History 06/02/20 Why Hitler did not expect the red Army had so many tanks
In the Soviet textbooks usually wrote that the biggest mistake Hitler the decision to attack the Soviet Union was the underestimation of the spirit of the Soviet people, the advantages of the socialist system, the leadership of the Communist party. Concerning the underestimation of the ability of our nation to wage war to a victorious end this debate is hardly possible, bad that it tried to conquer Russia, realize it after the defeat. The rest of the category is purely political. Consider the errors of the leaders of Germany, which led to the defeat in the war.
in September 1941, Hitler says that if he knew sooner about the number of tanks in the red Army, he would not be attacked.
If you examine the German planning documents of the war with the Soviet Union, it is surprising complete lack of awareness of the Wehrmacht on the status of the Soviet armed forces. German intelligence failed to give information on two fundamentally important points: the composition of the armed forces, and for possible mobilization potential.
In the General staff of the Wehrmacht believed that the Red Army had by the summer of 1941, 150 infantry divisions, 36 brigades, mechanized units, and 32 cavalry divisions. A fifth of all forces will be on the South and East and cannot be used against the Wehrmacht. The Germans believed that the Red Army put up to five thousand combat aircraft, and assumed that the red army has nearly ten thousand tanks.
Here will be fitting one of the quotes of Churchill, where he says that he is ready to become a Communist to have 10 thousand tanks. In 1941, nobody believed that there is an army having a number of tanks. In the red Army on 1 June 1941 there were 25 482 5260 tanks and armored vehicles. Aircraft in the red Army, and naval aviation was 18 914 units. And only in the Western part of the country was focusedabout 13 924 tanks, armored cars 2015, 8974 combat aircraft.
fact, confirming the poor performance of the German intelligence, is the mention of a red Army three dozen mechanized brigades and the mechanized corps consisting of two mechanized and one rifle-machine gun brigade. Whereas in 1941 no teams were not, and had 29 mechanized corps, each of which consisted of two Panzer and a motorized division, and even a motorcycle regiment, and the Germans didn’t even know existed. All in all, the red army was the beginning of the war 303 divisions: 177 infantry, 2 mechanized infantry divisions, 19 infantry, 9 cavalry, 4 gornobalykleisky, 31 motorized and Panzer 61.
the Germans did not know about the existence of seven Soviet armies of the Second echelon, who in June was nominated to the border. And when, in full accordance with the plans, the troops of the Western front was defeated and opened the way to Moscow, the Wehrmacht had to face with the troops of the Second echelon. To which more and joined the army, created from divisions of the NKVD, and later joined the militia.
perhaps the biggest error was underestimating the mobilization capacity of the Soviet Union. In February 1941, in the report of the notorious General Paulus indicated that the Red Army will be able to put in the first months of the war additional 30-40 reserve divisions, and within six months to form before hundreds. The leadership of the Wehrmacht doubted that the Soviet Union had enough weapons to create new connections.
However, after the summer of 1941 was defeated by Soviet troops in Belarus and the Baltic States, Ukraine and Smolensk in the Soviet Union, a new division was formed by dozens. First, was undervalued opportunities military industry. Secondly, there were the Germans unaccounted internal reserves. According to the note of people’s Commissar of Defense “On mobilisation deployment of the red army” on February 12, 1941, in reserve, there were about two million rifles, twenty thousand guns, fifteen thousands of mortar shells, five thousand 76 mm field and mountain guns and a thousand heavy guns. And that was just the regular weapons. And there was an old and foreign weapons. The literature often mentions that during the fighting near Moscow there was a shortage of artillery shells. As artillery ammunition enough, then it was just poor organization of supply, but not only. Then dozens of newly formed divisions received non-standard weapons. They were German, English, Czech, French guns, rifles, machine guns. For example, the well-known “Panfilov” division had 75-millimetre French guns. In the warehouses there were hundreds of them, but ammunition was very little.
the hopes of the Wehrmacht to defeat the Red Army in the border battles and not have a serious resistance is not justified. Is best evidenced by data from the Handbook “the Combat composition of the Soviet army 1941-1945.”. Despite huge losses when the boilers got the whole army on 1 January 1942, the red army was 275 of infantry and cavalry divisions 48, 77 48 infantry and armored brigades. A year was only 367 infantry divisions, and a year later they became 438. Ended the war, the Red Army, with a build 455 infantry divisions and 33 armored and mechanized corps. Those who planned the attack on the USSR in early 1941, it never could.
Cyril Shishkin
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© Russian Seven
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