The day the war started. Hitler's Germany attacked the USSR
In the terrible and bloody confusion of the first day of the Great Patriotic War, the exploits of those soldiers and commanders of the Red Army, border guards, sailors and pilots who, without sparing own life, repelled the onslaught of the strong and skillful against.
War or provocation?
On June 22, 1941, at five o'clock 45 minutes in the morning, an urgent meeting began in the Kremlin with the participation of the country's top military and political leadership. There was only one item on the agenda. Is this a full-scale war or a border provocation?
Pale and sleepy, Joseph Stalin sat at the table, holding a pipe not stuffed with tobacco in his hands. Addressing the People's Commissar for Defense, Marshal Semyon Timoshenko and the Chief of the General Staff of the Red Army, General Georgy Zhukov, the de facto ruler of the USSR asked: "Is this not a provocation of the German generals?"
“No, Comrade Stalin, the Germans are bombing our cities in the Ukraine, Belarus and the Baltics. What kind of provocation is this? Timoshenko answered gloomily.
Offensive in three main directions
By this time, fierce border battles were already in full swing on the Soviet-German border. Events developed rapidly.
Field Marshal Wilhelm von Leeb's Army Group North was advancing in the Baltic, breaking the battle formations of the North-Western Front of General Fyodor Kuznetsov. At the forefront of the main attack was General Erich von Manstein's 56th motorized corps.
Army Group "South" of Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt operated in Ukraine, inflicting a blow between the Fifth and Sixth Armies of the Southwestern Front of General Mikhail Kirponos by the forces of the First Panzer Group of General Ewald von Kleist and the Sixth Field Army of Field Marshal Walther von Reichenau, advancing by the end of the day by 20 kilometers.
The Wehrmacht, which numbered in its ranks seven million 200 thousand people against five million 400 thousand soldiers and commanders in the Red Army, dealt the main blow in the zone of the Western Front, which was under the command of General Dmitry Pavlov. The strike was carried out by the troops of Field Marshal Fedor von Bock's Army Group Center, which included two tank groups at once - the Second General Heinz Guderian and the Third General Hermann Goth.
sad picture of the day
Hanging from the south and from the north over the Bialystok ledge, in which the 10th army of General Konstantin Golubev was located, both German tank armies moved under the base of the ledge, destroying the defenses of the Soviet front. By seven o'clock in the morning, Brest, which was part of Guderian's offensive zone, was captured, but the units defending the Brest fortress and the station fought fiercely in complete encirclement.
The actions of the ground troops were actively supported by the Luftwaffe, which destroyed on June 22 1200 aircraft of the Red Army aviation, many still at airfields in the first hours of the war, and gained air supremacy.
A sad picture of the day was described in his memoirs by General Ivan Boldin, whom Pavlov sent by plane from Minsk to restore contact with the command of the 10th Army.
During the first 8 hours of the war, the Soviet army lost 1200 aircraft, of which about 900 were destroyed on the ground. In the photo: June 23, 1941 in Kyiv, Grushki district.
Nazi Germany relied on a blitzkrieg strategy. Her plan, called "Barbarossa", meant the end of the war before the autumn thaw. In the photo: German aircraft bombing Soviet cities. June 22, 1941.
The day after the start of the war, in accordance with the Decree of the Presidium Supreme Council USSR, the mobilization of 14 ages liable for military service (1905-1918 years of birth) was announced in 14 military districts. In the other three districts - Trans-Baikal, Central Asian and Far Eastern - mobilization was carried out a month later under the guise of "large training camps." In the photo: recruits in Moscow, June 23, 1941.
Simultaneously with Germany, Italy and Romania declared war on the USSR. A day later, Slovakia joined them. In the photo: a tank regiment at the Military Academy of Mechanization and Motorization named after. Stalin before being sent to the front. Moscow, June 1941.
On June 23, the Headquarters of the High Command of the Armed Forces of the USSR was created. In August, it was renamed the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command. In the photo: columns of fighters go to the front. Moscow, June 23, 1941.
The state border of the USSR from the Barents to the Black Sea on June 22, 1941 was guarded by 666 border outposts, 485 of them were attacked on the very first day of the war. None of the outposts attacked on June 22 retreated without orders. In the photo: children on the streets of the city. Moscow, June 23, 1941.
Of the 19,600 border guards who met the Nazis on June 22, more than 16,000 died in the first days of the war. In the photo: refugees. June 23, 1941
At the beginning of the war, three groups of German armies were concentrated and deployed near the borders of the USSR: "North", "Center" and "South". Air support was provided by three air fleet. In the photo: collective farmers are building defensive lines in the front line. July 1, 1941.
The army "North" was supposed to destroy the forces of the USSR in the Baltic states, as well as capture Leningrad and Kronstadt, depriving the Russian fleet of its strongholds in the Baltic. "Center" provided an offensive in Belarus and the capture of Smolensk. Army Group South was responsible for the offensive in western Ukraine. In the photo: the family leaves their home in Kirovograd. August 1, 1941.
In addition, in the territory of occupied Norway and in Northern Finland the Wehrmacht had a separate army "Norway", which had the goal of capturing Murmansk, the main naval base of the Northern Fleet Polyarny, the Rybachy Peninsula, as well as Kirov railway north of Belomorsk. In the photo: columns of fighters are moving to the front. Moscow, June 23, 1941.
Finland did not allow Germany to strike at the USSR from its territory, but received instructions from the German Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces to prepare for the start of the operation. Without waiting for the attack, on the morning of June 25 Soviet command launched a massive air strike on 18 Finnish airfields. After that, Finland announced that it was at war with the USSR. In the photo: graduates of the Military Academy. Stalin. Moscow, June 1941.
On June 27, Hungary also declared war on the USSR. On July 1, at the direction of Germany, the Hungarian Carpathian Group of Forces attacked the Soviet 12th Army. In the photo: nurses help the first wounded after the Nazi air raid near Chisinau, June 22, 1941.
From July 1 to September 30, 1941, the Red Army and the Soviet Navy carried out the Leningrad strategic operation. According to the Barbarossa plan, the capture of Leningrad and Kronstadt was one of the intermediate goals, followed by an operation to capture Moscow. In the photo: a link of Soviet fighters flies over the Peter and Paul Fortress in Leningrad. August 01, 1941.
One of largest operations the first months of the war was the defense of Odessa. The bombing of the city began on July 22, and in August Odessa was surrounded by German-Romanian troops from land. In the photo: one of the first German aircraft shot down near Odessa. July 1, 1941.
The defense of Odessa delayed the advance of the right wing of Army Group South for 73 days. During this time, the German-Romanian troops lost over 160 thousand troops, about 200 aircraft and up to 100 tanks. In the photo: scout Katya from Odessa is talking with the fighters, sitting in a wagon. District Red Dalnik. August 01, 1941.
The original plan of "Barbarossa" assumed the capture of Moscow during the first three to four months of the war. However, despite the successes of the Wehrmacht, the increased resistance of the Soviet troops prevented its implementation. They delayed the German offensive of the battle for Smolensk, Kyiv and Leningrad. In the photo: anti-aircraft gunners defend the sky of the capital. August 1, 1941.
The battle for Moscow, which the Germans called Operation Typhoon, began on September 30, 1941, with the main forces of Army Group Center leading the offensive. In the photo: flowers to wounded soldiers in a Moscow hospital. June 30, 1941.
The defensive stage of the Moscow operation was carried out until December 1941. And only at the beginning of the 42nd year, the Red Army went on the offensive, pushing the German troops back 100-250 kilometers back. In the photo: the beams of searchlights of the air defense forces illuminate the sky of Moscow. June 1941.
At noon on June 22, 1941, the whole country listened to the radio address of the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR Vyacheslav Molotov, who announced the German attack. “Our cause is right. The enemy will be defeated. Victory will be ours,” was the final phrase of the appeal to the Soviet people.
"Explosions shake the ground, cars burn"
“Trains and warehouses are on fire. Ahead, to our left, there are big fires on the horizon. Enemy bombers constantly scurry in the air.
Going around the settlements, we are approaching Bialystok. Further we go, worse it becomes. More and more enemy aircraft are in the air ... We had no time to move 200 meters from the plane after landing, when the noise of engines was heard in the sky. Nine Junkers showed up, they are descending over the airfield and dropping bombs. Explosions shake the ground, cars burn. The planes on which we had just arrived were also engulfed in fire ... "Our pilots fought to the last opportunity. In the early morning of June 22, the deputy squadron commander of the 46th Fighter Aviation Regiment, Senior Lieutenant Ivanov Ivanov, at the head of the I-16 troika, took on several He-111 bombers. One of them was shot down, and the rest began to drop bombs and turn back.
At that moment, three more enemy vehicles appeared. Given that the fuel was running out and the cartridges ran out, Ivanov decided to ram the leading German aircraft and, going into its tail and making a slide, sharply hit the enemy's tail with his propeller.
Soviet fighter I-16
The exact time of the air ram
A bomber with crosses crashed five kilometers from the airfield, which was defended by Soviet pilots, but Ivanov was also mortally wounded when an I-16 crashed on the outskirts of the village of Zagortsy. The exact time of the ram - 4:25 - fixed Wrist Watch pilot who stopped on impact dashboard. Ivanov died on the same day in a hospital in the city of Dubno. He was only 31 years old. In August 1941, he was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
At 5:10 a.m., junior lieutenant Dmitry Kokarev from the 124th Fighter Aviation Regiment took off his MiG-3. From left and right, his comrades took off - to intercept German bombers that attacked their field airfield in Vysoka Mazowiecka near Bialystok.
Shoot down the enemy at any cost
During a short-lived battle on the plane of 22-year-old Kokarev, the weapon failed, and the pilot decided to ram the enemy. In spite of aimed shots enemy shooter, the brave pilot approached the enemy Dornier Do 217 and shot it down, landing on the airfield on the damaged aircraft.
Pilot Oberfeldwebel Erich Stockmann and non-commissioned officer gunner Hans Schumacher burned to death in a wrecked aircraft. Survive a swift attack Soviet fighter only the navigator, squadron commander Lieutenant Hans-Georg Peters and flight radio operator Sergeant Major Hans Kownacki managed to jump out with parachutes.
In total, on the first day of the war, at least 15 Soviet pilots made an aerial ramming against Luftwaffe pilots.
Fighting surrounded for days and weeks
On the ground, the Germans also began to suffer losses from the beginning of the invasion. First of all - faced with fierce resistance from the personnel of 485 attacked border outposts. According to the Barbarossa plan, no more than half an hour was allotted for the capture of each. In fact, the soldiers in green caps fought for hours, days and even weeks, nowhere retreating without an order.
The neighbors also distinguished themselves - the Third Frontier Outpost of the same detachment. Thirty-six border guards, led by 24-year-old lieutenant Viktor Usov, fought for more than six hours against infantry battalion Wehrmacht, repeatedly turning into bayonet counterattacks. Having received five wounds, Usov died in a trench with a sniper rifle in his hands and in 1965 was posthumously awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union.
The Gold Star was also posthumously awarded to 26-year-old Lieutenant Aleksey Lopatin, commander of the 13th border outpost of the 90th Vladimir-Volynsky border detachment. Leading an all-round defense, he fought with his subordinates for 11 days in complete encirclement, skillfully using the facilities of the local fortified area and favorable terrain. On June 29, he managed to withdraw women and children from the encirclement, and then, returning to the outpost, he, like his fighters, died in an unequal battle on July 2, 1941.
Landing on the enemy coast
The soldiers of the Ninth Frontier Post of the 17th Brest Frontier Detachment, Lieutenant Andrey Kizhevatov, were among the most staunch defenders of the Brest Fortress, which was stormed by the 45th Wehrmacht Infantry Division for nine days. The thirty-three-year-old commander was wounded on the first day of the war, but until June 29 he continued to lead the defense of the barracks of the 333rd regiment and the Terespol gates and died in a desperate counterattack. 20 years after the war, Kizhevatov was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
On the site of the 79th Izmail border detachment, which guarded the border with Romania, on June 22, 1941, 15 enemy attempts were repelled to cross the Prut and Danube rivers in order to capture a bridgehead on Soviet territory. At the same time, the well-aimed fire of the fighters in green caps was supplemented by aimed volleys of army artillery of the 51st Infantry Division of General Pyotr Tsirulnikov.
On June 24, the division’s soldiers, together with border guards and sailors of the Danube military flotilla, led by lieutenant commander Ivan Kubyshkin, crossed the Danube and captured a 70-kilometer bridgehead in Romania, which they held until July 19, when, by order of the command, the last paratroopers left for the eastern bank of the river .
Commandant of the first liberated city
The first city to be recognized as liberated from German troops was Przemysl (or Przemysl - in Polish) in Western Ukraine, which was hit by the 101st infantry division from the 17th field army of General Karl-Heinrich von Stulpnagel, advancing on Lvov and Tarnopol.
Fierce battles ensued for him. On June 22, Przemysl was defended for 10 hours by the fighters of the Przemysl border detachment, who then retreated, having received the appropriate order. Their stubborn defense allowed them to gain time before the approach of the regiments of the 99th Infantry Division of Colonel Nikolai Dementyev, who the next morning, together with border guards and soldiers of the local fortified area, attacked the Germans, knocking them out of the city and holding it until June 27.
The hero of the battles was the 33-year-old senior lieutenant Grigory Polivoda, who commanded a combined battalion of border guards and became the first commander whose subordinates cleared the Soviet city of the enemy. He was rightfully appointed commandant of Przemysl and died in battle on July 30, 1941.
Gained time and pulled up new reserves
Following the results of the first day of the war with Russia, the chief of the general staff of the Wehrmacht Ground Forces, General Franz Halder, noted with some surprise in his personal diary that after the initial stupor caused by the suddenness of the attack, the Red Army switched to active operations. “Without a doubt, on the side of the enemy there were cases of tactical withdrawal, albeit disorderly. There are no signs of an operational withdrawal, ”the German general wrote.
Red Army soldiers go on the attack
He did not suspect that the war that had just begun and victorious for the Wehrmacht would soon turn from a lightning-fast one into a life-and-death struggle between the two states, and victory would not go to Germany at all.
General Kurt von Tippelskirch, who became a historian after the war, described in his works the actions of the soldiers and commanders of the Red Army. “The Russians held out with unexpected firmness and tenacity, even when they were bypassed and surrounded. By doing this, they bought time and pulled together all the new reserves for counterattacks from the depths of the country, which, moreover, were stronger than expected.
On Sunday, June 22, 1941, at dawn the troops Nazi Germany without declaring war, they suddenly attacked the entire western border of the Soviet Union and launched bombing airstrikes on Soviet cities and military formations.
The Great Patriotic War began. She was expected, but still she came suddenly. And the point here is not a miscalculation or Stalin's distrust of intelligence data. During the pre-war months, different dates for the start of the war were called, for example, May 20, and this was reliable information, but due to the uprising in Yugoslavia, Hitler postponed the date of the attack on the USSR for more late deadline. There is another factor that is rarely mentioned. This is a successful disinformation campaign by German intelligence. So, the Germans spread rumors through all possible channels that the attack on the USSR would take place on June 22, but with the direction of the main attack in an area where it was obviously impossible. Thus, the date also looked like disinformation, so it was on this day that the attacks were least expected.
And in foreign textbooks, June 22, 1941 is presented as one of the current episodes of the Second World War, while in the textbooks of the Baltic States this date is considered positive, giving "hope for liberation".
Russia
§4. Invasion of the USSR. The beginning of the Great Patriotic War
At dawn on June 22, 1941, Nazi troops invaded the USSR. The Great Patriotic War began.
Germany and its allies (Italy, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia) did not have an overwhelming advantage in manpower and equipment and, according to the Barbarossa plan, they relied on the blitzkrieg ("lightning war") tactics on the surprise attack factor. The defeat of the USSR was supposed within two three months by the forces of three army groups (Army Group North, advancing on Leningrad, Army Group Center, advancing on Moscow, and Army Group South, advancing on Kyiv).
In the early days of the war german army caused serious damage to the Soviet defense system: military headquarters were destroyed, the activities of communications services were paralyzed, and strategically important objects were captured. The German army was rapidly advancing deep into the USSR, and by July 10, Army Group Center (commander von Bock), having captured Belarus, approached Smolensk; Army Group "South" (commander von Rundstedt) captured the Right-Bank Ukraine; Army Group North (commander von Leeb) occupied part of the Baltic. The losses of the Red Army (including those who were surrounded) amounted to more than two million people. The current situation was catastrophic for the USSR. But the Soviet mobilization resources were very large, and by the beginning of July, 5 million people were drafted into the Red Army, which made it possible to close the gaps formed at the front.
V.L.Kheifets, L.S. Kheifets, K.M. Severinov. General history. Grade 9 Ed. Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences V.S. Myasnikov. Moscow, publishing house "Ventana-Graf", 2013
Chapter XVII. The Great Patriotic War of the Soviet people against the Nazi invaders
The perfidious attack of Nazi Germany on the USSR
Fulfilling the grandiose tasks of the third Stalinist five-year plan and steadily and firmly pursuing a policy of peace, the Soviet government, at the same time, did not for a moment forget about the possibility of a new "imperialist attack on our country. Comrade Stalin tirelessly called on the peoples of the Soviet Union to be in mobilization readiness. In February 1938 In his response to a letter from Komsomol member Ivanov, Comrade Stalin wrote: “Indeed, it would be ridiculous and stupid to turn a blind eye to the fact of a capitalist encirclement and think that our external enemies, for example, the fascists, will not try, on occasion, to launch a military attack on the USSR.”
Comrade Stalin demanded the strengthening of the defense capability of our country. “It is necessary,” he wrote, “to strengthen and strengthen in every possible way our Red Army, Red Navy, Red Aviation, Osoaviakhim. It is necessary to keep our entire people in a state of mobilization readiness in the face of the danger of a military attack, so that no "accident" and no tricks of our external enemies could take us by surprise ... "
Comrade Stalin's warning alerted the Soviet people, made them more vigilantly follow the intrigues of the enemies and strengthen the Soviet army in every possible way.
The Soviet people understood that the German fascists, led by Hitler, were striving to unleash a new bloody war, with the help of which they hoped to win world domination. Hitler declared the Germans a "superior race" and all other peoples inferior, inferior races. With particular hatred, the Nazis treated the Slavic peoples and, first of all, the great Russian people, who more than once in their history came out to fight against the German aggressors.
The Nazis based their plan on the plan of a military attack and lightning defeat of Russia developed by General Hoffmann during the First World War. This plan provided for the concentration of huge armies on the western borders of our homeland, the capture of the vital centers of the country within a few weeks and the rapid advance deep into Russia, up to the Urals. Subsequently, this plan was supplemented and approved by the Nazi command and was called the Barbarossa plan.
The monstrous war machine of the Nazi imperialists began its movement in the Baltic States, Belorussia and the Ukraine, threatening the vital centers of the Soviet country.
Textbook "History of the USSR", 10th grade, K.V. Bazilevich, S.V. Bakhrushin, A.M. Pankratova, A.V. Foght, M., Uchpedgiz, 1952
Austria, Germany
Chapter "From the Russian Campaign to Complete Defeat"
After careful preparation, which lasted for many months, on June 22, 1941, Germany began a "war of complete annihilation" against the Soviet Union. Its goal was to conquer a new living space for the Germanic Aryan race. The essence of the German plan was a lightning attack, called "Barbarossa". It was believed that under the rapid onslaught of a trained German military machine, Soviet troops would not be able to provide decent resistance. In a few months, the Nazi command seriously hoped to reach Moscow. It was assumed that the capture of the capital of the USSR would finally demoralize the enemy and the war would end in victory. However, after a series of impressive successes on the battlefields, after a few weeks, the Nazis were thrown back hundreds of kilometers from the Soviet capital.
Textbook "History" for grade 7, team of authors, Duden publishing house, 2013.
Holt McDougal. The World History.
For Senior High School, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Pub. Co., 2012
Hitler began planning an attack on his ally, the USSR, as early as the early summer of 1940. The Balkan countries of Southeast Europe played key role for Hitler's invasion plan. Hitler wanted to create a foothold in Southeastern Europe to attack the USSR. He also wanted to be sure that the British would not interfere.
In order to prepare for the invasion, Hitler moved to expand his influence in the Balkans. By early 1941, by threatening to use force, he persuaded Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary to join the Axis. Yugoslavia and Greece, ruled by pro-British governments, fought back. In early April 1941, Hitler invaded both countries. Yugoslavia fell after 11 days. Greece surrendered after 17 days.
Hitler attacks Soviet Union. By establishing tight control over the Balkans, Hitler could carry out Operation Barbarossa, his plan to invade the USSR. Early on the morning of June 22, 1941, the roar of German tanks and the drone of aircraft marked the beginning of the invasion. The Soviet Union was not ready for this attack. Although he had the largest army in the world, the troops were neither well equipped nor well trained.
The invasion progressed week after week until the Germans penetrated 500 miles into the territory of the Soviet Union (804.67 kilometers. - Ed.). Retreating, the Soviet troops burned and destroyed everything in the way of the enemy. The Russians used such a scorched earth strategy against Napoleon.
Section 7. World War II
The attack on the Soviet Union (the so-called Barbarossa plan) was carried out on June 22, 1941. The German army, which numbered about three million soldiers, launched an offensive in three directions: in the north - on Leningrad, in the central part of the USSR - on Moscow and in the south - on the Crimea. The onslaught of the invaders was swift. Soon the Germans laid siege to Leningrad and Sevastopol, came close to Moscow. The Red Army suffered heavy losses, but the main goal of the Nazis - the capture of the capital of the Soviet Union - never materialized. The vast expanses and early Russian winter, with the fierce resistance of the Soviet troops and ordinary inhabitants of the country, thwarted the German plan for a blitzkrieg. In early December 1941, units of the Red Army under the command of General Zhukov launched a counteroffensive and drove the enemy troops back 200 kilometers from Moscow.
History textbook for the 8th grade of elementary school (Klett publishing house, 2011). Predrag Vajagić and Nenad Stošić.
Never before have our people treated the German invasion otherwise than with determination to defend their land, but when Molotov announced the German attack in a trembling voice, the Estonians felt everything but sympathy. On the contrary, many have hope. The people of Estonia enthusiastically welcomed German soldiers as liberators.
Russian soldiers aroused dislike in the average Estonian. These people were poor, poorly dressed, extremely suspicious, and at the same time often very pretentious. The Germans were more familiar to the Estonians. They were cheerful and fond of music, from the places where they gathered, laughter and playing musical instruments could be heard.
Lauri Vakhtre. Textbook "Turning Moments in Estonian History".
Bulgaria
Chapter 2: The Globalization of Conflict (1941-1942)
Attack on the USSR (June 1941). On June 22, 1941, Hitler launched a major offensive against the USSR. Starting the conquest of new territories in the east, the Fuhrer put into practice the theory of "living space", proclaimed in the book "My Struggle" ("Mein Kampf"). On the other hand, the termination of the German-Soviet pact again made it possible for the Nazi regime to present itself as a fighter against communism in Europe: the aggression against the USSR was presented by German propaganda as a crusade against Bolshevism with the aim of exterminating the "Jewish Marxists".
However, this new blitzkrieg developed into a long and exhausting war. Shaken by the surprise attack, bled dry by Stalin's repressions and ill-prepared, the Soviet army was quickly driven back. In a few weeks, the German armies occupied one million square kilometers and reached the outskirts of Leningrad and Moscow. But fierce Soviet resistance and the rapid arrival of the Russian winter stopped the German offensive: on the move, the Wehrmacht could not defeat the enemy in one campaign. IN spring period 1942 required a new offensive.
Long before the attack on the USSR, the German military-political leadership was developing plans for an attack on the USSR and the development of the territory and the use of its natural, material and human resources. The future war was planned by the German command as a war of annihilation. On December 18, 1940, Hitler signed Directive 21, known as Plan Barbarossa. In accordance with this plan, Army Group North was to advance on Leningrad, Army Group Center - through Belarus to Moscow, Army Group South - to Kyiv.
The plan of "blitzkrieg" against the USSR
The German command expected to approach Moscow by August 15, to end the war against the USSR by October 1, 1941 and create defensive line against "Asian Russia", by the winter of 1941, reach the line Arkhangelsk - Astrakhan.
On June 22, 1941, the Great Patriotic War began with the attack of Nazi Germany on the Soviet Union. Mobilization was announced in the USSR. Voluntary entry into the Red Army acquired a mass character. Popular militia became widespread. Fighter battalions and self-defense groups were created in the front line to protect important national economic facilities. From the territories threatened by the occupation, the evacuation of people and material values began.
Military operations were led by the Stavka Supreme High Command, created on June 23, 1941. The rate was headed by I. Stalin. Italy
June 22, 1941
Giardina, G. Sabbatucci, V. Vidotto, Manuale di Storia. L "eta`contemporanea. History textbook for the 5th grade of high school. Bari, Laterza. Textbook for the 11th grade of high school "Our new story", publishing house "Dar Aun", 2008
With the German attack on the Soviet Union in the early summer of 1941, a new phase of the war began. The widest front was opened in the east of Europe. Great Britain was no longer forced to fight alone. The ideological confrontation was simplified and radicalized with the termination of the anomalous agreement between Nazism and the Soviet regime. The international communist movement, which after August 1939 adopted an ambiguous position of condemnation of "opposing imperialisms", revised it in favor of an alliance with democracy and the fight against fascism.
What the USSR is main goal Hitler's expansionist intentions were no mystery to anyone, including the Soviet people. However, Stalin believed that Hitler would never attack Russia without ending the war with Britain. So when, on 22 June 1941, the German offensive (code-named "Barbarossa") began on a 1,600-kilometer front, from the Baltic to the Black Sea, the Russians were unprepared, and this lack of readiness, exacerbated by the fact that the 1937 purge had deprived the Red the army of its best military leaders, made the task of the aggressor easier at first.
The offensive, which also included the Italian expeditionary force sent in great haste by Mussolini, who dreamed of participating in a crusade against the Bolsheviks, continued throughout the summer: in the north through the Baltics, in the south through Ukraine in order to reach the oil regions in the Caucasus .
Image copyright RIA Novosti Image caption Semyon Timoshenko and Georgy Zhukov knew everything, but took the secrets to the grave
Until the very beginning of the war and in the first hours after it, Joseph Stalin did not believe in the possibility of a German attack.
He learned about the fact that the Germans were crossing the border and bombing Soviet cities at about 4 am on June 22 from the Chief of the General Staff, Georgy Zhukov.
According to Zhukovsky's "Memoirs and Reflections", the leader did not react to what he heard, but only breathed heavily into the phone, and after a long pause, he limited himself to telling Zhukov and People's Commissar of Defense Semyon Timoshenko to go to a meeting in the Kremlin.
In a prepared but undelivered speech at a plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU in May 1956, Zhukov claimed that Stalin forbade opening fire on the enemy.
At the same time, in May-June, Stalin secretly transferred 939 echelons with troops and equipment to the western border, called up 801,000 reservists from the reserve under the guise of training camps, and on June 19, by secret order, reorganized the border military districts into fronts, which was always done and only a few days before. start of hostilities.
"The transfer of troops was planned with the expectation that the concentration would be completed from June 1 to July 10, 1941. The offensive nature of the planned actions influenced the disposition of the troops," the collective monograph "1941 - Lessons and Conclusions" published by the Russian Ministry of Defense in 1992 says.
A legitimate question arises: what is the reason for the tragedy of June 22? Usually referred to as "mistakes" and "miscalculations" of the Soviet leadership. But on closer examination, some of them turn out to be not naive delusions, but the result of well-thought-out measures in order to prepare a preemptive strike and subsequent offensive actions Vladimir Danilov, historian
"There was surprise, but only tactical. Hitler was ahead of us!" - said Vyacheslav Molotov to the writer Ivan Stadnyuk in the 1970s.
"The trouble was not in our lack of plans - we had plans! - but in the fact that the suddenly changed situation did not allow them to be carried out," Marshal Alexander Vasilevsky reported in an article written for the 20th anniversary of the Victory, but which was published only at the beginning of 90 -X.
Not the "traitor Rezun", but the president of the Academy of Military Sciences, General of the Army Mahmud Gareev, pointed out: "If there were plans for defensive operations, then the groupings of forces and means would be located in a completely different way, management and echeloning of material reserves would be built differently. But this was not done in the border military districts".
“Stalin’s main miscalculation and his fault was not that the country was not prepared for defense (it was not preparing for it), but that it was not possible to accurately determine the moment. A preemptive strike would have saved our Fatherland millions of lives and, possibly, would have led much earlier to the same political results that the country, ruined, hungry, having lost the color of the nation, came to in 1945,” said Academician Andrei Sakharov, director of the Institute of History of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Clearly aware of the inevitability of a collision with Germany, the leadership of the USSR until June 22, 1941 did not see itself as a victim, did not guess with a beating heart "they will attack - they will not attack", but worked hard to start a war at a favorable moment and conduct it "small blood on foreign soil." Most researchers agree with this. The difference is in details, dates and, mainly, in moral assessments.
Image copyright RIA Novosti Image caption The war broke out unexpectedly, although foreboding was in the airOn this tragic day, on the eve and immediately after it, amazing things happened that did not fit into either the logic of preparing for defense or the logic of preparing for an offensive.
There is no explanation based on documents and testimonies of the participants in the events, and it is unlikely that it will appear. There are only more or less plausible guesses and versions.
Stalin's dream
Around midnight on June 22, having agreed and allowed Timoshenko and Zhukov to send a controversial document known as "Directive No. 1" to the border districts for their signatures, the leader left the Kremlin for the Near Dacha.
When Zhukov called with a message about the attack, the guard said that Stalin was sleeping and did not order to wake himself, so the chief of the general staff had to shout at him.
The widespread opinion that the USSR waited for an attack by the enemy, and only then planned an offensive, does not take into account that in this case the strategic initiative would be given into the hands of the enemy, and the Soviet troops were placed in deliberately unfavorable conditions Mikhail Meltyukhov, historian
Saturday, June 21, passed in incredible tension. From the border there were reports that the approaching roar of engines was coming from the German side.
After the Führer's order was read to the German soldiers before the formation at 13:00, two or three communist defectors swam across the Bug to warn the "kamaraden": it would begin tonight. By the way, another mystery is that we do not know anything about these people who should have become heroes in the USSR and the GDR.
Stalin spent the day in the Kremlin in the company of Timoshenko, Zhukov, Molotov, Beria, Malenkov and Mekhlis, analyzing the incoming information and discussing what to do.
Suppose he doubted the data he received and did not take concrete steps. But how could one go to bed without waiting for the denouement when the clock was counting? Moreover, a person who had the habit of working until dawn and sleeping until lunch even in a casual, calm atmosphere?
Plan and directive
At the headquarters of the Soviet troops on westbound up to and including divisions, there were detailed and clear cover plans that were kept in "red packets" and were subject to execution upon receipt of the corresponding order of the people's commissar of defense.
Cover plans are different from strategic military plans. This is a set of measures to ensure the mobilization, concentration and deployment of the main forces in the event of a threat of a preemptive attack by the enemy (occupation of fortifications by personnel, the advancement of artillery to tank-prone areas, the rise of aviation and air defense units, and the activation of reconnaissance).
The introduction of a cover plan is not yet a war, but a combat alert.
During the one and a half hour meeting that began at 20:50 on June 21, Stalin did not allow Timoshenko and Zhukov to take this necessary and obvious step.
The directive completely confused the troops on the border Konstantin Pleshakov, historian
In return, the famous "Directive No. 1" was sent to the border districts, which, in particular, stated: "During June 22-23, a surprise attack by the Germans is possible. The task of our troops is not to succumb to any provocative actions […] at the same time be in in full combat readiness to meet a possible strike […] other measures should not be carried out without a special order.
How can you "meet the blow" without carrying out the activities provided for by the cover plan? How to distinguish a provocation from an attack?
Belated mobilization
Unbelievable, but true: general mobilization in the USSR was not announced on the day the war began, but only on June 23, despite the fact that every hour of delay gave the enemy additional advantages.
The corresponding telegram from the people's commissar of defense was received by the Central Telegraph at 16:40 on June 22, although from early morning the leadership of the state, perhaps, did not have a more urgent task.
At the same time, a short text of only three sentences, written in dry clerical language, did not contain a word about a treacherous attack, defense of the homeland and sacred duty, as if it were a routine call.
Theatrical and concert evening
The command of the Western Special Military District (by that time, in fact, the Western Front), headed by General of the Army Dmitry Pavlov, spent Saturday evening in the Minsk House of Officers at the performance of the operetta "Wedding in Malinovka".
Memoir literature confirms that the phenomenon was massive and ubiquitous. It is hard to imagine that the big commanders in that atmosphere would unanimously go to have fun without instructions from above.
There are numerous testimonies about the cancellation on June 20-21 of earlier orders to increase combat readiness, the unexpected announcement of days off, and the sending of anti-aircraft artillery to training camps.
The anti-aircraft divisions of the 4th Army and the 6th Mechanized Corps of the Western OVO met the war at a training ground 120 km east of Minsk.
Marshal Konstantin Rokossovsky was completely bewildered by orders to the troops to send artillery to the firing ranges and other instructions that were ridiculous in that situation.
“On Sunday, the regiment was declared a day off. Everyone was happy: they didn’t rest for three months. On Saturday evening, the command, pilots and technicians left for their families,” recalled former pilot of the 13th bomber regiment Pavel Tsupko.
On June 20, the commander of one of the three ZapOVO air divisions, Nikolai Belov, received an order from the district air force commander to bring the division to combat readiness, cancel vacations and layoffs, disperse equipment, and at 16:00 on June 21, it was canceled.
“Stalin sought by the very state and behavior of the troops of the border districts to make it clear that calm reigns here, if not carelessness. As a result, instead of misleading the aggressor with skillful disinformation actions about the combat readiness of our troops, we actually reduced it to extremely low degrees," he wondered. former boss of the operational department of the headquarters of the 13th army, Sergei Ivanov.
The ill-fated regiment
But the most incredible story happened in the 122nd Fighter Aviation Regiment, which covered Grodno.
On Friday, June 20, high officials from Moscow and Minsk arrived at the unit, and at 6 pm on Saturday personnel announced an order: to remove weapons and ammunition from the I-16 fighters and send them to the warehouse.
Image copyright RIA Novosti Image caption It took several hours to reinstall the removed machine guns on the I-16The order was so wild and inexplicable that the pilots started talking about treason, but they were silenced.
Needless to say, the next morning the 122nd Air Regiment was completely destroyed.
The grouping of the Soviet Air Force in the western direction consisted of 111 air regiments, including 52 fighter regiments. Why did this one get so much attention?
What happened?
"Stalin, contrary to the obvious facts, believed that this was not yet a war, but a provocation by individual undisciplined units of the German army," Nikita Khrushchev said in a report at the 20th Congress of the CPSU.
The obsessive thought of some kind of provocation, apparently, was indeed present in Stalin's mind. He developed it both in "Directive No. 1" and at the first meeting in the Kremlin after the start of the invasion, which opened at 05:45 on June 22. Until 06:30, he did not give permission to return fire, until Molotov announced that Germany had officially declared war on the USSR.
The late St. Petersburg historian Igor Bunich claimed that a few days before the start of the war, Hitler sent Stalin a secret personal message warning that some Anglophilizing generals might try to provoke a conflict between the USSR and Germany.
Stalin allegedly remarked to Beria with satisfaction that, they say, this is impossible with us, we have put things in order in our army.
True, it was not possible to find a document in the German or Soviet archives.
Israeli researcher Gabriel Gorodetsky explains Stalin's actions panic fear and the desire not to give Hitler a pretext for aggression at any cost.
Stalin really drove every thought from himself, but not about the war (he didn’t think about anything else), but about the fact that Hitler at the very last moment would be able to get ahead of him Mark Solonin, historian
"Stalin drove away any thought of war, he lost the initiative and was practically paralyzed," writes Gorodetsky.
Opponents object that Stalin was not afraid in November 1940, through the mouth of Molotov, to firmly demand Finland, Southern Bukovina and the base in the Dardanelles from Berlin, and in early April 1941 to conclude an agreement with Yugoslavia that enraged Hitler and at the same time had no practical meaning.
A demonstration of defensive preparations, however, cannot provoke a potential enemy, but can make one think again.
“When dealing with a dangerous enemy, you should probably show him, first of all, your readiness to fight back. If we had demonstrated our true power to Hitler, he might have refrained from war with the USSR at that moment,” the experienced staff officer believed Sergei Ivanov, who later rose to the rank of Army General.
According to Alexander Osokin, Stalin, on the contrary, deliberately encouraged Germany to attack in order to appear in the eyes of the world as a victim of aggression and receive American help.
Critics point out that the game in this case turned out to be painfully dangerous, Lend-Lease did not have a self-contained value in Stalin's eyes, and Roosevelt was guided not by the kindergarten principle "who started it?", but by the interests of US national security.
Shoot first
Another hypothesis was put forward by historians Keistut Zakoretsky and Mark Solonin.
During the first three weeks of June, Timoshenko and Zhukov met with Stalin seven times.
According to Zhukov, they urged to immediately bring the troops into some kind of incomprehensible "state fully prepared to war" (preparation was already carried out continuously and at the limit of strength), and, according to a number of modern researchers, to deliver a preemptive strike without waiting for the completion of the strategic deployment.
Truth is stranger than fiction, because fiction has to stay within the limits of the probable, but the truth cannot Mark Twain
Zakoretsky and Solonin believe that in the face of the obvious aggressive intentions of Berlin, Stalin did listen to the military.
Presumably, at a meeting on June 18 with the participation of Timoshenko, Zhukov, Molotov and Malenkov, it was decided to start a preventive war not sometime, but on June 22, the longest day of the year. Only not at dawn, but later.
The war with Finland was preceded by. According to researchers, the war with Germany should also have started with a provocation - a raid by several Junkers and Dorniers bought from the Germans on Grodno. At the hour when residents have breakfast and take to the streets and parks to relax after a week of work.
The propaganda effect would be deafening, and donate to higher interests a few dozen civilians, Stalin could well.
The version quite logically explains almost everything.
And Stalin's refusal to believe that the Germans would strike almost simultaneously (such coincidences simply do not happen, and what Hitler intends to do in the following days is no longer important).
And the beginning of mobilization on Monday (the decree was prepared in advance, but they did not bother to redo it in the confusion of the first morning of the war).
There are two wills in the field Russian proverb
And the disarmament of the fighters based near Grodno (so that one of the "vultures" is not inadvertently shot down over Soviet territory).
Deliberate complacency made the fascist cunning even more flagrant. The bombs were supposed to fall on a peaceful Soviet city in the midst of complete prosperity. Contrary to popular belief, the demonstration was not addressed to the Germans, but to their own citizens.
It becomes clear that Stalin's unwillingness to smear the effect by putting the cover plan into action ahead of time.
Unfortunately for the USSR, the aggression turned out to be real.
However, this is only a hypothesis, which the authors themselves emphasize.
VL / Articles / Interesting
How it was: what Hitler really faced on June 22, 1941 (part 1)
22-06-2016, 08:44
On June 22, 1941, at 4 o'clock in the morning, Germany treacherously, without declaring war, attacked the Soviet Union and, starting to bomb our cities with peacefully sleeping children, immediately declared itself to be a criminal force that had no human face. The most bloody war in the entire history of the existence of the Russian state began.
Our fight with Europe was deadly. On June 22, 1941, German troops launched an offensive against the USSR in three directions: east (Army Group Center) to Moscow, southeast (Army Group South) to Kyiv and northeast (Army Group North) to Leningrad . In addition, the German army "Norway" was advancing in the direction of Murmansk.
Together with the German armies, the armies of Italy, Romania, Hungary, Finland and volunteer formations from Croatia, Slovakia, Spain, Holland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and other European countries advanced on the USSR.
On June 22, 1941, 5.5 million soldiers and officers of Nazi Germany and its satellites crossed the border of the USSR and invaded our land, but in terms of the number of troops, the armed forces of Germany alone exceeded the Armed Forces of the USSR by 1.6 times, namely: 8.5 million people in the Wehrmacht and a little over 5 million people in the Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army. Together with the Allied armies, Germany had at least 11 million trained, armed soldiers and officers on June 22, 1941, and could very quickly make up for the losses of its army and strengthen its troops.
And if the number of only German troops exceeded the number of Soviet troops by 1.6 times, then together with the troops European allies it exceeded the number of Soviet troops by at least 2.2 times. Such a monstrously huge force opposed the Red Army.
The industry of Europe united by it worked for Germany with a population of about 400 million people, which was almost 2 times the population of the USSR, which had 195 million people.
At the beginning of the war, the Red Army, compared with the troops of Germany and its allies that attacked the USSR, had 19,800 units more guns and mortars, 86 units more warships of the main classes, and the Red Army outnumbered the attacking enemy in the number of machine guns. Small arms, guns of all calibers and mortars, in terms of combat characteristics, not only were not inferior, but in many cases even surpassed German weapons.
Concerning armored forces and aviation, our army had them in quantities far exceeding the number of units of this equipment that the enemy had at the beginning of the war. But the bulk of our tanks and aircraft compared to the German ones were weapons of the "old generation", obsolete. Tanks for the most part were only with bulletproof armor. A considerable percentage were also defective aircraft and tanks to be written off.
At the same time, it should be noted that before the start of the war, the Red Army received 595 KB heavy tanks and 1,225 T-34 medium tanks, as well as 3,719 new types of aircraft: Yak-1, LaGG-3, MiG-3 fighters, Il- 4 (DB-ZF), Pe-8 (TB-7), Pe-2, Il-2 attack aircraft. Basically, we designed and produced the specified new, expensive and science-intensive equipment in the period from the beginning of 1939 to the middle of 1941, that is, for the most part during the validity of the non-aggression pact concluded in 1939 - the "Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact".
It was the presence of a large number of weapons that allowed us to survive and win. For with the huge loss of weapons in initial period of the war, we still had a sufficient amount of weapons to resist during the retreat and for the offensive near Moscow.
It must be said that in 1941 the German army did not have equipment similar to our heavy KB tanks, armored attack aircraft IL-2 and rocket artillery, such as BM-13 ("Katyusha"), capable of hitting targets at a distance of more than eight kilometers.
Due to the poor work of Soviet intelligence, our army did not know the direction of the main attacks planned by the enemy. Therefore, the Germans had the opportunity to create a multiple superiority of military forces in the breakthrough areas and break through our defenses.
The capabilities of Soviet intelligence are greatly exaggerated in order to belittle the military merits and technical achievements of the USSR. Our troops retreated under the onslaught of superior enemy forces. Parts of the Red Army had to either withdraw quickly to avoid encirclement, or fight in encirclement. And it was not so easy to withdraw the troops, because in many cases the mobility of the German mechanized formations that had broken through our defenses exceeded the mobility of our troops.
Of course, not all groupings of Soviet troops were capable of mobile German formations. The main part of the German infantry advanced on foot, as our troops basically retreated, which allowed many units of the Red Army to retreat to new lines of defense.
The encircled covering troops held back the advance of the Nazi hordes to the last opportunity, and the units retreating in battles, uniting with the troops of the 2nd echelon, significantly slowed down the advance of the German armies.
In order to stop the German armies that had broken through the border, large reserves were needed, equipped with mobile formations that could quickly approach the breakthrough site and push the enemy back. We did not have such reserves, since the country had no economic opportunities to maintain an 11 millionth army in peacetime.
It is unfair to blame the government of the USSR for such a development of events. Despite the desperate resistance to industrialization on the part of certain forces within the country, our government and our people have done everything they could to create and equip an army. It was impossible to do more in the time allotted to the Soviet Union.
Our intelligence, of course, was not up to par. But it's only in the movies that scouts get drawings of aircraft and atomic bombs. In real life, such drawings will take far from one railway car. Our intelligence did not have the opportunity to receive the Barbarossa plan in 1941. But even knowing the direction of the main blows, we would have to retreat before the monstrous force of the enemy. But in this case we would have less losses.
According to all theoretical calculations, the USSR should have lost this war, but we won it, because we knew how to work and fight like no one else on earth. Hitler conquered Europe, except for Poland, in an effort to unite and subordinate to the will of Germany. And he sought to exterminate us both in battles, and the civilian population, and our prisoners of war. About the war against the USSR, Hitler said: "We are talking about a war of extermination."
But everything did not go as planned for Hitler: the Russians left more than half of the troops far from the border, announced mobilization after the start of the war, as a result of which they had people to recruit new divisions, took military factories to the East, did not lose heart, but fought steadfastly for every inch of land. The German General Staff was horrified by Germany's losses in men and equipment.
The losses of our retreating army in 1941, of course, were greater than the German ones. The German army created a new organizational structure, including tanks, motorized infantry, artillery, engineering units and communications units, which made it possible not only to break through the enemy’s defenses, but also to develop it in depth, breaking away from the bulk of its troops for tens of kilometers. The proportions of all military branches were carefully calculated by the Germans and tested in battles in Europe. With such a structure, tank formations became a strategic means of struggle.
We needed time to create such troops from newly manufactured equipment. In the summer of 1941, we had neither the experience of creating and using such formations, nor the number of trucks needed to transport infantry. Created on the eve of the war, our mechanized corps were much less perfect than the German ones.
General base Germany's plan of attack on the USSR was given the name "Barbarossa" after the name of the German emperor of terrifying cruelty. On June 29, 1941, Hitler declared: "In four weeks we will be in Moscow, and it will be plowed up."
Not a single German general spoke in his forecasts about the capture of Moscow later than August. For everyone, August was deadline the capture of Moscow, and in October - the territory of the USSR to the Urals along the line Arkhangelsk - Astrakhan.
The US military believed that Germany would be occupied in the war with the Russians from one to three months, and the British military - from three to six weeks. They made such predictions, because they knew well the force of the blow that Germany brought down on the USSR. How long we will hold out in the war with Germany, the West estimated by itself.
The German government was so sure of a quick victory that it did not even consider it necessary to spend money on warm winter uniforms for the army.
Enemy troops advanced from the Barents to the Black Seas on a front stretching over 2,000 thousand kilometers.
Germany counted on a blitzkrieg, that is, a lightning strike against our armed forces and their destruction as a result of this lightning strike. The location of 57% of Soviet troops in the 2nd and 3rd echelons initially contributed to the disruption of the Germans' calculation for a blitzkrieg. And in combination with the resilience of our troops in the 1st defense echelon, it completely disrupted the German calculation for a blitzkrieg.
And what kind of blitzkrieg can we talk about if the Germans in the summer of 1941 could not even destroy our aircraft. From the first day of the war, the Luftwaffe paid a huge price for the desire to destroy our aircraft on the airfields and in the air.
From 1940 to 1946, the People's Commissar of the Aviation Industry of the USSR, A. I. Shakhurin wrote: “During the period from June 22 to July 5, 1941, the German Air Force lost 807 aircraft of all types, and for the period from July 6 to 19, another 477 aircraft. A third of the German air force that they had before attacking our country."
Thus, only for the first month of fighting in the period from 22.06. By July 19, 1941, Germany lost 1284 aircraft, and in less than five months of fighting - 5180 aircraft. Surprisingly, only a few people in the whole of large Russia know today about our glorious victories in the most unfortunate period of the war for us.
So who and with what weapons destroyed these 1284 Luftwaffe aircraft in the first month of the war? These aircraft were destroyed by our pilots and anti-aircraft gunners in the same way that our artillerymen destroyed enemy tanks, because the Red Army had anti-tank guns, aircraft and anti-aircraft guns.
And in October 1941, the Red Army had enough weapons to hold the front. At this time, the defense of Moscow was carried out at the limit of human strength. Only Soviet, Russian people could fight like that. I. V. Stalin deserves a good word, back in July 1941 he organized the construction of concrete pillboxes, bunkers, anti-tank barriers and other protective military construction structures, fortified areas (Urov) on the outskirts of Moscow, who managed to provide weapons, ammunition, food and uniforms fighting army.
The Germans were stopped near Moscow, first of all, because even in the autumn of 1941, our men fighting the enemy had weapons to shoot down planes, burn tanks and mix enemy infantry with the ground.
On November 29, 1941, our troops liberated Rostov-on-Don in the south, and Tikhvin was liberated in the north on December 9. Having pinned down the southern and northern groupings of German troops, our command created favorable conditions for the offensive of the Red Army near Moscow.
It was not the Siberian divisions that made it possible for our troops to go on the offensive near Moscow, but the reserve armies created by the Stavka and brought up to Moscow before our troops went on the offensive. A. M. Vasilevsky recalled: “A major event was the completion of the preparation of regular and extraordinary reserve formations. At the turn of Vytegra - Rybinsk - Gorky - Saratov - Stalingrad - Astrakhan, a new strategic line was being created for the Red Army. Here, on the basis of the decision of the GKO, adopted on October 5, ten reserve armies were formed. Creating them throughout the entire battle of Moscow was one of the main and daily concerns of the Central Committee of the Party, the State Defense Committee and the Headquarters. We, the leaders of the General Staff, daily, when reporting to the Supreme Commander-in-Chief on the situation on the fronts, reported in detail on the progress in the creation of these formations. It can be said without exaggeration: in the outcome of the Battle of Moscow, the fact that the party and the Soviet people promptly formed, armed, trained and deployed new armies under the capital was of decisive importance.
The battle near Moscow can be divided into two parts: defensive from September 30 to December 5, 1941 and offensive from December 5 to April 20, 1942.
And if in June 1941 German troops suddenly attacked us, then in December 1941 near Moscow our Soviet troops suddenly attacked the Germans. Despite the deep snow and frost, our army successfully advanced. Panic broke out in the German army. Only the intervention of Hitler prevented the complete defeat of the German troops.
The monstrous force of Europe, faced with the Russian force, could not overcome us and, under the blows of the Soviet troops, fled back to the West. In 1941, our great-grandfathers and grandfathers defended the right to life and, meeting the New Year 1942, proclaimed toasts to the Victory.
In 1942, our troops continued to advance. The Moscow and Tula regions, many areas of the Kalinin, Smolensk, Ryazan and Oryol regions. Losses in manpower only of the Army Group Center, which until recently stood near Moscow for the period from January 1 to March 30, 1942, amounted to over 333 thousand people.
But the enemy was still strong. By May 1942, the fascist German army had 6.2 million people and weapons superior to the Red Army. Our army numbered 5.1 million people. without air defense troops and the Navy.
Thus, in the summer of 1942 against our ground forces Germany and its allies had 1.1 million more soldiers and officers. Germany and its allies maintained superiority in the number of troops from the first day of the war until 1943. In the summer of 1942, 217 enemy divisions and 20 enemy brigades operated on the Soviet-German front, that is, about 80% of all German ground forces.
In connection with this circumstance, the Headquarters did not transfer troops from the Western to the South-Western direction. This decision was correct, as was the decision to deploy strategic reserves in the area of Tula, Voronezh, Stalingrad and Saratov.
Most of our forces and means were concentrated not in the south-western, but in the western direction. Ultimately, this distribution of forces led to the defeat of the German, or rather European, army, and in this regard, it is inappropriate to talk about the incorrect distribution of our troops by the summer of 1942. It was thanks to this distribution of troops that we were able in November to gather forces near Stalingrad sufficient to defeat the enemy, and were able to replenish our troops in defensive battles.
In the summer of 1942, we could not hold the defense for a long time against the German troops, which were superior to us in forces and means, and were forced to retreat under the threat of encirclement.
It was still impossible to compensate for the missing number of artillery, aviation and other types of weapons, since the evacuated enterprises were just starting to work at full capacity, and the military industry of Europe still surpassed the military industry of the Soviet Union.
German troops continued their offensive along the western (right) bank of the Don and sought, by all means, to reach the large bend of the river. Soviet troops retreated to natural lines where they could gain a foothold.
By mid-July, the enemy captured Valuiki, Rossosh, Boguchar, Kantemirovka, Millerovo. Before him opened the eastern road - to Stalingrad and the south - to the Caucasus.
The battle of Stalingrad is divided into two periods: defensive from July 17 to November 18 and offensive, culminating in the liquidation of a huge enemy group, from November 19, 1942 to February 02, 1943.
The defensive operation began on the distant approaches to Stalingrad. From July 17, the forward detachments of the 62nd and 64th armies offered fierce resistance to the enemy at the turn of the Chir and Tsymla rivers for 6 days.
The troops of Germany and its allies could not take Stalingrad.
The offensive of our troops began on November 19, 1942. The troops of the Southwestern and Don Fronts went on the offensive. This day went down in our history as Artillery Day. On November 20, 1942, the troops of the Stalingrad Front went on the offensive. On November 23, the troops of the Southwestern and Stalingrad fronts united in the Kalach-on-Don, Sovetsky area, closing the encirclement of German troops. The Headquarters and our General Staff calculated everything very well, tying the Paulus army hand and foot with a great distance from our advancing troops, the 62nd Army, located in Stalingrad, and the offensive of the troops of the Don Front.
New Year's Eve 1943 was celebrated by our courageous soldiers and officers, just like New Year's Eve 1942, by the victors.
A huge contribution to the organization of the victory at Stalingrad was made by the Headquarters and the General Staff, headed by A. M. Vasilevsky.
During the Battle of Stalingrad, which lasted 200 days and nights, Germany and its allies lost ¼ of the forces operating at that time on the Soviet-German front. “The total losses of enemy troops in the region of the Don, Volga, Stalingrad amounted to 1.5 million people, up to 3500 tanks and assault guns, 12 thousand guns and mortars, up to 3 thousand aircraft and a large number of other equipment. Such losses of forces and means had a catastrophic effect on the general strategic situation and shook the entire military machine of Nazi Germany to its foundations, ”wrote G.K. Zhukov.
During the two winter months of 1942-1943, the defeated german army was thrown back to the positions from which the offensive began in the summer of 1942. This great victory for our troops gave additional strength to both the fighters and the home front workers.
The troops of Germany and their allies were also defeated near Leningrad. On January 18, 1943, the troops of the Volkhov and Leningrad fronts united, the ring of the blockade of Leningrad was broken.
A narrow corridor 8-11 kilometers wide, adjacent to south coast Lake Ladoga, was cleared of the enemy and linked Leningrad with the country. Trains long distance began to walk from Leningrad to Vladivostok.
Hitler was going to take Leningrad in 4 weeks by July 21, 1941 and send the liberated troops to storm Moscow, but he could not take the city by January 1944 either. Hitler ordered the proposals to surrender the city to the German troops not to accept and wipe the city off the face of the earth, but in fact, the German divisions stationed near Leningrad were wiped off the face of the earth by the troops of the Leningrad and Volkhov fronts. Hitler declared that Leningrad would be the first major city, captured by the Germans in the Soviet Union and spared no effort to capture it, but did not take into account that he was fighting not in Europe, but in Soviet Russia. I did not take into account the courage of the Leningraders and the strength of our weapons.
The victorious conclusion of the Battle of Stalingrad and the breakthrough of the blockade of Leningrad became possible not only thanks to the stamina and courage of the soldiers and commanders of the Red Army, the ingenuity of our soldiers and the knowledge of our military leaders, but, above all, thanks to the heroic work of the rear.
Vyacheslav Molotov, People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the USSR:
"The adviser to the German ambassador Hilger, when he handed the note, shed a tear."
Anastas Mikoyan, member of the Politburo of the Central Committee:
“Immediately, members of the Politburo gathered at Stalin’s. We decided that it was necessary to make a speech on the radio in connection with the outbreak of the war. Of course, they suggested that Stalin do it. But Stalin refused - let Molotov speak. Of course, this was a mistake. But Stalin was in such a depressed state that he did not know what to say to the people.
Lazar Kaganovich, member of the Politburo of the Central Committee:
“We gathered at Stalin's at night when Molotov received Schulenburg. Stalin gave each of us a task - to me for transport, to Mikoyan - for supplies.
Vasily Pronin, Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Moscow City Council:
“On June 21, 1941, at ten o'clock in the evening, Shcherbakov, secretary of the Moscow Party Committee, was summoned to the Kremlin. We had barely sat down when, addressing us, Stalin said: “According to intelligence and defectors, German troops intend to attack our borders tonight. Apparently, the war begins. Do you have everything ready in the city air defense? Report!" We were released at about 3 am. Twenty minutes later we arrived at the house. They were waiting for us at the gate. “They called from the Central Committee of the party,” the person who met him said, “and they instructed me to convey: the war has begun and we must be on the spot.”
- Georgy Zhukov, Pavel Batov and Konstantin Rokossovsky
- RIA News
Georgy Zhukov, General of the Army:
“At 4:30 am, Timoshenko and I arrived at the Kremlin. All the summoned members of the Politburo were already assembled. Me and the people's commissar were invited to the office.
I.V. Stalin was pale and sat at the table, holding a pipe not stuffed with tobacco in his hands.
We reported the situation. J.V. Stalin said in bewilderment:
“Is this not a provocation of the German generals?”
“The Germans are bombing our cities in Ukraine, Belarus and the Baltics. What kind of provocation is this…” S.K. Timoshenko replied.
... After some time, V.M. Molotov quickly entered the office:
"The German government has declared war on us."
JV Stalin silently sank into a chair and thought deeply.
There was a long, painful pause."
Alexander Vasilevsky,major general:
"At 4 o'clock with minutes, we became aware from the operational bodies of the district headquarters about the bombing of our airfields and cities by German aircraft."
Konstantin Rokossovsky,lieutenant general:
"About four hours on the morning of June 22, upon receiving a telephone message from the headquarters, he was forced to open a special secret operational package. The directive indicated: immediately put the corps on combat readiness and advance in the direction of Rovno, Lutsk, Kovel.
Ivan Bagramyan, Colonel:
“... The first strike of German aviation, although it turned out to be unexpected for the troops, did not at all cause panic. In a difficult situation, when everything that could burn was on fire, when barracks, residential buildings, warehouses were collapsing before our eyes, communications were interrupted, the commanders made every effort to maintain leadership of the troops. They firmly followed the combat regulations that became known to them after opening the packages they had stored.
Semyon Budyonny, Marshal:
“At 04:01 on June 22, 1941, Comrade Timoshenko, People's Commissar, called me and said that the Germans were bombing Sevastopol and should I report to Comrade Stalin about this? I told him that it was necessary to report immediately, but he said: “You call!” I immediately called and reported not only about Sevastopol, but also about Riga, which the Germans are also bombing. Tov. Stalin asked: "Where is the People's Commissar?" I answered: “Here, next to me” (I was already in the People’s Commissar’s office). Tov. Stalin ordered the phone to be handed over to him ...
Thus the war began!
- RIA News
Iosif Geibo, deputy regiment commander of the 46th IAP, ZapVO:
“... My chest went cold. In front of me are four twin-engine bombers with black crosses on their wings. I even bit my lip. Why, these are Junkers! German Ju-88 bombers! What to do? .. Another thought arose: "Today is Sunday, and on Sundays the Germans do not have training flights." So it's a war? Yes, war!
Nikolai Osintsev, chief of staff of the division of the 188th anti-aircraft artillery regiment of the Red Army:
“On the 22nd, at 4 o’clock in the morning, we heard sounds: boom-boom-boom-boom. It turned out that it was German aircraft that unexpectedly flew into our airfields. Our planes did not even have time to change these airfields and all remained in their places. Almost all of them were destroyed."
Vasily Chelombitko, head of the 7th department of the Academy of Armored and Mechanized Troops:
“On June 22, our regiment stopped to rest in the forest. Suddenly we see planes flying, the commander announced drill alert, but suddenly the planes began to bomb us. We understood that the war had begun. Here in the forest at 12 noon they listened to Comrade Molotov's speech on the radio and on the same day at noon received the first combat order of Chernyakhovsky about the division moving forward towards Siauliai.
Yakov Boyko, lieutenant:
“Today, i.e. 06/22/41, day off. While I was writing a letter to you, I suddenly hear on the radio that the brutal Nazi fascism bombed our cities ... But this will cost them dearly, and Hitler will no longer live in Berlin ... I now have only one in my soul hatred and the desire to destroy the enemy where he came from ... "
Pyotr Kotelnikov, defender of the Brest Fortress:
“In the morning we were awakened by a strong blow. Broke the roof. I was stunned. I saw the wounded and the dead, I realized: this is no longer an exercise, but a war. Most of the soldiers of our barracks died in the first seconds. Following the adults, I rushed to the weapon, but they did not give me rifles. Then I, with one of the Red Army men, rushed to extinguish the wares.
Timofei Dombrovsky, Red Army machine gunner:
“Airplanes poured fire on us from above, artillery - mortars, heavy, light guns - below, on the ground, and all at once! We lay down on the banks of the Bug, from where we saw everything that was happening on the opposite bank. Everyone immediately understood what was happening. The Germans attacked - war!
Cultural figures of the USSR
- All-Union Radio announcer Yuri Levitan
Yuri Levitan, announcer:
“When we, the announcers, were called to the radio early in the morning, the calls had already begun to ring out. They call from Minsk: “Enemy planes over the city”, they call from Kaunas: “The city is on fire, why aren’t you transmitting anything on the radio?”, “Enemy planes are over Kiev.” Women's crying, excitement: "Is it really war"? .. And now I remember - I turned on the microphone. In all cases, I remember myself that I only worried internally, only experienced internally. But here, when I uttered the words “Moscow is speaking”, I feel that I can’t continue to speak - a lump in my throat got stuck. They are already knocking from the control room - “Why are you silent? Go on! He clenched his fists and continued: "Citizens and citizens of the Soviet Union ..."
Georgy Knyazev, Director of the Archives of the USSR Academy of Sciences in Leningrad:
V.M. Molotov's speech about the German attack on the Soviet Union was broadcast on the radio. The war began at 4 1/2 in the morning with an attack by German aircraft on Vitebsk, Kovno, Zhitomir, Kyiv, and Sevastopol. There are dead. The Soviet troops were ordered to repulse the enemy, to drive him out of our country. And my heart trembled. Here it is, the moment we were afraid to even think about. Ahead... Who knows what's ahead!
Nikolay Mordvinov, actor:
“Makarenko was rehearsing... Anorov bursts in without permission... and in an alarming, muffled voice says: “War against fascism, comrades!”
So, the most terrible front has opened!
Woe! Woe!”
Marina Tsvetaeva, poet:
Nikolai Punin, art historian:
“I remembered the first impressions of the war ... Molotov’s speech, which A.A. ran in with disheveled hair (grayed) in a black Chinese silk robe . (Anna Andreevna Akhmatova)».
Konstantin Simonov, poet:
“The fact that the war had already begun, I learned only at two o'clock in the afternoon. All morning on June 22, he wrote poetry and did not answer the phone. And when he came up, the first thing he heard was war.
Alexander Tvardovsky, poet:
"War with Germany. I'm going to Moscow."
Olga Bergolts, poet:
Russian emigrants
- Ivan Bunin
- RIA News
Ivan Bunin, writer:
"22nd of June. FROM new page I am writing the continuation of this day - a great event - Germany this morning declared war on Russia - and the Finns and Romanians have already "invaded" its "limits".
Pyotr Makhrov, lieutenant general:
“The day the Germans declared war on Russia, June 22, 1941, had such a strong effect on my whole being that the next day, the 23rd (the 22nd was Sunday), I sent registered letter Bogomolov [the Soviet ambassador to France], asking him to send me to Russia to enroll in the army, at least as a private.”
USSR citizens
- Residents of Leningrad listen to a message about the attack of Nazi Germany on the Soviet Union
- RIA News
Lydia Shablova:
“We were tearing shingles in the yard to cover the roof. The kitchen window was open and we heard the radio announce that the war had begun. Father froze. His hands dropped: “We will probably not finish the roof ...”.
Anastasia Nikitina-Arshinova:
“Early in the morning, a terrible roar woke me and the children. Shells and bombs burst, shrapnel screeched. I grabbed the children and ran barefoot into the street. We barely had time to grab some clothes with us. The street was terrified. Above the fortress (Brest) planes circled and dropped bombs on us. Women and children rushed around in a panic, trying to escape. In front of me lay the wife of one lieutenant and her son - both were killed by a bomb.
Anatoly Krivenko:
“We lived not far from the Arbat, in Bolshoy Afanasevsky Lane. There was no sun that day, the sky was covered with clouds. I was walking in the yard with the boys, we were chasing a rag ball. And then my mother jumped out of the entrance in one combination, barefoot, running and shouting: “Home! Tolya, go home immediately! War!"
Nina Shinkareva:
“We lived in a village in the Smolensk region. That day, my mother went to the neighboring village for eggs and butter, and when she returned, father and other men had already gone to war. On the same day, residents began to evacuate. A big car arrived, and my mother put on all the clothes that my sister and I had, so that in winter we also had something to wear.
Anatoly Vokrosh:
“We lived in the village of Pokrov, Moscow Region. On that day, the guys and I were going to the river to catch carp. Mother caught me on the street, told me to eat first. I went to the house and ate. When he began to spread honey on bread, Molotov's message about the beginning of the war was heard. After eating, I ran away with the boys to the river. We rushed about in the bushes, shouting: “The war has begun! Hooray! We will defeat everyone!" We had absolutely no idea what it all meant. The adults discussed the news, but I don't remember any panic or fear in the village. The villagers were doing their usual things, and on this day, and in the following cities, summer residents gathered.
Boris Vlasov:
“In June 1941, he arrived in Oryol, where he was assigned immediately after graduating from the Hydrometeorological Institute. On the night of June 22, I spent the night in a hotel, as I had not yet managed to transport my things to the allotted apartment. In the morning I heard some fuss, turmoil, and the alarm signal overslept. It was announced on the radio that an important government message would be broadcast at 12 o'clock. Then I realized that I overslept not the training, but combat alert- the war started.
Alexandra Komarnitskaya:
“I rested in a children's camp near Moscow. There, the camp leadership announced to us that the war with Germany had begun. Everyone—the counselors and the children—began to cry.”
Ninel Karpova:
“We listened to the message about the beginning of the war from the loudspeaker at the House of Defense. There were a lot of people there. I was not upset, on the contrary, I became proud: my father will defend the Motherland ... In general, people were not afraid. Yes, women, of course, were upset, crying. But there was no panic. Everyone was sure that we would quickly defeat the Germans. The men said: “Yes, the Germans will drape from us!”.
Nikolay Chebykin:
“June 22 was Sunday. Such a sunny day! And my father and I dug a cellar for potatoes with shovels. About twelve o'clock. Somewhere at five minutes, my sister Shura opens the window and says: “The radio broadcasts:“ A very important government message will be transmitted now! Well, we put down the shovels and went to listen. It was Molotov. And he said that the German troops, treacherously, without declaring war, attacked our country. passed state border. The Red Army is fighting hard. And he ended with the words: “Our cause is right! The enemy will be defeated! Victory will be ours!".
German generals
- RIA News
Guderian:
“On the fateful day of June 22, 1941, at 2:10 am, I went to the command post of the group and went up to the observation tower south of Bogukala. At 03:15 our artillery preparation began. At 3 o'clock 40 min. - the first raid of our dive bombers. At 04:15, the forward units of the 17th and 18th Panzer Divisions began to cross the Bug. At 6 hours 50 minutes at Kolodno, I crossed the Bug in an assault boat.
“On June 22, at three hours and minutes, four corps of the tank group, with the support of artillery and aviation, which was part of the 8th aviation corps, crossed the state border. Bomber aircraft attacked enemy airfields, with the task of paralyzing the actions of his aircraft.
On the first day, the offensive proceeded completely according to plan.
Manstein:
“Already on this first day, we had to get acquainted with the methods by which the war was waged on the Soviet side. One of our reconnaissance patrols, cut off by the enemy, was later found by our troops, it was cut out and brutally mutilated. My adjutant and I traveled a lot in areas where enemy units could still be located, and we decided not to surrender alive into the hands of this enemy.
Blumentritt:
“The behavior of the Russians, even in the first battle, was strikingly different from the behavior of the Poles and allies who were defeated on the Western Front. Even being in the encirclement, the Russians staunchly defended themselves.
German soldiers and officers
- www.nationaalarchief.nl.
Erich Mende, Oberleutnant:
“My commander was twice my age, and he had already had to fight the Russians near Narva in 1917, when he was in the rank of lieutenant. “Here, in these endless expanses, we will find our death, like Napoleon ...” he did not hide his pessimism. “Mende, remember this hour, it marks the end of the old Germany.”
Johann Danzer, artilleryman:
“On the very first day, as soon as we went on the attack, one of ours shot himself with his own weapon. Clutching the rifle between his knees, he inserted the barrel into his mouth and pulled the trigger. Thus ended the war and all the horrors associated with it.
Alfred Dürwanger, lieutenant:
“When we entered into the first battle with the Russians, they clearly did not expect us, but they could not be called unprepared either. Enthusiasm (we have) was not in sight! Rather, everyone was seized by a sense of the grandeur of the forthcoming campaign. And then the question arose: where, at which settlement will this campaign end?!”
Hubert Becker, lieutenant:
“It was a hot summer day. We walked across the field, suspecting nothing. Suddenly, artillery fire fell upon us. That's how my baptism of fire happened - a strange feeling.
Helmut Pabst, non-commissioned officer
“The advance continues. We are constantly moving forward through enemy territory, we have to constantly change positions. I'm terribly thirsty. There is no time to swallow a piece. By 10 am, we were already experienced, fired upon fighters, who had time to see a lot: positions abandoned by the enemy, tanks and vehicles wrecked and burned out, the first prisoners, the first killed Russians.
Rudolf Gshöpf, chaplain:
“This artillery preparation, gigantic in terms of power and coverage of the territory, was like an earthquake. were visible everywhere huge mushrooms smoke that instantly rose from the ground. Since there was no talk of any return fire, it seemed to us that we had completely wiped this citadel off the face of the earth.
Hans Becker, tanker:
“On the Eastern Front, I met people who can be called a special race. Already the first attack turned into a battle not for life, but for death.