The stage of the Second World War, covering the events of the spring, summer and autumn of 1942, was characterized by a particularly difficult and intense struggle of the Soviet Armed Forces against the combined forces of the fascist bloc for more than seven months. At this time, along with the ongoing battles for Leningrad and the Crimea, the largest battle of the Second World War, Stalingrad, unfolded. Simultaneously and in direct connection with it, the battle for the Caucasus also unfolded. Here, on the southern wing of the front, was the center of the armed struggle throughout this stage of the war. A huge amount of forces and means were involved in the long and difficult defensive battles in the south. The enemy attracted here during July - November 1942 almost all the forces of Army Groups "A" and "B" - seven armies (365). In total, this amounted to about 80 of the most combat-ready divisions, or 30 percent of all enemy forces that were at that time on the Soviet-German front.

At the same time, active hostilities were going on in the areas of Demyansk, Rzhev and Voronezh. On the seas and in the air, just as in 1941, independent operations and daily combat activities of the Navy, Air Force and Air Defense Forces of the country were carried out. The forces of the partisan movement also intensified the fight against the enemy. Increasingly, they coordinated their actions with the actions of the regular troops of the Soviet Army.

The intensity and scope of the struggle on the huge Soviet-German front (4-6 thousand km) increased. The main shock strategic group of the Nazi armies, which launched the summer offensive in a zone up to 800 km, by the end of the stage, was already operating on a front of about 2400 km, that is, the width of the zone of active operations increased 3 times. The depth of penetration of the enemy into the territory of the USSR during his offensive amounted to 650 km in the Stalingrad direction and up to 1000 km in the Caucasus. Since intense battles were also fought in summer and autumn in other sectors, the general front of active operations of the Soviet Armed Forces by the end of autumn 1942 was very significant.

The armed struggle on the Soviet-German front went through two stages - spring and summer-autumn, which differed sharply from one another both in the nature of the hostilities and in their results. The Soviet Armed Forces were unable to launch a major offensive planned for the summer of 1942. As a result of the unsuccessful outcome of the spring battles, they lost their strategic initiative and were forced to conduct a defensive campaign from June 28, which lasted almost five months.

Thus, for the second time during the war, strategic defense became the main type of military operations of the Soviet Armed Forces. The Soviet Army consistently carried out a number of major operations that frustrated the strategic plans of the German Wehrmacht on the Soviet-German front.

Suffering heavy losses in the fight against the stubbornly resisting Soviet troops on the Stalingrad, Caucasian and other directions of the Soviet-German front, the enemy was forced to bring here all his strategic reserves, transfer forces from other theaters of military operations, send huge flows of march reinforcements and echelons of military equipment, weapons and other material and technical means of combat. But all this did not bring the desired success to Nazi Germany. In total, from April 1 to November 18, 1942, the Nazi command additionally transferred about 70 divisions here from the West. And taking into account the 16 formations formed directly in the theater of operations and entered into battles against the Soviet Army, the total number of Wehrmacht divisions that additionally entered the fight against it reached more than 80.

The data in Table 16 testify to the dynamics of the transfer of enemy troops to the Soviet-German front from the West. introduced an average of 10 divisions against the Soviet Army. In addition, 250,000 marching reinforcements were sent to the front every month. The total number of enemy formations by the end of the stage reached 278, or in terms of divisions - 270. This was the largest number of forces involved by the Nazis on the Soviet-German front in the entire Second World War.

Table 16

Name of connections

Transferred from the West

April-June

July-November

Total arrived between April and November

Total Connections

in divisions

Including: infantry divisions

tank divisions

motorized divisions

The Soviet Army in the course of the heroic struggle against the Nazi troops and the armies of the allies of the "Third Reich" inflicted irreparable losses on them, which during the spring, summer and autumn of 1942 amounted to about 1 million people, 20.4 thousand guns, over 1 .5 thousand tanks and more than 4 thousand aircraft.

The Soviet Navy also caused great damage to the enemy. Ensuring the escort of convoys on the external sea lanes of the Soviet Union and disrupting German shipping by sea, the Northern Fleet sank 13 warships and 28 transports from May to November 1942, and the submarine forces of the Baltic Fleet sank about 60 enemy transports. This forced the Nazi command to allocate additional forces to protect the sea lanes linking Germany with Finland, Norway, Sweden, and also providing supplies to the troops on the northern sector of the front.

Significant losses during the spring and summer-autumn battles of 1942 were also suffered by the Soviet Armed Forces.

Despite the heroic resistance of the Soviet troops, the enemy managed to break through to Voronezh, reach the Volga near Stalingrad and capture a number of passes of the Main Caucasian Range. The enemy completely captured the coal and metallurgical base of the country - the Donbass, the rich agricultural regions of the Kuban and the Don, part of the oil-bearing regions of the Caucasus and cut off the most convenient communications linking the South of the country with the Center.

As a result of the forced withdrawal of the Soviet Army into the interior of the country, by the autumn of 1942, the occupiers seized an area of ​​1,795 thousand square meters. km (366) . Before the war, about 80 million people, or almost 42 percent of the total population, lived on it, large factories of heavy engineering and other industries of the USSR were located. Before the war, about 71 percent of pig iron and 60 percent of steel were produced here. The territory occupied by the enemy contained 47 percent of all sown areas in the USSR.

The fierce battles waged by the Soviet Armed Forces in repulsing a major offensive by the Wehrmacht in 1942 required a huge expenditure of material resources. From May to November, the combat losses of only one aircraft amounted to more than 7 thousand (367). Especially great were the losses of ammunition during the forced withdrawal of Soviet troops in the southwestern direction.

What are the main reasons why the enemy managed to advance so far in 1942 on the southern wing of the front? Why were the Soviet troops able to stop the enemy only on the Volga and Caucasian borders?

The reasons for the temporary military failures of the Soviet Army in the spring and early summer of 1942 can be reduced to two groups. The first covers the objective political, economic and strategic conditions of warfare, the second - refers to the area of ​​subjective factors.

One of the main reasons for objective failures was that the enemy concentrated very large forces in order to strike in one strategic direction. So, if in 1941, to implement the Barbarossa plan, the Wehrmacht leadership was able to allocate 190 divisions (taking into account the formations of Germany's allies in aggression) for a simultaneous offensive in three strategic directions, then to implement the strategic plan for the second round of the eastern campaign, the Nazis deployed only in one southeast direction, 90 fully equipped divisions equipped with modern weapons and military equipment for that time. As a result, the enemy managed to create a large superiority in forces in this direction. Having preempted the Soviet Army in opening active hostilities in the spring of 1942, the fascist German troops achieved major successes in the Crimea and in the Kharkov region and again seized the strategic initiative.

The fighting took place for the enemy in favorable conditions. The Hitlerite command took advantage of the favorable strategic situation in Europe. Expecting that the second front would not be opened in the summer and autumn of 1942, it could use troops for decisive actions on the Eastern Front, concentrate a large grouping here to deliver a powerful initial blow to the Soviet Army in the summer of 1942. At the same time, the German command continued in a calm situation, to transfer a huge number of divisions from West to East and bring them in to build up forces in the course of the offensive itself. The second front in Western Europe could have diverted from the East 40-60 divisions of the German ground forces and certain aviation forces, which the Soviet command had the right to count on when planning the strategic actions of the Soviet Armed Forces in 1942, but it was not opened.

All this demanded an enormous effort from the Soviet Union. The Soviet Armed Forces had to once again fight the armed forces of fascist Germany (and its allies in aggression) one on one, waging an unequal struggle under very difficult conditions.

The complexity of the struggle in the spring and early summer was also determined by the fact that the Soviet Army was forced to start repelling a major Wehrmacht offensive in conditions when the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command did not have prepared strategic reserves. In addition, it should be said that in the troops during this period there was a process of organizational restructuring and technical re-equipment; industry was not yet fully able to provide the army with modern military equipment, especially tank equipment, and ammunition. The completion of all these measures had to be carried out already during the beginning of the summer offensive of the enemy, while overcoming new difficulties that arose as a result of the failures of the Soviet troops in the spring battles. At the end of May, it was decided to create ten combined arms armies from among the available reserve formations of the Ground Forces by June - July 1942, but there were no real opportunities for their formation by this date.

By the middle of 1942, the Soviet military industry was already completing perestroika and increasing the production of weapons. Nevertheless, it could not yet provide such a quantity of aircraft, tanks, artillery pieces and mortars, which would be enough at the same time to replenish the troops and to form new formations and formations. Meanwhile, the active army experienced a great need for weapons and military equipment. In the spring, the planes and tanks available in it were 50 percent obsolete, and more than half of the aircraft fleet were fighters. The problem of ammunition was especially acute for the Soviet troops. Their shortage in 1942 was the greatest for the entire time of the war.

Many formations that entered the fight against the enemy in the south did not have sufficient combat experience. The experience gained in the fight against the enemy, acquired in the battle near Moscow, has not yet been fully generalized and has not become the property of all the troops of the army in the field.

The difficult situation at the front made it difficult to create strategic reserves. The headquarters was forced to carry out all the work on their formation, staffing with rank and file and officers, armament, training and cohesion in an extremely short time, which could not but have negative consequences.

These were the objective reasons for the temporary failures of the Soviet Army in the spring and early summer of 1942.

Factors of a subjective order were associated mainly with certain miscalculations in assessing the situation in the spring of 1942, in making strategic decisions and in leading troops in individual command and control levels.

However, the temporary setbacks of the Soviet Army could not change the buildup of forces by the Soviet Army and the Soviet Union as a whole. The finale of the autumn battles convincingly showed that the course of the struggle was more and more determined by the constantly operating factors of victory, which continued to develop steadily, creating the necessary basis for a turning point in the war in favor of the USSR, in favor of the entire anti-fascist coalition.

The Soviet Armed Forces were eventually able to come out of severe trials with honor and make a worthy contribution to the ongoing struggle for a radical change. The general results of the struggle in the spring, summer and autumn of 1942 allow us to conclude that during this period the Soviet-German front was still the main front of the Second World War. Its decisive role was manifested primarily in the fact that it was here that Nazi Germany's plans to conquer world domination were finally thwarted. The Volga and Caucasian borders became for the Wehrmacht that insurmountable barrier that blocked its path of escalation of aggression to other regions of the world. Having failed to defeat the Soviet Armed Forces, having failed to achieve the main goal - the withdrawal of the USSR from the war, the fascist German army was forced to switch to strategic defense for the second time during the world war. Thus, the political and military leadership of the "Third Reich" admitted the failure of their offensive plans.

The decisive role of the Soviet-German front was determined by the fact that the main forces of the fascist bloc were still located here (two-thirds of the Wehrmacht troops and almost all the forces of Germany's European allies). On this front, the losses of the Wehrmacht amounted to 95 percent of all losses in the spring and summer-autumn periods of 1942. All the existing and created strategic reserves of the Nazi high command were involved here. The heroic resistance of the Soviet Army to the main forces of the Wehrmacht created a very favorable environment for the Anglo-American partners of the USSR in the anti-fascist coalition for the preparation and deployment of an offensive campaign in North Africa. This campaign was launched by the armed forces of Great Britain and the United States in late October - early November.

And, finally, the significance of the selfless struggle of the Soviet Armed Forces consisted in the fact that, as before, it remained an incentive for the activation and growth of the forces of the national liberation, anti-fascist movement in the countries occupied by fascist Germany and militaristic Japan. The last thought was very succinctly expressed in his book “The Second World War” by the famous French historian A. Michel: “The Soviet Union gave everyone an example of firmness in the struggle and showed that resistance to the invaders leads to success. In all countries, the communist parties, which were at the forefront of the underground struggle, drew strength and confidence from this example.

Results of the Second World War. Conclusions of the Defeated Specialists German Military

1942 offensive

1942 offensive

In the spring of 1942, the question arose before the German high command in what form to continue the war: to attack or defend. Going on the defensive would be an admission of our own defeat in the 1941 campaign and would deprive us of the chances of successfully continuing and ending the war in the East and West. 1942 was the last year in which, without fear of immediate intervention by the Western powers, the main forces of the German army could be used in an offensive on the Eastern Front. It remained to be decided what should be done on a 3,000-kilometer front in order to ensure the success of an offensive carried out by relatively small forces. It was clear that on most of the front the troops had to go on the defensive and that the proposed offensive had a chance of success only if all mobile forces and the best infantry divisions were concentrated in its direction. The decision was facilitated by the appearance at the front of the troops of Germany's allies - Italians, Romanians and Hungarians - with a total number of up to 35 divisions. True, the armament and combat training of these troops were not up to the mark and they did not have experience in waging war in the Russian theater of operations, however, if this large reserve of fresh forces were introduced into the German defense and mixed with the German troops, the experiment would obviously be would have succeeded. In the meantime, the German command decided to use the Allied forces in a separate section of the front, namely, along the Donets River, and later on the Don, and in this way directly invited the Russians, who were certainly aware of the state and combat capability of the Allied forces, to strike at this sector.

The German high command decided to launch an offensive in the south of the Eastern Front, a decision in which military-economic considerations played a large role: the availability of oil in the Caucasus and the Caspian Sea, as well as the rich agricultural and industrial areas of Eastern Ukraine. Russian attempts to prevent the preparation of the German army for the offensive in the spring of 1942 yielded only minor local successes.

On June 28, 1942, five German, two Romanian, one Italian and one Hungarian armies began their offensive. First, they delivered the main blow from Izyum and Kharkov in an easterly direction. All armies were consolidated into two army groups, of which the southern one (Army Group A) was to reach the lower reaches of the Don, while the northern one (Army Group B) was to reach the Volga on both sides of Stalingrad on a broad front. The offensive was again to be purely frontal. At first it developed according to plan. But very soon the left flank was held up by the strong resistance of the Russians and could not cross the Don and move east, although several bridgeheads were captured. This time, the Russians did not allow their armies to be encircled, but made a planned withdrawal, preserving the integrity of their front. They, of course, suffered heavy losses, but their final defeat did not follow.

From that moment on, both army groups began to move in different directions. Hitler insisted on the continuation of the offensive of Army Group "A" towards the oil regions of the Caucasus, while Army Group "B" with its right flank was to advance on Stalingrad in order to cut the allegedly important communication route - the Volga and paralyze the industry of Stalingrad. The fulfillment of these orders expanded the front of both army groups from 500 km between Taganrog and Kursk to almost 2 thousand km between Tuapse and Elbrus. Mozdok, Elista. Stalingrad and Voronezh. The depth of the operational area was now 750 km. Not surprisingly, insurmountable supply difficulties soon arose.

Such a division of the German strike force into two parts led to the fact that in one decisive place near Stalingrad, the 6th Army of General Paulus, reinforced by several divisions of other armies, formed a narrow wedge, the top of which, although it reached the city, but its mass was not enough in order to capture and hold the city and, in addition, to provide reliable protection for their flanks. By his stubbornness, Hitler prevented this dangerous situation from being eliminated by the timely withdrawal of Paulus's army. He turned Stalingrad into a symbol and became so determined not to give it up that it was impossible to talk him out of it.

The Stalingrad catastrophe caused by Hitler's stubbornness needs no detailed description. It began on November 19, 1942, when the Russians broke through the front of the 3rd Romanian Army northwest of Stalingrad. At the same time, the front of the 4th Romanian Army south of Stalingrad was also broken through. November 22, Stalingrad was surrounded. The plan developed by Paulus to break out of the encirclement was banned by Hitler. It was also impossible to persuade Hitler to a different decision because Goering, for his part, managed to assure him that the supply of the encircled army could be ensured by the daily delivery of 500 tons of necessary supplies by air. However, the average daily aviation power in supplying the 6th Army only occasionally reached 100 tons. Thus, due to the unscrupulous attitude of the high command towards its troops, the fate of the 6th Army was finally decided. Manstein's attempt to liberate the 6th Army with a deblocking blow was not successful.

As a conclusion from this sad chapter of German military history, it should be written that in the wide expanses of the eastern theater of operations, in the absence of reliable ground rear communications, the supply of troops can be ensured to some extent only with the help of a very powerful air fleet. Operations as bold as the Stalingrad one depend to a large extent on the availability of such capabilities. The delivery of supplies by air must be covered by aviation, which alone can ensure air supremacy over the combat area. At that time, the Germans no longer had such aviation forces.

In December 1942, the Russians managed to defeat the 4th Romanian Army north of Stalingrad and thereby eliminate all attempts to free the 6th Army from the encirclement, as well as to achieve the withdrawal of the German army from the Caucasus. On January 30, 1943, the 6th Army capitulated. On the day when her encirclement ended, she numbered 265 thousand people. Of this number, 90,000 people were taken prisoner, 34,000 wounded were airlifted out of Stalingrad, and over 100,000 people died. With great difficulty, General Kleist managed to save his Army Group A, withdrawing it in early January 1943 beyond the Don in its lower reaches. At the end of January 1943, Voronezh had to be abandoned in the northern sector of the former offensive front of the German army.

So, the summer campaign of 1942 ended with a heavy defeat for the German army. Since that time, German troops in the East have ceased to advance forever.

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Chapter 6. OFFENSIVE AND DEFENSE IN THE SOUTHERN SECTION OF THE EASTERN FRONT IN 1942 With the onset of snowmelt and the onset of a period of spring thaw, the mobility of troops was significantly reduced. The division continued to hold the conquered positions on the front on both sides

At the end of the spring of 1942, the international and internal situation of the Soviet Union improved somewhat. The anti-fascist front continued to expand and strengthen. In January, a declaration was signed by 26 countries in which they agreed to use all forces and means to fight against aggressive states and not to conclude a separate peace or truce with them. An agreement was reached with the United States and England on the opening of a second front in Europe in 1942. All these and other circumstances, especially the defeat of German troops near Moscow, the disruption of Hitler's plans for a blitzkrieg against the USSR, to a large extent activated anti-fascist forces in all countries. There was a temporary lull on the Soviet-German front.

In the rear of the country, new strategic reserves of all types of troops were formed. The total number of our active army increased to 5.5 million people, the number of tanks was 4065, guns and mortars - 43642, combat aircraft - 3164. Nazi Germany and its allies had 217 divisions and 20 brigades on the fronts from the Barents to the Black Sea, with 178 divisions, 8 brigades and 4 air forces were purely German. On the other fronts and in the occupied countries, due to the absence of a second front, Germany kept no more than 20% of its armed forces.

By May 1942, the enemy on the Soviet-German front had more than 6 million army, 3230 tanks and assault guns, up to 43 thousand guns and mortars, 3400 combat aircraft. In general terms, Hitler's political and military strategy for the next period of 1942 boiled down to defeating our troops in the south, capturing the Caucasus region, reaching the Volga, capturing Stalingrad, Astrakhan, and thereby creating conditions for the destruction of the USSR as a state.

Hitler's Directive No. 41 of April 5, 1942, provided for seizing the richest industrial economic resources (primarily Caucasian oil) from the Soviet Union and occupying a dominant strategic position in order to achieve their military and political goals. The Supreme Commander-in-Chief did not support the proposal of the Headquarters members to switch to temporary defense due to the fatigue of the troops and incorrectly assessed the strategic plan of the German command, which was made not by Moscow, but by the south-western direction.

The events of May and June showed the miscalculations of the Stavka. Our armed forces in the south have again been severely tested. At the end of April, the offensive of our troops in the Crimea ended in failure. The troops of the Crimean Front, led by Lieutenant General D.T. Kozlov, did not reach their goal and suffered significant losses.

The headquarters ordered the front command to go over to a tough defense.

The defeats in the Kerch region seriously complicated the situation in Sevastopol, where the defenders of the city had been waging a tense struggle since October. Having occupied Kerch, the German command concentrated all forces against Sevastopol. July 4 Sevastopol was abandoned by our troops. Crimea was completely lost, which greatly complicated the general situation for us.

As a result of the loss of the Crimea, the defeat of our troops in the Barvenkovo ​​region, in the Donbass and near Voronezh, the enemy again seized the strategic initiative and, having brought up fresh reserves, began a rapid advance towards the Volga and the Caucasus. By mid-July, having driven back our troops across the Don from Voronezh to Kletskaya and from Surovikin to Rostov, the enemy troops started a battle in the bend of the Don, trying to break through to Stalingrad.

As a result of the forced withdrawal of our troops, the richest regions of the Don and Donbass fell into the hands of the enemy. There was a direct threat of the enemy entering the Volga and the North Caucasus, the threat of losing the Kuban and all communications with the Caucasus, the loss of the most important economic region that supplied the army and industry with oil.

On July 28, 1942, Stalin issued Order No. 227. The order ordered the unconditional elimination of retreating moods in the troops, forbade the withdrawal of troops without an order from the top commander, ordered the creation of barrage detachments in the rear of the active armies, and shot "alarmists and cowards" on the spot. Historians debate the meaning of this order. On the one hand, he kept silent about the responsibility for the defeats of the Supreme High Command and reduced them to cowardice, lack of discipline among the soldiers and officers who bravely fought the enemy. On the other hand, he played a big role in the mobilization of troops.

During the retreat from Kharkov, the troops of the Southwestern Front suffered heavy losses and could not successfully hold back the advance of the enemy. For the same reason, the southern front was unable to stop the enemy in the Caucasian direction. It was necessary to block the path of the German troops to the Volga. On July 12, the Headquarters created a new, Stalingrad front. On the outskirts of Stalingrad, preparations were made for defensive and fortified lines. As in the defense of Moscow, many thousands of residents went out to build lines and selflessly prepared the city for defense. By July 17, the Stalingrad Front zoned the following line of defense: Pavlovsk-on-Don and further along the left bank of the Don to Serafimovich, then Kletskaya, Surovikino up to Upper Kurmoyarskaya.

In late July - early August, the development of events in the North Caucasian direction was clearly not in our favor. The superior forces of the enemy persistently moved forward. Soon German troops reached the Kuban River. In August, serious battles flared up in the Maikop direction. On August 10, enemy troops captured Maikop, and on August 11, Krasnodar. In mid-August, the enemy, having occupied Mozdok, reached the Terek River. By September 9, having driven our 46th Army from the frontiers, the fascist German troops had captured almost all the mountain passes.

By the end of July, the Stalingrad Front included 38 divisions, only 18 of them were fully equipped, 6 had from 2.5 to 4 thousand people, and 14 - from 300 to 1000 people. These small troops had to turn around on a 530-kilometer front. In total, the front at that time had 187 thousand people, 360 tanks, 337 aircraft, 7900 guns and mortars. Against the front, the enemy concentrated 250 thousand people, about 740 tanks, 1200 aircraft, 7500 guns and mortars. Thus, the ratio of forces was: in terms of people - 1.4: 1, in terms of guns and mortars 3.5: 1 in favor of the enemy.

Due to the fact that the troops of the Stalingrad Front stretched for 700 kilometers and there were difficulties in command and control, the Stavka decided to divide this front into two: Stalingrad and South-Eastern. This was done on August 5th. Lieutenant General V.N. Gordov, who replaced Marshal of the Soviet Union S.K. Timoshenko, remained commander of the Stalingrad Front, and Major General D.N. Nikishev was chief of staff.

After many days of fierce battles, on August 23, the 14th tank corps of the enemy broke into the Vertyachey area and, cutting the Stalingrad defense into two parts, higher to the Volga in the Latoshynka-Rynok area. German bomber aviation subjected Stalingrad to barbaric bombardments, turning it into heaps of ruins. Civilians died, industrial enterprises and cultural values ​​were destroyed.

Having transported his main forces across the Don, the enemy launched a vigorous offensive, supporting it with powerful air strikes.

In this difficult time for Stalingrad, the Stavka ordered private offensive operations to be carried out in the western direction in order to pin down enemy reserves and prevent their transfer to the Stalingrad region. It was clear that the battle for Stalingrad was of the greatest military and political importance. With the fall of Stalingrad, the enemy command got the opportunity to cut off the south of the country from the center. We could lose the Volga - the most important waterway, along which cargo from the Caucasus flowed in a large stream.

On the morning of September 3, after artillery preparation, the troops of the 1st Guards Army went on the offensive, but advanced only a few kilometers in the direction of Stalingrad, inflicting an insignificant defeat on the enemy. On September 5, the repeated attack of our troops did not bring much results. Our troops advanced only 2-4 kilometers.

Further calculations showed that it would be impossible to prepare the necessary forces and means for the counteroffensive before mid-November. When evaluating the enemy, we proceeded from the fact that fascist Germany was no longer in a position to fulfill its strategic plan of 1942. The forces and means that Germany had at its disposal by the autumn of 1942 would not be enough to complete tasks either in the North Caucasus or in the Don and Volga region. Soviet troops in mortal battles with the enemy on the outskirts of Stalingrad, and later in the city itself, suffered heavy losses and therefore had no opportunity to defeat the enemy with their available forces. But we have completed the preparation of large strategic reserves, which had the latest weapons and the latest military equipment. By November, the Headquarters was to have mechanized and tank formations armed with world-famous T-34 tanks, which allowed us to set more serious tasks for our troops.

In addition, our top-level command cadres learned a lot during the first period of the war, rethought a lot and, having gone through a difficult school of fighting a strong enemy, became masters of operational art. The rest of the command and political staff and soldiers of the Red Army, on the experience of numerous fierce battles with enemy troops, fully mastered the methods and methods of combat operations in any situation.

In early November, the enemy tried several times to carry out operations in the city to eliminate individual centers of defense, and on November 11, when our troops were finishing the grandiose preparations for the counteroffensive, they tried to attack again, but to no avail.

By this time, the enemy was exhausted and exhausted. During the period from July to November, in the battles in the Don, Volga and Stalingrad areas, the enemy lost up to 700 thousand people, more than a thousand tanks, over 2 thousand guns and mortars, up to 1400 aircraft. The general operational situation of the German troops in the Volga region also became more complicated. There were no divisional and corps reserves, on the flanks of the front of Army Group "B" there were insufficiently combat-ready Romanian, Italian and Hungarian troops, who began to understand their unpromising and alarming situation.

In mid-November 1942, the first period of the Great Patriotic War ended with defensive battles in the region of Stalingrad and the North Caucasus. By November 1942, enemy troops had occupied the vast territory of our country with an area of ​​about 1 million 800 thousand square kilometers, on which about 80 million people lived before the war.

Revenge for brother

Forging malice.

The language of poetry.

…Time "blitzkrieg" ("lightning war") for the Third Reich and its armed forces is irretrievably gone. By the end of the year, the initiative was in the hands of the enemy, and the Third Reich was forced to go on the defensive.

Heavy defeats on the fronts seriously undermined the foreign policy positions of Nazi Germany, and even major military successes could not now change the fate of the Third Reich. The offensive of Rommel's African Corps in North Africa was stopped by the British in a bloody battle at El Alamein. As a result of the Western Allied landings in Algiers and Morocco, the initiative was wrested from Germany and Italy, which now passed into the hands of the Allies, so that by May 1943 it was all over for the Germans and Italians in North Africa.

On the Eastern Front, the offensive of the German troops in the summer of 1942 could have led to important results for the Third Reich if Hitler had not dispersed the forces of his troops between the two main goals - Stalingrad and the Caucasus. As a result, the German armies reached the Caucasus, but did not capture the oil fields, went to the Volga to Stalingrad, but never captured "city of Stalin". As a result, the Soviet armies opposing the Germans not only were not defeated, but, in turn, managed to go on the counteroffensive with unprecedented superiority in manpower and equipment.

In the spring of 1942, a relative calm settled on the fronts, but the German army retained an advantage in the number of troops and weapons. It was clear that in the summer the enemy would undertake active offensive operations.

The General Staff developed a plan of defensive actions. It was supposed to wear down the enemy and by the end of 1942 go on the offensive.

However, Stalin demanded to achieve a strategic turning point in the war and start offensive operations in the spring and summer of 1942.

In planning the operations of the summer offensive, he took the initiative, making mistakes that cost the Red Army dearly.

Hitler's intelligence managed to misinform the Headquarters and convince Stalin that the main blow would be delivered by the Army Group "Center" in the direction of Moscow.

Believing this, Stalin ordered the main forces to be concentrated near Moscow and weakened the armies in other directions.

The strategy for the summer period was reduced to active hostilities in the south. It was planned to take over the Caucasus, capture Stalingrad, Astrakhan and deprive the Red Army of fuel, cutting off from the Baku oil fields.

After the victory in the south, the Germans planned to transfer forces to the north and again strike at Moscow and Leningrad.

In the spring, the Red Army tried to lift the blockade of Leningrad, but the troops were not sufficiently prepared, so the offensive was not successful.

The army got stuck in the swamps, did not receive timely support, was surrounded and, having put up courageous resistance, was nevertheless defeated in May 1942.

The Soviet troops suffered a no less heavy defeat during an unsuccessful offensive in the Crimea. The advanced units, unjustifiably stretched along the front, came under an unexpected attack by German aircraft, the front was broken through, and the troops were defeated.

This predetermined the tragedy, forcing the defenders of the city to leave the city after 250 days of hardest fighting.

Events unfolded tragically in the Rzhev-Vyazemsky bridgehead, which was captured by the Germans. The Soviet units, without the support of artillery and aviation, made numerous attempts to seize positions and carry out unreasonable orders from the high command. At the same time, the troops suffered monstrous losses.

The actions of our troops in the southwest were also unsuccessful. The Headquarters received a proposal from the command of the Southern Front to conduct an offensive.

Taking into account the difficult situation in the Crimea, in order to divert the enemy forces, it was decided to launch an offensive against Kharkov.

The Germans allowed the advanced units of the Red Army to go deep into the rear and inflicted powerful flank attacks on the extended grouping. As a result, they were surrounded and 20 divisions were defeated. The offensive in the Kharkov region ended in defeat.

Failures in the Crimea and near Kharkov had a negative impact on the course of hostilities. The army, weakened by defeats, could not prevent the advance of the enemy deep into the country.

The Germans occupied the Donbass, recaptured Rostov-on-Don. Their advance to the Volga and the North Caucasus began.

The events and causes of the defeats of the spring and summer of 1942 exactly repeated the failures of 1941. They were based on the mistakes made by Stalin and the higher command staff. The lack of experience in planning operations and the underestimation of enemy forces had an effect.

The country was in a difficult situation, and ordinary soldiers had to rectify the situation.

On July 28, 1942, the order of the Supreme Commander No. 227 was issued: "Not a step back!" Severe punishments were imposed for retreating without orders from above. Behind the troops began to have barrage units of the NKVD.