Thursday, January 31, 2013 marks 70 years since the end of the Battle of Stalingrad. On that morning in 1943, the newly-minted German Field Marshall Friedrich Paulus emerged from his "headquarters" - the damp cellar of a bombed-out department store near the center of the ruined city - and surrendered into captivity the remnants of the Wehrmacht's Sixth Army.
At the time of the surrender, the 100,000 soldiers remaining under Paulus' command were unfit to be called an Army. In reality, they were a dismal mob of exhausted, frozen and disease-ridden men; former soldiers with no ammunition, food or shelter from the bitter Russian winter: former soldiers no longer capable of waging war. Indeed, so desperate was their condition that within 90 days of the surrender over 2/3 of the soldiers were dead from disease (especially Typhus and Dysentery), malnutrition, exposure, and harsh treatment by their vengeful Soviet captors. Scarcely 6,000 of these soldiers made it back to Germany, the last in 1955.
When the gaunt, unshaven and stoop-shouldered Paulus surrendered his shattered Army, he brought to a close one of the bloodiest battles in human history. The struggle for the city itself - begun on August 23, 1942 when the tanks of the 16th Panzer Division reached the Volga River north of the city proper - claimed casualties of over 800,000 Axis combatants (Germans, Romanians, Hungarians, Croatians, Italians, "Hiwis" [Anti Stalinist Soviet Nationals] . The Red Army sustained about 1,200,000 casualties including 40,000 civilians killed in the city.
The agony of these numbers is compounded when considering that the capture of Stalingrad was not strategically necessary. The original German plan for the summer campaign of 1942, Operation Blue, called for the Sixth Army and the Fourth Panzer Army to advance eastward to the Volga River in order to:
1.) Choke off the Volga as a vital supply and communications route for the Soviet war effort.
2.) Serve as a blocking force for German Armies advancing south into the oil-rich Trans-Caucasus region.
Conquering the city itself was not considered to be a high priority. The cost was initially considered to be too high and the benefits too low to undertake such an operation.
Operation Blue began on June 28, 1942. In late July, Adolph Hitler, self-appointed Commander-in-Chief of the German Military, ordered the Sixth Army to assault and capture Stalingrad for reasons that were probably more self-serving than strategic. In the 1920s the city had been re-named after Soviet Dictator Joseph Stalin, Hitler's most bitter enemy, and The Fuhrer wanted to crush "Stalin's City" for psychological reasons, apparently.
The decision to assault Stalingrad was disastrous. Fighting to capture the City, The Sixth Army, an enormous (250,000 - 300,000 men), well-trained and veteran formation would be unable to use its' strong Panzer and mobile capabilities (Blitzkrieg). Instead, the Army would have to engage in the murderous and unfamiliar realities of Urban Warfare, where the defenders enjoy a considerable tactical advantage.
[ Prior to Stalingrad, the Germans had relied on "Blitzkrieg" (Lightning War) to subdue enemy cities. The Wehrmacht would use a high-speed Panzer/Motorized assault to penetrate then encircle defending armies. The Luftwaffe (German Air Force) would then bomb the target city into rubble (or threaten to do so) and the Army would demand (and receive) capitulation of the city while taking few, if any, casualties.]
Of course, the Russian defenders at Stalingrad proved to be different and difficult: they adamantly refused to surrender the City. The German attack on the City took nearly three months of savage, hand-to-hand combat, with both armies crawling on their bellies through mountains of rubble (the work of the Luftwaffe), dark cellars, fetid sewers and crumbling factories in increasingly freezing cold and snowy weather. The German infantry quickly coined a slogan for the battle : "Rattenkrieg" or "Rat War."
By the third week in November, 1942, the Wehrmacht had captured over 90% of the city, though their hold over portions of it was tenuous. Both sides had endured hundreds of thousands of casualties in a grim struggle measured in hundreds of lives lost for every inch of ground gained. Many contested positions changed hands several times in a single day, resulting in scores of casualties with no gain for either side. More German soldiers were succumbing to frostbite and disease than to Russian bullets. Food and ammunition and medical supplies were becoming scarce, as were experienced infantrymen. Replacement soldiers for German casualties had a very short life expectancy - a day or two at best. Russian partisans and "General Winter" were causing havoc with the long German supply lines while reports coming from the thinly-defended Northern Flank warned of a massive Soviet build-up in that sector. The Russians (62nd & 64th Armies), packed into a couple of tiny pockets on the West Bank of the Volga, still refused to surrender.
Then on the bitter cold and snowy morning of November 19, 1942, the Red Army attacked and broke through the German flank 125 miles North-West of Stalingrad. This section of the flank was held by the Romanian 3rd Army, a poorly trained, poorly equipped and understaffed formation. For three months prior to this attack, the Russians had been meticulously assembling and equipping an enormous force of nearly 1,000,000 men, thousands of artillery pieces and hundreds of tanks. At first, the Romanians resisted as best they could, but they were no match for the Russian onslaught, and were quickly overrun and pushed aside. As soon as they broke through the Romanians, the Russians split into two columns: the first headed southeast toward Stalingrad; the second moved southwest toward the city of Rostov-on-Don, gateway to the Trans-Caucasus where large German Armies were fighting for control of the oil-fields.
The next day, November 20, 1942, a second massive Soviet Army attacked and broke through a section of the Sixth Army's Southern Flank held by the Romanian 4th Army. This Romanian formation was also quickly overrun and the advancing Soviet forces turned northwest. Four days later, November 24, 1942, the two Soviet Armies met at the town of Kalach, about 40 miles west of Stalingrad, completing a classic "pincer" maneuver and effectively trapping the 250,000+ soldiers of the Sixth Army in a "pocket" around the still unconquered city.
It was at this point that Hitler made yet another decision that catapulted the fate of the Sixth Army from disaster to catastrophe. He ordered General Paulus to remain in the encirclement and continue fighting. Hitler had been informed by Hermann Goering, Luftwaffe Commander, that the besieged Army could be supplied by a massive airlift. The rest of the German General Staff disagreed with Goering and strongly urged Hitler to order an immediate breakout to the southwest. Of course, Hitler chose to listen to Goering, his most loyal and fawning toady. The order to Paulus was reaffirmed and the grisly fate of the Sixth Army was assured.
[Hitler was adamant that the Sixth Army would NEVER leave Stalingrad. He feared that if he were to let the Sixth breakout of the encirclement and leave Stalingrad, they would never return. Thus, he would personally lose face and be held up to ridicule by the whole world. Of course, this was unacceptable. And so, the Sixth Army was ordered to stand and fight].
The airlift was a total failure. An army of the size and composition of the Sixth would need over 500 tons per day of the right supplies (food, warm clothing, ammunition, medical/surgical supplies, fuel, etc.) to keep its strength at levels sufficient to conduct combat operations in the extremities of a Russian winter. The Luftwaffe never reached even 50% of this daily requirement over the 8 weeks when landing sites were operational (25 November 1942 - 23 January 1943). Frequently the wrong supplies (summer clothing, loads of condoms, vodka, food spices) were flown in. Improved Russian airpower and anti-aircraft fire cost the Luftwaffe nearly 500 aircraft lost. The Russian winter prevented all flying on many days. Aircraft quickly fell into disrepair and had to be grounded until repaired. Russian attacks on the airfields inside the pocket destroyed scores of planes. On the positive side, the Luftwaffe was able to evacuate about 40,000 sick, wounded and "essential" soldiers.
Over the next ten weeks, over 150,000 Axis soldiers perished from Russian bullets, disease, exposure, starvation and suicide. Cannibalism among German soldiers increased late in the siege as the soldiers ran out of food, quickly ate the available horses, then the rats, until finally they carved up some of the thousands of corpses that were everywhere throughout the ever-shrinking pocket. The lack of food weakened the men to such an extent that thousands of them became unable to move and simply died wherever they happened to collapse.
In late December 1942 and early January 1943 two initiatives were undertaken to relieve the agony of the Sixth Army, the first by the Germans, the second by the Russians.
OPERATION WINTER STORM
On December 12, 1942, the German Fourth Panzer Army began an effort to relieve the trapped Sixth Army by driving into Stalingrad from the southwest. After a week of intense fighting the Panzers had penetrated Soviet positions to within 30 miles of the Sixth Army's southern lines. At this point Field Marshal Erich von Manstein, overall commander of Winter Storm, contacted Adolph Hitler and General Friedrich Paulus requesting that Sixth Army commence a drive toward the hard-pressed Fourth Panzer Army (30 miles away) to effect a breakout from the Stalingrad pocket. Both Hitler and Paulus refused. Hitler cited his standing order that there would be no breakout. Paulus stating that it was logistically impossible to accomplish a breakout at that late date. Paulus was also unwilling to disobey Hitler's orders. The next day the Fourth Panzer Army began a withdrawl from its positions. By Christmas Day, the Sixth Army knew that all hope for a rescue was gone.
RUSSIAN SURRENDER TERMS OFFERED
On the night of January 8, 1943 a trio of Soviet envoys crossed into German lines under a flag of truce. The envoys carried a packet of documents spelling out the terms of surrender for the Sixth Army. The documents were signed by the senior Soviet Commanders in the region: General Konstantin Rokossovsky and Marshal Nikolay Voronin. The terms offered to General Paulus were as follows:
1.) All Axis military personel, all weapons and all Army property were to handed over to the Red Army by 1500 hours on January 9, 1943.
2.) The Red Army guarantees the lives and the safety of all German Officers, NCOs and men.
3.) All surrendering forces will be immediately issued with Normal Rations. Medical attention will be provided to all soldiers in need of it.
4.) All surrendering personel will be allowed to keep their valuables, uniforms and other personal belongings.
5.) At the end of the war, all surrendering forces will be repatriated to Germany or any other country of their choice.
General Paulus refused to meet with the envoys or accept the packet containing the surrender terms. The envoys were then escorted safely back to their own lines. 22 days later, the all-but-annihilated Sixth Army gave up the fight and passed into a much harsher captivity than was offered on January 8th.
And so it ended.
AFTERMATH
*By February 3, 1943 all units of the Sixth Army had surrendered. Many of the survivors were immediately put to work in the clean-up and reconstruction of Stalingrad. Others were marched off to Siberia and labor camps. Most of these captives died quickly. The Romanians, Hungarians, Italians and Croatians fared no better than their German compatriots: most died in captivity or spent long years in the labor camps. The fate of the "Hiwis," (anti-Stalinist Soviet Nationals) was particularly grim. Stalin had ordered them to be killed immediately upon capture, and, for the most part, they were.
*It has been reported that up to 10,000 SS soldiers refused to obey Paulus' surrender order, fearing they would be executed upon capture. They hid themselves in cellars and cavities carved out of the rubble and continued the fight with ambushes and suprise attacks on Russian troops and civilians. By mid-March, 1943 the Russians reported that around 8,000 had surrendered and the rest had been killed.
*High ranking German Officers were taken into a captivity that was far less harsh and lethal than that of the common soldier. Most were interrogated briefly near Stalingrad, then taken to Moscow where they were treated fairly, with ample food, medical care and comfortable quarters. If any of these Generals (23 were captured) were to publicly denounce Hitler and the Nazis (many did) their conditions improved considerably.
*Wehrmacht Artillery General Walter von Seydlitz-Kurzbach, led an anti-Nazi group of captives that spread propaganda to German soldiers in the field. He also offered to form a 40,000 man military force of POWs that could be airlifted into Germany to fight against Hitler. The Russians were not interested.
*Many German Women were serving as Wehrmacht medical personel in the pocket. They were airlifted out of Stalingrad in December, 1942, to prevent their falling into Russian hands. All German Doctors capable of performing their duties remained in the pocket and went into captivity.
*A large number of Russian soldiers who fought in and around Stalingrad also fought in the Battle of Berlin, two and one-half years and 1400 miles distant.
*General Friedrich Paulus was promoted to Field Marshal by Adolph Hitler on January 30, 1943, one day before he surrendered. This was not a reward of any kind. Both men were well aware that no German Field Marshal had EVER surrendered to the enemy. The promotion was a loud and clear message to Paulus that The Fuhrer expected him to commit suicide rather than capitulate. Paulus later commented that "I have no intention of shooting myself for this Bohemian corporal."
Paulus remained a defacto captive until his death on February 1, 1957. In 1953 he was relocated to Dresden, East Germany where he lived comfortably and wrote until his death.
The Wikipedia "Battle of Stalingrad" page has an extensive and comprehensive bibliography of books and other media on the Battle. I would recommend the following authors:
1.) David M. Glantz "The Stalingrad Trilogy." Comprehensive and complete. Prof. Glantz is a world recognized authority on the WW2 Soviet military, and the trilogy contains everything there is to know about the Battle. Somewhat dry reading with lots of maps and lists.
2.) Antony Beevor "Stalingrad: The Fateful Siege." A well-written and fairly comprehensive account of the Battle. Many personal anecdotes from survivors of Stalingrad, both German and Russian. Good photos and good maps. Very reader-friendly writing style. A perfect first read about Stalingrad.
Lastly, a personal note.
To me Stalingrad is a very sobering lesson on the tragedies that can befall even a civilized and cultured nation such as Germany in the mid twentieth century. When oppressive conditions and radical ideologies are filtered through the dark recesses of the mind of a psychopath such as Adolph Hitler, unspeakable depravities can and will be unleashed. The young people of Germany in the 1930s were by-and-large a decent, moral generation. Yet, within a few years of Hitler's ascention to total power, they had been transformed into the Wehrmacht, one of the most efficient and brutal killing machines the world has ever seen. They staffed the SS, built the Death Camps, killed tens of millions of people and themselves went to the grave in their millions rather then stop the killing. If such a thing could happen in the Germany of 1933 - 1945, then it could most certainly happen in the USA in the early 21st century. I think that the groundwork has already been laid. Witness the many atrocities of the Viet Nam War (My Lai, Secret bombings of Cambodia and Laos, The Phoenix Program, etc.), up through the current time ( Abu Grahib, CIA Renditions, Guantanamo, the USA Patriot Act, the phony wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, torture, etc.) The evidence is clear; we need only to open our eyes. We have been lulled into accepting actions that even a generation ago would have been unthinkable. We are now quite capable, both militarily, and psychologically, of unleashing our own Stalingrad.
Do not forget Stalingrad, for it could soon be coming to a city near you.
P.S.
A few days ago, the Department of Defense (what ever happened to the War Department?) announced that Women were now being allowed to serve in "combat" positions. The mainstream media greeted the news as being a Great Leap Forward in the march toward "full equality" for women! Over 200,000 new "job opportunities" are now open for women to fill! Women now have the opportunity to demonstrate that they can slaughter third-world peasants just as good, or better, than men. Women are now being allowed to donate their bodies, their sanity and their morality for the furtherance of a Corporate agenda that in no way recognizes or includes them.
What is happening to my once-beautiful country? How did we come to a place such as this?