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I prefer to believe what my grand-mother told me, because she was there, in Moscow at that time. She told me about panic settling in the city, the ashes covering the sky in the center of Moscow ( TASS was burning the papers she tolld me,) and overall she said there was a feeling that for three days the government has left Moscow, (although she didn't say that they really did.)
Then, she said, "we've heard that they've sent the reserve troops from Siberia - they were marching through city during the night, silently, all clad in white. Then the next day or so we've heard for the first time that Germans started retreating."
I don't want to discount what your grandmother told you from her perspective. The sources I am citing from western historians are pulled directly from STAVKA records. Overall the divisions from Siberia (based on the region where the division was raised) accounted for around 10% of the forces defending Moscow. However, those divisions were made up of troops from throughout the USSR with most being 50% "Siberian" and 50% from all other locations. Overall, one could infer that roughly 5% of the troops defending Moscow were Siberian. Also in the STAVKA records are the reported combat effectiveness of the divisions and the majority of "Siberians" performed at an average level.
Here is a quote that was published in Pravda from Aleksey Isayev the so-called "anti-Suvorov" one of the foremost modern Russian historians on the Great Patriotic War:
Quote:
Siberian divisions were invented by the Germans, who tend to think that any person wearing warm winter clothes is a Siberian. It goes without saying that Siberian troops contributed greatly to the destruction of the Germans near Moscow. The main role, however, was played by the troops formed from the residents of the Moscow region, Ural and Udmurtia republic. During the renowned parade on November 7, 1941, a division from Ivanovo (the Moscow region) marched across Red Square.
This is a photo from the parade he is referencing and many sources state that these are the vaunted fresh Siberian troops, but they weren't:
Quote:
Originally Posted by erasure
PS. Now, when I have few more minutes I'd like to comment on something else;
The "wildmen" is the description that fits Siberians the least. In fact, their character is known for quite the opposite - calmness and sapience. The kind of qualities that make you feel that everything is under control - no need to rush or jitter. Yet you do have a feeling that when they make their move, it's rather well-calculated and deadly. Overall they are very laid-back people I've noticed, unlike Moscovites lol.
So if you have this kind of people in your midst, they have tendency to bring the calmness, determination and order - precisely what was probably needed the most during the battle of Moscow. This is the human factor you know, that might be missing from the calculations of Western historians.
The "wildmen" reference was from the German perspective and not indicative of anything true about the Siberians themselves.
What is true is that these units even being green were outfitted with the latest that the Russians had, including the new winter camo. Siberians as you also pointed out are rather adept at dealing with the cold and many grew up knowing how to handle firearms hunting. They certainly made great troops for the fighting around Moscow in the winter of 41/42.
However, what I am disputing and the records prove, is that Moscow wasn't magically saved by the arrival of legions of Siberian troops that turned back the German assault. Moscow was saved, as stated by Isayev, by the concerted efforts of all of the Soviet people. It makes a better story to say it was the Siberians and this was heavily played on by the Soviets, but while they played a role, it was not the decisive role that has been given to them over the years.
The importance of the Battle of Moscow can only really be appreciated when one takes a broad look at the German military philosophy. Ever since Moltke the Elder defeated Austria in in 1866, the German military thought basically boiled down to what Napoleon meant when he said "One sharp blow and and the war is over." By mobilizing its men more quickly than her enemies, and exploiting the element of surprise, in every conflict Germany sought to deliver a decisive blow to enemy forces, usually with Cannae style envelopments, before the latter could have time to properly react. The point was to avoid a costly war of attrition - a war that a country in the middle of a continent without overseas colonies or even control of sea lanes could ill afford to fight.
Blitzkrieg was simply a new iteration of the same strategy that German used against Austria in 1866, France in 1870, and France again in 1914 (the only time it did not succeed). Blitzkrieg added new technology and other improvisations on the tactical level but nevertheless it was the same strategy of defeating the enemy quickly in "one sharp blow', and thereby breaking down his will and capacity to resist.
Coming back to the Battle Moscow, what makes it so important is that, just like the Battle of the Marne in 1914, it signified the failure of the fundamental German plan for the war in the East. After Moscow, the Soviet-German war entered an entirely new phase which the German leadership had neither prepared for nor anticipated. And the reason why it didn't anticipate it is because planning for such a war was deeply contrary to German military though.
As to whether BoM was the real turning point - I believe it was. It was the closest the Soviet Union came to losing. Had the Germans been able to capture Moscow, it might have been enough to start a chain reaction to Soviet collapse. Moscow was the focal point of the Soviet transportation system, the location of many important factories as well as a significant psychological factor. Losing Moscow would have been far more damaging than it was in, say, 1812.
On the other hand the failure of Barbarossa gave the Soviet Union breathing room to train more troops, rebuild its factories, receive supplies from the Allies and continue the fight on a much more equal footing than in 1941. After Moscow, Germany was in an unwinnable position. It was simply a matter of time before the industrial might of the United States would make itself felt and thus it was in a race against the clock.
My argument would lie that the German plan, as envisioned, failed at Smolensk and not at Moscow. The original German plans for Barbarossa required AG Center to advance to the area of Smolensk and destroy any opposing forces. Then, nothing. The German plan was to destroy the Red Army in the field and force the Soviets to surrender. When this didn't happen the Germans were sort of left to "wing it". Guderian and others strongly lobbied to continue on to Moscow even when the fighting at Smolensk was still ongoing, but the final decision was not made for sometime and only after securing the flanks.
There is also some argument to be made as to whether losing Moscow would have actually destroyed the Soviet's and forced them to surrender. I think in reality, if the Germans had taken the city in late 1941, they would have been in no better (and possibly worse) position in early 1942. The "Fall of Moscow" may very well have been an extremely hollow and pyrrhic victory.
As for it being the tuning point, there is some merit in saying it was. It was the first time the German advance was stopped. However, I think one could argue that losing Stalingrad and the Baku fields would have ultimately been a greater blow than losing Moscow. To me, Stalingrad represents the turning point and the last German hope for victory in the east. From that point on, the Germans were in retreat and even if they had achieved victory at Kursk, it only would have delayed the inevitable.
Re: Siberians
The cartoonish version of the thesis that they were basically the Soviet versions of Captain America, super-hardy and impervious to cold is obviously just a myth probably started by the Germans themselves based on their stereotypes of Russian people.
However I think the term "Siberian" should be interpreted more broadly, not just necessarily people born in Siberia but basically any troops that were stationed in the eastern part of USSR. It is important note that in the fall of 1941, the USSR had very little regular army troops left. Almost all either died or were captured in the pockets during the earlier campaigns. Most of the RKKA was now composed of raw recruits armed with whatever was at hand and led by equally inexperienced officers. Almost all decently trained and equipped troops that remained were ones that were stationed in the East at the beginning of the war. Again, these units could have been made up of men from any part of the USSR - this is not important. What matters is that units transferred from the East were better trained and equipped than most of the rest of the army.
Quote:
Originally Posted by NJGOAT
My argument would lie that the German plan, as envisioned, failed at Smolensk and not at Moscow. The original German plans for Barbarossa required AG Center to advance to the area of Smolensk and destroy any opposing forces. Then, nothing. The German plan was to destroy the Red Army in the field and force the Soviets to surrender. When this didn't happen the Germans were sort of left to "wing it". Guderian and others strongly lobbied to continue on to Moscow even when the fighting at Smolensk was still ongoing, but the final decision was not made for sometime and only after securing the flanks.
You could even say that the German plan failed still earlier, when they incorrectly assumed that the bulk of Soviet forces would deploy north of Pripet Marshes, in Belarus rather than in Ukraine. This is why AG Center was the strongest AG, with 2 panzer armies. AG South, with arguably insufficient forces, was unable to prevent the Soviet troops of Southwestern Front from
retreating behind the Dnieper. Hence, the necessity of Guderian's infamous detour.
On the whole, I agree, Barbarossa began to unravel already in August but Moscow was the final nail in the coffin. The capture of Moscow, if successful, while quite short of the A-A line, still would have placed the Germans in a very good position. Thus, the final outcome of the campaign was determined there.
Quote:
Originally Posted by NJGOAT
There is also some argument to be made as to whether losing Moscow would have actually destroyed the Soviet's and forced them to surrender. I think in reality, if the Germans had taken the city in late 1941, they would have been in no better (and possibly worse) position in early 1942. The "Fall of Moscow" may very well have been an extremely hollow and pyrrhic victory.
An interesting "what-if". An argument I've read (made in part by the same Isaev) is that the capture of Moscow would begin a chain reaction that would eventually lead to collapse. Moscow was the nexus of the Soviet rail system and thus very important for supplying troops along the entire front north of it.
Thus, without Moscow, the Soviets would probably be unable to defend Leningrad (which, while surrounded, depended on the troops outside to tie down German forces and also supplies coming from across lake Ladoga). With Leningrad captured, the Germans could then begin using its port facilities of greater ease of supplying their forces in the north. Other advances in the area would also endanger Soviet rail lines from Murmansk and Arkhangelsk. In short, the Soviets would have been in a very tough position.
Quote:
Originally Posted by NJGOAT
As for it being the tuning point, there is some merit in saying it was. It was the first time the German advance was stopped. However, I think one could argue that losing Stalingrad and the Baku fields would have ultimately been a greater blow than losing Moscow. To me, Stalingrad represents the turning point and the last German hope for victory in the east. From that point on, the Germans were in retreat and even if they had achieved victory at Kursk, it only would have delayed the inevitable.
While it's true that losing Stalingrad or Baku oil fields would have been very bad, I see less chance of this actually happening. The Soviets were in much better place in 1942 than they were in 1941. For the first time, they had sufficient breathing room to bring up their troop density to comfortable levels along the entire front, to rebuild their factories and resume production, and to even accumulate a strategic reserve. All this allowed them to begin planning a counteroffensive as early as September 1942. Compared to 1941 when they were basically scrambling and reaching for the kitchen sink in order to stop the German offensive at all costs, in 1942 the situation, while serious, was better. Also Baku was very well defended and unlikely to fall in my view.
The cartoonish version of the thesis that they were basically the Soviet versions of Captain America, super-hardy and impervious to cold is obviously just a myth probably started by the Germans themselves based on their stereotypes of Russian people.
However I think the term "Siberian" should be interpreted more broadly, not just necessarily people born in Siberia but basically any troops that were stationed in the eastern part of USSR. It is important note that in the fall of 1941, the USSR had very little regular army troops left. Almost all either died or were captured in the pockets during the earlier campaigns. Most of the RKKA was now composed of raw recruits armed with whatever was at hand and led by equally inexperienced officers. Almost all decently trained and equipped troops that remained were ones that were stationed in the East at the beginning of the war. Again, these units could have been made up of men from any part of the USSR - this is not important. What matters is that units transferred from the East were better trained and equipped than most of the rest of the army.
I agree with the first part about the mythos surrounding Siberians. However, on the second part...
The sites author is Nigel Askey and he has been quoted on here before, most famously when someone copied his entire thesis on the role of ground attack planes in WW2. His statistics are also widely utilized on Axis History Forum among others. I think he does a good job breaking down the impact of Siberian/Eastern divisions on the Battle of Moscow.
FWIW, many of the experienced and well equipped overstrength eastern divisions that people talk about as being pivotal at Moscow had already been moved west, engaged and expended before the actual defense of the city and counterattack had begun.
So, we are dealing with two separate things:
1. Siberians meaning someone from Siberia that have a "Captain America" mythos about them.
2. Soviet divisions transferred from eastern areas to the western front.
In both cases, the implied and commonly accepted impact of those troops in terms of "saving Moscow" are not entirely correct.
Quote:
An interesting "what-if". An argument I've read (made in part by the same Isaev) is that the capture of Moscow would begin a chain reaction that would eventually lead to collapse. Moscow was the nexus of the Soviet rail system and thus very important for supplying troops along the entire front north of it.
Thus, without Moscow, the Soviets would probably be unable to defend Leningrad (which, while surrounded, depended on the troops outside to tie down German forces and also supplies coming from across lake Ladoga). With Leningrad captured, the Germans could then begin using its port facilities of greater ease of supplying their forces in the north. Other advances in the area would also endanger Soviet rail lines from Murmansk and Arkhangelsk. In short, the Soviets would have been in a very tough position.
It is an interesting scenario. Personally I would see the battle for Moscow devolving into a Stalingrad encounter as the Soviets just poured troops into the city, a situation I'm not sure the Germans would have been any more succesful at then they were at Stalingrad.
Certainly, had the Germans been able to take Moscow and hold Moscow in a strong position, it would have had disastorous consequences for the Soviets, even if it didn't mean the end of the war. It's just that when I look at the supply situation, depletion of reserves, lack of replacements, etc. I don't see any way for the Germans to score a real victory at Moscow unless we go back and re-plan the entire invasion and change the timelines and strategic decisions. From the moment they completed reducing the pocket at Smolensk and secured their flanks, they had almost no chance of victory.
Quote:
While it's true that losing Stalingrad or Baku oil fields would have been very bad, I see less chance of this actually happening. The Soviets were in much better place in 1942 than they were in 1941. For the first time, they had sufficient breathing room to bring up their troop density to comfortable levels along the entire front, to rebuild their factories and resume production, and to even accumulate a strategic reserve. All this allowed them to begin planning a counteroffensive as early as September 1942. Compared to 1941 when they were basically scrambling and reaching for the kitchen sink in order to stop the German offensive at all costs, in 1942 the situation, while serious, was better. Also Baku was very well defended and unlikely to fall in my view.
That's a good counter. If we look at it from the perspective of the Soviets, the war hinged on the defense of Moscow. That was their weakest moment and they steadily grew stronger from then on.
I think from the German perspective it is still Stalingrad as that represented their last real chance at some kind of victory/tipping the balance in their favor on the eastern front for the remainder of the war. Failure there doomed them to failure overall. They still had one good punch left after Moscow, even if it was ultimately poorly chosen on where to land it.
You know what I love about history, since the collapse of communism and the advent of the Internet everything we thought we knew about WWII is very much subject to interpretation. It will take another generation before we finally get a clear, definitive idea what really happened.
You could even say that the German plan failed still earlier, when they incorrectly assumed that the bulk of Soviet forces would deploy north of Pripet Marshes, in Belarus rather than in Ukraine. This is why AG Center was the strongest AG, with 2 panzer armies. AG South, with arguably insufficient forces, was unable to prevent the Soviet troops of Southwestern Front from retreating behind the Dnieper. Hence, the necessity of Guderian's infamous detour.
Even after the adoption of the concept of “blitzkrieg”, German military planners retained the idea that any attack should have a “schwerpunkt” or focal point where the maximum amount of force would be concentrated to achieve the most positive outcome in battle. A line running from the Polish border along the Biaylstok-Minsk-Smolensk axis toward Moscow had been designated as the “schwerpunkt” of Operation Barbarossa which necessitated Army Group Center being made the strongest of the three invasion forces. Though the capture of Moscow was not the objective at the time, it was anticipated that those cities (especially Smolensk) which stood between the Germans and Moscow would be where the Russians would resist most strongly.
Army Group South, while not packing as big a punch as Army Group Center, was by no means too weak for the task assigned to it. The problem lay in the route AG South had been forced to take to enter the Soviet Union. Halder’s original plan for Barbarossa had called for AG South to cross the Dneister River then execute a double envelopment of Russian forces in the Ukraine west of the Dneiper. Hitler vetoed this idea and insisted AG South enter the Soviet Union through Romania and into the Ukraine along a gap between the southern edge of the Pripyat Marshes and the Carpathian Mountains. What the Germans did not know was that Stalin fully believed the Ukraine would be the primary target of any invasion from the West and had ordered the region to be strongly reinforced and held at all cost. Though some in the Soviet military establishment questioned the wisdom of such a move, none tried very hard to dissuade Stalin from his line of thinking. Stalin was convinced that, as had happened during World War I, the Germans would move into the Ukraine to capture the region and exploit it for the benefit of the Reich. And even when it became clear to Russian commanders in the field in the days following the start of the invasion that the main German drive was actually toward Moscow, Stalin still refused to believe it was anything more than a feint.
Thus when AG South began its’ advance into the Ukraine, the invasion path chosen by Hitler forced his army to attack head on into Soviet formations that were both unexpected in their size and numerically superior. While initial going was slow, the Germans eventually gained the upper hand, reducing the strength of the armies of the Russian Southwest Front to the point where they were isolated and unable to mount a serious threat against either AG South itself or the flanks of AG Center. Despite this, the remnants of the Southwest Front were simply too tempting a target for Hitler to pass up at which point their complete elimination became his top priority. And this is why, despite protests from his commanders, Hitler ordered the transfer of Guderian’s panzer group from AG Center to AG South to assist in the capture of Kiev and the liquidation of the Southwest Front. What seems to have been completely lost on Hitler was the fact that had AG South followed the invasion route originally set out by General Halder, the Southwest Front armies would likely have been completely enveloped and destroyed and Kiev captured in the first weeks of Operation Barbarossa. This would have removed any need to halt the advance of AG Center for more than the two weeks Field Marshal Von Bock believed necessary to rest and refit his army group for its’ final push on Moscow or send Guderian south on an operation that was not really necessitated by conditions on the ground in mid July 1941.
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Originally Posted by MrMarbles
An interesting "what-if". An argument I've read (made in part by the same Isaev) is that the capture of Moscow would begin a chain reaction that would eventually lead to collapse. Moscow was the nexus of the Soviet rail system and thus very important for supplying troops along the entire front north of it. Thus, without Moscow, the Soviets would probably be unable to defend Leningrad (which, while surrounded, depended on the troops outside to tie down German forces and also supplies coming from across Lake Ladoga). With Leningrad captured, the Germans could then begin using its port facilities of greater ease of supplying their forces in the north. Other advances in the area would also endanger Soviet rail lines from Murmansk and Arkhangelsk. In short, the Soviets would have been in a very tough position.
Correct. Those within the OKH who advocated making Moscow the primary objective of Operation Barbarossa firmly believed that the capture of the city would create an untenable situation for Soviet forces at Leningrad and in the Ukraine. With the main north/south road and rail lines no longer open, these formations would be cut off and forced to fight on in isolation without hope of resupply or reinforcement. The OKH generals believed, justifiably so, that these remaining armies would quickly collapse, at which point the Germans could finish the task of clearing European Russia of Soviet troops.
Keep in mind though that the objective of Operation Typhoon as set down by Hitler was not the actual capture of Moscow. Hitler feared that any attempt to enter the city would lead to house to house fighting which he felt could be potentially disastrous for German troops. Instead, he wished the city to be handled in the same manner as Leningrad; namely, setting up siege lines around Moscow and starve the city into surrender. What Hitler failed to grasp was that the delay caused by his earlier diversion of resources to the Ukraine had not only permanently degraded the strength of AG Center but had also given the Russians valuable time to strongly reinforce their defensive positions around Moscow. This, combined with extremely bitter winter conditions, left the Germans not only too weak to push past Soviet defenses but also unable to set up anything but the thinnest of siege lines around Moscow. So when the Russians launched their counteroffensive, the Germans could neither contain it nor defeat it.
What should be considered also within the context of Operation Barbarossa is what would have constituted victory from the German perspective. Yes, the hope of all was that the loss of Moscow would force the Soviets to surrender. But it is clear from occupation plans developed for Russia that the Germans did not anticipate that taking Moscow would necessarily mean the immediate end of the Soviet Union. Instead they saw a situation where the Soviet Union would be pushed so far eastward that it would lack both the strength and ability to threaten Germany’s hold on European Russia. This would become even more likely once Germany could either cut off what remained of the Soviet Union from the oil fields in the Caucasus or take possession of the fields outright. After that, the Germans reasoned, the Soviet Union would fragment into disparate republics, much as it did during the Russian Civil War.
Once again, one can only speculate whether any of this would truly have come to pass had Operation Barbarossa been executed both flawlessly and as originally planned.
When the Germans invaded, there were a few communities along the Russian border that treated them as heroes--at first. Better treatment of the Russians could have resulted in a situation where many chose to turn on Stalin.
While Stalin was destroying churches in Russia,
Hitler donated money to Russians living in exile
in Germany to build an Orthodox church in Berlin.
As the German army liberated Russia, thousands of
churches [the bolsheviks had closed] were reopened.
In 1942, the Archbishop of the Russian Church
in exile said the "courageous German sword"
was resurrecting Russia.
This will give you some idea why Russians fought
along side the Germans against the bolsheviks.
My dad partook in these battles..From what I heard from himself and his friends is that it was withering fire from all sides..It was a REAL war - intense and endless - without relief for an instance...It is irksome when some describe Afghanistan or Iraq as a war - these modern conflicts are war games - they are not the real deal.
Many White Russians/Monarchists supported and funded Hitler,
in the hope Germany would destroy bolshevik rule and the
monarchy would be restored. Hitler did entertain the idea of
restoring Romanov rule in Russia.
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