The Day of The Red Army's victory & the Nazi invaders defeat in the Battle of Stalingrad
February 2, 1943 saw the end of one of the largest and most fierce battles in the Great Patriotic War, a battle that turned the tide of the war. This bitter battle lasted 200 days on the banks of the Don and Volga rivers, at the walls of Stalingrad, and finally in the city itself. Up to 2.1 million people took part in the battle on both sides at a given time. The Battle for Stalingrad surpassed all previous battles in world history in its scale and intensity.
The Third Reich believed that taking the Caucasus, with its enormous oil reserves and fertile agricultural areas in the Don and Kuban regions, the North Caucasus and the low reaches of the Volga, and control over the Volga River in general, were the main objectives in defeating the USSR.
By late June, 1942, the enemy had concentrated about 900,000 officers and soldiers, 1,260 tanks, 17,000 weapons and mortars, and 1,640 war planes in the corridor from Kursk to Taganrog at a front some 600–650 kilometres long. This group had up to 35 percent of the infantry and over 50 percent of the tank and motorised divisions from the overall number of forces on the Soviet-German front.
The operations near Kharkov, towards Voronezh and Donbass, had a bad outcome for Soviet forces. At the same time, the enemy was moving substantial forces to the large meander of the Don River. This move revealed the real threat of an enemy breakthrough along the Volga. This could have broken the Soviet front and resulted in the loss of communications between the central regions and the Caucasus, where about 90 percent of all Soviet oil was produced.
The Red Army on the Southwestern Front sustained heavy losses and were unable to stop the eastward movement of the Nazis. While repelling attacks by units from the German 1st Tank and 17th Tank battalions of Army Group A from the east, north and west, the forces of the Southern Front were retreating with heavy fighting, to the Rostov defensive region.
In this situation, the Supreme High Command General Headquarters (Supreme Command) deployed the 62nd, 63rd and 64th armies to the rear of the Southwestern and Southern fronts. A new Stalingrad Front was created on July 12. Marshal Semyon Timoshenko was appointed commander. The Stalingrad Front was given the task of creating strong defences on the left bank of the Don in the corridor from Pavlovsk to Kletskaya and further along the Kletskaya-Surovikino-Verkhne-Kurmoyarskaya line. The 51st Army on the South Caucasus Front was moved from Verkhnyaya-Kurmoyarskaya to the Azov Sea on the left bank of the Don River. It was charged with covering the area towards the Caucasus together with the retreating forces from the Southern Front. The Supreme Command soon moved the 28th, 38th and 57th armies, which had retreated with heavy losses, to the Stalingrad Front. Ten aviation regiments were sent to the Stalingrad area to reinforce the 8th Air Army.
On instructions from the Supreme Command, Deputy Supreme Commander-in-Chief Army General Georgy Zhukov and Head of the Supreme Command Colonel General Alexander Vasilevsky were given command of general strategy and of the coordination of the fronts’ actions.
The Battle of Stalingrad is divided into two periods: the defensive (from July 17 to November 18, 1942) and the offensive (from November 19, 1942 to February 2, 1943).
The defensive operation is also divided into two stages. The first one includes defensive operations on the remote approaches to Stalingrad (July 17– September 12). The second stage includes defensive operations on the possession of Stalingrad (September 13 – November 18, 1942).
The first stage of the operation began on July 17, 1942 in the large meander of the Don River by an armed contact of the 62nd Army with advanced units of the German army. The enemy had to deploy five divisions out of 14 and spend six days in order to advance to the main line of defence of the Stalingrad Front. Under the pressure of the overpowering enemy forces, the Soviet forces had to retreat to new positions that were poorly set up or not set up at all. However, they continued to deal heavy blows to the enemy.
By late July, the situation in the Stalingrad direction remained very tense. The German army deeply enveloped both flanks of the 62nd Army and reached the Don River near Nizhne-Chirskaya, where the 64th Army held the defence line, and threatened to break through towards Stalingrad from the southwest.
Under the circumstances, on July 28, 1942, the Supreme High Command General Headquarters issued Order No. 227, which was conveyed to the soldiers of the Stalingrad and other fronts. The Order contained a sombre and blunt description of the difficult situation at the front, including in the Stalingrad direction:
The German occupiers are breaking through to Stalingrad and the Volga, and aim to capture the Kuban and the northern Caucasus with their riches in oil and grain, whatever the cost. The enemy has already captured Voroshilovgrad, Starobelsk, Rossosh, Kupyansk, Valuiki, Novocherkassk, Rostov-on- Don and half of Voronezh. […] We have lost over 70 million citizens, over 13 million tonnes of grain and over 10 million tonnes of metal each year. We now no longer exceed the Germans in human reserves or reserves of grain. Retreating further means we work ourselves and our Motherland into ruin. Each patch of land we abandon will strengthen the enemy and weakens our defence and our Motherland […]
It follows from all of this that the retreat must be stopped now. ‘NOT A SINGLE STEP BACK.’ That must now be our main slogan. Нenceforth the solid law of discipline for each commander, Red Army soldier, and commissar should be the requirement - NOT A SINGLE STEP BACK without an order from higher command... These are the orders of our Motherland. To execute this order - means to defend our lands, to save the Motherland, to exterminate and to conquer the hated enemy… This order is to be read in all companies, cavalry squadrons, batteries, squadrons, commands and headquarters.
People's Commissar for Defence, Joseph Stalin
Due to the increased spread of the defence line, on August 5 the Supreme Command divided the Stalingrad Front, which was under command of Lieutenant General Vasily Gordov since July 23, into Stalingrad and Southeastern fronts. For closer interaction between the forces of the two fronts, from August 9 the command of the defence of Stalingrad was united and the Stalingrad Front was brought under Commander of the Southeastern Front Colonel General Andrei Yeryomenko.
On July 30, the German Command decided to turn the 4th Tank Army from the Caucasus direction to Stalingrad. As a result, there were already two armies operating in the Stalingrad direction – the 6th Army from the west and the 4th Tank Army from the southwest. On August 5, the vanguard elements of the 4th Tank Army came to the external defence line of Stalingrad. The enemy’s attempts to break through the defence were countered by well-organised counterattacks by the 64th and 57th armies.
Despite stubborn resistance by the Soviet forces, the enemy managed to break through the defences of the 62nd Army on August 23 and to approach the middle defence line whereas the advanced units of the 14th Tank Corps came up to the Volga River to the north of Stalingrad in Yerzovka. Alongside that, the Germans sent an armada of bombers which made over 2,000 sorties on a single day. That was the harshest air raid throughout the entire war. The whole city was in flames. In total, over 2,900,000 bombs, mines and shells hit Stalingrad during the battle, to say nothing about small calibre and tank artillery shelling.
Alexander Vasilevsky of the Supreme Command recalls:
I was with the 62nd Army on the morning of the unforgettable and tragic day of August 23. On that day, the Nazis managed to advance their tank units to the Volga and to cut off the 62nd Army from the bulk of the Stalingrad Front forces. Simultaneously with breaking through our defence, on August 23 and 24 the enemy launched a massive bombing of the city with nearly all the aircraft of its 4th Air Force fleet. The city was turned into ruins. The telephone and telegraph communications were lost, and on August 24th I had to talk to the Supreme Commander-in-Chief using an open radio channel.
On August 23 alone, the air defence units brought down 120 enemy planes. Of those, 90 were downed by fighter aviation and 30 by air-defence artillery. At the same time air defence artillery regiments were repelling repeated attacks of the German tanks and infantry in front of the city inflicting heavy losses on the enemy.
This is when the City Defence Committee headed by Secretary of the Stalingrad Regional Party Committee Alexey Chuyanov issued the following message to the people of Stalingrad:
Dear comrades, fellow Stalingrad residents, our city is once again facing challenging times, just like 24 years ago. The vicious Nazis are eager to conquer sunny Stalingrad and reach the Volga, the great Russian river. People of Stalingrad, we will not let the Germans commit their outrages in our city. We will all rise to defend our beloved city, our homes and families. We will install impenetrable barricades in every street. We will turn every building, every neighbourhood, every street into an impenetrable fortress. I call on all of you to get out and build barricades. Block every street. Our fathers stood firm for Tsaritsyn in 1918, and what a terrible year it was. In 1942, let us also take a firm stand in Stalingrad, the city of the Red Banner. I call on everyone to join forces to build barricades. Everyone capable of carrying arms must defend our city, our home!
The Soviet forces started the second stage in the defensive operation to retain Stalingrad on September 13. It lasted for 75 days. During that time, the enemy mounted four assaults on the city trying to seize it in-stride.
The first attack against the city started on September 13 with massive artillery fire, supported from the air. The enemy’s forces and assets were 1.5 to 2 times superior to those available to the units of the 62nd and 64th armies, and the Germans had six times more tanks. They focused their main assets on capturing the city centre in order to reach the Volga in front of the central crossing.
September 14 was one of the most challenging days in the heroic defence of the city during the Battle of Stalingrad. The grain elevator and Stalingrad-2 train station became the scenes of the heaviest fighting. On September 15, the enemy had to endure heavy losses in order to take control of the Mamayev Kurgan, the dominant height in the city centre with an elevation of 102 meters. However, the next day units of the 13th Guards Division and the 112th Motorised Infantry Division succeeded in recapturing the mount.
The second enemy attempt to take over the city lasted from September 28 until October 8. The German high command wanted Stalingrad to be taken in a matter of days at any the cost, and insisted that this result be achieved.
The third assault against the city started on October 14, becoming the most brutal attack with the biggest firepower. Even with the enemy separating them, units and formations of the 62nd Army continued to hold the line along the Volga embankment. Cut off from the main forces, the 138th Rifle Division held a 700-metre section along the banks.
There was heavy fighting for every block, for every passage, every building, every foot of land. Sometimes, Soviet and German forces found themselves inside the same building controlling different floors. The feats accomplished by the fighters from the Pavlov’s House, who managed to hold their positions for 58 days, acquired worldwide fame. The enemy carried out air strikes against this building, as well as used artillery and mortar fire, but the defenders would not budge. They accomplished a combat feat. This was also where a real miracle happened. A girl, Zina Seleznyova, was born there despite the never-ending shelling. Thanks to the courage of the defenders, she survived the Battle of Stalingrad and regularly met with her saviours afterwards. Mumin Konoat, a Tajikistani poet, dedicated the following lines in his poem Voices from Stalingrad to the miracle of a child being born in the bleeding Stalingrad:
Sniper Vasily Zaitsev’s words in Stalingrad became a slogan for all Soviet forces:
There is nothing beyond the Volga for us, the soldiers and commanders of the 62nd Army. We took our last stand here and it will always be this way.
Vasily Zaitsev received the Hero of the Soviet Union title after the Battle of Stalingrad.
In fact, everyone joined the fight for Stalingrad, including Igor Mikhailov, an eight-year-old boy who received the medal For the Defence of Stalingrad. His story is quite telling. During the defence of Stalingrad, he stayed with the artillery unit where his father Konstantin Mikhailov served. Despite his young age, Igor endured the dangers and deprivation like all other Soviet soldiers. He did what he could to help the fighters: delivered letters, newspapers, brought water, collected German posters and gave them to the commanders, and spotted many enemy scouts. When the battle was over, Igor flew to Moscow and enrolled in school No. 95 as a first grader.
Life was the ultimate value for Soviet soldiers during all this heavy fighting. This is what photographer Yakov Ryumkin wrote:
Stalingrad became a dead city at the time. Even birds stopped flying around. However, there was suddenly this cat, alive, and who knows how it managed to stay safe. It was like a miracle with all these ruins and chimneys around. For soldiers, this fluffy creature symbolized the warmness of the hearth. They had held nothing but rifles in their hands for many months, so now they were all eager to get hold of what symbolised life for them, so distant that they almost forgot how it felt. They quarrelled and almost fought over who would get to keep the cat. Dolgov regiment soldiers got the animal.
Heavy fighting continued for a month along the entire line of defence held by the 62nd and 64th armies. It is thanks to the heroism of the Soviet soldiers that the enemy never succeeded in breaching the Soviet defences. The German forces suffered heavy losses despite their superiority in manpower and firepower. Still, they failed to take the city under their control, including the embankment.
The fourth assault on Stalingrad began on November 11. Five infantry divisions and two panzer divisions attacked the 62nd Army that found itself in an extremely difficult and precarious situation. It had 47,000 officers and soldiers, about 800 artillery systems and mortars, as well as 19 tanks. By that time, the 62nd Army’s defensive positions had been split into three segments.
The Wehrmacht sustained tremendous casualties during these defensive operations. In all, about 700,000 enemy personnel were killed and wounded, while fighting to seize Stalingrad. The Germans also lost over 2,000 artillery systems and mortars, over 1,000 tanks and self-propelled guns, as well as over 1,400 warplanes and transport aircraft. Instead of moving towards the Volga without respite, enemy forces had to conduct protracted and exhausting battles in and around Stalingrad. The German high command’s plans for the summer campaign in 1942 had been wrecked completely. However, Soviet forces also suffered grievously, losing 644,000 officers and soldiers, including 324,000 killed in action and 320,000 wounded, as well as 1,400 tanks, over 12,000 artillery systems and mortars and over 2,000 aircraft.
The strategic counteroffensive operation involving elements of the Red Army’s Southwest, Don and Stalingrad fronts, the left flank of the Voronezh Front and the Volga Naval flotilla was launched on November 19, 1942 and ended on February 2, 1943. Army General Georgy Zhukov and Colonel General Alexander Vasilevsky coordinated the efforts to draft the counteroffensive plans.
Elements of the Southwest Front and the 65th Army of the Don Front jumped off on November 19 following an 80-minute artillery barrage. By the end of the day, the Southwest Front scored the greatest successes by breaching defensive positions of the 3rd Romanian Army in two sectors. The 2nd and 4th Romanian corps were defeated, and their surviving units were outflanked together with the 5th Army Corps that was deployed near Raspopinskaya. Elements of the 65th Army encountered tough resistance and advanced three to five kilometres, failing to completely breach the enemy’s first line of defence.
Elements of the Stalingrad Front attacked on November 20. Here is what Colonel General Andrei Yeryomenko wrote about those events:
Katyusha multiple launch rocket systems were the first to launch the concert. Artillery systems and mortars later joined the fray. It is difficult to describe how I felt while listening to the many-voiced chorus prior to the offensive. of the most vivid feeling is pride in our powerful nation and faith in our victory. Just yesterday, we clenched our teeth and told ourselves: “Not a single step backwards,” and now the Motherland ordered us to advance…
On the first day, rifle divisions broke through defensive positions of the 4th Romanian Army and penetrated enemy defences in the southwestern sector by 20 to 30 km.
In two days, elements of Soviet fronts inflicted a crushing defeat on the 3rd and 4th Romanian armies. On November 21, the 26th and 4th tank corps of the Southwest Front reached Manoylin, turned east and took a shortcut to the Don River. On November 22, the 26th Tank Corps seized a bridge across the Don River and entered Kalach.
On November 23, elements of the 26th Tank Corps quickly reached Sovetsky and linked up with elements of the 4th Mechanised Corps. Mobile units of the Southwestern and Stalingrad fronts reached Kalach, Sovetsky and Marinovka and completely encircled the German forces. In all, the Soviet forces created a pocket with 22 divisions and over 160 detached units, part of the 6th German Army and the 4th Panzer Army numbering about 300,000 officers and soldiers. This became the first major encirclement of German forces during World War II.
On the same day the enemy’s Raspopinskaya formation capitulated. It was for the first time in the Great Patriotic War that a large enemy formation surrendered to the Soviet forces. In all, Soviet soldiers captured over 27,000 officers and soldiers from two Romanian army corps near Raspopinskaya Stanitsa.
The German formation was encircled completely on November 30. A rapid Soviet offensive involving tank, cavalry and rifle units made it possible to create external and internal perimeters of envelopment. However, Soviet forces were not able to quickly split German units inside the pocket.
The Wehrmacht’s high command tried to rescue surrounded units and elements. The Germans put together plans for Operation Winter Storm (Unternehmen Wintergewitter), which aimed to extricate their comrades in and around Stalingrad. They established Army Group Don with up to 30 divisions for this purpose. Field Marshal Erich von Manstein coordinated the entire operation, and Colonel General Hermann Hoth commanded the forces involved and executed operational plans.
Operation Winter Storm got underway in the morning of December 12. Enemy units hit hard from Kotelnikovo, breached Soviet defences and advanced 25 kilometres by dusk. Intense fighting ensued, with the opponents committing numerous tanks. Supported by the Luftwaffe, the Germans continued to exploit their success. By the evening of December 19, only 35 to 40 km separated General Hoth’s panzers from the surrounded 6th German Army.
The Supreme Command quickly deployed the 2nd Guards Army from the Strategic Reserve, commanded by Lieutenant General Rodion Malinovsky. This powerful all-arms formation had been brought up to full strength in terms of manpower, weaponry and military equipment. On December 20-23, a fierce engagement raged on the banks of the Myshkova River, with the enemy suffering heavy casualties and completely depleting its offensive capabilities. The Germans were forced to dig in.
On orders from the Supreme Command, elements of the Red Army’s Western Front, commanded by Colonel General Ivan Konev, and the Kalinin Front, commanded by Colonel General Maxim Purkayev, launched Operation Mars. Although Soviet forces converging from the west and the east failed to defeat the main elements of the 9th German Army and to eliminate the Rzhev salient, their active offensive pinned down up to 30 enemy divisions and prevented the German high command from redeploying them to the Stalingrad sector, where the main events were unfolding. Moreover, the enemy was forced to redeploy four panzer divisions and one motorised division there from OKW reserves and that of Army Group Centre.
The Soviet offensive started in the morning of December 16, with Soviet forces breaching enemy defences in eight days and outflanking Army Group Don. In all, 72 enemy divisions were defeated in the middle reaches of the Don River. The Germans lost 120,000 officers and soldiers, including 60,500 prisoners of war. Soviet casualties totalled an impressive 95,700, including 20,300 killed in action. Most importantly, the enemy exhausted its reserves and was no longer able to advance towards Stalingrad. The Germans renounced any further attempts to rescue the 6th Army. Rome was shocked to learn about the defeat of Italian forces in the Don River area, and relations between Rome and Berlin greatly deteriorated.
The Supreme Command devised a plan, codenamed Operation Koltso (Operation Ring) to destroy the encircled group. It included three stages: first, to cut off and destroy the enemy in the western and northeastern sections of the encircled area; second, to destroy German forces near the city; and third, to destroy the remaining enemies in the city.
On January 8, the Don Front command issued an ultimatum to the commanders of the encircled invaders demanding that they stop the senseless resistance and accept the capitulation terms. Signed by the Supreme Command representatives Nikolai Voronov and Don Front Commander Konstantin Rokossovsky, the ultimatum reached the Friedrich Paulus headquarters by radio waves, and messengers delivered it as a hard copy. However, the commander of the 6th Army wrote back to the Soviet command, rejecting the offer.
This is what Lieutenant General Pavel Batov, who commanded the 65th Army, wrote about this in his memoires:
This is when all this might started to shake. The Nazis started jumping and crawling out of their shelters, basements and from under the tanks. Some of them tried to flee, while others got on their knees, bewildered as they were, with their hands up in the air. There were still others who rushed back to take shelter, disappearing in the thick smoke, only to reappear again.
At the same time, the enemy came under attack from the air. German soldiers and officers surrendered en mass, dropping their weapons.
On February 2, the enemy’s northern group of troops capitulated with over 40,000 German soldiers and officers under General Karl Strecker’s command laying down their weapons. This signalled the end of combat action along the Volga. The Don Front forces defeated 22 divisions and 149 reinforcement and supply units as part of the effort to destroy the encircled German army between January 10 and February 2, 1943. Over 91,000 people were taken prisoner, including 2,500 officers and 24 generals. The operation left about 140,000 enemy corpses on the battlefield, who were later buried.
In their report to Supreme Commander-in-Chief Joseph Stalin, Supreme Command representative, Artillery Marshal Nikolai Voronov and Commander of the Don Front, Colonel General Konstantin Rokossovsky wrote:
“In execution of your order, the Don Front forces completely defeated and destroyed the Stalingrad enemy group as of 4 pm of February 2, 1943. Military action in and around the city of Stalingrad stopped after the surrounded enemy army were eliminated.”
The Battle of Stalingrad ended with a historic victory by the Soviet armed forces, marking a radical turn not only in the course of the Great Patriotic War, but also in the entire World War II. The fascist block lost a quarter of its forces on the Soviet-German front during this battle with the total losses, including the dead and wounded, prisoners of war and those who went missing, totalling around 1.5 million people. This led Germany to announce its first national day of mourning during the war. The Red Army lost 1,130,000 people, including 480,000 dead, but was able to secure the strategic initiative. The victory in Stalingrad created conditions enabling Soviet forces to mount a large-scale counteroffensive for expelling the invaders from the occupied Soviet territory.
Not only did the destruction of a major enemy group of forces give the USSR and its armed forces international prestige, but also helped strengthen the anti-Hitler coalition.
On November 29, 1943, during the Tehran Conference and in the presence of US President Franklin Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill presented a ceremonial longsword (The Sword of Stalingrad) made at the special command of King George VI of the United Kingdom, as a sign of admiration for the courage and resilience demonstrated by the defenders of Stalingrad. The sword had the following inscription on its blade, both in Russian and English:
To the steel-hearted citizens of Stalingrad • The gift of King George Vi • In token of the homage of the British people.
President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin (in Volgograd, during the celebrations of the 80th anniversary of victory in the Battle for Stalingrad):
This was not merely a battle for a city – the very existence of a tormented but unvanquished country was at stake, as was the outcome of not only the Great Patriotic War but of World War II as a whole. Every person in the trenches and on the home front felt and understood this. And so, as it has happened repeatedly in our history, we united in the decisive battle and won.
Sources:
https://mil.ru/winner_may/history/more.htm?id=11333818@cmsArticle
https://rg.ru/2018/01/30/rodina-stalingrad-zina.html