This is an AAR on a recently completed Germany 1936 game scenario.
Stage by stage, Germany defeated its enemies one by one and laid down the foundation of the Thousand-Year Reich…
Stage 1, Operation White
August 24, 1939, Wehrmacht marched into Poland. On September 7, it reached Przemysl, the last Polish province.
Stage 2, Operation Yellow
On September 27, 1939, Germany declared war on Netherland, thus beginning the Western European campaign. Vichy France came into being on October 16.
Stage 3, Operation Barbarossa
On June 6, 1940, Wehrmacht began this epic operation against USSR. By early September, the front line reached Volga River. Moskow, Leningrad and Stalingrad were all within German control. By early December, USSR lost all the Caucasus and large industrial complexes in Urals.
Stage 4, Operation Sealion
July 19, 1941, General von Manstein led 3 panzer, 2 infantry and 2 marine divisions on board the 7 Transport Squadrons (all the Kriegsmarine had at the time). The amphibious assault on Glasgow began on the 21st. On the 23rd, the marine divisions were the first units landed in Glasgow…
The beginning of this chain of events dated back to a fateful day in December 1935.
THE ROAD TO WAR
In a late afternoon in December 1935, General Beck, Chief of the General Staff Wehrmacht, dazed toward the setting sun out of his office, wondered what had happened to his country. Several months ago, that Bohemian Corporal (the Fuhrer, he corrected himself) ordered the General Staff to draft a General Directive for the next great European war. In Fuhrer’s vision, Germany would come out from this war with a territory stretching from Atlantic (including British Isles) to Volga River. To Beck, the mere idea was nothing but crazy. Nonetheless, his General Staff had already produced two versions of the Directive, which were returned with Bohemian Corporal’s comments, “unimaginative”, “coward”. Eventually, General Beck put this ordeal on a young major general, von Manstein. Von Manstein in turn pulled in Guderian, another young major general, and Sperrle, a Luftwaffe major general. Three generals put together a draft and submitted to Hitler.
Then, in this December morning, Beck and the three major generals were called to a meeting with Hitler alone. Here’s the except of von Manstein’s report to Hitler:
- To establish Germany’s dominant position in Europe, a war with France, UK, USSR and quite possibly USA is inevitable.
- Given the enormous existing and potential industrial and military strength, simultaneously fighting two major wars will lead to disastrous results.
- Battle plans should be drafted with a single focus – to achieve a fast and decisive victory against one enemy at a time.
- Because Germany will not enjoy a numerical advantage against any of these major powers, the battle plans must be highly mobile-focus: with a large formation of panzer divisions supported by aircrafts.
- The limited industrial capacity of Germany is not sufficient to support the armament build-up. From this moment on, research projects to increase the industrial capacity and efficiency should become the highest priority.
- To prepare for a lengthy war, stockpiling strategic materials, petroleum and rare materials, which Germany relies on import, must start immediately. The goal is to maintain at least 3 years of supply should external supply be entirely cut off.
- As to armament development and production, tank should be the highest priority, combat aircrafts are the immediate next.
Hitler listened quietly throughout. After von Manstein finished, a long silence emerged. In the end, Hitler slowly spoke, “Let’s take Germany’s fate in our hands.” He paused, grabbed the Directive and said, “This should be the only copy that has ever existed.”
On his way out, General Beck had all but one thought in his mind, “what will happen to Germany?”
During the next 3 years, Austria and Czech peacefully joined Germany. Going into late summer of 1939, however, this German brand of diplomacy seemed to run into a dead end on Poland. Wehrmacht massed at the Polish boarder. On August 23, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was signed. Germany declared war on Poland next morning and the Allies, led by UK and France, immediately declared war on Germany. WWII thus began.
THE BATTLE OF POLAND
At beginning of the war, Germany had 13 panzer divisions (Mark III basic medium tank) and near 70 infantry divisions (1939 model) on the land. Among these, 11 panzer and 55 infantry divisions were either in East Prussia or at the Polish boarder. They were supported by 6 Fw-190A (improved interceptor) wings and 8 He-111 (basic tactical bomber) wings.
On the west, 2 panzer and 13 infantry divisions were along the French Boarder, supported by 6 Ju-87 (basic CAS) wings. Further north, 12 Fw-190A wings defended the sky of Western Germany.
Since 1936, Kriegsmarine’s build up was virtually halted. Besides the aging Baltische Fleet, Kriegsmarine had added only 1 new battleship (Bismarck), 3 heavy cruisers and 3 U-boat squadrons. As the war began, all ships were kept in the Rostock Naval Base. No combat mission would be assigned at this stage of the war.
The blitzkrieg on Poland was carried out in high precision. On the north, a coordinated attack from the mainland and East Prussia established a land link between the two and cut off Polish armies in Danzig. On the south, the main force attacked toward the Lublin direction and a smaller force attacked toward the Cracow. A panzer group from the main force then stroke north to take Lodz and thus enclosed Polish armies in the Poznan pocket. While leaving some infantries to clear the Danzig and Poznan pocket, the rest move further eastward, spearheaded by the panzer groups. The northern and southern armor spearheads reached Lomza and Lublin on September 1 and 2, respectively. Consequently, most of the remaining Polish divisions were encircled in Warsaw. Warsaw was taken on September 5. On September 7, the last Polish province (German side of the partition) was taken. Poland was later annexed.
THE BATTLE OF FRANCE
While the war was raging on the eastern front, the western front was all quiet except for a few air battles. Allie’s smaller bomber squadrons were decimated outright and larger ones severely damaged. Joined by 6 Fw-190A wings originally allocated to the eastern front, Luftwaffe’s interceptor forces now enjoyed a big qualitative and quantitative superiority. The allied fighter forces soon found way to repair shops, for a long while.
As the Battle of Poland came to an end, all but 2 infantry divisions on the eastern front moved west. A smaller force, including 5 panzer divisions moved toward Hanover, while a larger force with 8 panzer divisions amassed quietly on the Luxembourg boarder.
On September 27, 1939, Germany declared war on Netherland. The invasion progressed rapidly. Then on October 3, Germany declared war on Belgium and Luxembourg. The large panzer columns dashed out west to the Atlantic coast and the mass of infantry divisions turned south behind the Maginot Line to cut off it from the rest of France.
Because the war developed so rapidly, neither UK nor France even had time to mobilize. With most of the French divisions were behind the Maginot Line, the resistance to German advance elsewhere was sporadic at best. Paris fell on October 12. Vichy France came into being on October 16.
OPERATION BARBAROSSA
Initially, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact appeared to have given Joseph Stalin everything he could have hoped for:
a. Eastern Poland and the Baltic States and thereby greatly extending USSR’s strategic depth on its western boarder;
b. turning the Nazis to fight the capitalist powers in the west while USSR staying out.
However, after Germany’s stunning victories with a lightening speed in Poland and in France, Stalin found that USSR was now face to face with a potential enemy with lethal military might, alone. At this point, building up a gigantic military force at full speed was his only option.
Germany began to plan a duet with the communist giant immediately after the Battle of France. The Red Army already enjoyed a sizable numerical superiority (about 130 divisions to Germany’s 85). Given USSR’s gigantic industrial capacity and a huge pool of man power, this margin would only be growing as time passed. Consequently, the earlier the war with USSR began, the better.
With a huge battle front in thousands of kilometers, even an army as big as the Red Army did not have enough forces to keep a strong defense on every point. Furthermore, with a near complete purge of the middle and high level officers, the effectiveness of the Red Army was highly questionable at best, not to mention conduct an operation of an epic scale. In contrast, the Wehrmacht had already perfected the art of blitzkrieg. A sufficiently large panzer force would be able to cut enemies’ long defense line into several pieces and destroy a large number of Soviet divisions stage by stage.
Due to harsh Russian winters and muddy road conditions for the most part of other seasons, the best attack time would be in early summer. June 1940 was set as the target date of the Operation Barbarossa.
Another 8 panzer divisions were under construction. They would later be upgraded to the improved medium tank (Mark IV) along with 13 existing divisions. In addition, 20 more infantry divisions were also under construction.
By June 1940, every division designated for Barbarossa had moved into the attack position. 75 of 90 of Wehrmacht’s infantry divisions and all 21 panzer divisions were on the eastern front. They were supported by 8 out of 22 Fw-190A interceptor wings, all 3 Bf-109G improved fighter wings, 6 out of He-111 basic tactical bomber wings and 3 out of 9 Ju-87 basic CAS wings.
Three army groups would attack in 3 general directions. The Army Group North, with 1 panzer corp (3 panzer divisions) and 18 infantry divisions under general von Kluge’s command, would attack Leningrad direction. The Army Group Center, with 2 panzer corps and 35 infantry divisions under marshal von Bock would attack Moscow direction. The Army Group South, with 4 panzer corps and 22 infantry divisions under marshal von Rundstedt would attack Stalingrad and Caucasus direction.
On June 6, 1940, Germany declared war on USSR, and the epic Operation Barbarossa started.
The first round of attacks were successful with Germans advanced across the entire battle front. Subsequent progresses, however, were uneven. Army Group North moved forward steadily along the northeastern direction and repeatedly defeated Soviet divisions on its path. As the Soviet forces defending Ukraine were relatively weak, the 4 panzer corps of the Army Group South dashed forward freely and rapidly: von Manstein corp and Hausser corp toward Kiev, Hoth corp toward Crimea, and von Kleist corp in between.
While the north wing of the Army Group Center, 10 infantry divisions and 2 panzer corps, were advancing on schedule, the south wing of 25 infantry divisions were delayed by muddy roads along the edge of the Pinsk Marsh. Furthermore, Soviet forces in front were stronger than originally estimated: over 50 divisions with a large group of 30 divisions in Slonim alone. This situation also provided von Bock an opportunity. Guderian’s and Dietrich’s panzer corps turned south to cut off the Soviet divisions in Slonim. These divisions were completely encircled on June 18 and annihilated on June 19.
At the same time, Army Group North was already in Riga. In the south, von Manstein corp and Hausser corp captured Kiev 2 days before and began to turn northeastern toward Tula-Moscow direction. On June 24, Hoth corp arrived in Black Sea side and cut off over 10 Red Army divisions in Odessa area, they surrendered the next day.
After a series of defeat, many retreating Red Army divisions were caught by the advancing Germany troops and surrendered. Yet, over 30 divisions managed to retreat into Pinsk Marsh. Eventually, the General Staff decided to take 20 infantry divisions from the Army Group South and the Army Group Center to clean up the Pinsk Marsh. By July 9, all remnants of Red Army divisions in the Pinsk Marsh surrendered.
At the beginning of Operation Barbarossa, USSR had 190 divisions. After one month of battle, it lost over 100. For Germans, the dramatic decrease in Red Army divisions allowed them to send a number of divisions (including the Dietrich panzer corp) back home as strategic reserve.
The decrease in Red Army’s strength was more apparent in the South, the Army Group South just marched into undefended provinces one after another. On July 6, Hoth panzer corp captured Rostov. While infantry and newly built mountaineer divisions were catching in to start a Caucasus campaign, Hoth drove further east toward Stalingrad.
On July 7, the vanguard of the Army Group North reached the outskirt of Leningrad. With over 10 divisions defending the heavily fortified city, von Kluge decided that the left wing of the Army Group North would wait in front of Leningrad while the right wing, 6 infantry divisions and Model panzer corp, commanded by general Rommel, would strike into Karelian and eventually encircle Leningrad.
Moscow remained to be the center of Soviet defense. The Army Group Center battled their way to Moscow by defeating wave after wave of fresh Red Army divisions in Smolensk, Vyazma, Rzhev and Mozhaisk. Finally on July 30, the Army Group Center launched a general attack on Moscow from west, southwest and south and captured Moscow on August 2.
In this series of battles, USSR commited over 40 divisions. After the battle of Moscow, only 15 left. While the Army Group Center continued to finish off the remnants of Soviet divisions, Guderian and von Manstein panzer corps charged to Leningrad.
In the south, Germany launched an attack on Stalingrad on August 10 and captured it on August 13.
In the north, Rommel captured Petrozavodsk on August 16. The Red Armies in the Leningrad area were cut off. With the arrival of Guderian and von Manstein on August 27, the Army Group North launched a general attack on Leningrad. German troops entered Leningrad on August 30. 10 divisions in the Leningrad pocket surrendered the next day.
At this point, most of the Red Army was destroyed. The majority of German troops in USSD began to pull back. About 20 divisions continued to push eastward.
Germany captured all Caucasus on October 15.
By November 6, Germany captured all Soviet industrial provinces in Ural, thereby reducing its industrial capacity to a minimum.
On November 19, Germany troops reached the Afghan boarder and continued to push eastward.
As the harsh Russian winter arrived, all other operation stopped and most troops moved to the relatively warm southern provinces to prevent attrition.
Germany renewed its advance in spring 1941. Yet, the distance to the Russian Pacific coast proved to be immense. The mountainous terrain in Mongolia also made military operations there slower than expected. Germany managed to annexed Tuva on September 24 and Mongolia on November 30, 1941. However, the divisions advancing in the Far East were still a long way from the coast.
While other troops either stayed in Mongolia for the winter or went back home, 3 divisions continued eastward. On June 25, 1942, one division eventually arrived in Khabarovsk, a Russian Pacific coast province. Yet, it was too exhausted to go any further. The newly built airborne divisions were called in to finish the mission. On July 20, Vladivostok, the last USSR province of strategic importance, was captured.
Germany annexed USSR on July 21, 1942!
(to be continued.)
Stage by stage, Germany defeated its enemies one by one and laid down the foundation of the Thousand-Year Reich…
Stage 1, Operation White
August 24, 1939, Wehrmacht marched into Poland. On September 7, it reached Przemysl, the last Polish province.
Stage 2, Operation Yellow
On September 27, 1939, Germany declared war on Netherland, thus beginning the Western European campaign. Vichy France came into being on October 16.
Stage 3, Operation Barbarossa
On June 6, 1940, Wehrmacht began this epic operation against USSR. By early September, the front line reached Volga River. Moskow, Leningrad and Stalingrad were all within German control. By early December, USSR lost all the Caucasus and large industrial complexes in Urals.
Stage 4, Operation Sealion
July 19, 1941, General von Manstein led 3 panzer, 2 infantry and 2 marine divisions on board the 7 Transport Squadrons (all the Kriegsmarine had at the time). The amphibious assault on Glasgow began on the 21st. On the 23rd, the marine divisions were the first units landed in Glasgow…
The beginning of this chain of events dated back to a fateful day in December 1935.
THE ROAD TO WAR
In a late afternoon in December 1935, General Beck, Chief of the General Staff Wehrmacht, dazed toward the setting sun out of his office, wondered what had happened to his country. Several months ago, that Bohemian Corporal (the Fuhrer, he corrected himself) ordered the General Staff to draft a General Directive for the next great European war. In Fuhrer’s vision, Germany would come out from this war with a territory stretching from Atlantic (including British Isles) to Volga River. To Beck, the mere idea was nothing but crazy. Nonetheless, his General Staff had already produced two versions of the Directive, which were returned with Bohemian Corporal’s comments, “unimaginative”, “coward”. Eventually, General Beck put this ordeal on a young major general, von Manstein. Von Manstein in turn pulled in Guderian, another young major general, and Sperrle, a Luftwaffe major general. Three generals put together a draft and submitted to Hitler.
Then, in this December morning, Beck and the three major generals were called to a meeting with Hitler alone. Here’s the except of von Manstein’s report to Hitler:
- To establish Germany’s dominant position in Europe, a war with France, UK, USSR and quite possibly USA is inevitable.
- Given the enormous existing and potential industrial and military strength, simultaneously fighting two major wars will lead to disastrous results.
- Battle plans should be drafted with a single focus – to achieve a fast and decisive victory against one enemy at a time.
- Because Germany will not enjoy a numerical advantage against any of these major powers, the battle plans must be highly mobile-focus: with a large formation of panzer divisions supported by aircrafts.
- The limited industrial capacity of Germany is not sufficient to support the armament build-up. From this moment on, research projects to increase the industrial capacity and efficiency should become the highest priority.
- To prepare for a lengthy war, stockpiling strategic materials, petroleum and rare materials, which Germany relies on import, must start immediately. The goal is to maintain at least 3 years of supply should external supply be entirely cut off.
- As to armament development and production, tank should be the highest priority, combat aircrafts are the immediate next.
Hitler listened quietly throughout. After von Manstein finished, a long silence emerged. In the end, Hitler slowly spoke, “Let’s take Germany’s fate in our hands.” He paused, grabbed the Directive and said, “This should be the only copy that has ever existed.”
On his way out, General Beck had all but one thought in his mind, “what will happen to Germany?”
During the next 3 years, Austria and Czech peacefully joined Germany. Going into late summer of 1939, however, this German brand of diplomacy seemed to run into a dead end on Poland. Wehrmacht massed at the Polish boarder. On August 23, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was signed. Germany declared war on Poland next morning and the Allies, led by UK and France, immediately declared war on Germany. WWII thus began.
THE BATTLE OF POLAND
At beginning of the war, Germany had 13 panzer divisions (Mark III basic medium tank) and near 70 infantry divisions (1939 model) on the land. Among these, 11 panzer and 55 infantry divisions were either in East Prussia or at the Polish boarder. They were supported by 6 Fw-190A (improved interceptor) wings and 8 He-111 (basic tactical bomber) wings.
On the west, 2 panzer and 13 infantry divisions were along the French Boarder, supported by 6 Ju-87 (basic CAS) wings. Further north, 12 Fw-190A wings defended the sky of Western Germany.
Since 1936, Kriegsmarine’s build up was virtually halted. Besides the aging Baltische Fleet, Kriegsmarine had added only 1 new battleship (Bismarck), 3 heavy cruisers and 3 U-boat squadrons. As the war began, all ships were kept in the Rostock Naval Base. No combat mission would be assigned at this stage of the war.
The blitzkrieg on Poland was carried out in high precision. On the north, a coordinated attack from the mainland and East Prussia established a land link between the two and cut off Polish armies in Danzig. On the south, the main force attacked toward the Lublin direction and a smaller force attacked toward the Cracow. A panzer group from the main force then stroke north to take Lodz and thus enclosed Polish armies in the Poznan pocket. While leaving some infantries to clear the Danzig and Poznan pocket, the rest move further eastward, spearheaded by the panzer groups. The northern and southern armor spearheads reached Lomza and Lublin on September 1 and 2, respectively. Consequently, most of the remaining Polish divisions were encircled in Warsaw. Warsaw was taken on September 5. On September 7, the last Polish province (German side of the partition) was taken. Poland was later annexed.
THE BATTLE OF FRANCE
While the war was raging on the eastern front, the western front was all quiet except for a few air battles. Allie’s smaller bomber squadrons were decimated outright and larger ones severely damaged. Joined by 6 Fw-190A wings originally allocated to the eastern front, Luftwaffe’s interceptor forces now enjoyed a big qualitative and quantitative superiority. The allied fighter forces soon found way to repair shops, for a long while.
As the Battle of Poland came to an end, all but 2 infantry divisions on the eastern front moved west. A smaller force, including 5 panzer divisions moved toward Hanover, while a larger force with 8 panzer divisions amassed quietly on the Luxembourg boarder.
On September 27, 1939, Germany declared war on Netherland. The invasion progressed rapidly. Then on October 3, Germany declared war on Belgium and Luxembourg. The large panzer columns dashed out west to the Atlantic coast and the mass of infantry divisions turned south behind the Maginot Line to cut off it from the rest of France.
Because the war developed so rapidly, neither UK nor France even had time to mobilize. With most of the French divisions were behind the Maginot Line, the resistance to German advance elsewhere was sporadic at best. Paris fell on October 12. Vichy France came into being on October 16.
OPERATION BARBAROSSA
Initially, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact appeared to have given Joseph Stalin everything he could have hoped for:
a. Eastern Poland and the Baltic States and thereby greatly extending USSR’s strategic depth on its western boarder;
b. turning the Nazis to fight the capitalist powers in the west while USSR staying out.
However, after Germany’s stunning victories with a lightening speed in Poland and in France, Stalin found that USSR was now face to face with a potential enemy with lethal military might, alone. At this point, building up a gigantic military force at full speed was his only option.
Germany began to plan a duet with the communist giant immediately after the Battle of France. The Red Army already enjoyed a sizable numerical superiority (about 130 divisions to Germany’s 85). Given USSR’s gigantic industrial capacity and a huge pool of man power, this margin would only be growing as time passed. Consequently, the earlier the war with USSR began, the better.
With a huge battle front in thousands of kilometers, even an army as big as the Red Army did not have enough forces to keep a strong defense on every point. Furthermore, with a near complete purge of the middle and high level officers, the effectiveness of the Red Army was highly questionable at best, not to mention conduct an operation of an epic scale. In contrast, the Wehrmacht had already perfected the art of blitzkrieg. A sufficiently large panzer force would be able to cut enemies’ long defense line into several pieces and destroy a large number of Soviet divisions stage by stage.
Due to harsh Russian winters and muddy road conditions for the most part of other seasons, the best attack time would be in early summer. June 1940 was set as the target date of the Operation Barbarossa.
Another 8 panzer divisions were under construction. They would later be upgraded to the improved medium tank (Mark IV) along with 13 existing divisions. In addition, 20 more infantry divisions were also under construction.
By June 1940, every division designated for Barbarossa had moved into the attack position. 75 of 90 of Wehrmacht’s infantry divisions and all 21 panzer divisions were on the eastern front. They were supported by 8 out of 22 Fw-190A interceptor wings, all 3 Bf-109G improved fighter wings, 6 out of He-111 basic tactical bomber wings and 3 out of 9 Ju-87 basic CAS wings.
Three army groups would attack in 3 general directions. The Army Group North, with 1 panzer corp (3 panzer divisions) and 18 infantry divisions under general von Kluge’s command, would attack Leningrad direction. The Army Group Center, with 2 panzer corps and 35 infantry divisions under marshal von Bock would attack Moscow direction. The Army Group South, with 4 panzer corps and 22 infantry divisions under marshal von Rundstedt would attack Stalingrad and Caucasus direction.
On June 6, 1940, Germany declared war on USSR, and the epic Operation Barbarossa started.
The first round of attacks were successful with Germans advanced across the entire battle front. Subsequent progresses, however, were uneven. Army Group North moved forward steadily along the northeastern direction and repeatedly defeated Soviet divisions on its path. As the Soviet forces defending Ukraine were relatively weak, the 4 panzer corps of the Army Group South dashed forward freely and rapidly: von Manstein corp and Hausser corp toward Kiev, Hoth corp toward Crimea, and von Kleist corp in between.
While the north wing of the Army Group Center, 10 infantry divisions and 2 panzer corps, were advancing on schedule, the south wing of 25 infantry divisions were delayed by muddy roads along the edge of the Pinsk Marsh. Furthermore, Soviet forces in front were stronger than originally estimated: over 50 divisions with a large group of 30 divisions in Slonim alone. This situation also provided von Bock an opportunity. Guderian’s and Dietrich’s panzer corps turned south to cut off the Soviet divisions in Slonim. These divisions were completely encircled on June 18 and annihilated on June 19.
At the same time, Army Group North was already in Riga. In the south, von Manstein corp and Hausser corp captured Kiev 2 days before and began to turn northeastern toward Tula-Moscow direction. On June 24, Hoth corp arrived in Black Sea side and cut off over 10 Red Army divisions in Odessa area, they surrendered the next day.
After a series of defeat, many retreating Red Army divisions were caught by the advancing Germany troops and surrendered. Yet, over 30 divisions managed to retreat into Pinsk Marsh. Eventually, the General Staff decided to take 20 infantry divisions from the Army Group South and the Army Group Center to clean up the Pinsk Marsh. By July 9, all remnants of Red Army divisions in the Pinsk Marsh surrendered.
At the beginning of Operation Barbarossa, USSR had 190 divisions. After one month of battle, it lost over 100. For Germans, the dramatic decrease in Red Army divisions allowed them to send a number of divisions (including the Dietrich panzer corp) back home as strategic reserve.
The decrease in Red Army’s strength was more apparent in the South, the Army Group South just marched into undefended provinces one after another. On July 6, Hoth panzer corp captured Rostov. While infantry and newly built mountaineer divisions were catching in to start a Caucasus campaign, Hoth drove further east toward Stalingrad.
On July 7, the vanguard of the Army Group North reached the outskirt of Leningrad. With over 10 divisions defending the heavily fortified city, von Kluge decided that the left wing of the Army Group North would wait in front of Leningrad while the right wing, 6 infantry divisions and Model panzer corp, commanded by general Rommel, would strike into Karelian and eventually encircle Leningrad.
Moscow remained to be the center of Soviet defense. The Army Group Center battled their way to Moscow by defeating wave after wave of fresh Red Army divisions in Smolensk, Vyazma, Rzhev and Mozhaisk. Finally on July 30, the Army Group Center launched a general attack on Moscow from west, southwest and south and captured Moscow on August 2.
In this series of battles, USSR commited over 40 divisions. After the battle of Moscow, only 15 left. While the Army Group Center continued to finish off the remnants of Soviet divisions, Guderian and von Manstein panzer corps charged to Leningrad.
In the south, Germany launched an attack on Stalingrad on August 10 and captured it on August 13.
In the north, Rommel captured Petrozavodsk on August 16. The Red Armies in the Leningrad area were cut off. With the arrival of Guderian and von Manstein on August 27, the Army Group North launched a general attack on Leningrad. German troops entered Leningrad on August 30. 10 divisions in the Leningrad pocket surrendered the next day.
At this point, most of the Red Army was destroyed. The majority of German troops in USSD began to pull back. About 20 divisions continued to push eastward.
Germany captured all Caucasus on October 15.
By November 6, Germany captured all Soviet industrial provinces in Ural, thereby reducing its industrial capacity to a minimum.
On November 19, Germany troops reached the Afghan boarder and continued to push eastward.
As the harsh Russian winter arrived, all other operation stopped and most troops moved to the relatively warm southern provinces to prevent attrition.
Germany renewed its advance in spring 1941. Yet, the distance to the Russian Pacific coast proved to be immense. The mountainous terrain in Mongolia also made military operations there slower than expected. Germany managed to annexed Tuva on September 24 and Mongolia on November 30, 1941. However, the divisions advancing in the Far East were still a long way from the coast.
While other troops either stayed in Mongolia for the winter or went back home, 3 divisions continued eastward. On June 25, 1942, one division eventually arrived in Khabarovsk, a Russian Pacific coast province. Yet, it was too exhausted to go any further. The newly built airborne divisions were called in to finish the mission. On July 20, Vladivostok, the last USSR province of strategic importance, was captured.
Germany annexed USSR on July 21, 1942!
(to be continued.)
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