"And all the dead, Lie down" Pobeda 9 May - 23 May 1943
The two weeks of operations from 9 to 22 May 1943 saw the near completion of the encirclement of 150-180,000 Axis troops on the central reaches of the Dniepr.
From the north, 1 Tank Corps and 3 Mechanized Corps attacked the Rumanian lines at Pereyaslav Khmelntskyy and Ivankiv on 9 May.
(T-34 of 1 Tank Corp in action near the Dniepr)
By 12 May both had broken clean through and were looking to exploit their gains. The Germans were struggling to cope with the speed of the Soviet advance but 8 Heavy Armour counterattacked at Ivankiv stalling 3 Mech till the 15th.
By picking the wrong target, and continuing to contest the Dniepr crossings with 12 Army at Yahotyn and Domantove, the German 19 Army effectively sealed its fate. Using paratroops to seize control of vital bridges and road junctions at Kaharlyk
(76 Airborne preparing for its first combat drop since the Syrian campaign in 1942)
(Soviet 76 Abn at Kaharhlyk, created the space for 1 Tank Corps to sweep around German strongpoints)
and Bila Tserkva, 1 Tank Corps was able to sweep west of the German resistance cutting quickly through scattered HQ and reinforcing divisions. By the 23rd, lead elements were racing towards Tarascha less than 15km north of the spearheads of 3 Tank Army.
In the meantime 2 Tank Corps was pushing south west of Kiev and towards Vinnytsa. Here the goal was to interdict the German effort to redeploy troops from Army Group Centre to reinforce the shattered front of Army Group South.
(a rare moment of calm for the motorised infantry attached to 2 Tank Corps)
In combination 5 Army commenced a series of holding attacks at Kozelets and Brovary.
Unusually for Pobeda, these attacks saw intense infantry style battles as the rifle divisions tried to force the Dniepr to the north of Kiev.
(Soviet bridgehead near Brovary)
The effect was to pin substantial German forces at the time when OKH was desparate to redeploy them to seal off the massive breach in their front at Vinnytsa.
To the south, 3 Tank Army had made slower gains. The Germans had heavily reinforced the north flank of the Odessa bulge at the end of Saturn.
(To add to the problems facing the Germans, the bulk of the Sturmovik squadrons had been re-allocated to the Ukraine, given near complete air-superiority they were able to hunt for targets almost at will)
Even so the German defense was ill prepared to hold the weight of 5 Tank Corps that broke their lines and reached Korsun by the 21st.
(elements of 5 Tank Corps near Korsun)
To the west, 6 Tank Corps was held up by the desparate German counterattacks at Valutine, but to the east 8 Mechanized Corps created the first, and largest of the Pobeda pockets when it took Kaniv early on the 23rd.
At this, the German 19 Army and Yugoslav 1 Army were trapped in a massive pocket centred on Cherkasy with their southern sector already buckling under the weight of 4 Army's offensive at Tsvitkove.
In the meantime Stavka had reached a decision as to the proper use of 1 Tank Army. 2 Tank was unable to spare the forces to actually capture Kiev or to drive into the huge gap ripped into the German lines in the North Ukraine. By 20 May, 1 Tank Army had detrained at Nizhyn and was redeploying.
(1 Tank Army OOB, its addition to the offensive meant that 30 brigades of T-34s were in action in the Ukraine)
3 Tank Corps was to operate with 5 Army and retake Kiev, 4 Tank and 13 Mechanized Corps were ordered to drive west so as to exploit the collapse in German resistance.
(1 Tank Army moving out of the rail yards at Nizhyn)
OKH was following the same logic. Partisans were ordered to blow the rail lines at Pinsk and around Brest-Litovsk,
(results of a partisan operation at Pinsk)
as it became increasingly clear OKH was reacting to the emerging disaster in the South by stripping Army Groups Centre and North of their reserves
(German redeployments from Army Group Centre)
as well as removing all the mobile forces from France and the UK.