Dnieper–Carpathian offensive
The Dnieper–Carpathian offensive (Russian: Днепровско-Карпатская операция, romanized: Dneprovsko-Karpatskaya operatsiya), also known in Soviet historical sources as the Liberation of Right-bank Ukraine (Russian: Освобождение Правобережной Украины, romanized: Osvobozhdeniye Pravoberezhnoy Ukrainy), was a strategic offensive executed by the Soviet 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Ukrainian Fronts, along with the 2nd Belorussian Front, against the German Army Group South, Army Group A and elements of Army Group Center, and fought from late December 1943 to early May 1944.[27][28] The battles in right-bank Ukraine and in the Crimea were the most important event of the 1944 winter-spring campaign on the Eastern Front.[29]
Consisting of a whole series of closely linked operations, the goal of this offensive was to split the Wehrmacht's Army Group South and to clear the German-Romanian-Hungarian forces from most of the Ukrainian and Moldavian territories, which were occupied by Axis forces. It was one of the biggest offensives of World War II, stretching over a 1,200 km (745 mi) front, to a 450 km depth (280 mi) and involving almost 3,500,000 troops from both sides.[30]
In the course of the operation, 20 Wehrmacht divisions were either destroyed, disbanded or required major rebuilding, while another 60 divisions were reduced to 50% of their establishment strength.[31][32] Even worse were equipment losses, with thousands of precious tanks, assault guns, artillery and trucks being lost, principally through their abandonment in the spring mud.[33] According to German General Kurt von Tippelskirch, this was the biggest Wehrmacht defeat since Stalingrad.[29]
As a result of this strategic offensive, Wehrmacht's Army Group South was split into two parts, north and south of the Carpathian Mountains. The northern portion was pushed back into western Galicia, while the southern portion was pushed back into Romania. The northern portion was renamed to Army Group North Ukraine, while the southern portion to Army Group South Ukraine, which was effective from 5 April 1944, although very little of Ukraine remained in German hands. It was during this offensive that the Red Army reached the June 1941 borders of the USSR, recapturing the territory seized during the 1939 Soviet invasion of Poland.[34]
Because of the Wehrmacht defeat, the commander of Army Group South Erich von Manstein and the commander of Army Group A Ewald von Kleist were dismissed by Hitler and replaced by Walther Model and Ferdinand Schörner respectively. This offensive marked the end of Manstein's career in the Wehrmacht.
In order to save its southern sector from complete collapse, the German high command was forced to transfer 8 divisions in January- February[35] and another 26 German divisions as reinforcements[36] between March- May from across France, Germany, Denmark, Poland, Balkans, Army Group Centre and Army Group North to the crumbling front of Army Group South. This amounted to a total of 34 divisions,[29] [37] and at least 1,200 tanks, assault guns, and self-propelled anti-tank guns.[38][39][40][41]
As a result, the Soviet Dnieper–Carpathian offensive played a key role in influencing the future successes of the western Allies' Normandy landings and the Soviet Operation Bagration, as German forces stationed in France and belonging to Army Group Centre were critically weakened by the transfers.[42] During the creation of the Kamenets-Podolsky pocket, the German forces stationed in France were deprived of 45,827 troops[43] and 363 tanks, assault guns, and self-propelled anti-tank guns on 6 June 1944.[44] Meanwhile, Army Group Center was deprived of a total of 125,380 troops[45] and 552 tanks, assault guns, and self-propelled anti-tank guns on 22 June 1944.[46]
In addition to the arrival of a large number of German reinforcements were those of Wehrmacht's Axis allies. As the Red Army approached the borders of Hungary and Romania, both countries mobilized their full resources and committed a combined total of 25 fresh divisions.[37]
The Soviet success during this operation led the German High Command to conclude that the southern sector of the Eastern Front would be the area where the main Soviet summer offensive of 1944 would take place.[47] For this reason, the German forces in the south, especially the crucial panzer divisions, received priority in reinforcements. The weakening of Army Group Centre during the Polesskoe offensive and German anticipation that the southern sector of the Eastern Front would be the place of the main Soviet summer offensive of 1944, had catastrophic consequences for the Germans during Operation Bagration.[48]
This was the only offensive in which all six elite Soviet tank armies participated at the same time. Similarly, out of 30 panzer and panzer-grenadier divisions available to the Germans in late 1943, 22 were stationed in Ukraine.[49]
Background[edit]
During the massive Battle of the Dnieper in autumn 1943, which secured the Left-bank or eastern Ukraine and cut off the German 17th Army in the Crimea, several Soviet bridgeheads were established across the right bank of the Dnieper River, which was declared to be "East Wall" by the Germans. These bridgeheads were expanded throughout November and December and became the platforms from which the Dnieper–Carpathian offensive was launched.[50]
One of these bridgeheads centered around Kiev was up to 240 km wide and 120 km deep, and was occupied by the troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front.[51] The other, in the region of Cherkasy, Znamenka, and Dnepropetrovsk, was up to 350 km wide and 30 to 100 km deep, and was occupied by troops of the 2nd and 3rd Ukrainian fronts.
Meanwhile, the troops of the 4th Ukrainian Front reached the lower reaches of the Dnieper in the Kakhovka-Tsyurupinsk sector, and had cut off the German 17th Army stationed in the Crimean peninsula, while also seizing a bridgehead on the southern coast of Sivash.
The troops of the North Caucasus Front (18th and 56th Armies, 4th Air Army) in early November 1943, with the assistance of the Black Sea Fleet and the Azov Flotilla, crossed the Kerch Strait and captured a bridgehead on the Kerch Peninsula.
Forces involved and their plans[edit]
Axis[edit]
After a heavy defeat in the summer-autumn campaign of 1943, the German forces adopted a posture of strategic defense. The main line of the strategic behavior of the German forces on the Soviet-German front was stubborn defense in order to keep the occupied lines.[52] Plans for stubborn defense on the Soviet-German front were determined by political and, most importantly, economic factors.
By holding the lines in Ukraine, the German High Command, Hitler foremost, hoped to prevent the German allies, namely Romania, Hungary and Bulgaria, from leaving the Axis military-political bloc. German General Kurt von Tippelskirch wrote the following:[52]
"The front was rapidly approaching the Balkans. We had to fear that if events continued to develop with the same speed, Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary, despite their fear of Bolshevism, would become unreliable allies. The example of Italy was in this sense highly indicative".
The most important reason for holding the right-bank Ukraine was economic. The control of Ukraine allowed the German leadership to export food and important strategic raw materials to Germany. In their calculations for stubborn defense, the Germans attached particular importance to the retention of the right-bank Ukraine and Crimea with their rich food resources, manganese production centers around Nikopol, iron ore production centers around Krivoy Rog and Kerch, as well as the Black Sea basin with first-class seaports.
The German command took into account the important strategic position of the right bank of Ukraine and Crimea, as areas covering the approaches to southern Poland and the Balkans and ensuring control over the central and western parts of the Black Sea.
Erich von Manstein's Army Group South and Ewald von Kleist's Army Group A consisted of 2 panzer and 2 field armies (from north to south):
The territory of the right-bank Ukraine[edit]
The hostilities that unfolded in January–May 1944 in the southern section of the Soviet-German front covered a vast territory from the Dnieper to the Carpathians, from Polesia to the Black Sea, including the right-bank Ukraine, Western Ukraine, Southern Ukraine, Crimea, part of Moldova and Romania.[59]
The terrain in the combat areas was very diverse, ranging from vast wooded swampy areas, endless steppes, to mountains and hills. On the right-bank Ukraine there are many rivers flowing mainly from the northwest to the southeast: for example, the Dnieper, Southern Bug, Ingulets, Dniester, Prut and Siret. Those rivers were serious natural barriers for the advancing Red Army troops that could be used by the Germans to organize defense. In general, the vast territory of the right-bank Ukraine allowed the Soviets to launch broad offensive operations and use all types of troops, including large armored and mechanized formations.
Right-bank Ukraine makes up more than half of the territory of all Ukraine and is of extreme economic importance. There are many large administrative and industrial centers such as Odessa, Dnepropetrovsk, Krivoy Rog, Nikolaev, Kirovograd, and Vinnitsa.
In the areas of the right-bank Ukraine, important industries were developed: iron ore (Krivoy Rog), manganese ore (Nikopol), oil extracting (Drohobych district), shipbuilding (Nikolaev), sugar, textile and other industries.[60] Wheat, sugar beet, maize, rye, and barley are grown on the territory of the right-bank Ukraine. Cattle breeding is well developed in the Polesie regions, while horticulture is well developed in the central and southern regions. Crimea is a horticulture and viticulture district. The iron ore development of the Kerch Peninsula is important. In the Crimea there are 4 large ports: Sevastopol, Feodosiya, Kerch, Yevpatoria.
The capture of the right-bank Ukraine and the Crimea would open the doors for the Red Army troops to Poland, Slovakia, Romania and the Balkans. It would also ensure the domination of the Soviet Black Sea Fleet in the Central and Western parts of the Black Sea.
Weather and its effect on combat operations[edit]
One of the defining features of the Dnieper-Carpathian Offensive is the weather, which had a major impact on combat operations.[61]
Compared to previous winters on the Eastern Front, the winter of 1943-1944 in Ukraine was unusually warm. During the winter of 1941-1942 around Moscow, the temperatures reached as low -40°C.[62] Meanwhile, during the winter 1942-1943 Soviet offensives in southern Russia, after the German 6th Army was destroyed at Stalingrad, the temperatures reached at least as low as -20°C.[63]
In 1944, spring in Ukraine was early. Already in January 1944, melting of the snow began, the wet snow was soon followed by rain. In February, there were frosts and snowstorms in places, but not for long, then it got warmer again by the end of the month. For 10 days in the period from 27 January to 18 February 1944, there were constant rains and wet snowfalls, for 5 days there were no precipitation, while the rest of the days there were snowfalls.[64] Daily mean temperature in Ukraine during this period ranged from -5.5°C to +4.9°C.[65] The rivers became flooded, the roads became very muddy, the terrain outside roads became difficult to pass.
Alexander Werth, a British journalist and wartime correspondent, who was with the 2nd Ukrainian Front at the time, described what he saw in Ukraine in the spring of 1944:
"The Ukrainian mud in spring has to be seen to be believed. The whole country is swamped, and the roads are like rivers of mud, often two feet deep, with deep holes to add to the difficulty of driving any kind of vehicle, except a Russian T- 34 tank. Most of the German tanks could not cope with it."[66]
The flooded rivers became serious obstacle for both sides. For the Germans attempting to break out of Korsun Pocket in February 1944, the last obstacle was the Gniloy Tikich shallow river. Usually, in the hot summer the river was no bigger than a brook that can be easily forded, but in February 1944, after a three-week thaw, the Gniloy Tikich flooded to a width of 20-30 meters.[67] The river was transformed into a fast flowing river, deeper than a person's height. It was a serious obstacle for the encircled German units that had lost their engineering equipment, as there was no bridge or fishing boat on the river. The banks of the Gniloy Tikich became a grave for thousands of German soldiers. Soon Soviet tanks approached the river and their shots began to pierce gaps in the ranks of the Germans who had gathered on its banks.[68] The retreat turned into a disorderly flight. German soldiers threw themselves into the icy water, trying to swim across the river, and many drowned or succumbed to frostbite .
All this sharply reduced the maneuverability of the troops of both sides, especially the Soviet troops that were on continuous advance with supply bases being over 300 km behind. It also limited the use of tanks and artillery, and hampered the supply of food, fuel and ammunition. In connection with the spring thaw, most of the ground airfields were no longer usable, which complicated the deployment and usage of aviation.
However, much to the disappointment of the Germans, the Red Army continued their offensives, becoming the only force in the history of warfare that was able to launch large-scale and successful offensives in the conditions of the spring mud (rasputitsa) and amid flooded rivers.[69]