The Year of Ruin
Part 4: The Great Offensive IV, February 2 – February 14, 1945
In any invasion of the Eurasian steppes, geography remains the ultimate variable, more so even than any actual human foe, regardless how intelligent. In the expanses of the Soviet Union, even the greatest of operational leaps and battles of annihilation, although decisive in any lesser theater, become merely acts of a greater overarching theme: attrition. What good is an advance of five hundred kilometers when this barely gets an army to the river line, and with the whole expanse of Eurasia still in front? Operational art fades into insignificance when matched against sheer geographical might, replaced by the concept that any advance anywhere is more or less of equal value, much as in standard theories of attrition any man killed anywhere is equal. This concept is not entirely true, as certain locations are more important than others, but nevertheless the line of thought is valid enough: the decision of war does not come quickly in the Soviet Union.
The first four days of February reinforced the scale of the clash that was being waged in the Ukraine, as over twelve thousand Italians and Soviets lost their lives in just those four days. The Italians were advancing by leaps and bounds, and had yet to actually leave Ukraine. In the far west, they were barely pushing into what had once been southeastern Poland, and in the far north of their frontline they had perhaps breached the line separating Belarus and Ukraine, but even this was not certain by any means. Kharkov had fallen long ago, but locations such as Belgorod, Kursk and Orel remained deep in Ukraine and far away from the Italian armies, even though this distance was shrinking daily. Further west, Kiev still remained unconquered for the moment, and Lvov remained secure in its distance from Italian arms. The Dnepr had been breached along much of its length yet there were other rivers behind and very far away. The Italians were winning local victories everywhere and even destroying numerous Soviet formations, and yet the challenge was slowly increasing, not decreasing.
The situation on the 4th of February.
On the eastern half of the front, the Soviet frontline had taken a terrible pounding. Northeast of Kharkov, the front had even been broken, with a significant gap between Soviet formations right at the corner of the front. Along the northern side of the front, the Italians were in full offensive mode, pushing the Soviets back with fire and cordite. The Soviet front was becoming increasingly brittle and prone to breaking. This was naturally quite worrisome for the Soviets, as this front was the shield protecting not just Belgorod, Kursk and Orel but also the most direct road from eastern Ukraine to Moscow. The Soviets were beginning to siphon off formations from their German front to send eastward, a clear indication of which threat they deemed the greater, despite the fact that the German army was nearly five times the size of the Regio Esercito. This is not to say that the Germans were not fighting. The battle of Krynica, admittedly instigated while the relevant German forces were under Italian control in late December, only just ended on the 7th of February. The Germans lost over nine thousand men, and the Soviets nearly eleven thousand. The Germans, unsurprisingly, lost. It was no wonder the Soviets did not rate them. This potential influx of Soviet formations would have to be dealt with by the other armies, west of Bastico’s 1a Armata. His goal was clear.
Bastico’s army on the offensive.
Even as Bastico was breaking the Soviet armies across his front, to the west Graziani and Vercellino were also doing sterling work in defeating their own respective enemies. While Pintor was maneuvering around Kiev and Graziani was pushing along the Dnepr, Vercellino saw and opportunity and seized it. The Soviet line in front of his cavalry had been broken, its formations all in retreat. Cei’s mobile corps was on the spot to exploit the attendant gap in Soviet defenses. Cei’s hope was that they would actually overrun the retreating Soviet formations and destroy them. He was also putting a division in place to coordinate another encirclement with Graziani. This was one aspect of the Italian plan to make it difficult for the Soviets to move eastward: by continuing to push north, the Italians were increasing the distance the Soviets had to cover to finally get over the hump, as it were, and actually begin deploying units to their desired destinations.
Cei’s mobile corps on the move.
By the 14th, the Soviet front had been broken in many places and dangerously elongated in others. The Soviet forces in front of Bastico and Vercellino had almost all dissolved away, and played little part in their planning of future operations. To the west, Pintor and Graziani were creating a significant salient that the Soviets would have to detour around to reach more critical areas of front, and Kiev was likely to fall soon. The gap between the Italian and German frontlines had decreased to a considerable extent. In fact, the only place where the Italians were not getting their own way was in eastern Ukraine, where the Germans seemed incapable of defending the flank that was left to them. Therefore, Bastico’s easternmost corps was tasked with reversing direction and clearing up the mess by encircling and destroying all Soviet forces in eastern Ukraine against the sea, with the help of Baistrocchi’s northern corps if necessary. Baistrocchi had finally taken Rostov-na-Don. The future was bright for the Italians.
The situation on the 14th of February.
The first two weeks of February confirmed Italian superiority over the Soviets in operational terms. However, strategically the balance was still against the Italians. Their German allies were being passive, allowing the Soviets to redeploy considerable forces eastward. Much distance had already been covered by the Italians, but much more remained to be conquered. Many Soviet soldiers lost their lives, but their army remained vastly stronger than the Italian army. In these fourteen days, six thousand, five hundred and seventy Italians lost their lives in battle. During the same time period, just over twenty thousand four hundred Soviet soldiers died as well. Furthermore, a handful of Soviet divisions had been completely destroyed. The resilience of the Soviet state in the face of persistent disaster was astonishing.
