The Eastern Front Week by Week

Eastern Front #25 The Battle of Moscow Begins

Last time we spoke about the fall of Tikhvin. The German offensive toward Tikhvin stalls against Rasputitsa, ice, and supply failures, while Soviet resilience around Leningrad, Volkhov, and Moscow’s approaches slows the Germans’ advance. By November 9–15, 1941, Hitler’s high command grappled with harsh logistical realities: trains, fuel, and winter clothing are scarce, and many units lack adequate armor and reconnaissance. Stalin reshuffles commanders, appointing Meretskov to command the 4th Army and canceling some attacks due to weak force strength, while pressing others to continue offensives despite dire conditions. At the front, the 4th, 52nd, and 54th Armies attempted to blunt German thrusts and seize critical corridors, but frontal assaults amid brutal cold yield limited gains and heavy casualties. The Shlisselburg corridor, Lake Ladoga, and Volkhov remained focal points as both sides jockey for position and supply routes. Across Kharkiv, Sevastopol, and Crimea, German advances stall or recede amid fierce Soviet defense and attritional warfare. Overall, winter intensified the struggle, highlighting endurance and the limits of operational planning under extreme conditions.

This episode is the battle of Moscow Starts

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. 

Even in their depleted state, the Wehrmacht’s officers pressed for a major winter offensive against Moscow and Rostov, and as winter tightens its grip on the USSR, Hitler’s Panzers roll forward again. Kleist pushes toward Rostov, while Army Group Center’s panzers begin the battle for Moscow, and the Red Army responds by stepping up its counteroffensive against Leeb’s overstretched forces. Last week, Klykov’s 52nd Army launched an offensive that failed to achieve its aims. STAVKA pressed him to attack again, but the army needed time to reorganize, until 17 November, when the night brought a sharper tactic: two detachments from the 259th and 111th Rifle Divisions slipped behind German lines, and in the morning those two divisions struck Malaia Vishera. The defenders were outflanked and overwhelmed, creating a breach in the German 126th Infantry Division’s line, which was forced to retreat west toward Bolshaia Vishera and the Volkhov River. Yet Klykov’s pursuit slowed, because the 215th Division was hurried into the line to reinforce the 126th after its redeployment from France. Despite this progress, Leeb managed to reinforce the besieged 39th Panzer Corps at Tikhvin with the 61st Infantry Division, a move made necessary as the German 4th Army opened its offensive on 19 November. Deep snow slowed the Northern Shock Group as it pressed toward Tikhvin, crawling through heavy resistance, while the Eastern Shock Group stalled at the Tikhvinka River and along the Tikhvin–Taltsy road, clashing with the 20th Motorised and the 61st Infantry Divisions. Meanwhile, the Southern Shock Group targeted the supply routes to Tikhvin, making steady progress against the layered battlegroups defending the extended southern flank of the Panzer Corps. Although the Soviet attack had stalled, the German positions around Tikhvin remained under constant pressure, with the 8th Panzer Force even breaching its line on 20 November. These clashes set the stage for a brutal winter campaign across multiple axes, as the push toward Moscow and Rostov competed with tense defensive holds around Tikhvin and both sides stretched their resources to the limit.

Trapped in a three-sided vice and poorly supplied, the 39th Panzer Corps took heavy losses from the fierce fighting and the cold. Leeb still believed Tikhvin could be held but concluded he would need two more infantry divisions to help shield the line from Ostashkov to Lake Viyele and the southern shore of Lake Ladoga. He thus sought ways to crush forces west of the Volkhov River, hoping to free up five more divisions. However, rumours reached him that the 39th Mobile Corps might be withdrawn from Army Group North. On the 20th, he informed OKH that he would need four or five fresh divisions to replace the mobile corps, and if he could obtain permission to abandon Tikhvin, that requirement might be reduced by one. Everyone knew that achieving such a transfer was impossible, so talk of withdrawing the corps ceased. Yet Halder insisted that Tikhvin be held at all costs. Any hope for a link-up with the Finns now rested on the Finns launching their own offensive, but they remained fully employed in East Karelia. Kondopoga had fallen, with both offensive prongs meeting north of Lake Lizhma; since then, extreme snow and cold had slowed the Army of Karelia to a crawl. Leeb’s problems could have been worse, but the 54th Army was still not in a position to launch its own offensive. It remained preoccupied with the latest push by reinforced Group Boeckmann. On the 18th, Leeb detached a battlegroup from the 12th Panzer to bolster their drive toward Lake Ladoga. Random fact, this is the same day Operation Crusader would start in North Africa with British forces surprising Rommel and his Italian allies. Overall the north africa campaign effected the Eastern Front as Germany had to divert more and more forces to remedy one of Italy’s numerous fuck up’s. If you want to learn more about that, please check outs my ten part series over on Echoes of War Podcast. Heavy fighting also raged outside Volkov and Voibokalo stations, even as the German advance began to slow despite additional reinforcements.

Meanwhile, assaults from Leningrad and operations by the 8th Army continued all week with little to show for them, the repeated efforts yielding the same lack of success. The persistent failures prompted STAVKA to replace Shevaldin with Bondarev as commander of the 8th Army, and Lazarov was replaced by Sviridov as the commander of the 55th Army. Despite the heavy losses, STAVKA insisted that the attacks go on, aiming to keep German divisions tied down around Leningrad and thereby prevent them from aiding the forces at Tikhvin and Volkhov. With the ice of Lake Ladoga hindering boat movement but not yet thick enough to support vehicles, an emergency airbridge was established to sustain Leningrad. However, between 14 and 28 November, only about 1,200 tons of high‑calorie food could be flown in, far short of the city’s needs. Food was growing scarce, and rationing tightened further. From 20 November, workers in priority jobs received only 375 grams of bread per day, while dependents were reduced to 125 grams. This was down from an initial ration of 250g a day or 300 for children under 12. Soldiers in Leningrad had access to just 500 grams of bread daily, yet the city required about 510 tons of bread each day to meet demand. To stretch supplies, edible cellulose was added to the bread mixture, along with other additives such as malt, soybeans, and oatmeal. The percentage of Cellulose ranged from 20 to 50% of bread while the additives could make up to 40% of the bread. 

Even with measures like this, the city still needed more than 1,000 tons of supplies a day to sustain everyone, which could not be transported properly, and a famine began in November, followed by disease as the city’s health system strained to cope. About 10,000 people died in the city during November, a figure that would rapidly rise as shortages deepened. In an effort to counter this, on 19 November the Leningrad Front ordered the construction of a military vehicle road between Kobona and Vaganovo across the frozen Lake Ladoga. Yet the rail link between Kobona and Vologa ran through the besieged Volkhov and the occupied Tikhvin, so until Tikhvin could be reclaimed a second road was forged to bypass the German forces. Light horse carts had already begun crossing the Shlisselburg Bay from 19 November, though the 100 millimeter thick ice was not yet sufficient to support supply trucks. This situation would change by 22 November, when the first major vehicle column, carrying 33 tons of flour, crossed the ice amid a heavy snowstorm. Thus began the Road of Life.

Gone were the Rasputitsa thaws and freezes around Moscow; the weather had settled into a regime of permanent snow and ice. With hopes of restored mobility, Operation Typhoon resumed on 15 November. In previous seasons the Red Army clung stubbornly to every meter of ground, but this time the 27th Corps’ opening offensive met only thinly dispersed screening troops, as the main Soviet forces had already withdrawn behind the Volga and all bridges across the river had been blown before the 27th Corps could reach them. On 16 November, the 16th Army committed the 126th Rifle, the 17th and 24th Cavalry, and the 58th Tank divisions to an offensive at the boundary between the 27th Army and the 56th Panzer Corps. The attack pressed against the 7th Panzer and the 14th Motorised earlier that day, but bogged down after only about 4 kilometers, suffering heavy losses. In an attempt to exploit the minor opening between the 56th Panzer and the 27th Army Corps, the 20th and 44th Cavalry divisions were sent in next. This proved a poor decision, as they charged straight into waiting German infantry across an open field, yielding the predictable results.

The 56th Panzer Corps would counterattack, aiming to push the boundary between the Soviet 30th and 16th Armies. The 7th Panzer made little progress, but its accompanying 14th Motorised division managed to cross the Lama River at Gribanovo and Kussowa. The earlier losses meant Roscosovsky could not hold the Lama river line and was compelled to retreat to new defenses on the 17th, with not all of his forward formations able to escape the faster-moving German units, resulting in further losses. The Soviet 49th Army had launched spoiling attacks against the right flank of the 4th Army, gaining little ground but forcing Kluge to adopt an extreme caution. At the same time, the 49th Army, together with the 50th Army, remained engaged in a running battle against Guderian’s forces around Tula, though their casualties were not immediately exploited. There had been more planned attacks against the German forces, one of which had diverted some reserves away from the 30th and 16th Armies to assemble a force around Volokolamsk for an assault on Kalinin.

On Kluge’s left flank, the 2nd Panzer Division would open their offensive on the 16th as well, aiming to secure better positions for the 5th Army Corps. The clash with the 316th Rifle Division to this attack would give rise to a legend intended to boost morale. To be more specific, the Soviets later promoted a myth, Panfilov’s Twenty-Eighters, portraying twenty-eight heroes who supposedly sacrificed themselves to destroy dozens of tanks as a propaganda boast. A declassified Soviet report later revealed that the story had been fabricated. The commissar’s rallying cry,“Russia is vast, but there is nowhere to retreat, we have our backs to Moscow!”, became immortalized. Such appeals to patriotism helped sustain the Red Army’s morale alongside its iron discipline. These offensives effectively split the 16th Army from the 30th Army. The Volga north of the Volga Reservoir was used to anchor a flank of the 30th Army’s defenses, while elements of the 9th Army pursued, ordered to secure bridgeheads across the river and protect the flank of the Moscow drive. The 16th Army anchored its northern approach to Moscow at Klin. The divergent aims of the 3rd Panzer Group and the 9th Army would lead to the Panzer Group being shifted to the direct command of Army Group Center by the 19th.

David Stahel and David Glantz both note that the Western Front had about 240,000 men, 1,254 guns, 502 tanks, and between 600 and 700 aircraft to oppose the renewed offensive, including Kalinin’s Front and the 30th Army. On the 17th, this Army was transferred to the Western Front, a move driven by logic: it was now assigned to protect Zhukov’s flank from the oncoming offensive rather than participate in the Kalinin assaults. Moreover, out of the 502 tanks available, only 200 were T-34 or KV-1 models, underscoring the material constraints that shaped the fighting. Although numerically weaker than the forces arrayed against them, this tally does not include the 68,000-strong Moscow garrison or any of the STAVKA reserves waiting behind the lines. Glantz estimates Bock’s Army Group at roughly 233,000 men, 1,880 guns, 1,300 tanks, and between 60 and 800 aircraft. Zetterling provides separate figures for November: the 2nd Army at 124,520 men, the 4th Army at 287,732, the 9th Army at 213,608, the 2nd Panzer Army at 182,321, the 3rd Panzer Group at 91,726, and the 4th Panzer at 249,294. It is important to note that not all of these forces were necessarily facing the Western Front at the same time. In addition, some sources claim the Western Front held around 700 tanks and 1,138 aircraft. As with many wartime statistics, these numbers vary by source and methodology, which can be frustrating for researchers.Zhukov’s forces were deeply entrenched, with bunker after bunker protecting their positions. Vast minefields also shielded Soviet lines and constrained the German attack, while roads were clogged with mines and fallen trees. The 9th Corp would report removing 5,000 mines in just two days. Every town and village stood as a strongpoint that had to be fought over, and dealing with these obstacles required extensive infantry work, a demand the Panzer Groups, now heavy with tanks, could not meet without infantry support. This gap forced Panzer Group 3 to urgently request infantry reinforcements on the 17th.

On the 17th, Kluge, still in command of the Panzer Group, delayed the 4th Panzer Group’s main offensive to the 18th, allowing only two regiments from the 5th Army Corps to attack in order to maintain contact with the flank of the advancing 9th Army. ‘As far as the number of divisions in relation to width of front is concerned, the Fourth Army is better off than all the other armies of the army group. In spite of the extraordinary drop in strength, on the whole the state of its forces is in no way worse than that of other fronts.’He justified the delay by citing the need to counter constant Soviet offensives against the 7th and 20th Army Corps to the south. Bock responded with a blistering critique, arguing that Kluge’s inaction endangered the 9th Army and pointing out that delaying due to the lack of action from the weaker 2nd Panzer Army was hypocritical. Kluge then claimed the entire 4th Army would attack on the 18th, but fifteen minutes later a new message stated that only the 5th Army Corps and portions of the 46th Panzer Corps would initiate the assault, with the remainder of the Army and Panzer Group held back for a delay until the 19th. Bock pressed Halder to pressure Kluge into a full commitment to the attack, yet stopped short of asking Halder to order it outright. Bock admitted to Halder that Kluge’s right wing was struggling and likely needed reinforcements to shore them up. The 4th Army’s war diary reflected this with one infantry regiment down to 400 effectives and many divisions were at the limit of their endurance. Halder countered, insisting that, regardless of how dire the situation looked for any German formation, it would be far worse for the Soviets opposing them. “we must understand that things are going much worse for the enemy than for us and that these battles are less a question of strategic command than a question of energy’”

The 5th Army Corps had been reinforced with the 2nd Panzer Division and two additional infantry divisions, and they attacked on the 18th to bolster the struggling Panzer Group 3. The infantry’s arrival broke through the Soviet defenses, and Buygorod fell, with about 1,550 taken prisoner. Tank losses were heavy on both sides, but considerably worse for the Soviets. German tankers once again complained about their inability to damage the Soviet T-34 and KV-1 tanks, noting that unless they scored a lucky hit on a critical point, their rounds simply bounced off. German tanker’s diary on the 20th after closing to ,point blank against a crippled KV-1. “we fired thirty shots into him. Nothing got through. There weren’t 10 cm without a direct hit. We’d never experienced any- thing like it.” The infantry divisions likewise pressed for immediate deployment of a 75mm anti-tank gun, as they faced challenges even greater than the Panzers. Both formations grew increasingly dependent on the cumbersome Flak 88s to counter the modern Soviet armor, a vulnerability intensified by winter conditions that limited mobility and undermined their former tactical approach. The 41st Panzer Corps at Kalinin was ordered to attack despite having no fuel to move and no expected supply until the 24th or 28th, a constraint that loomed as a critical bottleneck. Supply shortages threatened to halt the advance of the formations already in motion, with fuel deficits reported across all Panzer and Motorised formations.

Supply shortages also hampered Luftwaffe operations before the full impact of cold and weather set in. On many days they could not even mount a single sortie; one Stuka wing managed only a single mission on the 13th and 18th, and four on the 26th and 28th, with no flights on the remaining days in November. Between November 15 and December 5, Soviet sources claim the Luftwaffe in front of Moscow managed about 3,500 sorties, while the VVS flew roughly 15,840 times. German sources themselves lament an onslaught of Soviet air attacks and an apparent sobering absence of their own air power. On the 19th, Hoepner believed the Soviet 16th Army was in flight and pressed for relentless pursuit from all formations, brushing aside Kluge’s reservations. Many of Hoepner’s divisions had to push motorised infantry forward on foot, and fuel shortages prevented all tanks from advancing. Which kinda makes a mockery of the frantic efforts of the previous weeks to restore panzer numbers at the expense of so much else. They lacked the fuel to use just over half their tanks with the 20th division only able to send 49 of their 75 tanks into battle. This conviction clashed with numerous reports and diary entries detailing heavy resistance on the front. There were also several local reverses, with captured Germans subjected to massacres in some counterattacks. Hearing of one such incident, Hoepner urged that no prisoners be taken and that mercy be dispensed to the Soviet soldiers.

Rokossovsky, now under extreme pressure, begged for permission to withdraw to the Istra river, his army depleted of reserves as the Panzer Groups closed in, threatening to encircle him. Zhukov rejected the retreat, but Rokossovsky pressed on, appealing to Marshal Shaposhnikov, who assented. Crisis hit when Shaposhnikov, unaware that Zhukov had already forbidden retreat seemed to sanction a withdrawal; Zhukov exploded with fury at this bypass of his authority.“ I am the Front Commander! I countermand the order to withdraw to the Istra Reservoir and order you to defend the lines you occupy without retreating one step”. In retaliation, Rokossovsky was ordered to take no step back. Unable to withstand the mounting pressure, his frontline collapsed on the 20th. In a dramatic shift, Hoepner’s Panzers surged forward, advancing 23 kilometers in a single day after previously averaging only about 5 kilometers daily. By week’s end, they stood a mere 48 kilometers north of Moscow.

The specter of encircling the 16th Army buoyed the German generals, even as mounting cold began to weigh on their nerves. Nighttime security grew lax as soldiers sought shelter from the shrinking temperatures, and sporadic Red Army raids began to exact greater damage under the cover of darkness. Attacks became increasingly hard to mount, with warm quarters and comfort tempting soldiers to resist the effort to push forward. Many soldiers and junior officers doubted their ability to fight in the heavy snow, expecting to retreat to barracks to endure the winter. They showed little appetite for more fighting in these frozen conditions. Halder dismissed these concerns as the Red Army being worse off, framing the cold as merely a test of will for the average soldier to endure. Meanwhile, Bock’s infantry divisions were bleeding manpower, taking position after position and leaving regiments reduced to company strength.

To the south, Guderian’s offensive began on the 16th with a preliminary strike that captured Bogoroditsk. Two days later, the main assault launched, targeting Kolomna, a mere 125 kilometers from Tula, though the Army could travel only about 80 kilometers due to fuel shortages. In a costly reallocation, the three motorised divisions were stripped of fuel to support the Panzer divisions, but even that was not enough to reach Kolomna. This was even with the army’s massively reduced panzer numbers. The 3rd Panzer had 60 tanks, 4th Panzer had 25 tanks, 17th panzer had only 15 operational tanks. The 18th Panzer had 50 tanks. The Second Panzer Army had started the war with 1,000 tanks but now only had 150. Ironically the same amount they had received in reinforcement in the build up to Operation Typhoon. Bock judged that fuel constraints would limit the operation more than Soviet resistance. The spearhead was the 24th Panzer Corps. Instead of punching straight through the entrenched garrison at Tula, the plan called for the 3rd and 4th Panzer divisions to encircle the city from the east. The 17th Panzer Division was ordered to seize Kasheria, with 15 tanks in hand. The 18th Panzer Division was tasked with taking Efremov, 120 kilometers south of Tula, while the rest of the 47th Panzer Corps moved to take Mikhaylov, keeping contact with the 2nd Army. The 53rd Army Corps would maintain liaison between the two Panzer formations while also capturing Venev. The 43rd Army, positioned between Lichvin and Kaluga, was ordered to march northwest of Tula to meet the encircling 24th Corps and to stay in contact with Kluge’s Army. With his divisions already stretched thin and widely dispersed, Guderian admitted doubts about the operation’s success even before it began.

Guderian did not know that the Bryansk Front had been dissolved on the 10th, with its armies redistributed to the Western and Southwestern Fronts. Those Fronts repositioned their forces toward their respective bodies, which left a fragile and weakened boundary where Guderian planned to strike. The Southwestern Front, additionally, lacked sufficient staff officers to effectively command all its armies. Proposals to create an independent Orlov front to shore up this weakness lingered too long without decision. It was precisely this vulnerability that Guderian aimed to exploit. In the brutal -18 °C weather, Guderian’s offensive began at a crawl. Many Germans had started to use propaganda leaflets and newspapers in an attempt to improve the insulation of their uniforms. By the 19th, the 4th Panzer Division reported it did not have the strength required to fulfill its directives. On the 20th, all three Panzer divisions suffered a massive drop in fighting capability due to the bitter cold and fuel shortages. Meanwhile, the 43rd Army Corps had to assume a defensive posture as it came under heavy attack from the 49th Army. Guderian admitted to Bock that his army was too weak to reach its objectives. Bock demanded confirmation before conveying it to OKH, but the information was ignored. This pattern repeated on the 21st, with Guderian pleading to shift to the defensive. Yet the day’s events, the 53rd Army’s victory at Uslovaia and the 4th Panzer’s repulsion of a Soviet counterattack launched by two Siberian divisions, prompted a dramatic reversal in mood. On the 22nd, Guderian claimed he could reach the Kolomna-to-Ryazan rail line, a declaration that severely undermined his credibility with Bock and Halder.

In the side-show offensive, the 18th Panzer Division captured Efremov on the 20th after pushing more than 50 kilometers. From their divisional war diary. “Under the worst circumstances the division took the important industrial city of Efremov without tank, without anti-aircraft gun, without assault gun, without support from our own planes, with only two engineer companies.” Yet the rapid advance stretched the division thin, and Soviet forces were reported to be massing for a counterattack. To the south, Schmidt’s Second Army had attempted to seize Voronezh after taking Kursk, but the effort collapsed. A second assault on Voronezh was planned for the 16th, was postponed to the 18th, and then delayed again to the 20th due to supply shortages. There was real fear that the Army’s flank would be exposed if the sluggish 6th Army did not advance. When the 6th Army finally moved, it met little resistance and only made minor gains.

As German troops were forced out of the relative warmth of prepared positions into the cold, their looting of the civilian population intensified. Curtains, towels, tablecloths, and more were stolen to protect against the elements. Trade with locals was rare; more often, civilians were murdered to seize what they needed. Prisoners of war and the dead were stripped of nearly everything, save for their distinctive jackets, for fear of misidentification as Soviets and swift execution. In the words of propaganda writer Ilya Ehrenburg: “They are rushing towards Moscow like frozen men rushing to the fire... They are ready to come under fire for a pair of felt boots or a woman’s warm jacket. That’s why they are now doubly dangerous... In terror, they say to each other: ‘This is only November.’” Kleist renewed his offensive against Rostov on the 17th, in -22 °C temperatures. The 3rd Panzer Corps pushed forward and reached Nakhichevan-on-Don on the 19th, just short of Rostov despite relentless assaults from the 9th Army. Instead of assaulting directly through the heavy fortifications on the main route, Mackensen maneuvered north of Rostov to strike from the east. The following day Rostov fell to the LeibstandarteSS, securing an intact railroad bridge and establishing a small bridgehead across the Don River. The overall Rostov operation had cost the Panzer army around 6,000 casualties and half of its remaining tanks. Yet Runstead already wanted to abandon the city, and Kleist contemplated withdrawing to the Mius.

Timoshenko planned a substantial counteroffensive against the extended northern flank of Kleist’s first Panzer Army. The objective was bold: reach Taganrog and, if possible, encircle the 1st Panzer Army. To that end, Rostov would be held by the 56th Army, while the rebuilt 9th and 18th Armies would man the flanks. The 37th Army would spearhead the main effort, reinforced by four rifle divisions and four armoured brigades. The 12th Army would provide support to the 37th. In total, the Soviet plan enlisted 40 rifle divisions, 13 cavalry divisions, 7 tank brigades, and an airborne corps. This ambitious offensive stretched the Southern Front’s command and control to its limits, diminishing its ability to respond quickly to Kleist’s drive on Rostov. It’s possible the 56th Army’s role was more delaying defense than a genuine attempt to stop the Germans, designed to lure Kleist in and anchor him for the Southern Front’s own attack. Timoshenko’s counteroffensive began on the 17th, concurrent with Kleist’s assault.

The 37th Army’s assault struck the flank of the 17th Army, the Italian CSIR, the 49th Mountain Division, and the left flank of the 14th Panzer Corps. A breach opened between the 1st Mountain Division and the SS Wiking. The only local reserve available was the brigade-sized Slovakian Mobile Division. Fuel shortages further hampered the Germans’ mobile divisions from employing their usual mobile-defensive tactics. While Kleist begged Runstedt for reserves to avert disaster, OKH insisted, with dangerous optimism, that Kleist press on immediately to seize Mykop and Stalingrad. Interestingly in his diary Halder would write on the 21st “Rostov is in our hands… “North of Rostov, First Panzer Army was forced into the defense by the Russian attack with superior forces, and will have a hard time seeing it through.”There were no reserves to spare, and mounting Soviet pressure from the 9th and 56th Armies hammered Rostov, threatening to push out the 3rd Panzer Corps. These attacks managed to force the Leibstandarte back across the Don by the 21st, while a second attempt to establish a bridgehead across the Don was crushed. It is worth noting that the Don had frozen solid, allowing tanks to cross, but its width meant any crossing would have to cover up to 1 km of exposed, open terrain.

With Crimea conquered except for Sevastopol, Manstein’s task boiled down to preventing Soviet reinforcements from arriving while continuing the siege of the fortress. His other objectives—opening a route through the Kerch Strait and pushing toward Mykop—remained impossible until the 1st Panzer Army had advanced further. As a result, Manstein faced pressure beginning on the 20th to shift divisions to the more urgent sectors. Yet the main events of this phase would unfold the following week and are reserved for coverage then. At Sevastopol, the 22nd Infantry Division had arrived from the north, spurring a renewed assault on the outer defences. The four German divisions pressed the offensive for five days before it was halted, having sustained roughly 3,000 casualties for little to show in close-quarters fighting. Soviet counterattacks to improve their positions also failed. Manstein abandoned his plan to rush into the port and instead adopted a more methodical, deliberate offensive. The near-ubiquitous air superiority hindered the German effort in the local area, despite the overall dominance. German air assets could base only a single fighter group and a single Stuka group at Evpatoria; the remainder of the 4th Fliegerkorps operated far away in Ukraine, tasked with several missions beyond supporting the 11th Army at Sevastopol.

On the 20th, Mainstein issued an order grounded in the Reichenau severity doctrine, directing measures that targeted the extermination of Jews. Not surprisingly this is absent from his memoirs which also claim the German troops never looted and had a good relationship with the local Soviet civilians … “Jewish Bolshevik system must be wiped out once and for all and should never again be allowed to invade our European living space ... It is the same Jewish class of beings who have done so much damage to our own Fatherland by virtue of their activities against the nation and civilisation, and who promote anti-German tendencies throughout the world, and who will be the harbingers of revenge. Their extermination is a dictate of our own survival”. While he did not actively collaborate with SS Einsatzgruppe D to carry out such killings across Crimea, he did request their presence, apparently to free up housing for his troops. In non-battlefield matters, on the 22nd, Churchill began pressing the governments of Hungary, Romania, and Finland to withdraw from hostilities against the USSR. Churchill had feared a war declaration would drive these nations into the German camp permanently but in the end succumbed to pressure from Stalin for greater support. He set a deadline of December 5 for their replies; if they did not respond positively, the United Kingdom would have no choice but to declare war on those nations. Churchill also proposed that Antony Eden travel to Moscow to confer with Stalin on the postwar settlement, de-emphasize ideological rifts, and ease tensions between the allies. Stalin accepted this proposal.

As convoys continued to arrive in the USSR, German formations reported facing Soviet units equipped with American and British weapons. Several tank duels erupted between German Panzers and British-made tanks. The medium-caliber weapons mounted on the Matilda and Valentine tanks were a frequent complaint among Soviet tankers, but despite these flaws, the Western-equipped tanks remained competitive with the majority of German armor, especially given the depletion of Germany’s own tank forces. The influx of Allied-supplied matériel also contributed to a political challenge in the UK, where war production intended to aid the USSR was popular among factory workers and strained labor relations. Lord Hankey the paymaster general complaining about Lord Beaverbrook the supply master general “Now I have to bring to light the fact that he is building nothing but dud tanks when he is vociferously appealing to the workers to work all day and night to produce for Russia innumerable tanks - all dud tanks.” Meanwhile, more squadrons flying Western-designed aircraft were being activated around Moscow. An ironic moment occurred when a German bomber, tasked with dropping propaganda leaflets over Moscow proclaiming that “Your allies are not helping you and will not help,” was shot down by a Western fighter. This encounter fed anxiety among some Germans who encountered Western equipment in Soviet hands, fueling fears that the war might last much longer than anticipated. An unidentified German soldier’s letter home“The war with Russia will last a long time yet. The enemy is offering tremendous resistance and the fanaticism that lies behind this obstinacy knows no bounds. To this must be added absolutely inexhaustible reserves of manpower and equipment, the latter even being augmented by deliveries from America.”

On November 21st, Marshal Shaposhnikov and the General Staff began planning their response. Twenty-two armies, totaling 58 divisions, remained uncommitted and undetected deep within the interior of the USSR. Some of these formations were newly raised, while others were transferred from the Far East. It is a myth to claim that every one of these divisions was an elite Siberian unit. In reality, Siberian divisions varied, often they had more training, yet many still adhered to the larger pre-war division. And if your curious to learn more about the movement of these units, please go over to the pacific war week by week podcast and check out my special episode titled “what if Japan invaded the USSR instead”. 

I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go 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 after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me.

Hitler’s forces push toward Rostov and Moscow despite fuel shortages, snow, and deteriorating supply lines; the 4th and 2nd Panzer Groups encounter fierce Soviet defense, command reshuffles, and mounting casualties. The Red Army holds key corridors. The Luftwaffe falters due to weather, and the Soviets establish the Road of Life across Lake Ladoga. Allied matériel arrives for the Soviets, while German morale and armor suffer under extreme winter conditions.

Eastern Front #24 Winter Arrives

Last time we spoke about the German capture of Tikhvin. In the cold dawns of 1941, the eastern front was a chessboard where hunger and ice ruled as cruel players. The Germans, imagining a swift coup toward Tikhvin and Moscow, pressed with a steel-sinew of tanks and planes, only to be slowed by Rasputitsa—mud turning roads to treacle and fuel to memory. The Soviet line, stubborn as ruined churches and brave civilians, held fast from Sitomlia to the Volkhov, a stubborn, glistening refusal to yield. On rivers that froze overnight, trains coughed and steam rose from broken pipes; German locomotives wept ice. Yet the Wehrmacht pressed, swallowing 20,000 prisoners and countless tanks, while Soviet artillery and dogged infantry bore the weight of the front, sometimes breaking through, sometimes retreating, always learning. Across Kalinin to Rostov and Sevastopol, plans frayed under weather, supply gaps, and stubborn resistance. The myth of unstoppable blitzkrieg cracked against the cold, the mud, and the stubborn endurance of both sides. In the hush before winter, the front stood as a stubborn monument to endurance, where logistics and courage outpaced any promised victory.

This episode is the Winter Arrives

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. 

Winter tightens its grip over the USSR. In the frozen north, the Red Army is regrouping and reorganizing, preparing to push back Leeb’s overextended forces. Across the approaches to Moscow, Soviet troops intensify their efforts against German lines, aiming to blunt the offensive that they know is coming. To the west, around Rostov, German and Soviet forces are poised to strike at one another, while siege lines close in around Sevastopol in the south. In this episode, we cover the week of November 9th through November 15th, 1941, focusing on the tense dynamics inside Halder’s headquarters as he argues with his staff officers.

Winter’s setback at Tikhvin on the eighth day sealed a grim warning for Leningrad and Oranienbaum: the supply lines to Lake Ladoga were suddenly cut. The German panzers now threaten to seize Volkhov and encircle the 54th Army. In Moscow, Stalin’s patience with Iakovlev’s failures finally ends, and General Meretskov is named to take command of the 4th Army. Meretskov had just been released from a gulag in September and, until now, had been commanding the 7th Separate Army facing the Finns at Lake Svir. Stalin also cancels the 54th Army’s attacks against Sinyavino; in truth, the Army had only put roughly one division into the effort last week due to the weakness of many units from prior offensives. The right flank of the 4th Army is handed to the 54th, as the 4th Army is tasked with defeating the Germans at Tikhvin, while the 54th counters the attempt to seize Volkhov. The 52nd Army is set to strike northward. Together, these three formations field about 192,950 soldiers—a rise from 135,700 at the start of the Tikhvin offensive. They muster 17 rifle divisions, 2 tank divisions, and 1 cavalry division, plus 3 rifle brigades and 2 tank brigades for this operation. The plan is to crush roughly 10 infantry divisions, 2 motorized divisions, and 2 panzer divisions that have driven into the 350-kilometer salient. On the German side, roughly 120,000 men, about 100 tanks, and around 1,000 artillery pieces are in play.

Winterfront confusion and the need to build up and reorganize forces prevented any simultaneous offensives. On the 12th, the 52nd Army began a push toward Malaia Vishera, with four rifle divisions striking the overstretched 126th Infantry Division. Yet the German unit held the line for the rest of the week, as Klukov pressed mindless frontal assaults aided by limited artillery and scant reconnaissance, failing to leverage concentrated effort against the division’s strongpoints. The 52nd Army had not massed its four divisions for a focused attack, instead striking along the entire 48-kilometer frontage of the 126th Infantry Division. The result was only modest gains and persistent rigidity on the front. In response, the OKH redirected a regiment from the 61st Infantry Division, pulled from Army Group Center’s reserve—to bolster this sector of the line. Nearby, the Novgorod Army Group mounted its own small offensive to the southwest, but it, too, failed for the same reasons: lack of concentration, insufficient supporting fires, and weak reconnaissance.

The 4th Army was scheduled to open its offensive on November 19th, with its forces divided into three operational groups. The 54th Army, originally slated to attack on November 25th, faced a disruption as Group Boeckmann renewed its attempt to reach Lake Ladoga. The newly arrived 254th Division moved toward Voibokalo Station, driving into the rear of the 54th Army. Fediuninsky quickly reacted, repositioning the 285th Rifle Division, backed by the 122nd Tank Brigade, toward Voibokalo Station. The remainder of Group Boeckmann, supported by a battlegroup from the 8th Panzer, renewed its efforts to seize Volkhov. By week’s end, temperatures had fallen to the point that both the Neva and Volkhov rivers were icebound strong enough to bear even KV-1 tanks. Lake Ladoga had also begun to freeze, hindering the movement of river barges carrying supplies around the German blockade. However, the ice on Ladoga had not yet become capable of supporting vehicle weights.

The reorientation of the 54th Army against Group Boekmann triggered a new round of organizational changes. The 8th Army assumed command of the forces on the eastern side of the Shlisselburg corridor, while the Coastal Operational Group took control of the 8th Army’s former forces at Oranienbaum. The Neva Operational Group returned to single control of the forces on the Leningrad side of the Shlisselburg corridor. The German command also saw a small shake-up. General Weichs, who had been commanding the Second Army, was relieved due to serious illness. He was replaced by Schmidt, and Von Arnim would take over command of the 39th Panzer Corps from Schmidt.These units were ordered to resume attacks to sever the Shlisselburg corridor and restore a land connection to Leningrad.

On the 11th, the 8th Army attacked with five rifle divisions, and the 227th Infantry Division required reinforcement from elements of the 223rd Rifle Division and the 7th Flieger Division before it could halt the Soviet offensive. There’s some dispute over whether the Flieger Division was present. The 233rd Infantry Division formed part of the latest wave of infantry mobilization and, as a result, was among the least well trained and least well equipped units in the army. It likely lacked many of its anti-tank weapons and heavy artillery. Complicating matters, this division appears to have been split between the Shlisselburg corridor, supporting Group Boekmann, and the southern sector around Malaia Vishera, where it helped guard the line. Regardless, Khozin attributed the failure to poor command and control by the 8th Army’s commander, Shevaldin. Nonetheless, this effort proved more effective than the offensives launched by the newly raised Volunteer Shock Groups. The Neva Operational Group’s three Shock Groups attempted to break out from the Dubrovka bridgehead against the 96th and 227th Infantry Divisions. On the 9th, 11th, and 13th, each group led a new offensive from the bridgehead, but all three ended the attacks on the same day, suffering extreme losses for essentially no gains against well-entrenched German infantry. The 55th Army carried on offensives across the Tosna River. Their shock groups managed to cross the river but failed to seize the town of Tosno from the 122nd Infantry and could not establish bridgeheads suitable for exploitation. In response, the 55th Army escalated the fighting by committing four rifle divisions and two tank battalions, but these efforts remained fruitless. By the 19th, Halder summarized the Leningrad front in his diary, dismissively noting, “On the Leningrad front, the usual attack was repelled.” At best, these offensives pinned German divisions around Leningrad, preventing their redeployment to bolster the forces at Tikhvin or Volkhov, but they inflicted horrendous casualties on Red Army units.

This week, Leeb sought to bolster the flanks of the Tikhvin offensive by obtaining more troops. He pressed the commander of the 18th Army to consider crushing either the Oranienbaum Pocket or the Kronshtadt fortress to free up divisions for the line. Von Küchler refused to launch an attack, arguing his army was too weak to concentrate for a meaningful assault, and suggested that any alternative would incur substantial casualties. Corps and divisional commanders likewise resisted attacking the strong fortifications with their current strengths. Undeterred, Leeb insisted that an attack would be ordered if Soviet forces appeared to be withdrawing from the pocket. He attempted to persuade OKH to send reinforcements for a plan against Oranienbaum and to lobby Hitler to lift an earlier prohibition on such an attack. Hitler remained unmoved, as he believed such an offensive would be prohibitively costly in material and casualties especially when other options would starve them out. As a result, Leeb left the four divisions in place, though he did withdraw a significant portion of their artillery. In parallel, Leeb’s chief of staff managed to persuade Halder to quietly drop the Army Group’s earlier requirement to capture Vologda. Despite that concession, there remained some hope that the Army Group might still press toward the Finnish lines.

The Soviet withdrawal from Hanko continued, though convoys on the 3rd and 9th suffered heavy losses due to extensive German and Finnish naval mine barrages. The 1,200 survivors from these convoys reinforced the Leningrad front. The high losses among these large convoys convinced Soviet Naval Command to switch to smaller vessels operating in smaller groups rather than large, single convoys. Using this revised approach, they evacuated 9,000 men with their equipment from Hanko by the 28th. An additional 4,000 men and their equipment reinforced the garrison at Kronstadt on the 3rd in a much more successful convoy. Leeb was unable to secure the desired reinforcements because events across the front opposite Moscow demanded attention elsewhere. On the 13th, Halder summoned the chiefs of staff from all Army Groups to a conference at Orsha. The gathering was less about exchanging ideas and more an effort by Halder to browbeat the officers into rubber-stamping his preexisting offensive plans from the prior week. This is the exact opposite of how a general staff should operate. The purpose of a general staff is to create a forum for discussing what’s possible with a wide range of viewpoints, and then set goals based on those possibilities. It should also maintain a connection across command levels, ensuring frontline reality is understood at the highest levels. Instead, under Halder the General Staff was asked to achieve goals dictated from above, regardless of feasibility. The armies’ staff and High Command lived in a different reality. Halder’s authority had been amplified after Brauchitsch suffered a heart attack on the 10th, and Halder was now functioning as Commander-in-Chief of the Army in addition to his duties as Chief of the General Staff.

However, there was pushback. Army and divisional staff officers rejected the possibility of preparing for an offensive next year by continuing the winter advance to more strategically valuable starting positions. They warned of the extreme need for replacements, supplies, and rest to stave off physical and psychological collapse among the soldiers. In addition, the protests over the sheer distances Halder was forcing them to cover in awful conditions can be summed up by Liebenstein, the chief of staff of the Second Army: “This was not the month of May, and we were not fighting in France.” In the end, Halder agreed to a direct thrust toward Moscow, moving away from the broad encirclement that had been the initial plan. Some sources indicate that Halder did not believe such a maneuvre was realistically achievable. His concern centered on Army Group Center’s supply constraints, which seemed insufficient for an intensified direct assault. Nevertheless, he was persuaded by Major Eckstein, the staff officer responsible for supply and administration, who argued that success would hinge on trust in the soldiers’ luck: “One just has to trust in the soldiers’ good fortune.”

It is far more likely that both Bock and Halder knew the offensive could not be supplied, yet they could not bring themselves to call off the operation, as the records of their conversations show. Halder still believed it was possible to destroy the Red Army’s vital fighting strength in front of Moscow, despite the failure of previous attempts. Halder claimed that the Red Army’s fighting strength had been reduced by about 50 percent, yet he insisted the army was on the verge of collapse. He framed the new offensive as the pursuit of a broken foe, requiring only six to ten more weeks of maximum effort. This juxtaposition, confidence in victory paired with a persistent doubt about the enemy’s resilience, highlights a clear cognitive dissonance in his assessments. His plan for a full-scale offensive would be pared back to Bock’s more limited vision: a straightforward frontal attack to seize Moscow. Even as frontline units faced signs that new Soviet formations were being raised and experienced divisions were being transported from the East, OKH still doubted that these forces were enough to stop the Germans’ assumed superiority.

The conference also featured a speech by a representative from the Foreign Army East. He reported that the Red Army had grown from 140 divisions to 190 between July and October. But recent victories had reduced that estimate to about 160 divisions. Kinzel countered, saying the training level meant their effective strength was closer to 75 divisions. He added that the Soviets were believed to have strong domestic artillery production and about 40 well-supplied tank brigades. A following speech from the Quartermaster General argued that the German Army would need to disband 15 divisions to free manpower for replenishing the remaining divisions in the east. There would be no new production of replacement motor vehicles, so each panzer division would lose about 500 trucks. All infantry divisions were to be demotorised, and the logistical service would become one-third horse-drawn. He also warned of a major ammunition shortfall expected in early 1942 because of earlier shifts in industrial priority. Although those priorities had been reversed, they had cost weeks or months of production. The speech concluded that winter supplies could only be delivered by February due to bottlenecks in delivering combat supplies to the front.

Those winter supplies were urgently needed as winter arrived in the central USSR this week. Many German soldiers were still in denim summer uniforms. Nighttime temperatures plunged to below -22°C by week’s end. Frostbite cases rose, and so did mechanical failures across German equipment. Telescopic sights failed. Tanks could only be started after a fire was lit beneath them to warm the engines. German fuel was found to contain water droplets that froze in the cold. It turned the fuel into a crystal foam, clogging pipes and other parts of the vehicles. The full list of cold-weather problems on German equipment is long, and it wreaked havoc everywhere. High-command directives on how to cope with the cold were summarized as utterly impractical, insane, or as assuming access to supplies that simply didn’t exist. Similarly, Army Group Center’s trains faced the same issues as those further north, with water in exposed pipes freezing solid and bursting. Just as the Germans were preparing a new offensive, their logistical system collapsed. General Bock had asked for 30 trains a day to stockpile for the offensive; he was promised 23 trains, but received an average of only 16. While all this was unfolding, OKH told Bock that several trains would be arriving to transport Jews from Germany into his army’s rear area. That move would divert supplies away from Army Group, adding to the already chaotic situation of supply trains being hijacked by other commands or simply going missing.

The plan lined up the Ninth Army and the 3rd Panzer Group to seize the Moskva-Volga Canal, then turn south toward Moscow. The Fourth Army and the 4th Panzer Group would march straight to Moscow. The Second Panzer Army was tasked with taking Kashira and Kolomna, though the original route via Ryazan was quickly dropped. The army’s chief of staff believed that, given the severe shortages and terrible roads, Venyov was the farthest they could hope to reach. The offensives would begin individually as soon as their supply situations permitted and once permanent frost arrived. This staggered approach was a practical concession to the supply crisis, reducing the overall demand for supplies. Bock himself conceded the offensive could not be a masterpiece under these conditions. The plan was to concentrate force into spearpoints and strike at the enemy’s weak points.

An increasing number of divisional and even corps-level commanders were beginning to show critical thinking. Protests about shortages and the worn-down conditions in various formations were growing. 11th November comment by Staff Officer Stieff of the 4th Army. “Our high command continues to issue wholly unrealistic orders, and we have not yet been properly resupplied with ammunition and fuel . . . For us, their attitude is utterly incomprehensible. They devise their objectives in the map room, as if the Russian winter did not exist, and our troops’ strength is still the same as when the campaign started in June. However, winter is now on our doorstep, and our units are so burnt out that one’s heart bleeds for them. Soon we will be unable to attack anything at all – the men desperately need rest. “ Yet, no one was willing to risk their career by voicing strong opposition to the offensive. While the halt allowed some recovery, constant Soviet attacks, the cold, and poor living conditions prevented any real revival among frontline troops. Hans-Heinrich Ludwig’s letter home November 12th. “Deep snow. Many vehicle losses . . . We are done. There are constant slogans about relief, but it goes on. The mood is indescribably low. Russian bombers by day, no accommodation by night. Frozen bread, sausage and butter.” 

Many soldiers grew so desperate they used telegraph poles, doors, or even whole buildings as fuel to keep warm. Individual efforts to live off the land meant there was little organized food support from local areas, and there was little regard for the needs of the local population. Some Panzer commanders, like Stumme of the 40th Panzer Corps, began to doubt that infantry could attack or hold ground without armored support. At the same time, many officers urged their subordinates not to question orders, treating them as achievable from the start. Geyer, 9th Army Corp commander.  “The positive aspects of every situation must first and foremost be recognized and emphasized. It is well known that the enemy invariably has problems too. It is also well known that all is not lost if all is not given up for lost. It is precisely in difficult situations that a soldier can do more than his best, even if it seems to be more than is humanly possible. Success often only comes at the last minute and hangs upon a single thread. Often one only realizes later that, given a little push, the enemy would have fallen over”. In other words, sheer willpower was used to ignore the limits of reality.

Fuel rations planned to last 100km were now only good for 15 to 25km, due to dilapidated vehicles and poor road conditions. The Panzer forces used the pause in operations to restore as many tanks as possible. For example, the 20th Division managed to get its fleet up to 74 working Panthers by the start of the week. But this was somewhat deceptive, because many of those tanks were only provisionally operational and likely to break down again in heavy use. Meanwhile, attention to repairing trucks that moved motorised infantry was neglected. The result was increasingly tank-heavy Panzer divisions that were less capable of the coordinated, combined-arms operations that had been their hallmark of success. Between 16 June 1941 and 31 October, the 19th panzer division used 4,222,680 litres of gasoline, 1,013,110 litres of diesel and 200,060 litres of oil. Only 75,000 of the initial 600,000 trucks across the German Army in the USSR were still functional. 

Instead of entrenching to await a German offensive, Stalin insisted that Konev and Zhukov keep pressing the attack on the 9th and 4th Armies. Some offensives achieved limited gains, such as reclaiming Szkirminowa and Marjino on the 12th from the 10th Panzer Division, but most territorial advances were small and casualties were high. The broader impact was psychological: on the 14th, Kluge asked to delay the upcoming offensive and to set more modest objectives. His request carried more weight on the next day when a Soviet breakthrough breached the frontline of the 13th Army Corps in several sectors. Kluge warned that this Corps would no longer be capable of offensive action, and he would be glad if it could at least hold its line. Bock granted Kluge autonomy on how to proceed in support of the offensive. Given Kluge’s cautious nature, this decision could become a source of tension with other officers in the future.

Guderian’s Second Army launched a large offensive starting on the 8th, but it kept escalating through the week. Local road conditions severely limited movement, so most German units fought their own isolated battles without meaningful support. A notable disaster occurred when the machine guns of the 112th Infantry Division froze in the cold and were overrun by fresh Soviet formations attacking from multiple directions. This attack had included several T34s while the German division only had outdated 37mm anti tank guns available which proved utterly ineffective. The arrival of the 167th Infantry Division stabilized the situation and halted the panic that had even spread to Bogorodisk. As a result, Guderian lost faith in the infantry’s ability to handle difficult tasks. His tank strength was also severely depleted: three leading panzer divisions had only about 50 operational tanks when full strength would be around 600. Combined, they couldn’t form a full-strength Panzer division. The supply situation was dire as well, with trucks capable of moving only about 200 tons of supplies per day. The Army argued that it could not move farther from the supply railhead than could be reached by horse and sled. Yet somehow, the order persisted to reach Moscow, over 170km away, within weeks, even though it had not yet reached Tula. The Chief of Staff of Army Group South attended the Orsha Conference and was the most outspoken critic of Halder’s plans. There, he reiterated Runstedt’s view that the Army Group’s objectives—to reach Maykop and Stalingrad—would best destroy the Army Group through sheer exhaustion and attrition. He managed to postpone demands to reach Maykop and Stalingrad until a new summer offensive, which was the plan Hitler had originally envisioned. Halder complained in bad grace that this would just result in the Soviets being stronger while the Germans would be weaker. 

Runstedt faced new challenges when the Hungarian Mobile Corps withdrew on November 11 to return to Hungary. Earlier, it had been ordered to free German infantry for the halted push on Rostov. The halted 1st Panzer Army attempted to renew its offensive on the 11th but cancelled almost immediately because of heavy rainfall. Kleist would have to wait for the winter freeze to mount a new offensive, and that wait would end soon, with the first cold snap arriving on the 13th. It is claimed that Southern Front commander Cherevichenko believed this delay marked the culmination of the German offensive, and sent his reserves to reinforce the 37th Army. Those reserves were being held at Shakhty in preparation for a counteroffensive. This move stripped the 9th and 56th Armies of their reserves and degraded their ability to conduct a defence in depth.

To the south, the 51st Corps’s attempts to storm Sevastopol last week were thwarted by two marine brigades, heavy coastal artillery, and relentless harassment from the VVS. Sevastopol’s garrison swelled as the Soviet Navy brought in reinforcements to more than 50,000 troops. They organized three defensive fortification belts around the port. The heavy cruiser Krasny Kavkaz,  light cruisers Krasny Krym and Chervona Ukraina and seven destroyers remained in the harbor to provide fire support, while the rest of the fleet moved to a safer base. No further full-scale assaults on the city occurred, but small German assault groups probed the defensive lines as the 51st Corps tightened the siege around Sevastopol. They awaited the arrival of the 30th Corps from the Yalta region, which began arriving toward the end of the week with the 72nd Infantry Division. The initial German attack was immediately halted by bombardment from the battleship Parizhskaya Kommuna and two light cruisers. To Crimea’s east, the 42nd Corps pressed on in pursuit of the retreating 51st Army toward Kerch. The Soviets offered stiff defense around the port, but Kerch fell on the 16th. The 51st Army found itself trapped in Crimea and, in effect, doomed. Overall, about 100,000 Soviet troops, 700 artillery pieces, and 160 tanks were said to have fallen into German hands since Manstein’s Crimea campaign began. Aside from Sevastopol and the partisan-infested hinterlands, the peninsula remained firmly in German control.

As the war wore on, German manpower grew increasingly stretched. Sickness drained resources as much as enemy action. In the mud and cold, many soldiers struggled to maintain hygiene. Lice became endemic, infesting about 80% of German infantry by mid-October, acting as vectors for diseases such as epidemic typhus. Other body parasites posed similar risks. Many Germans attributed the lice outbreak to the poor conditions in peasant houses they used as shelter. The cold discouraged soldiers from cleaning themselves or washing clothing, and a shortage of soap meant that even with will, proper cleansing was often impossible. By November, many soldiers hadn’t changed their clothing in weeks. Dysentery, typhoid, and even cases of trench foot, among other illnesses, began to appear. While only about 1% of cases were fatal and another 6% left individuals permanently unfit for service, a large number of soldiers were medically unfit at any given time, adding to the Germans’ already overstretched manpower. Typhus also affected Soviet POW camps. The Health Department of the White Russian General Commissariat recommended executing all infected prisoners, but this was rejected as requiring too much work. On top of illness, it was so cold that frostbite began to appear in October, and by mid-November the cold was so severe that unprepared sentries froze to death overnight.

Weather conditions hindered the timely evacuation of the wounded to aid stations and then to field hospitals. Mud and transport shortages forced the Germans to triage casualties on the spot, delaying any attempt to move them back. While some Red Army soldiers were brought to German facilities for medical care, it is suspected that the vast majority were left to die on the battlefield. Soldiers often waited hours or even days to receive basic first aid. This delay caused many casualties to die from their wounds. German medical staff were overwhelmed, as each division had only two aid stations and one field hospital, underequipped and undermanned. Many wounded were evacuated to hastily converted field hospitals in Germany. By week's end, time-delayed bombs in Kharkiv city center exploded, killing General Braun and his staff from the 68th Division. Once again, the Germans attributed the attack to the city’s remaining Jewish population. About 200 civilians were randomly rounded up and publicly hanged in reprisal by troops from the 57th Infantry Division. The SS Einsatzgruppe C would arrive in December and escalate the deliberate killings of up to 20,000 Jews. The Germans also confiscated all food stored in the city. Starvation, random executions, and forced deportations reduced Kharkiv’s population from nearly 1 million to around 300,000 by January 1942.

I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go 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 after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me.

From Tikvin to Volkhov, supply lines frayed, tanks froze, and trains coughed steam from broken pipes. Leaders debated strategy: Halder’s grand ambitions clashed with reality at Orsha, while Stalin shuffled commanders and pressed for renewed offensives. Yet winter’s bite hardened both sides, fuel dwindled, uniforms turned denim, and soldiers fueled by sheer will fought on. The front endured, a monument to endurance amid ruin.

Eastern Front #23 Tikhvin at Last!

Last time we spoke about the collective German delusions on the eastern front. The German spear aimed at Tikhvin and Moscow, driven by hunger for a swift conquest, while the Soviets gathered courage from ruined cities and stubborn civilians who walked beside soldiers. Rasputitsa, a living mire, swallowed tanks and hope, turning advances into cautious skirmishes as fuel ran low and supply lines sagged. Stalin shuffled commanders like chessmen, swapping Khozin for Fedyuninsky to place a frontline fighter where danger burned hottest. Yet even as the 54th Army strained, the red line held at Sitomlia and along the Volkhov, a stubborn fortress against encroaching winter. The German center faltered first, then the wings, as the 259th and 288th fought to pin back armored columns near the Malaia Vishera. Finland’s cautious patience and Finland’s own war fatigue complicated a broader push, while Moscow worried about fuel, frost, and a gnawing sense that victory would depend as much on weather as on steel.

This episode is the Tikvin at Last!

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. 

A major Soviet counterattack hit the German vanguard on the Tikhvin front, with the objective of seizing Budogosh and then Gruzino. The northern shock group opened its assault on the 2nd, followed by the southern group on the 4th. In response, the 8th Panzer, moved up from its failed push toward Malaia Vishera, was shifted into the northern sector to meet the threat, while the 20th Motorized prepared to oppose the southern advance. Both Soviet offensives endured heavy artillery fire and Luftwaffe air strikes, and after a punishing bombardment, German mobile divisions mounted counterattacks that repulsed the attacks and drove the Soviets back.

By November 6, both offensives were halted, and temperatures had plummeted to the point that rivers and streams across the region were freezing solid. The day before, Schmidt drew the 18th Motorised, the 12th Panzer, and the 8th Panzer into a concentrated push toward Tikhvin. This combined assault overwhelmed the 191st Rifle Division and brought German forces into Tikhvin on November 8. The German command claimed the offensive had yielded about 20,000 prisoners of war, along with the destruction or capture of 96 tanks and 179 artillery pieces. The Moscow–Ladoga railroad was severed, amplifying the pressure on Leningrad’s defenders and civilians. Yet Schmidt’s formations were worn down from their long advance and increasingly beset by winter. Temperatures ranged from -27 °C to -40 °C, taking a severe toll on soldiers and vehicles alike.

Soldiers faced frostbite in mounting numbers, and some even froze to death, as the Wehrmacht’s meager winter uniforms sat in depots in Poland. Ammunition and fuel remained top priorities for train shipments, yet deliveries were still far short of demand. Cold-related casualties began to surpass combat losses for Army Group North. Weapons and vehicles suffered random failures from the freezing conditions, and the oil and lubricants the Germans relied on often froze solid. Theoretically the Germans had access to freeze proof petroleum, oil, and lubrication but either it was not issued or it did not work at the temperatures reached by the winter. Many vehicles became stuck in mud when the ground froze; while the frost hardened the earth and aided movement, extracting those that were trapped required extraordinary effort, and many were irreparably damaged in the process. German locomotives were especially hard hit, as water in unprotected pipes froze and expanded. An estimated 70 to 80 percent of German-built trains sustained serious damage from burst pipes. The railway network, already unreliable, deteriorated further. For now, this problem mainly affected those in the North, as winter spread slowly southward. By November, German logistics increasingly depended on the Grosstransporttraum trucks to move supplies over long distances.

Schmidt could not advance any further. The 8th Panzer and 20th Motorised divisions were defending a 100-kilometer front along with the 126th Infantry Division, organized into a chain of small strongpoints. The 126th faced increasingly heavy attacks around Malaia Vishera. The 12th Panzer and 18th Motorised were pinned, defending Tikhvin from three sides as the Soviets tried to retake the town. Neither side was able to mount a new offensive, and morale among their troops showed little appetite for renewed assault. Leeb’s hope of linking with the Finns depended on a Finnish offensive, which remained uncertain. The northern sector also faltered. The 11th Infantry Division, reinforced by elements of the 21st Infantry, was halted again by week’s end, 14 kilometers south of Volkhov. After nearly two weeks of fighting, they had driven back the 285th, 311th, 319th and portions of the 282 rifle divisions, creating a wedge between the 4th Army and the 54th Army but not forcing the 54th Army to retreat or encircle it. Consequently, the offensive could not be halted. The 254th Infantry Division was ordered to reinforce Group Boeckmann, which was tasked with taking Volkhov and then Novaia Ladoga to complete the encirclement of the 54th Army. Elements of the 8th Panzer were also sent north to bolster Group Boeckmann. However, their attempt to outflank Volkhov’s defenses was stopped by the 310th Rifle Division at Zelenets Station.

The 61st Infantry Division was sent east to reinforce the now besieged 39th Motorised Corps at Tikhvin. In addition, the arriving 223rd Infantry Division was ordered to cover the gap between the 39th Motorised and the infantry forces around Malaia Vishera. The previously impassable swampland there was starting to freeze solid enough to allow for military movement. While Leeb remained confident in the offensive’s prospects, Hitler’s concerns loomed, and Leeb grew increasingly worried about his southern flank. The 9th Army’s difficulties in Army Group Center forced it onto the defensive, a shift that freed Soviet formations to press Leeb’s extended southern flank, giving the Soviets the initiative to renew their attacks.

Back on the 3rd, the Neva Operational Group had its headquarters reinforced by staff from the 8th Army and was ordered to attack toward Sinyavino alongside the 55th Army. Even with six rifle divisions and two additional divisions in reserve, the breakthrough at the bridgehead was immediately halted. Soviet artillery ammunition around Leningrad was insufficient to suppress the German guns, which faced a dense, target-rich Red Army force. The same was true for the seven rifle divisions and one tank division comprising the 55th Army. These offensives gained little ground and inflicted heavy casualties on the Red Army. Yet Stalin attributed the failures to a lack of will and, on the 8th, ordered Khozin to form volunteer regiments for another attempt.

Winter was beginning to bite Army Group Center as well, though not as badly as further north. Ground froze overnight but thawed by morning, leaving the terrain swollen, waterlogged, and persistently muddy. Army Group Center’s divisions were operating near subsistence levels, with deliveries far short of what would be needed to stockpile for a new offensive. Even the Panzer forces and SS formations, which enjoyed priority, did not receive enough supplies to build reserves. The supply situation was at its worst for the Kalinin front. There was only a single supply road, and it was dominated by Soviet forces occupying nearby high ground, making supply runs highly vulnerable to interdiction and attrition. The 41st Panzer Corps reported ammunition stocks sufficient for only about two days of defensive fighting. The OKH Quartermaster estimated that it would take until the end of November for Bock’s forces to be capable of launching another offensive.

Germany and Romania had exhausted their fuel stockpiles, so consumption was now constrained by refinery production rates. The only potential relief came from 190 fuel trains that had been earmarked for use in the USSR but had not yet reached the front. As a result, Panzer Group 3’s main fuel stockpile at Smolensk ran dry, forcing them to dispatch trucks all the way back to Orsha to fetch additional supplies. The only possible advantage lay in the shortage of operational vehicles, which themselves required fuel to run. For example, the 41st Panzer Corps’ 1st Panzer Division could muster only 48 functional tanks remaining.

The Panzer Group’s other Panzer Corps continued pushing toward Kalinin, but the mud and cold took a heavy toll. They were rapidly losing towing vehicles due to the constant need to recover damaged ones. The ground, oscillating between freezing and thawing, intensified wear on the 56th Panzer Corps’ vehicles. Many areas that had seen heavy fighting were cratered, with some holes up to 2 meters deep, rendering them impassable. Even the traversable roads were clogged with mud up to 75 centimeters deep. At this depth vehicles sunk up to their chassis. This rendered them immune to all attempts to free the vehicles. The depth of mud frequently caused massive damage to towed vehicles, which could only be repaired in dedicated facilities behind the lines, assuming spare parts and the ability to bring the vehicles in for repairs. The 4th Panzer Corps was also suffering under these conditions. The 46th Panzer Corps reported its troops were down to one-third rations, an unsustainable level, because heavy rains had rendered its main supply route impassable to towing vehicles as well. Despite these grave logistical problems, Hoepner remained adamant that the Corps would be ready for an offensive as soon as the ground properly froze.

Similarly, the Second Panzer Army faced logistical difficulties. Guderian noted that, given current conditions, the only viable route to supply his army was to expand the rail line from Oryol to Tula. At present, its Panzer divisions were being sustained by supplies airlifted to a forward airbase and then ferried the remaining distance by prime movers drawn from the divisional artillery. These prime movers were failing at a rapid rate due to mechanical issues, threatening the future mobility of the artillery. Guderian’s Army Corps received lower supply priority than the Panzer Corps and was thus forced to rely on “living off the land,” which contributed to the starvation of the local peasantry.

However, Nazi Germany’s military doctrine held that material constraints such as logistics should never restrict operational aims. The Army embraced the supremacy of the Will, believing that any problem could be overcome with enough motivation and that failure merely indicated a lack of willpower. For example, planned offensives against the Red Army, which would disrupt the Kalinin supply route, were affected by this mindset. Kirchner’s 41st Panzer Corps was initially slated for a minor role due to fuel shortages, but Bock overruled the plan and insisted the Panzer Corps take a larger part in the offensive, even if they had to attack on foot. Bock’ diary entry about the event.  “a letter from the panzer group which arrived today held forth in great detail and in generally negative terms about the use of motorized troops as foot soldiers. In my reply I made reference to Panzer Army Guderian, which is providing daily proof that motorized forces fighting on foot are capable of outstanding feats – they just have to want to!” This optimism, often blind permeated both OKH and OKW, with neither questioning the reliability of the logistical system. In parallel, OKH proudly displayed its new winter uniform designs to Hitler that week. Wagner pledged that sufficient numbers would be produced to supply all frontline soldiers, yet this ignored the reality that several hundred additional train deliveries would be required at a moment when the railway capacity to deliver food, ammunition, and fuel was already inadequate.

By November, German forces in the East had been reduced to 2.7 million personnel after absorbing 686,000 casualties. An OKH assessment on November 6 reported that the 136 Infantry Division on the Eastern Front possessed only the fighting power of about 83 fresh divisions. The 17 Panzer divisions had the strength of roughly 6 full-strength Panzer divisions, while the 13 motorized infantry divisions had the combined strength of about 8 full divisions. Only about one-third of the Wehrmacht’s motor vehicles remained operable. Even as German forces in the USSR were pared down, Military Intelligence assessments suggested the Red Army was in worse shape: estimates placed the Red Army at 160 divisions and 40 brigades, with most units operating at less than half strength. By contrast, in the West of the USSR there were 269 divisions and 65 brigades, totaling around 2.2 million men as of November 1, with numbers rapidly increasing as new formations formed or were moved from the Far East. The Germans fervently believed the Soviet war effort was on the verge of collapse and that the Red Army would continue to retreat on all fronts except Moscow and the Caucasus. The German assessment held that the Red Army would trade space for time, aiming to rebuild its forces for late 1942. Moscow was believed to be defended mainly because of its strategic value as a railway hub for the Soviet rail network. The Caucasus, in turn, was thought to be defended not only by terrain that favored defense but also with support from the British and potentially the Americans. Yet, once again, the German High Command disastrously underestimated its foe.

On this basis, Halder submitted a plan on the 7th. In his approach, the 3rd and 4th Panzer Groups were to take Yaroslavl and Rybinsk. In his maximum plan, the Germans would advance to the Vologda, Gorki, Stalingrad, and Maikop lines. His minimum plan targeted reaching 50 km east of Lake Ladoga, about 275 km east of Moscow, and Rostov. For the sake of comparison, Army Group Center had managed only about 220 km of advance eastward during Operation Typhoon. Now they faced demands to push farther, despite being weaker, with even thinner supply lines, and under far worse weather conditions. The objective across these schemes was to seize as many rail hubs and industrial centers as possible to deny the Red Army the ability to rebuild. The enormous distances involved and the challenges of controlling such a vast expanse were not seriously considered by Halder and his staff. Halder pressed for these objectives to be achieved even as winter began, while Hitler treated them as operational targets for spring 1942. To Halder, the Red Army had allegedly ceased to exist, and in his perception he even claimed on the 4th that Moscow would be abandoned as it held little strategic or industrial value.Blumentritt, the chief-of-staff of the Fourth Army, during a post war recollection. “With amazement and disappointment we discovered in late October and early November that the beaten Russians seemed quite unaware that as a military force they had almost ceased to exist.” A meeting was arranged at Orsha on the 13th to discuss plans for a renewed offensive on Moscow with the staff of all three Army Groups and their Armies.

The OKH’s objectives were viewed by some commanders as insane. Bock argued that, given the depleted strength of his Army Group, only near-term, close-range goals were attainable, since a strategic encirclement of Moscow was no longer feasible. Bock on the 11th November to Halder.  “In my opinion, the objectives you marked on the recently-delivered map as worthwhile surely cannot be reached before winter, because we no longer have the required forces and because it is impossible to supply these forces after reaching these objectives on account of the inadequate potential for supply by rail. Furthermore, I no longer consider the objectives designated ‘worthwhile’ by me in the army group order for the encirclement of Moscow, specifically the line Ryazan [185 km southeast of Moscow] – Vladimir [180 km east of Moscow] – Kalyazin [165 km north of Moscow], to be attainable. All that remains, therefore, is to strive for a screening front in the general line Kolomna [100 km southeast of Moscow] – Orekhovo [85 km east of Moscow] – Zagorsk [70 km northeast of Moscow] – Dmitrov [70 km north of Moscow], which is absolutely vital to the encirclement of Moscow. I will be happy if our forces are sufficient to obtain this line” 

He began advocating for objectives more in line with Hitler’s original Typhoon concept—small, deliberate offensives designed to destroy Soviet forces in front of them before attempting to seize Moscow itself. Even some corps-level leaders, such as Vietinghoff, submitted carefully worded reports questioning the feasibility of their orders. “The following conclusions can be drawn: The success of an operation in the present season, where at any time serious traffic problems can arise from frosts, heavy snowfalls or snow drifts, is only guaranteed if”:

(a) the organisation of the mot[orised] division is eased and for each panzer division one viable road is available. 

(b) full replenishment of these divisions with fuel, special provisions and food prior to commencement (5 daily rations) is achieved.

After careful evaluation of all experiences of the past weeks I am forced to conclude – although painful for the corps – that no benefits are to be expected from the deployment of the panzer corps under present and expected weather and road conditions. The wear on the troops, equipment and fuel bears no relationship to the possible success. The massing of mot[orised] troops is only a hindrance and not of any use. 

Vietinghoff’s assessment, however, was dismissed by his Army commander, Hoepner, who scornfully labeled it overly pessimistic and an exaggeration of the likely problems. One reason for this stance was that Hoepner commanded the strongest panzer concentration in the east and yearned for the autonomy enjoyed by Guderian and Kleist, hoping to shed what he saw as the infantry general’s conservatism. It is unknown what Kluge’s reaction was to Vietinghoff’s report.

Despite the prior halt order, fighting continued across Army Group Center. The 7th Army Corps conducted local offensives in an effort to improve its position after Zhukov’s late October offensive. Yet these assaults stalled under sustained Soviet resistance, even with panzer support. By the 4th, the divisions of the Corps had been reduced to roughly one-third to one-half of their full strength. In early November, the 5th Panzer Division launched a local attack on the 3rd, but the operation quickly turned disastrous as infantry sheltered in their bunkers and refused to advance. The panzers pressed ahead, becoming isolated and subsequently overwhelmed by anti-tank forces. In the ensuing chaos, 21 tanks were damaged or destroyed before the force managed to withdraw back to German lines. Many formations used this period to consolidate depleted units and promote new junior officers and NCOs in an effort to recover from the attrition suffered by Army Group Center.

Soviet offensives also appeared along the front line with surprising frequency. Many of these assaults produced more casualties than their modest gains warranted, though they did deny German formations the rest they desperately needed. One Soviet offensive even temporarily cut the only road supplying Kalinin on the 3rd, before a counterattack forced them back. The effectiveness of Soviet attacks varied dramatically with the officers leading them: some persisted in Civil War-era tactics and resisted innovative approaches, while others were more receptive to modern battlefield methods. Some officers seemed unable to accept responsibility for failure, preferring to press on with the same inadequate tactics rather than reassessing. A stark example was the loss of 2,000 men from the 44th Mongolian Cavalry Division, who repeatedly charged the 106th Infantry Division in parade-ground assaults. Overall, the Red Army officer corps was gradually improving. It would take time to weed out the incompetent but politically connected officers, and for new officers to develop their skills. The effectiveness of the late-war Red Army came at the cost of blood shed and learning from earlier mistakes.

Guderian was growing increasingly concerned about a potential large Soviet offensive from both the east and west of Tula, targeting his overstretched forces. Reconnaissance assets had detected a substantial influx of Soviet reinforcements in the area, while his flanks remained thinly guarded. Guderian was not able to bring his entire 2nd Panzer Army to bear at Tula. For example, the 47th Panzer Corps remained trapped around Oryol due to fuel shortages and the need for infantry from the Second Army to reach and protect this vital supply hub. Other units were still bogged down on the long road between Oryol and Tula. Four depleted rifle battalions from the 4th Panzer Division were holding a line about 32 kilometers long to maintain contact between the 3rd Panzer Division and the infantry of the 53rd Army Corps. This feared assault was anticipated to begin on the 8th against the 53rd Army Corps’ 112th and 167th Infantry Divisions, and was expected to develop over the following week.

To the south, the Battle of Kursk commenced on November 1. The 9th Panzer Division had only nine tanks available for the attack and was stretched across 260 kilometers of advance. It was accompanied by the 95th Infantry, likewise dispersed, and the force could not bring any artillery to bear due to a lack of horses. Nevertheless, the assault would succeed against a weak Soviet defense, though it took until the 4th for the last resistance to be cleared. The German reports claimed that although the Red Army had abandoned much of the city and evacuated about a quarter of its population, many of the remaining civilians had been armed. This assertion was widely used to justify the perceived lack of concern for civilian casualties during the attack. Although Voronezh did not have a large Jewish population, numerous atrocities were committed in its wake, including mass executions. Clearing the city of hidden explosives, however, would take longer. Even before Voronezh could be secured, the Second Army was ordered to seize Voronezh, despite Weiss’s reports that a rest period was desperately needed. Weiss’s plea for a winter halt was denied by Heusinger, who argued that troops should not gain the impression of a winter base, or they might fail to understand the order to set out again. Halder would admit these orders were largely theoretical because the mud currently prevented the movement but still did not allow the Army to stop for the Winter and insisted they be carried out. OKH believed the Soviets in this sector were completely shattered so it was just a matter of marching there. 

Von Rundstedt’s reluctance to undertake a major offensive the previous week prompted a visit from Halder on the 3rd. Halder noted down in his Diary the purpose of the visit to Army Group South on the 3rd: “some energetic ‘persuading’ would be in order to knock the lead out of them”. Hitler was also getting frustrated about the pessimism of Rundstedt. During the discussion, Rundstedt reiterated his view that the lower Don River and the Donets region represented the limit for his Army Group, arguing for a long halt thereafter. Representatives from OKH demanded more optimistic propaganda in the Army Group’s logistical forecasts and pressed for the capture of Stalingrad and Maykop before year’s end. After Rundstedt refused, Brauchitsch inquired about Rundstedt’s health, a detail Halder recorded. In a follow-up report, Rundstedt also cited poor troop morale driven by cold weather, ammunition and food shortages, and growing irritation among soldiers who felt they were being “preached at” in orders about the importance of objectives. He warned that any large winter offensive would paralyze the Army Group come spring as they recovered, making a winter halt preferable. This assessment was, unsurprisingly, rejected outright, and OKH bypassed Rundstedt to issue offensive orders directly to the First Panzer Army and the 17th Army to seize Maykop and Stalingrad, respectively.

Kleist’s Rostov offensive began on the 5th. The 14th Panzer Corps crossed the Mius River at Golodayevka and advanced about 30 kilometers eastward. The Soviet 9th Army had anticipated a direct assault along the coastline toward Rostov and was caught off guard by the northern offensive. The 14th Panzer Corps then swung south to secure a bridgehead across the Krepkaya River. Heavy rain again stalled further movement on the 7th, allowing the defenders time to establish new defensive positions along the Tuzlov River.

Manstein’s 11th Army continued its pursuit of the routing Red Army in Crimea, despite terrible road conditions and gradually returning resistance. The 54th Corps took a direct route to Sevastopol, but was halted in the steep mountains and ravines around the port fortress on the 2nd, with the 8th Marine Brigade playing a significant role in the battle. The 54th Corps would press offensives until the 8th, when mounting casualties, shortages of supplies, and exhaustion forced a pause. The 30th Corps was taking a longer route through the partisan-infested Yalta mountains and lagged behind. Any attempt to seize the fortress from its 52,000 defenders would have to await improved logistics, reinforcements, and the arrival of siege artillery. Manstein hoped to renew the offensive on Sevastopol by the end of November. However, the already chaotic logistical situation in Crimea was worsened by a prolonged rainstorm across the region. He bitterly complained that with even a single motorized division, they could have raced to the fortress and captured it before the Soviets organized a defense. "By granting this to us, we would have been spared a great deal of blood, difficult winter battles, and a future assault of the fortress; we would have also soon had available an additional army for the other operations on the Eastern Front.” Although this assessment is doubtful given the number of troops still present there from the Odessa evacuation. The 62nd Corps, which was supposed to be the weaker secondary effort, managed to bypass a hastily formed defensive line and captured Feodosia on November 3, triggering a new race to Kerch, the last major port available to the fleeing 51st Army.

Meanwhile, the Romanian Mountain Corps was tied down fighting numerous partisan bands across the peninsula. The Yalta Mountains would become a stronghold for these partisans, while at the same time they were intended to secure the southern coastline of Crimea in case of a Soviet naval attack. The 6th and 17th Armies remained largely static due to supply shortages and casualties sustained. A substantial 160-kilometer gap persisted between the 29th Army Corps at Belgorod and the nearest formations from Army Group Center, which had just conquered Kursk. The Hungarian Mobile Corps was ordered to take positions alongside the 17th Army to free up German infantry divisions for a new offensive into the Donbas.

The USSR marked the anniversary of the October Revolution on November 7. Stalin had delivered a speech the night before, broadcast across the country. Military parades had traditionally celebrated the occasion, but in 1941 they were largely abandoned due to the invasion. Stalin nevertheless insisted that a parade be held, despite widespread objections. Zhukov’s 1st November report. “It is unlikely that the opponent in the next 2–3 days will be able to advance on Moscow. To build up operational reserves, provide food and ammunition as well as tanks and other equipment, the enemy will need at least half a month, to provide everything needed for a new offensive prepared in advance in the area of Smolensk– Viaz’ma” The objections faded when Zhukov argued that the Germans were unlikely to mount a major offensive toward Moscow for several weeks, making the parade seem safe. He did, however, recommend improving Moscow’s air defenses for the event. Planning was conducted in complete secrecy to prevent any German interference. The soldiers participating in the parade only learned of it on the day itself, though many were puzzled by the sudden inclusion of marching drills and likely suspected the real purpose. More than 28,000 soldiers took part, with many proceeding directly to front-line duties outside the city afterward. In the speech held the day before and the speech after the parade, Stalin would claim the Germans had lost 4.5 million men whilst the USSR had lost only 1.7 million. He also pointed out that the USSR was supported by Britain and the USA. Stalin would also refer back to past military heroes of Russia from Aleksandr Nevskiy to Mikhail Kutuzov. Similar parades were held in Kuybyshev and Voronezh. The morale boost from the display appears to have been significant, reaffirming leadership resolve to defend Moscow and enhancing perceptions of the USSR’s strength.

Similarly, Hitler would participate in the anniversary of the Munich Beer Hall Putsch on the 8th. There he sought to bridge the growing credibility gap between the harsh realities of the war in the east and the constant propaganda announcements claiming the war had already been decided. “Right now, we have over fifteen thousand planes, over twenty-two thousand tanks, twenty-seven thousand guns. It is truly an enormous amount of material. The entire industry of the world, including German industry, could only replace such amounts slowly …. With all due respect to lightning warfare – you still have to march! . . . If you walk all the way from the German border to Rostov or the Crimea, or Leningrad, then we are talking real distances, especially considering the roads in the ‘paradise of workers and peasants ” 

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In the bleak hush before winter, a stubborn battle raged from Tikhvin to Moscow. German spearheads plowed toward Budogosh and Gruzino, while Soviet defenses clung to Sitomlia and the Volkhov line, stubborn as ice. Rasputitsa turned roads to mire, tanks to statues, and fuel into a fevered memory. Commanders shuffled like chess pieces; Stalin swapped Khozin for Fedyuninsky as frost tightened its grip. German logistics buckled under -40°C, trains bursting, engines sighing. Yet both sides pressed on: Soviets probing with fresh grit, Germans chasing Marathons of supply and bravado. 

Eastern Front #22 Collective German Delusions

Last time we spoke about the Wehrmachts' struggle during the Rasputitsa. In the autumn of 1941, a rain-soaked road stitched Moscow to Leningrad as two colossal armies walked a fever-dream toward a grim deadline. On one side, German steel pressed for a swift clinch at Tikhvin and along the Smolensk-Moscow spine; on the other, Soviet resolve rebuilt from ruin, civilians shoulder-to-shoulder with soldiers, refuse-to-quit etched in every hand. Mud and Rasputitsa swallowed tanks and trucks, turning battlefields into quagmires where progress slowed to a wary crawl. The German lines stretched, with Beowulf’s Baltic gambit collapsing under determined Soviet resistance, while Soviet counteroffensives stitched defensive curtains around critical hubs like Tikhvin and the Volkhov corridor. Supplies faltered; airfields clogged; fuel ran low as winter loomed. Beowulf’s island ambitions dissolved into hard lessons about logistics and distance. In Kyiv and Kharkiv, the front’s pressure persisted as Hitler’s strategic visions collided with grim realities: fuel, rail, and morale frayed, and German armor ground toward exhaustion. 

This episode is the Wehrmacht Struggled in October Mud

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. 

 

On Monday, the 26th, a notable leadership shuffle occurred in the Soviet ranks: Stalin swapped the positions of Fedyuninsky and Khozin. Technically, Khozin outranked Fedyuninsky, and that hierarchy was cited as the official reason for appointing Khozin as the commander of the Leningrad Front. But many historians suspect there was more under the surface. Some argue Stalin wanted a frontline fighter, someone with proven mettle in combat, leading the 54th Army, which was coming under increasing threat. Fedyuninsky had earned a reputation as a capable and aggressive commander on the battlefield, a reputation that could be leveraged by placing him where his forward-facing leadership would be most effective. This swap, then, might reflect a strategic alignment of personalities to match the demands of the moment rather than a simple matter of official rank. Two days after the swap, the call to proceed with the second Sinyavino Offensive was withdrawn. The German threat at Tikhvin and in the surrounding approaches was draining vast portions of the 54th Army’s strength, and the Soviet offensive effort was not making meaningful progress. With the 54th Army’s lines stretched and the enemy pressing from multiple directions, the risk of encirclement grew, shifting the priority toward holding the line and preventing a collapse that could threaten the entire operational area around Leningrad and its supply routes. Despite that recalibration, Khozin was ordered to begin planning a fresh offensive at Sinyavino once the immediate German push was repelled. In other words, even as the frontline risk loomed, the strategic clock kept ticking toward a renewed push in the Sinyavino sector, where the geometry of terrain and the timing of German withdrawals would shape the next phase of the battle.

In addition to the leadership reshuffle, Stalin also reprimanded the commander of the 52nd Army on the 26th for a pattern of failures that kept undermining progress. With the German push toward Moscow blunted for the moment, STAVKA could reallocate reinforcements to other sectors of the theatre where needed most. The 92nd Rifle Division and the 60th Tank Division were pulled from STAVKA reserves and sent to bolster defenses around Tikhvin. It would take until the 30th for both formations to arrive in the front lines and become fully operational. But even as those reinforcements moved in, the early elements of the 60th Tank Division took part in an offensive on the 27th, alongside the 191st Rifle Division and elements of the 4th Guards Rifle Division. Their target was the vanguard of the German 12th Panzer Division near Sitomlia. Despite a clear numerical advantage, the attack failed to push the Germans back. In fact, the German force held firm long enough to halt and even begin regrouping. The broader picture remained the same: the 52nd and 4th Armies were advancing in fits and starts, their counterattacks hampered by coordination problems and incomplete preparation, which limited their impact on the battlefield.

As the German center offense was checked, trouble also brewed on the wings. On the southern flank, the Soviet 259th Rifle Division anchored the defensive line along the Malaia Vishera River, a boundary reinforced by the 288th and 267th Rifle Divisions. Together, these three divisions mounted a disciplined defense that blunted the advance of the German armored and mechanized spearheads—the 18th Motorised, the 8th Panzer, and the 126th Infantry Divisions. By the 27th, the southern prong of the offensive had to be abandoned, and the two mobile divisions received orders to pull north toward Sitomlia. The 126th Infantry Division remained behind, holding the front line. Up north, the drive of the 11th Infantry Division north along the Volkhov River ground to a halt north of Kirishi by the 28th. To bolster that sector, portions of the 21st Infantry Division were reassigned to strengthen the 11th. Those were the only reinforcements available, reflecting Leeb’s shortage of extra reserves. The relieved unit then received marching orders to move northeast along the Volkhov river line, a maneuver designed to shield the flank of the push toward Tikhvin and to keep the German advance from turning the northern front.

Scared by the slowing pace of the offensive even on the 26th, Field Marshal von Leeb sought permission from Hitler to cancel the planned assault on the Oranienbaum Bridgehead. That order would free up three more infantry divisions, allowing them to be redeployed to refresh the Tikhvin offensive. But moving those divisions into their new positions would take time, and the timing mattered. If Tikhvin finally fell, the implications for Leningrad and its surrounding pockets were stark: Soviet forces in Leningrad proper and at Oranienbaum would be cut off from vital supplies and would face rapid starvation, effectively undermining the need for further costly assaults. There was also the hope that Finland might be drawn into the pressure, offering a distraction that could slow Soviet mobilization and complicate their logistics.

In the build-up to the Tikhvin offensive, German diplomacy with Finland had nudged Helsinki toward its own push toward the same objective. Yet Finnish Generalissimo Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim kept a tight rein on timing, offering no firm start date. For the moment, Finland’s army was consumed with its wider Karelia campaign. Medvezhyegorsk stood as the main objective of two separate pushes from the south and east, a sign of how the front was being pressed from multiple directions. By the 19th, Finnish forces had crossed the Suna River line and were creeping forward, albeit slowly. The two powers, Finns and Germans, were also talking about a joint operation toward Belomorsk, but Finland insisted that any such strike would hinge on a larger development: the fall of Leningrad. The reasoning behind this was straightforward: if Leningrad fell, it would remove a major pressure on Finnish forces and free them to shift northward. Mannerheim estimated that he could dispatch eight or nine Finnish brigades once the city was secured. In their eagerness to renew efforts to sever the Murmansk railway, the OKW and Hitler leadership appeared to overlook this Finnish requirement, namely that Finland needed time and capacity to reassign its units before any joint action could be effective. The Continuation War was exacting a harsh toll on Finland: recruitment of half its industrial workforce and a staggering 70% of its agricultural labor was strained to the limit. The year 1941 would end with roughly 75,000 Finnish casualties, and to keep resources flowing, Finnish divisions were condensed into brigades, with surplus manpower shifted back to civilian industry. Amid this strain, Finland pressed for grain: 175,000 tons were sought to bridge the gap until harvests in 1942. A strategic glimmer appeared when the Soviet leadership announced the start of plans to abandon the port of Hanko, announced on October 23rd—an action that would alter naval and land considerations in the region. In a related redeployment move, the USSR began shifting garrison forces away from vulnerable posts toward Oranienbaum, with the first transfer scheduled for October 27th.

STAVKA had been tracking the faltering pace of the German offensive, and by the 29th they pushed for a bold corrective move. They ordered the 4th Army to form two shock groups, setting the stage for a major counteroffensive to begin the following week. One shock group was formed at Sitomlia from the 191st Rifle Division, a regiment drawn from the 44th Rifle Division, and a regiment pulled from the 60th Tank Division. The second shock group consisted of the 4th Guards Rifle Division, augmented by two regiments taken from the 60th Tank Division, and was assembled about 25 kilometers south of Sitomlia. In support, the 92nd Rifle Division would be operating in the same area to lend additional manpower and firepower to the shock groups. The aim was clear: smash the German formations driving toward Tikhvin and restore the Soviets to a secure defensive line along the Volkhov River.

At Moscow, Zhukhov’s offensive pressed on against the southern flank of the 4th Army and the 4th Panzer Group. Kleist pressed for the Army Group reserve to be released, a request that by the 27th Bock was seriously weighing. The 23rd and 268th Infantry Divisions stood as the only formations still uncommitted within Army Group Center, while Guderian’s Panzer Army remained too distant to offer timely support. Even as segments of the German line teetered toward collapse, the rest of Army Group Center stayed in motion. On the northern front, the 5th Army Corps seized Volokolamsk on the 27th. Consistent with Wehrmacht practice, once a goal was reached, planners reset their sights to an even more ambitious target: Klin, about 80 kilometers northeast. Yet rather than pressing immediately, the 4th Army was allowed to begin preparations to mount this offensive as soon as the ground froze enough for movement. The catch was fuel and ammunition, stockpiles that simply did not exist for any unit facing Moscow. An estimate suggested it would take at least six days for supplies to reach the 4th Panzer Group after frost set in, delaying any offensive action.

 

Back in Germany, a fresh round of infighting erupted.On one side, Hitler clung to the belief that Guderian lacked the bridging equipment needed to cross the many watercourses between his forces and Tula. On the other side, Hitler insisted that the 4th Army could take over the Tula operation in addition to its existing objectives. He also wanted infantry from the 9th Army to replace the 3rd Panzer Group at Kalinin and shift to a defensive posture. Panzer Groups 3 and 4 would then merge to push on Rybinsk, Yaroslavl, and finally Vologda. This stance clashed with the reality that the 4th Army was on the defensive and running low on reserves. Kalinin itself was besieged by Soviet forces, and the Germans could barely supply their own forces there, not to mention troops 250 kilometers further northeast. Hitler therefore pressed Guderian to abandon the drive on Tula and join the Voronezh offensive. Bock protested to Halder immediately. “I have no idea what the objective of the Second Panzer Army’s departure for Voronezh is. It is essential at Tula and farther north- east. The situation is such that the southern half of Fourth Army between the Oka [River] and the highway has been forced onto the defensive by the increasingly strong enemy … Relief for the Fourth Army and a possible resumption of the attack can only come through a continuation of the panzer army’s advance through Tula to the north-east. Turning this army is unjustifiable.” Halder appeared to side with Bock, but the very next day sent orders to halt Guderian anyway. When Bock tried to pass the orders on, Halder refused the transmission, forcing Bock to brief Heusinger. After reiterating his objections, Bock flatly refused to relay the order to Guderian. Bock wrote in his diary that day “If the army command wants to do it, it will have to tell the [panzer] army itself. The advance by the panzer army, including its infantry corps, has been started through unspeakable effort and after overcoming great difficulties. If I now order it to halt, they will think me mad.” Throughout the night of the 27th, telegrams moved between Bock’s HQ and OKW/OKH—each time Bock refusing transmission. On the 28th, OKW and OKH finally conceded defeat and ordered Guderian to continue toward Tula, but with an additional instruction: cross the Oka River with a small detachment near Serpukhov.

Following the incident, Kluge was ordered to fly to Hitler’s Headquarters to brief him directly on the front’s conditions. It is theorised that Hitler believed the OKW was deceiving him once more for its own strategic ends. Although there are no surviving meeting minutes, Kluge later told Bock that Hitler had requested detailed battlefield accounts, including weather, mud, and road conditions. Kluge spent three nights and two days at Hitler’s headquarters. A key outcome of the meeting was Hitler’s acceptance that Army Group Center’s forces should wait for frost or dry conditions before resuming any major offensive, while still permitting local attacks and opportunistic advances, but not large-scale operations. “Kluge spoke once again about the possibilities of attacking. He said that if he drove his forces forward now there might be a gain of a few kilometres then that would be it again because artillery and motorized weapons became stuck. I told him that we would gain nothing by that. Naturally we must stay alert to any weakening of the enemy and strike there immediately. But in general the army had to, as per orders, make thorough preparations for an attack as soon as the cold sets in. This time benefits the enemy but unfortunately there is no other solution. The situation is enough to drive one to despair and filled with envy I look to the Crimea, where we are advancing vigorously in the sunshine over the dry ground of the steppe and the Russians are scattering to the four winds. It could be the same here if we weren’t stuck up to our knees in the mud.”

Plavsk fell on the 27th after a 36-kilometer sprint in two days, achieved despite heavy mud and scarce fuel, with German forces advancing faster than Soviet lines could realistically form defenses. By the 29th, the vanguard approached within about 5 kilometers of Tula, and on the following day the leading battlegroup—comprising two infantry battalions and two tank battalions, attempted to seize Tula. Soviet defenses were stout, reinforced in the days prior, and included anti-aircraft guns wired for direct fire alongside entrenched anti-tank batteries, which inflicted heavy casualties on the attackers. This particular battlegroup at Tula depended entirely on airdrops for supplies, an arrangement unsustainable for any further buildup. The eventual capture of Tula remained contingent on ground frosts hardening the soil and on near-term railhead repositioning to bring supplies closer to the front.

The fighting around Kalinin continued through the week as Soviet forces pressed to complete the encirclement of the Panzer Corps defending the city, while German logistics deteriorated under mud and fuel shortages, limiting reinforcement efforts and keeping ammunition scarce, which in turn drove higher German casualties; the airfield near Kalinin had been closed due to excessive aircraft losses, further constraining airlift and resupply. The 1st Panzer Division was demanding withdrawal for a full organizational overhaul after heavy losses, the 6th Panzer Division was cannibalizing tanks to keep some in service as it pushed toward the city, and casualty figures in the Kalinin vicinity rose with the 161st Infantry Division suffering around 2,000 losses, the 36th Motorised Division about 960, and the 129th Infantry Division around 550, all of which underscored the strain on German combat power and complicated efforts to break the encirclement or relieve besieged units.

The conditions surrounding the Kalinin sector prompted Strauss, commander of the 9th Army, to oppose Hitler’s plan to capture Yaroslavl, arguing that Kalinin itself was not a secure base of operations. Reinhardt, commander of the Third Panzer Army, disagreed with Strauss and pressed for an offensive start on November 4, a timetable that would not have allowed time for the 56th Panzer Corps or the 3rd Panzer Corps to arrive, leaving the already battered 41st Panzer Corps to advance roughly 250 km in cold, muddy conditions largely on its own. Yet the 3rd Panzer Group was technically subordinate to the 9th Army, and Strauss promptly countermanded this reckless order, forbidding any of his infantry divisions from taking part in such an offensive. Even as Strauss worked to keep his forces from being drawn off to the northeast while trying to hold the Army Group’s northern flank, Bock issued new directives that the north should be treated as a secondary theatre, focusing instead on the 70 km gap between Yaropolets and Kalinin where no German units were stationed and where neither Strauss nor Kluge had stretched to cover the sector. Nevertheless, Reinhardt refused to participate in any operation unless it was directed toward Yaroslavl, even in the face of Bock’s intervention.

On the 30th, a new set of orders for Army Group Centre clarified the operational focus: Yaroslavl and Tihkivin would remain targets for both Army Group North and Centre, while the 9th Army was reduced to securing supply lines for the Panzer Group's push toward Yaroslavl and no longer tasked with conducting an encirclement alongside Army Group North. The 4th Army was instructed to await an improvement in weather and logistics, then attack Moscow without delay. The 2nd Panzer Army received approval to cross the Oka and was assigned to seize the industrial areas of Stalinogorsk and Kashira. It was determined that the encirclement of Moscow would require eliminating Soviet forces between Kalinin and the Moskva River. Operation Typhoon was declared at an end, with German losses in October amounting to 41,099 men. Total losses by the 6th of November was 686,108. 1 in 5 soldiers who had entered the USSR in July was now a casualty. Like Operation Barbarossa, Typhoon was successful in many tactical and operational respects, but failed to achieve its overarching strategic objective of winning the war.

After Kyiv, Hitler imposed a drastic shift in German policy toward Soviet cities, forbidding assaults on the cities themselves or accepting their surrender, including Moscow. The 12th October order from OKH  "The Führer has once again decided that a surrender from Moscow is not to be accepted. … Just as the most serious dangers to the troops in Kyiv were caused by time-detonated bombs, the same must be expected to an even greater extent in Moscow and Leningrad. Soviet Russian radio itself announced that Leningrad is mined and would be defended to the last man. … Therefore, no German soldier is to enter these cities. Anyone attempting to leave the city against our lines is to be repelled by fire. Smaller, unblocked gaps that allow the population to flow out into central Russia are therefore only to be welcomed. The same applies to all other cities: before they are captured, they must be worn down by artillery fire and air raids, and their populations must be forced to flee. It is irresponsible to risk the lives of German soldiers to save Russian cities from fire or to feed their populations at the expense of the German homeland. The more the population of Soviet Russian cities flees into the interior of Russia, the greater the chaos in Russia, and the easier it will be for us to administer and exploit the occupied eastern territories. This will of the Führer must be brought to the attention of all commanders”. 

Instead, the population was to be driven out or exterminated through artillery, air bombardment, or starvation, justified publicly by concerns over time bombs left by Soviets and the supposed waste of German lives in taking cities. Civilians attempting to flee were to be shot unless they could reach special corridors eastward, and no food or firefighting assistance was to be provided to those inside the cities. The aim was to starve the 3.1 million Moscow population to death, reflecting a broader Nazi view that urban populations were largely unwanted except for those who could work in factories. The prewar population had been 4.1 million. Refugees flowing into the city had outpaced the ability to evacuate civilians from the city until October. Only after October did the population start to decrease down to 2.1 million by 1941. The Nazis saw the urban population as a drain on food resources intended to ease long-term shortages, while rural populations were valued mainly for producing food or supplying raw materials. These plans reportedly remained unknown to the Soviets.  Hilter on 17th October with Reich minister Dr. Todt and Gauleiter Sauckel “We shan’t settle in the Russian towns, and we’ll let them fall to pieces without intervening. And, above all, no remorse on this subject! We’re not going to play at children’s nurses; we’re absolutely without obligations as far as these people are concerned. To struggle against the hovels, chase away the fleas, provide German teachers, bring out newspapers – very little of that for us! We’ll confine ourselves, perhaps, to setting up a radio transmitter, under our control. For the rest, let them know just enough to understand our highway signs, so that they won’t get themselves run over by our vehicles! For them the word ‘liberty’ means the right to wash on feast days … There’s only one duty: to germanise this country by the immigration of Germans, and to look upon the natives as Redskins”.

Eight thousand kilometers of trenches and anti-tank ditches were dug to defend Moscow, complemented by 300 kilometers of barbed wire, while a semicircular main defensive line with a radius of 16 kilometers was established, followed by three progressively smaller urban rings. In a parallel to Kyiv, civilian factories were repurposed to produce rudimentary weapons for local volunteer formations and to manufacture pillboxes and other defensive works. Many buildings were mined in anticipation of a German entry, and special stay-behind teams were organized to sabotage what remained or to assassinate prominent German figures. The city’s airfields remained well supplied and enabled near-total Luftwaffe superiority in the Moscow airspace, yet forward German positions often lacked adequate flak coverage, and the Luftwaffe struggled to deploy enough aircraft to contest the Soviet air forces around Moscow. Casualties mounted steadily, with the 2nd Panzer Division recording around 100 casualties in just a few days.

Zhukov had ordered a summary execution policy as early as the 13th to punish “cowards and panic-mongers that leave the battlefield and retreat from their positions without permission.” This hard line continued into late October and early November, with Colonel Kozlov of the 17th Rifle Division executed on the 22nd for retreating without orders on multiple occasions, together with the political commissar. Political commissars were tasked with assisting their commanders and chiefs of staff to reach appropriate decisions, and also with ensuring that those decisions were indeed appropriate. They were intended to share full responsibility alongside their attached command for the condition and combat activities of that command, establishing a joint accountability framework. Under this arrangement, a commissar was considered responsible for allowing their attached unit to retreat without authorization in the face of a no-retreat order, reflecting both the unit’s operational stance and the political oversight guiding it. Likewise, Lt. Colonel Gerasimov was executed on the 2nd of November, alongside his commissar, for the same alleged offenses.

STAVKA had ordered the formation of ten armies to be stationed inside the USSR, and by November the unseen structure was taking shape: 59 rifle divisions, 13 cavalry divisions, 75 rifle brigades, and 20 tank brigades. These formations were not rushed to the frontlines out of desperation; unlike earlier waves, each division was intended to be fully trained and equipped before deployment. The prolonged resistance around the Bryansk and Vyazma pockets, the stubborn Mozhaisk defensive line, and the counterattacks led by Konev and Zhukov bought the Red Army precious time to assemble a brand-new force capable of taking revenge on the Wehrmacht in the depths of winter. German military intelligence completely failed to detect this buildup, highlighting the strategic patience and evolving mobilization that characterized Soviet preparations during this period. German military intelligence in the USSR was notoriously limited and often disastrously ineffective. The only reliable strands tended to come from local tactical information about forces directly opposing German divisions, or from sources such as prisoners of war and defectors. Outside of these narrow channels, German intelligence struggles manifested as broad misreads of Soviet mobilization, unit formations, and strategic intentions, contributing to missed warnings and delayed reactions during critical phases of the conflict.

On the 28th, the First Panzer Army sent a memorandum to OKH stating that it was not in a condition to undertake further operations without improved access to supplies, and it requested withdrawal to Germany so its tanks and equipment could be restored, since only minor field repairs were feasible and major repairs required factories or major repair centers. After 11,600 km the pure mechanical strain from normal operation was starting to ruin many tanks and trucks beyond the capabilities of normal field maintenance. They needed a complete overhaul to restore them back to normal capabilities and reliability. OKH, however, insisted on achieving the Maykop–Stalingrad–Voronezh line but permitted a pause after the Don River line was captured. The Army was then ordered to renew its offensive toward Rostov in early November, but Hitler opposed even this concession, fearing the loss of offensive momentum and soldiers’ reluctance to resume after a pause. Ultimately, a four-week pause was agreed, though Hitler pressed that any snow-free period or frost should be exploited at all costs, with both Hitler and Halder aiming to secure the Don River line before the year’s end. Many staff officers opposed this approach due to the crisis across multiple divisions, ongoing supply shortages, and high attrition rates; the Army group had expected 724 trains in October but received only 195, and the 6th and 17th Armies found themselves operating at the end of barely sufficient logistical chains after securing their sections of the Don line. All priority shifted to sustaining the offensive of the 11th Army and preparing a renewed push by the 1st Panzer Army, illustrating a persistent tension between aggressive strategic aims and the harsh realities of supply and maintenance under political-military pressure. 

The conference of Chiefs of Staff on October 31st focused on the state of the First Panzer Army and the practicalities of reconstituting its equipment. The consensus was that as much equipment as possible should be returned to Germany for restoration, and that it would be wiser to halt Army Group South in its current positions, preserving strength for renewed spring offensives with fresh formations rather than pressing on toward distant objectives with divisions depleted to unusable levels. The chief of staff of the 17th Army warned that the Soviets might be attempting to lure them into a scenario where the German supply situation was so overstretched that a counterattack could be crushed, but this concern was dismissed by the others. Halder noted that day “The Army High Command no longer expects the greatly weakened enemy to take active measures. He will try only to withdraw and reorganize his forces undisturbed.”  Despite these internal cautions, OKH and OKW pressed for the Army Group to reach the Don River by year’s end, even though the staff officers argued they lacked the resources to adequately secure the flanks if the front extended along the river. They also asserted that any advance would have to be conducted with small infantry groups supported only by Panzer wagons, with no motorization beyond those towings for anti-aircraft guns, reflecting the severely constrained logistical reality and the preference for conserving forces until more favorable conditions could allow a more robust, sustained operation. 

Hausen’s 54th Corps had been ground down by a brutal assault on the Crimean defenses, leaving them combat ineffective as the week opened. Kuznetsov’s 51st Army defensive efforts began to falter, and by the 28th the Soviet defenders were pushed from their prepared positions, triggering a rapid retreat. This retreat fractured into two segments, with the 51st Army pulling back to Kerch and the long-standing defenders around Odesa streaming toward Sevastopol to brace for another siege. Mainstein again faced a stark shortage of mobility, lacking motorised formations to exploit the Soviet rout, and he reiterated the need for a mobile division, arguing that if the attack stalled, a corps comprising two panzer divisions and a motorised unit would be required to restart it. That demand, however, was denied once more, forcing his infantry to pursue the fleeing Soviets at best, as they proceeded to follow the retreat until a new decision point emerged. Consequently, the 54th and 30th Corps advanced toward Sevastopol, while the newly reassigned 62nd Corps moved toward the Parpach Isthmus. The Romanian Mountain Corps took up the crucial task of securing the gap between these German formations against potential partisan activity and any anticipated naval landings. Just as the USSR’s northern and central sectors appeared to stabilize, a fresh crisis began to loom in the south. 

The Romanian armed forces bore a heavy toll from the Crimea campaign, suffering an additional roughly 10,000 casualties by the start of November on top of the already steep losses incurred during the Odesa fighting. This brutal toll pushed Romania toward a more passive posture, as its military apparatus and strategic position were strained beyond endurance and its broader role in the war appeared effectively exhausted. Disturbingly, in the wake of Odesa’s capture, Romanian forces participated in acts aligned with the Nazi regime’s antisemitic policies, reportedly shooting about 19,000 Jewish civilians in the city. One estimate was that 250,000 Jews and 12,000 Roma died in the aftermath of Romania's occupation of Bessarabia. Antonescu fully shared Hitler’s mania about Jews and Bolshevism. On the Italian side, Mussolini’s reaction to Odesa’s fall was to elevate the sense of urgency and prestige by ordering the expansion of Italy’s contribution: on October 22 he decreed that 15 Italian divisions should be raised and dispatched to the Eastern front. These were to be on top of the 92 divisions that the Chief of Italian Supreme Command General Ugo Cavallero proclaimed he would have raised and ready for use in Spring 1942. This is the same genius who, when faced with the lack of motorisation in the Italian army, ordered the daily marching distance of Italian soldiers from 18km to 40km… To say that Cavallero was delusional would be an understatement. This directive came despite the notable contributions already made by the modest Italian CSIR, which, though small, had played a significant role in the invasion, including assisting in the capture of Stalino as part of its responsibility for screening the inland flank of the 1st Panzer Army. 

Hungary, by contrast, was already exploring ways to withdraw from frontline operations while remaining useful to Germany in a rear-security role. The Hungarian Mobile Corps remained a valued asset for the 1st Panzer Army and the 17th Army even after intense losses, which helped explain why the Germans repeatedly refused to return the formation to Hungary until early November. When the corps finally withdrew, it had suffered about 4,500 casualties and had lost roughly 90% of its tanks and 30% of its aircraft, a brutal toll that limited its battlefield utility. In exchange for its continued cooperation, Hungary sent two brigades to take on rear-area security duties. Slovakia followed a somewhat similar trajectory: initially deploying about 41,000 men to the Eastern Front, but by the end of October that force had been reduced by roughly two-thirds, with many units sent home. The remaining force was limited to a small mobile division, and even that formation was not regarded as an equal to a heavily depleted German division, underscoring the shrinking combat viability of Slovakia’s contribution as the campaign wore on. 

I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go 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 after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me.

The Wehrmacht’s longing for a quick triumph near Tikhvin and Moscow collided with a stubborn Soviet resistance, civilians marching beside soldiers and turning Rasputitsa into a tidal trap. Stalin shuffled generals, shipping help to threatened frontiers while STAVKA plotted bold countermoves from Sitomlia to the Volkhov. Germans fretted over fuel, frost, and frail supply lines, while Moscow’s defenders fortified with torches and resolve. As frost finally loomed, both sides weighed limits and tactics, imagining victory, yet understanding the campaign’s brutal truth: logistics, weather, and will define war’s end.

Eastern Front #21 Wehrmacht Struggles in October Mud

Last time we spoke about the beginning of the Tikhvin offensive. In the autumn of 1941, a thin road from Leningrad to Moscow braided with mud and grit as two colossal armies pressed toward a grim deadline. On one side, German steel sought a swift triumph; on the other, Soviet resolve rebuilt from ruined lines, shoulder to shoulder with civilians who refused to surrender their city. Cities along the corridor buckled under pressure, Bryansk, Vyazma, Kalinin, yet the Red Army held, taught newcomers, and refused to yield Moscow to the encroaching winter. The Tikhvin Offensive blossomed as a dire race against Rasputitsa and frost. German panzers clawed forward through swamps and forests, sometimes breaking the front and exposing vulnerable flanks. Soviet countermeasures, though hampered by stretched reserves, stitched together new fronts and defensive corridors, buying time for the capital. Civilians endured hunger, cold, and the fear of occupation as fronts shifted like winter winds: planes thundered above, trains groaned along damaged rails, and soldiers traded warmth for survival. The Tikhvin Offensive began, but the war’s winter symphony had only just begun.

This episode is the Wehrmacht Struggled in October Mud

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. 

The German offensive toward Tikhvin fanned out after the 21st. The 12th Panzer Division and the 20th Motorised Division were directed at Tikhvin and made slow but steady progress, with Budogosh falling on the 23rd. Mud and snow created ongoing difficulties, and tanks and trucks were repeatedly lost to the terrain. The level of attrition reached a point that prompted consideration from Hitler about suspending the attack. Leeb and Halder persuaded Hitler to allow the operation to continue. Leeb was granted authorisation to halt the attack at his discretion, provided a bridgehead across the Volkhov River remained intact. To the southeast, the 8th Panzer Division and the 18th Motorised Division were redirected toward Bologoye, with the objective of connecting with Panzer Group 3 from Kalinin. Leeb requested control over Panzer Group 3 and the northern wing of the 9th Army to create a unified command structure for this operation. The request was refused. The offensive proceeded despite the failure of the 3rd Panzer Group to break out of Kalinin. The 18th Motorised Division and the 126th Infantry Division managed to capture Bolshaya Vishera. In response, the 288th Rifle Division and the 267th Rifle Division delayed the German advance long enough to establish a defensive line along the Malaya Vishera River. Supporting offensives by the 2nd and 10th Army Corps toward Vyshniy Volochek and Valday were halted by strong Soviet tank-led counteroffensives.

The 11th and 21st Infantry Divisions were dispatched north along both sides of the Volkhov to cover the German offensive’s flanks and threaten the rear of the 54th Army. North of Kirishi, the 11th Infantry Division was halted by the 285th and 311th Rifle Divisions on the 24th. Recognizing the growing German threat, STAVKA ordered a reshaping of the Soviet force: the 310th Rifle Division and the 4th Guards Division were transferred from the 54th Army to the 4th Army; the 191st Rifle Division moved to Sitomlia; and the 44th Rifle Division was assigned to defend Tikhvin itself. This created a layered defense around the critical railway hub at Tikhvin. The 259th Rifle Division was reassigned to the 52nd Army. The Soviet offensive at Siniavino continued without significant progress, with the objective of drawing German reinforcements away from the Tikhvin front. 

Beowulf referred to two German plans to occupy the islands of Saaremaa, Hiiumaa, Muhu, and Vormsi  off the eastern coast of Estonia, at the mouth of the Gulf of Riga in the southeastern Baltic region, as part of the broader Barbarossa invasion of the USSR. The proximate trigger for Beowulf planning and execution had been the Soviet Berlin Bombing Offensive. Soviet aircraft staged through an airfield on Ösel, and although the operation had been small and largely ineffective, it prompted German concern. Hitler ordered a reduction of activity on these islands. Their strategic importance had been limited; the northern drive of Barbarossa toward Leningrad had already moved to the north, leaving the islands and their Soviet garrisons largely isolated and vulnerable to smaller craft.

Both Beowulf I and Beowulf II shared the same objective but were based on different starting assumptions. Beowulf I had imagined a rapid German victory in the Baltic states, particularly the seizure of the Courland (Kurland) peninsula as Heeresgruppe Nord advanced toward Leningrad. This would have been a reworking of Operation Albion from World War I, launched from the Courland region of Latvia. In practice, German forces had faced delays crossing into Estonian territory. Beowulf II was the operation actually undertaken, an attack launched from the western coast of Estonia. Diversionary attacks were employed to confuse Soviet defenders Südwind, Westwind, and Nordwind with sub-plans Lel, Nau, and Stimmung designed to mislead. The islands were garrisoned by about 23,700 Soviet troops of the 3rd Rifle Brigade. The German force assigned to the operation consisted of the 61st Infantry Division, reinforced with assault pioneers and artillery. The force was transported from the Estonian coast by about 100 barges and ferries plus roughly 150 smaller assault boats. A joint German–Finnish naval task force covered the landings, including light cruisers Emden, Köln, and Leipzig. During diversionary naval bombardments, the Finnish coastal defense ship Ilmarinen struck a mine off Hanko and sank.

Vormsi was secured on 9 September. The main assault on Muhu began on 14 September; Muhu was connected to Saaremaa Ösel in German by a causeway. Muhu was secured by 16 September, and a bridgehead across the causeway was established the following day. By 23 September, Soviet forces had been pushed back to the Sorve Peninsula, from which they were gradually forced off with assault pioneers and naval gunfire support; the last Soviet troops surrendered on 5 October. The assault on Hiiumaa (Dagö) began on 12 September; defenders retreated to the Takhuna Peninsula, with survivors surrendering on 21 October 1941. Due to Axis naval and air superiority, Soviet forces could not escape; Soviet losses were about 4,700 killed and 19,000 captured. German casualties totaled about 2,850. Afterwards the 61st Infantry Division was redirected to support the offensive toward Tikhvin, while the 217th Infantry Division was reassigned to strengthen the Oranienbaum pocket.

As mud became a larger problem, on 21 October, Beowulf-committed orders had been drafted that all motorised formations abandon their vehicles and temporarily convert to foot infantry with limited artillery. However, this proposal was outright refused by Brauchitsch, who did not believe conditions at the front were so bad that the symbols of modern warfare needed to be abandoned. Yet, senior commanders had already begun implementing similar measures: several formations ordered their advanced battlegroups to abandon vehicles and proceed on foot. Other formations had already been forced to do so due to the practical reality that all their vehicles were stuck, broken down, or out of fuel. The 41st Panzer Corps had been virtually encircled at Kalinin and was subjected to constant attacks from Konev’s Kalinin Front. By 21 October, it had been in continuous combat for 18 days without relief. The remaining elements of the 3rd Panzer Group and supporting infantry corps from the 9th Army had been tied down longer than expected at Vyazma and then slowed to a crawl by mud as they advanced northward. After its aborted attack toward Torzhok, the 1st Panzer Division was stuck on the wrong bank of the Volga and was retreating toward Kalinin. In the span of two weeks, it had lost 63 tanks and had been reduced to 16 operational tanks by 23 October. It had suffered over 800 casualties between 13 and 20 October.

Even with the arrival of elements from the 129th Infantry Division and the 6th Panzer Division, the 9th Army reported that the situation around Kalinin could not be held indefinitely and that the Soviet forces to the south of the city needed to be forced back. The supply situation for the Luftwaffe was so precarious that pilots were throwing bread out of their cockpits as they passed by to provide food. Hitler proposed that the 41st Panzer Corps seize Bezhetsk, over 110 km from Kalinin, shortly after it had failed to take Torzhok, 60 km away. Hitler keenly watched Goebbel’s weekly newsreels and so it is likely his view of the war was highly influenced by his own propaganda output. Furthermore, Bock demanded that another attempt to take Torzhok be planned by the 9th Army. He did not specify whether the Infantry Corps or the 3rd Panzer Group would conduct the operation. Much of the original Mozhaisk Defensive Line had fallen to the Germans, but the Red Army had only been pushed back to a new layer of defensive lines. The Germans remained 80 to 100 km from Moscow. As German formations grew weaker, new formations flowed in to reinforce the defenders. By the end of October, 13 rifle divisions and five tank brigades had arrived, along with several formations raised directly in Moscow. Moreover, the 33rd Army had been inserted into the line between the 5th and 43rd Armies.

The 46th Panzer Corps, positioned at the northern end of the German lines against Moscow, had lacked sufficient fuel to maneuver freely and conduct offensives. They remained on the receiving end of constant Soviet tank and air attacks. Previously, raids were carried out by groups of two bombers with fighter cover; by this time, the VVS had begun launching squadron-strength raids against ground targets as its strength had returned. Additionally, German airfields in the area had become so clogged with mud that planes struggled to reach takeoff speed. To the south, the 40th Panzer Corps pressed headlong down the Smolensk–Moscow highway in largely predictable assaults. Although they were winning battles due to better training, their casualties were becoming prohibitively high and unsustainable. The 2nd Panzer Division assaulted Volokolamsk alongside the 35th Infantry Division. They had managed to capture the rail station just south of the town by the 25th, but Volokolamsk itself remained stubbornly in Soviet hands. The 10th Panzer Division was engaged around Istra but had not managed to seize it. The 57th Panzer Corps had been immobilized outside Kamenskoye all week. Mud deep enough to trap tractors and tanks prevented maneuver, and supply shortages denied them the strength to undertake offensives. The 20th Panzer Division had been left in the rear of the corps due to its severe depletion.

The 4th Panzer Group had been consuming between 1,000 and 1,500 tons of supplies each day, yet it had received only about 200 tons. This forced the Panzer Group to slowly wind down its offensives, as it was unable to sustain them. Similarly, the 4th Army had managed to grind its way toward the Naro-Fominsk area, but was halted by stiffened resistance and ongoing supply shortages. Quartermaster General Eduard Wagner wrote on the 12 of October. ‘The whole front is moving! Unbelievable this theatre of war. Every day I am asked: How far will you get? I always say: So far I have not left anyone in the lurch!’ On the 25th, Soviet counterattacks had slammed into the 4th Army and managed to push German infantry back several kilometers. The 12th Army Corps bore the brunt of the assault and was ordered to go on the defensive. The next day, the counterattack expanded against the 13th and 20th Army Corps. Kluge was forced to commit his two reserve divisions but was unable to stem the Soviet attack and was compelled to request that the Army Group reserve be released. The 19th Panzer Division repositioned itself to save the neighboring infantry divisions from a concentrated attack by Soviet tanks.

Despite some defensive successes, a state of siege had been declared in Moscow on the 20th to ensure the priority flow of resources and reinforcements. There had been a temporary panic in the previous two weeks. Wild rumours and gossip had circulated about the collapse of the Red Army at Bryansk and Vyazma. Some rumours included that Stalin had been removed by a coup d’état or that German paratroopers were in the Red Square or that German troops in Soviet uniforms were already in the city. The population felt betrayed by this apparent retreat of the elite after so much had been demanded of them, which caused a temporary hysteria. Stalin’s declaration that he would remain in the city helped stabilize morale, alongside measures to ensure that shops and the metro system functioned. He also unleashed the NKVD on the city to deal with those who did not accept this metaphorical carrot. However, this unrest had been dealt with by the 20th, so it was unlikely to be related to the declaration of a state of siege.

The Luftwaffe had attempted to bomb Moscow, but by 25 October it had managed to drop only about 1,000 tons of bombs. As a comparison, on a single day in 1944, the RAF dropped approximately 10,050 tons of bombs on the cities of Cologne, Braunschweig , and Duisburg. This occurred as part of Operation Hurricane over the 14th and 15th of October 1944. It represented the largest weight of bombs dropped in a single 24-hour period during World War II. That same month in 1944, the Western Allies dropped a total of 109,975 tons of bombs. For the Moscow bombing, the damage done was utterly negligible, even if the raids proved a hostile and unpleasant experience for the city’s inhabitants. The airframes of the Luftwaffe were ill-suited to such operations, even before the need to substitute payload for additional fuel. Furthermore, the vast majority of raids on Moscow involved only three to ten planes. This campaign likely harmed the Germans more than the Soviets. Large quantities of supplies were required to sustain these raids, and the attrition rate remained high. German planes had an operability rate of only about 40% due to extensive issues caused by the cold, even before the onset of winter.

The aircraft used for these raids were the same ones typically employed for ground-support operations. The pilots who participated in the raids observed the extremely heavy and effective anti-air defences around Moscow. Pilots who had also taken part in the Blitz noted that Moscow’s air defences were far more intense than the London defences during the Blitz in 1940. British Hurricanes and American P-40 Warhawks, known as Tomahawks in Commonwealth and Soviet usage, were flown in the defense of Moscow. While the Hurricane was already approaching obsolescence as a frontline fighter, it was still capable. The Tomahawk was the preferred design among Soviet pilots. Across the entire Eastern Front, the Luftwaffe was losing an average of 268 bombers per month. Production was nowhere near replacement rates, and airframe stockpiles were rapidly depleting. A study by the Inspector General of Fighters, Werner Mölders, into the potentially highly negative effects of winter on the Luftwaffe, was dismissed as alarmist by Göring.

To the south, the 26th Army and NKVD formations defended Tula. The 50th Army had been attempting to withdraw toward Tula but was severely depleted and lacking all heavy equipment. By the 22nd, the 4th Panzer Army had been reinforced by the 3rd Panzer Army, and both were prepared for a new offensive. On the 23rd, the 3rd Panzer Division attacked and gained ground slowly. The 4th Panzer Army was initially ordered to wait until a bridgehead across the Zusha River had been secured before it began its attack. However, the 3rd Panzer was so delayed by conditions and Soviet resistance that by midday the 4th Panzer Army was committed early. By the end of the day, the 3rd Panzer Army had managed to cross the Susha and expand the bridgehead by 6 km. The 4th Panzer Army remained within 3 km of Mtsensk, pinned by entrenched Soviet tanks on nearby high ground. Guderian blamed the lack of success on the 4th Panzer Army not being used as he had intended, while Schweppenburg pointed to the well-concealed Soviet positions that ambushed any German advance.

The offensive was renewed on the 24th with reinforcements from the Großdeutschland regiment. Nevertheless, the 24th Panzer Corps managed only a 3 km advance that day after multiple attacks were repulsed. The ammunition of the 24th Panzer Corps was nearly exhausted, and the 4th Panzer Division had completely run out of fuel. Some formations in Guderian’s 2nd Panzer Army required airlifts of food because their access to supplies had deteriorated to a terrible level. One example was the 43rd Army Corps, which had received no supplies between the 20th and 29th. It was out of rations and nearly out of fodder for the horses, and its area of operations had already been picked clean. The fuel issue was alleviated through an airlift. The mud forced the 4th Panzer to use its tanks as supply vehicles, and all of its wheeled transport was immobilized. However, the Soviet defenders fell back during the night of October 24. This allowed the 24th Panzer Corps to capture Chern, 30 km north of Mtsensk. In their wake, the Soviets had destroyed every bridge possible and laid random minefields. The Germans used Panzer I tanks as sacrificial mine clearers which the other tanks carefully followed behind. A slow pursuit of the retreating Soviet forces toward Tula commenced as rear-area troops desperately attempted to repair roads and bridges. Due to a shortage of trucks to move infantry, the leading battlegroup adopted the Soviet method, with infantry from the Großdeutschland regiment riding on the backs of advancing tanks.

Elsewhere, the 48th Panzer Corps, alongside the 34th and 35th Army Corps, were transferred to the Second Army, which was designated as responsible for the Kursk-Voronezh area. The 48th possessed only one Panzer division. It had been reduced to 11 tanks by the 24th and was stalled 85 km from Kursk, with Voronezh another 200 km distant. The Second Panzer Army was then to be responsible solely for the capture of Tula. Only General Bock opposed such dispersion of his Army Group’s strength, as it was now attacking to the north and south in addition to Moscow. Bock’s War Diary 25th October stated “The splitting apart of the army group together with the frightful weather has caused us to be bogged down. As a result the Russians are gaining time to bring their shattered divisions back up to strength and bolster their defence, especially since they have most of the rail lines and roads around Moscow. That is very bad!’” All the other generals at OKH and OKW either meekly submitted to Hitler’s desire in this case or were so entangled by the lure of victory that they had long disregarded reality. This situation would only worsen in the coming days. Guderian’s Second Panzer Army would also lose the 1st Cavalry Division as it was ordered to be returned to Germany and converted into the 24th Panzer Division. This process would take months to complete and would return to service in Russia in the summer of 1942.  

At the same time, four infantry divisions and Corps Headquarters were withdrawn to the west. Many horses had been so weakened and overexerted by the campaign that their health had irreversibly collapsed. During the return train journeys, they often had to halt to unload the horse corpses. The mud, alongside the broken supply network, had deprived the German Army of its primary advantage: mobility. In his war diary, von Bock complained that “the Russians are impeding us far less than the wet and the mud.” Quartermaster General Eduard Wagner wrote on the 20th ‘It can no longer be concealed’ ‘we are hung up in the muck, in the purest sense.’ The rainfall in October 1941 was below average, and the temperature was only 1°C below the long-term average. These conditions were not a surprise to anyone, and any competent staff could have foreseen and mitigated many of the issues caused by the predictable weather.

General Heinrici of the 43rd Army Corps reported taking 36 hours to drive only 35 km, while the 137th Division reported it took 53 hours for three trucks to travel 40 km. Fun fact this was significantly slower than Napoleon’s forces were able to travel during the same period in 1812. It was now taking up to 24 draft horses to move a single artillery gun. Sometimes the mud was so deep that horses could fall up to their necks into the quagmire and become irrecoverably stuck. But mud was not the only problem. The 2,093 trains that reached the eastern front in September had not been nearly adequate to meet demand; in October, only 1,860 trains arrived. Compounding the issue, those trains were further behind the front lines. Many formations were now 300–400 km from their supplying railhead. Even the most fortunate formations attacking Moscow were still about 115 km from their supply hub at Vyazma. This distance would attrit supply vehicles quickly.

Alone, this would have been a logistical catastrophe. The mud severely exacerbated these problems, and no precautions had been taken beforehand to address the conditions. Many formations found that the effort to tow supply vehicles forward through the mud consumed nearly as much fuel as it brought forward. The German logistical machine, numbering over 600,000 supply vehicles in the East, had been reduced to about 75,000 by mid-November. At any one time, roughly half were in repair stations. The Wehrmacht was being demotorised. The Germans were forced to learn how to scrounge from the land, to capture and reconfigure all Soviet vehicles they encountered simply to survive. Most divisions were now reliant on columns of horse-drawn Panje wagons, Luftwaffe air drops, or river barges to move supplies.

The Germans faced an increasing deployment of T-34 and KV-1 tanks by the Soviets, which were also employed with growing competence. German complaints consistently centered on their tank cannons and anti-tank guns’ inability to reliably defeat Soviet tanks at range. By contrast, Soviet tank guns proved highly effective against the armor of even the heaviest German tanks in service. The Germans were forced to rely on heavy artillery or the temporarily attached 88 mm Flak guns in a direct-fire role. This culminated in a Hitler decree ordering that all formations on the Eastern Front be equipped with Flak 88 guns. The T-34 was one of the few pieces of equipment that the Germans feared in 1941, though it appears likely that KV-1 tanks were often misidentified as T-34s in German reports. Soviet artillery would become feared by the Germans; however, in 1941, Soviet ranging and coordination of its fire were poor, heavily restricting the effectiveness of Soviet artillery at this point. 

In Ukraine, the first battle of Kharkiv began on the 22nd, as the forward defenses of the city were attacked by the 57th Infantry and the 101st Jäger divisions. The attack occurred despite Hitler’s prohibition against directly assaulting Soviet cities. The Germans were so close to Kharkiv and desperately sought the shelter it provided, in addition to the rail links flowing through the city. Several German formations would make random attacks just to capture a nearby village. They hoped this would afford them shelter from the cold and night but often Soviet forces ensured to destroy as much shelter as possible before retreating. The assault on the city itself commenced the following day. Its start was delayed by mud that slowed the deployment of artillery and anti-tank guns. By the 24th, Kharkiv had fallen into German hands. The city was lightly defended by only the 216th Rifle Division, which was sacrificed to buy time for the 38th Army to fall back. The 216th rifle division had also been recently reformed after being destroyed during the Uman pocket. Therefore, it received no supporting action. The Soviets had no reason to defend the city, its industry, including the large T-34 plant, had already been evacuated.

The 6th Army’s objective had been to reach Kursk and Voronezh, linking up with the Second Army, while the 17th Army was to continue toward Stalingrad. However, on the 22nd this plan was updated. The 6th Army was now tasked with capturing Belgorod to secure rail connections, and the 17th Army with establishing a bridgehead at Izyum. Both armies were then to halt to collect supplies for the winter, an operation estimated to take three weeks. Only after achieving sufficient supplies were they to return to their previous objectives, advancing along rail connections where possible.

The First Panzer Army remained mostly static for the week due to extreme fuel shortages and defending attacks from the 9th Army. The 9th Army was attempting to buy time for the new 56th Army, which fielded six rifle divisions and six cavalry divisions that were still assembling and being transported to Rostov. Manstein received new orders to capture Tuapse and Krasnodar, but first he had to break through the neck of the peninsula. A breach existed in the Soviet defences north of Inshin, but his infantry lacked the speed to truly exploit it before more soviet forces arrived. Mainstein pressed for a mobile division to be allocated to his command, but Kleist refused on the grounds of having sufficient fuel to make the transfer and also make his push to Rostov. He also claimed such a transfer would weaken his forces too much to capture the city. Essentially this forced Hitler to determine if Rostov or Crimea was the priority for forces in the South. Rostov would be chosen as the priority on the 26th. The fighting over the week was so fierce that, on the 25th, Hausen claimed his 54th Army Corps was combat-ineffective; this claim was rejected by Manstein. The arrival of promised Luftwaffe support significantly helped protect ground forces from Soviet air attacks and hinder Soviet defensive efforts. Six fighter groups, three dive-bomber groups, and two Italian fighter groups arrived in Ukraine. These air units were split between the Crimea and Rostov sectors while also providing fighter cover for the 17th and 6th Armies. This week also saw the commander of the Soviet 51st Army, Kuznetsov, replaced by Batov due to poor initial deployment of forces. Vice Admiral Levchenko was placed in overall command of the peninsula to coordinate between the 51st Army and the Independent Coastal Army, which had arrived from Odessa.

German offensives across the Soviet Union had stalled again. If the USSR managed to survive the year, longer-term factors would begin to take effect. An October study by General Georg Thomas, head of the German War Economy Office, suggested that the USSR was not as close to economic collapse as previously thought. Furthermore, American war industry was outstripping German production, which theoretically could be directed to the UK and/or the USSR in its entirety, given the United States’ wartime neutrality-ending stance and eventual Lend-Lease commitments. It was projected that the United States would produce approximately 4,700 combat aircraft, 2,600 armored fighting vehicles, and more than 1,600 artillery pieces in the eight months between October 1941 and May 1942. This output was greater than the entire annual German production at that time. The full details of Allied aid to the USSR were complex enough to warrant a dedicated future analysis. By October, the First Protocol had been signed between the UK, USA, and USSR, promising roughly 400 planes and 500 tanks per month, along with a range of raw materials and other weaponry, though actual deliveries would fall short of these figures. The British had already dispatched two convoys to the USSR prior to the agreement; the second convoy had brought 140 tanks, 100 Hurricane fighters, and 200 universal carriers. These were the Valentine and Matilda models. The Matilda would not be too popular with the Soviets but the Valentine would become loved as a scout tank over time. The Soviets also criticized the low caliber guns on both British models and their relatively poor cross country speed. However these tanks were still capable of matching the fielded German tanks and the Soviets were in desperate need for more tanks. Overall 466 British tanks would be delivered over 1941. Additionally, Britain had begun sharing information from ULTRA intercepts with the Soviet Union. Ultra was the British codename for the signal interception and decryption work done at Bletchley Park  However, suspicions in Moscow that the British were willing to fight to the last drop of Soviet blood had begun to surface. This situation had been fueled by the apparent reluctance of the British to actively engage the Germans on the ground in Europe or to send troops into the USSR, while they were nonetheless willing to replace Soviet garrisons in occupied Iran. The fact that sending aid to the USSR was severely hindering British rearmament after their own disasters in 1940 and 1941 was overlooked.Accusations of such strained the British-Soviet relationship, recalling Soviet support for Nazi Germany against the United Kingdom months earlier. While these tensions and other factors placed strain on the alliance, they were not sufficient to fracture it, as both sides recognized their mutual need.

The USSR held a distinctly stronger industrial position than the Germans. For example, the Soviet Union produced over 500 tanks in October, compared with the German output of 387 tanks. The vast majority of Soviet tank production had already shifted to the KV-1, T-34, and T-60 models, and in the last quarter of 1941 alone these three lines accounted for a surge of output: 441 KV-1s, 765 T-34s, and 1,388 T-60s. This shift occurred despite the upheaval caused by evacuating a significant portion of Soviet industry beyond the Urals. 

German production priorities had already shifted away from the Army, and it would take months or even years to reverse that shift. Worse for Germany, there was growing concern about the onset of hyperinflation once more. Additionally, crude oil shipments from Romania declined from 375,000 tonnes to 253,000 tonnes during October. This drop mattered greatly because the naval and air war against the Western Allies was consuming substantial amounts of fuel oil and aviation gasoline. The USSR was primarily engaged in a land and air war against the European Axis and, in theory, could dedicate all of its war production to this single conflict. Germany, by contrast, found itself fighting on multiple fronts: a land war against the USSR and, to some extent, the Commonwealth in Africa, while also waging an air and naval war against the Commonwealth and contending with broader resource and industrial pressures. This meant Germany faced intensified demands on its industrial base to sustain operations across Europe, North Africa, and the Atlantic, whereas the USSR could, in principle, concentrate its industrial mobilization on the European Axis front. The result was different production and logistics dynamics for each side, with the USSR able to channel more of its output toward armored, infantry, and airpower suitable for the Eastern Front, while Germany had to balance expansion, occupation administration, and long supply lines across multiple theaters. The Germans increasingly desired the Caucasus oil fields to offset their limited access to oil. This economic strain would contribute to discussions about using Soviet POWs as slave labor.

I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go 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 after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me.

The October 1941 front near Moscow lay in mud and attrition as Germans pressed toward Tikhvin and Moscow while Soviets patched defenses. The German advance, hampered by flooding, fuel shortages, and relentless Soviet counterattacks, stretched logistics and slowed progress; Beowulf operations in the Baltic fizzled under Soviet resistance. By month’s end, German forces faced supply crises, fuel shortages, and mounting casualties, prompting partial redeployments and even discussions of slowing or halting offensives.

Eastern Front #20 The Tikhvin Offensive

Last time we spoke about the continued drive towards Moscow. In the autumn of 1941, a winter-thin road stretched from Leningrad to Moscow, watched by two vast armies. On one side, shells and steel; on the other, stoic resolve. Mud, Rasputitsa, dragged wheels and tested men as much as enemy fire. The Germans pressed from the Ukrainian plains, chasing a swift triumph, while Zhukov’s Soviets rebuilt lines and held a stubborn defense around the capital. Cities along the road buckled under pressure, yet the Red Army stood shoulder to shoulder with civilians, brick by brick staving off encirclement. Bryansk and Vyazma glowed with brutal fights; yet the Germans found no easy path. The Red Army’s manpower, once underestimated, surged back with veterans teaching newcomers, even as many units forming in the field faced shortages and fatigue. Kalinin became a crucible: tanks clashed with captured bridges and muddy streets, as both sides paid a heavy toll. Stalin’s pressure and Zhukov’s improvisation produced new fronts and counter-strokes, transforming despair into a stubborn, almost defiant, endurance. The Germans, starving for fuel and momentum, slipped into the mud that slowed their advance to a crawl. By month’s end, Moscow loomed but could not be seized in the teeth of relentless Russian resilience.

This episode is the Tikhvin Offensive

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. 

With Vyazma crushed, Army Group Centre pivots toward Moscow, while Army Group South presses on to seize Ukraine’s industry and fuel. Yet weather grows harsher and resistance thickens as Typhoon and the Rasputitsa grind the advance to a halt; a northern offensive opens up, panzers surging toward Tikhvin and the last supply route to the besieged Leningrad. Between October 16th to the 20th, 1941, finds the Germans racing to win before the Russian winter takes hold. The disaster of Vyazma and Bryansk forces STAVKA to rebuild in front of Moscow, a rebuilding that comes at the expense of other fronts. The 4th Army is reduced to three rifle divisions, one cavalry division, and a lone tank battalion, stretched over fifty kilometers, with its only reserve a single rifle regiment. All of the 4th Army’s formations are seriously understrength. Likewise, the 52nd Army is trimmed to two rifle divisions, exhausted and depleted, supported only by four artillery regiments and an anti‑tank regiment, but with no reserve frontline formations, leaving the 52nd with the daunting task of covering an eighty‑kilometer front with minimal backing.

In nine inches of early-morning snow on the sixteenth, the 21st and 126th Infantry divisions surged across the Volkhov, pressing against the surprised, thinly stretched, undermanned 288th and 267th rifle divisions. Behind them, the 8th and 12th Panzer divisions moved with the 20th Motorised, carving a path through the white. Four days of brutal fighting pushed the 288th and 267th eastward, widening a breach that exposed the southern flank of the 292nd Division and left it to be shattered by a flanking hammer. With reserves nearly non-existent, the assault ripped a massive hole in the Soviet front between the 4th and 52nd Armies. Soviet reconnaissance again failed to warn of the attack. Again, a thinly held frontline buckled at a weak point under a concentrated push. Again, there was no second defensive line to blunt the break, and no reserves able to counter the rush. The attack’s principal aim was Tikhvin and the rail link between Moscow and Lake Ladoga, the last lifeline to Leningrad, a city that required roughly 1,000 tonnes of supplies daily even under rationing. Supplies were transferred over Lake Ladoga by slow moving barges which came under frequent air attack. The same route carried the equipment and materiel produced in the remaining Leningrad factories to the broader Red Army.

The region was dominated by swamps, lakes, and forests, a landscape that dictated every step of the advance. Dirt roads dissolved into the mud of Rasputitsa, rain and thaw turning passable routes into treacherous ribbons, while corduroy roads had to be laid down just to keep some wheels turning. This environmental grip didn’t merely slow movement; it funneled the fighting into the patchwork of settlements and hamlets scattered across these high ground pockets. Elevated and dry, these spots offered strategic vantage points that controlled the surrounding routes, becoming indispensable nodes for maneuver and supply. Night after night, they offered respite from the cold, sheltering troops and equipment from the bitter wind as winter pressed in.

Sleeping in the open had once been a possibility in the brief warmth of summer, but as the temperatures plummet, bivouacs become lethal. Some Germans share the shelter with their regular hosts, yet many push the inhabitants aside with cold indifference, leaving people to face the night alone and exposed. From Wehrmacht soldier Wilhelm Pruller’s diary  “You should see the act the civilians put on when we make it clear to them that we intend to use their sties to sleep in. A weeping and yelling begins, as if their throats were being cut, until we chuck them out. Whether young or old, man or wife, they stand in their rags and tatters on the doorstep and can’t be persuaded to go … When we finally threaten them at pistol point, they disappear.” Franz Frisch recalled: “When the first snows fell in early October, I could only think of the fate of Napoleon.” Likewise, Kurt Meissner noted that “the big drop in temperature affected men and vehicles; we had no warm clothing and suffered accordingly … We began to think of Napoleon’s Grande Armée in the previous century.” Léon Degrelle described the harmful effects of the clinging mud before concluding: “we couldn’t avoid thinking about the hundreds of thousands of men, committed to the depths of Russia, who were going to try what Napoleon had not dared to try: to maintain themselves in spite of everything in the midst of the steppes, with the enemy in front of them, the desert to their backs [and] the snow falling from the sky.” Even Blumentritt, Kluge’s chief of staff, looked on nervously as the difficulties mounted alongside the historical parallels. Writing of October 1941 Blumentritt noted after the war: “And now the ghosts of the Grand Army and the memory of Napoleon’s fate began to haunt our dreams … Comparisons with 1812 multiplied.” 

The civilians’ misery deepens as winter’s chill tightens its grip: soldiers steal winter clothing to fill official gaps or torment occupants for sport, adding cruelty to the daily hardships. For months, the German Army has pressed deeper into the land, living off the land itself, snatching food and village stores with the parabolic efficiency of locusts, while brittle logistics fail to keep troops supplied. In the pale light of dawn and the long black nights, countless Soviet civilians will perish from exposure, random killings, or famine before the season’s end. Captain Hans von Luck, who served as part of the 7th Panzer Division’s command staff noted the army was stealing warm Russian sheepskins to equip their motorcyclists and grenadiers, while the plight of Russian civilians, what they wore, if anything at all, remained unrecorded. Not only were peasant homes looted for winter apparel, but Soviet POW columns also lost boots, coats, and any item of value. One account describes a prisoner transport in which the first thirty to forty men were nearly naked and pressed together for warmth during the march. Max Landowski reported that even a Russian deserter faced no mercy: upon arrival, our soldiers stripped him, hat, boots, coat, until the man stood in his underpants, and he was shot because, as Landowski noted, “The Russian couldn’t have walked like that, he would have frozen to death.” Dead Soviet soldiers became a source of supply as well. Gottlob Bidermann recalled insulating their bunker with overcoats stripped from enemy dead, including thick, brown flannel gloves. Another soldier, Max Kuhnert, dressed almost entirely in Russian clothing, a thick quilted coat and fur cap, that he thought made him look “odd,” yet kept him warm. However, that appearance could be fatal, for a post-war study notes that wearers were often mistaken for the enemy and fired upon by friendly troops.

Privation and brutality extended beyond the civilian population to the Prisoner of War camps themselves. Germany reported that 673,098 Soviet soldiers were captured at Bryansk and Vyazma, compelled to march under brutal conditions toward rear camps along corridors already strewn with the bodies of those who had perished from hunger, exhaustion, or beatings. Stragglers were often shot out of hand, and the rail transports that carried them were packed so densely that many suffocated before reaching their destination. Like civilians, POWs were robbed of their possessions and clothing, leaving them exposed to the cold and the elements. Wearing Soviet uniforms and clothes led to several instances of friendly fire due to misrecognition. The overcrowded camps became incubators of disease, hunger, and cold, killing thousands each week, with more than two million souls doomed to die in these camps by February 1942.

On the 20th, STAVKA issued an order that the 4th Army and the 52nd Army must seal the breach the new offensive had opened. In practice, the directive struck a discordant note: those two formations were barely clinging to their own survival, stripped of reserves and unable to muster any meaningful offensive action. Nearby, additional Soviet forces stood in the region under a different banner, the 54th Army. Its composition was formidable by scale and scope: six rifle divisions, one tank division, one mountain rifle division, two tank brigades, and two artillery regiments, together accounting for roughly 70 percent of the Soviet strength between Lake Ladoga and Lake Ilmen. Yet rather than pivot to meet the German push toward Tikhvin, these forces were directed to pursue their own plan: preparations for an offensive aimed at Siniavino. The assault began on the morning of the 20th, but it yielded only token gains against dug-in German infantry, their positions bolstered by the stability of shelter and the brutal discipline of the frontline. Despite many elements needing to conduct river crossing none of the Soviet forces were prepared for such operations. They also found it extremely difficult to get the heavy KV-1 tanks across rivers. 

By mid-October, Vyazma’s battle was officially deemed finished, and German forces pressed on toward Moscow. The narrative among the Wehrmacht’s leadership painted a picture of an almost imminent victory, with many senior commanders convinced that the war would be decided soon, indeed, that victory would arrive by October 18. One officer somehow took the rejection of their battalion’s request for winter gear as proof that the war was nearly won.  In that mood, claims circulated that after this point the German Army was instructed not to make further urgent requests for supplies of this kind, extending beyond clothing to winter necessities such as antifreeze and other cold-weather gear. The rising realities of cold, knee-deep mud, and deteriorating conditions were effectively ignored or downplayed in the propaganda and planning. Joseph Goebbels stood apart from the feverish enthusiasm, nearly alone in his misgivings. He lamented how the term “decision of the war” had permeated broadcasts, noting that the public’s interpretation was closer to an “ending of the war” than a decisive turning point. He understood that continued warfare would erode public support and damage the prestige of the Nazi state. Concurrently, an increasing number of Germans began turning to foreign radio broadcasts, seeking perspectives beyond official channels.  In Goebel's 13th October diary entry it stated “‘All that lay between us and the capital was the so-called Moscow Defensive Position. We had no reason to believe that this would prove a particularly difficult nut to crack.”

Free from their duties at Vyazma, the 46th Panzer Corps pressed on toward Moscow, yet contact with the enemy remained elusive and the pace stubbornly slow, at best about 25 kilometers a day. The reasons were practical and harsh: a lack of up-to-date maps, muddy roads, and few suitable bridges to carry tank traffic. Fuel shortages driven by the muddy slog forced the corps to prune its fleet, discarding unnecessary or unreliable vehicles. The 11th Panzer Division faced a similar squeeze, compelled to abandon portions of its Panzer regiment to ensure enough fuel for the leading battlegroup. Fuel constraints would shadow the Moscow advance as well. Then, in an abrupt turn, the weather warmed on the 17th and 18th, only to worsen the situation: mud thickened into a watery quagmire, amplified by heavy rain. Movement ground to a near standstill for days, as even the most straightforward advances became impossible. War diary of 46th Panzer Corp “The corps has serious concerns about the achievement [of its orders] because after careful study of the maps the fact becomes clear that for this operation there is only one single road available. The corps will be forced to advance with three divisions on this one road, which from experience and the time of year will be bad. As a result the corps will not be able to adequately utilise its striking power, but will always only be able to commit weak spearheads. Furthermore, the supply convoys will move only with great difficulty.” One division commander contrasted the typical march discipline of a Panzer Division, normally spreading over 40 kilometers with his own unit’s extraordinary march footprint, extending roughly 300 kilometers.

Advances were made despite the dire conditions. The SS Das Reich, aided by elements of the 40th Panzer Corps, managed to seize Mozhaisk on 18 October in a five-day battle. A report from Obersturmführer Günther Heysing detailed what the soldiers of Das Reich faced: “built-in rows of electrically ignited flamethrowers, all sorts of tank obstacles, boggy streams, minefields, wire-entanglements, bunker systems, steep slopes and concealed forest positions.” He added that the Soviet defense was equally formidable, with “concentrated defensive fire from artillery, flak, anti-tank guns, mortars, rockets and machine guns.” On 14 October, Hausser, commanding Das Reich, was wounded and replaced by Oberführer Wilhelm Bittrich. At that moment, Fischer’s 10th Panzer Division was engaging Soviet positions a few kilometers north on the historic Borodino battlefield—the site where Napoleon faced the Russians on 7 September 1812, in one of the bloodiest confrontations of the era. A Das Reich report to the SS headquarters in Berlin summarized the situation: “a rest of several days, where possible in warm and heated billets, is essential for the success of any new attack.” The 57th Panzer Corps had not been at Vyazma, but its progress had been so throttled that it reached the Mozhaisk line only on the 16th. The 20th Panzer Division, meanwhile, could muster only 34 tanks in operation, awaiting the arrival of the 19th Panzer. Even then, two days of fighting and the loss of another 30 tanks were required to take Maloiaroslavets. The pace of the panzers slowed so much that the regular infantry of the 12th and 13th Corps could finally reach the Mozhaisk defense line on the 10th at Kaluga, though those infantry divisions were already depleted. At Detchino, the 98th Infantry’s battalion had fallen to 190 men in combat strength after suffering 100 casualties and the loss of five company commanders during the town’s capture on the 19th.

Similar to the German advance to Kalinin, the Moscow drive was wasting its strength from within, an outcome of dreadful logistics that forced the panzers to cannibalize themselves just to keep fighting. Vehicles were abandoned due to a lack of spare parts for minor repairs, insufficient fuel to keep them moving, or being stuck in mud that could not be recovered. The Soviets also targeted key arteries to cripple movement. On the Moscow–Minsk highway, one of the few hard-surfaced routes in the area, multiple delay-cratering charges detonated daily, steadily hampering traffic and supplies. The already-depleted 5th Infantry Division could not be retrained into a Jäger division and was instead retasked, on the 19th, to the repair and rebuilding of the highway. Its commander earned the moniker “Motorway Dictator” for his role in this crucial, ongoing effort to restore mobility despite ongoing pressure. The pressures of this deteriorating supply chain reduced spearheads to weaker formations that had to resort to simpler, less sophisticated tactics suited to mud and scarcities. Instead of rapid maneuvers around flanks, the operations devolved into slow, grinding assaults, and even when a breakthrough occurred, it came at the cost of far higher casualties. Compounding the situation, unlike earlier offensives, the Red Army had built multiple layered defenses in front of Moscow. Each frontal assault merely invited another, with no decisive breakthroughs or rapid advances on the horizon.

More infantry were required to press the assault, but it would take time for recruits to march up from the Vyazma battlefield. Even abandoning heavy artillery, the infantry could not cover more than about 20 kilometers per day. Despite this accumulating evidence, OKH still expected Zhukov’s defenders to be rapidly swept away. In contrast, OKW spent its energies debating the scope of the encirclement and the creation of an exclusion zone around Moscow. Meanwhile, Halder at OKH entertained plans for encircling all forces north of Army Group Centre and establishing a line along the Vologda region before winter closed in. The 2nd Airfleet had fallen to about 269 sorties per day, a dramatic drop from the over 1,000 sorties seen at the start of the month as weather worsened. The Luftwaffe was operating from the most basic airfields with scant infrastructure to sustain operations, leaving the VVS with air superiority on many days across wide sections of the front. Air strikes against slow-moving or even static targets became a priority for the Soviet air force, compounding the attrition already inflicted by mud and strained logistics. One segment on the Road to Kalinin had over 1,000 bogged down in the mud. It should be noted that despite later German claims the Raspitisa was not unusually severe but actually below average in terms of rainfall. 

The fighting around Kalinin intensified as the small battlegroups from 1st Panzer, the 36th Motorised, and Lehrbrigade 900 were pressed into heavy house-to-house combat in the city. On the 16th, Bock subordinated Panzer Group 3 to the 9th Army, acknowledging that the Panzer Group was bogged down in a major battle and again reliant on the Infantry Army for support. That same day, Reinhardt ordered the 1st Panzer and Lehrbrigade 900 to seize all available fuel and ammunition and push to Torzhok. The 36th Motorised was tasked with defending the city against continuous assaults. Yet the very next day, the offensive stalled at Mednoye after advancing 30 kilometers. Lehrbrigade 900, whose ammo was nearly spent, could muster only 34 operational tanks. Ahead of them, the formidable Operational Group Vatutin pressed forward, with additional Soviet forces attempting to cut off the division from its route back to Kalinin. The division was forced to retreat to Kalinin, but Halder insisted that the city be held as Soviet forces closed in from the North, East, and Southwest.

Zhukov moved Konev north in response to the German capture of Kalinin. On the 17th, Konev’s command was reorganized into the Kalinin Front and was assigned the new 22nd, 29th, and 30th Armies. In addition, Operational Group Vatutin and the 31st Army were subordinated to his command. The entire Front maneuvered around Kalinin, launching continual assaults against the Germans entrenched there. By the 20th, Kalinin was nearly encircled, leaving only a small corridor to the southwest. Some assaults even penetrated into the city before being repelled. The pressure was intense, with Bock describing Kalinin as a bleeding wound that would require strong infantry to seal. In response, the 56th Panzer Corps and three Infantry Corps were dispatched north to bolster the 41st Panzer Corps in the Kalinin sector.

The logistical situation around Kalinin deteriorated to the point where an improvised airfield was quickly established to fly in supplies, even though it sat on the front line. Hans Rudel, one of the German pilots flying from the Kalinin airfield “The Soviets are attacking the airfield with tanks and infantry, and are less than a mile away. A thin screen of our own infantry protects our perimeter; the steel monsters may be upon us at any moment. We Stukas are a Godsend to the ground troops defending the position … The ground personnel are able to follow every phase of the battle. We are well on the mark, for everybody realizes that unless the tanks are put out of action we have had it.” Still, the airfield could only deliver about 30 to 50 cubic metres of fuel per day, while a single Panzer division typically required about 220 cubic metres daily. The nearest railhead was at Sychevka, more than 150 km away, and it took several days for supply trucks to cover the distance. Panzer Group 3 received only about 200 tons of supplies per day from this railhead—insufficient to meet their daily needs even if all of it reached the front. Supplying lines frequently traversed sectors of the front under constant attack, compounding the shortages. Behind the lines, partisan activity was rampant; the Chief of Staff of the 9th Army was nearly assassinated in one such attack. Convoy protection was tightened around Kalinin, with heavy guards assigned to supply runs. In a desperate move, Panzer Group 3 ordered trucks to divert to Smolensk for extra supplies, but this yielded only a small net gain and caused enormous wear on the vehicle fleet. Trucks need fuel to travel and over such a large distance will consume the majority of their carried fuel supplies themselves. 

The Bryansk front began to unravel as the northern Bryansk pocket was officially eliminated by the 2nd Army on the 17th, and the southern pocket was closed by the 2nd Panzer Army on the 18th. Guderian’s Army had suffered approximately 4,300 losses in the first 20 days of October. This amounted to 45,643 casualties since the start of the invasion. The Bryansk front’s death grip, though draining, tied down the Second Army and the Second Panzer Army for at least 16 days. While Soviet losses were heavy, they bought time for the Soviets to establish new defenses and to bring fresh troops toward Moscow. The 4th Division became bottled up at Mtsensk due to relentless Soviet attacks; by the 20th, it held only 46 tanks and 18% of its ammunition. In several respects, the division’s fighting power resembled that of a regiment more than a division. Nevertheless, OKH and Guderian still expected to seize Tula, around 120 kilometers to the north. The division’s only prospect lay in being reinforced by divisions redirected from the Bryansk encirclement.

The 9th Panzer led the 48th Corps’ push toward Kursk but had stalled at Dmitriev-Lgovskiy. By the 20th, its commander was openly protesting orders to attack, citing unguarded flanks, ruined roads, and the near-total depletion of combat power. Only 7 tanks remained operational, and in one motorised infantry regiment, merely 51 of 287 trucks were functional. In a stark display of risk assessment, OKH contemplated ordering the battered 48th Corps to advance more than 200 kilometers east to seize Voronezh, though such orders were not yet finalized. The four infantry corps of Guderian’s Army were creeping forward at about 1 kilometer per hour as horses and heavy wagons sank into the mud. Infantry casualties of illness surged compared with the mobile divisions, and soldiers trudged through cold, waterlogged ground. Yet the Eastern Army’s policies kept these troops on the front; only severe illness could excuse a soldier from duty. On the 18th of October soldier Harald Henry sent a letter home stating“ Our company … went into the woods until we were over our knees in snow, which filled our boots. Across frozen marshes that broke open so that icy water ran into our boots. My gloves were so wet that I could not bear them any longer. I wound a towel around my ruined hands … My face was contorted from tears, but I was already in a sort of trance. I stamped forward with closed eyes, mumbled senseless words and thought that I was experiencing everything only in a sleep as a dream. It was all like madness … Agony without end … We are all more or less sick.”

These conditions were also killing the German horses. Many horses continued wearing summer shoes, contributing to frequent slips and leg fractures. Others died from sheer exhaustion after months of constant campaigning. Even for the survivors, forage was scarce, and many became emaciated. By November, only about 65% of the horse-drawn transposition remained in the infantry divisions across the Eastern Front, even after replacement horses were sent. Panzer Group 3 was losing about 1,000 horses per day. The 53rd Army Corps had already left half of its horses behind in Bryansk due to illness and exhaustion. Local Panje horses were attempted as replacements, but they were significantly smaller and weaker, unable to move the 105 mm or 150 mm artillery pieces. In the muddy conditions, the requirement for draft horses to move each artillery piece doubled, making it nearly impossible to relocate the heavy 150mm guns. Consequently, many divisions chose to leave their heavier guns behind to be recovered when the weather improved, bringing forward only a small subset of their lighter artillery pieces.They also could not haul the standard steel wagons used to transport ammunition and equipment for the infantry. As a result, lighter, smaller wagons had to be employed, drastically reducing logistical capacity. This served as a temporary stopgap but could not substitute for proper artillery and supply trains.

To worsen the situation, even though the Bryansk pocket had been officially closed, active Red Army groups and partisans remained dispersed, and supply columns came under constant attack, including by Soviet tanks that had been bypassed earlier. The most damaging activity was the destruction of 33 bridges, creating a substantial reconstruction burden. Even by the 20th, several divisions remained tied down dealing with remnants of Red Army forces. On the 18th, OKH assigned new objectives for Army Group South. The 1st Panzer Army was ordered to take Rostov and then push toward the area between Voroshilovgrad and Stalingrad. The 17th Army was tasked with clearing the area west of the Don and securing the northern flank of the 1st Panzer Army by capturing Stalingrad. The 6th Army received orders to advance to a line from Kharkiv to Novaya Kalitva and then toward Voronezh. The ongoing infighting between OKH and Hitler continued. OKH favored enveloping the Kharkiv defenders to the west of the city with minimal forces, while Hitler insisted on a full encirclement and destruction. Regardless of the approach, the retreating Soviet 38th Army outpaced the German units and eluded attempts to annihilate it. By the 21st, the Germans had closed to within 6 kilometers of the city, and the 55th Infantry Corps was tasked with capturing it.

After two months of besieging the city and suffering 98,000 casualties, the Romanians finally occupied Odessa on the 17th October, following the defenders’ evacuation to bolster Crimea’s defenses. The Romanians failed to detect the evacuation in time to impede it effectively. Almost the entire Coastal Army defending Odessa managed to withdraw, though they were forced to abandon much of their heavy equipment due to shipping constraints. In total, about 121,000 troops evacuated, along with roughly 20,000 tonnes of ammunition, 400 artillery pieces, and over a thousand trucks. The 12 divisions that had taken part absorbed an 80% casualty rate. The Soviet withdrawal from Odessa left Crimea defenders with numbers nearly double Manstein’s 11th Army. Nevertheless, the assault began early on the 18th. Three divisions of the 54th Infantry Corps broke through across the Ishun line. The local lakes channelled these assaults into three narrow corridors. Also as the ground was barely above sea level, most rapidly made fighting positions ended up filling up with salt water.

German artillery, supported by Stuka dive-bombers, sought to suppress the significant Soviet artillery assets. Initial gains on the eastern flank soon stalled as Soviet reinforcements arrived, prompting Manstein to shift focus to the western sectors of the defenses. The substantial Soviet air presence forced the Luftwaffe to redeploy many Air Groups from the 4th Air Corps to Crimea, reducing air support for other German forces in Ukraine. By the 19th, German forces had pierced the neck of land north of Inshin. Yet casualties mounted due to sustained frontal assaults against multiple prepared layers of defense. By the 20th, Manstein was begging for reinforcements, specifically panzer formations. He would receive only the German divisions already engaged in the Odessa siege, and they would need time to march to Crimea.

1st Panzer Army remained short of its objectives, but limited fuel supplies prevented any nonessential troop movements. The Panzer Army refused to place the Romanian 3rd Army under its command, citing coastal and rear-security considerations. The decision stemmed from a dire supply situation that could not bear any additional strain on the logistic network. The 3rd Corps even sent a memo on the 23rd warning subordinate units to be prepared to survive on their own for several days. This suspicion of approaching scarcity had been growing since a “catastrophic” assessment of supply flows on the 17th. Conditions deteriorated further over time, culminating in the Panzer Army receiving nothing on the 20th. Rundstedt judged the Army ineffective and in need of recovery time, yet OKH did not share this assessment. Pressed to act, on the 19th it ordered its corps to seize Stalino and Rostov, along with Rostov’s bridges and fuel depots, by a surprise attack. The 49th Mountain Corps would capture Stalino on the 20th, only to find the city a ruin, having been scorched-earth by the retreating Soviets. The SS Liebstandarte had already secured Taganrog on the 17th to establish a bridgehead across the Mius. There, the 3rd Panzer Corps prepared to assault Rostov, while the 14th Panzer Corps stood by in reserve to the north. This cautious arrangement reflected the reality that fuel was sufficient for only one Panzer Corps to operate at a time.

I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go 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 after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me.

In the autumn mud and Rasputitsa turned wheels to bronze, and men pressed on with stubborn grit. The Germans hoped for a swift triumph, but Zhukov’s Soviets rebuilt, brick by brick, holding the capital at a grueling pace. Kalinin burned with fighting; Bryansk and Vyazma bled; civilians shared the cold, their stories etched in frost and fear. Battles raged across forests, swamps, and rail lines destined to feed Leningrad. The Tikhvin Offensive began, and the struggle deepened.

Eastern Front #19 Mud and Blood

Last time we spoke about the accumulation of mud and continued sieges on the eastern front. In the autumn of 1941, a winter-thin road stretched from Leningrad to Moscow, watched over by two immense armies. On one side, the Germans, Panzer power blazing, hunger for a swift victory, pushed from Ukrainian plains toward a hoped-for triumph. On the other, the Soviets, led by Zhukov, then hastily recalled to defend the capital, laid brick by brick a stubborn defense, rebuilding lines and bracing for the storm. The Rasputitsa arrived like a living obstacle. Mud swallowed wheels, bridges sighed under strain, and supply lines twisted into knots. Yet the air carried more than fuel and fear; it carried a stubborn resolve. Across the front, pockets formed and dissolved in a dance of encirclement. Bryansk and Vyazma blazed with brutal fights; attempts to seal the gaps faltered as weather, logistics, and tenacious Soviet resistance frustrated even the boldest panzers. By October’s end, the battlefield wore a quiet, haunted truth: endurance, unity, and a city’s stubborn heartbeat could hold against a siege. The roads remained muddy, but hope steeled the spine of a defense that would echo through the winter to come.

This episode is Mud and Blood

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. 

 

City after city falls on the road to Moscow. Zhukov’s new defensive line has already been breached through by the panzers. From the map tables of the Wolf’s Lair, it is clear that Hitler’s army is only days from capturing the Soviet capital. Yet what the map tables cannot show is the mud. It drags men, machines, and beasts into a sucking morass that cannot be bypassed. The Red Army has endured the worst streak of defeats in military history, but they are far from defeated. Soviet soldiers stand shoulder to shoulder with Soviet civilians, willing to defend their capital with their lives. As the second week of October ended, Operation Typhoon could still be considered a success. Yet it was clear that the Red Army would not yield. Next, we approach the third week. Zhukov and Bock will again face off as time runs out on the German offensive. 

 

First I want to talk about how the Soviet Union managed to rebuild its field forces in the face of devastating losses during the early months of the campaign. On June 22, the Red Army had 303 divisions on its rolls, of which 81 were cadre formations still in the process of organization. As discussed in previous podcasts, during the early stages of Operation Barbarossa most, if not all, Red Army divisions were under strength. This weakness stemmed largely from a peace-time organizational framework, in which units were kept weaker to conserve manpower and resources. After the invasion began, Stalin mobilized the classes of 1905–1918, producing five million three hundred thousand men by July 1. By the end of the year, 3,544,000 were brought into the active army, forming 291 new divisions. These numbers dwarfed the German high command’s pre-invasion understanding of Soviet manpower capabilities. In Halder’s diary, he estimated roughly 200 divisions in the Red Army, and believed that once these were gone, there would be little left worth fighting. The falsity of this perception was evident to Halder even before August ended. By mid-October, there seemed to be no end in sight for the Wehrmacht. The reality of the Red Army’s manpower in 1941 was not captured by the Wehrmacht’s shifting opinions. They had begun the war underestimating Soviet potential, and by October this had evolved into fantastical notions of endless Red Army hordes. In truth, the Red Army was developing an effective replacement system based on creating new units from veterans and new recruits. This system had both positives and negatives. On the positive side, it allowed rest and refit for veterans and enabled them to pass on knowledge to newcomers. On the negative side, many half-formed units were rushed into battle to meet emergencies requiring immediate action. These cadre forces would be built up in the field, if they survived long enough; often they did not.

 

The Stavka had planned a large offensive from both sides of the Shisselburg Corridor to begin on October 20. The Germans had also been planning a renewed attack under Hitler’s direction to seize Tikhvin. The city was an important rail junction with significant mineral resources. There were reasonably productive bauxite mines in the area. Sources are unclear whether they were still producing as the Germans approached. The aluminum plants had been relocated earlier in the year as part of the mass industrial migration. The mining equipment had been evacuated at some point, though the timing remains uncertain. The rail head offered a convenient base for the Stavka to build up supplies and units on the exposed flanks of Army Groups North and Center. Army Group North struck first on October 16. Though under-resourced and little more than a diversion from the campaign’s main effort, the direction of this attack drew Hitler’s attention. The impact of Nazi ideology is neatly reflected in this attack. To the regime, any objective could be achieved with enough willpower. The dictator’s personal involvement was meant as both a blessing and a reminder that he embodied the ultimate expression of the Nazi will. He sought to direct the counter-offensive with limited resources, even in the face of his generals’ objections, as a demonstration of that will. The assault was supervised by him directly, though the chain of command remained nominally in place.

 

Infantrymen from the 21st and 126th Infantry Divisions crossed the Volhkov River early on the morning of the sixteenth. They trudged through several centimeters of snow, but they managed to breach the defending 4th Army in several sectors. However, two of the three divisions involved were able to pull back in good order. The withdrawal opened a substantial gap between the 52nd and 4th Armies. The Germans were prepared to exploit this, and the Red Army did not have the resources to close the gap before the 20th Motorized Infantry and 12th Panzer Divisions pushed through. They were followed by the 21st and 126th Infantry. They struggled through minefields and encountered deserters. Some of these deserters claimed to be Ukrainian. This is notable because it highlights how the Ukrainian people still held hopes of independence from the Soviet Union. Many greeted the Wehrmacht as liberators, but as time would prove, this was a mistake. The Nazi war machine regarded nothing but extermination and deportation for the Ukrainian people.

 

On the 20th, late in the evening, the 52nd Army attempted a counter-attack. Broadly speaking, this failed to accomplish much, but the next day was still miserable for the advancing Germans. They managed to push through the gap and fan out, creating a large bulge before the end of the day on the twenty-first, but it was clear that there would be no rapid exploitation. They were blocked everywhere by obstinate Red Army infantry units. The fighting for the city of Tikhvin was not easy as the weather continued to alternate between drenching rains, freezing mud, and light snow. The few tanks the Germans possessed were forced to run continuously through the night, or they would freeze up and become hard or impossible to start in the mornings. This aggravated the already short fuel situation even more. The attack began to falter, but Army Group North was not ready to call it off. They would fight well into November attempting to take Tikhvin.

Operation Typhoon continued to expand in a mimic of the reverse funnel the entire campaign was undergoing. During the morning of the 14th, the 1st Panzer Division started probing the suburbs of Kalinin. Helmut Pabst, who took part in the advance to Kalinin, wrote home in a letter: “The going’s good on the frozen roads of this country of hills crowed with villages. But fifty-five kilometres is a lot. It took us from eight in the morning till 2:00 the next day. And then we didn’t find billets. The few houses in our rest area had been allocated long before. But the boys wormed themselves into the overcrowded rooms, determined to get warm even if it meant standing.” The Northwestern Front was responsible for the city’s defense, but there was not much in place when the panzers arrived. Vatutin was still serving as the chief of staff for the Front and promptly organized a force to counterattack. Two rifle and two cavalry divisions were put together in an operational group and marched out. They were spearheaded by the 8th Tank Brigade. Before the end of the day, they had marched over two hundred and fifty kilometers to reach the city. They were too late. 

 

Early on 13 October, Krüger’s 1st Panzer Division rolled into Kalinin, having carved more than 70 kilometres from Staritsa and about 150 from Sychevka. Like Orel ten days earlier, streetcars clattered on, and the stunned inhabitants watched as German tanks threaded through their streets. The moment of surreal spectacle did not endure; soon brutal street fighting erupted, with civilians joining in. As in Mogilev, Dnepropetrovsk, and Leningrad , reaching the city was only the prelude to capture, not the end of the campaign. Only the division’s vanguard confronted the costly urban combat, while the rest stretched along the 150-kilometre route. To complicate matters, Bock had ordered Reinhardt to push on to Torzhok, highlighting Panzer Group 3’s overextension, which had proved costly at Smolensk and was unfolding again.

 

Colonel Rotmistrov wisely chose not to assault blindly into the city without support. Instead, he parked the brigade with some straggling rifle battalions northwest of the city and waited for the rest of Vatutin’s operational group. Before they arrived, the Germans decided to continue the advance. They blundered into the waiting Soviet tanks sometime around noon on the fifteenth. Rotmistrov managed to ambush the Germans from both sides. His men succeeded in knocking out three tanks and at least eight half-tracks. Overwhelmed by the ambush, the panzers managed to pull back. They regrouped and came back out looking for a fight before the day was over. After some back and forth, Rotmistrov had to hold his tankers in place for lack of fuel. The ad-hoc nature of the Red Army in this stage of the war was understandable, but it continually haunted them. Here, they had achieved a tactical victory and managed to hold back the tip of the spear. Yet, the institutional army was unable to support them, either with fuel or reinforcements. Vatutin was still on the way, but could do nothing for the 8th Tank Brigade. On the 16th, Rotmistrov was outmaneuvered. The Luftwaffe bombed his positions and then a company of German tanks managed to find his command post. He was forced to abandon several of his best tanks for lack of fuel as he retreated. The 1st Panzer was able to send elements twenty kilometers further down the road and seize a crucial bridge over the Tversta.

 

From Moscow came another attempt to take Kalinin back. The 21st Tank Brigade under Colonel Lesovoi had just arrived in the capital from the east. On the seventeenth, the brigade was about thirty kilometers to the south of the city. The man who ordered the 21st into action was Lieutenant General Fedorenko. The general did not let Vatutin know he was giving him support, and did not attempt to coordinate its actions. They started their advance on Kalinin before dawn on the seventeenth. The brigade was split into two columns, each led by an experienced tank commander. The two commanders were Major Lukin and Major Agribalova, both non-political recipients of the highest award in the country, the Hero of the Soviet Union. Both earned their decorations for combat at Khalkhin Gol in 1939. As they advanced, the first column stumbled into the 36th Infantry Division, which was moving up to support the panzers. Almost immediately the column was wrecked, and its commander was killed in a hectic retreat. The second column made it to the south side of the city before being picked off by an organized counterattack. Before the day was over, almost the entire 21st Tank Brigade was wiped out. The only notable accomplishment from this action was that several fuel trucks from the 1st Panzer Division were knocked out. There were precious few trucks on the eastern front, and even fewer tanker trucks. Losing these was a serious blow to the advance, even if they had not been intentionally targeted.

 

At this point, the Panzers were being starved for fuel and ammunition. There simply hadn’t been enough supplies stockpiled before the offensive began. Further losses to trucks and the worsening weather only made things worse. A soldier’s diary entry for 7 October reveals the stark contradiction between hopeful expectations for an end to the war and the grim reality if it did not end: “We’ve not much petrol, and none will come for quite a while because our tankers are standing way back and it’ll take them a long time to get through all the mud. Tomorrow we’re to storm the town of Dmitriev, five kilometres in front of us. Everyone is saying that this is to be our last job … It would be the best thing too for all the companies are thoroughly beaten up, and many of the vehicles are already knocked out. If it really does go on though, it would be better to create a battalion out of the regiment; then it could be properly equipped with men and machines and would be ready for battle.”

 

Rain continued to turn the barely navigable roads into little more than mud trails. Even the Luftwaffe was struggling to provide aerial resupply, due to their own supply issues and the continuing threat from VVS fighters. Aside from the disaster of the 21st Tank Brigade, Zhukov was not going to allow the Germans to walk away with Kalinin. He sent Konev with three new armies and an order to create the Kalinin Front on October 17th. Between these forces and Vatutin, Reinhardt’s 3rd Panzer Army was hard pressed. The 1st Panzer had regrouped and started to advance towards Torzhok. The Red Army was waiting. In a series of bold moves, they managed to outflank the 1st Panzer and cut them off from the city. Simultaneously Soviet forces took Kalinin under attack. Konev was fighting for his life, and maneuvered deftly with the resources he had. Konev had only been saved from the executioner’s pistol in early October by the direct intervention of Zhukov. Stalin had not been happy with the former’s poor showing in the opening moves of Operation Typhoon. Without Zhukov, there is no doubt that Konev would have been executed, as Pavlov and others had been in July. Eventually the 1st Panzer was able to get back to friendly lines, but the cost was steep. 

 

Kirchner’s 31st Panzer Corps was almost completely encircled as attacks by Konev’s Kalinin Front pressed in from all sides. Reinhardt’s other corps, Schaall’s 56th Panzer Corps, had been delayed much longer at the battle of Viaz’ma and was now struggling north on the bad roads to assist Kirchner with a battle group formed from Landgraf’s 6th Panzer Division. An even smaller advanced detachment had left for Kalinin on about 13 October and arrived in the city on 16 October. Yet the battle group’s progress was hardly much faster than that of the marching infantry. Gerhard vom Bruch, who took part in the march, wrote on 20 October: “More and more time is being lost – and we are suffering endless halts. During the day the snow thaws somewhat; in the night it freezes again, and fresh snow sweeps over the flat countryside. Was it merely an illusion that we would be able to defeat this Russian colossus in just a few months?”

 

Major-General Erhard Raus, a brigade commander in the 6th Panzer Division, wrote of the autumn conditions: “Motor vehicles broke down with clutch or motor trouble. Horses became exhausted and collapsed. Roads were littered with dead draft animals. Few tanks were serviceable. Trucks and horse-drawn wagons bogged down.” Schaall’s 56th Panzer Corps also commanded Funck’s 7th Panzer Division, which sent at least one of its grenadier regiments north to Kalinin, but the bulk of the division, including the panzer regiment, remained resting and refitting at Vyazma until 25 October. When at last the division did depart for the north it found the roads extremely hard going, and a letter from Karl Fuchs, a tanker in the division’s panzer regiment, indicates just how hard movement was. Writing on 26 October Fuchs explained: “Rain, rain, nothing but rain! The countryside looks like an endless grey swamp. The roads, at least what’s left of them, have become totally impassable. Even walking has become a feat. It is very difficult to stay on your feet – that’s how slippery it is.”

 

By 27 October an entry in the war diary of Panzer Group 3 stated that no less than 50 percent of the 25th Panzer Regiment belonging to the 7th Panzer Division had already fallen out as a result of the roads and conditions. While Schaall’s panzer corps played almost no role in the fighting at Kalinin until the very end of the month, by 20 October Kirchner’s 41st Panzer Corps had been in uninterrupted battle for seventeen days, and with Soviet pressure increasing there was no sign of relief. On 21 October Krüger’s 1st Panzer Division was still on the northern bank of the Volga some 10 kilometers from Kalinin and was fighting its way back to the city after being cut off during its abortive advance on Torzhok. The divisional war diary noted that the condition of the men gave cause for “serious worries” and that the division was attempting to get back over the Volga “without too many material losses.”

 

Yet Krüger’s division had been devastated in the fighting. On 14 October the 1st Panzer Division had seventy-nine serviceable tanks, but by 21 October that figure had shrunk to just twenty-four. Two days later it was reported that a further eight tanks had been lost, four to enemy action and four blown up to avoid capture after breaking down. At the same time the division reported having lost 765 men and 45 officers between 13 and 20 October. Losing more than 800 men in just one week was serious enough, but since 22 June 1941 the division had lost 265 officers, from a starting complement of 387 and 4,935 non-commissioned officers and men. Hans Röttiger, the chief of staff of the 41st Panzer Corps, noted: “Due to the heavy Russian pressure against the road Mednoye–Kalinin, the [1st Panzer] Division had to confine its withdrawal to a very narrow strip along the northern bank of the Volga. As a result, a great number of men and particularly materiel was lost.” The defensive perimeter around Kalinin was held by Gollnick’s 36th Motorised Infantry Division, the withdrawn remnants of Krüger’s 1st Panzer Division and Krause’s “Lehrbrigade 900”, which had also taken part in the drive to Torzhok, an advanced detachment from the 6th Panzer Division and a newly arrived advanced detachment from Major-General Stephan Rittau’s 129th Infantry Division.

 

Helmut Pabst, whose unit reached Kalinin on 23 October, wrote in a letter the following day: “Since last night we have been in Kalinin. It was a tough march, but we made it. We’re the first infantry division here … We marched up the road which stretches into this bridgehead like a long arm, without much covering on either flank. The bridgehead must be held for strategic and propaganda purposes. The road bears the stamp of war: destroyed and abandoned equipment, tattered and burnt-out houses, enormous bomb craters, the pitiful remains of men and animals.” The situation was frequently desperate, as Konev’s Kalinin Front launched relentless assaults and carried them out, according to Hans Röttiger, “without regard to casualties.” One captured Soviet officer claimed Stalin had demanded the retaking of Kalinin by 27 October or else the commanding officer, presumably Konev, would be shot. Earlier in the month Stalin had considered having Konev shot for the debacle at Viaz’ma, making such a threat not beyond the realm of possibility, but Kalinin was not retaken by the stated date and Konev was not shot. However, if true, it says much about Stalin’s method of “motivation.” By 22 October Ninth Army reported to Army Group Centre that, unless Soviet forces to the south and southeast of the city could be pushed back, Kalinin could not be held indefinitely, and certainly no further offensives could be undertaken. This, however, conflicted with Hitler’s latest thinking, which Kesselring had expressed to Bock the day before, 21 October. Not only was Hitler still envisaging an offensive from Kalinin, but rather than the 60-kilometer advance to Torzhok, which had in any case proved beyond Kirchner’s corps, the dictator was now proposing an advance to the northeast town of Bezhetsk some 110 kilometers away. Bock was flabbergasted. “We are pushed back to Kalinin; first we must hold Kalinin! I have always remarked that this will be the bloody wound of the Ninth Army.” On 23 October Bock discussed his orders for the Ninth Army with Halder at the OKH. The army group headquarters had not yet received instructions from Hitler demanding an advance towards Bezhetsk, so Bock insisted his first priority was to eliminate Soviet forces striking across the Volga and secure Kalinin from the south. Bock, however, then reiterated his desire for another offensive towards Torzhok. By 25 October Soviet attacks south of Kalinin, far from abating, were striking with renewed vigor across the Volga from the west. Bock, on the other hand, took some heart from the fact that two corps from Ninth Army, General of Engineers Otto-Wilhelm Förster’s 6th Army Corps and General of Infantry Albrecht Schubert’s 23rd Army Corpswere making some progress towards Torzhok from the south. Yet these were still some 40 kilometers from the town, and Schubert’s corps reported on the following day that even its horse-drawn vehicles were now stuck in mud up to 1 meter deep.

 

In the center of Operation Typhoon, Bock was starting to realize that he had to concentrate his dwindling combat power if he was going to take Moscow. Zhukov was still desperately scraping together a rebuilt western front, and his lines were not well established. As the battle of Vyazma was more or less concluded on the fourteenth, Vietinghoff’s 46th Panzer Corps was released from the 4th Army and told to march on the new Western Front’s defensive lines. The 11th Panzer Division was the lead element of the advance. They struggled under the triple burdens of poor supply, bad weather and stiff resistance. Still, they advanced. Zhukov had essentially abandoned everything but his main centers of resistance at Mozhaisk, Volokolamsk and Maloyaroslavets. This allowed him to concentrate his fighting strength, but allowed the Germans free rein elsewhere. By October 15th, the 10th Panzer and SS-Division Reich were prepared to launch a set piece battle at Borodino, in front of Mozhaisk. This was the location of the infamous Battle of Borodino between Napoleon and Kutuzov. That battle had been fought almost exactly 129 years prior to 1941 and had lasted a single day, costing 68,000 dead and wounded on both sides.

 

Lieutenant General Lelyushenko had prepared a defense that included the 32nd Rifle Division and the 121st Anti-Tank Regiment. This regiment was armed with 76.2mm F-22 guns. These proved excellent weapons that destroyed several German panzers in the ensuing back and forth. The 5th Army was the main defensive command, but like many other field armies, it had been severely reduced. Lelyushenko also had the 20th Tank Brigade. On October 16th, the Germans began to break through the prepared defenses of the city proper. However, just as the SS troops started to stream through the lines, the 20th Tank Brigade organized a brilliant counterattack that struck the SS men, many of whom ran in fear at the sight of the T-34’s and KV-1’s. However, on the morning of the seventeenth, the 10th Panzer concentrated all their forces and managed to break through, brushing off the Soviet counterattacks. The SS followed through and started to envelop the remaining defenders. On the 18th, Mozhaisk fell. All across the front, town after town fell to the invaders: Kaluga, Maloyaroslavets, Detschino. But with each town came a fight. Each fight drained the Wehrmacht of men and material it could not afford to lose. Infantry battalions had started Operation Barbarossa with something like 800 men. Yet by the middle of October, some battalions were down to less than two hundred. The Red Army was in worse shape in many places, but they were not trying to carry on an offensive almost two thousand kilometers from their base of operations. Zhukov had been using every minute gained from the defense of the outer positions to build yet another line. This was the true reason the Germans couldn’t win. The Red Army just refused to give up. Behind every defensive line lay another army digging trenches and preparing to fight to the death. The Germans had steamrolled dozens of positions just like this. Now they stood at the gates of Moscow, only 90 kilometers away from the city center. However, the fighting had taken its toll.

 

In the southern sector of Operation Typhoon, Guderian was struggling to wrap up the destruction of the Bryansk pocket. He had his forces split roughly in half, with one group handling the pocket and the other trying to push east. There was little progress in the push east, but the Bryansk pocket was steadily reduced, bit by bit. As the third week of October came to an end, this task was about complete. Even as this was being done, it was slowly dawning on the professional officers of the Wehrmacht that the offensive could not carry on in the torrential rains. The infantry were averaging only one kilometer per hour under forced-march conditions. One of Army Group Center’s quartermasters estimated that up to one thousand horses were dying every day under the conditions. Most of these animal casualties were from being literally worked to death. The draft horses of western and central Europe were not up to the combination of poor fodder, extremely hard work, and pitiful care. Examples abound of the poor care of the draft animals. Notably, at this time there was an absence of winter shoes for the horses. Because of this, they often lost their traction, resulting in slips and falls and preventable injuries. The situation was growing ever darker for the Wehrmacht in the east. One soldier wrote in his memoir after the war: “Tempers were high because everybody was starving and dead tired besides being soaked to the skin; and the Russian artillery kept pumping shells in our direction, which of course did not help our morale … We not only lost men and materials, even things like trucks, but most of all we lost a great deal of hope of ever getting out of such a darned mess.” Like the soldiers and their horses, Operation Typhoon was dying in the mud of late October.

 

In Army Group South’s area of operations things were effectively being divided into two distinct areas of operations. The first was the main body of troops in Ukraine. The second was the 11th Army in Crimea under Manstein. Originally, he was to split his army in two and support the 1st Panzer Army in a drive on Rostov while the other half of his troops took Crimea. After the mess of the first weeks of October, this was changed. Kleist would drive on Rostov alone, while Manstein attacked Crimea with the whole of his army. This gave him a free hand to do what he wanted, but it ensured that Manstein was effectively on his own during the Crimean campaign. He would have to make do with what he had plus some reinforcements. After Kleist had taken Melitopol and finished the Battle of the Sea of Azov, Manstein was able to focus entirely on his task. However, the time taken to deal with the distraction around Melitopol had given the Soviets a respite. They used it to their full advantage. The 11th Army had to frontal-ally assault well-prepared positions to make it across the isthmus. They had broken through once, but couldn’t exploit it and had to pull back. Now they were ready for another push. Ishun lay at the bottom of the isthmus connecting Crimea to the mainland. The area around the town is dotted with large lakes and narrow strips of dry land. On august 18th, Manstein attacked. Three divisions formed his front. The 73rd Infantry Division attacked Ishun while the 46th and 22nd Infantry attacked elsewhere along the line. The first Soviet positions were quickly overran, but well-placed artillery slowed the attackers down as they attempted to cross a canal covered in barbed wire and mines.

 

The defending 51st Army did not have the depth of defenses behind these positions to absorb the penetration. One of their best strong points was a bromide plant that had been fortified by soldiers of the 530th Rifle Regiment.  As the 46th Infantry Division attacked, they came under fire from prepared machine-gun nests. After they were pushed back, the Germans reorganized and tried again; this time they managed to take the plant. The Soviets counterattacked and regained control late in the afternoon of the eighteenth. Tactical battles like the Krasnoperekopsk Bromide Plant demonstrated that on the tactical level, the Red Army was proving its ability to fight the Germans to a standstill, even after months of devastating defeats and crippling loss of organization. This flies in the face of established narratives that the Germans were always better soldiers at the small unit level and could outfight Soviet units in every case. At 06:15 on the morning of the nineteenth, the Germans brought the full force of their combined arms team on the Soviets. The 170th Infantry Regiment, supported by close air support and assault guns, attacked the plant and the adjacent village. By noon, they had driven the defenders back and were converging on Ishun. The 51st Army brought up some men to reinforce the area, but the Germans countered with the 213th Infantry Regiment. By nightfall, Ishun was in German hands. During the remainder of the week, the German infantry conducted cleanup operations and secured a bridgehead across the Chatyrlyk River south of Ishun. Meanwhile, in the mainland of Ukraine, Kleist was continuing his drive toward Rostov. Like everywhere else on the front, he was struggling to supply his men. Still, on the 17th, two SS divisions reached the outskirts of Taganrog. After some street fighting, the city was secured. The Soviet 9th Army was pushed back. Notably, there was no encirclement, and the Soviets retreated in reasonably good order. This was vital to Stavka plans if they were ever to pull off a determined counter-offensive in the south. Everywhere in Ukraine after Melitopol had fallen had amounted to little more than delaying operations, but they had to be carried out.

 

I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go 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 after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me.

 

In the autumn wind, mud and steel wrestled for Moscow. On the eastern front, Zhukov’s stubborn lines held fast as German panzer suns blazed toward the capital. Across the map, soldiers rebuilt and endured: divisions reformed from veterans and recruits, while logistics starved and fuel ran thin. Kalinin flickered with flashes of success and failure as encircling moves collapsed under Russian resilience. The wheel turned with each retreat and counterattack, roads turning to rivers of mud. Yet through frost and fear, unity endured: cities defended, civilians stood shoulder to shoulder with soldiers, and the dream of Moscow persisted. Mud and Blood, forever remembered.

 

Eastern Front #18 Mud and Sieges

Last time we spoke about the beginning of winter. In October 1941, two vast armies stood toe-to-toe on a winter-thin road toward Moscow. On one side, the Wehrmacht, hungry for a swift triumph, reshaped its backbone: Panzer Groups now Panzer Armies, roaring across Ukrainian and Russian plains with tanks as headlines. On the other, the Red army, led by Zhukov who refused to yield, braided defense lines from Leningrad to Moscow and rebuilt the Mozhaisk line with stubborn grit. The air smelled of fuel and fear as Operation Typhoon began. The Germans punched across the Desna and Dnieper, their armor moving like clockwork, yet every bridge they crossed whispered a new limit, fuel shortages, stretched supply lines, and stubborn Soviet countermeasures. In the north, Hitler’s orders clashed with battlefield reality; in the south, stalwart cities like Orel and Vyazma flickered with hard-fought breakthroughs and costly retreats. As October wore on, the myth of easy victory dissolved. Hitler boasted that the end was near, while soldiers on both sides kept their heads above the smoke, counting casualties and praying for more favorable weather. The siege of Moscow loomed, a hinge that could tilt the war’s fate.

This episode is Mud and Sieges

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. 

 

Rain begins to fall across the Eastern Front as the dreaded Rasputitsa settles in. Autumn arrives just as Operation Typhoon climbs to its zenith. German generals speak of an inexorable victory, their voices carrying over mud-slicked roads and rain-soaked fields. Supply columns bog down in the quagmires, while infantry fight with dwindling ammunition, threadbare equipment, and the iron will to grind the enemy into submission. In Moscow, Stalin, unsettled and wary, recalls Zhukov to the capital to organize the defense as one fortress after another buckles under the German onslaught.

 

So what do I mean when I say “Rasputitsa”. It  is a term used to describe the annual mud season in parts of Eastern Europe, particularly Russia and Ukraine, when unpaved roads and the countryside become nearly impassable due to heavy rains in spring or the thaw of frozen ground in autumn. The word itself comes from Russian roots meaning “to trample” or “the laying waste,” but in practice it captures the practical impossibility of moving troops, vehicles, and supplies through the soft, waterlogged terrain. In spring, frost rules the ground: the soil switches from solid to glue-like as the thaw sets in, drainage is overwhelmed, and mud swallows wheels and tracks. In autumn, rains saturate the already soft earth after harvest, turning fields and ridges into a churned, sticky mire. Rasputitsa has had significant strategic implications in warfare by delaying or diverting movements, stranding logistics, and forcing commanders to rely on alternative routes, slower tempos, or temporary retreats. Its impact is not only military; it disrupts transportation, agriculture, and daily life, complicating aid delivery and civilian movement for extended periods. Rasputitsa repeatedly hinders warfare by turning military vehicles and artillery into mud-bound impediments. Coupled with winter conditions, this phenomenon is credited with slowing the campaigns of Napoleonic France in 1812, our story of Nazi Germany during Operation Barbarossa, and all belligerents in the recent 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.

 

Now last week, Army Group Center advanced rapidly into the Soviet defenses surrounding Moscow, with the Panzers achieving progress reminiscent of the war’s early days. The Red Army did not fare well during the first week of October 1941. We are now entering the second week as Zhukov assumes command of the defense of the Soviet capital. From October 8 to 14, the Soviet Union will strive to hold back the invaders as the situation continues to deteriorate. Operations in the farthest reaches of the Arctic Soviet Union had bogged down by mid-October. Operation Silver Fox aimed to seize Murmansk and its port facilities, placing them out of Communist hands. 

 

Operation Silver Fox was planned as a two-stage pincer maneuver, executed in three operations. Phase one, Operation Reindeer or “Unternehmen Rentier”, involved the 2nd and 3rd Mountain Divisions of Mountain Corps Norway under Eduard Dietl. They were to advance east from Kirkenes into the Finnish-held Petsamo area to secure the nickel mines. Phase two envisaged a pincer against the Soviet port of Murmansk, which remained ice-free in winter and, with Arkhangelsk, likely served as a route for Western Allied supplies to the Soviet Union. The first prong, Operation Platinum Fox (Unternehmen Platinfuchs), was a frontal assault from Petsamo toward Murmansk, with the aim of securing the Rybachy Peninsula with Finnish border support. The second prong, Operation Arctic Fox or “Unternehmen Polarfuchs”, would strike farther south to seize Salla, ceded to the Soviet Union after the Winter War and then push east along the railway to capture Kandalaksha, thereby severing the Murmansk Railway linking Murmansk with Central Russia. This operation involved the German 36th Corps under Hans Feige and the Finnish 3rdCorps led by Hjalmar Siilasvuo.

 

Aerial support for the offensive was to come from Luftflotte 5, based in Norway and the Finnish Air Force. For Silver Fox, Luftwaffe established a new headquarters in Finland. At the outset of hostilities, the Finnish air force fielded about 230 aircraft; Luftflotte 5 assigned 60 aircraft to Silver Fox in Finland, employing the Junkers Ju 87, Ju 88, and Heinkel He 111 for close air support. By late February 1941, German units had moved into Finland, and transit rights through neutral Sweden enabled the movement of the 2nd and 3rd Mountain Divisions into Kirkenes for Operation Reindeer. For 36th Corps, two sea-transport operations, Blue Fox 1 and Blue Fox 2 or “Blaufuchs I and II”, were arranged. Units embarked at Stettin and Oslo for Oulu, then traveled by train to Rovaniemi, where they linked with Finnish forces for the offensive under border-defense pretenses.

 

Soviet preparations were tentative; Stalin did not expect a German invasion along the entire border so soon. The primary Soviet opponent was the Northern Front, comprising the 7th and 14th Armies in the Arctic, commanded by Lieutenant-General Markian Popov. On 23 August 1941, the Northern Front was split into the Karelian Front (Valerian Frolov) and the Leningrad Front. Frolov, who had commanded the 14th Army, was succeeded by Roman Panin when he assumed command of the Karelian Front on 1 September. In the early weeks, Axis forces held numerical superiority, the Soviets having roughly 150,000 troops north of Lake Ladoga. Axis air superiority followed, as Soviet Karelia was defended only by the 1st and 55th Mixed Air Divisions, totaling about 273 serviceable aircraft of obsolescent types.

 

Operation Silver Fox began on 22 June 1941 to coincide with Operation Barbarossa. Mountain Corps Norway, comprised of the 2nd and 3rd Mountain Divisions under Eduard Dietl, moved east from Kirkenes into the Finnish-held Petsamo area to secure the nickel mines. The appearance of a German corps on the Soviet border surprised the Russians, and the operation succeeded in establishing a foothold around Petsamo as Dietl began reorganizing for Platinum Fox. Farther south, Feige’s 36th Corps prepared its attack at Salla. On 29 June, Dietl launched an eastward assault with Finnish border units against two Soviet divisions of the 14th Army, the 14th and 52nd Rifle Divisions. The opening day saw the 2nd Mountain Division secure the neck of the Rybachy Peninsula while the 3rd Mountain Division breached Soviet lines at the Titovka Valley, capturing a bridge over the river. As the element of surprise faded, German momentum slowed under growing Soviet resistance and the harsh Arctic conditions. The rough terrain, lack of detailed maps, and freezing weather impeded progress, and by July the 2nd Mountain Division had halted at the Rybachy peninsula, taking defensive positions at its neck, with several units diverted south to aid the 3rd Mountain Division. With reinforcements scarce, the Germans advanced east to establish a bridgehead over the Litsa River, but a Soviet flanking landing threatened these positions. Dietl pressed for reinforcements, yet the German High Command limited relief, providing only marginal aid from Norway. Supply problems compounded the stalemate as Soviet and British naval activity along the Norwegian coast disrupted German shipments, weakening Mountain Corps Norway further. Renewed offensives failed, the Soviets closed the Litsa bridgehead, and on 21 September the operation halted. Mountain Corps Norway was ordered to defend the front and secure the Petsamo area and its nickel mines, ruling out a renewed offensive; the northern front then remained relatively stable for the remainder of the war, aside from small-scale ski patrol skirmishes. Parallel to Platinum Fox, Arctic Fox began on 1 July. The German main force at Salla consisted of the 169th Division, the SS-Infantry Kampfgruppe Nord, and the Finnish 6th Division, facing three Soviet divisions from the 14th Army, the 122nd Rifle Division, the 104th Rifle Division, and the 1st Tank Division. The Germans launched a frontal assault on Salla, while the Finnish 6th Division attempted a substantial flanking attack behind Soviet lines toward Alakurtti and Kayraly. 

 

The initial assault faltered due to inadequate Arctic warfare training, and the SS division, composed largely of former police units, struggled against organized Soviet defenses. After repeated failures, 36thCorps redirected its effort and, with the Finnish flanking maneuver by the 6th Division, breached Soviet defenses on 6 July. Salla fell on 8 July, and the Soviets began retreat toward Kayraly; the Germans pursued to Kayraly on 9 July, but heavy resistance and challenging terrain, lakes and fortified positions, prevented further progress, creating a stalemate for the rest of the month. To the south, Finnish III Corps advanced east from Kuusamo to support the Salla effort, aiming to reach Kestenga (Kiestinki) and Ukhta in a two-pronged attack, and then move toward Loukhi and Kem to sever the Murmansk railway. III Corps made rapid progress, crossing the canal between Lake Pyaozero and Lake Topozero within 20 days and reaching Kestenga by 7 August, but Soviet reinforcements, including the 88th Rifle Division, halted the Finnish advance. The German command, impressed by the Finnish pace, moved additional 36th Corps units south to bolster the effort. Despite early gains, Soviet resistance intensified, stalling the Finns’ momentum. In mid-August, 36th Corps renewed its push on Kayraly from the north, and with the Finnish 6th Division from the south, encircled Soviet forces. After clearing the perimeter, 36th Corps advanced east again, capturing Alakurtti and pushing toward the Voyta and Verman Rivers near prewar border fortifications. Exhausted by heavy resistance, Feige’s forces could not sustain the drive, and the German High Command redirected available units to the south, placing 36th Corps on the defensive by late September. Bolstered by new German reinforcements, Finnish  3rd Corps launched a final push on 30 October. Despite stronger Soviet defenses and additional reinforcements, Finnish troops managed to encircle an entire Soviet regiment. However, on 17 November the Finnish command abruptly halted the offensive after diplomatic pressure from the United States, which warned that disrupting U.S. deliveries to the Soviet Union would have serious consequences for Finland. Consequently, Arctic Fox ended in November, and both sides entrenched at their positions.

 

By October, the Arctic ports were already proving to be a lifeline for the Soviet Union. Murmansk and Arkhangelsk offered the fastest routes for British and American supplies to reach the front. Convoys departing from Iceland or Britain could reach port in under two weeks. By comparison, the Basra route in the Persian Gulf required closer to three months, making the Arctic supply path dramatically swifter. Besides the Basra route, there was also the Vladivostok route for shipping. This path took about twenty days by sea, but the goods were roughly five thousand miles farther from the Soviet industrial heartland. Moreover, these two ports were much closer to the front lines and to existing Soviet infrastructure, enabling materials and resources to be deployed much more quickly. Of the two Arctic ports, Murmansk was the more valuable to the war effort. Despite its latitude, it remained ice-free year-round, while Arkhangelsk did not and was effectively useless during the long, dark winter months.

 

The Germans recognized the strategic value of the port and decided in the early stages of planning for Barbarossa that its capture was essential. Thus far, this objective had remained out of reach for the combined German and Finnish attackers. The Army of Norway, commanded by Colonel General Falkenhorst, was under-resourced for the task and struggled with coordinating with its nominal Finnish allies. The Finns were dutiful soldiers, but they limited their attacks to align with their nation’s war strategy. The Finns remained cautious about unlimited support for Hitler’s war. They continued to attack the Red Army, but only to the extent that it served their own objectives. Despite German propaganda portraying the invasion of the Soviet Union as a clash of civilizations, few of Hitler’s allies were willing to give their all for the struggle.

 

Finland was fighting for territory it had lost during the Winter War with the Soviet Union in 1939–1940. For this reason, the Finns preferred to refer to their war as “the Continuation War,” viewing their participation as separate from Germany’s wider European war aims. To the Finns, it was thus a joint war against a common enemy. Accordingly, Finland declined to be seen as a German ally and never joined the Axis, but styled its relationship as that of a “co-belligerent.” With a country of only 3.9 million people, Finland fielded an army of 476,000 men, and by late summer there were roughly 650,000 people working directly for the armed forces, constructing fortifications, roads, and bridges, or serving as nurses, air-raid wardens, and in supply services. The manpower drain imposed a massive burden on the Finnish economy, with industry losing about 50 percent of its workers and agriculture around 70 percent. By October, Finland was forced to appeal to Germany for 175,000 tons of grain to survive until the 1942 harvest.

 

Meanwhile, the threat of a declaration of war from Britain and the United States grew, as Finland refused to halt its advance even after reoccupying its 1939 frontier established by the Peace of Tartu in 1920. Up to that point, the western powers had tolerated Finland’s co-belligerency despite strenuous Soviet objections, but were not prepared to endanger relations further for a “Greater Finland.” Militarily, the war was proving extraordinarily costly for the Finns, with approximately 75,000 casualties in 1941 alone and, coupled with the worsening economic crisis, seemed unsustainable beyond 1941. The much-anticipated quick victory over the Soviet Union had failed to materialize, necessitating major structural changes and a comprehensive demobilisation of the army. Between the end of 1941 and the spring of 1942, the Finnish army shrank to about 150,000 men occupying defensive positions along a relatively quiet front. This allowed Allied Lend-Lease supplies to flow unhindered from northern ports, eased pressure on Leningrad, and freed Soviet troops for deployment on other, more critical fronts. Thus, in 1941 Germany’s single biggest contributor of foreign troops to the war against the Soviet Union had evolved from an aggressive co-belligerent to a passive advocate. Wavering support from Mannerheim’s government caused serious alarm in the German High Command. This helped explain why Army Group North was being pushed so hard to cover the eastern shores of Lake Ladoga. Meeting the Finns was crucial for two reasons: first, the Finns had made clear they were not interested in further advances themselves; second, officers of the OKH believed that a linkup would restore Finnish confidence in the alliance. Hitler supported these conclusions and was a driving force behind the planning of Army Group North’s next offensive.

 

Army Group North had reached a stalemate with the Leningrad and Northwestern Fronts. General Leeb was doing his best to stabilize his front lines and prepare for a renewed offensive. We detailed those plans last week. This localized offensive aimed to push the Soviets back from the shores of Lake Ladoga. Meanwhile, the Germans continued their bombardment of Leningrad. The city’s large urban sprawl and persistent Soviet counter-battery fire complicated these efforts. Counter-battery actions are artillery-on-artillery duels. A battery of guns seeks to return fire on the attacker by tracking and plotting the positions of the enemy artillery. Despite the German attempts to saturate the city with artillery and air bombardment, Army Group North lacked the resources to achieve this fully. The Lake Ladoga supply route, however, kept the Leningrad Front well stocked with ammunition. Ration stocks were declining, but the defenders still had fight left in them. Zhukov appointed a trusted officer to command the defense. General Fedyuninsky was supported by a Stavka representative. On the 12th and 14th, the Leningrad Front was ordered to break the German hold on Shisselburg. Fedyuninsky began preparations immediately, but they would not be ready until the middle of the following week.

 

The first week of Operation Typhoon had gone brilliantly for the invaders. They managed to encircle eight Soviet field armies at Bryansk and Vyazma, and Hitler and his entourage were ecstatic. There was little to complain about as the second week began. However, warning signs were starting to trickle in. It had snowed across much of the front on the seventh. Logistics remained hampered by the poor state of Soviet infrastructure, and many of the rebuilt panzers were already starting to break down. The German encirclement battles in the eastern campaigns had historically proven less than airtight. At Minsk, Smolensk, and Kyiv, tens of thousands of men managed to escape the loosely guarded pockets. Bryansk and Vyazma were no different. It has been estimated that around eighty thousand men escaped from the Vyazma pocket alone. The Germans could ill afford to let numbers like these escape, but there were simply not enough resources to seal the pockets.

 

To be sure, the losses were devastating to the defending Soviets. Contrary to German propaganda, the Soviet Union did not have unlimited manpower. The Red Army could muster only about 1.2 million men to defend the Moscow sector. The entirety of the Red Army stood at roughly 3.2 million, but the manpower reserves were now very shallow. Many of the recently inducted men had only the barest whiff of training. Compared to their German counterparts, they were little more than rank amateurs in the realm of tactical competence. The surviving veterans of the earlier titanic clashes with the Germans were scattered throughout the army. This prevented the Red Army from forming any set of particularly experienced or talented units. However, it allowed for the experience of one man to trickle outward to many men in his unit. Therefore, the impact of veteran officers, NCOs, and junior soldiers in the Red Army was amplified.

 

The loss of the eight field armies in the double envelopment of Bryansk and Vyazma appeared as an incredibly dangerous possibility as the second week of October began. As the fighting around these pockets continued, the German High Command decided to press on along a broad front. Rather than throwing their entire effort at the main objective, they ordered Hoth’s 3rd Panzer Army to Kalinin, to operate to the north of Moscow. In the south, Guderian would continue to advance with his Panzer Army split: his 48th Panzer Corps would attempt to capture Kursk, which lay far south of his main effort at Tula, while Schweppenburg’s 24th Panzer Corps was at Tula and directed to push toward Moscow. The 47th Panzer Corps was assigned to reduce the Bryansk pocket. Hoepner’s 4th Panzer Army was kept on a short leash by Kluge, who wanted his men and armor to stay close to the Vyazma pocket. These pockets were far from airtight, and the Soviets continued to fight hard to breakout. Indeed, in small battles scattered around the periphery, groups of Red Army soldiers managed local victories. The Germans were spread too thinly to cover all escape avenues. The vastness of the dual envelopments betrayed their purpose, as they had at Minsk and Smolensk earlier in the war. The German field commanders apparently refused to recognize this and continued to believe that all could be made good with just one more advance.

 

On the Eighth, tensions around Guderian’s right flank began to rise. The trapped Soviets were attempting to break out, and there was not enough pressure from the diminished Wehrmacht to contain them. By the ninth, the situation evolved into a full-blown crisis centered on the small town of Sizemka. There was a gap of unknown size between two infantry divisions: the 29th Motorized holding the eastern flank of the Bryansk pocket, and to their left the 293rd Infantry Division guarding the southern flank. However, a significant gap in their lines remained. The Soviet 13th Army trapped inside the pocket saw this weakness and threw what they could at it. This breakout attempt caused panic in Guderian’s headquarters. He ordered the 25th Motorized Infantry to fill the gap. They could only get into place after several hours of delay, and the situation continued to develop in the meantime. Guderian halted the advance of Kempf’s 48th Panzer Corps toward Kursk and diverted them northward. The Soviets continued to pressure the German lines, but once the 25th Motorized arrived late in the day the situation stabilized. The division commanders reported that only a small number of Soviets had escaped the pocket. This was an obfuscation at best; thousands of soldiers had indeed slipped from the grasp of the invaders. Postwar Soviet accounts alleged that whole divisions had made it out intact. The situation remained fluid enough that even Bock refused to characterize the event as a true envelopment or pocket by the usual standard. Guderian’s position remained in flux for much of the week, his rapid advance having again left behind infantry needed to secure the pocket before continuing with planned movements.

 

The confused command situation for the Red Army continued into the second week of October. Indeed, some blamed the Bryansk–Vyazma failure on this arrangement. The Western, Bryansk, and Reserve Fronts had no single point of command and coordination. They reported directly to the Stavka, which was attempting to coordinate the entire war effort. The German speed of attack remained unmatched by the cumbersome Red Army command structure. Even now, as the second week began, some units had been effectively cut off for days and did not realize it, a situation especially true around Vyazma. The command situation only began to improve on October 10. Zhukov was placed in charge of a unified command that incorporated all the remnants of the three front commands. This was a major step in improving the defense of Moscow and demonstrated Stalin’s renewed trust in Zhukov after his dismissal from the Stavka earlier in the year.

 

The situation around Vyazma looked grim for the defenders. Kluge was working hard to ensure that the encirclement remained tight, aiming to prevent the wholesale escapes that had occurred at Smolensk and Minsk. Yet he faced opposition from other commanders. Hoepner and Bock both wanted to resume the drive east as soon as possible, understanding that any delay would allow the Red Army to regroup on a new defensive line, as they had after every encirclement. Kluge resisted, arguing that reducing the holding forces around the pocket would let significant forces escape, thus enabling the very rebuilding that haunted Bock and the panzer commanders. Both sides presented valid tactical points, and compromise became the guiding principle. Kluge was through and through a classic German infantry officer. He had been arguing with the panzer commanders since the Polish campaign and before. Notably, Guderian had been his primary nemesis in France and the early months of 1940, but Kluge clashed with nearly all of the panzer commanders in due time. He believed in the thorough methods of his forefathers and disdained the reckless advance advocated by Hoepner, Guderian, and others. Bock allowed Kluge to keep the panzers but ordered that he compress the pocket into extinction at the earliest possible moment. Hitler then stepped in and, on the ninth, ordered Hoepner to extend northward to relieve the 3rd Panzer Army from the encirclement.  Hoth was sent south to take over the 17th Army after its commander was relieved. General Stülpnagel faced accusations of timid leadership, stemming from a dispute with the Army Group South commander. Hoth was ultimately relieved by Reichenau, who had previously been one of his corps commanders.

 

The 3rd Panzer Army was needed to start the drive on Kalinin and threaten the Soviet North Western Front. This stretched Hoepner’s 4th Panzer Army to the breaking point, as he was still ordered to continue advancing on Moscow. It was at this moment that the Soviets managed to begin attacking the Vyazma encirclement from the outside. The forces within the pocket had not given up either, tenaciously defending against infantry assaults from the west. On the 10th, Major General Hellmich’s 23rd Infantry was nearly overrun. The Soviets overwhelmed the infantry’s improvised positions and broke through in several places. Only with the help of a sister division’s reserves could Hellmich restore his lines. The Germans were beginning to crack, even on the north side of the pocket that should have been secure. The 7th Panzer Division’s positions could not be reached by any of Hoepner’s relief forces; they were forced to bunker down and endure the assaults. Men dug fighting positions up to their necks. Even as the Germans were battered to the breaking point, they managed to hold on. The Soviets were steadily squeezed. By October eleventh, the Vyazma pocket had shrunk from over two thousand square kilometers to just four hundred. Major Shabulin, an officer from the 50th Army wrote in his diary on October fifteenth: “I am reeling. Corpses, the horrors of war, uninterrupted shelling. Again, I am hungry and have not slept in a longtime. I have confiscated a bottle of liquor. I went to a forest and reconnoitered. The disaster is complete. The Army is defeated, the baggage train destroyed…. The Army has been turned into shambles”. Major Shabulin stumbled through the forest for a few more days before eventually locating Major General Petrov, the commander of his army. However, both men were killed before they could reach friendly lines.

 

As the twin pockets were steadily reduced, Red Army soldiers who managed to escape the carnage took one of three paths. Most avoided contact and fled eastward in an attempt to reach Soviet lines again. A few surrendered to the nearest German units, but this was far fewer than earlier in the year. The third path was to take up arms in the rear and attack anything they could. This had been a choice taken by Red Army soldiers trapped behind enemy lines since June. They attacked supply columns, blew up bridges, made contact with partisans, and otherwise proved to be a considerable thorn in the side of German operations. Army Group South was advancing relatively quickly across Ukraine. The first week of October had seen some hiccups, but Mariupol fell on the ninth to the SS Division Adolf Hitler. Halder complained that the Italian Divisions were barely sufficient even for static security positions. Mussolini had sent the Italian Expeditionary Corps despite less than enthusiastic support from Hitler. They were poorly equipped and only semi-motorized. This caused mobility issues trying to keep up with Kleist’s fast-moving panzers, to whom they were attached.

 

The 17th Army made good progress under their new commander. Hoth was not thrilled to be assigned to the infantry, but it was considered a promotion. The situation he found on arrival was not ideal, but his task was straightforward: push his infantry through to Donetsk. The 17th Army had to break through the slogging match first, facing three Soviet field armies in his path, the 21st Army to the north, the 38th in the center, and the 6th to the south. Little progress was made in the first week of Hoth’s command, though he managed to straighten his lines and eliminate a Soviet bulge on his southern flank. Further to the south, the 11th Army operated in concert with the Romanian 3rd Army to pin the Soviets in place while Kleist drove south. The Italians did their best to hold the northern flank of this movement. The capture of Mariupol signaled the end for the Red Army on the Sea of Azov. By the eleventh, what had become known as the Battle of the Sea of Azov was over, a resounding German victory, but achieved at a heavy cost. The Soviets lost about sixty-five thousand prisoners and well over one hundred tanks. The Germans suffered around twelve thousand casualties, with an unknown number of vehicles lost. The victory allowed the 11th Army to turn toward the Crimea and unleash its full force. The advance had stalled since the turn of the month amid the Romanians’ crisis; it would now be resumed in full. Kleist’s 1st Panzer Army would be responsible for taking Rostov. Yet as he began to resume the assault, the supply situation grew almost catastrophic. The June-to-date strain on the Wehrmacht’s supply system, coupled with deteriorating weather, rendered it essentially non-functional at times. The Southwestern Front seized the momentary pause, throwing another wave of divisions into the Rostov defense.

 

At Odessa, the Red Army finally pulled its last troops out and evacuated them to Sevastopol. It had taken two months and eight days, but the Germans and their Romanian allies had broken through to the coast. It was not the last siege of the eastern front. Lessons learned on both sides would be applied at Leningrad, Stalingrad, and Sevastopol, among others. The inability of the Germans or any of their allies to prevent the naval evacuation of Odessa was a testament to their fundamental weakness at sea. Even at this stage of the war, they could do little beyond harassing enemy formations outside their core areas. Even in the Mediterranean, the Axis fleets demonstrated an inability to control the sea. This would come back to haunt them as the North African campaign progressed into 1942. The operations there would prove to be a drain on valuable attention and materials from the Eastern Front in the months ahead. There were no significant Axis naval operations in the Black Sea for the remainder of the war.

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In the cold, mud-slicked dawn of October 1941, two colossal armies faced off along the Moscow road. The Germans, hungry for a quick win, pushed with Panzer power, while the Soviets, guided by Zhukov and a hastily rallied defense, stitched a stubborn line from Leningrad to Moscow. Rasputitsa wove its muddy traps, delaying tanks and sealing bridges, as autumn rain turned roads into glue and hunger into courage. Amid encirclements and bitter retreats, the Red Army honed its resolve. By winter’s edge, the siege loomed, lessons etched in smoke: endurance, rally, and a city’s stubborn heartbeat held the line.