Eh? My understanding is that the Germans were very much expecting an Anglo-American invasion of France, and their strategy (dicated by lack of men and material) was to crush the Allies on the beaches before they could move inland. Hitler rather stupidly thought that the attack at Normandy was a feint and expected the real attack to come elsewhere. Consequently, he refused to release badly needed forces to the German defenders at Normandy (expecting he would need them elsewhere) until it was too late. Sure, we bamboozled 'em, but I wouldn’t say the Normandy invasion was a complete, total surprise.
They still could have pulled it off in summer 1942, had they attacked via Army Group Center towards Moscow somehow. Remember, Operation Blue (1942 southern offensive) cut right through the Soviets with ease, until they got bogged down in Stalingrad.
With Moscow out of the way, the Soviet govt. would have had to flee somewhere (Saratov?) and would be significantly less effective for a while afterward. Plus, the Soviet transport system (railroads primarily) centered on Moscow, and capturing it would have seriously impeded the Soviet ability to move stuff around.
I think the combination of both would have done them in, in conjunction with continuing German pressure.
What screwed the Germans at Stalingrad wasn’t some unforeseen Russian assault, but Hitler insisting they take the city. The Germans lost the tactical/operational initiative at that point (in other words, they allowed themselves to be pinned down).
Strategically, they didn’t lose the initiative until after Kursk in 1943.
Okay, let me restate my case for the crushing toll the winter took on the Germans.
Despite their lengthy supply lines and troops diverted to Africa, France, Norway, etc… the Germans rolled through The S.U. like a knife through butter in 1941. In November, heavy rains struck and the German vehicles sank into the mud. Then the temperature nose-dived and they were frozen into the mud. Additionally the Germans hadn’t bothered to bring winter weight motor oil with them and their vehicles became inoperable.
The temperature inside most home freezers is around 30 above zero Fahrenheit. I’ve been outside in -30 weather (excluding wind-chill) and let me tell you it’s so cold it hurts. You lose all feeling in your hands and feet in just a few minutes, assuming you have gloves and boots on. How does one fight like that? Of course, I don’t go out in such weather wearing summer clothes and I try not to stay out for long. Those are luxuries the Germans didn’t have. And it actually fell to -40 along the front that year. In such conditions, gangrene would have been rampant. Afflicted soldiers would have been unable to hold their weapons or walk much. Any hole in a person’s gloves (which would be impossible to feel) would have let bare skin come in contact with metal, freezing it instantly. The soldiers could only tear their hands away leaving chunks of flesh behind. The upshot was that the Germans gained no ground (in fact they lost ground) between December 1941 and April 1942. The Russians got a badly needed break in the onslaught. They were busily manufacturing munitions and bringing up new troops throughout that period. The Germans were forced to abandon many vehicles they could not get going. Perhaps most importantly, Hitler seeing this loss of materiel fired his generals and essentially took command of the war himself. By the spring of 1942 many German infantry divisions were at half strength. More of the attrition was caused by the weather than by the Red Army.
Germany went on the offensive again, of course, but their chance to actually win the war was pretty much shot by that point.
But the main reason the German offensive began so well was because the Soviets had expected Moscow would be the main target. They had put most of their forces in that area to defend the city. It took several weeks for the Soviets to convince themselves the southern offensive wasn’t a diversion and then to redeploy their troops for a defense and counter-attack in a new theatre. If the Germans had attacked Moscow they would have been facing much stronger Soviet resistance from the first day of the campaign.
The LOCATION certainly was - which, really, is all that mattered. Again, Hitler’s culpability is being exaggerrated, and the incompetence of German military command is being downplayed. Hitler did not “stupidly” come up with the idea that Normandy was a feint; he was told, by his intelligence arm, that the main attack would fall on Pas-de-Calais and that Normandy was a feint. He was ASSURED by Abwehr that the main force would be coming ashore at Pas de Calais up until at least a week after D-Day. Irrespective of his stupidity, the man was, in that case, following the advice of the professionals.
More or less the same thing happened, almost simultaneously, on the Eastern Front, in the case of Operation Bagration.
Just to add a little something to that, Paul Carrell in his book Operation Barbarossa tells of German soldiers who were found dead at their post because their brain had frozen over. It seems they weren’t even issued caps to put under their steel helmet, so that the steel didn’t come in close contact with their skin.
And after seeing RickJay’s post on preview, it might be interesting to note that Hitler originally believed that the invasion would come in Normandy, but was dissuaded that it would be the case.
[QUOTE=Captain Lance Murdoch]
The Germans lack of preparedness for the Russian winter could be chalked up to overconfidence, but I think a lack of understanding came into play as well. I think they failed to realize that winter in Germany is a LOT different than winter in Russia.QUOTE]
While you are correct that the winter of 1941 was abnormally bad even by russian standards I have to point out here that the German army had fought for four years on the eastern front in WW1 by the end of which they were well into the Ukraine. They were familiar with winter conditions in the east so it wasn’t a failure of understanding that had their army clad only in greatcoats in November as they had been through it before. Major reason was gross underestimation of the Soviet ability to keep fighting. Some stocks of winter clothing had been prepared as it would have been needed by the occupying forces after a successful campaign but it was insufficient for the wider army and the woefully inadequate logistic system meant that when needed most of it was still back in Poland.
And, just to add to what’s been said: while German soldiers were freezing to death for want of insulated boots and helmet liners, the Gestapo was comandeering polish railroad trains…to ship the Jews to the death camps! They were also suing huge amounts of labor and concrete to build atobahns through the forests of Poland!
Talk about stupid!
Not using the national aspirations of the Ukranians and other “nations” was in my opinion the worse mistake of the Third Reich. The germany army would have hundreds of miles “friendly” territory behind them instead of a growing partisan threat on their supply lines.
The manpower and resources these "allies" would have boosted the fight against Stalin greatly. If eventually this would have been enough I am not sure... but it would have helped greatly. Especially when the Soviets were back on offensive. Those "free" ex-soviets would have fought fiercely... way more fiercely than italians and hungarians.Damn straight. The Ukrainians suffered horribly under Stalin. I understand that Ukrainian peasants actually welcomed German troops with flowers and wine.
By the way, thanks for recommending * The Beast. * You’re right, this is truly a classic war movie. It’s a shame it didn’t get adequate promotion and distribution when it was first released.
Okay, perhaps Hitler wasn’t being quite as stupid as I’d thought. Even so, I’d say the German intelligence services were victims of a highly successful disinformation campaign by the Allies. Ain’t sayin’ there weren’t any snafus on the part of German intelligence, but let’s be fair. The Allies were doing everything they could to mislead them about the real landing site.
I’m totally in the dark about this one. Care to offer some details? How’d they screw up?
Never mind, I googled Operation Bagration and got all the dope I need.
Just a small correction, by the time of Operation Zitadel, Richard Sorge was already dead. It was the “Lucy” ring that gave the Sovs the information about Kursk.
The Germans more or less knew there would be an invasion of northern France in '44. Allied deception efforts (such as the fictitious FUSAG and false intel sent by erstwhile German agents in England (every single one of whom had been turned)) convinced the Germans that the attack would be at the Pas de Calais rather than in Normandy, which was the German’s first instinct for an invasion site (and also convinced the Germans to reinforce Norway). The efforts were so overwhelmingly successful that the Germans believed that the Normandy invasion were merely a diversion for the real attack in the Pas de Calais.
The beach defense/mobile defense debate was between Rommel and Von Runstedt. Rommel felt the German’s only chance was to stop teh allies at the beaches - he knew all too well what effect superior allied artillery, mobility and especially air supremacy would do if they were able to break out. By keeping the allies in knife fighting range (so to speak) at least part of those advantages would be nullified. Von Runstedt favored letting the allies form a bridgehead and move inland where German superiority at mobile combat could prevail, whereas on the beaches the huge allied preponderance of firepower due to naval support and air support concentrated on a narrow defensive zone. Both were probably half right. In a typical compromise, neither general was given the resources to complete his job his way and the armored forces were placed in reserve only to be released on the Fuhrer’s express personal permission (and if his adolfness is taking a nap when you need your precious panzer divisions, well tough nougies.)
Regarding the much-feared Russian winters: Paul Johnson (MODERN TIMES) reported that the synthetic diesel fuel supplied to the Wehrmact would solidify at temperatures below 0 F-meaning that much of the panzer force was useless. Perhaps this was the motivation for Hitler to strike at the Caucasus oilfields in 1942?
Also, I understand that the vast distances of Russia wore out the treads on the German tanks…somehow there was never enough in the way of spare parts, repair crews, etc…bad planning all around?
hehe… I don’t remember when I recommended it. People have long memories in SMDB. It sure is a great movie especially those tank scenes. 
Like you I don’t understand how it got so little attention…
IIRC it quickly became SOP to keep tank engines running 24/7, lest all of the various hydrocarbons acquire unpleasant properties. If you didn’t keep your engine running you might have to light a fire under it to get everything working again. Of course none of this helped the already abysmal supply situation.
As long as the Russians held out until the entry of the US into WWII, Germany loses every time.
The Allied atomic weapon programme was years ahead of the German equivalent, and there is just no way at all that Germany could have been allowed to survive long enough to complete theirs either.
Allied air power would have still outstripped Germany, sooner or later that bomb would have taken out German cities.
The big reason the plan, as concieved, failed, was the lack of a 4-engined heavy bomber.
Stalin was able to re-locate much of his war industry west of the Ural Mountains, out of the reach of German aipower.
If Hitler had a long-range heavy bomb carrier, he could have destroyed these relocated factories.
If he had bought Italian heavy bombers (yes, Italy had a 4-engined heavy bomber), Hitler could have pulled it off too.
But he just couldn’t reach the target.
The history of the Second World War is Airpower, in every important way.
As has been said elsewhere in the thread, the reason it didn’t work is logistics, logistics logistics. Plain and simple, the Germans didn’t prepare correctly for their invasion but getting their logistics in order to supply their forces for an extended campaign. You NEVER plan for the easy victory (unless you are an idiot)…you plan for the worst case scenerio and set up your logistics train accordingly.
Had the Germans done this properly, and had they changed their attack strategy subtly to emphasize taking out the Russian leadership by quickly capturing the capital (and perhaps capturing or killing Stalin et al), they certainly could have won. To a lesser degree, had they been a bit less brutal and a bit less infatuated with their own superiority and gone into Russia as liberators, they could have had a large percentage of the population if not fully on their side, at least not in rebellion.
As has been said though, had they done this they wouldn’t have been the Nazi’s…so might not have invaded in the first place. So, disreguarding that as unrealistic, I’d have to fall back on logistics as the prime reason they failed…and the prime reason they COULD have had a chance to succeed as the OP asked.
-XT