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the Eastern Front. March saw the beginning of the thaw on the southern parts of the Eastern Front - but as it ran over a thousand miles long conditions varied enormously. The Balkans and the Eastern Front. The War in the Balkans
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the Eastern Front March saw the beginning of the thaw on the southern parts of the Eastern Front - but as it ran over a thousand miles long conditions varied enormously.
The Balkans and the Eastern Front • The War in the Balkans • Hitler plans to invade Soviet Union; as such, he needs to ensure that the Balkan countries are firmly behind him. • Hungary, Romani and Bulgaria are all on Hitler’s side. • But in a strange twist of events, the pro-German government of Yugoslavia is overthrown and a pro-British government is put in place. • Greece – directly south of Yugoslavia – is also pro-Britain, so Hitler decides to invade. • Hitler invades Yugoslavia and Greece in April 1941; both fall quickly Blitzkrieg!
Battle of greece The Battle of Greece is generally regarded as a continuation of the Greco-Italian War, which began when Italian troops invaded Greece on October 28, 1940. Within weeks the Italians were driven out of Greece and Greek forces pushed on to occupy much of southern Albania. In March 1941, a major Italian counterattack failed, and Germany was forced to come to the aid of its ally. Operation Marita began on April 6, 1941, with German troops invading Greece through Bulgaria in an effort to secure its southern flank. The combined Greek and British Commonwealth forces fought back with great tenacity, but were vastly outnumbered and outgunned, and finally collapsed.
Russian Aggression Soviet and German invasions, annexations, and spheres of influence in Central and eastern Europe 1939-1940
Operation Barbarossa: June 22, 1941 • 3,000,000 German soldiers. • 3,400 tanks.
Operation Barbarossa • Hitler Invades the Soviet Union • Germany invades an unprepared Soviet Union in June 1941 • Soviet troops burn land as they retreat; Germans move into Russia • Germans stopped at Leningrad, forced to undertake long siege • Germans almost capture Moscow, but forced to pull back • The fiercest fighting of WWII take place on Russian soil, in and around the great Russian cities of Stalingrad and Leningrad. • Blitzkrieg!
Russian soldiers prepare to attack German lines outside Leningrad
The propaganda war From the “Why We Fight” series, a crazy video detailing Russian forces.
A column of Red Army POWs captured near Minsk is marched West.
A group of Soviet POWs, taken to undefined Prison Camp (read: dead)
Willy Reese’s memoir of his time on the Eastern Front is remarkable as being the work of a very cultured and sensitive individual who found himself caught up in a war. He does not flinch from describing the appalling conditions suffered by German troops who were effectively cut off from their own supply lines during the Russian winter. Although an emergency collection of cold weather clothing had been made in Germany, much of it did not reach the troops who needed it until the cold weather broke. In some areas the Wehrmacht were building up for a counter-attack, in others their units were in a terribly deprived state. This undated general description gives an indication of how bad things got during this period: • It was garrison warfare. The front, such as it was, was a chain of widely separated villages. The Russians were able to march through in between us and pressed forward as far as Shchigry. We didn’t know. • We found food. There were potatoes in cellars and bunkers, and we slaughtered sheep and cattle. But when the daily ration was four slices of bread, potatoes and slaughtering were banned, so as to build up a stock of provisions for the flood season ahead. We went on starving, and our guts and bellies didn’t heal. Every day there were several hours of duty in the open, weapon cleaning also, but we had to collect our own wood and provisions. We waited a month for mail. • … [they were attacked and counterattacked ] … • Our quarters were wrecked, and there were corpses littered about everywhere. We covered the German dead with tarpaulins; with the Cossacks we took off their felt boots and caps, as well as their pants and underpants, and put them on. We now moved closer together in the few houses still standing. One soldier had been unable to find any felt boots, which were an excellent protection against the cold. • The next day he found a Red Army corpse frozen stiff. He tugged at his legs, but in vain. He grabbed an axe and took the man off at the thighs. Fragments of flesh flew everywhere. He bundled the two stumps under his arm and set them down in the oven, next to our lunch. By the time the potatoes were done, the legs were thawed out, and he pulled on the bloody felt boots. Having the dead meat next to our food bothered us as little as if someone had wrapped his frostbite between meals or cracked lice. ww2today.com
Once the German advance bogs down around the Russian cities – which refuse to surrender – the winter sets in and Russia does what it always does in winter wars: starts to win. […] Your encircled troops are in a grave situation. They are suffering from hunger, sickness and cold. The harsh Russian winter is only just beginning: hard frosts, cold winds and snowstorms are still to come, but your soldiers do not have winter uniforms and are living in unsanitary conditions. You, as commander, and all the officers of the surrounded troops know very well that there is no longer any realistic possibility of breaking through the encirclement. Your position is hopeless and further resistance is pointless. Given the inescapable position that your forces now find themselves in, and in order to avoid unnecessary bloodshed, we propose that you accept the following terms of surrender:1. All surrounded German troops, with you and your staff, are to give up further resistance.2. You are to hand over to us, in an orderly fashion and intact, all men, arms, weaponry and army property. […] If you choose to reject our proposal for your capitulation, be warned that the forces of the Red Army and the Red Air Force will be compelled to take steps to destroy the surrounded German troops, and that you will bear the responsibility for their annihilation. Signed,Colonel-General of Artillery, Voronov;Supreme Commander of the Don Front, Lieutenant-General Rokossovsky.
WW II Casualties: Europe Each symbol indicates 100,000 dead in the appropriate theater of operations
