Eastern front : won from the start ?

The subject is often treated like if the eastern front had a linear story.

Indeed this is the case when we (I am included in "we") say Germany lost its war against USSR from the start.

But there are many occurences, up to Kursk un july 43, when the Red Army got spanked and suffered terrible losses (mainly failed counterstrikes) entire land or air armies were smashed, entire Fronts (more or less = army groups) almost vanished.

I'm not only talking about the firts months of Barbarossa, nor the famous Mars operation, but also the sate of the Red Army in the center zone in february 1942, depleted and exhausted, the southern and caucasian sectors in summer 1942, when land and air armies were disbanded if not decimated, what about eastern Crimea in may-june 42, the almost total destruction of the "southern" VVS over Stalingrad area in september 42 etc etc

It's easy to say now that the game was won from the begining but I think, in these circumstances, Germany might have been pretty close to have the Red Army collapse and the rushed stop gap measures dictated by Stalin and his HQ prove the situation might have looked close to desperate for USSR in several occasions.



Of course, I agree the reasons and explanations given here for the outcome of this part of WWII, but the "Germany had no way to win this war from the start, which is proven by the fact they NEVER were close to win at any moment" theory is a little disturbing.

It sounds a little like if Germany had lost against himself and forgetting a key factor : Red Army.

 

I don't think it is so easy; I think it is quite wrong and usually said by those who want to denigrate the German army, usually in a larger effort to make their own favorite Allied power seem all the more grand. "Yeah, the German army actually sucked and never had a chance of winning because the American/Canadian/British/Russian (no one ever inserts "French" here, however!) army was superior in (virtually) every way". If Germany could have taken Leningrad, Moscow and Stalingrad the Soviet Union would have been forced to either come to terms with the Germans (unlikely) or retreat behind the Urals, essentially giving the Germans the victory. And Germany came quite close to taking each of those cities. The question then becomes; what prevented the Germans from taking those three cities? The Russians did a rather poor job of defending their nation in early summer 1941 but due to the massive size of their army and general population the Russians could take an enormous amount of damage and still field a force larger than the Germans had. The great length between German soil and those Russian cities also meant that the Russians could keep retreating for a long time and still have those three strategic cities behind the front lines. The mud season which wreaked havoc on the poor Russian transportation system also bought Russia time, as did General Winter. And by the early winter the Russians were finally beginning to defend more tenaciously than before. And just in time as the Germans were reaching the outskirts of Moscow.

One of the things to remember is that Germany was a nation only half the size of the Soviet Union (in terms of population) and being pounded from the air by the Allies. Time was definitely not on the side of the Germans. Their only hope in the war against Russia was to capture those three cities as soon as possible. The longer the war dragged on the stronger the Russians would become. And that's not considering the presence of the growing Anglo-American forces in southern England just waiting to re-enter the war on the Continent.

Germany could have beaten Russia if it could have taken Leningrad, Moscow and Stalingrad quickly, basically before the winter of 1941. Even in 1942 they still had a chance. Leningrad was under siege, they were only about 100 km from Moscow, and they nearly took all of Stalingrad. But by this point they were an exhausted and depleted army. By the time the forces in front of Leningrad and Moscow would be ready to renew their offensives the Russian forces would have surpassed them. The moment was lost. Time was of the essence and the Germans lost because they couldn't finish off the Russians before the onset of winter.

 

My thoughts after reading on German economy and preparations for war in 1941 :

Germany was in no way prepared for a long war as Barbarossa begun. Instead Hitler was sending men from the army to civil life and production figures were not boosted to help the front at all. So that is the biggest reason why Germany simply could not win the war if it went on for a longer time. Everybody else was producing everything for war at the highest possible speed and Hitler just acted like everything was already won. That was a big mistake. So even if figures in 1944 for production were good for Germany they were a long way behind the enemy´s total figures.

 

Brainwashing and the feel good factor played it's role in the planning of Barbarossa a six month campaign and Hitler and Co drinking snaps in the Kremlin.

Someone forgot the size of Russia and the true logistic situation that faced them, in one respect Hitler was right to attack before the U.S.S.R caught up on the production front but Hitler forgot one thing. Stalin was a more ruthless son of a bitch and dug his heels in those dark days of 1941/42.

 

I think if Hitler ran the war on Russia a bit different he could possibly have done better.

In the 1920's there was civil war in the country and if Hitler could have gotton agents to "spin" German's being on Russian soil as liberators against Stalin and if he and not been so barbaric to the civil population but gotton some of the population to up rise against Stalin the war would go better. The Urkraine and the moslem states come to mind as good places to start a revolution aided by Germany.

 

If Hitler had took Russia seriously instead of his "they'll fall in 6 weeks" attitude. Like Kia mentioned, stepped up production before the invasion.
Motorized his Army to capture Russian troops before they escaped and before they moved their factories far out of bomber range.

Focus on either Russia or Rommel in the Middle East.....not both.

 

Now this is true. Imagine the havoc on logistics when you equip a division with commandeered civilian vehicles from occupied countries and when they break down, try to look for spares. Even prior to the outbreak of war, there was no standardization of vehicles for their motoized korps. Almost seems like Hitler was trying to reward all of his business sponsors by purchasing a little from each???????

 

The Germans...

Tactical experts, poor strategists and logistics is a dirty word.

If you consider that the invasion of such a vast country with a force built for a short war, not Total War, then it was indeed a folly from the start.

I have yet to see a convincing statement that shows Germany could have won in the East without changing the whole German premise for the invasion and the building of German Armed Forces and industry in the late 1930's. To have succeeded would have required differences that the Nazi's and their leader would never have adopted.

 

To me it seems ever since the Poland invasion the German Army lived only through winning and conquering. Thus they got more resources without which the capability of fighting a (long) war was not possible. I think even by summer 1942 the German(!) workers of the Reich were still doing one shift working system, if I recall correctly it was changed from 8 hours to 10 hours though, but just think what everyone else did since 1940 or earlier!

 

True. Like the Roman Emperors, Hitler knew that he needed the 'volk' behind him so he did little to 'inconvienence' them. This way, his war, if not popular, would not be resisted by the common man. The quick victories fed this dillusion and cost him and the people the war.

 

I agree that it would be foolish to state the war was lost from the outset. I also agree that many people assert this theory with the benefit of hindsight and a desire to make the German Army look bad. Granted it has been a bit overated by some historians, but much is being done to undermine its quality simply due to bias. There were definate obstacles that were not taken seriously or were overlooked as a whole; terrain, logistics, war production, etc. These have been mentioned above and need no further mention. However, despite these mistakes and pitfalls, I fell the Germans still came quite close to victory at several points during the war on the Eastern Front. To me this is impressive. Obviously improvising they still managed to come that close and hang around as long as they did. If it was as disastrous as many say it was, in my mind the invasion would have collapsed and limped back to Germany much sooner than 1943. It's obvious, but had anyone in the military actually been able to do thier job and plan the bloody invasion, or advise Hitler to the dangers of it, the Germans would have won quite easily. If I might add to FramerT's comment about North Africa or Russia, not both, I would sight leaving England in your rear unconquered as being a deadly mistake adding to the failure in Russia.

 

The UK was, in terms of their army, no threat to Germany, and by early 1941 even their airforce was little threat. Yes, Germany was having a tough time knocking out the RAF in southern England but this was due to the English defensive strenghts and the concomitant German weaknesses in offence over England. Most of the British planes were short range fighters that were excellent defensively but could do little to bring the war to Germany. Only after Germany turned its attention, including most of its Luftwaffe, to the east did the British get a chance to build up their air force, including heavy bombers that could start bothering Germany in a major way. But let us not forget that this recovery of British strength was due in large part to supplies coming in from Britain's allies, including the US, which was in the war by this point in all but name.

Germany launched Barbarossa with the intention of defeating Russia in a few months. The Germans never planned on waging a long, drag-out war with the Soviet Union. If the Germans knew that they weren't going to defeat the Russians quickly I doubt they would have attacked when they did. Now, Germany's failure to anticipate a long war with Russia, one they would not win very quickly in typical Blitzkrieg fashion, can certainly be held against them. The Germans figured they could leave a broken Britain in their back while attacking Russia because they figured it would only take a short while to defeat Russia, and at the conclusion of this short, victorious war they could once again swing their Luftwaffe and other forces back to face England before England could recover her strength and pose any real threat to Germany's "Fortress Europe". Only when Germany couldn't extricate itself quickly after a short victorious campaign in Russia did Britain (and the real strength behind them, the US) become a serious problem for Germany.

 

If I recall correctly Hitler assumed that as long as the USSR existed Churchill considered there was a chance of winning the war. By removing the Soviets with Barbarossa Britain would have to admit there was no chance whatsoever and would accept Hitler peace terms.

SO Hitler would get two things with Barbarossa, the lebensraum and peace in the West.

 

Good point. With the USSR in the bag Churchill's government almost certainly would have fallen. If Chamberlain couldn't survive the loss of Norway it is doubtful that the British, seeing the writing on the wall, would have kept Churchill in power for long. Not without the US already in the war on their side.

 

Maybe England only had a few planes at the time. Not the point. The point was England still lived on to fight another day, no matter what or how, it continued to do so. No matter that they were not potent, they were not defeated. Leaving a wounded but not dead enemy behind you is always a poor choice. That being the historical reality, it was a mistake. True with Russia out, Britain would have had no real choice but to relent. However, in my mind, the reverse would also have been true. Had Britain been knocked out of the war, the United States would not have dared to interfere in a continental conflict and left Russia alone to face Germany. That removes the British military and lend-lease threats, as well as the American military threat, and it also frees up German divisions (perhaps not many) to be sent to the Eastern Front. With the extra focus, resources and men, perhaps it would have been easier for the Germans to accomplish thier goal of a quick victory over the Russians.

 

Agreed, knowing what know about how things ultimately fell out it was a mistake. However, if Germany had conquered Moscow and Leningrad in 1941, essentially forcing the Soviet Union beyond the Urals, Hitler's gamble would have been seen as not only acceptable but inspired. Only when Russia wasn't knocked out quickly did Britain come to be more than a nuisance.

Except that the Germans were woefully inadequate to the task of conquering Britain. Their Luftwaffe couldn't defeat the RAF and the German navy stood no chance against the British navy. Germany was militarily strong but their strength was weighted heavily towards the army. Germany was a continental superpower but had little hope of fighting across ocean boundaries. Germany did have a chance of conquering Russia, and however small this chance was it was much larger than its chance of conquering Britain.

 

Let's say that Germany did knock Russia out of the war early, while Britain, as it has been said, was still in a tenuous position with few planes and what not. Could not the Germans have shifted much of thier production to meet the new strategic reality? For example, manufacture more planes and finish off what was left of the RAF?

 

That seems to have been the big picture that Hitler was looking at. With Russia out of the war either Britain would realize they wer doomed and finally come to an arrangement with Germany or Germany could, at its leisure, revamp its military to overwhelm the RAF and continue where they had left off in late 1940. Of course, this ignores the fact that the US would have gotten more and more interested in supporting the British as time wore on. How it ultimately would have ended? Who knows. But I do believe that this is how Hitler saw the future and why he believed that Barbarossa was his best strategic decision.

 

Im not so sure this is the case..... While England's biggest allie was and is the Channel, the country itself is smaller then Germany with a smaller population and a smaller industrial might not to mention that Great Britain depended more on other countries for help ( the U.S. ) which gave it if you may, a chink in its armor which the Germans exploited.

Russia on the other hand, is about 20 times the size of Germany with 11 times zones and a population more the triple the amount not to mention almost an infinite amount of resources and industrial might ( if needed ) which made Russia much less reliant on other powers.....

If Germany was stretched to its limit at Moscow, how would they capture the other 3/4's of the country??

 

I don't think it was the objective of Hitler or the General Staff to occupy the entirety of Russian territory, but rather to force a capitulation of the government. Once this had taken place they would require terms that allowed them access to western Soviet holdings (the Lebensraum so often mentioned). The Germans were not foolish enough to attempt to quite literally occupy Russia as a whole. Hence, the early war saying 'kick in the door and the whole rotten structure will come crashing down.'