Asia 1945

United States - 1944

Japs Threaten Hawaii!

7 December 1942 - With American naval forces shattered, the Japanese have cruised through the Pacific on a rampage and are now returning to finish what they started at Pearl Harbor. From bases on the Palmyra Atoll and Johnston Island, the Imperial navy and air forces have been sending sorties time and again to harass Oahu in what appears to be a prelude to invasion. Supplies have already been virtually cut off by Yamamoto's battleships with only the smallest percentage sneaking through.

The nation's nightmares have been realized with the Japs poised to invade American soil. Many point to Midway as the hinge upon which history has taken this dark turn. With American naval power crippled in the battle, no one could stand against Japanese encroachment. Just three weeks after Midway, Dutch Harbor was invaded by Imperial forces and occupied. Through an island hopping campaign, the Japanese seized Guadalcanal virtually unopposed and continued through Espiritu Santo, New Caledonia, Fiji, Tonga, and Samoa. It has only been in the past month that the Japanese turned north in an assault on Canton and Phoenix islands before their invasion of Palmyra. Contact with Australia has been cut off leading to fears for the future of seven million lives.

This comes on the tails of a Nazi invasion in Labrador where German beachheads get stronger everyday. How long before they drive south to our borders?

President Dewey went on record in a speech to Congress: "America is facing her greatest test. The armies of darkness are closing in to smother the last glimmer of democracy in the world. Though we face anihilation, America will survive. We must be brave, be vigilant, and fight not only for ourselves but for the salvation of the world. We cannot, must not fail or else the world itself shall be lost."

Many wonder what the president will fight with. With rearmament barely two years old, already bottlenecks have stifled lines of production. After the loss at Midway, Congress pressed the Dewey to increase the Army to 100 divisions, robbing expanding industry of manpower and trashing schedules slowing down our military growth. With Hitler on our doorstep, the need for men at the borders is greater than ever yet production has only recently been streamlined and fear runs through the nation that we may be too late to stave off the Devil and his forces.

SOURCE: Courier-Journal

The Battle of Midway

Prelude to Battle
Yamamoto is uncertain if American forces are taking the bait as he and his naval forces make way for Midway. This would change following Operation K. A night reconnaissance of Pearl Harbor by Kawanishi flying boats from Kwajalein on March 31, 1942 find no American carriers, confirming for the Yamamoto that the American Admiral Chester Nimitz was trying to counter his moves as the Japanese closed on Midway.

The Opening Phase of Midway
Yamamoto set a submarine picket line between Hawaii and Midway. These forces would catch a glimpse of Rear Admiral Raymond Spruance’s carriers moving towards the battle area on April 2 providing early warning of the American approach. Admiral Nagumo responds by having all his escort craft float planes in the air before dawn searching determinedly for the enemy; his air groups would be primed on deck, ready to strike at the first opportunity.

Alerted to America’s readiness to meet him at the outset, Nagumo is poised to unleash his veteran flight leaders to seek out the enemy fleet and destroy it. Not long after dawn on April 4, a contact report comes in: The Americans were sighted-one carrier and escorts. With full concurrence of his air staff, although at extreme range, Nagumo immediately gave the order to launch against the Americans, identified as the Enterprise. Balanced attack groups of Val bombers and Kate torpedo bombers, flown by magnificent air crews, and escorted all the way to their targets by half of Nagumo’s Zero fighters, bear down on Spruance. The Japanese carriers, ready for an American counterattack, spot their fighters on deck, as the armoires prepare Nagumo’s planes for a second strike.

A report locating Nagumo’s force from a Midway-based PBY Catalina flying boat comes in just as Task Force 16’s radar picks up what may be incoming Japanese planes. Spruance, himself expecting and seeking contact, launches his own strike at this target. Ray Spruance does this despite the position of the enemy fleet being beyond the round-trip range of many American aircraft; he will attempt to close the distance on their return trip, he tells them, knowing that many will have no chance to make it back. The fighters of TF-16’s Combat Air Patrol, those not sent as escorts on the attack, meet the incoming enemy courageously, but they are knocked aside as Japanese Zeroes engage them aggressively, downing many using their superior maneuverability to screen the Americans from the slower bombers. Few of the attacking bombers are turned aside before they reach the frantically turning American flattops. Within ten minutes, despite the desperate efforts of every antiaircraft gunner in the fleet, torpedoes have rammed home on both beams of the Enterprise. The carrier is ablaze from several large holes on her flight deck. TF-16 is out of action; losses among the attackers are moderate. Heroic attacks and frantic actions still lie ahead.
Even as Ray Spruance transfers his flag from Enterprise while her captain tries desperately to save his ship, the planes of TF-16 are intercepted by a swarm of Japanese fighters as they approach Nagumo’s carrier force. With great courage, most attempt to press home their attacks, but the slow-moving torpedo bombers are slaughtered; the dive-bombers are picked up by more Zeroes, waiting for them on high, which pursue them down their less-than-perfect bombing paths with murderous persistence; all this occurs while the ships of Nagumo’s force are throwing up a curtain of ack-ack, maneuvering skillfully to avoid their attackers. As at Coral Sea, American bombers inflict severe damage on a Japanese carrier, Kaga, but fail to finish her. With their own mother ships devastated, these pilots won’t get a second chance.

The Second Phase
Rear Admiral Frank Jack Fletcher and the Yorktown, core of TF-17, learn of the sighting of Japanese carriers and want to join the action, but he is not yet close enough to participate. His planes ready to go, and making flank speed to the west, he then gets the terrible news from Spruance of his ship’s condition.

Jack Fletcher knows that Vice Admiral “Bull” Halsey would have hurled himself into battle, but he is not “Bull” Halsey, likely to act before considering all the ramifications; nor can he easily abandon Spruance to an unanswered second strike from Nagumo. It is still midmorning. Fletcher believes he has escaped detection and can get a blow in before the enemy finds him, evening up the score. Fletcher makes the decision to sail west, rather than turn back for Pearl, hoping to narrow the range on Nagumo. A scout plane from the Japanese cruiser Tone, on its homeward leg, detects him. Fletcher launches Yorktown’s planes when he gets reports of “enemy carriers,” perhaps to catch Nagumo recovering his aircraft. America’s last hope make their way to Mobile Force’s previous location, but can only find a crippled Kaga limping westward, escorted by two destroyers. Despite searching frantically for Nagumo’s ships, which have made a sharp turn to the north to recover, they can find no fresh targets. The flight groups from Yorktown overwhelm the damaged Japanese carrier, dispatching her and one of her escorts in frustration.
While the American aircrews are pounding Kaga, Fletcher’s flagship becomes the target of a ferocious attack in turn. Nagumo’s other three carriers, having recovered their planes at the prearranged rendezvous to the north, launch their second strike against Yorktown, stalked by several floatplanes; she is a smoldering hulk by nightfall. Fletcher’s planes are lost when they return to the site, though some of the aircrews who can make it back to all that remains of TF-17 are able to splash nearby. In a single day, Yorktown has been wrecked and scuttled by the same crew who had seen her saved just a few days before, while Enterprise, trying to make it home, the fires put out but her flight deck ruined, becomes an easy target for one of Japan’s submarines, just as Lexington had been at Coral Sea; torpedoed, she sinks near dawn the next day, the fifth of April. The Japanese navy’s surface units close in for night action to pick off any damaged vessels and American survivors of lost ships and ditched planes bobbing about in the water. Over the next few days, Japanese destroyers find many survivors, Americans and Japanese, though there is little joy for the prisoners, who find their rescuers interested only in what information they can provide about the defenses of Midway and Hawaii before they are killed. The loss has stripped America’s naval air corps of its core of fine pilots and experienced aircrews, while possession of this “ocean battlefield” means many downed Japanese airmen will fly again.

Midway Island in range, Nagumo’s planes from the Mobile Fleet reduce the island’s airbase to rubble, its aircraft burned or expended in futile efforts to sink fast ships at sea. Midway is then pummeled by the big guns of the Support Group’s cruisers and then even the Main Force battleships under Admiral Yamamoto himself, hurling 16 and 18.1 inch shells against coral. The American garrison, even reinforced as it is, can hardly resist for long unsupported, once Japanese troops are ashore. It proves a bloody affair and a formidable warning for Japan of the dangers inherent in making opposed landings against the U.S. Marines in base-defense mode; the garrison adds “Midway” to the name of “The Alamo,” “Wake,” and “Bataan” in America’s hagiography of last stands.

Admiral Chester Nimitz finds himself with just a single carrier in the Pacific: Saratoga, just in from San Diego. Halsey wants to steam off directly toward the enemy, “catch ‘em gloating,” as he puts it, but Nimitz is aware that the strategic defense he had planned has been ruined by his own impetuosity. He had gone on a hunch, but it was a very thin strand that had held it all together. There never seemed to be any consideration of whether the Japanese might have guessed his plans. Most of the fleet had been risked and now it was gone. How could expert strategic intelligence have produced such a catastrophic defeat? How could he have guessed right and still be defeated?

SOURCE: Dietrich, Robert Point Luck: The American Tragedy of Midway

The Battle of Midway: Planning Stage

The Battle of Midway was a major naval battle in the Pacific War. It took place from April 4, 1942 to April 7, 1942, approximately one month after the Battle of the Coral Sea, five months after the Japanese capture of Wake Island, and exactly six months to the day after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.

The Japanese plan of attack was to lure America's remaining carriers into a trap and sink them. The Japanese also intended to occupy Midway Atoll to extend Japan's defensive perimeter farther from its home islands. This operation was preparatory for further attacks against Fiji and Samoa, and Hawaii.

The Midway operation was aimed at the elimination of the United States as a strategic Pacific power, thereby giving Japan a free hand in establishing its Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. It was also hoped another defeat would force the U.S. to negotiate an end to the Pacific War with conditions favorable for Japan.

Japan had been highly successful in rapidly securing its initial war goals, including the takeover of the Philippines, capture of Malaya and Singapore, and securing vital resource areas in Java, Borneo, and other islands of the Dutch East Indies. As such, preliminary planning for a second phase of operations commenced as early as November 1941. However, because of strategic differences between the Imperial Army and Imperial Navy, as well as infighting between the Navy's GHQ and Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto’s Combined Fleet, the formulation of effective strategy was hampered, and the follow-up strategy was not finalized until February 1942. Admiral Yamamoto succeeded in winning a bureaucratic struggle placing his operational concept — further operations in the Central Pacific — ahead of other contending plans. These included operations either directly or indirectly aimed at Australia and into the Indian Ocean. In the end, Yamamoto's barely-veiled threat to resign unless he got his way succeeded in carrying his agenda forward.

Yamamoto's primary strategic concern was the elimination of America's remaining carrier forces. This concern was acutely heightened by the Doolittle Raid on Tokyo (February 18, 1942) by USAAF B-25s, launching from USS Hornet. The raid, while militarily insignificant, was a severe psychological shock to the Japanese and proved the existence of a gap in the defenses around the Japanese home islands. Sinking America's aircraft carriers and seizing Midway, the only strategic island besides Hawaii in the East Pacific, was seen as the only means of nullifying this threat. Yamamoto reasoned an operation against the main carrier base at Pearl Harbor would induce the U.S. forces to fight. However, given the strength of American land-based air-power on Hawaii, he judged the powerful American base could not be attacked directly. Instead, he selected Midway, at the extreme northwest end of the Hawaiian Island chain, some 1,300 miles (2,100 km) from Oahu. Midway was not especially important in the larger scheme of Japan's intentions; however, the Japanese felt the Americans would consider Midway a vital outpost of Pearl Harbor and would therefore strongly defend it.

Yamamoto's Plan
Typical of Japanese naval planning during the Second World War, Yamamoto's battle plan was quite complex. Additionally, his designs were predicated on optimistic intelligence information suggesting USS Enterprise and USS Hornet, forming Task Force 16, were the only carriers available to the U.S. Pacific Fleet at the time. USS Lexington had been sunk and USS Yorktown severely damaged (and IJN believed her sunk) at the Battle of the Coral Sea just a month earlier. Likewise, the Japanese were aware USS Saratoga was undergoing repairs on the West Coast after taking torpedo damage from a submarine. As such, the Japanese believed they faced at most two American fleet carriers at the point of contact.

More important, however, was Yamamoto's belief the Americans had been demoralized by their frequent defeats during the preceding six months. Yamamoto felt deception would be required to lure the U.S. Fleet into a fatally compromising situation. To this end, he dispersed his forces so their full extent (particularly his battleships) would be unlikely to be discovered by the Americans prior to battle. However, his emphasis on dispersal meant none of his formations were mutually supporting.

Critically, Yamamoto's supporting battleships and cruisers would trail Vice-Admiral Chuichi Nagumo's carrier striking force by several hundred miles. Japan's heavy surface forces were intended to destroy whatever part of the U.S. Fleet might come to Midway's relief, once Nagumo's carriers had weakened them sufficiently for a daylight gun duel to be fought; this was typical of the battle doctrine of most major navies.

Also, Japanese operations aimed at the Aleutian Islands (Operation AL). However, a one-day delay in the sailing of Nagumo's task force had the effect of initiating Operation AL a day before its counterpart.

Prelude to Battle
U.S. Forces
In order to do battle with an enemy force anticipated to be composed of 4 or 5 carriers, Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, Commander in Chief, Pacific Ocean Areas, needed every available U.S. flight deck. He already had Vice Admiral William Halsey's two-carrier (Enterprise and Hornet) task force at hand; Halsey was stricken with psoriasis and was replaced by Rear Admiral Raymond A. Spruance (Halsey's escort commander). Nimitz also hurriedly called back Rear Admiral Frank Jack Fletcher's task force from the South West Pacific Area. He reached Pearl Harbor just in time to provision and sail. Saratoga was still under repair, and Yorktown had been severely damaged at the Battle of the Coral Sea, but Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard worked around the clock to patch up the carrier. Though several months of repairs at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard was estimated for Yorktown, 72 hours was enough to restore her to a battle-worthy (if still not structurally ideal) state. Her flight deck was patched, whole sections of internal frames were cut out and replaced, and several new squadrons (drawn from the Saratoga) were put aboard. Nimitz showed disregard for established procedure in getting his third and last available carrier ready for battle — repairs continued even as Yorktown sortied, with work crews from the repair ship USS Vestal—herself damaged in the attack on Pearl Harbor six months earlier—still aboard. Just three days after putting into drydock at Pearl Harbor, Yorktown was again under steam.

Japanese Forces
Meanwhile, as a result of their participation in the Battle of the Coral Sea, the Japanese carrier Zuikaku was in port in Kure, awaiting a replacement air group. The heavily damaged Shōkaku was under repair from three bomb hits suffered at Coral Sea, and required months in drydock. Despite the likely availability of sufficient aircraft between the two ships to re-equip Zuikaku with a composite air group, the Japanese made no serious attempt to get her into the forthcoming battle. Consequently, instead of bringing five intact fleet carriers into battle, Admiral Nagumo would only have four: Kaga, with Akagi, forming Division 1; Hiryū and Sōryū, as the 2nd Division. At least part of this was a product of fatigue; Japanese carriers had been constantly on operations since October 7, 1941, including pinprick raids on Darwin and Colombo.

Japanese strategic scouting arrangements prior to the battle also fell into disarray. A picket line of Japanese submarines was late getting into position (partly because of Yamamoto's haste), which let the American carriers proceed to their assembly point northeast of Midway (known as "Point Luck") without being detected. A second attempt to use four-engine reconnaissance flying boats to scout Pearl Harbor prior to the battle (and thereby detect the absence or presence of the American carriers), known as "Operation K", was also thwarted when Japanese submarines assigned to refuel the search aircraft discovered the intended refueling point — a hitherto deserted bay off French Frigate Shoals — was occupied by American warships (because the Japanese had carried out an identical mission in January). Thus, Japan was deprived of any knowledge concerning the movements of the American carriers immediately before the battle.

Japanese radio intercepts also noticed an increase in both American submarine activity and U.S. message traffic. This information was in Yamamoto's hands prior to the battle. However, Japanese plans were not changed in reaction to this; Yamamoto, at sea in Yamato, did not dare inform Nagumo without exposing his position, and presumed (incorrectly) Nagumo had received the same signal from Tokyo.

Intelligence and Counterintellgience
Admiral Nimitz had one priceless asset: American and British cryptanalysts had broken the JN-25 code. Commander Joseph J. Rochefort and his team at HYPO were able to confirm Midway as the target of the impending Japanese strike and to determine the date of the attack as either 4 or 5 April (as opposed to mid-April, maintained by Washington).

This was not accomplished without ingenuity on the Navy's part. They had only cracked 10% of the Japanese code and had to rely heavily on hunches and guesses to determine Japanese plans. When knowledge of a Japanese offensive aimed at some point in the Pacific became known, AF, the Naval cryptographers nailed down a potential list and began openly broadcasting the status of these "candidates" to see the Japanese response. For Midway, a broadcast of the island "being short of water" was sent over the airwaves. Midway was later confirmed as point AF when the Japanese broadcast that "AF was short of water".

This "intelligence" had not been discovered by sheer American and British skill and luck. A Japanese sailor, Ryu Hayabusa, was responsible for transcribing American radio messages the day the broadcast of Midway's water problem was received. After copying the message down, something gnawed at him. The content of the message and the way it was received did not quite fit. Hayabusa turned to his superior and asked, "Why are they broadcasting this message in the clear? Don't they care if we know that Midway is running short of water?" His superior would pass on Ryu's doubts. This led to questions being asked by cryptographers and cipher specialists in Tokyo over whether the Americans had broken their code. One specialist reasoned that perhaps the Americans were reading their messages and using a gambit to link potential objectives and cipher designations, in this case the code word for Midway. This raised a red flag at Imperial General Headquarters Tokyo.

Many of the Imperial Staff argued that Yamamoto's planned invasion should be cancelled, but Yamamoto would not hear of it. If the Americans had, in fact, gotten wind of their operations, all the better. Knowing the objective, the Americans would not allow Midway to fall into Japanese hands without a sizable fight. This was his opportunity to finally draw the Americans into the decisive battle he'd been hoping for.

On March 19, 1942, the Japanese radioed that "AF was running short of water." The Japanese were going to lure the Americans in.

SOURCE: Dietrich, Robert Point Luck: The American Tragedy of Midway

Annexations Mark Fuhrer's Birthday (Excerpt)

20 April 1941 - To mark the Fuhrer's 52nd birthday, Norway, Denmark, Holland, and Flemish Belgium will be annexed to the Reich. Grand pomp and ceremony will be held in the Reichstag to celebrate the expansion of the Reich and the ongoing leadership of our Fuhrer.

Already there is much to applaud. With the end of the second Great War and the collapse of the Soviet Union, peace and prosperity have spread throughout Germany. The demobilization of the Wermacht has allowed sons, brothers, and fathers to return to their families while the newly acquired eastern frontier provides room for future generations. The economy thrives and Germany stands leader of all Europe.

SOURCE: Völkischer Beobachter

Asia - March 1941

Europe - March 1941

Operation WOTAN: August 7, 1940 -September 24, 1940

Operation WOTAN Begins
On X-Day Panzer Group 1 was in action on the southern side of the encircling ring around Kiev; Guderian’s Group 2, leaving XXXXVIII Corps at Priluki, had disengaged from the encirclement’s northern side and had concentrated around Glukhov; while Panzer Groups 3 and 4 were still deeply committed to the battles at Briansk and Vyasma. The long advance to battle which they would have to undertake meant that they would enter late into the second stage of WOTAN. Guderian, impatient to march, decided that if the other groups were not in position by X-Day then he would open the operation without them. His formations moved forward, and at dawn on the misty morning of 9 August, the order came: “Panzer marsch.” Guderian named as his Group’s first objective the road and rail communications center of Orel. General Geyr von Schweppenburg’s XXIV Panzer Corps, with 3rd and 4th Panzer Divisions in the line, advanced up the Orel Road, while Lemelsen’s XXXXVII Panzer Corps, fielding 17th and 18th Panzer Divisions, flooded across the lightly undulating terrain to the north of the highway.

Guderian’s soldiers were confident. On the eve of the offensive Heini Gross, serving in one of the panzer battalions of 4th Division, wrote “Last evening the Corps Commander visited us. There were several speeches and then we all sang the ‘Panzerlied.’ Very, very moving. Tomorrow at 05:30 we open the attack which will win the war.”

Guderian’s first blows smashed the left wing of Yeremenko’s Front and within a day had crushed Thirteenth Red Army. Soviet counterattacks launched by two Cavalry Divisions and two Tank Brigades were flung back in disarray by 4th Panzer Division. Through the gap which had been created XXIV Corps struck for Sensk, captured it and drove on towards Orel while XXXXVII Corps swung northeastwards for Karachev and Briansk. To the north of Guderian, von Weichs’ Second Infantry Army brought about the collapse of Yeremenko’s right wing when it split asunder the Forty-third and Fiftieth Red Armies. Within two days Panzer Group 2 had driven 130km through the Soviet battle line against minimal opposition. A breach had been made between Orel and Kursk and Kesselring directed the other Panzer Groups to reach and pass through “Guderian’s Gap,” in order to begin the exploitation phase of WOTAN. That order drove Kleist’s Panzer Group 1 northwards from the Kiev ring and was to send Groups 3 and 4 southwards once the main part of their forces had been withdrawn from the Vyasma encirclement battles.

On 11 August, the first air drop was made to Guderian’s Group. Friedrich Huber in a Flak battery recalled, “Fighter aircraft circled above us to drive off any Russian machines. Then the Ju-52s flew in, approaching from the west at a great height, descended lower and circled. They roared low above our heads, the yellow identification stripe [carried by aircraft on the Eastern Front] glowing in the sunlight. A cascade of boxes and the first flight climbed, circled and flew back westwards. In less than ten minutes forty Ju’s had supplied us. Another flight of forty came in, delivered and flew off to be followed by a third wave. This is an idea of the Fuhrer, of course. Simple and effective, swift and efficient…”

Stavka’s reaction to the 2nd Panzer Group attack was sluggish and the weak tank attacks against XXIV Corps were repulsed with heavy loss. Guderian’s Group gained ground at such pace that it was confidently believed the hard crust of the Soviet defense must have been cracked. But it had not. Supreme Stavka ordered that Tula, on the southern approaches to Moscow, was to be held to the last, and the fanatical Soviet defense of the area between the city and Mtsensk brought the first check to 2nd Panzer Group’s drive.

Kesselring, who had been elated at the fall of Orel on 12 August, intended to capitalize on that success by changing WOTAN’s thrust line. Hitler had ordered this to the northeasterly: Dankov-Kasimov-Gorki. That original direction Kesselring now changed so that it marched northwards from Orel, via Mtsensk and Tula, to attack Moscow from due south.

Guderian’s Panzer Group Checked at Mtsensk
It was Colonel Katukov’s armor positioned south of Mtsensk that checked Guderian. A post-battle report, by the staff of XXIV Panzer Corps described the first two days of battle:

“The unit confronting us on Tula road was 4th Tank Brigade. They fought with a terrifying ferocity, even their crews assaulting us with small arms once their tanks had been destroyed. We overcame such resistance by calling Stuka strikes and by setting up lines of our 88mm anti-aircraft guns and employing these in a ground role.”

Kesselring’s disobedience of Hitler’s order forbidding Panzer Army Group to become involved in pitched battles had resulted in Guderian’s drive faltering. To retrieve the situation OKH moved Second Infantry Army from 2nd Panzer Group’s left flank to its right and gave the infantry force the task of capturing Tula. Guderian’s Group, relieved on 16 August, then raced for its next objective, Yelets to the northwest of Voronezh and some 160km distant. Its advance was still unsupported. The other Panzer Groups had still not yet reached the breached area.

Hitler had correctly forecast that Stavka’s slow reaction to WOTAN would allow the Panzer Army Group to gain ground swiftly and Guderian met little organized opposition en route to Yelets. It was principally ill-trained local garrisons reinforced by untrained factory militias who came out to contest the German advance. Lacking adequate training they were slaughtered.

The crossing of the Olym river might have delayed Guderian more than the Russian enemy, but Hitler’s insistence upon extra pioneer units to accompany the Panzer Groups had proved him right and six tank-bearing bridges were erected in a single day. On 20 August Guderian’s reconnaissance detachments entered the outskirts of Yelets and quickly captured the town. The leading elements pressed on: the next water barrier was the mighty Don where Panzer Group 2 could expect to meet serious resistance unless the river could be “bounced”. For the Don crossing Guderian demanded the strongest Stuka support. His Divisions moved towards the river ready to cross on 23 August.

At dawn on that day the Stukas, the Black Hussars of the air, flew over the battle area and systematically destroyed everything which moved on the Don’s eastern bank. Yelets came within the defense zone of Voronezh and was ringed by deep field fortifications and extensive mine fields. “We attacked under cover of a smoke screen across a vast, flat and open piece of ground towards the Don,” explained Hauptmann Heinrich Auer. “On our sector the bluffs were over 100 meters high but upstream where they were almost at water level the Pioneers constructed bridges. We motorized infantry crossed in assault boats, then scaled the bluffs to storm the bunkers and trenches. The Stukas had bombed the Ivans so thoroughly that they were ready to surrender…

“It is not true that the crossing was easy. It was not but at its end we had broken the Don river line. Our panzers crossed the first bridge at about 1400hrs and came up to support us. Together we fought all that night and most of the next day. By the afternoon of the 24th we had reached the confluence of the Don and the Sosna, to the west of Lipetsk, and dug in there. The panzers left us at that point and wheeled north towards Lebyedan…”

Kleist Moves North
On 12 August, Kesselring ordered Kleist’s Panzer Group 1 to advance on a broad front, “…left flank on Kursk and the right on Gubkin…to drive northeastwards to gain touch with Guderian at Yelets.” Once he was in position on Guderian’s right Kleist was next to strike southeastwards and capture Voronezh before changing direction again, northwards to create the western wall of the salient.

Kleist’s Group, like Guderian’s, had not had to cover such vast distances as either Hoth or Hoepner but its advance had been slowed by deep mud and by a surprising fuel famine. A mechanical defect in Elekta, the ground identification signal apparatus, caused the Ju transports to overfly Kleist and to airdrop their cargoes over Guderian. It took nearly four days to identify and to rectify that fault, by which time Kleist was so short of fuel that his Group’s advance was reduced to that of a single Panzer Company. Drastic shortages call for radical action and Kesselring’s solution was direct. Every Heinkel III in VIII Air Corps was loaded with fuel and ammunition and the massed squadrons touched down on the Kursk uplands at Swoboda where Kleist’s Group had halted. A single mission was sufficient to replenish it and the Divisions resumed their drive across the open steppe-land.

On 23 August Panzer Group 1 forced a crossing of the Olym downstream from Guderian, and in the area of Kastornoye the point units of 1st and 2nd Groups met. Later that afternoon the main force of both groups linked up and a solid wall of armor extended from Gubkin to Yelets. Kleist Group moved out immediately to capture Voronezh but that city was not to be taken by coup-de-main. It was a regional capital with half a million citizens, most of whom worked in its giant arms factories. As in the case of Mtsensk, Stavka ordered Voronezh to be held at all costs, intending that Mtsensk be the northern and Voronezh the southern jaw of a Soviet pincer. Those two jaws would be massively reinforced and, when the Red Army opened it offensive, they would trap the Panzer Army Group and destroy it.

Hoepner Struggles to Reach Guderian’s Gap
Hoepner’s Panzer Group 4 had been so heavily engaged in the encirclement operations at Smolensk and in the continuing fighting around Vyasma that it could only withdraw individual Panzer Regiments from the battle line. Acting upon Kesselring’s orders these marched southwards to gain contact with Guderian now driving hard for Yelets.

On the Mtsensk sector Vietinghoff grouped his XXXXVI Panzer Corps in support of Second Infantry Army which was fighting desperately against the heavily reinforced Fiftieth Red Army. Stalin had ordered that Soviet formation in order to hold Mtsensk and Tula and form the northern pincer of Stavka’s planned counteroffensive. When Stumme’s XXXX Corps reached Vietinghoff he handed over the task of supporting Second Army and struck eastwards across the Neruts river, passed south of Khomotovo and halted at Krasnaya Zara where he positioned his Corps on Guderian’s left flank. Detained by the Vyasma battles and slowed by mud, neither Stumme’s XXXX nor Kuntzen’s LVII Panzer Corps had gained touch with Vietinghoff by the evening of 23 August, but late that night, to the west of Guderian’s Gap, the first elements of both Corps reached their concentration areas.

24 August, Vietinghoff swung towards Yefremov where his advance struck and dispersed the Twenty-first and Thirty-eighth Red Armies, both reinforced by workers’ battalions armed with Molotov cocktails and other primitive anti-tank devices.

Hoth Reaches Guderian’s Gap
Like Hoepner’s Group, Hoth’s Group 3 disengaged piecemeal from the Vyasma operation, then concentrated and began to march southwards, en route to “Guderian’s Gap.”

Through the end of August, Hoth drove his Group forward at top speed. Kesselring’s dispositions for the advance of Panzer Army Group to Gorki had long been redundant, but a rearrangement brought Panzer Groups 2 and 3 shoulder to shoulder forming the assault wave with 4 and 1 preparing to line the eastern and western salient walls respectively.

On the evening of 23 August Hoth’s Group gained touch with the others and halted at the junction of the Sosna and Don rivers with Hoepner’s Group on one flank and Guderian’s on the other. “Our pioneers worked all night bridging those rivers,” said Panzer Captain Wolfgang Hentschel, “so that the advance could press ahead.”

Panzer Army Group Drives on Gorki
Early in the morning of 25 August, Kesselring, set up his Field Headquarters in Yelets and coordinated the great wheeling movement which would bring the Panzer Groups in line abreast ready to advance towards Gorki, some 650km distant. WOTAN was behind schedule and it worried him, for every day’s delay served the enemy’s purpose. When his subordinates demanded time to rest their men and to service their vehicles he could give them only three days. WOTAN’s third phase had to open on 27 August. Military Intelligence had indicated that the Soviets were about to carry out a major withdrawal and Panzer Army Group had to be ready to exploit any weakness shown by the Red Army during that retreat.

The series of battles leading up to Gorki created a period of bitter fighting, of relentless attack and desperate defense. Weeks in which the sable candles of smoke rising in the still summer air marked the pyres of burning tanks. In essence, the course of operations from 27 August to the middle of September was characterized by the Soviets being confined to the towns along the salient walls from which they mounted furious attacks against the panzer formations ranging across the open countryside and destroying such opposition as they met. In its advance from Yefremov via Dankov to Skopin, Panzer Group 1 was so fiercely attacked by Red forces striking out of Novmoskovsk, that Guderian was compelled to detach Geyr’s XXIV Corps to support Kleist until an infantry Corps reached the area. A similar action was fought at Ryazan against an even heavier offensive, supported by troops of the Moscow Front, switched on internal lines from west to the east flank. Panzer Group 1 was fortunate in being aided by nature on the Ryazan sector. The river Ramova was not a single stream but a mass of riverlets running through marshland-a perfect barrier against Soviet armor striking from the west and from the northwest. Kleist needed only to patrol on his side of the river and concentrated the bulk of his force on the high ground between the Ramova and the Raga, the latter river forming the boundary between Panzer Groups 1 and 2.

Guided by reconnaissance aircraft and supported by Stukas the panzer formations of each Group dealt with any crisis which arose on a neighbor’s flank. An analysis of Russian tank tactics highlights the difference between the Red Army’s highly skilled, pre-war crews and its more recently trained men. A post-battle report stated:

The enemy’s second attack (on the right flank) made good use of ground, coming up out of the shallow valley of the river and screened by the low hills on the eastern side of the road. This wave of machines got in amongst the artillery of 3rd Panzer Division which was limbering up ready to move forward. Hastily laid belts of mines and flame throwers drove back the T26s…The third attack was incompetently mounted and a whole tank battalion moved on the skyline across a
ridge. Our anti-tank guns picked the machines off and destroyed the whole unit…

Kesselring’s handling of his Army Group was masterly and he coolly detached units to bolster a threatened sector or created battle groups to strengthen a panzer attack. His energy and presence were an inspiration to his men.

Guderian’s Group, bypassing towns and crushing opposition, moved so fast that on 5 September, Kesselring was forced to halt it at Murom until Hoth and Hoepner had drawn level. The towns of Kylebaki and Vyksa fell to Panzer Group 3 on the following day and Hoth detached his LVI Panzer Corps to help take the strategic road and rail center of Arzhamas against the fanatic defense of a Shock Army specially created to hold it. With the full of Arzhamas on the 7th, the Soviet formations opposing Panzer Group 4 broke. As they fled Hoepner sent out his armored car battalions to patrol the west bank of the Volga, while 2nd and 10th Panzer Divisions went racing ahead to pursue the enemy and to gain ground. Wireless signals advised Hoepner that Bogorodsk had been taken, then that the advance guard had seized Kstovo and later that day had pushed on to the Volga. But Hoepner desperately needed infantry reinforcements and Kesselring sent in waves of Ju-52s, each carrying a Rifle Section. Within five hours two battalions of 258th Division had been flown in. The 5th and 11th Panzer Divisions of XXXXVI Corps moved fast to support Stumme’s XXXX Corps while LVII Corps continued with the unglamorous but vital task of strengthening the salient walls. By 10 September the Panzer Army Group was positioned ready to begin the final advance to Gorki. Group 1, on the left, had reached the Andreyevo sector and Guderian was advancing towards Gorki supported by Hoth’s Group 3. Meanwhile Hoepner’s Group 4 crossed the Volga against fanatical resistance and massive, all-arms counterattacks, and went on to establish bridgeheads on the river’s eastern bank.

On 12 and 13 September a vast air fleet, under Kesselring’s direct control, launched waves of raids upon Gorki. Stukas bombed Russian strongpoints and gun emplacements, until there was no fire from Soviet anti-aircraft batteries to defer the Heinkel squadrons which cruised across the sky bombing Gorki and the neighboring town of Dzerzinsk at will. The impotence of the Red Air Force is explained in a Luftwaffe report covering the period from the opening of WOTAN: “Soviet air operations were made initially on a mass scale but heavy losses reduced these to attacks by four or even fewer Stormovik aircraft on any one time…[they were] nuisance raids which had little effect…” The total number of enemy aircraft destroyed during the period was 2700 but the report does not state aircraft types: “…the Soviets could produce planes in abundance but not pilots sufficiently well trained to challenge our airmen…”

Resistance to the infantry patrols of 29th Division which entered both towns on the following day was weak and soon beaten down. Opposition on the eastern flank had been crushed and when Kleist Group secured Andreyevo, to the southeast of Vladimir the western sector was also firm. A German cordon, with both flanks secure, extended south of the Gorki-Vladimir-Moscow highway.

On 14 September Panzer Army Group Headquarters ordered a defensive posture for the following day in anticipation of massive Russian attacks. Those assaults came on the 15th and 16th, employing masses of infantry, tanks, and cavalry supported by artillery barrages of hitherto unknown intensity. Furious though those assaults were they were everywhere beaten back by German troops who knew they were winning: as one German major put it, “Thank Heaven for Ivan’s predictability. He attacks the same sector at precise intervals. Once his most recent assaults have been driven off we know things will be quiet until the stated interval has elapsed. When that new attack comes in we are ready for it. His tactics are almost routine. A very long preliminary barrage which ends abruptly. Then a short pause and the barrage resumes for five minutes. Under its cover his tanks roll forward and as they come close our panzer outpost line swings round and pretends to flee in panic. The Reds chase the ‘fleeing’ vehicles and are impaled on our anti-tank line…It never fails…”

But those days had been ones of deep crisis causing a signal to be sent to all units on the 17th for the defensive posture to be maintained throughout the following two days. Where possible, the time was to be spent in vehicle maintenance so that when the attack opened against Moscow, every possible panzer would be a “runner.”

Causes for Concern
On 9 September, the Field armies reported to OKH that losses from casualties and sickness were not being made good. Statistically, each German Infantry Division had lost the equivalent of a whole regiment and that scale of losses was also reflected in armored fighting vehicle strengths. When WOTAN opened only Panzer Group 4 had been at full establishment with Groups 1 and 3 at 70% and Panzer Group 2 at only 50%. To OKH the worrying question was whether Kesselring’s Army Group would be so drained of strength that it would be too weak to fulfill its mission. On the same day a memo from Foreign Armies (East) advised Hitler that the Red Army in the West had 200 front-line Infantry Divisions, 35 Cavalry Divisions, and 40 Tank Brigades, with another 63 Divisions in Finland, the Caucuses, and the Far East. That memorandum went on to warn that “…the Russian leaders are beginning to coordinate all arms very skillfully in their operations…” The warning was clear: WOTAN should be cancelled. Hitler ignored that warning. The operation would continue.

The second week of September was highlighted for the infantry and panzer forces around Mtsensk and Voronezh by a series of major Red Army offensives.

The Intelligence Section summary of 20 September reported, “The Siberian troops first encountered (on 15 September) maintained their attacks until yesterday morning. These attacks were bravely made but badly led. Prisoners stated that they had been foot marching for six weeks…There are 36 Divisions still in the Far East preparing to move westwards…”

Supreme Stavka, in desperation, were dredging the depths to stave off German conquest and launching major offensives with their reserves. Those at Mtsensk and Voronezh, made to close “Guderian’s Gap,” were the major ones. Whole Divisions of NKVD troops were concentrated in both areas and swung into action with such élan that their initial attacks forced the German infantry to retreat. But Stavka had made two errors. Firstly, so great a concentration of men in the cramped Mtsensk appendix restricted the armored formations, and secondly, although at Voronezh there was room for maneuver the garrison was equipped with only undergunned, light, T26 tanks. The fighting at both places was bitter and both sides knew that its outcome would depend upon which of them broke first. It was the Soviets, bombed from the air, pounded by artillery, and facing the fire of German soldiers fighting for their lives, whose morale cracked. Although the NKVD still marched into machine gun fire as unwaveringly as the Siberians or the cadets of the Voronezh military academies, the German troops sensed that the enemy’s spirit was gone. General Lothar Rendulic, commanding 52nd Infantry Division, wrote “Stavka recognized…that the standard Russian infantryman’s offensive quality was poor and that he needed the prop of overwhelming artillery and armor.” In the Mtsensk and Voronezh battles the Red Army’s armor and air support was eroded, and without those buttresses the Soviet infantry lost heart and were slaughtered. This paradox-initial fanatical struggles followed by a sudden and total collapse-was a feature encountered during the subsequent stages of WOTAN. The failure of the NKVD and the Siberians to crush the Germans affected the morale of the ordinary Red Army units encountered by the Panzer Army Group.

The presence of the Siberians on the battlefield was countered politically. Messages between Berlin and Tokyo were followed by belligerent, anti-Soviet editorials in semi-official Japanese newspapers. These alarmed the Kremlin, which halted abruptly the flow of Siberian Divisions to the west, for these might be needed to fight in Manchuria. The surge of reinforcements from the central regions of the Soviet Union also slowed as Panzer Army Group’s advances and Luftwaffe air raids cut railway lines forcing the Red Infantry to undertake wearisome foot marches to the battle front.

The Westward Advance to Capture Moscow
On 19 September, Sovinformbureau announced “The battle for Moscow has resumed with attacks…by the fascist Army Group von Bock…Waves of enemy troops made one assault after another…” On the same day OKH also reported that Maloarchangelsk had been captured without resistance and that German formations were within 7km of Aleksin. It concluded “Weak enemy attacks indicate that the Red Army’s resistance is beginning to crumble…”

Concurrent with the opening of Army Group Center’s offensive against Moscow, the leading elements of Panzer Army Group having spent two days regrouping and replenishing, began their westward drive. Hoepner created a strong battle group from units lining the salient’s eastern wall and sent it out to gain the area between Kstovo and Balaxna. Battle group Schirmer not only enlarged the bridgeheads on the Volga’s eastern bank but also cut the main east-west railway line.

While Panzer Groups 2 and 3 completed their regrouping, Panzer Group 1, echeloned along the salient’s western wall, was defending itself tenaciously against the Red Army’s fanatical assaults. Pioneer detachments working at top speed repaired the railway line between Michurinsk and Murom so that Infantry Divisions could be “lifted” by train to release the panzer formations for more active duties; and one Corps of Kleist’s Panzer Group promptly struck and seized Krasni Mayek to protect Panzer Army Group’s southern flank.

On 19 September, under a lowering sky, Panzer Group 2 on the right of Moscow highway and Panzer Group 3 on left, moved from Gorokovyets to open WOTAN’s final phase. The number of “runners” with each Group had sunk considerably in the bitter fighting but the Field workshops had repaired damaged vehicles and had cannibalized those too badly wrecked to repair. The first waves of Panzer Group 2 disposed 200 machines and Group 3 nearly 240. Throughout the two days of inactivity relays of transport aircraft brought in only shells and fuel. With petrol tanks filled to the brim and covered by a rolling barrage the two Groups advanced side by side westward towards Moscow. At midday the September gloom vanished to be replaced by cloudless blue skies. The Stukas which had been grounded reentered the battle, taking off from advanced airfields outside Murom, Kylebaki, and Vyksa. Opposition to the German advance, light to begin with, grew despite the dive bomber raids, and the combined forces of XXIV and XXXXVII Panzer Corps were able to advance only slowly on the northern side of the highway. The two Corps of Panzer Group 1 made better progress along the southern flank bouncing across marshland.

Panzer Group 4’s war diary entry of 21 September records that 2ns Panzer Division (XXXX Corps) was attacked south of Kstovo by what was estimated to be a whole Division of Cavalry. The horsemen’s assaults to break through the Group’s front were crushed with almost total loss, but that series of charges had unnerved many German soldiers who saw with horror wounded horses galloping across the battlefield screaming in pain. Shrapnel had disemboweled others who dragged their entrails leaving swathes of blood in their wake.

Panzer Group 1 reported minimal opposition on 24 September, not the furious assaults out of Vladimir and Sudogda that had been anticipated. 1st Group’s right-wing Corps, amalgamated with the left-wing Corps of Panzer Group 3, attacked and gained ground quickly. The frontline soldiers realized that the weak opposition they were meeting indicated that the Red Army was all but defeated. One of these soldiers, Sergeant Strauch, said “24 September. We found the bodies of a number of their Commissars, all shot at point-blank range. If the Party isn’t executing them then the rank and file are…”

The recce battalions of Groups 2 and 3 approaching Vladimir met the phenomenon of large, organized bodies of Red Army troops standing, lining the roads, waiting to surrender. The officer commanding one group told General Geyr von Schweppenburg, who was riding with the recce point detachment, that revolution had broken out in Moscow, the government had been overthrown and its leaders shot. Von Bock’s soldiers were already in the capital’s inner suburbs. A flurry of signal messages confirmed the story. General Vlassov, a former dedicated communist, whose Twentieth Army had up to now staunchly defended the northwestern approaches to Moscow, was leading a military junta which had sued for peace terms.

“Our battalion and two others were ordered from the armored personnel carriers and into passenger trains. Russian officers, many with Tsarist cockades, escorted us…After several hours we reached Moscow’s West Station and marched to the city center. Units of Bock’s Army Group were already there and in Red Square an SS detachment was blowing up Lenin’s tomb. At dusk massed searchlights lit up the flag staff over the Kremlin and deeply moved we saw the German War Standard flying at the mast head…”

The war in Russia was over. Now there would be a period of tidying up, politically, socially, and economically. The population had to be fed, the Red Army demobilized, and Russia incorporated into the Reich’s New Order. Hitler was triumphant. His battle plan Operation Wotan had won the war on the Eastern Front.

SOURCE: Reich Historical Archives

Operation Barbarossa - Middle Phase (May 12, 1940 - August 7, 1940)

On May 12th, Hitler finally gave the go-ahead for the Panzers to resume their drive east after the infantry divisions had caught up. The ultimate objective of Army Group Center was the city of Smolensk, which commanded the road to Moscow. Facing the Germans was an old Soviet defensive line held by six armies. On May 15th, the Soviets launched an attack with 700 tanks against the 3rd Panzer Army. The Germans defeated this counterattack using their overwhelming air superiority. The 2nd Panzer Army crossed the River Dnieper and closed on Smolensk from the south while the 3rd Panzer Army, after defeating the Soviet counter attack, closed in Smolensk from the north. Trapped between their pincers were three Soviet armies. On June 4th, the Panzer Groups closed the gap and 180,000 Red Army troops were captured.

Four weeks into the campaign, the Germans realized they had grossly underestimated the strength of the Soviets. The German troops had run out of their initial supplies but still had not attained the expected strategic freedom of movement. Operations were now slowed down to allow for a resupply; the delay was to be used to adapt the strategy to the new situation. Hitler had lost faith in battles of encirclement as large numbers of Soviet soldiers had continued to escape them and now believed he could defeat the Soviets by inflicting severe economic damage, depriving them from the industrial capacity to continue the war. That meant the seizure of the industrial center of Charkov, the Donets Basin and the oil fields of the Caucasus in the south and a speedy capture of Leningrad, a major center of military production, in the north. Hitler then issued an order to send Army Group Center's tanks to the north and south, temporarily halting the drive to Moscow.

The German generals vehemently opposed the plan as the bulk of the Red Army was deployed near Moscow and an attack there would have a chance of winning the war — also because it was a crucial railway center — but Hitler was adamant and the tanks were diverted. By late-May below the Pinsk Marshes, the Germans had come within a few miles of Kiev. The 1st Panzer Army then went south while the German 17th Army struck east and in between the Germans trapped three Soviet armies near Uman. As the Germans eliminated the pocket, the tanks turned north and crossed the Dnieper. Meanwhile, the 2nd Panzer Army, diverted from Army Group Center, had crossed the River Desna with 2nd Army on its right flank. The two Panzer armies now trapped four Soviet armies and parts of two others.

For its final attack on Leningrad, the 4th Panzer Army was reinforced by tanks from Army Group Center. On June 17th, the Panzers broke through the Soviet defenses and the German 16th Army attacked to the northeast, the 18th Army cleared Estonia and advanced to Lake Peipus. By the beginning of July, 4th Panzer Army had penetrated to within 30 miles (50 km) of Leningrad. The Finns had pushed southeast on both sides of Lake Ladoga reaching the old Finnish-Soviet frontier.

At this stage Hitler ordered the final destruction of Leningrad with no prisoners taken, and on July 19th, Army Group North began the final push which within ten days brought it within seven miles (11 km) of the city. However the pace of advance over the last ten kilometers proved very slow and the casualties mounted. At this stage Hitler lost patience and ordered that Leningrad should not be stormed but starved into submission. He needed the tanks of Army Group North transferred to Army Group Center for an all-out drive to Moscow.
Before the attack on Moscow could begin, operations in Kiev needed to be finished. Half of Army Group Center had swung to the south in the back of the Kiev position, while Army Group South moved to the north from its Dniepr bridgehead. The encirclement of Soviet Forces in Kiev was achieved on July 27th. The encircled Soviets did not give up easily, and a savage battle ensued in which the Soviets were hammered with tanks, artillery and aerial bombardment. In the end, after ten days of vicious fighting, the Germans claimed over 600,000 Soviet soldiers captured but that was false, the German did capture 600,000 males between the ages of 15-70 but only 480,000 were soldiers out of which 180,000 broke out netting the Axis 300,000 Prisoners of war.

SOURCE: Reich Historical Archives

Operation Barbarossa - Opening Phase (May 1, 1940 - May 12, 1940)

At 3:15 am on May 1, 1940, the Axis attacked. It is difficult to precisely pinpoint the strength of the opposing sides in this initial phase, as most German figures include reserves slated for the East but not yet committed, as well as several other issues of comparability between the German and USSR's figures. A reasonable estimate is that roughly three million Wehrmacht troops went into action on 1 May, and that they were facing slightly fewer Soviet troops in the border Military Districts. The contribution of the German allies would generally only begin to make itself felt later in the campaign. The surprise was complete: Stavka, alarmed by reports that Wehrmacht units approached the border in battle deployment, had at 00:30 AM ordered to warn the border troops that war was imminent, only a small number of units were alerted in time.
The shock stemmed less from the timing of the attack than from the sheer number of Axis troops who struck into Soviet territory simultaneously. Aside from the roughly 3.2 million German land forces engaged in, or earmarked for the Eastern Campaign, about 500,000 Romanian, Hungarian, Slovakian and Italian troops eventually accompanied the German forces, while the Army of Finland made a major contribution in the north. The 250th Spanish "Blue" Infantry Division was an odd unit, representing neither an Axis or a Waffen-SS volunteer formation, but that of Spanish Nazis and sympathisers.

Reconnaissance units of the Luftwaffe worked at a frantic pace to plot troop concentration, supply dumps, and airfields, and mark them for destruction. The task of the Luftwaffe was to neutralise the Soviet Air Force. This was not achieved in the first days of operations, despite the Soviets having concentrated aircraft in huge groups on the permanent airfields rather than dispersing them on field landing strips, making them ideal targets. The Luftwaffe claimed to have destroyed 1,489 aircraft on the first day of operations. Hermann Göring, Chief of the Luftwaffe distrusted the reports and ordered the figure checked. Picking through the wreckages of Soviet airfields, the Luftwaffe's figures proved conservative, as over 2,000 destroyed Soviet aircraft were found. The Luftwaffe had achieved temporary air superiority over all three sectors of the front, and would maintain it until the close of the year, largely due to the need by the Red Army Air Forces to manoeuvre in support of retreating ground troops. The Luftwaffe would now be able to devote large numbers of its Geschwader to support the ground forces.

Army Group North
Opposite Heersgruppe Nord were two Soviet armies. The Wehrmacht OKH thrust the 4th Panzer Group, with a strength of 600 tanks, at the junction of the two Soviet armies in that sector. The 4th Panzer Group's objective was to cross the River Neman and River Dvina which were the two largest obstacles in the direction of advance towards Leningrad. On the first day, the tanks crossed the River Neman and penetrated 50 miles (80 km). Near Rasienai, the tanks were counterattacked by 300 Soviet tanks. It took four days for the Germans to encircle and destroy the Soviet armour. The Panzer Goups then crossed the River Dvina near Dvinsk. The Germans were now within striking distance of Leningrad. However due to their deteriorated supply situation, Hitler ordered the Panzer Groups to hold their position while the infantry formations caught up. The orders to hold would last over a week, giving time for the Soviets to build up a defence around Leningrad and along the bank of River Luga.
Army Group Centre
Opposite Heersgruppe Mitte were four Soviet armies: the 3rd, 4th, 10th and 11th Armies. The Soviet Armies occupied a salient which jutted into German occupied Polish territory with the Soviet salient's center at Bialystok. Beyond Bialystok was Minsk, both the capital of Belorussia and a key railway junction. The goals of the AG Center's two Panzer Groups was to meet at Minsk, denying an escape route to the Red Army from the salient. The 3rd Panzer Group broke through the junction of two Soviet Fronts in the North of the salient, and crossed the River Neman while the 2nd Panzer Group crossed the River Bug in the South. While the Panzer Groups attacked, the Wehrmacht Army Group Centre infantry Armies struck at the salient, eventually encircling Soviet troops at Bialystok.

Moscow at first failed to grasp the dimensions of the catastrophe that had befallen the USSR. Marshall Timoshenko ordered all Soviet forces to launch a general counter-offensive, but with supply and ammunition dumps destroyed, and a complete collapse of communication, the uncoordinated attacks failed. Next came the infamous Directive of People's Commissariat of Defence No. 3, which demanded that the Red Army start an offensive: Stalin commanded the troops “to encircle and destroy the enemy grouping near Suwałki and to seize the Suwałki region by the evening of May 5" and “to encircle and destroy the enemy grouping invading in Vladimir-Volynia and Brody direction” and even “to seize the Lublin region by the evening of 24.6” This manoeuvre failed and disorganised Red Army units, which were soon destroyed by the Wehrmacht forces. Further complicating the Soviet position, on 1 May the anti-Soviet June Uprising in Lithuania began, and on the next day an independent Lithuania was proclaimed. An estimated 30,000 Lithuanian rebels engaged Soviet forces, joined by ethnic Lithuanians from the Red Army. As the Germans reached further north, armed resistance against the Soviets broke out in Estonia as well.

On May 6th, 2nd and 3rd Panzer Groups met up at Minsk advancing 200 miles (300 km) into Soviet territory and a third of the way to Moscow. In the vast pocket between Minsk and the Polish border, the remnants of 32 Soviet Rifle, eight tank, and motorized, cavalry and artillery divisions were encircled.

Army Group South
Opposite Army Group South in Ukraine Soviet commanders had reacted quickly to the German attack. From the start, the invaders faced a determined resistance. Opposite the Germans in Ukraine were three Soviet armies, the 5th, 6th and 26th. The German infantry Armies struck at the junctions of these armies while The 1st Panzer Group drove its armored spearhead of 600 Tanks right through the Soviet 6th Army with the objective of capturing Brody. On May 5th, five Soviet mechanized corps with over 1,000 tanks mounted a massive counter-attack on the 1st Panzer Group. The battle was among the fiercest of the invasion lasting over four days; in the end the Germans prevailed, though the Soviets inflicted heavy losses on the 1st Panzer Group.
With the failure of the Soviet counter-offensives, the last substantial Soviet tank forces in Western Ukraine had been committed, and the Red Army assumed a defensive posture, focusing on conducting a strategic withdrawal under severe pressure. By the end of the first week, all three German Army Groups had achieved major Campaign objectives. However, in the vast pocket around Minsk and Bialystok, the Soviets were still fighting; reducing the pocket was causing high German casualties and many Red Army troops were also managing to escape. On the final reduction of the encirclement, 290,000 Red Army troops were captured, with 1,500 guns and 2,500 tanks destroyed, but 250,000 Red Army troops managed to escape.

SOURCE: Reich Historical Archives

Asia: January 1940

Europe: December 31, 1939

Africa 1939 - Axis Territories

The Allied Surrender

Following Germany's success at Dunkirk, the Germans wheeled around and headed south towards Paris. On June 12, 1939, the French government was forced to relocate to Bourdeaux and declared Paris an open city.

Meanwhile, Italy had begun making moves of her own. Mussolini declared war against France and Great Britain. They would invade southern France as well as French and British Somalia before moving hesitatingly into Sudan from Ethiopia and gradually pushing into Egypt from Libya. Save for Somalia, all Italy's advances bogged down. Their African campaigns achieved little more than establishing armed camps stretching into enemy territory. Weak as the forward operating bases were, the state of affairs in Europe left Britain and France unable to counter.

With Italy entering the war and Germany driving south, the French government sued for peace. When Adolf Hitler received word from the French Government that they wished to negotiate an armistice, he selected Compiègne Forest near Compiègne as the site for the negotiations. As Compiègne was the site of the 1918 Armistice ending the Great War with a humiliating defeat for Germany, Hitler saw using this location as a supreme moment of revenge for Germany over France.

In the very same railway carriage in which the 1918 Armistice was signed (removed from a museum building and placed on the precise spot where it was located in 1918), Hitler sat in the same chair that Marshal Ferdinand Foch had sat in when he faced the defeated German representatives. After listening to the reading of the preamble, Hitler - in a calculated gesture of disdain to the French delegates - left the carriage, leaving the negotiations to his OKW Chief, General Wilhelm Keitel.

The armistice terms imposed on France were far harsher than those France had imposed on Germany in 1918. They provided for German occupation of three-fifths of France north and west of a line through Geneva, Tours and the Spanish border so as to give the German Navy access to all French Channel and Atlantic ports. All persons who had been granted political asylum had to be surrendered and all occupation costs had to be borne by France. A minimal French Army would be permitted. As one of Hitler's few concessions, the French Navy was to be disarmed but not surrendered, for Hitler realized that pushing France too far could result in France fighting on from French North Africa. The unoccupied third of France was ostensibly left free to be governed by the French, until a final peace treaty would be negotiated.

The French delegation - led by General Charles Huntziger - tried to soften the harsher terms of the armistice, but Keitel replied that they would have to accept or reject the armistice as it was. Given the military situation that France was in, Huntziger had "no choice" but to accede to the armistice terms. The cease-fire went into effect on June 28, 1939, 0:35. Britain now fought on alone.

The magnitude of the loss at Dunkirk weakened Britain's grip on its empire and drew unwanted attention from all corners of the globe. Arab and Indian nationalists throughout the Orient began pressing for greater independence. Meanwhile, Japan increased their scrutiny of Britain's Far Eastern possessions. Pressuring France to allow Japanese inspectors in Indochina to staunch the flow of arms to chinese Nationalists, the Japanese became emboldened and started making demands of the British to allow them entrance to Burma and Hong Kong. Franco saw potential for Spanish expansion into Morocco and the reclamation of Gibraltar to finally complete the Reconquista. Even Turkey and Argentina saw possibilities in the wavering British Empire, drawing up plans for the seizure of Mosul and the Falkland Islands, respectively.

The loyal Commonwealths of South Africa, Canada, and Australia began edging away, quietly evaluating their own security positions if England were no longer capable of protecting them. Australia was especially worried with the growing presence of Japan.

Prime Minister Wood (Lord Halifax), reluctantly assumed the role of leader of a fraying dominion when no other suitable candidate could be found. With the BEF in Hitler's hands, most of the Army's heavy equipment lost, and the damage suffered by the Royal Navy and RAF not readily replaceable, he found his options limited. He did not possess the forces needed to push the Italians out of Egypt or Sudan (the South African government proved very reluctant to send troops and unrest spread throughout the Middle East and India tying up local forces) nor could he raise the flagging morale of the nation which overwhelmingly wanted peace. Overtures made to the United States proved futile as President Garner adamantly opposed any intervention in the European conflict, even materiel.

As July came, tension mounted throughout the Empire. Iraq revolted, Arab nationalists seizing power with arms supplied by the Japanese. Turkey rapidly entered and occupied the Mosul area to protect their claim. Egypt, seeing this development and realizing the weakness of British forces as well as fearing the possibility of the Italians conquering their nation, began a revolt aimed at dislodging British forces. Turkey and Greece began to make voiced claims on Cyprus, preparing their forces to seize the island should the opportunity present itself. These events prompted the Italians to recommence their drive into Egypt and Sudan more aggressively. To make matters worse, the Luftwaffe commenced aerial assaults on Britain itself.

With allies either conquered or turning their back on him, an economy facing bankruptcy, no army to speak of, and the threat of invasion of Britain itself, PM Wood was forced to begin negotiations through Swedish intermediaries. This would worsen the British situation as Indian nationalists, wishing their concerns included in the talks, began a nationwide revolt once news broke of the British peace feelers. The Japanese would invade and overrun Burma and Hong Kong. Finally, Franco would finally act on this sign of weakness, declaring war on Britain and laying seige to Gibraltar.

Preapring for the worst, Lord Halifax went to negotiate with the Reich. Hitler's terms shocked Halifax as they proved less draconian in comparison to France's terms. The British were forced to cede Malta, British Somalia, and the southern third of Sudan to the Italians. The Suez Canal was to be "internationalized" with German and Italian troops stationed in the Canal Zone alongside British troops. The status of Gibraltar and Cyprus were to be settled in future negotiations between Britain and the parties involved. Germany would regain its old colony of Tanganyika and its rights to the Belgian Congo, Iceland, and Greenland were to be recognized. Turkey's rights to Mosul were likewise recognized. As for the Arab and Indian nationalists, their claims were ignored.

The treaty would also limit the British armed forces though not as heavily as the Versailles Treaty did to Germany. The British were allowed to build their army back up to its prewar level with restrictions on the number and weight of British tanks. The RAF was allowed to maintain its current fighter force levels but could not build any new heavy bombers. As for the Royal Navy, Germany was allowed an increase to 40% of the RN's tonnage.

The British would agree to allow German and Italian inspectors into their country to ensure they were complying with the treaty. The British government would also have to pay for any damages to German property incurred during the war and to cover expenses related to the above inspectors. The British would finally have to dismantle tariffs and restrictions on investment between them and Germany.

This treaty would bring about the conclusion of war on Germany's western border. Britain would attempt to consolidate the remainder of its empire as well as to shore up its economic base. Economically, the United Kingdom would never recover. German business would gradually move into British markets. The British economy continued to deteriorate as Halifax struggled to quell the rebellions in India and the Middle East as well as pay war reparations. As English factories and corporations went bankrupt or neared such a state, German businessmen were quick to buy them up. With finances dwindling, military expenditures began to decline along with the size of the armed forces. Britain found itself unable to keep its forces at their current level let alone to modernize them leading to further erosion of British might. Eventually Britain would find itself relegated to the position of a German dependency.

France fared little better. With Germany seizing numerous banks throughout the country, numerous loans were called up leading to a large percentage of French businesses declaring bankruptcy; their fate, to be purchsed by German business.

Italy would turn its eyes to Albania as a future conquest whereas Germany's eyes would turn eastward. The Soviet Union's poor showing against the Finns in the Winter War (Sept. 1938 - March 1939) served to embolden Hitler's plans for lebensraum.

SOURCE: Reich Historical Database

The Massacre at Dunkirk

3 June 1939 - Allied Forces took another blow, perhaps a fatal one, in their conflict against Germany. The past year has seen the fall of Poland, Denmark, Holland, Belgium, and Luxembourg, and the invasion of Norway who teeters on the edge of surrender. German forces have crashed through French defenses, bypassing the Maginot Line, leading to an unprecedented advance and the pocketing of French and British forces at Dunkirk. Those Allied forces are now either wiped out or have surrendered.

Following a series of clear skies over the past several days, the Luftwaffe bombed Allied Forces at will inflicting horrid damage to forces on the ground as well as to Allied ships attempting to extract soldiers to the British Isles. Port facilities also took a major blow limiting naval access. Pandemonium ruled as soldiers threw down their weapons and battled with one another for seats on the few ships that made it through, the lines evaporating as every man thought of himself. German forces drove into the chaos on May 28 and gradually crushed all resistance. Only 45,000 Allied troops escaped. Casualties and dead are estimated in the hundreds of thousands.

The RAF did their best to ease the relentless onslaught on the RN and Allied soldiers, flying from their bases in Britain to try and disperse Luftwaffe aircraft. The RAF suffered heavy losses, all for nought.

France is not expected to survive the month as little stands in the way of German forces and Paris. Already, the French government is preparing to evacuate to the south. Britain, her Army all but gone, finds herself in dire circumstances. Prime Minister Chamberlain's government is facing its end with calls for peace before the Empire is torn apart.

SOURCE: Chicago Tribune

War in Poland

Schleswig Holstein firing on Westerplatte

2 September 1938 - Germany has invaded Poland threatening to plunge the whole of Europe into another war. Following calls for territorial concessions, including the annexation of Danzig back into the German Reich, the Wermacht crossed the Polish border this morning.

Germany claims that Polish soldiers assaulted them first, attacking a radio station in German territory, and that the Wermacht invaded Poland as a means of self-defense. Already, Wieluń has come under attack by the Luftwaffe and Westerplatte has seen naval bombardment. Mokra has also seen an assault by German troops.

The issue has been complicated due to a non-agression pact signed between the Soviet Union and Germany last month.

Britain and France have called for an immediate cessation of conflict and for all German forces to withdraw from Poland by September 4 or else they would declare war. President Hitler has as of yet to respond to this demand.

SOURCE: Los Angeles Times

Ribbontrop-Molotov Pact

The Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact, colloquially named after German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop and Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov, refers to the officially-titled Treaty of Non-aggression between Germany and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, signed in Moscow in the early hours of August 23, 1938, dated August 22. The Pact is known by a number of different titles. These include the Nazi-Soviet Pact, Nazi-Soviet Alliance, Hitler-Stalin Pact and German-Soviet Non-aggression Pact. It remained in effect until Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union on May 1, 1940 in Operation Barbarossa.

In addition to stipulations of non-aggression, the treaty included a secret protocol dividing the independent countries of Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Romania into Nazi and Soviet spheres of influence, anticipating "territorial and political rearrangements" of these countries' territories. All were subsequently invaded, occupied, or forced to cede territory by Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, or both.

At the time, many on the political left were outraged that the Soviet Union would make such a treaty with Nazi Germany, which lay on the extreme right of the ideological spectrum. Many Communists in Western parties repudiated this action and resigned their party membership in protest. Likewise, a number of Nazis were outraged by this treaty, and some party members went so far as to throw their party badges into the courtyard of the Brown House.

SOURCE: Reich Historical Archive

Italian Conquest of Albania

As Germany annexed Austria and moved against Czechoslovakia, Italy saw itself becoming a second-rate member of the Axis. After Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia without notifying Mussolini in advance, the Italian dictator decided in early 1938 to proceed with his own annexation of Albania. Mussolini publicly claimed he was only acting to stabilize Albania against the instability wrought by the Greek Civil War, now in its third year. Italy's King Victor Emmanuel III criticized the plan to take Albania as an unnecessary risk.

Rome, however, delivered Tiranë an ultimatum on March 26, 1938, demanding that it accede to Italy's occupation of Albania. Zog refused to accept money in exchange for countenancing a full Italian takeover and colonization of Albania, and on April 8, 1938, Mussolini's troops invaded Albania. Despite some stubborn resistance, especially at Durrës, the Italians made short shrift of the Albanians. Unwilling to become an Italian puppet, King Zog, his wife, Queen Geraldine Apponyi, and their infant son Skander fled to Greece and eventually to London. On April 13, the Albanian parliament voted to unite the country with Italy. Victor Emmanuel III took the Albanian crown, and the Italians set up a fascist government under Shefqet Verlaci and soon absorbed Albania's military and diplomatic service into Italy's.

SOURCE: OnWar.com

Threat of War Averted

August 31, 1934 - Chiang Kai-shek once more has bowed to Japanese aggression, ceding control of Peking and Tianjin. Aides cite an intense conflict with communist forces for his decision to surrender rather than fight. "Internal pacification before external resistance" has become the buzz words of Chiang, though how much he will have left to defend with should he finally crush the communists is yet to be seen.

With an ever weakening Chinese situation, anonymous claim Germany may be rethinking its military alliance. Already, Reich officials have begun meeting with their Japanese counterparts for the possible formation of a order-shaking alliance.

As for China, the current situation continues to look bleak. The North China Plain is now wide open as a possible invasion route into the heart of China itself. With Germany edging away, the Japanese further emboldened, and a civil war with no end in sight, how long before Chiang's China falls apart?

SOURCE: New York Times