[Music] I'm [Music] Herman guring ominously summarized German policy towards the Soviet Union when he made a typically Sinister speech late in 1941 many tens of millions in the industrial areas will become redundant and will either die or have to immigrate to Siberia in little more than one year ging's promise had been made good Hitler's armies had reduced vast areas of Western Russia to dust and rubble and subjected the Soviet peoples to unimaginable brutality Russia experienced an Agony of brutality as she was dragged through a nightmare of Slaughter to the edge of Extinction the launch of operation Barbarosa the invasion of the Soviet Union on the 22nd of June 1941 was Germany's most desperate gamble of the second world war it was a gamble Hitler felt compelled to take if his ambition of the complete subjugation of Europe was to become a reality 3 million German troops were initially committed to the most appalling conflict in the history of warfare in the course of the next 4 years she would need to find 3 million more the whole ideological thrust of the German plan for war was different this was not a conventional war of Conquest it was intended to be a war of extermination it was intended to root out what Hitler called the Jewish Bolshevik gang who ran Russia it was designed to destroy the political structure both of the Soviet Union and of the Red Army in Consequence the terrible barbarization which set in at the first stage in the Soviet German war was to become the overriding feature which persisted until the very last day of that war standing between Hitler and the realization of this Vision were the armies of the Union of Soviet Socialist republics a fighting force whose condition of disorganization was mirrored by the paranoia of its political leadership the disarray in the ranks of the Red Army was a direct result of the ex esses of Stalin who had carried out a systematic Purge of the Red Army in 1936 tokachi Chief of Staff of the Russian army was executed for treason following a trial which lasted only a single day six of the eight generals forming the court Marshal which condemned him were themselves to follow suit soon after by the end of The Purge the Russian army had lost three of the five remaining Marshals of the Soviet Union all 11 Deputy Ministers of Defense 75 of the 80 members of the military Soviet all the commanders of the military districts 13 of the 15 Army commanders more than half the core commanders and approximately 30% of the officers below Brigade level the performance of the Russian tank forces was affected by three major considerations the first one was that during the purges in the late 1930s early 1940s well over 90% of all the tank commanders were shot and so there was a um a death of experienced tank commanders a lot of the senior commanders who were actually replaced after the Fiasco in Finland in 1940 they were actually reinstated even though they were had a poor track record they went back in and commanded these units the units because they were so large because there was over 24,000 tanks the Russians really couldn't afford to spend a great deal of time training the crews and most of the training that the crews had had was for exercises more for the um poit Bureau and for propaganda purposes rather than naturual tactical exercises and the third Factor was there was very little in the way or almost no spare parts so when a vehicle broke down unless they cannibalized another vehicle there was no spare parts for that vehicle this great offensive codenamed Barbarosa had been fermenting for a long time in Hitler's mind firmly rooted in National Socialist ideology was the conviction that Germany's Destiny lay in the east once more Hitler needed a quick War once more he needed it soon it was his Instinct that Germany would never stand so strong as she stood then his gambler's instinct told him that if he delayed even one year the crowds that cheered the latest successes so fervently might no longer be willing to follow him into so hazardous an adventure and there was no greater military Adventure than the invasion of Russia as the German buildup towards operation Barbarosa continued Stalin's attempts to pacify Hitler grew more desperate Stalin felt he was continuing to buy Time by these unrequited concessions but his use of the breathing space which he had already obtained was totally devoid of any worthwhile attempt to remedy his military disadvantages Stan was well aware that sooner or later the Germans would attack but what accompanied this was as follows actually there was also the Assumption very deafly introduced by the Germans that in fact before this attack there could well be negotiations there might even be and the Russians now have disclosed this there might even have been a personal meeting between Hitler and Stalin and Stalin therefore became persuaded that there were two elements to this German position one was that the massive German military buildup was in fact if you like not an inducement but a form of coercion to force him into a negotiating position and on June the 14th he made this perfectly plain by the famous task statement saying look we know what you're up to we we know all about these concentrations but there is nothing to prevent a settlement of Soviet German relations that was the first thing the second thing was a certain element of self-deception on Stalin side to the effect that one he strongly believed that Hitler would never embark on a two-front war and the second thing was again Stalin's great concern that although the Soviet general staff zukov and vasilki and others were particularly timoshenko were urging Stalin to mobilize Stalin argued actually and he shouted at timoshenko what do you want a war because the the act of mobilization full formal mobilization essentially would trigger War indeed even on the morning of the 22nd of June 1941 when German armor is advancing he's still partly persuaded of what he what he thought was a praia he even imagined it was some Breakaway German generals who were trying it on as it were this wasn't the real thing so that the explanation of Soviet unreadiness is much more complex than the fact that yes they knew about it B they did nothing about it uh and it was certainly plain from Stalin's statements that he did expect a war which he hoped through his diplomacy and his General political initiatives to postpone to 1942 the reality of it was that Hitler meant every word he said he would attack on the 22nd of June 41 and he did attack by June 1941 with a German attack imminent the Western special military District on which the blow would fall was nothing short of a shambles many divisions were between six to 7,000 men short of wartime establishment levies of experienced Personnel had been hived off to build new tank and Aviation units only one of six mechanized core had received their full complement of equipment three of the four motorized divisions had no tanks and four out of every five vehicles in the tank fleets were obsolete four of the core had only one quarter of their designated motor vehicles and in another four one in three Motor Vehicles needed repairs although the two opposing forces had amassed V vast amounts of Weaponry along their common borders the Soviet Red Army and the German vear were anything but equal adversaries Russian armored Warfare was inhibited by Stalin's disenchantment with tank divisions which had led him in the 30s to utilize his armor only in the support of infantry formations after witnessing German successes on the Western Front in 1940 Stalin changed his mind but the reorg ization of Russian armor was not completed before the launch of Barosa even though Russian tanks outnumbered German 2:1 at the front and 6:1 overall tactical ineffectiveness obsolete models and widespread disrepair tipped the advantage overwhelmingly in favor of Germany during the first stages of the conflict in the western part of Russia the Red Army consisted of about 5 million men the tank strength of the Red Army on the 21st of June 1941 was 23,100 of which possibly 8,000 were battle ready and in good condition typical of the Russian tank forces in the early part of the war was the t26 the t26 was built under license from a design that was originally created by Vicor Armstrong in about 1928 so it was a British tank you can always tell it was a good tank because the British army never ordered it it was purely a commercial offering and the Russians took to it in a big way and they got a license it was all done above board and then put a much better gun in it than the British had done they had a 45 mm anti-tank weapon which is actually quite effective against contemporary tank so from that point of view it was an excellent little vehicle it was reliable but it was very very rough the actual suspension the wheels and tracks that it runs on gave people a very hard ride and of course like all tanks of the pre-war period it's of bolted construction so it's weak when it comes to defending itself against incoming rounds but generally speaking for its day an excellent little tank just on a historical note what makes this tank interesting is that it was captured from the Russian army by the fins during the winter War they did some minor modifications used it for a while in their army and then laterally they buried all these tanks in their defensive regions particularly what was known as the manaheim line and the tank was buried and its turret was showing and it became part of the fixed defenses back in the sort 70s and ' 80s they started digging up the manaheim line suddenly produced all these tanks and we were able to do an exchange with them to get it for the tank Museum which is great because it means we have a representative example not only of a pre-war Russian tank which is quite something to have but also something Which derived originally from a British design and we have the British design from which it came also in the museum so historically it's interesting I should point out of course that the SW fostier on the turret has absolutely nothing to do with the Nazis it is a Finnish symbol one of the runic symbols that they employed so it in this case there's no Nazi Association at all on the German side the field strength was roughly about 3 and a half million men with the addition of the German allies the fins the slovaks and the hungarians the figure Rises to nearly 4 million in infantry the Germans were therefore outnumbered by 1 million men at the outset in terms of armor the discrepancies were even larger the Germans were able to employ something like 3,300 tanks to face the Russian 8,000 but numbers don't tell the whole story in the case of Barbarosa numbers are extremely misleading considering the operational Readiness of the armies the verar was clearly Superior it was also battle hardened experienced and it was well prepared and briefed for its task by comparison the Red Army suffered severe problems of Manning organization training Logistics Supply even more importantly the Germans were operating according to a carefully conceived master plan discover the past with exclusive military history documentaries and adree podcasts presented by world-renowned historians all on History hit watch them on your smart TV or on the go with your mobile device download the app now to watch everything from the gripping story of the Band of Brothers to operation Barbarosa and D-Day immerse yourself in the dramatic stories of this remarkable era by signing up via the link in the description the Red Army was in an extraordinary position there was no recognizable military plan the Red Army could neither defend nor attack many of its tanks were not suitable for the demands of World War II the tank Army by 1936 was probably the biggest in the world they not only had these little fellas they had a series of Tanks known as the BT series which had been derived from the American Christy machine some of the fastest tanks on Earth and this massive Army of Tanks wiped out largely in the initial stages of Barbarosa meant that the Russians had to rethink their designs and start again so you almost and it would be a dream to some tank armies get a clean sweep of the board and the Russians then come back with the t34 arguably one of the best tanks of the second world war and the heavy KV series tanks which they then fitted into their army so really what you're seeing is the Germans kindly clearing up for the Russians a load of old junk which they'd had on their hands since the mid-30s the first part of the war was really not an occasion for praising tank commanders that was a martydom of Soviet uh tank troops though one or two people did emerge which are very important for example um chovsky who was very young he must have been about yes he was just in his very early 30s he commanded a tank division in the terrible days of 1941 and really proved himself to be a very capable Commander he in fact went on to become not only an army Commander but a front Commander that gives you some idea of the caliber of these [Music] people the awesome German armies which the 170 understrength divisions of the Russian troops faced were divided into three large groups these consisted of 148 fully manned and equipped divisions the German armor was grouped into 19 Panza and 15 Panza Grenadier divisions the Army group South was commanded by field Marshall gar Von runed and was charged with seizing Kiev and taking control of the Ukraine as far as the River neppa Field Marshal Von Bach's Army group Center was to strike towards smolin Army Group North under field Marshall Von Le was to attack through the Baltic states and seiz Leningrad Army group Center was a larger formation than the forces which comprised the other two Army groups it had 50 German divisions as opposed to 39 in Army group South and only 29 in Army Group North it could deploy 910 aircraft as opposed to 684 Army group South and 434 Army Group North the two Panza groups under Von bok's control in Army group Center also claimed the Lion's Share of the tanks which were allocated to the great attack some 1700 machines were available to ROK as opposed to 1,000 for Von runestad with army group South and 650 in Army group Cent center with Von Le the three German Army groups were supplemented by 500,000 Finnish troops advancing from their Homeland in 14 divisions and 150,000 Romanians attacking along the Black Sea towards Odessa these forces together with the LT Waffa which had devoted 80% of its operational strength 2770 aircraft to the buildup of Barbarosa fielded over 3,350 tanks over 7,000 artillery pieces 60,000 motor vehicles and 625,000 horses the Russian army still clung to its peacetime structure should War occur then each military District would be transformed into Army groupings similar in structure to the Germans which mirrored the German intentions the north Soviet front was to repel advances through the Baltic states and defend Leningrad from finish attack the Northwest west and southwest fronts would engage the three main German Army groups and the southern front would deal with any advance towards Odessa Behind These similarities the contrast between the Waring Nations could not have been greater while Germany boasted one of the finest Industrial infrastructures in the world Russia had still not completed her Industrial Revolution Stalin had declared in 1931 that one feature of old Russia was the continual beatings that she suffered for falling behind for her backwardness for military backwardness for agricultural backwardness we are 50 or 100 years behind the advanced countries we must make good this distance in 10 years either we do it or they crush us ironically the enemy which might now attempt to crush the Soviet Union was to rely heav on tanks which the Russians had helped their develop between 1926 and 1933 the Red Army and the Rish collaborated in secret on the development of weapons on the development of tactics on the development by the way of chemical weapons and uh the Russians were very interested in German ideas and the Germans were very interested in Russian ideas obviously and there was a yeah there was certainly a form of exchange there uh and by the way many Russians today say that what happened was German early German successes were actually based on Soviet Theory well that's a little bit of national pride being thrown in undoubtedly both sides were interested in the potentialities of the tank that's very true and the second thing they were interested in was the relationship between airr cooperation between the tank and the dive bomber yes that was true but I don't think that's a justification for for arguing that the blitz Creek and Soviet operations in depth are the same because they're not they're really not the way partly in the way in which they are practiced they are different and partly the manner in which what objectives they set themselves are also different as well by the early 30s 10 prototype tanks had been designed and built in secret the initial development of what would become the most technically accomplished and cost-effective tank program ever seen took place at the German Soviet tank school at Kazan in Russia the firm grip of the party on the state meant that the Russian people were deprived of any suspicion of the huge buildup along their borders the state controlled media was devoid of any mention of the increasingly anti-soviet rhetoric of Hitler which may have provided a clue they were totally unprepared therefore for the latest disaster which was about to descend [Music] At Last At 0400 on the 22nd of June 1941 the code word Dortmund crackled down the wires and the Maelstrom that was Barbarosa finally erupted the German armies of the blitz Greek sliced through the Russian forces on every front faced by the results of his intransigent refusal to act Stalin panicked while his Army Headquarters desperately tried to piece together the most rudimentary picture of what was happening he ordered an immediate counter offensive on all fronts as the first reports of the devastation his own command had helped to create filtered through he was shattered all that Lenin created we have lost forever he declared he finally retreated to his Dua not to emerge until the 3rd of July but what really stunned the Red Army commanders was that the massive German assault proceeded without any artillery support it simply sliced through the Red Army command had expected that there would be meeting engagements and opening actions that would develop over a period of days next would come a large series of complex Frontier engagement and then the real war would begin what actually happened was that in 48 hours in Army Group North German Panzer columns were approaching rer at the beginning of the war Soviet tank training was terrible was awful the tank drivers had very little little experience probably maybe two three hours on it if they had that by the way the level of actually handling a tank and fighting a tank was extremely low and it showed it showed in the disaster which was visited on the red Army's tank forces the level of the training of the commanders was very poor and that changed it changed importantly the Soviet training methods were completely overhauled at the end of 1942 in 1943 uh it was no good just pushing people in tanks and saying get on with it do this they realized that for the tank force they had and what the tank force had to do you really need highly trained Crews in the opening days of the campaign the two Panza groups of army group Center under Hoth and Garian completed the encirclement of a huge Hall of confused and virtually leaderless Russians near bisho then surged onwards towards Minsk this refined Blitz Greek technique of the Germans and the use of their armor in that respect came as an extraordinary and totally disorganizing surprise even to the senior Russian commanders Within within 48 Hours general staff reports made it perfectly plain they had lost control of the situation they were in complete chaos and many didn't know where their troops were or what was happening they certainly didn't have accurate reports of German movements and they were not quite sure whether German thrusts were aimed at all that they did know was to the South Army group South was being slightly delayed but in the Northwest and in the west there was total collapse in consequence Stalin operated his usual practice he took out the front commanders and shot them at the front the Rapier thrusts of the German Panza divisions were skewering through the chaotic Russian defenses the paner groups created deadly breaches in the Soviet line slicing the red army forces into isolated segments the supporting German divisions then moved forward in encircling ADV advances which surrounded these pockets of Defenders the ferocity and effectiveness of the Panzer attacks was so great that some of the pockets were gigantic groups of up to 15 Russian divisions were surrounded and mercilessly pummeled into surrender the encirclement of Minsk by the right flank of army Group North and the Left Flank of army group Center yielded 300,000 prisoners 2,500 tanks 1,400 artillery pieces 32 of the 43 Russian divisions were emasculated within a week and the road to Moscow penetrated to a depth of 300 km the remainder of army Group North sced into the Baltic states capturing Ria the Latvian Capital only in the South were the German forces limited to shallow advances towards Luv and Runa on the ground chaos rained the Lu Waffa were pulverizing the road and rail links behind the Russian lines many officers were not even bothering to use code in their desperate pleas for instructions from their headquarters struggling masses of uncoordinated troops were being slaughtered by the German troops as they attempted to obey Stalin's orders to Counterattack others were being machine gunned by their own military police for fleeing from positions which were worse than hopeless the reality was that the Soviet forces were left leaderless they had no orders sometimes they had guns but no ammunition sometimes they had tanks but no fuel or they had tanks which broke down with no Prospect of repair or they simply had orders which were contradictory the usual situation was that if in doubt Red Army commanders would simply order Advance many many of the Red Army divisions simply broke up and formed very large pockets of Red Army troops for example within a matter of four or 5 days the verar the German Army in the East had managed to encircle 350,000 Red Army soldiers the first of what was to prove a number of huge encirclements by the 3rd of July the battle for the frontier was over the German armies had Advanced along a line from the river in the North to the Nea in the South General halder chief of German general staff declared that the war against the Soviet Union had taken only 14 days to win but the German intelligence had totally underestimated the reserves which Russia could command the Red Army had a great number of men but the equipment that it used tended to be outdated and obsolete this was particularly with regard to tanks and aircraft in terms of signals equipment the red Army's position on the Western Front was quite appalling it simply did not have the communications equipment to enable it to fight the fast moving battles the German Army specialized in and they would be required to fight effectively in order to defend their country properly and to achieve the initiative therefore it can be concluded in terms of leadership position and Equipment tanks aircraft and Communications the Russian forces facing Army group Center was no way a match for their German counterpart The Invasion forces sied through hopelessly disorganized opposition and moved rapidly onwards well honed the blitz Greg pattern was being repeated and the Soviet defenses Whirled away like chaff in the Wind the number of prisoners taken seemed too immense to be true but it was and the scale of Destruction was terrifying as the news of Barbarosa reverberated around a stunned and disbelieving world even Germany was a stroke not all the German generals joined the celebration General Hines cadarian who still held relatively Junior rank had been appalled by the headlong advances against two farflung objectives he was acutely aware that the guiding principle of Blitz Greek was the concentration of Maximum Force against a single objective this had already been neglected and where there should be convergence there was Divergence as the Army groups Advanced they moved further away from one another instead of coming closer audacious though he undoubtedly was Hitler bulked at the thought of his precious armored units racing too far or too deep into the Soviet Hinterland and settled instead for a compromise with the more traditional Grand strategy of [Music] envelopment by the end of June Garian and ho's tanks had joined near Minsk to complete a huge encirclement and by mid- August Army Group North was approaching Leningrad the Germans continued to achieve extraordinary success and the verar surged on with undiminished impetus incredible numbers of prisoners were taken and huge quantities of tanks and guns captured or destroy despite this sustained progress Garian was increasingly conscious of grounds for unease in the development of the campaign the unending immensity of the land depressed many soldiers lack of Mobility particularly of tracked Vehicles was a severe drawback there continued to be a huge Hall of prisoners but the German pincers were closing too slowly allowing large numbers of Red Army troops to get away and the Red Army appeared to command endless reserves most roads were of dirt which with the sudden rains turning quickly to Mud halted entire columns meanwhile Hitler was vacillating having failed to annihilate the Red Army his interest turned towards securing the economic prize of the Ukrainian oil wells to garan's dismay he was diverted from his plan to drive hard and fast for Moscow the capture of the Russian Capital would have been a profound psychological shock for the Soviets in instead Garian was ordered South to the Ukraine to link up with ho his division still performed outstandingly helping to take well over half a million prisoners and nearly 1,000 tanks but the crucial moment of the campaign had already passed the Germans were confronted with another and equally unpleasant surprise at this time the first Russian t34 tanks appeared during the Battle of Vima at varea the Russian tank simply drove straight through the seventh Infantry Division onto the artillery positions and literally ran over the guns the effect on the infantryman's morale was devastating this marked the beginning of what came to be called the tank Terror we've come here to North Norfolk to the Muckle collection to have a look at this the t34 in many respects this is the vehicle that actually won the second world war they were manufactured in such quantity that they swamped the German forces and they really had no answer to the sheer numbers of t-34s which appeared on the battlefield there were something like 50,000 of these that were manufactured during the war period it's by no means a beautifully finished machine but it was solid and it was very very workmanlike uh when you consider that there were only something like 7 00 Tigers which were manufactured they had to face 50,000 of these and on the Allied side 50,000 shans Allied to all the British types so you can appreciate that it didn't have to be the best tank in the world but in many respects it was a very very solid performer it was it was made with the Russian conditions in mind it had wide tracks it had the simple suspension based on the Christie model and this tank really had everything that was needed to allow it to be mass produced in the Russian economy in the kind of numbers that arrived just in time and there's no doubt that a tank like a tiger was a far better machine it was better engineered it had a bigger harder hitting gun and it was better protected but what they couldn't cope with were the numbers of these medium tanks which weighed in around 30 tons but could move quickly and above all could deal with the Russian mud and the snow in a way that until the Advent of the later German tanks none of the early models could it was absolutely different to everything else what was available then strong armor sloping armor uh machine guns fitted one here for the radio operator to fire from another coaxial one to be fired out of that hole and that this other hole is for the gun layer to look through and lay the G gun driver sits here and next to him the radio operator as I said who who will fire the gun and the other three men the commander the early one did not have a commander the commander at the top with a vision all around the gun layer and the loader which was a quite a difficult job in there the t34 embodied everything as close as possible to Perfection which could be expected from a tank at the time speed protection Firepower and most of all reliability because that's the worst thing which could happen on a tank especially on a modern German tank at the time to break down somewhere miles from anywhere and not be able to get going this as I said earlier is a 85 mm gun which was very very good but the Russian Optics perps were not quite as good as the Germans which meant lesser shells hit their tar than they might have done on their German tiger for instance one of the best things on this tank well everything is good as I said earlier but one of the best reliable things is the engine itself now this tank was made in 1943 but the engine hasn't changed very much to this very day actually the very same engine with a slightly higher power output is put in the t-55 the very same engine develops about 30 or 40 more horsepower that's all designed in the very early' 40s and still up to date if you look closely on this Edge you see how rough the manufacturer of the tank was I mean it's unbelievable here the hole didn't quite line up so with a burner they cut the whole bit bigger you see but they turned out 45,000 of these things you see they knew very well it hasn't got a long life expectancy so a little bit rough Edge or their voice didn't matter the enormous turret if you take a look at that it's very heavy you wouldn't think anybody could move it but let me tell you if that tank gets the direct hit a penetrate armor penetrating shell inside and sets of its own ammunition by it the whole turret as it is will be blown Sky High and sails through the air 10 or 12 yards that's the force of an exploding tank its own ammunition and its own pet egg diesel what have you in 1941 the t34 was impervious to the infantry's anti-tank weapons at that time the German infantry was equipped only with 37 mm and 50 mm anti-tank guns but they had no effect on the t34 a gun of at least 75 mm caliber was needed but at first had to be designed and built in the meantime only 88 mm anti-aircraft guns could be relied upon and those were hurridly pressed into the anti-tank r still Russia was not defeated by the end of August 5,300,000 men had been mobilized Stalin had emerged from his isolation to broadcast a message of patriotism and resistance to the nation for once the Russian people were told the truth Stalin now took Direct Control of the Red Army the pre-war complacency which he himself had done so much to Foster had now rapidly to be undone but the general mobilization of Russian troops failed to Cil the German Advance four Reserve armies of 37 divisions were dispatched to bolster the West front in the general area of sualin the Germans counted with yet another encirclement and the Panza groups of generals ho and Garian smashed through the Soviet line and maneuvered 300,000 Russian troops into an indefensible pocket another 150,000 prisoners 2,000 tanks and 2,000 artillery pieces fell into German hands drunk with anticipation Geral announced that the Eastern continent lies like a limp virgin in the mighty arms of the German Mars spurred on by the successful actions of their commands the men of army group South finally broke through the Russian Southwest front and another pocket yielded a further toll of 100,000 prisoners [Music] at the outbreak of war in the East the backbone of the Panza core was the Panza markv designed by kup and weighing 17.3 tons the Panza Camp vargon 4 carried a crew of five at a maximum speed of 182 mph its armor varied in thickness from 8 to 30 cm and it was armed with a 75 mm turret gun and two machine guns supported by the lighter Mark III which was similar in size and appearance the markv swept all before it until the Russian t34 tank made its appearance in numbers despite the confusion which surrounded her armed forces the Red Army had tried in 1940 and 1941 to bring in two new tanks the t34 which had been successfully tested in 1939 and the heavier kv1 tank but so far they only produced about a thousand of each the t-34s and kv1s were distributed in very small packets on a Battlefront about 2,000 M long nonetheless when they did meet German armor it did come as an enormous shock the first time that the Germans encountered them particularly the t34 the superior quality of the t-34s armor Mobility speed and gunpow was something they simply hadn't suspected Garian himself ran into a t-34 ambush in November 1941 and his force was almost completely destroyed Garian was pushing forward to Moscow and had swung around from the south and was approaching tula and for the first time he was met not by one of two t34 tags but a perfectly organized competently commanded uh Soviet tank Brigade commanded by a man called katukov and this is where the Germans really learned what the t34 could do and the alarm Bells rang throughout Germany and for the first time one began to see how these tank forces could be handled but it wasn't just the quality of the tanks which counted it was the capability of the Panza commanders to control their armor that was essential they had excellent command control facilities and also at that time they had very good support and logistical facilities so that although German Mark 2 and Mark 3s might run up against a huge kv1 the big heavy tank such was the haphazard and untrained manner in which the Russians handled their armor that the Germans soon learned to defeat them even with inferior armor but there were a few hard lessons to be learned first one of these was the emergence of the Cav one after a month of Victorious progress the German High command were disconcerted by the rapidity of their own Advance their armies were now fighting on a front 1,000 M wide the stukas could no longer deliver the concerted Hammer blows which had punched the holes in the Russian lines which the panzas had so mercilessly exploited the lengthening supply lines were also affecting the German Ground Forces tank Commanders hundreds of miles from their polish depos nevertheless pressed for the final thrust towards Moscow they argued that only the continuation of the offensive would prevent the Russians from organizing a fresh line of resistance while many of Hitler's generals disagreed that such an attack should be launched immediately they were almost unanimous in recommending that Moscow should become the primary objective of the next phase of the war Hitler on the the other hand was worried about the possibility of the gaps between the Panza divisions and the main armies being exploited by Russian reinforcements Hitler had never been fully convinced of the importance of Moscow and continued to regard it as a secondary objective the debate stretched out until mid August a vital month of Summer weather was wasted the Russians had the breathing space to throw Reserve divisions into the gaps in their defenses barely trained poorly equipped some in The Battered remnants of their civilian clothing their stubborn ferocity meant that they were still a force to be reckoned with a rapid campaign to crush Russia which should have been over by August had not achieved its objectives the German High command had to think again and the first thing that they had to think about was Logistics and supplies no great preparation had been made for a winter campaign in Russia neither were their tanks equipped for the job in hand eventually the objections of the generals were overruled and not one but two major objectives were prioritized by Hitler who demanded the simultaneous capture of Moscow and the fall of the Ukraine he decided that the general Hines Garian and his second Panza group should be diverted South to assist the German Army group fighting there instead of concentrating on the final drive to towards Moscow with hindsight it was to prove a disastrous intervention although at the time Hitler appeared to have been Vindicated as seen here in the news reels of the time Garian and his tanks were able to penetrate deep into Soviet territory they were to contribute to the huge Victory when they combined with the Panza forces of army group South under Von K to produce a stunning encirclement which produced a vast Hall of prisoners this footage shows the link up between the tanks of Garian with the white G and Von K whose vehicles are marked with the white K it was not just in the ranks of the German army that strategic errors were being made as the Russians too made some costly blunders the giant pins movement involving half of army group Center and the Left Flank of army group South began to close its jaws on a huge pocket of Russian forces to the rear of Kiev field Marshall zukov the Soviet Chief of Staff pleaded with Stalin for a strategic withdrawal of the troops defending the city he was dismissed from his post Marshall timochenko the newly appointed Southwest Commander arrived just in time to see the trapped Soviet divisions March into captivity with the help of Panza group 2 from army group Center Von K's Panza Group 1 was able to complete the encirclement of a further huge pocket of Dazed Russian prisoners outside Kiev this time a staggering 650,000 men marched into captivity Army group South had played its part in the largest victory in history the unfortunate captives had nothing to celebrate the 650,000 prisoners taken by the Germans Remains the highest number ever captured in a single engagement the battle for the Ukraine now centered on the Crimean peninsula where the right flank of army group South pressed the Soviet 51st Army back towards Sebastapol while half of the German group Center were engaged in subduing the Ukraine Marshall zukov transferred to the reserve forces behind West Front seized the opportunity to attack the ger fourth Army occupying a Salient near smolin the Germans were now themselves vulnerable to encirclement the German fourth Army were thrown back 12 km but without sufficient tanks and aircraft zukov failed to tighten the Noose he had made however in terms of morale zukov counter thrust was highly significant his action was the first substantial Soviet Counterattack of the war [Music] the advance to Moscow was resumed at the end of September but the delay proved to be fatal Fuel and supplies were delivered through a system that had become frequently inefficient if not corrupt and the lines of communication were enormously overextended shortages of every kind impaired the fighting ability of the Frontline forces the vague fears of the generals who had initially harbored doubts were beginning to take the shape of a massive problem the advance had been over areas so vast that it was impossible for comprehensive mopping up operations to be undertaken behind the Germans there lay the huge expanses of territory in which tens of thousands of Red Army troops roamed uncaptured Blitz Greg's lifeblood was rapid movement and the spearheads were now being reduced to a perilously slow crawl there was something seriously seriously wrong with the blitz Creek technique it didn't fit in Russia from the Soviet side they began to realize that there were these shortcomings in the German Blitz Creek approach and that uh the first job that the the Russians had to do at in mencos was actually to Halt this to stop the blitz Creek literally stop its movement this was a very difficult lesson they had to learn and um the first thing was that they really had this was a very painful lesson for them they really had to learn the lessons of active and effective defense it was no good setting up a system of of constant um uh and continued uh counter blows and counterattacks all that happened there was you simply incurred very heavy casualties and you really didn't do anything as the Germans regrouped and reorganized the Autumn rains were heavy in France there had been metal roads here the highways were Vanishing into impossible tracts of mud in which men vehicles and horses floundered more and more helplessly breakdowns increased and repairs became extremely difficult to carry out one of the disadvantages of a tank like the Panzer 3 can be seen down here in the tracks compared to the E34 for example they're comparatively narrow and the reason for that is that these machines were designed with Western Europe in mind uh the Great War was still fresh in the minds of everybody who was designing these tanks uh and as a consequence no one had really given serious consideration to the possibility that they might have to operate in Russia uh and when they did particularly in the winter of 1941 it came as a severe surprise to the ger to find that the conditions were just so extreme you had these bottomless Seas of mud and you had these extensive snow conditions which meant that really a vehicle needed wide tracks to be able to negotiate conditions like that Garian had started barbarasa with 600 tanks by the middle of November he was left with just 50 that were operational by the end of October Army groups South held a line which ran from approximately kov in the North to the Black Sea in the South the limit of the advance in that first year of the war proved to be the city of rostoff on Dawn the forces of army group South with their supply lines massively overstretched and the troops exhausted could at present do no more for adol Hitler it was not enough for the furer during the bitter winter of 1941 Fierce Russian counterattacks began to push the German forces backwards runed for the first time in the campaign asked for permission to withdraw Hitler refused and rad resigned but it made no difference on the ground the withdrawal from rostoff had to be carried out as a matter of military necessity the situation was just too difficult and the German forces withdrew in good order 40 Mi west of rostov it was the first Retreat of the war in the [Music] s [Music]
