Battle of Stalingrad

The **Battle of Stalingrad** **(1942-1943)** was fought during the Second World War between Nazi Germany led by Adolf Hitler and the Soviet Union led by Joseph Stalin. They were fighting for control of the city of Stalingrad. Germany got support from Italy, Hungary, Croatia and Romania. The battle was fought between 23 August 1942 and 2 February 1943. It was one of the most important battles of the war because it marked the end of Germany's advances. Hitler even blamed his defeat partly on Stalingrad. The Battle of Stalingrad has often been recorded as an example of how brutal a war can be. It is reported that, due to limited supplies, soldiers and civilians had to resort to eating rats, mice, and even cannibalism.

Stalingrad, now Volgograd, was a city on the Volga River. It was an important industrial city, and the Volga was an important transport route.  Hitler also wanted to capture Stalingrad because it was named after Joseph Stalin, the leader of the Soviet Union, thus it would embarrass him.

In June 1942, Adolf Hitler launched an attack in southern Russia. By the end of July the German army had reached Stalingrad.  With bombs and fire the German Luftwaffe turned the city into ruins. However, the rubble made hiding places from which Russian snipers could attack the Germans. Hitler and Stalin sent in large numbers of soldiers. They both ordered that anyone who retreated would be shot on the spot for treason.

On 19 November 1942, the Red Army launched an attack which surrounded the Stalingrad area, pinching off the German salient. Hitler ordered the army to stay there. The German air force tried to supply them by air. By February 1943, the German forces in Stalingrad had no ammunition and food. Rather than freeze, they surrendered, knowing the Soviets were usually cruel to their prisoners.

The battle lasted five months, one week, and three days. 1.6 million people dead or wounded in battle were reported. There were more Russian deaths than German, but it was a victory for the Russians. They had killed so many Germans that Hitler's overall plan to conquer the Soviet Union, started with Operation Barbarossa, was seriously weakened. Also, the Germans failed to get control of Russian oil fields.

About one quarter of the German Sixth Army's soldiers were Eastern European volunteers called HIWIs. The Battle of Stalingrad was the largest and deadliest battle in the history of warfare.

## Background 
By the spring of 1942, the German Operation Barbarossa did not defeat the Soviet Union.  The war was still going well for the Germans: the U-boat offensive in the Atlantic had been very successful and Rommel had just captured Tobruk.

In the east, they had captured land including Leningrad in the north and  Rostov-on-Don in the south. There were a number of places where Soviet attacks had pushed the Germans back (to the northwest of Moscow and south of Kharkov) but this did not threaten the Germans. Hitler was confident that he could beat the Red Army after the winter of 1941. Even though Army Group Centre had heavy losses near Moscow the previous winter, 65% of its infantry had not fought and had been rested and given new equipment. Army Groups North and South had also not had a hard time over the winter.  Stalin was expecting German summer attacks to again be directed against Moscow.

The Germans decided that their summer campaign in 1942 would be directed at the southern parts of the Soviet Union. The Germans wanted to destroy Stalingrad's industries. Hitler also saw the city of Stalingrad as a key city to capture due to it holding Joseph Stalin's name in it.  The Germans also wanted to block the Volga River. The river was a route between the Caspian Sea and northern Russia. Capturing the river would make it hard for the Soviets to use the river to transport goods such as oil which Germany had been lacking due to their main supply, coming from the Soviets being stopped after Operation Barbarossa commenced.

The German operations were initially very successful. On July 23, 1942, Hitler changed the goals for the 1942 attack. He made occupying Stalingrad one of the goals. The city was important, because it was named after Stalin, the leader of the Soviet Union. The Germans thought that if they captured Stalingrad, it would help the northern and western parts of the German armies to attack Baku. The Germans wanted to capture Baku because it had a lot of oil.

## Attack on Stalingrad 
 submachine gun in Barrikady factory rubble. Many German soldiers took Russian weapons, because they were better for close quarter combat.]]

On the 23 of August the 6th Army reached the edge of Stalingrad. They were following the 62nd and 64th Armies, which had gone back into the city. Kleist later said after the war:
 The capture of Stalingrad was [a place] where we could block an attack...by Russian forces coming from the east.

The battle began with the heavy bombing of the city by *Luftflotte 4*. A 1,000 tons of bombs were dropped. Stalin prevented most civilians from leaving the city because he thought that this would make the Soviet armies fight harder. Civilians, including women and children, were told to dig trenches.  Massive German bombing on 23 August caused a firestorm. It killed thousands and turned Stalingrad into rubble and ruins. Between 23 and 26 August, 955 people were killed and another 1,181 wounded from the bombing. 

The Soviet Air Force, the *Voenno-Vozdushnye Sily* (VVS), was destroyed by the Luftwaffe. The Soviets lost 201 aircraft between 23 and 31 August. They brought in another 100 aircraft in August. In the battle, the NKVD organized  "Workers' militias" who were often sent into battle without rifles.

On 19 November 1942, the Red Army launched Operation Uranus. The attacking Soviet units under the command of Gen. Nikolay Vatutin consisted of three armies. This included a total of 18 infantry divisions, eight tank brigades, two motorized brigades, six cavalry divisions and one anti-tank brigade. The Soviets pushed past the Romanian Third Army. The response by the *Wehrmacht* was disorganized. Bad weather prevented air attacks against the Soviets.

On 20 November, a second Soviet offensive (two armies) was launched to the south of Stalingrad against the Romanian 4th Army Corps. The Romanians were overrun by large numbers of tanks. The Soviet forces moved west and made a ring around Stalingrad.

## Sixth Army surrounded 
About 265,000 German, Romanian, Italian soldiers, the 369th (Croatian) Reinforced Infantry Regiment, and other troops including 40,000 Soviet volunteers fighting for the Germans. were surrounded. There were 210,000 Germans on 19 November 1942. There were also around 10,000 Soviet civilians and several thousand Soviet soldiers the Germans had taken captive during the battle. Not all of the 6th Army was trapped; 50,000 were not surrounded. Of the 210,000 Germans surrounded, 10,000 remained to fight, 105,000 surrendered, 35,000 left by air and the remaining 60,000 died.

The Red Army formed two defensive groups. Field Marshal Erich von Manstein told Hitler not to order the 6th Army to break out. Manstein thought that he could break through the Soviet troops and free the 6th Army.p451 After 1945, Manstein says he told Hitler that the 6th Army must break out. Hitler said that the Sixth Army would have to stay at Stalingrad and that the air force would supply it until the Germans could attack the Soviets.

The *Luftwaffe* was able to deliver an average of  of supplies per day. The most successful day, 19 December, delivered  of supplies in 154 flights. In the early parts of the operation, more fuel was shipped than food and ammunition because the Germans thought they could escape from the city. Transport airplanes also flew out sick or wounded men from the city. The German attack did not reach the 6th Army. The air supply operation continued. The 6th Army slowly starved. 160 German transport aircraft were destroyed and 328 were heavily damaged. Some 266 Junkers Ju 52s were destroyed.

## Final stages 
### Operation Winter Storm 
Soviet forces grouped together around Stalingrad. Violent fighting to attack the Germans began. Operation Winter Storm (*Operation Wintergewitter*), the German attempt to rescue the trapped army from the south, was at first successful. By 19 December, the German Army had pushed to within 48&nbsp;km (30&nbsp;mi) of Sixth Army's positions. Some German officers asked Paulus go against  Hitler's orders and try to escape out of the Stalingrad. Paulus refused. On 23 December, Manstein's forces had to defend themselves from new Soviet attacks.

### Operation Little Saturn 
On 16 December, the Soviets launched Operation Little Saturn.  It attempted to make a hole through the Axis army (mainly Italians) on the Don and capture Rostov. The Germans set up a defence of small units. 15 Soviet divisions—supported by at least 100 tanks—attacked the Italian Cosseria and Ravenna Divisions. The Soviets never got close to Rostov because of the Italian defence.

The German attempt to break through to Stalingrad was stopped and Army Group A was told to come back from the Caucasus.

The 6th Army could no longer hope to escape. The 6th Army did not have enough fuel. As well, the German soldiers have found it very hard to break through the Soviet lines on foot in the cold winter conditions.

### Soviet victory 
 (left), with his chief of staff, *Generalleutnant* Arthur Schmidt (centre) and his aide, Wilhelm Adam (right), after their surrender.]]

The Germans retreated from the suburbs of Stalingrad to the city itself.  The loss of the two airfields, at Pitomnik on 16 January 1943 and Gumrak on the night of 21/22 January, meant an end to air supplies and to the flying out the wounded. The third and last runway was at the Stalingradskaja flight school, which had the last landings and takeoffs on the night of 22–23 January.  After that, there were no landings except for air drops of ammunition and food.

The Germans were now not only starving, but running out of ammunition. They continued to fight because they thought the Soviets would execute any Germans who surrendered.  A Soviet group (Major Aleksandr Smyslov, Captain Nikolay Dyatlenko and a trumpeter) carried an offer to Paulus: if he surrendered within 24&nbsp;hours, he would receive a guarantee of safety for all prisoners, medical care for the sick and wounded, prisoners allowed to keep their personal belongings, food rations, and be sent to any country they wanted after the war.  Paulus was ordered not to surrender by Hitler, so he did not respond.

On 30 January 1943, the 10th anniversary of Hitler coming to power, Goebbels said "The heroic struggle of our soldiers on the Volga should be a warning for everybody..." Also on that day Hitler promoted Paulus to *Generalfeldmarschall*. Since no German Field Marshal had ever been taken prisoner, Hitler assumed that Paulus would fight on or kill himself.

The next day, the southern group in Stalingrad was defeated by the Soviets. Soviet forces reached the entrance to the German headquarters. General Schmidt surrendered the headquarters. Paulus said he had not surrendered and refused to order the remaining German forces to surrender.

Four Soviet armies attacked the remaining northern group. On 2 February, General Strecker surrendered. Around 91,000 tired, ill, wounded, and starving prisoners were taken, including 3,000 Romanians (the survivors of the 20th Infantry Division, 1st Cavalry Division and "Col. Voicu" Detachment). The prisoners included 22 generals. Hitler was angry and said that Paulus should have killed himself, but instead "he prefers to go to Moscow."  Paulus was Roman Catholic and therefore did not.

## Aftermath 
The German public was not officially told of the loss until the end of January 1943, though positive media reports had stopped in the weeks before the announcement.

On 18 February, Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels gave the *Sportpalast* speech in Berlin, encouraging the Germans to accept a total war.
 soldier marches a German soldier into captivity.]]

Out of the nearly 110,000 German prisoners captured in Stalingrad, only about 6,000 ever returned. They were sent to prisoner camps and later to labour camps all over the Soviet Union. Some 35,000 were eventually sent on transports, of which 17,000 did not survive. Some were kept in the city to help rebuild.

Some senior officers were taken to Moscow and used for propaganda purposes. Some of them joined the National Committee for a Free Germany. Some, including Paulus, signed anti-Hitler statements that were broadcast to German troops. Paulus testified for the prosecution during the Nuremberg Trials. and only 5-6,000 returned to Germany by 1955. The remainder of the POWs died in Soviet captivity.

On 2 February 1943, the fighting of Axis troops in Stalingrad stopped. Out of the 91,000 prisoners taken by the Soviets, 3,000 were Romanian.

The Red Army had a total of 1,129,619 total casualties; 478,741 men killed or missing and 650,878 wounded. These numbers are for the whole Don region; in the city itself 750,000 were killed, captured, or wounded.

Anywhere from 25,000 to 40,000 Soviet civilians died in Stalingrad and its suburbs during a single week of aerial bombing by *Luftflotte* 4 as the German 4th Panzer and 6th Armies got close to the city; the total number of civilians killed in the regions outside the city is unknown.

In all, the battle resulted in an estimated total of 1.7-2 million Axis and Soviet casualties, making it possibly the bloodiest battle in all of human history.

### Scope of the battle
In the original 1942 plan, the occupation of Stalingrad had not been a goal. Based on the military successes of the Germans in the first month of the attacks, Hitler decided to expand the military goals. Hitler thought that the Soviet forces across the Don river were weak. The new goals included Stalingrad and even capturing the Volga.

Once the Armies began to fight in the for the city, both sides began to feel that it was very important to win. The Germans sent a lot of troops into the city. This meant that their side did not control the Don river and the Soviet bridges. The German side made steady progress in the fighting and eventually held about 90% of the city.

The German focus on the city made them not think of the weakness of their defenses along the Don and the massive buildup of Soviet forces on their sides. After the Soviet breakthrough, the Germans were very disorganized. The 6th Army was eventually reorganized in time for the Battle of Kursk, but was made up mostly of new soldiers and was never as strong as it had once been.

Stalingrad was a turning point in the war. It also showed the discipline and determination of both the German *Wehrmacht* and the Soviet Red Army. The Soviets first defended Stalingrad against a strong German attack. Newly arrived Soviet  soldiers often died in less than a day. Soviet officers often died in three days.

Historians have talked about how much terror there was in the Red Army. Beevor noted the bravery of the Soviet soldiers. A historian talked to Soviet veterans about terror on the Eastern Front. Many soldiers said they were relieved at the order not to retreat. Infantryman Lev Lvovich’s said he felt better.

For the heroism of the Soviet defenders of Stalingrad, the city was awarded the title Hero City in 1945. Twenty-four years after the battle, in October 1967, a monument, The Motherland Calls, was built on Mamayev Kurgan, the hill overlooking the city. The hill actually used to be much larger, but had been flattened due to constant artillery fire. The statue forms part of a war memorial that includes ruined walls from the battle. The Grain Silo, as well as Pavlov's House can still be visited.

Many women fought on the Soviet side, or were under fire. At the beginning of the battle there were 75,000 women and girls from the Stalingrad area who had finished military or medical training, and all of whom were to serve in the battle. Women staffed a great many of the anti-aircraft batteries that fought not only the Luftwaffe but German tanks. Soviet nurses not only treated wounded men under fire but brought wounded soldiers back to the hospitals under enemy fire. Many of the Soviet wireless and telephone operators were women who often suffered heavy injuries and deaths. Though women were not usually trained as infantry, many Soviet women fought as machine gunners, mortar operators, and scouts. Women were also snipers at Stalingrad. Three air regiments at Stalingrad were entirely female.

The German Army showed a lot of discipline after being surrounded. Many German soldiers starved or froze to death. Yet, discipline was continued until the very end. General Friedrich Paulus obeyed Hitler's orders and did not attempt to escape out of the city. German ammunition, supplies, and food became scarce. Generals from both sides suffered from massive stress because of the battle and also because of the fact that they had to report to the most brutal leader in their nation's history. Many generals suffered health problems because of their stress.

Paulus followed his orders and fought to the very end. He asked for permission to surrender, but it was denied. Hitler promoted him to the rank of *Generalfeldmarschall*. No German field marshal had ever surrendered, and the implication was clear. Hitler believed that Paulus would either fight to the last man or commit suicide. Paulus was taken prisoner.

After his capture, Paulus told the Soviets that he had not surrendered.  He refused to issue an order for the Germans to surrender.

### In popular culture
The events of the battle for Stalingrad have been shown in several movies of German, Russian, British and American origin.

The battle is described in many books.

In the novel *The Book Thief*, one character was presumed to have died or been captured in The Battle of Stalingrad.

In the 2011 video game Red Orchestra 2: Heroes of Stalingrad, the game shows famous locations of the battle, such as Pavlov's House, the Red October Factory and Mamayev Kurgan, among others.

The 2013 game, Company of Heroes 2, showed the battle in certain missions. It was criticized by Russian players for being untrue and on August 7 sales in Russia were stopped.

## Notes 
## References 
## Other websites 
* WW2DB: Battle of Stalingrad
* Detailed summary of campaign 
* Information, Photos, and Original Maps of the Battle 
* Stalingrad-info.com, many Pictures from the battle and the city
* Volgograd State Panoramic Museum official homepage
*  Stalingrad Battle  This site is sponsored by the main historical and culture organizations of Volgograd.
* The Battle of Stalingrad in Film and History Written with strong Socialist/Communist political under and overtones.
* The Battle of Stalingrad  The Battle of Stalingrad in detail.
* Roberts, Geoffrey. "Victory on the Volga", *The Guardian*, February 28, 2003
* Operation Blau 
* Battle of Stalingrad 
* The Soviet counter-offensive: Operation Uranus 
* Disaster of 6th Army 
* The Great Battle on the Volga  on Google Video
* German Newsreels of the Battle of Stalingrad on YouTube