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Barbarossa - Part 4

© William Waller

But the German forces in front of Moscow were not going to be allowed to sit out the winter, one of the worst in living memory with temperatures as low as minus 60 degrees. General, later Marshall Zhukov had been quietly gathering a force, the existence of which was completely unkown to the Germans. Consisting of 100 divisions of infantry, tanks, artillery and aircraft support, the men were fresh troops or else rested veterans, all properly clothed and equipped, simply awaiting the order to move. Besides huge distances into which to retreat, the Russians had a manpower source of 35 million men and took about 6 months to turn a newly created division into a fighting force. The German troops were by now exhausted, having been fighting without a break since June and fighting the weather since mid October. Now, in early December, the temperatures in the Moscow region took their usual sudden drop and cold became utterly freezing. Tanks just would not start, guns jammed, hot food froze before it could be eaten, and frostbite claimed thousands (proper clothing was still not available).

Dividing his forces into 7 armies and two armoured corps, Zhukov launched his counter-offensive all along the 200 mile semi-circle of attacking forces in front of Moscow on 6th December. The Germans were completely surprised and gave ground almost automatically at the overwhelming assault. The only reason why a rout did not occur was that the roads and the weather made any idea of running away quickly simply impossible. All the Germans could do was to endure the assaults and slowly retreat. Hitler was in a continual rage at these reversals when Moscow had seemed about to fall, and he ordered all troops to fight to the last man, and not to surrender. But self-preservation is instinctive and there was always the chance that, by living to fight another day, they would be able to halt the Russians and resume their own advance. In eight days, the front had moved back about 50 miles; 6th December 1941 was a day to remember, the day when the German army was found not to be invincible, after all!

Having no one else on whom to vent his rage, Hitler turned on the Generals. Starting from mid-December, one after the other was dismissed or forced to resign. Runstedt, Commander of Army Group South, was forced to resign because he retreated before Rostov. On 18th, Bock of the Centre Group was relieved because the stress of retreating exacerbated his ulcerated stomach until the pain became unbearable. Sponneck was dismissed for pulling back one division in the Crimea after Russians had landed by sea in its rear. Guderian and Hoepner, equally brilliant tank commanders, were cashiered for retreating without permission. Finally, Brauchitsch, the Commander in Chief, suffered repeated heart attacks at the news from the front lines, and asked to be relieved. Hitler thought him inept, while everyone else knew that he had never been able to stand up to him, and formally relieved him on 19th December. Replacement generals were appointed to all the vacant positions but there was speculatipon as to who would be the new Army head. Hitler did not keep them in suspense and, on 19th as he relieved Brauchitsch, he announced that he would be the new Commander in Chief, in addition to being the Minister of War, the Supreme commander of the Armed Forces, and Fuehrer.

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