Who is to blame for the failure of Barbarossa ? (2)

(Copy of the “who is to blame for the failure of Barbarossa?”-thread in the WW2 general – ain’t working, let’s try it here)

Who is to blame?


The Soviet resistance.


If you just look on the German side: It's always hard to single out names, just as în success, failure is a team effort, too. So the names are more for the responsible Departments they led.

Hitler - Chief of the State
Brauchitsch - Chief of the Wehrmacht
Halder - Chief of Staff / Operational planning
Wagner/Gercke - Quartermaster / Transportation
Tippelskirch / Matzky - Ouartermaster IV (German intelligence evaluation service - eastern section)

I wonder how the blundering and overly optimistic Germans managed to get that far as they did, guess the blundering Soviets helped 'em much. Otherwise the Nazi Army wouldn't even have gotten beyond Smolensk.

Cheers,

[ 21. January 2004, 04:50 AM: Message edited by: AndyW ]

 

Hitler of course as he would not believe in the huge resources Russia could make available. I wonder if Hitler really meant by what he said to Guderian in autumn 1941 (?) " If I believed the Russians had 20,000 tanks like you said I never would have attacked Russia.." or something like that.

Then of course something that Speer noted in one of his interviews:

After Finland fought back in Winter War Hitler was confident that Russia and its army was totally obsolete and could not fight against the German army.

That would mean the the Finns are to be blamed....

After Winter War and of course the German attack on the west the Russians did start some major changes in their army and started the production of T-34 in may-june 1940.

Of course the fierce Russian resistance was one of the major factors in the war. Think about Sevastopol and many smaller forts that fought for a long time.

 

The Red Army probably had something to do with it don't you think?

- The same weather affected both sides, so let's not blame that.

- The Germans were easily the best-trained, best-led Army in the world at the time. Maybe they bit off more than they could chew?

- The Red Army didn't simply cave in like the French did.

- They had a lot of space to retreat into. The ratio of force to space was much, much smaller in the USSR theatre than in any western European campaign or the Polish campaign. There was no terrain objective that was really decisive, and even if there had been, the Germans were too muddled to concentrate on it.

- The Germans thankfully failed to bring the mass of the Red Army to battle and defeat it decisively. They tried, and won a lot of major engagements, but the Red Army had a LOT of mass. Eventually they learned to use it rather effectively.

- Contrary to much popular belief, the Red Army was rather well-equipped in most categories of weapons. Even if the T-34 and KV had not existed, the typical Soviet tanks (BT and T-26) were not grossly inferior to the most common German tanks (Pzkw-III E,F,G,H.....38t). Their artillery was at least as good if not better in most respects. However, they were terribly unprepared especially after the purges. Maintenance status was terrible. trainig standards were low in many units. Many Infantry Divisions went into combat with 0% of their artillery, for example. But there were a lot of units and most of them fought.

- At the strategic level, the Soviets early on concentrated on the essentials better than the Germans did. They were completely outclassed on the tactical and operational levels, but on the strategic level they were at least as good by 1942 and much, much better later on. On th eoperational level they eventually got as good as the Germans, although they paid a terrible price for the lesson.

- Again contrary to much popular belief, the Red Army had an advanced tactical and operational doctrine. They just couldn't execute on it in 1941 very well. By 1943-44-45 they were.

 

Everyone always misses the most important point here. The biggest blame has to go to GOD.

Rain, Snow, Mud, Fog and -20*c :
= Dead troops OR
Frozen/Dead horses = no supplies wagons pulled = dead troops. OR
The above = no fuel for vehicles = stranded troops (who will eventually freeze) OR
Frozen engines/bogged vehicles = Time gained for Soviets to regroup/rearm = Dead troops. OR
Grounded Luftwaffe = Dead troops

Ok, it wasn't always this cold, but crucial to the success of B was speed, if in Autumn and Winter the weather made it impossible to move then surely this was a huge contributing factor.

Of course Hitler didn't help much when in the above weather in Christmas 1942 he says ...
"Don't dig in for the winter ... go get 'em!!" Or something like that

[ 22. January 2004, 08:19 AM: Message edited by: BratwurstDimSum ]

 

I'll add my comments later, when I do a little re-reading...

Meanwhile, I'll comment your posts!

Exactly. Even if most units were very badly leaded, their tactics were poor, were ill-equiped and ill-trained, the ferocity and resistance of the average Russian foot soldier made the Germans pay dearly to reduce the pockets.

The German units weakened so much for this that by December most of them were 50% of their original strength. E. g. Russian soldiers didn't surrender en masse like British and French had done in the previous campaigns, but they fought fiercely to the bitter end. Russian soldiers didn't panic with Stuka's sirens and they simply stood there and shoot the plane, which cost the Luftwaffe many pilots and planes. Russian morale was never very high and never very low during those days. That's why they kept fighting.

And the casualty rate of the German Army was slightly higher than in the western campaign of 1940 and it didn't last six weeks. This explains why all units lost so many men and so much matériel...

As stated above. Not the Red Army, but the individual soldier.

Sorry, but NO. The Russians were not affected by the weather. They could deal it and were prepared for it. And actually, it helped them.

Weather, a most decisive factor:

- The snow melted very late that year and it delayed 'Barbarossa' for five crucial weeks.

- The rains in late September made the rough Russian roads a gigantic swamp in which motor vehicles, men and horses —only tanks in a very limited way— could not advance. This literary halted the advance for two weeks or more.

- The light snow in early November froze the mud and allowed the Germans to advance, but it was too late.

- And the terrible low temperatures in mid and late December cost the Germans thousands of casualties for gangrene and hypothermia.

This is not right at all. A few T-34s and KV-1s —very poorly used, by the way— didn't help the remaining 19.000 old fashioned tanks, the lacks of lorries, enough ammunition, communication devices, even horse-transports, artillery and small arms.

You contradict yourself here. How the Soviet artillery could have been good then?

The men who manned the guns were badly trained. The infantry observers were badly trained and didn't have radios nor an adequate communication system to direct fire accurately. The officers were not experienced or well-trained enough to lead those guns. There were no lorries and even horses to carry the guns and their ammunition —which by the way, was scarce in many units.

On paper! But if you don't have way to co-ordinate, lead and perform it... you DON'T have such a doctrine...

And please explain this clearly:

In October-November 1941. It was marshal Von Bock who gave complete priority to Operation 'Typhoon'. He commited all his resources for the advance, instead of building supply depots and defensive poistions for the winter.

[ 22. January 2004, 11:15 AM: Message edited by: General der Infanterie Friedrich H ]

 

I appreciate all the input gentlemen but I am affraid I am going to have to disagree with most of you. Let me rephrase my question; who is personally responsible for the German failure during the Barbarossa campaign in early summer, 1941. I do not agree that it was Russian resistance, nor was it the weather and I specificaly left Hitler and Stalin out of it due to their obvious contributions. According to Erickson, Glantz and others many of the reasons stated above were not factors. T-34s and KVs were not in great enough supply to make a difference on any front. Erickson talks repeatedly about the Germans easily crushing Soviet armoured 'divisions' and 'corps', supplied with only a handful of tanks of any kind. Some 'divisions' had less than twenty tanks among them. Other 'Tank Corps' had very little amunition and were being operated by the factory workers who assembled them. Artillery units with not one single round of ammunition, and infantry with no rifles or ammunition were also present on all fronts. As if Stalin hadnt done enough with his purges in 1939-40, he killed more 'panic mongers' and 'traitors' as Barborossa progressed. With no ammunition, no transportation, and few if any tanks front commanders were expected to stop the Germans. With what were they supposed to stop them? When leaders tried to hold a position or secure a river crossing, it was nearly always to late, for German armor had already broken deep into the rear. Every front was smashed in and back, yet the Germans failed to finish them off. I believe the Russians did little if anything (though it was not their fault) to stop the Germans. What I want to know is why the Germans failed to kill off the Russian army in the first two months of fighting against unarmed mobs, and who was at fault? They should have been able to win the war in the first months easily, before the winter set in.

 

Daniel,

It seems like if you didn't read any of the posts above.

The Russians DID resist. How do you think that the Wehrmacht suffered a million casualties during 'Barbarossa' then?

The weather was one of the main factors, since it delayed the operations many times, consuming precious time, which was the German's only alternative.

There is of course the huge factors of Hitler allowing his generals to waste time deciding the strategy to follow, the logistic chaos and the lack of intelligence reports.

No one can be blamed completely for the failure of it. Maybe Hitler for starting it, not precisely for spoiling it.

 

I don't think you can single out one or a few persons responsible for the German's "failure." Rather, it was an organizational and doctrinal failure that didn't recognize the necessity and value of a highly organized logistics system and engineering support to repair and build infrastructure as the army moved forward.
For instance, the Wehrmacht really didn't have a plan to repair, regage and/or, utilize the existing Soviet rail system (there were only 4 battalions of dedicated railway engineers for this purpose when the invasion started, same as was available in 1939). They failed to recognize differences in the Soviet system like larger water tanks on Soviet locomotives that put watering stations too far apart to easily use German locomotives even where the rail system was regaged. This is just one of a multitude of examples of how the Germans failed logistically and engineering-wise in Russia.
There was no real understanding by the Germans of what it would take to move supplies to a front moving 10's of miles a day or more and hundreds of miles from their original bases.

 

Thanks for your opinion T.A. I had read something about the rail gaga problem but had not thought about how major the potential problem could be. Friedrich I did read all the above posts, and many of your points I agree on and would argue myself, but again you mention the weather and the resistance. What I am arguing is not that the Russians did not resist, rather that according to Erickson, Glantz and House, the resistance the Russians attempted for the most part failed. They tried but failed. Of course there are few cases of very stubborn and bloody resistance but not on the whole. As I mentioned above, the campaign should have been sealed before the weather was a factor, especially in lieu of such light Russian resistance. Therefore I dont think the weather had anything to do with the German failure in the first two months of Barbarossa. The Russians and the weather played thier part in beating the Germans certainly, but it was not during June-July-August of 1941. And Finch, could you please tell me what nonsense books you have been reading on Barbarossa?

 

Spot on the logistics problem.

As T.A. already pointed out some of the logistical problems the German were facing.

I have read a couple of studies (**) dealing specifically with the German logistics and transportation and the pre-war planning of "Barbarossa" and to make a long story short:

Of course the Germans knew about the different rail gauges, the maximum distance of 300 km in which an Army can/should be supplied by motorized transportation, the needs for stops to establish a supply chain, stores etc. Of course they knew that an Army cannot (should not) operate above 100 km from the next major rail end. Of course they knew what they need during advance (fuel) and during defense (ammo). The German were no morons, they knew the ABC of logistics and what they didn’t know they learnt during Poland, Norway, France, Balkans.

This was all known, but as in almost any other aspect during the planning of “Barbarossa”, all this potential problems were not regarded to be critical. It was simply unthinkable by the German operational planning staff that logistical problems shall rule the grand operational strategy. The approach was more: Here are the operational plans, here’s the timeline, let’s get the logistics to make this happen. Many logistical concerns were de-emphasized or simply washed away: Logistics as the showstopper for Germany’s “millennium war”? No way! Once the deployment for “Barbarossa” (Operation “Otto”) during Jan.-June. 41 went superb, and even the campaign in the Balkans and the logistical efforts involved with it didn’t screw up the “Barbarossa” deployment, even the German hardcore logistical pessimists washed away most of their headaches.

Now this cumulating overly optimistic approaches, not only in logistics, but in almost every planning aspect, accumulated the entire Operation to become a highly risky gamble. Almost every aspect was seen in a “best case”-scenario, the list is endless: own manpower and material, supply, food, strength (only Soviet 213 Divisions anticipated by German intel at “Barbarossa”-Day”), motivation (“feet of clay”) of the enemy, weather. etc. pp.

The Germans knew this (see f.ex. theresults of the Paulus war game and the many operational studies who did show the difficulties and risks involved), but with the experience of the fall of France everybody’s optimistism was endless.

Following Beer (*) the major mistakes made during the planning of “Barbarossa” were the following:

1. The time between the decision to invade the USSR (July 1940) and the invasion (June 1941) was too short to get a sufficient Army and infrastructure in place.

2. Because of the campaign in the Balkans, there was no more operational time „buffer“; any unpredicted stop would led into the Rasputiza or the winter. THAT’s was what made the stubborn and unpredicted Soviet defense and counterattacks at Smolensk, Stolb'tsy, Staraia Russa, Bobruisk, Novgorod-Volynskii etc. decisive “lost victories” for the Germans. The flip side for the stiff Russian resistance was that thy got encircled in mass numbers, however they didn’t stop fighting even if encircled, delaying the German advance.
Smolensk is a very good example for stopping AGC and forcing them into defense.

Basically Germanys momentum in the Clausewitzian meaning, gained by surprise and unpreparedness of the enemy, was too weak to carry it to victory.

3. No long-term, „worst case“ planning above Autumn / winter 1941, it’s almost like no-one wanted to think in pessimist terms, asking inconvenient questions after France.

4. Miserable intelligence on the enemy and his potentials

5. Inadequate consideration of the material losses involved in a modern, large-scale war; no integrated system of armament and weaponry, no mass production of weapons and equipment

6. Underestimation of the importance of logistics

7. Insufficient mobilization of soldiers and female workforce

8. No ideological preparation of the German people due to the strict confidentiality

9. Splitting of forces.

10. Hitlers‘ harsh policy of a ruthless colonization of the countries conquered

11. No sufficient knowledge of the Russian war doctrines and war history among Hitler and his generals

12. Overestimation of the own capabilities. No critical debriefing / assessment of the Polish and French campaigns, everything was just “wonderful”.

13. Due to the “Blitzkrieg” approach (short, decisive) the German armament was „broad“ instead of „ deep“

14. No modern system to organize Army requests and supply demands until 1943

15. No optimal use of the material and personal resources within the German sphere of influence

16. missing war plan

17. Non-settled differences between OKW plans (Hitler) and OKH plans (Halder). Basically the Army Generals went into “Barbarossa” with a will to NOT act according to the planning. That’s comparable like if your wife want to have holidays to plan a vacation to go swimming on an talian beach and you want to visit Vatican City. Now you just don't tell her your own agenda but agree to buy tickets to Rome, bathing suits, T-Shirts, sunscreen, surfboard, in the hope that once you're in Italy she will accept to go to the Vatican and notto the beach. Unfortunately, your suitcase is full of shorts and bathing tools, no way to get into the vatican dressed _this_ way.

Cheers,


(*) two of the best studies:

H. Rohde: „Das deutsche Wehrmachttransportwesen im Zweiten Weltkrieg. Entstehung - Organisation - Aufgaben.“ (The German Army Transportation Service during WW II: Genesis – Organization – Tasks) in: „Beiträge zur Militär- und Kriegsgeschichte, 12“, Stuttgart 1971

K. Schüler: „Logistik im Rußlandfeldzug. Die Rolle der Eisenbahn bei Planung, Vorbereitung und Durchführung des deutschen Angriffs auf die Sowjetunion bis zur Krise vor Moskau im Winter 1941/42“ (Logistics in the Russian Campaign. The role of the Railroad in planning, preparation and execution of the German Invasion of the USSR up to the crisis in front of Moscow during winter 1941/42), Frankfurt 1987.

The only noteworthy study in English dealing with German logistics during “Barbarossa” is Martin van Crefeldt: „ Supplying War: Logistics from Wallenstein to Patton“ (Cambridge University Press, 1980).

(**) Beer, Albert: “Der Fall Barbarossa. Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der Vorbereitungen des deutschen Feldzuges gegen die Unioin der Sozialistischen Sowjetrepubliken im Jahre 1941” (Case Barbarossa: Studies of the Genesis of the preparation of the German invasion of the USSR in 1941), Diss. Münster, Eigenverlag Ellwangen 1978, 261 pages

 

Of your list, I would say that items 1, 3, 5, 6, 7, 14 and, 15 are all related to what I think of as logistical or engineering concerns. While there were many contributing factors I think this one (logistics and engineering) was the single most critical. Had the Germans had a better supply and support system they would have had more running tanks and vehicles later in late 1941 as they approached Moscow etc. They would have had more supplies at the front. Winter clothing issue would have been more possible. Far less equipment would have been lost or abandoned in poor weather conditions due to lack of transport or roads.
Essentially, good supply can make up to some extent for poor operational results. I would point to the British in North Africa as a prime example of this. They were able to maintain their army in the field and grow stronger over time dispite repeated setbacks and defeats at the hands of Rommel. Rommel's own lack of appreciation for logistics and engineering cost him in large part the campaign. The same is true in Russia.

 

T.A.

Don´t forget that even if the supply had worked better Germany had not enough reserves to send ahead. Especially this was true to tanks, whether Hitler had tanks in reserves hidden or not, but the old truth is that as Guderian required more tanks in Sept-Oct 1941, Hitler said he could only give 200 new engines to the old tanks.Nothing more.

 

Good post, T.A. I didn't know that curious detail about Russian and German locomotives.

I never said they succeeded. They lost those annihilation battles. But in the long term, to beat the Russians, the Germans lost a lot of men, equipment and time that they couldn't afford to lose.

This is absolutely wrong. If the invasion would have started on May 15th —as originally intended— the Germans would have had five weeks more of good weather. FIVE MORE CRUCIAL WEEKS! But weather did NOT allow it.

 

More assertions.

</font>

• Lack of adequate knowledge of the Soviet forces —common in every western European general staff.</font>
• Lack of OKH branches expertise on certain tactical matters. They had to be quickly created and improvised.</font>
• Non existent co-operation between OKW and OKH. The assembling of forces for ‘Barbarossa’ was entirely under the command of OKH. General Jodl wasn’t even invited to the OKH’s conferences.</font>
• Thanks to Russian geography, the 1.300 , miles front would soon expand to 2.500 miles.</font>
• 3,5 million men and half a million horses had to be supplied in an immense space with different railroad gauge and very few adequate roads.</font>
• The Wehrmacht had a severe lack of motor vehicles, replacement parts and the tank production in 1941 was never bigger than 250 a month.</font>
• The Home Army had only 500.000 men, what meant just enough reserves for a summer six-weeks campaign like France.</font>
• Lieutenant general Friedrich Paulus, chief of operations of the OKH had assembled a plan that involved three Army Groups, being the main priority the annihilation of Russian forces and the capture of Moscow. On December 1940, the OKW —generals Jodl and Warlimont— present an alternative plan giving the Baltic and the Ukraine strategic priority. Hitler’s economic aims being the most important factor in the creation of this plan. Then it was decided that the strategic priorities would be decided after Army Group ‘Centre’ had captured Smoliensk.</font>
• Delays because of weather —the invasion was to start on May 15th but that year the snow had not yet melted by mid May and the resulting floods made swamps of the roads and the ground dried only until mid June— and lack of time for appropriately equipping motorised, armoured and supply units —most of the latter had to be rapidly improvised using civil transports. And the planning for re-conversion of Russian rail gauge was going to make the advancing armies to depend on motorised supply units for the first six hundred kilometres.</font>
• Over confidence by Hitler and many generals in the outgoing of the campaign. He issued an order on July 8th 1941 for not sending any more tanks to the eastern front and reducing the number of infantry divisions. He also wanted to drive Moscow’s population out by terror bombings. Those were carried out but had very little effect.</font>
• Russian stiff resistance. Improvised and un co-ordinated counter attacks, as well as dispersion through marshes, steppes and woods made it very difficult for the German units to completely encircle and isolate them. This cost time and casualties to the Germans.</font>

 

Good post Friedrich, many points here I find are along the lines I am looking for. However, you continue to return to the damn weather. I beleive this is the third time I will say this. According to Erickson, the German armoured formations mauled the Russians so sverely, they appeared to be beyond recovery. In fact this is what Stalin's commandres told him and Stalin told Harry Hopkins in London, that they were on the verge of total annihilation. Here we go again with this weather statement. The weather was not a factor here. Later on obviously it was a major factor, but not during the period of which we are speaking(june-july of 1941). My point is the Germans should not have needed your extra 5 weeks. The campaign should have been wrapping up. The dogged resitance of which you speak was the exception rather than the rule. I dont think it was much of a factor. I do agree with you about the lack of intelligence on Soviet formations. The Germans thought that they would cut through the Russians fairly easily, and for the most part they did; but it seems one general consensus here from you guys is that the Germans had no idea exactly how much Russian mass they would have to slice through. Erickson takes note of the fact that by late July, the Germans had counted twice as many Soviet formations than thye had estimated. Once again thank you for your insight.

Daniel

 

Here's a good example of German logistics: I recently got a book (sorry, don't have it in front of me at the moment) that was an autobiography of a member of a Panzerjäger abteilung of an infantry division (the 95th I think). Anyway, when he is posted to the unit they are equipped with English Bedford 1.5 CWT trucks captured at Dunkirk. The problem is that each truck has a fuel filter in a fragile glass housing. There are no replacements if it breaks. Once broken, the truck is rendered useless. By the time the unit reaches the outskrits of Moscow in the inital advances into Russia the unit has lost most of its trucks, many for nothing more than the fuel filter housing having broken.
A more thorough logistics system could have foreseen some problems of this type and tried to find solutions. The US in North Africa found their initial 75mm AT rounds (issued with the M3 medium tanks to the British) worked poorly. Their solution was to remanufacture 100,000 captured German Pz IV 75mm AT rounds to fit the M3's 75mm gun.
Given the amount of Russian artillery the Germans ended up using they should have started manufacturing ammunition and repair parts for those guns but, instead relied on captures almost exclusively.

 

Daniel,

Five weeks more would have meant no autumn rains and no halt in October! Which means no halt in winter either! Five more weeks to clear the flank and head on to Moscow. If your whole statement is that time was not a decisive factor in 'Barbarossa' in 1941 is the same thing as saying that absolutism didn't have anything to do with the French Revolution.

And you also seem to think that Russian troops droped their weapons and surrendered en masse immediately after they were encircled. Well, that is not true. French, British, Greeks, Yugoslavs, etc. had all surrendered when they realised there was no way out of the pocket in the lightning wars of 1940 and 1941. The Russians DID NOT do that. They were so confused that they didn't know they were completely surrounded and they kept fighting for days and even weeks. Infantry divisions had to fight them. And that fighting recquired time and casualties. This is what I am stating as stiff resistance, which contributed in a big deal to German defeat.

[ 23. January 2004, 05:45 PM: Message edited by: General der Infanterie Friedrich H ]

 

like the others i'd find it hard to say someone was PERSONALLY responsible for the failure of Barbarossa (besides Hitler of course) but if you just HAD to i suppose Mussolini must take his share of the blame.. he mounted a pointless invasion of Greece and managed to let the greek army a quarter of the italians size embarrass his vaunted legions... i may be wrong but i do believe that it was because of this humiliating defeat for his ally that Hitler postponed barbarossa for a crucial couple of months while he sent the wehrmacht down to Greece to do it right.

 

Excellent point Oliphaunt. Friederich, you are hopelessly missing my point, and repeating yourself to no avail. Thanks anyway.


Daniel

 

Well, Daniel then I don't know what your point is... that weather didn't affect German operations from June to August 1941? Of course it did: sun and no rains meant that operations could be carried out without depending on weather; good roads, visibility, etc.

Hitler is the one to blame for starting it, not necessarily for screwing it.

Oliphaunt, the Balcans campaign did NOT delayed 'Barbarossa' in a very substantial way. Even without this campaign, operaataiaons