Chapter Three
On 22 June 1941 Hitler threw 3,200 panzers at Stalin’s enormous tank force of some 20,000 vehicles; in his favour, only about 60 per cent of them were serviceable and most were obsolete, dating from the 1930s. The Germans were able to knock out huge numbers of Soviet tanks because they were poorly deployed and vulnerable, often cooking the crews, despite the Red Army having learned its lesson the hard way fighting the Japanese and Finns in 1939.
Within just three weeks Stalin lost 2 million men, 3,500 tanks and 6,000 aircraft to Hitler’s unrelenting Blitzkrieg. Within five months Hitler had destroyed or captured 17,000 tanks for the loss of 2,700 panzers, and had reached the very gates of Moscow. Soviet losses were such that they could muster only 780 tanks for the defence of Moscow. For a while the decimated Red Army suffered an acute shortage of tanks, guns and aircraft.
Hitler’s titanic assault on Stalin began at 03.15am on Sunday 22 June 1941, heralded by air attacks on 66 frontier airfields; the result was that the Red Air Force was swiftly taken out of the equation. Some 550 bombers and 480 fighters were involved in the raids. Hitler’s strike force also included an additional 300 Stuka dive-bombers. A hail of fragmentation bombs fell on runways, taxiing strips and hangars. Soviet aircraft were either destroyed on the ground or shot out of the air as they rose to meet the Luftwaffe. They lost 1,200 aircraft by noon.
This left the Red Army at the mercy of the marauding Luftwaffe. Soviet troop concentrations were bombed and strafed as they sought to mass in order to conduct counter-attacks. On the day of the invasion German aircraft bombing Lvov airport also struck the barracks of Vlasov’s 32nd Tank Division.
Hitler’s forces rolled relentlessly across eastern Poland, evicting the Red Army, and into Byelorussia. Army Group North thrust towards Leningrad, Army Group Centre headed for Moscow and Army Group South cut deep into Ukraine. Further south, combined German, Hungarian and Romanian forces drove into the Caucasus, while to the far north the Finns thrust toward Murmansk and down the Karelian Isthmus as part of the ‘Continuation War’. Pre-1939 Soviet gains in both Poland and Finland were soon lost.
General Heinz Guderian’s 2nd Panzer Group’s key armoured formations comprised three panzer corps, which included five panzer divisions. General H. Hoth’s 3rd Panzer Group included two further corps encompassing four panzer divisions. In their path were the Red Army forces of Pavlov’s 3rd, 10th and 4th Armies. His attempts at holding the Germans at bay proved futile as the 6th and 11th Mechanised and 6th Cavalry Corps’ counter-attacks were crushed and Minsk was encircled. Armoured units trapped in the Minsk pocket included the 20th Mechanised Corps, the 4th and 7th Tank Divisions and the 8th Tank Brigade. Stalin and his generals became obsessed with launching rushed and ill-conceived counter-attacks and rapidly threw away their mechanised corps.
In the south on 22 June General M.P. Kirponos tried to get his harassed 15th and 22nd Mechanised Corps to counter the Germans’ flanks. Only a weak element of the 15th’s 10th Tank Division was committed, but to little effect, and the panzers penetrated 24 miles to Berestechko. Likewise the 22nd’s 215th Motorised and 19th Tank Divisions were unable to prevent the panzers reaching Lutsk. When mustered, the 15th’s 10th and 37th Tank Divisions were unable to stop the panzers pushing on another 18 miles.
Likewise Rokossovsky’s 9th and General N.V. Feklenko’s 19th Mechanised Corps were ordered to counter-attack north of Dubno, while to the south I.I. Karpezo’s 15th and D.I. Riabyshev’s 8th Mechanised Corps were also to attack. Unfortunately Zhukov and Kirponos’ orders led to Vlasov’s 4th Mechanised Corps being dispersed, preventing its forces from supporting the 8th Mechanised Corps.
The counter-attack was launched on 26 June, resulting in a battle involving over 2,000 tanks. During the fighting the 8th Mechanised Corps was surrounded and the 15th made little headway. In the north the 19th Corps ran into two panzer divisions and was driven back to Rovno. Rokossovsky conducted his attack on the 27th, only to suffer heavy losses, and was ordered back. While it was overall a failure, this Soviet counter-offensive delayed Hitler for a week and convinced him that he needed to secure Ukraine, which would have ramifications for Army Group Centre’s drive on Moscow.
In Byelorussia on 28 June Minsk fell to Army Group Centre; with the liquidation of the Minsk pocket the Germans claimed to have destroyed or captured 4,799 tanks and 9,427 guns and to have taken 341,000 prisoners. The subsequent seizure of Smolensk yielded similar results, as did the massive encirclements at Vyazma and Bryansk. On 30 June Army Group Centre entered Lvov, the 32nd Tank Division having fled the city and gone back to Kiev. Likewise the rest of Vlasov’s 4th Mechanised Corps was long gone.
Stavka’s other counter-strokes launched the newly arrived 5th and 7th Mechanised Corps at Hoth’s 3rd Panzer Group in Byelorussia on 6 July. In five days of fighting near Senno and Lepel they lost 832 of their 2,000 tanks. This left the panzers free to press on towards Smolensk. In a desperate move to restore the situation along the Dnepr Zhukov instructed Timoshenko’s Western Front to conduct counter-attacks along its full length. Also on 6 July Timoshenko threw the 6th and 7th Mechanised Corps, with a total of 700 tanks, at the flanks of the German XXXIX Panzer Corps north of Orsha. Lacking air cover, they headed for Senno and came across the 17th and 18th Panzer Divisions. A week later a German breakthrough heralded the encirclement of Smolensk and 300,000 Soviet troops were cut off between the city and Orsha.
During the first 18 days of the war the Soviet Western Front, defending eastern Poland and western Byelorussia, lost more than 417,000 men killed, wounded or missing, as well as 9,427 guns and mortars, more than 4,700 tanks, and 1,797 aircraft.
Crucially, at the end of July 1941 Hitler decided that Army Group Centre would go over to the defensive, and the diversion of part of its forces to support Army Group South’s capture of Kiev from the Soviet South Western Front fatally delayed the drive on Moscow. However, at Kiev two-thirds of a million Soviet troops were caught in a pocket the size of Belgium, and for the first and last time the German Army outnumbered the Red Army. All eyes then turned back to Army Group Centre.
Panzer IIIs roll over the border. On 22 June 1941 Hitler’s Operation Barbarossa swept through Soviet defences in eastern Poland and into western Russia. He struck Stalin’s Red Army on three strategic axes, with Army Group North aiming for Leningrad, Army Group Centre striking for Moscow and Army Group South targeting Kiev. The bulk of the Red Army’s armoured forces lay in the path of Army Group Centre. (Scott Pick Collection)
Columns of Panzer IIIs and Panzer IIs pushed through Russian villages in the face of little or no opposition. There were seventeen panzer divisions on the border; six had been issued with PzKpfw 38(t) and eleven had PzKpfw IIII. Despite repeated warnings from Stalin’s senior generals, Hitler’s Blitzkrieg caught the Red Army completely off guard. (Scott Pick Collection)
Czech designed and built LT-38 light tanks advancing into Russia; they equipped the 7th, 8th, 12th, 19th, 20th and 22nd Panzer Divisions for Barbarossa. (Author’s Collection/Scott Pick Collection)
Behind the panzers came the support weapons and infantry. This sequence of photos shows a convoy of captured French Chenillette tracked infantry carriers towing Pak 35/36 anti-tank guns. The two-man crew were only protected by 7mm of armour, their heads enclosed by the distinctive steel domes. After the fall of France Hitler gained 6,000 carriers, many of which were re-employed as the Infanterie Schlepper UE 630(f). (Author’s Collection)
The harsh reality of the situation in the summer of 1941 was that the masses of BT-5/7 and T-26 were obsolete and could simply not cope with the Panzer Mk III and IV medium tanks or the Sturmgeschütz III assault gun, while the T-28 and heavy tanks like the T-35 and KV-1 were easily outmanoeuvred. This BT-7 seems to have reversed into a river in a desperate bid to escape its attackers, perhaps betraying the inexperience of the crew. (Scott Pick Collection)
German troops examine the spoils of war – abandoned BT-7s. Although the Red Army was deployed in depth, it was poorly sited and the Germans swiftly cut through its defences, leaving a trail of death and destruction. In the way of the 2nd and 3rd Panzer Groups lay the Soviet 3rd, 10th and 4th Armies; Hitler’s panzers easily brushed aside the 10th, 19th and 37th Tank Divisions. (Scott Pick Collection)
The interior of this T-26 provides some fascination for the victors, who may be trying to coax out a very frightened Soviet tanker. (Scott Pick Collection)
Some 1,125 T-34 tanks had been produced by June 1941. Although it eventually proved to be the world’s best tank, initially there were too few of them and they were often driven by incompetent crews. Early T-34s had transmission problems and during the invasion more broke down than were knocked out. This Model 1941 shows absolutely no battle damage. (Scott Pick Collection)
The T-34 first went into action at Grodno, Byelorussia, with the 6th Mechanised Corps on the day of the invasion. Its appearance caught the panzers by surprise, but there were not enough of them, nor did the crews know how to use them properly, as this pile-up demonstrates. Artillery or dive-bombers account for the mess, but the tanks should never have been so close together. (Scott Pick Collection)
Similarly, the KV-1 heavy tank had gone into production in February 1940 at Leningrad’s Kirov works and was only available in limited numbers. This one came to rest in a massive crater. The discoloration on the front indicates that it caught fire. (Scott Pick Collection)
On the road to Moscow counter-attacks by the 6th and 11th Mechanised Corps and the 6th Cavalry Corps were smashed and the Byelorussian capital Minsk was duly encircled. This T-26 threw a track and had its hull pierced twice; its crew didn’t stand a chance. A charred tanker lies half out the turret. (Scott Pick Collection)
German infantry plod past what looks to be a Model 1941 T-34. With the capture of Minsk on 28 June 1941 and the annihilation of Soviet forces in the area, the Germans claimed to have taken or knocked out almost 4,800 tanks. (Scott Pick Collection)
But the panzers did not have it all their own way, as this burnt-out Mk III testifies. The Red Army did all it could to throw back the Nazi Blitzkrieg but it was not enough. (Author’s Collection)
Soviet counter-attacks on 26 June 1941 led to a huge tank battle involving some 2,000 tanks. They suffered appalling losses, such as this T-26; the infantry on the hull found no shelter from death. (Scott Pick Collection)
German soldiers examine a disabled SdKfz 232 armoured car (issued to the Panzerspäwagon squadrons), another victim of determined but ultimately futile Red Army resistance. (Author’s Collection)
German troops marvel at the sheer size of this abandoned T-35. It may have looked impressive but with just 30mm of armour it was vulnerable to most anti-tank guns. In 1941T-35s served with the 67th and 68th Tank Regiments, 34th Tank Division, attached to the 8th Mechanised Corps in the Kiev Special Military District. (Scott Pick Collection)
The majority of the T-35 heavy tanks were lost to mechanical failure and abandoned while serving with the 34th Tank Division during the summer battles in Ukraine. This particular example, after coming off the road, became stranded in the adjacent flooded field. It shows no visible signs of damage. (Scott Pick Collection)
The Soviet 30th Army lost almost half of its armour during early July trying unsuccessfully to fend off the 3rd Panzer Group. This burnt-out BA-10 is testimony to the fierce battles in which Stalin threw everything he had at Hitler’s Blitzkrieg. (Scott Pick Collection)
Marshal Timoshenko, in a futile attempt to retake the Dnepr, launched 700 tanks at the Germans north of Orsha. This blood-splattered T-26 became the crews’ tomb; once a tank was immobilised, escape was almost impossible. (Scott Pick Collection)
This grainy but atmospheric photo shows a smoking T-28 lying in a roadside ditch. At almost 10 years old, these medium tanks did not last long in action, with many breaking down, though some remained to help defend Leningrad and Moscow during the winter. (Author’s Collection)
German soldiers with a KV-1. Ultimately Hitler’s victory was due to his superior use of armour, speed, morale and better equipment. General Pavlov, Commander Western Army Group, who contributed to the Red Army’s disastrous performance, was shot for his trouble. (Scott Pick Collection)
A German corporal and his mate tuck into their lunch in front of their Opel Blitz 3-ton lorry. Keeping the panzers resupplied over such vast distances was a full-time undertaking. Over 70,000 of these lorries were supplied to the Wehrmacht between 1937 and 1944. (Author’s Collection)
A column of Opel Blitz lorries struggling through the mud. Russia’s steppes turned into muddy quagmires during autumn and spring but were a frozen wasteland in winter. In Russia the appalling roads forced the Germans to convert conventional wheeled trucks into semi-tracks known as Maultiers. (Author’s Collection)