What operation was more devastating to the German war effort, Bagration or Cobra? What Operation was more successful and which of these lead more to the end of the war against Germany?

Which is more important?

Not much of a comparison really. Perhaps a better comparison would be Bagration to the whole Normandy campaign. Both seriously eroded the German army's resources. In that respect more significantly in the East.

These figures may underline my point...

German Casualties on Eastern and Western Fronts.

Eastern Front

Month - KIA - WIA - MIA - %MIA

June - 10,629 - 41,165 - 73,723 - 58.7%
July - 30,420 - 131,732 - 238,284 - 59.5%
August - 30,636 - 152,484 - 191,557 - 51.1

Western Front

June - 4,975 - 14,631 - 15,848 - 44.7%
July - 10,839 - 38,824 - 55,135 - 52.6%
August - 7,205 - 13,605 - 127,633 - 86.0%

But then Cobra was merely the breakout phase of the Normandy campaign and was against a pretty worn down German army. As I said before it would be better to compare the Normandy Campaign to Bagration. Cobra was a small operation compared to Bagration.

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'Operation Cobra' —as stated by Red— was the phase of a campaign and 'Operation Bagration' was a whole campaign on itself. There's actually no comparisson at all between the two.

'Bagration' lasted two months, it advanced 600 km, it —along simultaneous operations in its flanks— kicked the enemy out of their territory, destroyed Army Group 'Centre', surrounded Army Group 'North' and isolated Army Group 'South' and of course, killed, fatally wounded or captured more than 500.000 enemy troops and reached the river Vistula, leaving almost no German soldiers between Warsaw and Berlin. It broke the backbone of the German Armed Forces in the east.

Of course the fact that it happened at exactly the same time than the Normandy campaign —which destroyed the German forces in the west along some 250.000 men— made 'Bagration' easier and to cause greater impact.

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I would agree with the above statements. Normandy as a whole is a much more close comparison to Bagration. I went as far as to assume you actually intended this in your poll. By that standard, they are of roughly equal importance. Both accomplished about the same end: Namely the destruction of a major portion of the German armies opposing them in both cases, the movement of the front towards Germany by a tremendous distance and, the isolation of large numbers of troops outside the battle area.

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Okay, I guess it is a popular decision (with the three people that did reply) that instead of just Operation Cobra, the entire Normandy campaign should be considered. So, I guess if you read this message before you vote, you should not just consider Cobra in the poll, but also the entire Normandy campaign.

Two polls, two bad mistakes!

On Bagration:

The heaviest tank fighting took place to the NW of Minsk. The main strength of the German 5th Panzer division, supported by Tiger tanks of sPzAbt 505, fought a costly series of battles on 1st and 2nd July against elements of Rotmistrov´s 5th Guards Tank Army. In a week of fighting , the 5th Panzer division claimed to have destroyed 295 Soviet armoured vehicles of which 128 were credited to Tigers. By July 8, the 5th Panzer Division had been reduced from 125 tanks to 18, and all ( 29 to start with ) of the Tigers had been lost.

Also the Germans were at the time of Bagration re-equipping their panzer arm, as several of the AGC´s panzer regiments were in Germany receiving new Panthers. The small number of Panther tanks was due to the higher priority that had been given to the Western Front since November 1943.

Air superiority was never in doubt during Bagration for the Soviets. Luftwaffe had only 40 fighters at the beginning of the campaign.

From Bagration 1944 by Zaloga

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Zaloga means in the operational area of Bagration, right? The Luftwaffe had a couple thousand fighter planes scattered across Europe from Norway to Odessia and from Bayonne to Lenningrad.

In terms of men & weapons elminated Bagration was more important. The Normandy campaign had a greater result in terms of economic results. The Anglo/US Armys stripped France & Belgium from Germanys war industry and place Germanys transport system within range of their shorter range medium bombers. With bases in France it was possible in the autum & winter to wreck the German transportation network the same as the French railroads & highway bridges had been wrecked the previous winter & spring.

Bagration liberated a vast agricultural region, with some industrial cities, but these were not on the same scale as in northern France and Belgium. Neither did Bagration place Soviet armys or its airforces in effective range of German industrial regions like Silesia or Bohemia. At the end of the Normandy campaign in September the Anglo/US armys were a little over 100 kilometers from the Rhine river and Ruhr industrial region. This forced the Germans to rebuild a large army in the west, allowing the Red army to make its next advance westwards. Similarly the Germans no longer had any depth to its air defense in the west. The Allied fighter secourts and medium bombers could sortie from bases just a couple hundred kilometers from the Rhine river.

Yes, Carl, I agree with your points on economical importance, and the facility it provided for the medium bombers to expand on their transportation network campaign, even if all this still took some while to organise.

Well, Bagration started from somewhat farther, didn't it? In any case, by the time Op. Bagr. reached it's objectives the Allies were still fully busy with Op. Cobra and the Falaise Pocket, so still on their way to Paris for instance (which would fall soon anyway, Aug. 25)

Well, so did Op. Bagration, it forced the Germans to remove troops from other areas in order to plug the immense void that was suddenly made between the North and South parts of the East front. Bagration started just west of Smolensk and went all the way until almost Warsaw on the Vistula, and entering Reich territory in East Prussia.

I'm not by any means denying the effects of Overlord, of course the regions liberated were of lesser industrial weight and there are also the other factors you mention, but the sheer amount of units eliminated (roughly 1/4 of the East Front manpower) that had to be made up somehow made a large dent in other parts of the front, and at the same time the Red Army was doing paralell offensives in the North and South as well, forcing the Germans out from large parts of the Baltic countries.

Elsewhere, among the effects were changes in the political and strategical outlook, as the Reichs's allies started throwing in the towel, like Romania in Aug. 23 (Ploesti kaput!) and Finland and Bulgaria 2 weeks later in Sep. 6th. (the USSR had declared war on Bulgaria on the 5th!!!). Hungary had been previously occupied so was forced to stay on.

I'm not comfortable with saying this or that operation was more important. Both Overlord and Bagration were very large operations, developed in the same timeframe, on different regions with different terrain characters. They were both important and they both were large steps to victory.

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