Whenever we talk about World War II, we would almost always account the Allies’ victory to the Soviets, the turning point being the Battle of Stalingrad and Battle of Kursk. The Internet and social media would instinctively compare the Germans’ failure to conquer the Soviet Union in 1941 to Napoleon’s failure to conquer the Russian Empire in 1812, with many memes mocking both rulers of their own countries. The most obvious thing about every of such memes is how they underestimated the drastically cold Russian Winter, and hence became the turning point for both demises. However, is the Russian Winter really the main reason for Hitler’s failure to conquer the USSR? After all, plain weather patterns cannot explain the loss of a powerful nation, …show more content…
A lot of evidence does seem to prove this. Source A shows the fact about the winter of Russia, in which claiming that 1941 and 1942 were the coldest winters in the entire 20th century. Source B shows that in December 1941, during the Battle of Moscow, temperatures reached -37oC, with recounts of soldiers having their fingers being completely frozen or fingers freezing at the triggers if they weren’t wearing a glove. This shows how the extreme coldness of the winters in 1941 and 1942 and greatly affected the performance of the soldiers of the Wehrmacht, not only causing them deep pain due to frostbite, which even caused their fingers to be frozen or break off, but also caused soldiers to use fuels which was supposed to be used for the vehicles and tanks to warm themselves up. The Battle of Stalingrad and Battle of Moscow, battles that happened during the winter, had relatively more deaths than previous battles, such as the Battle of Kiev and Battle of Minsk. Source C shows the total deaths in each battle other than Minsk. The battle of Stalingrad had about 1.1 million axis casualties, the battle of Moscow had about 180,000 to 400,000 deaths while the Battle of Kiev only had 128,000 deaths. Moreover, these ‘winter battles’ also took a longer time to finish compared to the Battle of Minsk while only last 2 weeks and Kiev lasted 1 month whereas the Battle of Moscow took 3 months …show more content…
After the successes of the Fall of France in 1940, Hitler decided to promote himself as the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the German Army, controlling every operation. This was a huge mistake considering Hitler’s short military campaign in the First World War. After all, he was only a corporal after 4 years in the Great War, in fact he was only a dispatch runner, meaning his role was to send message from fronts to fronts. Hence, meaning that he has very little combat experience let alone commanding an entire army. However, he felt he was superior to the other generals, such as Guderian and Manstein, despite them actually carrying higher ranks than him from the First World War, and it was their plans and strategies that brought about the success of blitzkrieg in Poland and the Low Countries. This resulted in many military blunders committed which had resulted in deadly consequences. One of these, is the invasion of Stalingrad. Stalingrad had little military purpose, most believed Hitler only wanted to conquer the city for the sake of conquering a city with the name of the Soviet leader. And the result was deadly due to splitting of forces, which resulted in the turning point of the war. Not only that, Hitler’s defeatism attitude, not allowing soldiers to retreat and to fight to the last man, resulted in many unnecessary deaths. This is the main reason for the destruction of the 6th army, the army that
Health and diseases also had an incredibly large impact on the outcome of the battle of Stalingrad and is also a factor as to why the German’s were so ineffective. Due to the mass amount of deaths due to bleeding out. German officials had developed a tactic in which stated that the German soldiers were to restrict from eating before fighting. This was developed as restricting would reduce the amount of blood loss if a soldier were to become injured. This tactic weakened the German soldier’s immune systems and caused many of their soldiers to die due to malnourishment. The deaths that related back to malnourishment hastily came to light, causing German officials to desperately try to refeed their soldiers; prompting the deaths of many German
Hitler’s conduction of the Battle of Stalingrad was his biggest mistake. The decisions that Hitler made during the Battle of Stalingrad influenced the outcome of following battles and World War 2. Adolf Hitler kept sending men into the front line even though generals advised him to withdraw the troops and surrender. According to William L. Shirer, “When General Zeitzler got up enough nerve to suggest to the Fuehrer that the Sixth Army should be withdrawn from Stalingrad, Hitler flew into a fury. ‘Where the German soldier sets foot, there he remains!’"(The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Document 1) Hitler aspires to take over the world so a loss could make his leadership appear to be weak and expose flaws to the rest of the world creating a downward spiral of his reputation, of being
... control under allied empower, Hitler appeared to look nervous from the actions that had taken place. Hitler’s force couldn’t resist the cold of Russia of which they had pushed too far into for further enhancements. Hitler would soon learn an enduring lesson since the push he had made in Russia would eventually backfire on him. The deceptive strategy by the Soviets would work perfectly on the German force. For example, Stalin let Hitler’s force into Russia but for the better of the Allied union. He knew that Hitler’s army would suffer and die from the extensive cold and lack of nourishment in Russia. He would then play an offensive move by counter-attacking and pushing all the way back into Germany. The devious tactics played by the allied force surely was a significant lesson learned from the raid, which in the end made Hitler surrender to its “Fortress Europe.”
The battle of Stalingrad is argued to be one of the most significant strategizing battle for the Germans. If Germany had won Stalingrad there would have been no fight left for the Russians to have. Instead, Germany made a hasty decision to attack in order to prevent Russia from coming up with a strategy which put Germany at a disadvantage. By the end of Stalingrad the Russians had managed to push back the Germans and put them on the defensive. If Russia had lost in their battle against Nazi Germany the United States and Great Britain would have faced a much harsher fight against Nazi Germany. Some would even argue that it would have been next to impossible for America to win against Nazi
Zhukov planned an attack from two directions, sweeping in and meeting in the middle. After four days, the Soviet attack had met in the middle and had completely surrounded German forces. The Soviet forces were ordered to stay very close to the German troops so that the airstrikes would put their own forces at risk. The German army begged Hitler to allow them to retreat, but he denied them and ordered his men to hold their ground at all costs. This proved to be a pivotal mistake.
Although, World War II lasted 6 years, the Battle of the Bulge with its planning, skills, and landings marked the “beginning of the end.” The Battle of the Bulge started on December 16, 1944 and was a last ditch attempt started by Adolf Hitler to separate Britain, France, and America into two. Hitler was sure that the Allies- Britain, France, and America- were not strong enough for the German forces and that he could disperse their coalition and cut off the Allies. Adolf’s plan was to launch an immense attack using three armies. He wanted to abolish, or take a huge port, of Ahtwerp which is where the Allies got a large portion of their supplies. While his plan was a very illogical plan, he believed that it would work. Germany had been in a retreat since D-Day and was looking for some way or somehow to defeat to Allies (Trueman),
In one month’s time, the Allies lost 34,000 men to either death or capture. Germany, by contrast, lost 100,000 men and 800 tanks. Hitler has failed to recognize the manpower resources of the American army and had misinterpreted the effect that Autumn Mist would have on the front. In reality, all it did was delay the impending break into Germany by a few months time. With Russia getting closer to Berlin by the day and the Rhine the only obstacle in the way of Montgomery, Hitler’s time was running out. The Battle of the Bulge is best concluded by Sir Winston Churchill, who said “It was without any doubt the greatest American battle of the Second World War and it will, I believe, always be considered as a great American victory.”
Throughout the destructive and bitter winters during the time span from December 1777-February 1778, many men at the Valley Forge Camp were catching an illness or dying. Studies from researchers at the University of Michigan show that over the course of 3 months almost 50% of the soldiers (3989 out of 8000) were sick, and 10% were dead by the time they were ready to fight again (Doc. A). If I was a soldier back then I wouldn’t want a 50% chance of catching an illness because medical issues weren’t as easily cured during that time period. Although only 10% resulted in death, out of 8000 soldiers that took a pretty significant toll on the Continental
World War II was filled with turning points, including Midway, El Alamein, and Moscow. Stalingrad, however, was not simply a turning point. It was the decisive battle of the most violent and destructive war ever fought. It is a fitting testament to the importance of Stalingrad that General Chuikov, the tough-as-nails commander of the 62nd Army that defended the city, would later lead his men in the final battle of the European war, the assault on Berlin.
The Germans took an unrealistic approach in the decision making process for the battle. During the debate in the German High Command about what to do in the summer of 1943, two options were introduced. The realistic option, which was supported by the best German field commanders and many soldiers, was to compensate for the large Russian numerical advantage by fully utilizing the superiority of the German commander and soldiers in tactics, command and fighting, by a strategy of dynamic mobile defense that would cause great losses to the Russians in a series of local clashes. This would delay the Russians and was a realistic goal as it was easily achievable. However, Adolf Hitler wanted to follow the enthusiast-optimistic option of having a major decisive battle against a large portion of the Russian armour in order to destroy them. He thought that the best suited place for such a battle was the Kursk salient, where the Russians had already established battle grounds. In fact, aerial photos taken by German airplanes clearly revealed that the Russians had already built dense and deep fortifications at the Kursk salient in order to counter an attack. Also, it was evident that many Russian tanks were moved deeper behind the front line. Finally, the Blitzkrieg tactic that was often used by the Germans would have to be changed.
World War II was seen around the globe as a war to end all wars. Combat like this had never been experienced before and it was the largest scale battle in recent history. The death tolls for all sides skyrocketed to heights that had never been reached in any battle ever before. There was one man at the center of it all, one man who came to personify the root of living, breathing evil. That man was Adolf Hitler and to the rest of the world, he was a superhuman military machine who had no other goal but to achieve world domination through destruction. But the roots of the Battle of Stalingrad all began in 1941 when Hitler launched operation Barbarossa. Hitler’s powerful army marched across the east, seemingly unstoppable to any force. Stalin’s Red Army was caught completely off guard and their lines were completely broken apart. A majority of the country’s air force was destroyed when airfields were raided and many of the planes never even got the chance to leave the ground. Hitler’s army finally came to Leningrad where the city was besieged. The city held for 900 days and never gave way to the relentless Germans. At the cost of 1.5 million civilians and soldiers, the Red Army stopped Hitler from advancing further and postponed his plan to sweep over the south. Another cause for the retreat of Hitler was the brutal Russian winter, which Hitler and his army were completely unprepared for and the icy cold deaths would continue to haunt the Germans.
In the spring of 1940 Europe was enveloped in war. The German military machine had already conquered Poland, Denmark, and Norway. However, not content with northern and eastern expansion, Adolf Hitler wanted to control the western countries in Europe. Hitler had long been obsessed with attacking and controlling France. After their defeat in World War I, the German people, government, and military were humiliated by the enormous post war sanctions leveraged against them from the Treaty of Versailles. Hitler wanted to defeat and humiliate the French people in the same way that his country had to experience. For him, revenge was necessary. The German plan was to swing into France using a new tactic know as Blitzkrieg or “Lightning War”. Blitzkrieg used speed and surprise along with highly concentrated tank corps, supported by mechanized infantry and airplanes.
...cy lead to the defeat and severe losses, which were unreplaceable. Hitler was weakening his own strength, whilst he was strengthening that of his opponent by declaring war on another great power, the United States. The declaration of war on the US proved very costly. Hitler’s alliance with Italy was also a burden to Germany as they were too dependable on Germany and became more of a liability than an asset. Plus after the overthrow of the Italian Government, the new Italian government joined the allies, which opened up a new front and threat of attack. Hitler continually underestimated the strength of his opponents and overestimated the strength of his own army. Diverting his troops to different fronts too often and weakening the German force. Hitler’s pursuit of the Final solution, which drained the army of manpower and resources, and his failure to recognise the need for total war before it was too late and Germany was already facing defeat, can also be attributed to bad leadership and judgement by the Fuhrer which would eventually lead to the downfall of the Third Reich. Therefore the leadership and decisions of Hitler make him responsible for Germany’s defeat in World War Two.
As the Soviets fought back the oncoming German army, it was evident that blitzkrieg was unsuccessful. As the Germans had never experienced Russian winters before; they were unaware of the freezing cold temperatures. Without proper clothing and material, this caused devastating effects. With Stalin choosing to stay in Moscow this raised the morale, and was an important aspect that led to the Moscow victory. Christian goes on to state, “A longer, drawn out war allowed Russia to exploit its reserves of raw materials and labour. In this sense, the battle of Moscow was a turning
The opening of the Eastern front caused Germany to shift some of its forces from Europe to invade the Soviet Union and the eventual loss of the war. The Siege of Leningrad is a battle between Germany and the Soviet Union, with little involvement from Finland on the side of the Axis Powers. During the start of the Operation, the weather was in favor of the invading German Forces. As the months passed, heavy rains began to slow the German Army due to the mud stopping armor and slowing the troop’s forward movement.