Schnapps and the Wehrmacht It is very likely that many Germans who fought on the Eastern Front did not initially have the so-called natural craving for alcohol. However, it was replaced in abundance by fear, constant nervous tension, and therefore they drank, perhaps, no less than ours.

Vladimir Beshanov. Hitler's Missed Chance: Operation Blue

“In the summer of 1942, victory could be desirable, but a very distant prospect. Not only Great Britain, but also its American, Russian and Chinese allies were forced to limit their plans to the immediate task - to avoid defeat from enemies, whose strength, as it seemed then, was growing and looked like an avalanche that received a push ... "

M. Howard "Grand Strategy"

On March 28, 1942, at the Headquarters of Adolf Hitler, the Fuhrer of the German nation, the Supreme Commander of the Wehrmacht, the Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces, "the greatest commander of all time" and so on, a meeting was held at which the summer campaign plan was adopted. The outcome of the war, contrary to the iron will of the "accumulator of the German people", was still being decided in the East. Therefore, the main tasks assigned to the Wehrmacht were to seize the initiative from the Red Army, which was not killed due to a misunderstanding, which vilely used the elemental forces of nature in its favor - dirt, frost, roads, commissars - to finally destroy its manpower and deprive the Soviet Union of the most important economic centers.

Since there were no longer enough forces and means to attack in all the strategic directions laid down in the ingloriously deceased Barbarossa plan, the Fuhrer, guided primarily by economic considerations, decided to concentrate his efforts on the southern wing of the Eastern Front. Here, in the course of the “main operation”, it was planned to completely capture the industrial Donets Basin, the wheat fields of the Kuban, the oil-bearing regions of the Caucasus and the passes through the Caucasus Range. In the north, "as soon as the situation permits", it was necessary to take over Leningrad and establish contact with the Finns, in the central sector of the front - to conduct restrictive actions with minimal forces. Moscow, as the goal of the offensive, has so far fallen away.

It was believed that if successful, no Anglo-American assistance would compensate I.V. Stalin of lost resources. In the future, Hitler intended to create an "Eastern Wall" against the Russians - a giant defensive line - in order to then strike at England through the Middle East and North Africa. In the occupied part of Russia, it was necessary to start implementing a 30-year program of colonization of the “living space”, in every way encouraging the Aryans to move to the East, “the desire to increase the birth rate”, a sense of their racial exclusivity and historical role, a clear understanding of the primitiveness of the “non-Nordic biological mass”, doomed to partial destruction, Germanization, deportation to Siberia.

The appearance of American troops in the European theater of operations was expected no earlier than in a year, since everyone understood: "The United States was in the initial stage of mobilizing its huge resources and was engaged in solving such administrative, economic and political issues that were completely unfamiliar to the people of the United States."

On April 5, 1942, the Fuhrer signed OKW Directive No. 41. According to this document, the main complex of operations for the upcoming campaign consisted of a series of successive interrelated and complementary deep strikes, each time ensuring "maximum concentration in decisive areas." The purpose of the first operation, which received the code name "Blau" on April 7, was a breakthrough from the Orel region to Voronezh, from where the tank and motorized divisions were to turn south and, in cooperation with the troops advancing from Kharkov, destroy the Red Army forces between the Don and Seversky rivers. Donets. This was to be followed by an offensive by two groups of armies on Stalingrad with the capture of the enemy in "pincers" from the north-west (downstream of the Don) and from the south-west (upstream of the Don). In parallel with the advance of mobile troops, to cover their left flank from the Orel region to Voronezh and further along the banks of the Don, it was necessary to equip powerful positions saturated with anti-tank weapons, to hold which German allied formations were intended. And, finally, a turn to the Caucasus - to the coveted oil and the “Indias” looming on the horizon. The ultimate goal of the "main operation" in 1942 was to conquer the Caucasian oil fields.

Operation Blue was to begin in June. Prior to this, in order to create favorable conditions, it was supposed to carry out offensive operations with a limited purpose - in the Crimea and in the Izyum direction.

The result was a risky multi-way combination that required constant maneuvering of forces, the organization of their continuous interaction and uninterrupted supply at a great distance from the "domestic base". Only the Wehrmacht could implement such a complex plan at that time, and even it “did not grow together”. Although, according to the British military theorist B. Liddell-Gart, "it was a subtle calculation that was closer to its goal than is commonly believed after its final and catastrophic failure."

We add that for the Third Reich it was the last chance to win or at least not lose the Second World War.

In the Soviet Headquarters, after the defeat of the Germans near Moscow, the party and military generals were filled with the most resolute intentions. In May Day Order No. 130, Comrade Stalin, “a brilliant leader and teacher of the party, a great strategist of the socialist revolution, a wise leader of the Soviet state and a commander,” set a specific task for the Red Army: “To ensure that 1942 becomes the year of the final defeat of the Nazi troops and the liberation of the Soviet land from the Nazi scoundrels. The idea for the spring-summer campaign was to consistently carry out a number of strategic operations in different directions, forcing the enemy to disperse his reserves, not allowing him to create a strong grouping in any of the points, beat him with "powerful blows" and drive him to the West without stopping . The beginning of the defeat of the Wehrmacht was supposed to be laid by the strikes of the Southwestern Front scheduled for May on Kharkov-Dnepropetrovsk and the expulsion of the Germans from the Crimean peninsula. After that, in the Lgov-Kursk direction, the troops of the Bryansk Front went on the offensive. Then came the turn of the Western and Kalinin fronts to eliminate the Rzhev-Vyazma grouping of the enemy. In conclusion, the de-blockade of Leningrad and the exit of the Karelian Front to the line of the state border of the USSR: “The initiative is now in our hands, and the attempts of Hitler’s loose rusty machine cannot hold back the pressure of the Red Army. The day is not far off when red banners will once again fly victoriously all over Soviet soil.

The Stavka correctly calculated that the Wehrmacht was no longer capable of conducting major offensive operations in all directions, but mistakenly believed that Moscow remained Hitler's main goal. Even after the war, having the documents of the German General Staff in their hands, Soviet historians did not dare to doubt the predictions of Comrade Stalin himself: in order to force the Red Army to capitulate and thus achieve the end of the war in the East. Therefore, most of the forces of the active army were concentrated in the Moscow direction, and 10 reserve armies were evenly distributed along the entire Soviet-German front.

The successes of the military industry made it possible to begin the formation of tank corps, and in May the creation of such powerful operational formations as tank and air armies began. However, it was May that marked the beginning of a series of catastrophic defeats. The Rzhev-Vyazemsky operation of the Kalinin and Western fronts turned out to be a major failure (only numbers remained from the 29th and 33rd armies), the agony of the 2nd shock army began in the Luban "bottle", the troops of the Crimean Front were defeated by the swift counteroffensive of General Manstein ( 44th, 47th, 51st armies lost more than 70% of their personnel and all materiel). The troops of the Southwestern Front (6th, 57th, 9th armies), advancing on Kharkov, themselves got into the "bag" just when the Germans started to liquidate it. The total human losses of the Red Army in the first half of 1942 amounted to more than 3.2 million commanders and Red Army men, that is, 60% of its average strength, and 1.4 million were irretrievable losses. Germany's losses in killed and missing in all theaters during the same period reached 245.5 thousand soldiers and officers; ground forces, according to entries in the diary of the chief of staff of the OKH, Colonel General F. Halder, lost 123 thousand people killed and 346 thousand wounded on the Eastern Front - 14.6% of the average number of 3.2 million.

Thus, by mid-June, the German command was able to create favorable conditions for the strategic offensive of the Wehrmacht.

To achieve the intended goals, Germany and its allies concentrated 94 divisions on the southern wing of the Eastern Front, including 10 tank and 8 motorized. They consisted of 900 thousand people, 1260 tanks and assault guns, more than 17,000 guns and mortars, supported by 1200 combat aircraft of the 4th Air Fleet. Of these, 15 divisions were in the Crimea.

An army group under the command of General von Weichs, consisting of the 2nd field and 4th tank German, as well as the 2nd Hungarian armies, in cooperation with the 6th army of General Paulus, were aimed at carrying out Operation Blau. Her plan was to deliver two blows in converging directions to Voronezh. As a result, it was supposed to encircle and defeat the Soviet troops west of the city of Stary Oskol, go to the Don in the sector from Voronezh to Staraya Kalitva, after which the 4th Panzer and 6th Armies were to turn south, towards Kantemirovka - to the rear of the main forces of Yugo -Western Front Marshal S.K. Timoshenko (21st, 28th, 38th, remnants of the 9th and 57th armies).

The second shock group - the 1st tank and 17th field armies - from the Slavyansk region was to break through the Soviet front and strike at Starobelsk, Millerovo to complete the encirclement of the troops of the Southwestern and Southern fronts.

In the 600-km zone from Orel to Taganrog, Field Marshal von Bock's Army Group "South" was opposed by the troops of the Bryansk, South-Western and Southern Fronts, which included 74 divisions, 6 fortified areas, 17 rifle and motorized rifle, 20 separate tank brigades, 6 tank corps - 1.3 million people, at least 1500 tanks. Air cover was provided by 1,500 aircraft of the 2nd, 8th and 4th air armies and two ADD divisions.

According to the plan, which, by the way, accidentally fell into the hands of the Soviet command, but was perceived by them as deliberately planted disinformation, the Weikhs group, with the support of the 8th Air Corps, launched a surprise attack from the Shchigry area at the junction of the 13th and 40th armies of the Bryansk front. In the center, along the Kursk-Voronezh railway, the 4th tank army of General Goth was rushing towards the Don, which included 3 tank (9, 11, 24th) and 3 motorized (3rd, 16th and "Great Germany" ) divisions. To the south, the 2nd Hungarian Army - 9 infantry and 1 tank divisions - advanced on Stary Oskol. The northern flank of the strike force was covered by the 55th Army Corps of the 2nd German Army.

On the very first day, the Germans penetrated 15 km into the Soviet defense; on the second, the "Panzers" defeated the headquarters of the 40th Army, completely disorganizing its management, and entered the operational space. Since June 29, the commander of the Bryansk Front, Lieutenant General F.I. Golikov tried to liquidate the breakthrough with flank attacks by five tank corps (1st, 4th, 24th, 17th, 16th, 24th) and individual tank brigades, but acted in the best traditions of the summer of 1941. The corps entered the battle on the move, in parts, inconsistently in time, without reconnaissance, without interaction with other branches of the military, without communication with each other and with higher headquarters. One by one, they were shattered.

On June 30, the troops of the 6th Army of General Paulus, who went on the offensive from the Volchansk region, which had two tank (3rd, 23rd) and 29th motorized divisions as part of the 40th Panzer Corps, with the support of the 4th Air Corps "suddenly quickly" broke through the Soviet defenses at the junction of the 21st and 28th armies of the Southwestern Front and advanced up to 80 km in three days. On July 3, they met at Stary Oskol with the Hungarian units, closing the encirclement around six Soviet divisions. After that, the main forces of Weikhs rushed to Voronezh, Paulus - to Ostrogozhsk, covering the right flank of the 28th Army of Lieutenant General D.I. Ryabyshev.

On July 5, the 6th Army crossed the Tikhaya Sosna River with its left wing, and the Great Germany Division and the 24th Panzer Division broke into Voronezh. In the evening of the same day, a categorical order followed from the Fuhrer's Headquarters to suspend the assault on the city, withdraw mobile formations from street fighting and send them south, to the corridor between the Don and the Seversky Donets.

While Hitler stated at the meeting that the capture of Voronezh did not matter to him, Stalin, fearing that the Germans would start a roundabout movement from here to the rear of Moscow, paid special attention to this direction. From the Stavka reserve, the 3rd and 6th reserve armies were advanced to the Don, renamed respectively the 60th and 6th (13 fresh rifle divisions). At the same time, a powerful counterattack was being prepared by the 5th Tank Army (2nd, 11th, and 7th Tank Corps, the 19th Separate Tank Brigade, and the 340th Rifle Division). The 1st Fighter Aviation Army of the Headquarters Reserve (230 aircraft) was redeployed to the Yelets area. To "assist in organizing the defense of Voronezh" from Moscow rushed the Chief of the General Staff A.M. Vasilevsky, his deputy N.V. Vatutin, head of the Main Armored Directorate Ya.N. Fedorenko.

On the morning of July 6, the 5th Panzer Army attempted to intercept Goth's communications from the north and disrupt the enemy's crossing of the Don. By this time, the 4th Panzer Army was already turning south, and in its place the infantry of the 2nd Field Army was digging in with its front to the north. As before, the Soviet corps were brought into battle one by one, on the move, without preparation, on a wide front. The German infantry, with the assistance of the 9th and 11th Panzer Divisions, successfully repelled the unorganized Russian attacks. At this, the 5th Panzer Army, which had delayed Goth's formations for four days, ceased to exist and was disbanded.

The gap between the Bryansk and Southwestern fronts reached 300 km wide and up to 170 km deep. On July 7, the Voronezh Front was formed, which included the 60th, 40th, 6th combined arms, 2nd air armies, 4th, 17th, 18th, 24th tank corps, which received the task of "strongly gaining a foothold" and by all means began to hold the eastern bank of the Don. On the opposite bank, with similar intentions, the Hungarians occupied the defense.

The immediate task of the offensive was completed. During the nine days of the battle, Soviet losses amounted to 162 thousand people. According to German data, 73,000 Red Army soldiers were captured and 1,200 tanks were destroyed.

Army Group South split into two parts on 7 July. Field Marshal von Bock took over Group B, which included the 4th Panzer, 2nd and 6th Field, 2nd Hungarian and 8th Italian armies. They were supposed to continue the offensive, at the same time organizing defenses at the turn of the Don River. The newly created command of group "A" took over the 17th field and 1st tank armies. Field Marshal List was entrusted with the leadership of operations for the offensive against Stalingrad from the southwest.

The first half of July 1942 passed to the sound of fanfare in honor of the victories of German weapons.

In North Africa, German-Italian troops defeated the British 8th Army and captured Tobruk. The tank corps of General Rommel, having traveled 600 km through the desert, reached El Alamein, a railway station located 100 km from Alexandria. The battle for Egypt reached its highest point. The English fleet was forced to withdraw to the Red Sea. The British headquarters had already worked out plans for the retreat of the 8th British Army to Palestine in case it failed to hold the Nile Delta.

On July 1, Sevastopol fell, the entire Crimean peninsula was in German hands - a base for the fleet, an airfield for aviation and a springboard for jumping into the Caucasus. Accordingly, Manstein's 11th Army was released to participate in hostilities in the south, which on this occasion was awarded the rank of field marshal. After rest and replenishment, the army was supposed to be transferred across the Kerch Strait to the Taman Peninsula (Operation Blucher).

In the Atlantic, "wolf packs" of Grand Admiral Dennitsa sank 700-800 thousand tons of allied ships every month.

In the North, German submarines and aircraft defeated the PQ-17 convoy. Of the 34 transports en route from Iceland to the port of Arkhangelsk, 23 were sunk. At the bottom of the Barents Sea were 3,350 vehicles, 430 tanks, 210 aircraft, and about 100,000 tons of cargo. The destruction of the convoy in Berlin was regarded as a major victory, equivalent to the defeat of a 100,000-strong army. The consequences were even more severe: at the request of the British Admiralty, the supply of military materials to the USSR along the Northern Route, associated with "unjustified risk", was suspended for almost half a year. Attempts to organize the supply of the Soviet Union through the Persian Gulf were frustrated due to the low throughput of southern ports, the absence of anything resembling a road network in the Middle East, a lack of vehicles, and the need to provide for the needs of the British troops in Iran and Iraq. 15 thousand tons of cargo per month is all that the Russians got in the summer of 1942.

Meanwhile, the second stage of the Wehrmacht's summer offensive was unfolding on the southern wing of the Eastern Front.

On the evening of July 7, the 40th tank and 8th army corps of the Paulus army, developing an offensive along the right bank of the Don, occupied Rossosh, cut the Moscow-Rostov railway, and the next day captured bridgeheads on the southern bank of the Chernaya Kalitva River. Here, across the river, the "weakly controlled units" of the 21st and 28th armies of the Southwestern Front rolled back. On July 8, the 1st Panzer Army of General von Kleist struck from the Slavyansk region through the Seversky Donets in the general direction of Millerovo, and the 17th General Ruoff from Artyomovsk attacked Voroshilovgrad.

Timoshenko's headquarters was not oriented in the situation and increasingly lost control of the troops. On July 9, Commander-38 Major General K.S. Moskalenko, having no connection with the higher command, made an independent decision to wrap the right flank of the army with the front to the north in order to organize defense in the Kantemirovka area, but von Schweppenburg's 40th Panzer Corps was already bypassing Kantemirovka from the east. By the end of July 11, the main forces of the Southwestern Front, enveloped from the northeast and east and attacked from the west by Kleist's tank army, were forced to fight heavily south and southwest of Kantemirovka. The advanced units of the 40th Panzer Corps reached the village of Bokovskaya on the Chir River. A day later, the 1st Panzer Army, with Mackensen's group at the forefront (16th, 22nd, 14th Panzer, 60th Motorized Divisions), crossed the Aidar River south of Starobelsk on a wide front and rushed to Millerovo, where a meeting with units of 4 was outlined. th Panzer Army, 17th Army approached Voroshilovgrad with its left flank.

The Southwestern Front, which had 610 thousand people before the start of Operation Blau, lost 233 thousand, was divided into separate groups of troops and actually collapsed. On July 12, the Headquarters decided to abolish it. Parts of the 28th, 38th, 9th armies were transferred to the Southern Front by Lieutenant General R.Ya. Malinovsky (37th, 12th, 18th, 56th, 24th armies), who was tasked with stopping the enemy's advance. True, there was nothing to transfer, and it didn’t work out - the shattered armies, under the pressure of circumstances, moved along their own trajectories, and Marshal Timoshenko could not answer Moscow’s question: “Where did these divisions go?” The bloodless formations of the 28th and 38th armies "in an unorganized and uncontrolled mass" broke through to the northeast, the 9th army rolled back to the south. At the same time, the formation of the Stalingrad Front began, which was to include the 63rd, 62nd, 64th (former 5th, 7th, 1st reserve - 19 divisions, more than 200 thousand people), 21st armies, as well as 28th, 38th and 57th, from which only headquarters remained. The new front received the task of firmly defending the line along the Don River from Pavlovskaya to Kletskaya, further along the line of Kletskaya, Surovikino, Suvorovsky, Verkhnekurmoyarskaya and preventing the enemy from reaching the Volga.

Commander of the Southern Front, Lieutenant General R.Ya. Malinovsky initially decided to stop the German troops at the turn of Millerovo, Petropavlovsk, Cherkasskoe, but too late ... late ... The enemy was ahead in pace. On July 12, General Halder wrote with satisfaction: "In the zone of operations in the south, a picture quite consistent with the plans is emerging."

However, the very next day, Hitler began to improvise and break the already fragile plan. Deciding that the main forces of Timoshenko, fleeing from the German "pincers", were retreating to the south, the Fuhrer decided to arrange a grandiose "cauldron" north of Rostov. To this end, on July 13, he ordered both tank armies to move at an accelerated march to the mouth of the Seversky Donets River and turn west along the Don to cut off the Russians from the crossings, and then destroy the enemy together with the 17th Army. At the same time, the 1st Panzer Army had to cross the Donets once again. The 4th Panzer Army was reassigned to Army Group A. Thus, the offensive of tank and motorized divisions to Stalingrad was postponed, only the 6th field army continued to move east, from which, moreover, the 40th tank corps was taken away in favor of Goth. At the same time, Field Marshal Bock was removed from his post, and General Weichs was appointed in his place.

On July 15, German tank corps met east of Millerovo. Formations of the 24th Army, Lieutenant General I.K. Smirnov, advanced from the reserve of the Southern Front, tried to open the outer ring of encirclement, but were defeated and thrown back to Kamensk by blows from moving units. On this day, the Headquarters ordered the immediate withdrawal of the troops of the Southern Front beyond the Don and, in cooperation with the 51st Army of the North Caucasian Front, to organize a strong defense along the southern bank of the river in the area from Bataysk to Verkhnekurmoyarskaya. The defense of the Rostov fortified area from the north was entrusted to the 56th Army of Major General A.I. Ryzhov. On July 17, Ruoff's troops took Voroshilovgrad, Kleist's tankers crossed the Seversky Donets in the opposite direction and occupied a bridgehead in the Kamensk-Shakhtinsky area. The motorized divisions of Hoth reached the Don east of the mouth of the Donets. They were supposed to force the river, then, turning to the west, go along the southern bank to the rear of the Rostov position. At that time, in the forest near Vinnitsa, where the General Staff moved with Hitler, Halder, doubting the presence of large Russian forces in the prepared trap, strongly objected to the "senseless concentration of forces around Rostov" and proposed, without wasting expensive summer time and precious fuel on empty maneuvers, finally move on to the Stalingrad operation. A little later, the general will write: “Even an amateur becomes clear that all the mobile forces are pulled together near Rostov, it is not known why ...”

On July 20, Kleist's 1st Panzer Army struck from Kamensk to Novocherkassk. A day later, the 57th tank corps of General Kirchner went on the offensive against Rostov from the area north of Taganrog. Goth's army captured bridgeheads on the southern bank of the Don in the areas of Konstantinovskaya and Tsimlyanskaya. The attack of the Rostov fortified region began on July 22; On the 23rd, divisions of the 3rd Panzer Corps broke into the city. But the demonstrative "cauldron" did not work out - Malinovsky's armies, where systematically, and where they ran, left for the Don.

The troops of the three Soviet fronts escaped encirclement similar to Kyiv or Kharkov, but since June 28, they have lost 568 thousand people (of which 370 thousand irrevocably), 2436 tanks, 13 716 guns and mortars, 783 combat aircraft, almost half a million small arms. The irretrievable losses of the Wehrmacht for a month of fighting in all theaters amounted to 37 thousand soldiers and officers (on the entire Eastern Front - 22 thousand), 393 tanks and assault guns.

The strategic line of the Red Army in the south was broken through to a depth of 150-400 km, which allowed the enemy to launch an offensive in the big bend of the Don towards Stalingrad. However, at that moment, like a bolt from the blue, Directive No. 45 “On the continuation of Operation Braunschweig” struck.

Hitler convinced himself that the Russians were now definitely at the limit of their strength, and found it possible to change the plan of the campaign.

The fundamental point of the operation "Blau" (from June 30 - "Braunschweig") was the rapid offensive of Army Groups "B" and "A" on Stalingrad and the encirclement of the retreating Soviet troops. This was followed by an attack on the Caucasus. However, Hitler was in such a hurry to seize Grozny and Baku oil that he decided to carry out these operations simultaneously. Against the objections of Halder, the Fuhrer redirected both tank armies to the south and took the 40th Panzer Corps from Paulus. Of the mobile formations in the 6th Army, only one motorized division remained.

Hitler feared that by throwing his main forces at Stalingrad, he would strike at an empty place and waste time in vain. In a directive signed on July 23, he approved a "fatal decision": instead of the originally envisaged echeloned operations, he ordered two simultaneous offensives in divergent directions - to the Volga and the Caucasus.

The troops received new tasks, new deadlines and no reinforcements. Moreover, considering that the available forces were quite sufficient for the final defeat of the Russians on the southern wing, the Fuhrer transferred two motorized (Adolf Hitler and Great Germany) and two infantry divisions from Army Group A to France and the Army Group " Center", two tank divisions (9th and 11th) - to Army Group Center. Manstein's army went to storm Leningrad. In total, 11 German divisions were removed from the main direction by the end of July. Finally, the command of the army of the reserve had to complete and send three new infantry divisions to the West as quickly as possible - to the detriment of the replenishment of the Eastern Front.

If on June 28, 68 German divisions and 26 Allied divisions were concentrated as part of Army Group South on a front of 800 km, then by August 1, there were 57 German and 36 Allied divisions to carry out new tasks. The front line at that moment was already about 1200 km. Nominally, the total number of formations remained unchanged, but the Germans themselves quite reasonably considered the combat power of an Italian, Romanian or Hungarian division equal to half the German one. These forces now had to capture and hold a strip of 4100 km. To say nothing of the difficulties of transportation and supplies, which were bound to arise, the strategic goal no longer corresponded in any way to the available funds.

“July 23,” writes General Dörr, “apparently can be considered the day when the High Command of the German Army clearly showed that it did not follow the classical laws of warfare and embarked on a new path, which was largely dictated by the willfulness and illogicality of Hitler than the rational, realistic way of thinking of a soldier."

General Halder openly spoke out against the next "brilliant insight." Relations between the Supreme Commander-in-Chief and the Chief of the General Staff of the OKH escalated to the limit. Like any dictator, Hitler distrusted generals who had a habit of thinking for themselves and "not trained in unquestioning obedience", especially in such an important matter as the conduct of war. Specifically, Halder, who constantly got involved in a big strategy with his warnings and academic judgments, he called stupid behind his back, and his headquarters - "a nest of conspirators and traitors." Halder staunchly hated the Fuhrer and more than once mentally tried on a "wooden pea coat" on him. In the end, the general said everything he thought about the ability of the Fuhrer to direct military operations, and Hitler in a rage told him to shut up. The court doctor Morel explained the increased irritability of the participants in the dispute by the unhealthy continental climate of Vinnitsa.

So, the main efforts were aimed at conquering the Caucasus. But already on July 26, Paulus' army for the first time got stuck in the defense of the Stalingrad Front. Five days later, Hitler ordered the return of the 4th Panzer Army to Army Group B. From that moment on, two approximately identical German groups advanced at right angles to each other. In the future, the Fuhrer transferred troops at his own discretion. Like a Buridan donkey, he could not make a choice between two "armfuls of hay." Permanent changes in the approved plans disrupted the already difficult work of the supply services.

The rest is known: the German forces, together with the allies, were not enough in any of the directions. Hitler had to throw more and more divisions at Stalingrad, but the Russians did it faster. As a result, Paulus was drawn into the "all-consuming funnel" in which his entire army perished. Kleist got stuck in the Caucasus, and a little later he barely got his feet out of there. The Russians won the race against time, although everything hung in the balance.

But, frankly, it is not clear how the Battle of Stalingrad could be blown away. It can be assumed that the Fuhrer was an agent of influence of the Comintern. After all, everything was calculated to the smallest detail, calculated correctly, this was confirmed by the three impeccably carried out stages of the summer campaign. Stalingrad lay literally on a silver platter. It was only necessary to continue to win at the pace, or, as Halder formulated back in the planning period, "the Russians must throw their forces after ours." Everything could be very different. More or less like this.

On July 14, at five o'clock in the afternoon, Hitler finished his favorite chamomile tea with dumplings, leaned back in his chair and said very intelligently: “You know, Franz Maximilianovich, you convinced me. Let's not force things."

On the morning of July 15, the 4th Panzer Army (24th, 48th Panzer, 4th Army Corps), having returned the 40th Panzer Corps to the submission of General Paulus, from the area northeast of Millerovo began moving east, towards Stalingrad. Ahead, to the very horizon, lay the burnt-out steppe, cut up by gullies and streams - and no sign of the Russians. To the north, in the same direction, without encountering resistance, hiding from the left flank of the Don and barriers of the 29th Army Corps, at an average rate of 30 km per day, the columns of the 6th Field Army were gathering dust. “Today it is 50 degrees of heat,” wrote non-commissioned officer of the artillery regiment of the 297th Infantry Division Alois Heymesser. “Footmen are lying in a swoon along the road, for a kilometer I counted 27 people.” The Schweppenburg tank corps, quietly scolding the staff strategists, again turned 90 degrees. The 1st Panzer Army (3rd Panzer, 44th, 51st Army Corps) continued to roll south, deeply covering Malinovsky's right wing. The 57th and 14th tank corps hit the left wing from Taganrog.

On the night of July 16, the troops of the Southern Front began to withdraw to the line indicated by the Headquarters. In the afternoon, Kleist's army occupied Tatsinskaya. Alfred Rimmer, a soldier in the motorized infantry regiment of the 16th Panzer Division, wrote in his diary: “At 6 o’clock we set out. We drove 170 kilometers. The Russian retreat road along which we traveled clearly shows their unplanned wild flight. Everything that was a burden for them in flight, they abandoned: machine guns, mortars, and even a “hellish weapon” with 16 charges of 10 cm caliber, which charges and shoots electricity. The 40th Panzer Corps (3rd, 23rd Panzer, 29th Motorized, 100th Jaeger Divisions) crossed the Chir River near the villages of Bokovskaya and Chernyshevskaya and entered into battle with the forward detachments of the Russians. A day later, the 48th (24th Panzer, motorized division "Grossdeutschland") and the 24th (14th Panzer, 3rd, 16th motorized divisions) corps of the 4th Panzer Army reached the Tsimla River in its upper reaches.

By this time, in the bend of the Don, having made a 100-km march from Stalingrad on foot, only the 62nd Army under the command of Major General V. Ya Kolpakchi managed to turn around. The defensive line for it was chosen unsuccessfully: on an open, tank-accessible area, without taking into account natural barriers that could be strengthened with engineering barriers and made them difficult for the attacking side, “the positions were placed in the bare steppe, open for observation and viewing them both from the ground, as well as from the air. However, there were no mines or other means of barriers, so the soldiers simply dug holes in the open field, called single rifle cells. The army, which had a total strength of 81 thousand people, included 6 rifle divisions, 4 cadet regiments of military infantry schools, 6 separate tank battalions (250 tanks), eight artillery regiments of the RGK. Five divisions of the first echelon stretched in a thread from north to south from Kletskaya to Nizhne-Solonovsky on a front of almost 130 km, further - to Verkhnekurmoyarskaya a 50-km hole gaped. One rifle division was in the second echelon near the railway to Stalingrad. One rifle regiment with reinforcements was assigned from each rifle division to forward detachments, advanced to a distance of 60-80 km from the main forces in order to find and "probe" the enemy.

The 64th Army, which was being transferred from the Tula region (for some reason without the commander who formed it), had barely begun to unload at several stations far from the front line. As deputy commander V.I. Chuikov, on July 17, he received a directive from the front headquarters to deploy the army on the front from Surovikino to Verkhnekurmoyarskaya within two days, replacing the left-flank divisions of General Kolpakchi here, and stand up on a tough defense:

“The task set by the directive was clearly impossible, since the divisions and army units were just unloading from the echelons and heading west, to the Don, not in military columns, but in the same composition as they followed by rail. The heads of some divisions were already approaching the Don, and their tails were on the banks of the Volga, and even in the wagons. The rear units of the army and army reserves in general were in the Tula region and were waiting for loading into railway cars.

The troops of the army had not only to be assembled after unloading from the echelons, but also to be transported across the Don, having covered 120–150 kilometers on foot ...

I went to Colonel Rukhla, head of the operational department of the front headquarters, and, proving the impossibility of fulfilling the directive on time, asked him to report to the Military Council of the front that the 64th Army could occupy the defensive line no earlier than July 23.

With such a density of construction, the Soviet side had no chance to withstand a strong enemy strike, especially a strike from mobile formations. The vast majority of the personnel of the reserve armies had no combat experience. Nevertheless, "the mood at the headquarters of the 62nd Army was upbeat." The fact is that the command of the Stalingrad Front, quite optimistic about the immediate prospects, considered its direction to be auxiliary and, in a report to the General Staff, predicted that the main blow “the enemy would strike in the lower reaches of the river. Don in order to break through to the North Caucasus.

On the morning of July 18, von Schweppenburg's corps from the Perelazovsky area struck at the right flank of the 62nd Army. A day later, the tanks defeated the headquarters of the 192nd and 184th rifle divisions in the Verkhne-Buzinovka area and reached the Don at Kamenskaya. German aviation, providing the actions of ground forces, absolutely dominated the air. On the left flank, formations of the 4th Panzer Army scattered the 196th Rifle Division to the wind, reached the mouth of the Chir River and captured a bridgehead on the northern bank. On July 20, the “pincers” closed up, a “cauldron” was formed west of Kalach for four Soviet divisions and the 40th tank brigade. Their remnants, leaving artillery and equipment, infiltrated in small groups from the encirclement to the east.

The way to Stalingrad was actually opened. However, further advance was hampered by a lack of fuel and a significant backlog of infantry. The Germans spent the next four days clearing the territory in the small bend of the Don, stockpiling supplies and regrouping forces.

In the zone of Army Group A, Ruoff's army captured Voroshilovgrad on July 17 and developed an offensive against Rostov. Kleist's infantry corps repulsed the deblocking attack of the 24th Army at the turn of the Seversky Donets, and the 3rd Tank Corps (22nd, 16th Tank, 60th Motorized Divisions) of General Mackensen crossed the Don south of Tsimlyanskaya on July 20. On July 24, Rostov fell, on the 26th, crossing the river, the 125th and 73rd Infantry Divisions captured Bataysk after fierce fighting, next to Aksayskaya, another bridgehead was created by the 13th Panzer and 198th Infantry Divisions.

A new catastrophe was brewing on the southern wing of the Soviet-German front. Before Stalingrad, the Germans had to go in a straight line about 70 km. There were neither serious natural obstacles nor organized defense along this path. On the 200-km section from Sirotinskaya to Verkhnekurmoyarskaya along the left bank of the Don, the Soviet command had six fairly battered rifle divisions of the 62nd Army, which had lost half of their composition, headed by Lieutenant General A.I. Lopatin, as well as four divisions, two naval rifle and 137th tank brigades of the 64th Army, Lieutenant General V.I. Chuikov. As a means of rapid response, their defense was “propped up” by the 13th Tank Corps (157 tanks) restored in a new composition, Colonel T.I. Tanaschishin - the benefit of the STZ continued to uninterruptedly supply brand new "thirty-fours" to the front line. The northern arc of the Don bend from the mouth of the Medveditsa River was covered by a curtain of six divisions of the 64th Army, Lieutenant General V.I. Kuznetsov, stretching for 300 km (with a lane width for each division from 40 to 100 km), the southern one - four rifle and two cavalry divisions of the 51st Army, Major General N.Ya. Kirichenko.

The front reserve had two rifle divisions (18th and 131st), two tank brigades (133rd, 131st) and the 3rd Guards Cavalry Corps. On July 22, it was decided to form two tank armies of mixed composition on the basis of the directorates of the 38th and 28th combined arms armies - the 1st under the command of Major General K.S. Moskalenko and the 4th under the command of Major General V.D. Kryuchenko, - which were to include the 13th, 28th, 22nd, 23rd tank corps, separate tank brigades and rifle formations. Another 6 tank brigades were being reorganized in the city. Headquarters reserves were hastily transferred to Stalingrad. In Saratov, Vologda, Gorky, the troops of the 8th, 2nd, 9th reserve armies were loaded. Echelons with the 204th, 126th, 205th, 321st, 399th, and 422nd personnel rifle divisions rushed from the Far East, however, their arrival was expected no earlier than July 27-28. In connection with the rapidly deteriorating situation, the city Defense Committee adopted a resolution on preparations for special measures - mining and destruction of industrial enterprises, communication centers, energy facilities, water supply and other facilities.

Defeats and endless retreats demoralized the Soviet troops, undermined their faith in victory, in the ability of military leaders to repulse the Germans. Special departments and departments of military censorship recorded the growth of defeatist sentiments and anti-Soviet statements on the part of fighters and commanders: “They don’t know how to command, they give several orders, and then they are canceled ...”, “We were betrayed. Five armies were thrown to the Germans to be devoured. Someone is currying favor with Hitler. The front is open and the situation is hopeless”, “The German army is more cultured and stronger than our army. We cannot defeat the Germans”, “Tymoshenko is a bad warrior, and he is ruining the army”. July 23 Marshal S.K. Timoshenko, who since May 1942 was pursued by continuous failures, was removed from command of the Stalingrad Front. His place was taken at the wrong time and not according to his abilities by Lieutenant General V.N. Gordov, famous for his "obscene management." On the same day, Stalin's order No. 227 appeared: “We have lost more than 70 million people, more than 800 million poods of grain a year and more than 10 million tons of steel a year. We no longer have superiority over the Germans either in manpower reserves or in grain supplies. To retreat further means to ruin ourselves and at the same time ruin our Motherland. Each new piece of territory left by us will strengthen the enemy in every possible way and weaken our defense in every possible way ... "

In the meantime, Paulus concentrated the main forces of the 6th Army (40th Tank, 8th, 17th Army Corps) at Vertyachy, to force the Don in the easternmost part of the bend. On the right, at Kalach, the 71st Infantry Division was supposed to deliver an auxiliary strike. The main forces of the 4th Panzer Army (48th, 24th Tank, 4th Army Corps) prepared for an attack in the Verkhnechirskaya area, south of the railway to Stalingrad, at the junction of the 64th and 62nd armies. The action plan of Army Group B was simple: both armies - the 4th Panzer to the south, and the 6th Army to the north of Stalingrad - struck in the direction of the Volga, at the river they turned left and right, respectively, and took the entire area of ​​​​Stalingrad with pincers from troops defending it.

But on July 24, the 1st Panzer Army, which had two tank, one motorized and 6 infantry divisions, was the first to go on the offensive from the bridgehead at Tsimlyanskaya. Kleist delivered the main blow east of the Salsk-Stalingrad railway with the task of reaching the Volga near Krasnoarmeysk. The Germans easily scattered the defenses of the 51st Army and moved to the northeast. At the same time, four infantry divisions of the 6th Romanian Corps were deployed on the Romanovskaya-Remontnaya line with the front to the south-west. Already on July 25, the 22nd Panzer Division captured the Kotelnikovo station, and a day later it reached the Aksai River at the Zhutovo station. There were no Soviet units on the southwestern front of the Stalingrad defensive bypass.

To protect this direction, it was decided to advance the 13th tank corps and two rifle divisions with the headquarters of the 57th army. The tank armies of Moskalenko and Kryuchenkon were ordered to deliver a powerful counterattack in the general direction to Verkhnebuzinovka, defeat the left wing of the Paulus army and push it back beyond the Chir.

However, on July 25, with the support of the entire 4th Air Fleet, the Germans launched a general offensive. The infantry of the 6th Army crossed the Don on both sides of Vertyachey, the 4th Army Corps of General Shvedler established a crossing near Nizhnechirskaya. During the day, significant forces were transferred to the bridgeheads, and on July 27 tank corps rushed into the gap. The unorganized counterattacks of the Soviet tank armies were repulsed with heavy losses for them. All these corps, brigades, divisions, formally united in armies, were scattered over a large area, had no connection with each other, and were not ready for well-coordinated military operations. The newly minted commanders did not even have time to get acquainted with the troops, not to mention working out interaction and control. Tank drivers had 3-5 hours of driving, and the tanks themselves, assembled in a hurry and in violation of technology, broke down even before reaching the battle line. The equipment of the troops with anti-tank and anti-aircraft artillery can be called symbolic, there were no howitzers at all, there was a catastrophic lack of rifle units, and “Stalin's falcons” were completely invisible in the air. S.K. Moskalenko bitterly recalls: “Enemy aviation operated in groups of two to three dozen aircraft that appeared over us every 20–25 minutes. Unfortunately, our 8th Air Army, apparently engaged in other directions, did not oppose them. Therefore, any movement of Soviet troops in the daytime was covered by paralysis "due to the strong influence of enemy aircraft."

By the evening of July 28, the advanced battalions of the 3rd Panzer Division crossed the interfluve and reached the Volga near the villages of Rynok and Latoshynka north of Stalingrad. The railway lines approaching the city from the north and northwest were cut, the river from that moment could no longer be used as a waterway. The German captain wrote in his diary: “We looked at the steppe stretching beyond the Volga. From here lay the road to Asia, and I was shocked.”

At the same time, the tank corps of the 4th Panzer Army broke into the Soviet defenses in the center and, repelling counterattacks from Kalach, reached the middle city bypass on the Chervlyonaya River; Von Knobelsdorff's 24th Panzer Corps turned north, Geimer's 48th Panzer Corps aimed at Beketovka.

Kleist's tanks, after a 150-km throw to Aksay, stood for a day waiting for fuel, but already on July 28 they broke into the Abganerovo station, where they were again stopped by brigades of the 13th tank corps. To the right, the divisions of von Seydlitz's 51st Army Corps were deploying like a fan to the southeast.

These days, Richthofen's aircraft repeatedly made massive raids on Stalingrad, moorings and crossings. The city burned like a giant fire. Industrial enterprises and residential areas were destroyed. A hail of incendiary bombs hit the wooden houses of the southwestern outskirts, everything here burned to the ground. The boxes of high-rise buildings survived, but the ceilings collapsed. Oil storage facilities and oil tankers blazed. Oil and kerosene streams flowed into the Volga and burned on its surface.

The Stalingrad front burned and collapsed in exactly the same way.

On July 29, the 14th Panzer Division met in the Gumrak area with the 23rd Panzer Division advancing from the north, the 48th Panzer Corps occupied Beketovka. On the southern front, Mackensen's panzer divisions, covered by motorized infantry, hit Plodovitoe and further north. By evening they broke into Krasnoarmeysk. From here, from a steep hill that towered 150 meters above the river level, the whole of Stalingrad, the bend of the Volga with Sarpinsky Island and the Kalmyk steppes were clearly visible. General Gordov's order to withdraw from the "bag" to the inner line was given too late. The front headquarters was evacuated to the left bank of the Volga, to the area of ​​the Yama farm, and to the west and south of Stalingrad, two “boilers” were formed at once, in which the troops of four Soviet armies were methodically ground. From the north, the Far Eastern divisions unsuccessfully tried to break through and restore contact with the city, attacking on the move, as they arrived, without artillery and air support - they were subordinated to the headquarters of the 21st Army. From a letter from private Ya.A. Trushkov to his native Ussuri region: “I will describe our incompetent situation. We reached the front with grief in half, upon arrival on the second day we entered into battle with German tanks and infantry, and we were smashed to smithereens, little was left of the division ... "

In principle, Paulus has already fulfilled his task. Stalingrad ceased to play the role of a major transport hub and weapons forge. The tractor-tank STZ stopped, the Krasny Oktyabr plant stopped producing armored steel, and transportation of Baku oil along the Volga was stopped. German aviation bombarded the river with mines for 400 km from Kapmyshin to Nikolsky. Batteries of 88-mm cannons, deployed on the west bank, were supposed to finally clog the waterway. With an acute desire of the Russians to defend the ruins of Stalingrad remaining after the bombing, it was possible not to take it. German radio already trumpeted to the whole world about the fall of "the famous city on the Volga, bearing the name of Stalin." But the fact of the matter is that there was no one to defend him.

In the city, in addition to almost 400 thousand civilians, the 10th rifle division of the NKVD, armed detachments of workers and police remained, and the most senior military commander, Colonel A.A. Saraev. The city was not prepared for defense in advance: there were no fortifications, barriers, firing points, the barricades hastily built on the streets looked frivolous, ammunition and medicines were taken out. July 30 was followed by a decisive assault from three directions, ending with a breakthrough of the division "Grossdeutschland" to the ferry at Krasnaya Sloboda.

On August 1, Paulus was awarded the rank of Field Marshal. Dr. Goebbels burst into a speech about the world-historical significance of the victory on the Volga and the guiding star of National Socialism. Moscow recalled General Gordov, his further fate is unknown.

As an asymmetric response, the Red Army tried, acting according to its own plan, to defeat the Army Group Center or, at worst, the 9th German Army in the Rzhev-Sychevsky salient. However, a series of offensive operations carried out from July 5 to August 29 by the troops of the Kalinin, Western, and Bryansk fronts ended in the loss of 300,000 soldiers, including the death of the 39th Army. In the south, on July 30, two new fronts were formed: Donskoy under the command of K.K. Rokossovsky and South-East, which was headed by General A.I. Eremenko. The latter was supposed to organize defense along the eastern bank of the Volga and the line of lakes south of Stalingrad. Rokossovsky had the task of blocking the enemy's path to the north.

“The wise commander, with whose name Soviet soldiers went into battle on their lips,” still believed that the German army, advancing on Stalingrad, made a “complicated detour maneuver” in order to encircle Moscow. The Germans equipped the positions in depth at an accelerated pace, taking into account the upcoming wintering, but they still “did not believe”:

"Tov. Stalin timely unraveled the plan of the German command, which was trying to create the impression that the main, and not the secondary goal of the summer offensive of the German troops was the occupation of the oil-bearing regions of Grozny and Baku. In fact, the main goal was, Comrade pointed out. Stalin, in order to bypass Moscow from the east, cut it off from the Volga and Ural rear and then hit on

Moscow and thus end the war in 1942. By order of the Supreme Commander Comrade. Stalin, Soviet troops blocked the enemy's path to the north, to the rear of Moscow.

The Soviet General Staff was misled by the buildup of enemy forces in the Stalingrad region and by his active actions to improve his positions. During August, the 8th Italian army of General Gariboldi advanced to the Don. The Italians occupied the area from Pavlovskaya to the mouth of the Khoper River. Not relying too much on the combat effectiveness of the allies, the German command did not withdraw the divisions of the 29th Army Corps that occupied this line, but included them in the Italian and 2nd Hungarian armies located upstream. The Romanians were brought up, who were supposed to guard the banks of the Volga, the 11th Corps of General Strecker was transferred from the OKH reserve to reinforce the 6th Army. In addition, at the beginning of August, Paulus conducted a private operation in the northern direction with the aim of pushing the front line away from Stalingrad. As a result, positions were taken on the outer bypass, passing along the Ilovaya and Berdiya rivers, Dubovka and tens of thousands of cattle, accumulated at Soviet crossings, were captured. The German troops landed on Sarpinsky Island, which made it possible to completely take control of the movement along the Volga.

General Rokossovsky, as was customary in Soviet military science, was active in the defense. From the reserve, the 24th, 66th, 1st Guards Armies were transferred to the Don Front, which rushed into battle on the move and one by one, and all together. However, the red commanders were not yet able to break the correct defense. The special department of the front reported to the capital: "The leading staff of the headquarters do not believe in the reality of their own orders and believe that the troops, in their current state, will not be able to break through the enemy's defenses." Leaders, in turn, reported: “People are not trained and completely unprepared, many do not know how to use a rifle at all. Before you fight, you need to train and prepare a new division for at least a month. The command staff, both middle and senior, are tactically illiterate, cannot navigate the terrain and lose control of units in battle. To the above, it remains only to add that the Red Army soldiers of the Don Front were swollen and dying of hunger. Fruitless attacks continued until mid-October.

In London and Washington, the position of the Soviet Union was considered close to collapse. However, even over the British Empire the sky was far from cloudless. Rommel's tanks stood at a distance of one throw from Alexandria. The defeat of the Red Army posed a threat to the Near and Middle East from the north. Already on July 5, the Middle East Defense Committee reported to London:

“If the campaign in Russia turns out badly for the Russians, and you cannot send us the necessary number of reinforcements in a timely manner, then we will face a dilemma:

a) either our troops or perhaps more of our bases and installations will have to be transferred from Egypt to the northern flank in order to cover the Iranian oil fields (and this would mean the loss of Egypt);

b) either we will need to continue our current policy and take the risk of losing the Iranian oil fields.

We do not have the strength to defend both, and if we try to perform both of these tasks, we will not complete either ...

In the worst case, we should expect a threat to Northern Iran by October 15, and if the enemy changes his plans and starts moving through the province of Anatolia, then we need to be ready to meet this danger in Northern Syria and Iraq by September 10.

The prime minister responded to this report with a letter in which he said that reinforcements could only appear after the defeat of Rommel in the Western Desert, and a serious threat to Iraq was unlikely to arise before the spring of 1943. On July 29, the Chiefs of Staff Committee reaffirmed that the security of the Middle East is provided in Cyrenaica. In the event of an unforeseen development of the situation, it was necessary to hold Abadan to the last opportunity, "even at the risk of losing the Nile Delta region in Egypt." The loss of Abadan could only be made up for by additional deliveries of 13.5 million tons of oil, which required 270 tankers to be found. The report of the Committee for the Control of Fuel Resources stated: "The loss of Abadan and Bahrain would lead to disastrous consequences, since it would cause a sharp reduction in all our possibilities to continue the war and, possibly, would force us to leave a number of areas." Moreover, to protect Iran and Iraq, there were only three infantry and one motorized divisions. The main forces of the 9th British Army since July 1941 were stationed in Syria in readiness to repel enemy attacks through Turkey.

The Turkish government maneuvered desperately, trying to stay out of the world conflict, to preserve the sovereignty and independence of the country. Ankara was worried both by Rome's claim to dominance in the Mediterranean and by Moscow's desire to control the Black Sea straits. In 1940, despite having a British-French-Turkish alliance, Turkey declared itself a "non-belligerent state". The rapid defeat of Yugoslavia and Greece, the capture of the island of Crete by German troops in the spring of 1941 brought them to the borders of Turkey, creating a real threat of invasion. In Berlin, plans were thoughtfully worked out to advance to Iran and to the Suez Canal through the territory of Turkey, with which, by the way, a friendship agreement was signed, regardless of its consent: “If Turkey does not go over to our side even after the defeat of Soviet Russia, a blow south through Anatolia will be carried out against her will. In the summer of 1942, the influence of the pro-German faction was steadily growing in the ruling circles of Turkey, calling for "not to miss the moment" and to take part in the division of the Soviet Transcaucasus. The ideologists of "Great Turkey" were concerned about the fate of the "Azerbaijani Turks" and other Turkic peoples living east of the Volga. Beginning in mid-July, Turkish troops began to concentrate on the eastern border. The chief of the General Staff, Marshal Chakmak, considered "Turkey's entry into the war almost inevitable."

As for the Arab countries, their population traditionally saw the British as colonizers, and in Hitler a natural ally of the national liberation movement. In an effort to provide a solid rear, in formally independent Iraq, Iran, Syria, Lebanon, the British were forced to establish occupation regimes with puppet governments. On the territory of Palestine and Transjordan, "irresponsible" Bedouins launched a real guerrilla war, threatening the strategic Kirkuk-Haifa oil pipeline. In the north-west of Iran, a rebellion of the Kurdish tribes flared up. Anti-British sentiment was fueled by German agents. For a direct invasion of the Middle East, a decision was made at the headquarters of the OKW to deploy a special-purpose corps "F".

The threat was also growing from the south. The capture by the Japanese in March 1942 of the Andaman Islands and Rangoon strengthened the position of their troops in Burma and created the threat of an invasion of India. In the first half of April, the 1st Air Fleet under the command of Vice Admiral Nagumo, with a swift raid of five aircraft carriers, disrupted shipping in the Bay of Bengal, destroyed the port facilities of Colombo and Trinco-mali, sank all British ships that got in the way, including the Hermes aircraft carrier and two heavy cruisers. The commander of the Eastern Fleet, Admiral Somerville, was forced to abandon the use of bases in Ceylon and the Maldives and withdraw his forces to the east coast of Africa in order to maintain control of at least the western part of the Indian Ocean, through which convoys to the Middle East passed. In early July, the Japanese launched an invasion of Ceylon. The naval battle near the island of Madagascar ended with the destruction of the Eastern Fleet, which had two aircraft carriers and five battleships during the First World War as its main combat units. The capture of Ceylon allowed the Japanese to establish dominance in the Indian Ocean and disrupt Great Britain's communications, not only with Australia and India, but also with the Middle East.

On August 12, Winston Churchill flew to Moscow to personally tell Comrade Stalin the most unpleasant news: a second front in Europe in 1942 should not be expected. Military deliveries are also not expected yet. On August 13, Stalin handed the British Prime Minister a memorandum in which he accused the British government of having dealt a "moral blow to the entire Soviet public" and destroyed the plans of the Soviet command, built on the basis of "creating in the West a serious base of resistance to the German fascist forces and facilitating such image of the position of the Soviet troops. It was further argued that it was now that the most favorable situation had developed for the landing of the allies on the continent, since the Red Army had diverted all the best forces of the Wehrmacht to itself. The Supreme Commander directly admitted that the Soviet Union was on the verge of defeat. Churchill threw up his hands and left for Cairo to organize the defense of British possessions. And the Soviet

The leader was finally convinced that the Anglo-American imperialists wished only the weakening and destruction of "the world's first proletarian state."

Hitler has not yet received Caucasian oil, but has already deprived Stalin of it. It only remained to "lay a hand on the oilfield area."

As early as July 23, the Fuhrer signed Directive No. 45 to continue Operation Braunschweig. The main role this time was assigned to Army Group A, which included the 4th Panzer Army of Gotha, the 11th Field Army of Manstein, and the Italian Alpine Corps. The immediate task of Field Marshal List was to encircle (by entering the motorized left wing) and destroy the Soviet troops south and southeast of Rostov. In the future, it was necessary to divide into three groups. One was to strike along the Black Sea coast, the other, reinforced by mountain units, against Armavir, Maykop and the Caucasian passes. The ultimate goal was to enter the regions of Tbilisi, Kutaisi, Sukhumi and master the entire Eastern coast of the Black Sea. At the same time, another grouping, made up of tank and motorized formations, broke through to Grozny, Makhachkala in order to seize Baku with a subsequent strike along the Caspian Sea.

With an exit to the Transcaucasus, the Germans captured the last bases of the Black Sea Fleet, which had only to heroically drown itself once again, and established direct contact with the Turkish army. In the future, Hitler hoped to involve Turkey in the war on the side of the Third Reich, as well as create conditions for the invasion of the Near and Middle East. After breaking through the Terek line, the German command also planned to deploy naval operations in the Caspian Sea in order to disrupt enemy communications.

More "modest" tasks fell to the share of Army Group "B": to organize a strong defense along the Don River, and to make an expedition to Astrakhan with mobile formations.

By the beginning of the new offensive, Army Group A had 63 divisions, including 6 tank divisions and 4 motorized divisions.

Troops of the Southern Front, General R.Ya. Malinovsky (18, 12, 37, 9, 56th combined arms, 4th air armies), covering the Caucasian direction, occupied a 320 km wide strip on the southern bank of the Don - from Bataysk to Romanovskaya. The nominally six armies included 27 rifle divisions, 8 rifle divisions, 5 tank brigades, 2 fortified areas and the 14th tank corps. At the same time, the 56th Army was withdrawn to the second echelon for resupplying. The front was faced with the task of liquidating the enemy who had broken through to the left bank and, having restored the situation, firmly hold the occupied lines. After the withdrawal of the front, a very tense situation arose with the material and technical support of the troops. The hasty retreat required the urgent evacuation of material assets from the threatened areas. The railroad tracks were packed with trains. On dirt roads from the Don to the Kuban, a huge number of automobile and horse-drawn vehicles, stolen cattle, and refugees moved. This greatly complicated the normal supply of the army in the field, in which there was an acute shortage of ammunition and fuel.

The defense from the mouth of the Don along the eastern coast of the Sea of ​​Azov, the Kerch Strait and along the Black Sea coast to Lazarevskaya was provided by the North Caucasian Front of Marshal S.M. Budyonny (47th Army, 1st Separate Rifle and 17th Cavalry Corps, 5th Air Army). Troops of the Transcaucasian Front under the command of General of the Army I.V. Tyuleneva (44th, 46th, 45th armies, 15th cavalry corps) defended the coast from Lazarevskaya to Batumi and further along the Soviet-Turkish border. Part of the forces of the front was in Northern Iran.

The defense of the Caucasus from the north was poorly prepared. Despite a number of valuable instructions from the center, they did not manage to create any prepared lines. More or less, using the respite, Malinowski's armies dug in. Throughout the entire zone of the Southern Front, enemy motorized and tank formations under cover and with the support of aviation persistently expanded the captured bridgeheads, concentrating strike groups for a further offensive.

Finally, on August 10, the 17th German Army (57th Tank, 5th and 52nd Army, 49th Mountain Rifle Corps), repulsed all enemy attempts to eliminate the bridgehead at

Bataysk, went on the offensive in the general direction of Krasnodar. Fierce fighting in the defense zone of the 18th Army, Lieutenant General F.V. Kamkov continued all day. However, for the Germans they were more of a chilling character. OKH Chief of Operations General Heusinger specifically reminded the Chief of Staff of Army Group A that General Ruoff should not press too hard on the Russians "so as not to force the enemy to retreat before he is surrounded by the advancing left flank of the Army Group."

On August 11, from the bridgehead at Konstantinovskaya, the 4th Panzer Army of Goth (24th, 14th Panzer, 4th Army Corps) struck south, and from the Repairnaya area along the railway to Tikhoretsk, the 1st Panzer Army of Kleist (3rd tank, 44th, 51st army corps). At Bataysk, at the junction of two Soviet armies, Kirchner's 57th Panzer Corps (13th Panzer Division and SS Viking Division) was put into action. On one day, the defense of the Southern Front was hacked in the entire strip, a day later, German mobile formations advanced to a depth of 80 km. On the night of August 13, General Malinovsky decided to withdraw the troops of the left wing of the front to the line along the southern bank of the Kagalnik River and the Manych Canal. However, a planned retreat did not work out, the divisions could not break away from the enemy and retreat to the indicated lines in an organized manner. In addition, as the history of the 18th Army indicates, “this line was not prepared in engineering terms, and the dry steppe river Kagalnik did not present a serious obstacle to the advancing enemy divisions. The Soviet troops had to take up defensive positions under the blows of the enemy, hastily build defensive structures under his fire. The maneuver disorganized the troops, disrupted the control and communications system. By the end of the day on August 13, there was no longer a front, large gaps formed between the Soviet armies, the troops were unable to hold back the German onslaught and continued to roll back south. In a number of sectors, the retreat turned into a flight. Goth's tanks at that time captured Yegorlykskaya, Kleist - captured Proletarian.

The exit of German tank and motorized formations into the Zadonsk and Salsk steppes and into the expanses of the Krasnodar Territory created a direct threat of their breakthrough into the depths of the Caucasus. In order to unite the efforts of the Soviet troops, the Headquarters, by decision of August 14, subordinated all the armies in this direction to S.M. Budyonny. The marshal, in turn, divided the troops into two operational groups: the Don on the right wing and the Primorskaya on the left wing of the North Caucasian Front. Don group, headed by R.Ya. Malinovsky, as part of the 9th, 37th and 12th armies, covered the Stavropol direction. Primorsky group of General Ya.T. Cherevichenko, as part of the 18th, 56th, 47th armies, the 1st rifle and 17th cavalry corps, covered the Krasnodar direction and the Taman Peninsula. In fact, the defeated, poorly controlled troops, experiencing an acute shortage of ammunition, Semyon Mikhailovich set the task of defeating and repelling the enemy, returning Bataysk at all costs and restoring the situation along the southern bank of the Don.

The Germans did not wait for Soviet counterattacks and continued their offensive. By mid-August, they reached the Salsk, Belaya Clay, Pavlovskaya line. From here, the 4th Panzer Army advanced rapidly in two directions: the 14th Panzer Corps attacked Tikhoretsk and Krasnodar, while the 24th Panzer Corps attacked Kropotkin and Armavir.

The 1st Panzer Army rushed across the steppe to Voroshilovsk, which fell on 20 August. A day later, the troops of the 4th Panzer Army crossed the Kuban, captured Armavir and continued to advance on Maykop. The motorized units of Kleist launched active operations at the line of Nevinnomyssk - Mineralnye Vody - Georgievsk. At this, the Don Operational Group of General Maslennikov ceased to exist. From the 9th Army, only control remained, from the 37th Army - scattered and demoralized units, the 12th Army was thrown back to the south-west and included in the Primorsky Group of Forces, which was in no less difficult a situation.

The main blow of Ruoff's army was taken by the weakened 18th and 56th armies. Already by the time of the liquidation of the Southern Front, Kamkov's divisions, deprived of control, retreated in disorder, without offering serious resistance to the enemy. The most combat-ready, fully equipped 47th Army of the Primorsky Group was on the Taman Peninsula in anticipation of an enemy amphibious assault, parts of the 1st Separate Rifle Corps were redeployed to occupy the Krasnodar defensive bypass. Krasnodar was captured by the Germans on August 24. On the same day, the Soviet units left Maikop, and this is the first oil that Hitler was so eager for. The Chief of the General Staff of the Italian Army, Marshal Cavaliero, wrote in his diary: “10,000 specialists follow List’s armies, who, after the capture of Maikop, must restore oil wells. It is estimated that it will take 4 to 5 months to put them back into operation.” In fact, it took less time. Although the Russians removed the oil and gasoline reserves in advance, the boreholes were clogged, the dismantled equipment was only partially removed, and the mining of the oil fields was not carried out. Therefore, a little more than a month passed before the moment when the Germans began to pump Maikop "black gold". However, oil is not yet fuel.

From the Stalingrad region, Field Marshal Paulus, while Rokossovsky blocked his path to the north, on August 16 struck in a diametrically opposite direction - a campaign began on Astrakhan of the 40th tank and 8th army corps. Blocking the way to the south, the 57th Army of Lieutenant General F.I. Tolbukhina at that time consisted of two rifle divisions and one fighter brigade, so it was not difficult for the Germans, who had two tank and two motorized divisions, to break through the defenses. After that, it was simply necessary to overcome 400 km of saline steppe on a marching march. Until Astrakhan there were no more Soviet troops, and there were none in the city itself. The Astrakhan defensive bypass, created in a hurry in the winter and transferred to the protection of local authorities, was in a deplorable state after spring rains and floods.

Operation "Edelweiss" developed according to plan with a slight delay from the schedule caused by difficulties in supplying combat units. On August 26, Goth's divisions broke through to the Khodyzhenskaya area. The shock group of the 17th army - the 57th tank and 52nd army corps - advanced on Goryachiy Klyuch, the 5th army corps - on Anapa, Novorossiysk. Eight infantry divisions of Manstein's 11th Army (54th, 30th Army Corps) began to force the Kerch Strait. Three days later, the 16th motorized division entered the sea near Tuapse, thereby cutting off the troops of the North Caucasian Front - the 47th, 56th, 12th, 18th armies. 12 Soviet divisions and 8 brigades were surrounded - about 200 thousand commanders and Red Army soldiers. The Black Sea Fleet lost its forward base. While Manstein and Ruoff were engaged in the liquidation of the "boiler", General Goth turned to the southeast - along the highway Tuapse - Sochi - Sukhumi.

To protect Grozny and Baku, on the orders of the Headquarters, the Northern Group of Forces of the Transcaucasian Front was formed under the command of Lieutenant General I.I. Maslennikova, who took up defense along the Terek and Baksan rivers. The group included the 44th, 37th and newly created 9th Army - 11 rifle, 2 cavalry divisions, 8 rifle, 1 tank brigades. The 1st Panzer Army of Kleist (3rd, 14th Panzer, 44th, 51st Army Corps) operated against them, which included 3 tank, 2 motorized, 7 infantry divisions. The problem of Maslennikov and his army commanders was also the presence of a large number of national formations, of which hundreds of Red Army soldiers scattered home or went over to the enemy. Among the German soldiers, an instruction was distributed about a special attitude towards the local population: “The peculiarities of the peoples living in the Caucasus make it necessary to warn about the inadmissibility of excesses in relation to the local population. The inhabitants of the Caucasus are mostly hostile to Bolshevism and seek to free themselves from communist violence. They see the German soldier as a natural ally, and to destroy their faith is a crime against the German people."

The defense of the Main Caucasian Range from the Mamison Pass to the Black Sea coast was entrusted to the troops of the 46th Army, commanded by Major General V.F. Sergatskov - 5 rifle, 1 cavalry divisions, 2 rifle and 1 tank brigades. Eight divisions of the 49th Mountain Rifle and Italian Alpine Corps were deployed against it.

45th Army Lieutenant General F.N. Remezov and the 15th Cavalry Corps covered the state border with Turkey and communications in Iran. In the Makhachkala region, the 58th army of Major General V.A. was hastily formed. Khomenko as part of 4 rifle divisions and 1 rifle brigade.

The further German plan was to proceed, after a small regrouping, to a direct assault on the Caucasus simultaneously in three directions. The 17th Army received the task, in cooperation with the 11th Army, to capture the Black Sea coast from Anapa to Poti and then advance on Batumi and Tbilisi. The 4th Panzer Army was to move along the coast to Sukhumi and further advance on Tbilisi. The 49th Mountain Rifle and Italian Alpine Corps had to overcome the passes of the Main Caucasian Range. The 1st Panzer Army received the task of delivering a blow from the Pyatigorsk region to Ordzhonikidze, Grozny, Makhachkala, and Baku.

At the end of August, the battle broke out with renewed vigor. Kleist's army, having captured Mozdok, crossed the Terek in the zone of the 9th army and broke through into the Elkhotovsky gates - a valley 4-5 km wide, through which the roads to Grozny and Ordzhonikidze ran. The huntsmen of General Konrad “unexpectedly” occupied the passes, most of which were simply not occupied by Soviet troops. As A.A. Grechko: “There was some kind of carelessness, obviously generated by disbelief in the ability of German troops to infiltrate with any significant forces through the high mountain passes in Transcaucasia ... All this led to the fact that, although time and terrain made it possible to make the defense insurmountable, it remained weak equipped. Even some key heights were not fortified and not occupied ... "

The divisions of Hoth and Manstein moved south along the Black Sea coast towards Sukhumi. Paulus' "expeditionary force" captured Astrakhan, the German motorized infantry saddled the railway to Kizlyar, aviation began to bombard Guryev and freely hunt for any vessel floating in the Caspian Sea.

On September 1, Istanbul broke the Soviet-Turkish Treaty of Friendship and Neutrality. The Turkish army moved through the Iranian highlands to help the “Azerbaijani brothers”.

Mackensen's 3rd tank corps broke into the burning Grozny on September 8, and at the end of the month the victorious German troops entered Baku.

On October 14, Hitler signed the order for the transition to strategic defense. His generals were increasingly concerned about the question of how realistic it was to hold the occupied territories. On this basis, a quarrel with Gelder again broke out, and he had to be sent into retirement. Field Marshal Paulus became the new Chief of the General Staff of the Ground Forces. But he, having familiarized himself with the situation, came to the conclusion: “The territory captured in the East no longer corresponds to the size of the occupying army. In other words, there are too few soldiers in such a vast area. However, Hitler believed that under his leadership the Wehrmacht was capable of storming the skies. Indeed, the timely transfer of mobile formations to the north and the creation of a new army group "Don" made it possible to repel the last counteroffensive of the Red Army, which took place in November 1942. True, in North Africa, Rommel's half-forgotten corps suffered a serious defeat from the British, but nothing irreparable has yet happened. The German troops entered the winter campaign "with a proud consciousness of the successes achieved, with firm faith in their own strength, with an unshakable will to defeat the enemy wherever he tried to break through our front."

On the threshold of 1943, the Third Reich secured exciting prospects for itself.

Firstly, the territory and resources were to be developed in the interests of the German people, and there was no doubt that, under the control of German specialists, the Caucasian oil fields would very soon begin to pump the “blood of war” again.

Secondly, the Soviet Union was practically withdrawn from the struggle. Having lost a third of GDP, Caucasian oil, half of the reserves of coal, iron and manganese ore, deprived of foreign assistance, the Soviet economy was on the verge of collapse. Stalin was fully ripe for the conclusion of a separate peace with Germany.

Thirdly, the Japanese friends, having occupied Ceylon, having secured dominance in the Indian Ocean, were able to attack the British oil fields in the Persian Gulf, Aden and Abadan, through which the 8th British Army was supplied with fuel, and this significantly increased Rommel's chances.

Fourthly, the time has finally come to pull out of the safes the cherished plans for a breakthrough into the countries of the Near and Middle East under the slogan of liberating them from the yoke of the plutocratic colonialists.

With the oil wells of the Caucasus and Iran in their hands, one could seriously engage in appeasing England and arguing on an equal footing with the United States.

The “Grossdeutschland” that Hitler wrote about in Mein Kampf, in terms so fantastic that they were generally ignored, has now become a reality ...

Operation Blue

On June 1, 1942, a meeting was held in Poltava, attended by Adolf Hitler. The Fuhrer hardly mentioned Stalingrad, then it was just a city on the map for him. Hitler singled out the capture of the oil fields of the Caucasus as a special task.

“If we do not capture Maykop and Grozny,” he said, “I will have to stop the war” “Hitler's Field Marshals and Their Battles”, S. Mitcham, Rusich, Smolensk, 1999, p.135. Operation Blau was to begin with the capture of Voronezh. Then it was planned to encircle the Soviet troops west of the Don, after which the 6th Army, developing the offensive against Stalingrad, ensured the security of the northeastern flank. It was assumed that the Caucasus was occupied by the 1st Panzer Army of Kleist and the 17th Army. The 11th army, after the capture of Sevastopol, was to go north.

Meanwhile, an event occurred that could undermine the success of the operation. On June 19, Major Reichel, officer of the operations department of the 23rd Panzer Division, flew out of the unit in a Fieseler-Storch light aircraft. In violation of all the rules, he took with him plans for the upcoming offensive. This plane was shot down, and the documents fell into the hands of Soviet soldiers. Here is how an eyewitness describes this event: “... one major with a briefcase jumped out of the Storch and, firing back, rushed to the forest. He was slapped. In his portfolio were the operational plans of the German command regarding the operation "Blau" "Barbarossa", V. Pikul, Military publications, Moscow, 1991, p.50. When Hitler found out about this, he was furious.

Ironically, Stalin, who was informed about the documents, did not believe them. He insisted that the Germans would strike the main blow at Moscow. Having learned that the commander of the Bryansk Front, General Golikov, in whose sector the main actions were to unfold, considers the documents authentic, Stalin ordered him to draw up a plan for a preventive offensive in order to liberate Orel.

On June 28, 1942, the 2nd Army and the 4th Tank Army launched an offensive in the Voronezh direction, and not at all in the Oryol-Moscow direction, as Stalin assumed. Luftwaffe aircraft dominated the air, and Hoth's tank divisions entered the operational space.

But their advance was not calm. The Headquarters of the Supreme High Command came to the conclusion that Voronezh should be defended to the end.

On July 3, 1942, Adolf Hitler again arrived in Poltava for consultations with Field Marshal von Bock. At the end of the meeting, Hitler made a fatal decision - he ordered von Bock to continue the attack on Voronezh, leaving one tank corps there, and sent all the rest of the tank formations south to Goth.

By this time, Timoshenko began to conduct a more flexible defense, avoiding encirclement. From Voronezh, the Red Army began to pay more attention to the defense of cities. On July 12, 1942, the Stalingrad Front was organized by a special directive of the Stavka. The 10th NKVD Rifle Division was quickly transferred from the Urals and Siberia. All the flying units of the NKVD, police battalions, two training tank battalions and railway troops passed into its subordination.

In July, Hitler became again impatient with delays. Tanks stopped - there was not enough fuel. The Fuhrer became even more convinced of the need for the fastest capture of the Caucasus. This set him on a fatal step. The main idea of ​​the operation "Blau" was the offensive of the 6th and 4th tank armies to Stalingrad, and then the offensive to Rostov-on-Don with a general offensive to the Caucasus. Against the advice of Halder, Hitler redirected the 4th Panzer Army to the south and took from the 6th Army

40th Panzer Corps, which immediately slowed down the attack on Stalingrad. Moreover, the Fuhrer divided the Army Group "South" into group "A" - the attack on the Caucasus, and into group "B" - the attack on Stalingrad. Bock was dismissed, accused of failures near Voronezh.

On July 23, 1942, Hitler issued Directive No. 45, effectively canceling the entire operation "Blau". The 6th Army was to capture Stalingrad, and after its capture, send all motorized units to the south and develop an offensive along the Volga to Astrakhan and further, up to the Caspian Sea. Army Group "A" under the command of Field Marshal List was to occupy the eastern coast of the Black Sea and capture the Caucasus. Upon receiving this order, List suggested that Hitler had some kind of supernova intelligence.

At the same time, Manstein's 11th Army was heading to the Leningrad region, and the SS Panzer Divisions "Leibstandarte" and "Grossdeutschland" were sent to France. Instead of the departed units, the command put the armies of the allies - the Hungarians, Italians and Romanians.

German tank and motorized divisions continued to move towards the Volga, and Stalingrad was already waiting for them ahead ...