days, a major tank battle ensued in the
Don Bend; the Germans were seriously stressed
but succeeded in fending off one Soviet attack
after another. The Luftwaffe also played a major
role in defeating the Soviet counter-offensive.
Having exhausted their armoured reserves,
the Stalingrad Front was unable to stop the
German attack which began on 7 August, and
proceeded to encircle and annihilate the bulk
of the 62nd Army in a pocket west of the Don.
As the situation deteriorated, Stalin sent one
of his favourites – General-polkovnik Andrei I.
Eremenko – to take charge at Stalingrad, but it
was too late. Hoth’s 4.Panzer-Armee had already
crossed the Don and was approaching Stalingrad
from the south-west, opposed only by the left
wing of the 64th Army. Paulus followed up his
victory in the Don Bend by crossing the Don on
17 August. Eremenko was faced with crisis in all
6
sectors of his front and forced to try to create new defensive lines with bits
and pieces of broken units.
The situation became even more desperate for the Soviets on 23
August, when XIV.Panzer-Korps broke out of the Vertyachii bridgehead
and pushed forward to the Volga. German troops were now in the north-
west suburbs of Stalingrad and the Luftwaffe conducted massive raids
on the city, setting large areas ablaze and killing thousands of civilians.
The only factor which saved Stalingrad at this point was that XIV.Panzer-
Korps was nearly out of fuel and isolated by Soviet counter-attacks; it
took 6.Armee a week to rescue its armoured vanguard and to expand
its position across the Don. However, the situation again altered for the
worse, when Hoth succeeded in breaking through the 64th Army in the
south on 29 August, forcing Eremenko to pull his forces back before they
were surrounded. Paulus and Hoth could now move to begin their direct
assault upon Stalingrad.
This is the second volume in a trilogy that will cover the entire Stalingrad
campaign from June 1942 until February 1943. Volume 1 covered Fall
Blau and the German advance to the Volga, the period from 28 June to
A German MG34 machine-
1 September 1942. This second volume covers the fighting in and around
gun position overlooking the
Stalingrad in September–November 1942, while Volume 3 will cover Volga. Once 6.Armee reached
the Soviet counter-offensive, from November 1942 to February 1943. the Volga in August 1942, the
Operations in the Caucasus, already covered in Osprey Campaign No. campaign appeared to be
nearly over. In fact, it was just
281, The Caucasus 1942–43: Kleist’s Race for Oil, will only be discussed in
beginning. (Nik Cornish @ www.
passing in this trilogy. stavka.org.uk)
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CHRONOLOGY
1942
31 August The 62nd Army retreats into Stalingrad’s inner perimeter.
3–5 September Second Soviet Kotluban Offensive fails.
7 September The Germans capture Gumrak Airfield.
9 September General-leytenant Anton I. Lopatin replaced by General-leytenant
Vasily I. Chuikov as commander of 62nd Army.
13 September The Germans begin their assault into the city of Stalingrad.
14 September The 71.Infanterie-Division reaches the Volga.
15 September The LI.Armee-Korps occupies the crest of the Mamaev Kurgan.
18 September Third Soviet Kotluban Offensive.
22 September The Grain Elevator is captured.
27 September Second major German attack in Stalingrad begins.
28 September Stalingrad Front is redesignated as the Don Front, under General-
leytenant Konstantin K. Rokossovsky. Eremenko’s South-Eastern
Front is redesignated as the new Stalingrad Front.
14 October Hitler orders all offensive operations on the Eastern Front suspended,
except for Stalingrad and the Caucasus. Kampfgruppe Jaenecke
launches a major assault against the northern factory district.
15 October The Stalingrad Tractor Factory (STZ) is captured.
20 October First snowfall in Stalingrad; Fourth Kotluban Offensive begins.
23 October LI.Armee-Korps launches new offensive towards the Krasny Oktyabr
(Red October) Steel Plant.
29 October The Barrikady Factory is captured.
11 November Operation Hubertus begins.
8
OPPOSING COMMANDERS
AXIS
Generaloberst Maximilian von Weichs (1881–1954) became commander of
Heeresgruppe B after Generalfeldmarschall Fedor von Bock was sacked in
July 1942. As army group commander, von Weichs had to be concerned
about a front that extended from Voronezh all the way out to the Volga,
as well as dealing with subordinate Hungarian, Italian and Romanian
armies. Although von Weichs had little direct influence on the positional
battle at Stalingrad, he did determine resource priorities for supplies and
replacements, which shaped 6.Armee’s ability to conduct a protracted urban
battle on the distant Volga.
General der Panzertruppe Friedrich Paulus (1890–1957) became
commander of 6.Armee in January 1942. Paulus had made his reputation
in the Heer (Army) as a diligent, hard-working staff officer, not as a field
commander. Indeed, Paulus’ prior command experience was negligible – he
had never commanded a division or corps. Although Paulus was involved
in the planning of Barbarossa, he did not participate in the operation and
lacked direct experience of fighting the Red Army. During the Battle of General der Panzertruppe
Kharkov in May 1942, Paulus turned in a mediocre command performance Friedrich Paulus, commander
of 6.Armee, observing the early
and von Bock judged him to be indecisive in moments of crisis. Given the
attacks into Stalingrad. (Nik
Wehrmacht’s reputation for competent battlefield leadership, it is indicative Cornish@ w ww.stavka.org.uk)
of the Ostheer’s dire shortage of
command cadre that Paulus was not
replaced prior to Fall Blau. During the
initial phase of Blau, Paulus turned in
another mediocre performance and
demonstrated difficulty in establishing
priorities. Although Paulus was capable
of conducting a methodical set-piece
battle, he lacked the decisiveness or
aggressiveness that was required to
lead a major offensive.
Generaloberst Wolfram Freiherr von
Richthofen (1895–1945) commanded
the Luftwaffe’s Luftflotte 4 from 4
July 1942. Von Richthofen, a Prussian
aristocrat, was a World War I ace and
9
cousin of the famous ‘Red Baron’. Hermann
Göring brought von Richthofen into the Luftwaffe
in 1933 and he served with Legion Condor in
Spain in 1937, where he began to experiment
with close air support tactics. After the 1939
Polish Campaign, von Richthofen’s command
was redesignated as VIII.Fliegerkorps, which he
led in the Western campaign and Barbarossa.
Von Richthofen developed his command into the
premier close air support force in the Luftwaffe
and was consistently used to reinforce the main
effort in every German offensive. Von Richthofen
was an aggressive commander, who was not shy
in inserting himself into decisions concerning
ground battles, as well. At Stalingrad, von
Richthofen constantly criticized the lack of rapid
progress on the ground – sentiments he shared
with Hitler.
General der Artillerie Walter von Seydlitz-
Kurzbach (1888–1976) became commander
of LI.Armee-Korps in May 1942. Seydlitz was
descended from an illustrious Prussian military
family and began his own career as an artillery
officer in 1910. He saw considerable front-line
service in World War I and was retained in the
post-war Reichswehr. However, Seydlitz was not
General der Artillerie Walter von sympathetic to the Nazi regime and his career progression was noticeably
Seydlitz-Kurzbach, commander slower than some of his peers. In March 1940, Seydlitz was given command
of LI.Armee-Korps. Seydlitz of 12.Infanterie-Division, which he led in the French campaign and Operation
was the tactical commander
Barbarossa. Seydlitz’s division was part of the German II.Armee-Korps
for most of the fighting in the
city. (Author) which was surrounded at Demyansk in January 1942. Seydlitz was chosen
to lead the relief operation and became a national hero when it succeeded in
April. Awarded the Oak Leaves to his Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes for
this victory, Seydlitz was given his own corps in 6.Armee. During the initial
stages of Fall Blau, Seydlitz’s LI.Armee-Korps had performed well and great
things were expected of him at Stalingrad.
Generalleutnant Hans-Valentin Hube (1890–1944) took command
of XIV.Panzer-Korps on 15 September 1942 after General der Infanterie
Gustav von Wietersheim was relieved of command. During World War I,
Hube had served as a junior infantry officer on the Western Front and he
was badly wounded in September 1914, resulting in the amputation of his
left arm. Returning to service in 1915, Hube served as an infantry company
OPPOSITE
General-leytenant Vasily I. commander in the Battle of the Somme and then as a battalion commander
Chuikov, commander of the in the Battle of Cambrai. After World War I, Hube was retained in the
62nd Army. Chuikov was
Reichswehr, serving in infantry training roles. In the early years of World
lionized as the defender
War II, Hube commanded an infantry division in the French campaign, then
of Stalingrad, but rather
than tactical brilliance, his 16.Panzer-Division in Barbarossa in 1941. Hube proved to be an extremely
main contribution was a aggressive commander and his division was the first to reach the Volga in
willingness to engage in meat- August 1942. In addition, Hube was a very ‘hands-on’ soldier – in contrast
grinder battles of attrition
to many of the other German commanders – and lived and fought under the
that exhausted the German
attackers. (Author) same conditions as his troops.
10