Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Battle of Stalingrad

The Battle of Stalingrad is a battle that resulted from Operation Barbarossa, and defeated the German army. It is also known as the turning point of the invasion of the Soviet Union. Prior to the battle, Operation Barbarossa was almost successful.

Some historians believe that the Battle of Stalingrad and Germany's loss could have been avoided. They believe that invading and attempting to take Stalingrad was not in the original plan, and Hitler ordered the taking of Stalingrad out of his personal hatred for Joseph Stalin. This theory could be correct, and the outcome of the war could have been very different if Stalingrad was not invaded. Although, many historians also argue that if Army Groups A and B moving through Russia had left a major city  unconquered, this could have resulted in trouble for Germany.

"You may rest assured that nobody will ever drive us out of Stalingrad." Adolf Hitler


The battle started on July 17,1942 and lasted until that February.General Freidrich Paulus advanced toward Stalingrad with 250,000 men, 500 tanks, 7,000 guns and mortars, and 25,000 horses. His army soon ran out of fuel, because it had to be rationed between them and army A. This made progress very slow and brought Paulus to a halt at Kalach. When supplies finally reached him, Paulus decided to continue moving slowly in order to conserve resources. 






The Red Army attacked the advance party, and stopped Paulus and his troops in Stalingrad. The Red Army fought fiercely for every building. the deeper the Germans advanced into the city, the harsher street fighting became. The German's tanks were no longer effective. At Stalingrad, hand grenades, rifles, pistols, and machine guns proved to be much more useful. This is very different in tactic and weaponry compared to other parts of the war, especially in the Pacific. The Germans used cleverly camouflaged artillery positions and machine-gun nests. The Soviets used sniper detachments deployed in the bombed out buildings in the city.






When the German's controlled 90% of the city, Hitler told Paulus to order a major attack. This was Germany's grave mistake in the invasion of Russia. Hitler had no clue that his soldiers were starving to death and ammunition was scarce when he ordered the attack that cost him the battle. 


The fact that Hitler was the only man who could approve and give military orders was a major flaw in German tactics. All other countries fighting in World War 2 trusted their military generals enough to make major decisions and distribute orders. Hitler did not completely trust anyone but himself when it came to military decisions. All of Hitler's orders had to be followed, and generals who were making major decisions had to run it by him. This hurt the Germans, because Hitler was sometimes oblivious to what was going on in the battle field. Therefore, he did not always make the right military decisions. 

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