Eastern Front #6 Battle for Smolensk Begins

Last time we spoke about the Red Army on the Run. In the second week of Operation Barbarossa, the progress of the German forces was marked by swift victories and severe challenges. The Luftwaffe's dominance in the skies led to significant destruction of Soviet aircraft, with Germany claiming thousands downed. However, the Soviet Air Force, with hidden reserves, began to regroup under General Timoshenko, setting the stage for resilience. Amid these chaotic battlefields, disorganization plagued the Red Army, which struggled to adapt its tactics against the more cohesive German forces. Despite losing heavily, Soviet commanders sought to turn the tide, but logistical issues and fierce German assaults exacerbated their plight. As the Germans captured crucial territories like Riga, their strategic goal conflicted with rising concerns from within their command. While Hitler believed victory was within reach, generals like Halder worried about underestimating Soviet strength. The relentless advances led to fierce fighting at the edges of Smolensk, where both armies braced for an inevitable and consequential clash. 

This episode is the beginning of the Battle for Smolensk 

Well hello there, welcome to the Eastern Front week by week podcast, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about world war two? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on world war two and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel you can find a few videos all the way from the Opium Wars of the 1800’s until the end of the Pacific War in 1945. 

 

Well hello there, we are back and its week three of Operation Barbarossa. On July 8, Army Group Centre officially proclaimed that it had captured 287,704 prisoners, destroyed or seized 2,585 tanks, and taken 1,449 guns. While these numbers do reflect considerable gains, they do not necessarily indicate that the Soviet Union was on the brink of collapse, in fact, the opposite was true. As the German offensive strength began to wane, the Soviet Union was implementing one of the most remarkable mobilization programs in military history. Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, the Red Army had developed a cadre system, maintaining a small number of active-duty soldiers in peacetime that could be rapidly expanded by reservists during wartime. This system received a boost with the 1938 Universal Military Service Law, which extended the age of enlistment for army reserves to 50 and established numerous military schools to accommodate the influx of recruits. By the time of the German invasion, the Red Army boasted a mobilization base of 14 million men. By the end of June 1941, 5.3 million reservists had been called up, with subsequent mobilizations continuing to swell the ranks. This cadre system allowed for an unprecedented rate of force generation, catching German intelligence completely off guard and concealing the true strength of the Soviet military. In July 1941, an astounding 13 new field armies emerged, followed by another 14 in August. While these reserve armies were not as well-equipped or trained as their professional counterparts, as the German mobile forces weakened, many of the frontlines began to settle into positional warfare. This shift granted the new armies the time they needed to improve.

 

While it would be unreasonable to downplay the magnitude of the Western Front’s military disaster in Belorussia, it is important to recognize that the Soviet Union’s system for generating forces allowed it to quickly replace losses and expand the size of the Red Army. On June 22, 1941, the Red Army counted 5,373,000 men. By August 31, despite heavy losses, this number had surged to 6,889,000, and by December 31, 1941, it reached an estimated 8 million. After the war, German military officer Blumentritt acknowledged the fundamental issue of latent Soviet military strength. He recalled the German offensive plans aimed at encircling and destroying the Red Army before reaching the Dnieper and Dvina Rivers, ultimately asking, “But what if armies, millions strong, had not yet even been mobilized, and only parts of the Red Army were in western Russia?”

 

The loss of tanks weighed heavily on the Soviets, as these assets were much harder to replace. However, historians have often overstated the extent of German victories, particularly regarding the Soviet tank fleet. At the war's outset, the Soviets had an astonishing total of 23,767 tanks, but this figure included many that were already obsolete. Around 15,000 of those were older T-26 and BT models, most of which were in need of repair. Compounding the issue, untrained crews faced a severe shortage of ammunition, fuel, spare parts, and critical support such as air cover. It’s little wonder that Soviet tanks often sat abandoned on the battlefield if they even made it that far. Thus, the seemingly impressive numbers of Soviet tanks destroyed can be better understood as a disaster waiting to happen. Ineffective Soviet planning and direction significantly contributed to what became the Germans' first major triumph, inflating the narrative of an overwhelming victory through the sheer volume of outdated equipment. However, what proved vital for the future of the war was the production of new tanks. In this regard, Soviet leadership demonstrated impressive resolve. 

 

As the powerful German war machine charged eastward, another kind of battle raged behind Soviet lines, a battle not fought with tanks or rifles, but with wrenches, train cars, and sheer determination. Entire factories were uprooted and transported east, beyond the towering Ural Mountains, in a frantic race against the relentless advance of the enemy. As the Wehrmacht relentlessly pushes toward Smolensk and Leningrad, the Soviets are embarking on an extraordinary industrial mobilization, one of the most staggering efforts in military history.  What was unfolding was nothing short of remarkable: the relocation of hundreds of Soviet factories from the devastated western front to the safer haven east of the Urals. It all began on June 24, when a dedicated committee sprang into action, tasked with the monumental challenge of evacuation. By the first week of July, the effort was in full swing and rapidly gained momentum as the month progressed. This evacuation would stretch on until December 1941, and its importance cannot be overstated, the survival of the Red Army depended on it. As the field forces suffered staggering losses of equipment, the situation grew even graver. Much of the stockpile was outdated, a relic of a bygone era. Modern war machines were rolling off assembly lines, but they were being deployed to the front lines faster than they could be replenished. Just last week, we witnessed KV-1 tanks being dispatched directly from factories to participate in fierce assaults. The emergency deployment of arms and ammunition to frontline units would continue throughout the war, but to sustain this momentum, the factories had to be relocated. And while the Lend-Lease equipment would only begin arriving in significant numbers in 1942, the Soviets were determined not to lose ground. Their resolve, ingenuity, and relentless spirit would be tested like never before in this pivotal moment of history.

 

It was decided that entire factories would be dismantled, sometimes down to the wiring carefully packed, and transported eastward. This monumental task was anything but easy. Surprisingly, the Germans appeared largely unaware of what was unfolding, showing little effort to disrupt the evacuation. Yet, even without German interference, the process of dismantling, moving, and reassembling the industrial base presented staggering challenges. The invasion itself turned this effort into a Herculean task, fraught with difficulties. Many factories arrived at their new locations incomplete, delayed, misplaced, and in some cases, all three. Throughout most of 1941, the fighting was carried out with weapons that had already been produced. However, one must wonder: how much would the Red Army’s rebuilding efforts for the 1942 campaigns hinge on the output from these relocated factories in 1941? Not everything necessary for the war effort could be evacuated. Crucial infrastructure, like mines, roads, and dams had to be abandoned. In many cases, Soviet forces resorted to sabotage, deliberately undermining these assets to prevent them from falling into enemy hands. Perhaps most famous of these acts of sabotage by the retreating Soviets was the destruction of the dam at Zaporozhye in August 1941. The resultant flood may have killed upwards of 100,000 people. This was no trivial matter; sabotage often came at a steep cost, claiming lives and destroying years of hard work by countless men and women who had toiled during the five-year plans. Yet, despite the risks, Stalin and his inner circle understood that this grim decision was essential for the survival of their war effort.

 

Between July and November, 1,523 industrial enterprises moved to the Volga region, Siberia, or Central Asia, totaling about 1.5 million railway wagon loads. Even more astonishingly, production of essential war materials actually increased during the latter half of 1941, with some official production quotas, particularly for tanks being exceeded. In fact, the Soviet Union produced more tanks in 1941 than Germany did, with 66 percent of these being the newer T-34 and KV-1 models. The Soviets also manufactured more aircraft and artillery pieces than Germany, effectively meeting the immediate needs of their armed forces. When evaluating the outcome of Germany’s first significant offensive on the eastern front, it becomes clear that the German military leadership overestimated how their victories would impact the Soviet Union’s ability to maintain a cohesive front. They failed to recognize the necessity of balancing the tight perimeter around their encircled forces with the need for a rapid continuation of their advance to capitalize on their success. The root of this problem became evident early in the war: the Germans lacked sufficient mobile forces to achieve their objectives. Consequently, as losses mounted and the campaign ventured into ambitious new territories, the specter of overextension loomed large.

 

Meanwhile as Guderian and Hoth were mapping out the next phase of their operations, Brauchitsch hosted an important meeting at his home, attended by Hitler, Halder, and Heusinger. Halder opened the session with a summary of current operations, after which Hitler expressed his strong belief in the necessity of securing the Gulf of Finland, emphasizing the need to eliminate the Soviet fleet's threat to ore shipments. In a notable shift from his previous assertiveness, Halder recorded that Hitler seemed “unsure” about whether additional panzer forces would need to be allocated by Bock for the rapid capture of Leningrad. It’s possible that under the pressure from Halder and Brauchitsch, who may have praised the successes of Leeb’s advances, Hitler felt compelled to hesitate about diverting strength from Army Group Centre. The positive reports from the front left Hitler in high spirits, giving Heusinger the impression that he could speak freely with him, even sharing ideas that might typically be unwelcome.

 

Aside from discussing northern operations, Hitler highlighted the strategic significance of Ukraine for its food supply and industrial potential, underscoring the economic motivations behind his military strategy. However, Halder's diary, the only surviving record of the meeting, reveals that Hitler did not seem to consider diverting Bock’s panzers to the south at that time. He viewed the advance on Moscow as a secondary priority, suggesting that it could only be undertaken by infantry units, at the earliest in August, once Smolensk had been secured. In Hitler’s mind, he would not commit armored forces to support the infantry’s drive toward Moscow until the northern front had been adequately addressed. Ultimately, the future role of Army Group Centre remained uncertain even after the meeting on June 30, and it would not be conclusively determined until Smolensk fell into German hands.

 

As the Battle for Smolensk commenced, the Luftwaffe struggled with dwindling numbers of aircraft, tasked with covering an ever-expanding frontline. The reduction of the encircled pockets at Minsk and Bialystok had only been achieved through the intense commitment of Luftwaffe resources. This heavy reliance resulted in wear and tear on the planes, hampering more comprehensive efforts to support the encirclement at Smolensk. Moreover, establishing and maintaining supply routes became increasingly challenging for many units in the Second Air Corps, which was responsible for supporting the southern flank of Army Group Center. These logistical issues allowed the Soviet air force, the “VVS” or “Voenno-Vozdushnye Sily”, to exploit gaps in the Luftwaffe’s protective coverage. Soviet Il-2 bombers launched raids that created significant headaches for the German Heer. With an ever-growing number of Soviet fighters joining the fray, the Soviets were far from ready to surrender control of the skies, even after suffering staggering losses in June.

 

Army Group North was fully engaged in its push towards Leningrad. The Red Army launched an armored counterattack at Ostrov against General Reinhardt’s 41st Panzer Corps but ultimately failed to drive them back. In the wake of this setback, desperation began to set in as the Northwestern Front sought to establish a new defensive position at Luga, just 140 kilometers southwest of Leningrad. Meanwhile, General Manstein’s 56th Panzer Corps found itself bogged down in swampy woods, struggling to cover the largely unprotected stretch between Ostrov and Luga. He arrived in Ostrov five days after Reinhardt, a delay that, while not catastrophic, was beginning to create complications. By July 10, Manstein finally reached Porkhov, around 90 kilometers past Ostrov. On the same day, Reinhardt arrived at Luga, another 100 kilometers further down the road. The growing gap between their forces was becoming increasingly perilous, but Manstein was determined to close it. To outflank the Soviets at Luga, he pushed his forces towards Soltsy. However, the first assault by the 1st Panzer Division at Luga met fierce resistance and was halted. In response, Reinhardt orchestrated a wide flanking maneuver with the 6th Panzer Division to the west. This approach was consistent with the standard tactics favored by Panzer commanders, who often achieved remarkable victories, from Sedan to Minsk, by opting for encirclement instead of direct assaults.

 

There was just one major issue: in the forests and marshes of the Baltic region, where the landscape was dotted with lakes and small rivers, the Panzers lacked the speed necessary for effective envelopment. Reinhardt managed to establish a small bridgehead at Luga, but this required an entire week of intense fighting. During this time, the Soviets capitalized on the slow progress of the Germans. The Northwestern Front repositioned significant forces, led by the 70th Rifle Division, on either side of Manstein’s stretched lines as he struggled to march to Soltsy. A trap was being set for the following week, aimed at crushing the leading edge of the 56th Panzer Corps. On July 13, the 8th Panzer Division finally arrived at Soltsy, and it was here that the trap would be sprung. Vatutin, now serving as the chief of staff for the Northwestern Front, was prepared to direct the battle. The tables had turned; it was now the Panzers that found themselves desperately trying to break free from a pocket. Hoepner would need to intervene to save Manstein from potential disaster, redirecting some of his forces away from the advance on Luga to assist him in this critical moment.

 

As Army Group North unwittingly led its Panzers deeper into the Baltic forests and into a carefully laid trap, Army Group Center was gearing up for the fight for Smolensk. July 10 is often marked as the official start of this battle. Battles rarely conform to neat definitions of time and space, especially in the context of industrial-scale conflicts. The timestamps we attach to the “beginning” and “ending” of battles are necessarily arbitrary. Throughout this podcast, we will emphasize this point while still acknowledging the most commonly accepted dates and locations for various battles. It’s important to remember that the fighting within a battle cannot be confined to the times or places we're mentioning. When battles involve hundreds of thousands of troops and span thousands of square miles over days or weeks, they cannot be adequately captured by a simple label like “the Battle of X.” This terminology implies a level of neatness that fails to reflect the complexity and chaos of real warfare. The counterattacks launched by Timoshenko’s Western Front the previous week were crucial; they aimed to buy him the time needed to assemble his main forces to resist the Germans at Smolensk. While these counterattacks failed to push the Panzers back, they were still successes in that they allowed him to move vital fresh troops into position. However, none of these efforts proved sufficient. Not the fresh divisions, nor the time, nor the space would be enough to turn the tide.

 

On the morning of July 9, the 20th Panzer Division launched a decisive strike across the Dvina River. Their attack was a textbook example of armored warfare, quickly demolishing the Soviet infantry of the 62nd Rifle Corps from the 22nd Army. By nightfall, the Panzers had reached Vitebsk, covering an impressive sixty kilometers while breaking through well-prepared Soviet defenses. This remarkable advance echoed the early days of the war and seemed to dispel any doubts about the offensive capabilities of the Wehrmacht’s panzer forces. However, this perception was misleading, as the declining numbers of available tanks and trucks told a different story. Yet many leaders within the Wehrmacht allowed themselves to be blinded by their string of victories, beliefs that would soon be put to the test. For the time being, the Wehrmacht remained in a position of dominance, leaving Timoshenko reeling from this unexpected assault that easily disrupted his preparations. In response, he clumsily committed the remainder of the 5th and 7th Mechanized Corps to the fight. Unfortunately for him, these forces were brushed aside with ease. In less than a week, Timoshenko had lost a significant portion of his armored reserves, more than eight hundred tanks, a catastrophic blow and the assault against his lines was just beginning. Meanwhile, in front of Guderian’s Panzergroup, the Soviet 13th Army struggled. Still battered from the encirclement at Minsk, the 13th had not received any significant reinforcements. The tanks of the 37th Panzer Corps faced little resistance from the remnants of the 13th Army. Once they crossed the river in force, they drove straight toward the heart of Smolensk. Timoshenko faced encirclement from both sides, just as his unfortunate predecessor had experienced at Minsk and Bialystok only two weeks earlier. Although the 20th Army still held the line between Smolensk and Orsha, this position was rapidly becoming irrelevant as the Panzers advanced further east, outflanking these defenses to the north and south.

 

In many respects, the first ten days of July 1941 represented a race toward the Dvina and Dnepr Rivers, as both Bock and Timoshenko endeavored to amass sufficient forces to confront each other. The swift collapse of the Soviet Western Front in June, coupled with the chaos among Timoshenko's scattered and makeshift troops, placed him at a disadvantage in this race. However, the German blitzkrieg was also losing its momentum. A major impediment for the Germans was the condition of Soviet roads, which inflicted more damage on their panzer and motorized divisions than on the Red Army. To bolster the German advance into the Soviet Union, a significant number of civilian vehicles, trucks and cars, were commandeered to supplement the army's lack of motorization. Unfortunately, these vehicles often lacked the ground clearance needed for such treacherous conditions, leading them to bottom out on the rutted and uneven roads. This caused considerable damage to their transmissions and oil sumps. Additionally, the weaker suspension systems of civilian vehicles frequently broke, leaving a trail of wreckage in the wake of the German advance.

 

Military vehicles were not spared either. Alexander Cohrs, serving with a panzer division, vividly described the perilous roads his unit encountered on July 5. Noting the "very bad roads, full of holes," he wrote in his diary: "Some [vehicles] tipped over luckily none in our company. After 18 kilometers of marching, I sat on an armored vehicle that tipped so much it balanced on two wheels while the other two lifted off the ground. Miraculously, it did not topple over. Along the way, there was a moor that forced the vehicles to take a long detour. One by one, they got stuck or even overturned, leading to breakdowns and a slow pace." On July 6, General Heinrici, who commanded three infantry divisions, expressed his frustrations in a letter to his wife: "The compression of troops onto narrow avenues of advance makes progress slower than we would like. To this, we must add the dreadful roads that exacerbate the difficulties. Lord God, this is a primitive land north of the Pripet marshes, forests everywhere, interspersed with kilometer-wide swamps where one can sink up to the knee."

 

In addition to the inhospitable terrain, vast distances, and terrible roads, worsening weather emerged as a significant obstacle for the advancing German forces. Following heavy rainfall, a report from Kluge’s 4th Panzer Army on July 6 indicated that the roads across the expansive Beresina swamplands—from the west of Minsk to the Dnepr were "exceptionally bad" and "often bottomless." The report noted that motorized units were being "greatly slowed" and urgently required more engineers and construction resources. As Hans von Luck from the 7th Panzer Division described, “after brief downpours, the roads transformed into muddy tracks that were only passable at certain points, often requiring engineers or off-loaded grenadiers to fell trees to create makeshift wooden pathways. Ultimately, it was not just the enemy that hindered the advance; the catastrophic state of the roads played a significant role”.

 

Field Marshal Kesselring, commander of Army Group Centre’s Air Fleet 2, noted that the intermittent rain worsened the already primitive roads, revealing "the true face of the Russian theatre." He summed up the logistical challenges in the east, concluding that even fully tracked vehicles, including tanks, and the supply services largely depended on the arterial roads, which aided troops by providing warnings about impending difficulties. On July 7, Bock added, "It has been raining for two days on the 4th Panzer Army. This has made the road conditions dreadful and placed an extraordinary strain on both men and materials." At one point, the sunken roads forced the 7th Panzer Division to struggle for two days to advance just 90 kilometers. While the summer downpours turned many roads into swamps, elsewhere, the thick mud quickly reverted to the army's other significant hindrance: dust. On July 6, Wilhelm Pruller noted in his diary: "The advance is proceeding very slowly. Numerous obstacles are hindering our progress. You can hardly call what we’re on a road it’s better than this in the smallest hamlet in Germany. And we’re marching on a main road! The shoulders of the road are muddy from the previous rain sinking up to our knees but in the center, there's already dust... each vehicle is engulfed in an impenetrable cloud of dust."

 

This remarkable scene was echoed by 4th Panzer Army’s Chief of Staff, Major-General Gunther Blumentritt, who later wrote, "A vivid picture that remains from those initial weeks is the massive clouds of yellow dust... The heat was intense, interspersed with sudden showers that quickly turned the roads to mud before the sun reappeared, baking them back into crumbling clay." On just the second day of the war, the commander of the 43rd Army Corps remarked, "Every step and every vehicle creates an impenetrable cloud of dust. The march routes are marked by a yellowish-brown cloud that lingers in the air like mist." For men, machines, and animals, the dust became a torment for the German advance. Ironically, the very roads crucial to the rapid German blitzkrieg were also a primary factor in slowing their progress eastward. One soldier described the exhausting summer advance: "Our feet sank into the sand and dirt, sending dust into the air that clung to us. The horses coughed in the dust, creating a pungent smell. The loose sand was almost as tiring for the horses as the deep mud would have been. The men marched in silence, covered in dust, with parched throats and lips. In the early days of the campaign, the fine dust of the Soviet Union proved deadlier to the German panzer and motorized divisions than the Red Army’s counterattacks."

 

The dust quickly overwhelmed the inadequate air filters, infiltrating the engines and initially increasing oil consumption, ultimately rendering many engines unusable. Despite its dangers, the dust remained pervasive and unavoidable. Claus Hansmann wrote that his motorized column drove "as if in a sandstorm," noting how "the wheels churned up fountains of sand that obscured the sun... The dust burned our noses and throats." As a result, the rate of vehicle failure began to rise alarmingly. In Guderian’s panzer group, estimates of combat-ready tanks varied widely but indicated a significant attrition rate that severely reduced force strength. The most optimistic assessment recorded on July 7 noted that the tanks in the 18th and 3rd Panzer Divisions were at just 35 percent combat readiness, while the 4th and 17th Panzer Divisions were at 60 percent, and the 10th Panzer Division was the strongest at 80 percent. However, contrasting figures from the quartermaster’s diary indicated that the 18th Panzer Division was only at 25 percent strength, and the 17th at 50 percent. Just two days earlier, the war diary of the 47th Panzer Corps, which included both divisions, reported the 18th Panzer Division at 30 percent strength and the 17th at 33 percent of its initial total. Clearly, there was confusion regarding the precise figures, likely due to differing definitions of what constituted as 'combat ready.' Nevertheless, it is evident that the first two weeks of operations took a toll on the German panzers. Undoubtedly, the poor roads and pervasive dust accounted for most of the high failure rates, although reports indicated that using captured Soviet low-octane fuel also significantly damaged German engines, contributing to the losses.

 

Timoshenko struggled to gather reinforcements to counter the German spearheads, but two major factors hindered their effective deployment. First, Timoshenko failed to wait for a strong force to be assembled. Instead, incomplete tank divisions and rifle corps arrived from trains or road marches and launched attacks before they could properly organize. These assaults lacked coordination and were no match for the well-structured German units. The second issue was Timoshenko’s poor intelligence regarding the positions and intentions of the Panzers. The German Army on the Eastern Front was starting to undergo a process that author David Stahel refers to as de-modernization. During the battle of Smolensk, the Panzer divisions were still capable of functioning as a well oiled combined arms team but this was reliant on the stockpile of spare parts and fuel that Army Group Center had been able to assemble for the push. This was one of the last times that any of the Army Groups was able to facilitate a large scale offensive before the end of the year. However, this de-modernization meant only that the units were regressing to an earlier stage of tactical mobility in the absence of trucks and tanks. It did not mean that they could not still beat their unorganized Soviet counterparts. This problem was not unique to the battle of Smolensk; it plagued the Red Army throughout Operation Barbarossa. Due to inadequate tactical intelligence, Timoshenko missed opportunities to isolate and destroy the Panzers. As a result, he often marched his troops deeper into developing pockets rather than cutting off the spearheads of the Panzer groups.

 

On July 12, Zhukov sent an order from Stavka to Timoshenko, directing him to initiate a counteroffensive with all available land and air forces. Timoshenko complied, launching the largest counteroffensive of the war up to that point, sending six armies into battle. One of the primary objectives was to relieve the encircled 13th Army at Mogilev. While this goal was not achieved, the distraction did allow some elements of the beleaguered 13th Army to make it back to Soviet lines. There were a few minor successes during this offensive. The 63rd Rifle Corps, under the 4th Army, managed to push back elements of the 43rd Infantry Corps in the area around Rogachev, a critical crossing point on the Dnipro River. However, this victory was short-lived, as the infantry of the 63rd Rifle found themselves exposed due to the failure of the surrounding attacks on their flanks. Other instances of squandered success appeared throughout the front. Colonel General Gorodnikov had a three-division horse cavalry group that broke out behind German lines around the same time, wreaking havoc on supply lines. However, their impact was less significant than it could have been, likely due to hesitancy about becoming cut off in the rapidly evolving situation. Meanwhile, Guderian paid little heed to these attacks, focusing instead on his drive to encircle Smolensk. Though maybe surprising to some, the Red Army employed cavalry throughout the war in large formations. This was partially because of the strong influence of old cavalry officers at the top of the Red Army’s hierarchy. Budyonny and Timoshenko had both been long-time cavalrymen in the Russian Civil War and preached its continuing place on the modern battlefield. They faced criticism for this stance, but eventually were proven right to some degree. No doubt helpful to their cause was the fact that Stalin had served in the Cavalry himself, where he first made the acquaintance of the two marshals.  The fighting was far from over; the scale of the conflict meant that a resolution could not be achieved within a week. By July 14, the situation had become dire, but the fate of the Western Front was not yet sealed. Timoshenko still had the opportunity to save his men, if not Smolensk itself.

 

On the Southwestern and Southern fronts, the situation was equally challenging for the Red Army. Kleist’s Panzers had been split, pursuing two divergent objectives. The 11th and 13th Panzer Divisions faced counterattacks from the 4th, 9th, 19th, and 22nd Mechanized Corps in front of Kyiv. Although the Southwestern Front remained strong, its forces were stretched thin across Western Ukraine. These mechanized forces represented Kirponos's last best chance to blunt the Panzers' advance toward Kyiv. While the Southwestern Front was launching its final armored reserves at the Panzers outside Kyiv, Lieutenant General Potapov was pulling the 5th Army back from positions at Korosten. Under Kirponos's orders, Potapov aimed to strike from the north, while Lieutenant General Muzychenko’s 6th Army was tasked with attacking from the south. Together, with the mechanized corps in the center, these armies hoped to rescue the trapped 7th Rifle Corps and, ideally, cut off Kleist’s spearhead heading toward Kyiv. Unfortunately, this goal was beyond their reach, and all they managed was to delay the Panzers at great cost. 

 

By July 13, the four mechanized corps had dwindled to just ninety-five tanks. On the opening day of Operation Barbarossa, these corps had possessed over two thousand three hundred tanks. Despite the losses suffered by the Germans, it was hard to see anything but a near-total victory for the Wehrmacht in the first three weeks of fighting in Ukraine. However, the fighting in front of Kyiv did manage to delay the Panzers long enough to convince Hitler that they could not take Kyiv on their own. He reversed his earlier order that Kleist should take Kyiv while simultaneously completing the southern encirclement at Uman. His new directive was to finish the encirclement first, then turn the entire Army Group to capture Kyiv. This was essentially a reversal, a tacit admission that he had erred just days after issuing orders to Kleist. Operation Barbarossa was always conducted with political pressures from Hitler and his inner circle at the forefront in the minds of his Generals. Halder, Rundstedt, Bock and Leeb as the highest ranking officers in the Army battled with each other and Hitler constantly over the direction of the campaign. The lower tiers of commanders were not immune to this either, as we shall see in a few weeks with Guderian. It was becoming clear that Army Group South was unable to seize Kyiv and destroy the Red Army around Uman simultaneously. Even the task of cutting off Soviet forces in the area was proving difficult. Choosing to focus on closing the pocket at Uman rather than a location further east was a compromise, reflecting the actual combat power Army Group South could muster. These deliberations continued throughout the week, with the attack date set for July 15. In the meantime, Hitler increasingly assumed the role of Army Group Commander, shuffling individual divisions around the front.

 

At this stage of the war, logistics underpinned every German plan. The General Staff recognized early on that the existing Russian rail lines would need to be converted to standard European gauge. Initially, there were unfounded hopes that a quick strike across the border would allow for the seizure of significant amounts of Russian rolling stock, which would mitigate the need for immediate rail conversion. "rolling stock" refers to all the vehicles that move on the tracks, including both powered and unpowered ones. This encompasses locomotives, passenger and freight cars, and various other railway equipment like snowplows. However, this did not materialize. In the absence of the necessary rolling stock, the gauge conversion process began, but this was not quick, even under the best conditions. The railroad troops assigned to the conversion were undermanned, poorly protected, and lacking in resources. Changing the gauge on rail lines is an involved process that is not done well by amateurs. As skilled workers were killed or died from the conditions on the Eastern Front, there were few replacements from the home front. The process revolves around pulling the track spikes, lifting the rails and re-laying them to the desired gauge, then driving the spikes back in. It is hard labor even if only one rail is moved when narrowing gauge.

 

Moreover, they faced conflicting demands from commanders at the front and the long-term construction priorities set by the Quartermaster General, General Wagner. Wagner required these troops to focus on building high-capacity rail lines behind each Army Group, which involved more than just re-gauging the tracks. Essential infrastructure such as switching yards, turnabouts, signals, and more had to be constructed to establish proper high-capacity lines. Additionally, many of the existing track routes were subpar. Even those tracks that could be easily re-gauged were often poorly engineered and installed, significantly lowering their carrying capacity. This entire process was labor-intensive and required careful allocation of men and materials to succeed. General Wagner was tasked with this challenge because it was his responsibility to ensure that field forces received the supplies they needed, facilitating the construction of large supply dumps that could serve as buffers against the demands of the armies.

 

The other side of the rail debate was the urgent need for the field forces to have the tracks re-gauged as quickly as possible. This would reduce the demand on their limited truck transport capabilities and enable them to redeploy via rail, which was far easier for both the men and equipment than marching. Unfortunately for the Wehrmacht in the east, there simply weren’t enough rail troops available to meet this demand. As a result, neither mission was accomplished to the satisfaction of any party involved, and the logistics of the Wehrmacht continued to suffer. From the war's opening days, the strategic reserves of fuel were already low, and a lack of other critical resources was impacting production. As the conflict dragged on, fuel became an immediate concern for field commanders. Some of this shortage was due to production shortfalls. There is much to be said about the war economy in Germany. Alternatives to petroleum based fuels were explored, but these required other resources that were scarce as it was. Steel, Coal, and Labor were not plentiful as production was falling in many areas of Europe.  However, even more critical for the Panzers was the sharp decline in fuel deliveries as they advanced further from Germany. The logistics apparatus simply could not keep pace with the demands of the front lines.

 

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The Luftwaffe dominated the skies, but the Red Army, under General Timoshenko, rallied despite heavy losses. A remarkable mobilization program saw millions of reservists called up, even as factories relocated eastward to evade German forces. As armored clashes erupted, Stalin’s leadership shone through, but logistical challenges loomed large. Timoshenko’s forces faced a desperate struggle, launching counteroffensives amid fierce battles. The fate of Smolensk hung precariously as both sides braced for an inevitable and crucial confrontation in this brutal conflict.