After Operation Barbarossa, German troops had encircled Leningrad, and began the siege of Leningrad. Several operations had been designed by the Soviet commanders in the area to liberate the outskirts of Leningrad from the Germans. In the fall of 1943, preparations had begun to design another plan to retake the outskirts of Leningrad from the Germans, after the only partially successful Operation Iskra in January of that year which had followed the failed Sinyavino Offensive of late 1942. The first staff meeting was held on , two years and a day after the beginning of the siege. Two plans, Neva I and Neva II, were conceived. Neva I was to be implemented if the Germans, pressured on different fronts, withdrew their forces from Leningrad on their own accord to reinforce the pressured areas. Both Stavka and Leningrad believed this was possible. Neva II, therefore, would be implemented if the Germans did not withdraw from Leningrad within the coming months. The offensive would be three-pronged, driving from the foothold at Oranienbaum that had been captured earlier that year, the Pulkovo Heights and from the fortifications around Novgorod. The offensive was planned to start in the winter, when sufficient numbers of troops and artillery could be moved across the ice without incident.