Why did Operation Barbarossa fail?

[Magnus Imperator Rex]

On the 22nd of June of 1941, in accordance with his long held ideological desires of eliminating Russia as a political rival and creating a massive eastern empire for Germany, Hitler ordered the invasion of the USSR.

The operation was supposed to bring about a quick victory for Germany in a few months. Hitler wrote ''The German Armed Forces must be prepared, even before the conclusion of the war against England, to crush Soviet Russia in a rapid campaign ('Case Barbarossa') ''

Two Army Groups were to be sent to the north to Leningrad and Moscow and one to the south in the direction of Ukraine and the oilfields. In the middle were the impassable Pripyat Marshes. The Axis had around 4 million troops ready for the invasion.

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Initially, the Germans had many impressive operational victories during the invasion. In fact, they were so great, that they are considered among the greatest military operations of history. Millions of Soviet soldiers were quickly encircled and captured. The Wehrmacht was constantly winning in Russia during 1941. Casualties were about 800,000 for the Axis and 4 million for the Soviets.

However, the road to victory had been very bloody, leaving the Wehrmacht with less forces to keep on pressing on, the german lines of supply and communication were overstretched and the fatal russian winter had arrived, making progress very slow and difficult.

Eventually, the closest the Germans got to Moscow was 8 km, they could even see the Kremlin from some points but their Army was not as strong as it had once been. Their offensive stalled and were pushed back by the Soviet Winter Counteroffensive of December 1941- May 1942. The Moscow front was finally secured by the Soviets by October of 1943. In total, Operation Barbarossa lasted from June 22 to December 5 of 1941.

The impossibility to take Moscow and other major cities like Leningrad meant that Operation Barbarossa was a failure and Germany was then forced into a war of attrition against the largest country on earth. The Eastern Front was opened, becoming the largest military showdown in history. They had also declared war on the U.S. and the UK was still fighting. This was the beginning of the end for Nazi Germany.

Will HOI 4 make Barbarossa easy or hard for the player who chooses Germany? In HOI3, I almost always conquered USSR in 6 months, which was a real shame, as I wanted to fight a massive war for years against Bolshevism for the gameplay. I hope the USSR will be much harder to beat in HOI 4.

Why do you think Operation Barbarossa failed? Was it the winter? The advantage of size for the USSR? Was the operation too ambitious to start with?

By the way, for any interested, this is a link to translated Directive No. 21, issued by Hitler to prepare for Barbarossa.

external link removed - Had a dad

 

[Ulsterman]

Winter, no preparations for winter, overextended supply lines, mud, overconfidence, too optimistic planning, just to name a few reasons.

And it's unlikely the Soviets would have surrendered even if the Germans had captured Moscow.

 

[ObssesedNuker]

Logistics and Soviet resistance were the two foremost reasons.

 

[TheRomanRuler]

Déjà vu

 

[Magnus Imperator Rex]

Déjà vu

It would be more productive if you can contribute to the thread. A major issue for me in HOI3 was playing an overpowered Germany even in Very Hard. I could steamroll the USSR very quickly, in about 6 months, which diminished my interest in this theatre. In HOI4, hopefully, USSR can better resist the Wehrmacht onslaught. It would be more realistic imho as it was during the war. The gameplay can only get better by facing a more realistic enemy.

 

[aruon]

the failure of barbarossa was a combination of pretty much everything stated above. but in a top 5 list IMHO:

6. (honorable mention) Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte. conquered half of europe with ease but in the end, russia was his undoing. as hitler would find out 120+ years later, and a basis for 2 of the below 5.
this why you study history people.

5. soviet tenacity: it's well known that the german-soviet KDR was absolutely absurd until the very end. did the soviets care? not really. hell, if 10 soviet soldiers died for each wehrmacht soldier the soviets would've accepted it as a neccessary expenditure. 50 for an officer. and once the soviet army got moving, it just kept going all the way to berlin.

4. supply lines: each of your generals could be the reincarnation of Julius freaking Caesar for all it matters. transporting foodstuffs and ammo across a massive country like russia is going to be a nightmare sooner or later. i wouldn't put too much blame on the germans though, russia is the bane of invading armies. just ask napoleon.

3. head count: now this really isn't the germans' fault (nor napolean for that matter). when you invade a country with a huge but devastated military, you expect to take some losses. they just took more than they expected (see: soviet tenacity). the germans wer just over-optimistic. some advice for warfare: hope for the best, expect the worst.

2. winter: as we all know, the winter of '41 was argubly the most brutal winter in russia EVER. and who has the only greatcoats in large numbers that are ready to withstand the icy fury of mother russia? you guess it, the russians. at least most german soldiers died to bullets instead of hypothermia and starvation. just ask napoleon again.

1. grinding to a halt: the crown jewel of bad decisions to make when invading russia. seen most prominently in stalingrad, the russians were in perpetual retreat until the germans decided to hibernate for the winter. well guess what? it gave the soviet military time to regain its composure. note: "and once the soviet army got moving, it just kept going all the way to berlin."

we have the benefit of hindsight and game mechanics. the soviets will never be quite as difficult for us to beat in the end... just as long as the axis doom train keeps of rolling.

 

[phantomrider]

1. Logistics logistics and more logistics-- The Germans underestimated the difficulty in moving stuff (people, weapons and supplies) the distances they needed to move them and overestimated the capability of the infrastructure to support these movements.
2. The reason the Germans invaded in the first place (and the stuff that is forbidden in the forum) gave the Soviets no incentive to cease resisting and accepting all the casualties -- the Soviets had no choice but to fight on.
3. Germans were unprepared for Winter warfare in 1941-2 and saw no need to be ready (arrogance and ignorance + plus more logistics)
4. Geography -- When you have "unlimited" depth you can withdraw as needed and further extend (or overextend) the attacker
5. The Soviets weren't as incompetent as the Germans thought they were (arrogance) -- they could regenerate armies much quicker than anyone anticipated, they had some nasty weapons that were better than what the Germans had (T-34) and they understood their own limitations and weaknesses better than the Germans did and were willing to use mass and numbers and take more casualties to do what needed to be done. You can make the case that the Soviets were smarter than the Germans or at least that Stalin was smarter than Hitler.

6. Barbarossa was a really dumb idea --- the guy that inspired it should have been "fired" or shot -- but my guess is that the staff officers who developed it were essentially given no choice about the goals and political decision and did the best they could (or anyone could) with a "bad" or impossible assignment.

 

[carron]

because nobody bothered to take a look at the map?

 

[Alias72]

(information from wages of destruction.) The Soviet Union had some of the poorest infrastructure in Europe. there were only 3 main rail lines for which the Wehrmacht could ferry supplies. One per army group. This is significantly less then what they were used to and comfortable with. This also meant that offensive operations were limited by the maximum length they could operate with a truck as fuel supply. The problem is the truck burns the fuel it intends to deliver. There is a point at which diminishing returns forces you to have a ridiculous number of trucks to fuel your army. This meant conducting a sequence of short bursts. Each burst had to encircle or destroy part of the Soviet army so that the next burst could be handled quickly. This limited the advance of German armies, necessitated zero serious delays, and allowed for almost no detours in planning (except where they may reduce the Soviet Army as in Belorussia).

this brings us to part 2

The Germans greatly Underestimated and overestimated the Soviet Union in three critical ways.

1. The Germans Overestimated the material and manufacturing resources and their relative importance west of Moscow. Ukraine was thought to be a breadbasket capable of feeding Germany through the war and it was believed that eliminating Soviet infrastructure would drop them below the Reich's production such that Germany could win if it took the Leningrad Moscow Volga line. It just so happened that soviet production exceeded that of Germany in 1942. Adam Tooze described this as the True armaments miracle of the second world war. I tend to agree considering how much damage had been done in 1941. It is also important to note that this rate of production was unsustainable (Russia was eating through its metal stockpiles) but it didn't need to be sustained.

2. Germany underestimated the size of the Soviet army. Germany had around 150 divisions in the east. They estimated the Soviets had approximately 200. They realized they were wrong after they hit the Ukraine and had already broken 200 divisions. They were utterly horrified when they were fighting near Moscow and had encountered 400 divisions with the soviets still having more in reserve. Ultimately the number of divisions is less important than total strength. the Wehrmacht started out at close numerical parity but the soviets rapidly expanded their military from 3.2 million to 6 million between 1941 and 1943.

3. Germany underestimated the quality of the Soviet Union. This seems a bit contradictory. Initially Soviet units performed quite poorly. They were smashed all along the east. but as the red army fell back to Leningrad, Moscow, and Stalingrad, it also began to improve in fighting ability. Every time the Wehrmacht slowed the Soviet Union had more time to promote competent NCO's, fire Incompetent ones (sometimes fire is meant literally) and rebuild shattered divisions. when Germany stood at the heights of her gains the red army was in the middle of a transformation. Some of the most competent operational commanders in history lead its army groups, its soldiers were veterans, and its coordination was getting better daily. By the time the Soviets began operation Bagration in 1944 their military effectiveness was closely approaching that of western armies.

The reality was that the operation was too ambitious to succeed. The Soviet Union had no intention of surrendering. They would have fought a guerrilla war in Siberia if they had too. as for why they chose to invade... well... they had no choice really. The war Germany had already started was unwinnable. The industrial capacity of the British empire was at least equal to that of Germany and the United states was openly backing Britain financially at this point. Germany thought the resources of the Soviet Union would even the scales. This ignores something critical.

Germany was not going to mobilize Caucas oil, ship it to Romania for processing, and then to Germany for use on single track rail lines, of a different gauge then their own, with almost no locomotives or rolling stock to spare, without sufficient refining capacity in Romania, without the steel to upgrade that capacity, on routes harassed by partisans, with factories being bombed from the sky, during wartime with a time window of at most 2 years.

I will say this. The winter was overrated. Not because it didn't have an effect. The effect of the winter was devastating. but because the window had already closed. Germany had spent all its spare combat strength in the dash to Moscow Stalingrad and the Ukraine. The Soviets were patching the holes in their military and had stabilized the northern fronts. Germany

 

[Veer]

Logistics and Soviet resistance were the two foremost reasons.

This is pretty much it. The USSR was truly vast and with a much poorer rail and road network than Western Europe. There also weren't very many terrain features like a sea or mountain range against with to "pin" an enemy. German mechanized forces required a huge logistics tail to keep supplied - that Germany did not have, and the regular infantry forces were slow and unable to fill the gaps quickly enough. One thing that is not modeled in HOI accurately is how quickly offensive power decreases when you outrun your supply train - because it's very difficult to model.

Russian resistance is the second most important criteria. While some Russian columns collapsed, others fought very hard and bravely despite being outnumbered and outgunned. The fighting around Smolensk in August 1941 was extremely brutal and the German panzer columns were effectively stopped here for the first time in the war, having to wait for the infantry to catch up. This was compounded by the fact that the German Army was not built for a long war. Reserves were tiny, barely sufficient for 3 months worth of campaigning. Production on the home front was slow, with many factories working only one shift. Unable to achieve victory in a few months the Germans were unprepared for a long war and that sapped their strength.

Other people mention stuff like the Winter, Hitler, etc, but in reality all of those would not matter if not for the first two. By the time Winter came and Hitler began interfering Barbarossa had already failed.

 

[George Parr]

2. Germany underestimated the size of the Soviet army. Germany had around 150 divisions in the east. They estimated the Soviets had approximately 200. They realized they were wrong after they hit the Ukraine and had already broken 200 divisions. They were utterly horrified when they were fighting near Moscow and had encountered 400 divisions with the soviets still having more in reserve. Ultimately the number of divisions is less important than total strength. the Wehrmacht started out at close numerical parity but the soviets rapidly expanded their military from 3.2 million to 6 million between 1941 and 1943.

I'd say this is very much the main reason. Wanting to win through a quick war that annihilates the enemies' army before it can escape into the depth of the country is a pretty sound idea, provided you have a solid knowledge about how large the army actually is. The plan completely falls apart when the enemy has far more units/soldiers than you expected, because then the very thing your plan depends on won't work anymore, and the enemy can pull enough of his army into the depth of his territory to trade space against time.

If the Soviet army - and its capabilities in expanding it - had been at the level Germany had expected, the Soviet Union would have been done for, regardless of any problems with logistics on the German side. The early German successes would have meant that Germany would have a numerical superiority everywhere.

 

[TheBromgrev]

By the way, for any interested, this is a link to translated Directive No. 21, issued by Hitler to prepare for Barbarossa.

Here's a copy of the original in the German Federal Archives, for those who can read German.

http://www.bundesarchiv.de/oeffentlichkeitsarbeit/bilder_dokumente/00845/index-14.html.de

 

[Alias72]

I'd say this is very much the main reason. Wanting to win through a quick war that annihilates the enemies' army before it can escape into the depth of the country is a pretty sound idea, provided you have a solid knowledge about how large the army actually is. The plan completely falls apart when the enemy has far more units/soldiers than you expected, because then the very thing your plan depends on won't work anymore, and the enemy can pull enough of his army into the depth of his territory to trade space against time.

If the Soviet army - and its capabilities in expanding it - had been at the level Germany had expected, the Soviet Union would have been done for, regardless of any problems with logistics on the German side. The early German successes would have meant that Germany would have a numerical superiority everywhere.

the numbers become even more disparaging when you realize there were 1 million veteran troops in the far east district which (with almost no exception) didn't move. Had Moscow fallen they could have given up eastern Siberia (hope the Japanese kwantung army stays put.) and transferred 1 million troops to retake the west.

 

[Number 7]

It would be more productive if you can contribute to the thread. A major issue for me in HOI3 was playing an overpowered Germany even in Very Hard. I could steamroll the USSR very quickly, in about 6 months, which diminished my interest in this theatre. In HOI4, hopefully, USSR can better resist the Wehrmacht onslaught. It would be more realistic imho as it was during the war. The gameplay can only get better by facing a more realistic enemy.

i think that is an AI vs human thing. Germany was really really strong in HOI3 but seeing an AI germany pull off barbarossa was very very rare. i still haven't seen it myself at all. So the challenge is to make a better AI while making germany's position worse which is not easy. i hope they work it out

 

[jamesd]

the numbers become even more disparaging when you realize there were 1 million veteran troops in the far east district which (with almost no exception) didn't move. Had Moscow fallen they could have given up eastern Siberia (hope the Japanese kwantung army stays put.) and transferred 1 million troops to retake the west.

A lot of those troops did move - it was just the divisions that stayed put. The Far Eastern divisions were used as training divisions to provide replacements.

 

[geogus]

Winter, no preparations for winter, overextended supply lines, mud, overconfidence, too optimistic planning, just to name a few reasons.

And it's unlikely the Soviets would have surrendered even if the Germans had captured Moscow.

I think that the two weeks delay in barbarossa that was necessary in order to suport Italy at Greece was decisive.

Barbarossa main goal was to capture Moscow, and most likely Germany would have done with extra two weeks of good weather.

Now what would happen if Moscow was captured is another issue.

Many argue that URSS had all it was needed to win even if Moscow had falled, more with US lend and lease.

However , im not sure of that.

Altough I agree URSS had the manpower, industrial power and equipements to keep fighting and turn the tide, sitil would take lots of time for moscow be liberated.

The moral blow of Moscow capture would be so strong that could change all the politics.

Would US still bet in URSS. Would still lend and lease?

Would britsh people keep morals high?

How would stalin and Politburo react?

Thats a lot of ifs, and those ifs could have changed the war

 

[henzington]

One of the biggest failures was the failure of German intelligence to properly identify the size and composition of the Russian military. Early on this was overcome by the operational success but even the huge losses wasn't enough to cripple a Russian army which was much larger then German estimates.

 

[Alias72]

Thats a lot of ifs, and those ifs could have changed the war

but how many ifs are required for Germany to win. Even if Germany surmounts the dozens of ifs standing between it and the fall of the Soviet Union there are still hundreds of ifs between that and stopping the Allies from drowning Germany in high tech equipment and personnel.

 

[Lightning Jack]

The Germans came very close to taking Moscow. I think the few weeks they lost in conquering Yugoslavia and Greece cost them Moscow. Holding Moscow allowed the Soviets time to transfer the Siberian troops for the winter offensive and then to throw the Germans back.

 

[Opanashc]

The Germans came very close to taking Moscow. I think the few weeks they lost in conquering Yugoslavia and Greece cost them Moscow. Holding Moscow allowed the Soviets time to transfer the Siberian troops for the winter offensive and then to throw the Germans back.

Germans came very close TO Moscow, not to TAKING Moscow. Germans came TO Stalingrad as well, did they TAKE Stalingrad?
Besides, Siberian troops numbered 18 divisions. Hardly a huge number, when the numbers involved hundreds of divisions.