Code name for the Battle of Stalingrad. Description of the Battle of Stalingrad

Samsonov's painting “Battle of Stalingrad. Connecting Fronts”

The Battle of Stalingrad played a decisive role in the entire Great Patriotic War. And it is not just words. Stalingrad was an important strategic point: it housed Soviet factories that produced military weapons, and one of the country's trade routes passed through the city. Also, having conquered Stalingrad, the Germans would have moved further into the country and captured the USSR's large mineral sources. It was also important for the people that the city was named after their leader, Joseph Stalin. The people understood the significance of this battle and bravely defended the city.

On July 17, 1942, the battle for Stalingrad began a few kilometers from the city. The Soviet troops fought bravely, but had to retreat: the enemy had a numerical superiority in equipment and people.

On August 23, the Germans broke into Stalingrad. People now fought literally for every piece of land, for every house.

The Germans captured one territory of the city after another. By November, almost the entire city was in their hands: the Russians only had a small plot of land along the banks of the Volga. Hitler already considered himself victorious and trumpeted it to the whole world.

However, at the last moment, the Soviet troops were able to rehabilitate themselves. Since September, the General Staff has been developing Operation Uranus. Its essence was to strike the flanks of the German army, which consisted of poorly armed and not particularly inspired Hungarians, Italians and Romanians.

On November 19, implementation of this plan began. Soviet troops defeated Germany's allies, and on November 23 they surrounded the German army (330 thousand people).

Now the Germans were forced to defend themselves. Hitler rejected the option of retreat; the German army under the command of Paulus continued the battle until February 2.

On February 2, the remnants of the defending army surrendered. Paulus himself was captured.
Interesting fact: during the war, Hitler proposed an exchange of prisoners, Stalin's son for Paulus. To this Stalin replied: “I don’t exchange field marshals for privates” - and refused the exchange.

The USSR won the Battle of Stalingrad. And it became the turning point of the war. This was the first major victory of the Soviet troops, and the first major defeat of the Germans in this war. The German plan to quickly capture the country was destroyed. However, both Germany and the USSR lost a lot of people... Russians a little more than 1 million, Germans - 840 thousand. It was a terribly bloody battle for both. With only one difference: the Russians pursued higher goals, they defended their Motherland, their families and homes. The Germans just decided to take over the world and exterminate the Jews.

The victory of Soviet troops over the Nazi troops at Stalingrad is one of the most glorious pages in the annals of the Great Patriotic War. For 200 days and nights - from July 17, 1942 to February 2, 1943 - the Battle of Stalingrad continued with continuously increasing tension on both sides. During the first four months there were stubborn defensive battles, first in the big bend of the Don, and then on the approaches to Stalingrad and in the city itself. During this period, Soviet troops exhausted the Nazi group that was rushing to the Volga and forced it to go on the defensive. In the next two and a half months, the Red Army, launching a counteroffensive, defeated enemy troops north-west and south of Stalingrad, encircled and liquidated a 300,000-strong group of fascist German troops.

The Battle of Stalingrad is the decisive battle of the entire Second World War, in which Soviet troops won their largest victory. This battle marked the beginning of a radical change in the course of the Great Patriotic War and the Second World War as a whole. The victorious offensive of the Nazi troops ended and their expulsion from the territory of the Soviet Union began.

The Battle of Stalingrad surpassed all battles in world history at that time in terms of the duration and ferocity of the fighting, the number of people and military equipment involved. It unfolded over a vast territory of 100 thousand square kilometers. At certain stages, over 2 million people, up to 2 thousand tanks, more than 2 thousand aircraft, and up to 26 thousand guns took part in it on both sides. The results of this battle also surpassed all previous ones. At Stalingrad, Soviet troops defeated five armies: two German, two Romanian and one Italian. The Nazi troops lost more than 800 thousand soldiers and officers killed, wounded, and captured, as well as a large amount of military equipment, weapons and equipment.

The Battle of Stalingrad is usually divided into two inextricably linked periods: defensive (from July 17 to November 18, 1942) and offensive (from November 19, 1942 to February 2, 1943).

At the same time, due to the fact that the Battle of Stalingrad is a whole complex of defensive and offensive operations, its periods, in turn, must be considered in stages, each of which is either one completed or even several interrelated operations.

For the courage and heroism shown in the Battle of Stalingrad, 32 formations and units were given the honorary names “Stalingrad”, 5 - “Don”. 55 formations and units were awarded orders. 183 units, formations and formations were converted into guards. More than one hundred and twenty soldiers were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, about 760 thousand participants in the battle were awarded the medal “For the Defense of Stalingrad.” On the 20th anniversary of the victory of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War, the hero city of Volgograd was awarded the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal.

There is a saying in Russian: “I disappeared like a Swede near Poltava.” In 1943, it was replaced by an analogue: “disappeared, like a German at Stalingrad.” The victory of Russian weapons in the Battle of Stalingrad on the Volga clearly turned the tide of the Second World War.

Reasons (oil and symbolism)

The area between the Volga and Don rivers in the summer of 1942 became the target of the main attack of the Nazis. There were several different reasons for this.

1. By that time, the original plan for the war with the USSR had already been completely disrupted and was no longer suitable for action. It was necessary to change the “edge of attack”, choosing new promising strategic directions.
2. The generals offered the Fuhrer a new blow to Moscow, but he refused. One can understand him - hopes for a “blitzkrieg” were finally buried near Moscow. Hitler motivated his position by the “obviousness” of the Moscow direction.
3. The attack on Stalingrad also had real goals - the Volga and Don were convenient transport arteries, and through them there were routes to the oil of the Caucasus and the Caspian Sea, as well as to the Urals, which Hitler considered as the main frontier of German aspirations in this war.
4. There were also symbolic goals. The Volga is one of the symbols of Russia. Stalingrad is a city (by the way, representatives of the anti-Hitler coalition stubbornly saw the word “steel” in this name, but not the name of the Soviet leader). The Nazis failed to strike at other symbols - Leningrad did not surrender, the enemy was driven away from Moscow, the Volga remained to solve ideological problems.

The Nazis had reason to expect success. In terms of the number of soldiers (about 300 thousand) before the start of the offensive, they were significantly inferior to the defenders, but they were 1.5-2 times superior to them in aviation, tanks and other equipment.

Stages of the battle

For the Red Army, the Battle of Stalingrad was divided into 2 main stages: defensive and offensive.

The first of them lasted from July 17 to November 18, 1942. During this period, battles took place on the distant and near approaches to Stalingrad, as well as in the city itself. It was virtually wiped off the face of the earth (first by bombing, then by street fighting), but never came completely under enemy rule.

The offensive period lasted from November 19, 1942 to February 2, 1943. The essence of the offensive actions was to create a huge “cauldron” for the German, Italian, Croatian, Slovak and Romanian units concentrated near Stalingrad, followed by their defeat by compressing the encirclement. The first stage (the actual creation of the “cauldron”) was called Operation Uranus. On November 23, the encirclement closed. But the surrounded group was too strong and it was impossible to defeat it immediately.

In December, Field Marshal Manstein attempted to break through the blockade ring near Kotelnikov and come to the aid of those surrounded, but his breakthrough was stopped. On January 10, 1943, the Red Army launched Operation Ring - the destruction of the encircled German group. On January 31, Hitler promoted von Paulus, the commander of the German formations at Stalingrad and who found himself in the “cauldron,” to field marshal. In his congratulatory letter, the Fuhrer transparently indicated that not a single German field marshal had ever surrendered. On February 2, von Paulus became the first, surrendering along with his entire army.

Results and significance (radical fracture)

The Battle of Stalingrad in Soviet historiography is called the “moment of a radical turning point” in the course of the war, and this is true. At the same time, the course of not only the Great Patriotic War, but also the Second World War was turned around. As a result of the battle, Germany

• lost 1.5 million people, more than 100 thousand only as prisoners;
• lost the trust of its allies (Italy, Romania, Slovakia thought about leaving the war and stopped sending conscripts to the front);
• suffered colossal material losses (on the scale of 2-6 months of production);
• lost hope of Japan's entry into the war in Siberia.

The USSR also suffered huge losses (up to 1.3 million people), but did not allow the enemy into strategically important areas of the country, destroyed a huge number of experienced soldiers, deprived the enemy of offensive potential and finally seized the strategic initiative from him.

Steel City

It turned out that all the symbolism in the battle went to the USSR. Destroyed Stalingrad became the most famous city in the world. The entire Anti-Hitler coalition was proud of the residents and defenders of the “steel city” and tried to help them. In the USSR, any schoolchild knew the names of the heroes of Stalingrad: sergeant Yakov Pavlov, signalman Matvey Putilov, nurse Marionella (Guli) Koroleva. The son of the leader of the Spanish Republic Dolores Ibarruri, Captain Ruben Ibarruri, and the legendary Tatar pilot Amet Khan Sultan received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union for Stalingrad. Such outstanding Soviet military leaders as V.I. Chuikov, N.F. distinguished themselves in planning the battle. Vatutin, F.I. Tolbukhin. After Stalingrad, “parades of prisoners” became traditional.

And Field Marshal von Paulus then lived in the USSR for quite a long time, taught at higher military educational institutions and wrote memoirs. In them, he very highly appreciated the feat of those who defeated him at Stalingrad.

On November 19, 1942, the Red Army's counteroffensive near Stalingrad began (Operation Uranus). The Battle of Stalingrad is one of the greatest battles in the Great Patriotic War and the Second World War. The military chronicle of Russia has a huge number of examples of courage and heroism, the valor of soldiers on the battlefield and the strategic skill of Russian commanders. But even in their example, the Battle of Stalingrad stands out.

For two hundred days and nights on the banks of the great rivers Don and Volga, and then at the walls of the city on the Volga and directly in Stalingrad itself, this fierce battle continued. The battle took place over a vast area of ​​about 100 thousand square meters. km with a front length of 400 - 850 km. More than 2.1 million soldiers took part in this titanic battle on both sides at different stages of the fighting. In terms of significance, scale and ferocity of hostilities, the Battle of Stalingrad surpassed all the world battles that preceded it.

This battle includes two stages. The first stage was the Stalingrad strategic defensive operation, it lasted from July 17, 1942 to November 18, 1942. At this stage, in turn, we can distinguish: defensive operations on the distant approaches to Stalingrad from July 17 to September 12, 1942 and the defense of the city itself from September 13 to November 18, 1942. There were no long pauses or truces in the battles for the city; battles and skirmishes went on continuously. For the German army, Stalingrad became a kind of “graveyard” for their hopes and aspirations. The city crushed thousands of enemy soldiers and officers. The Germans themselves called the city “hell on earth,” “Red Verdun,” and noted that the Russians were fighting with unprecedented ferocity, fighting to the last man. On the eve of the Soviet counteroffensive, German troops launched the 4th assault on Stalingrad, or rather its ruins. On November 11, 2 tank and 5 infantry divisions were thrown into battle against the 62nd Soviet Army (by this time it consisted of 47 thousand soldiers, about 800 guns and mortars and 19 tanks). By this point, the Soviet army was already divided into three parts. A hail of fire fell on the Russian positions, they were flattened by enemy aircraft, and it seemed as if there was nothing alive there anymore. However, when the German chains went on the attack, Russian riflemen began to mow them down.

By mid-November, the German offensive had run out of steam in all major directions. The enemy was forced to decide to go on the defensive. This completed the defensive part of the Battle of Stalingrad. The Red Army troops solved the main problem by stopping the powerful advance of the Nazis in the Stalingrad direction, creating the preconditions for a retaliatory strike by the Red Army. During the defense of Stalingrad, the enemy suffered heavy losses. The German armed forces lost about 700 thousand people killed and wounded, about 1 thousand tanks and assault guns, 2 thousand guns and mortars, more than 1.4 thousand combat and transport aircraft. Instead of maneuver warfare and rapid advancement, the main enemy forces were drawn into bloody and furious urban battles. The German command's plan for the summer of 1942 was thwarted. On October 14, 1942, the German command decided to transfer the army to strategic defense along the entire Eastern Front. The troops were given the task of holding the front line; offensive operations were planned to continue only in 1943.

It must be said that the Soviet troops also suffered huge losses in personnel and equipment at this time: 644 thousand people (irrecoverable - 324 thousand people, sanitary - 320 thousand people, over 12 thousand guns and mortars, approximately 1400 tanks, more than 2 thousand aircraft.

The second period of the Battle of the Volga is the Stalingrad strategic offensive operation (November 19, 1942 - February 2, 1943). The Headquarters of the Supreme High Command and the General Staff in September-November 1942 developed a plan for the strategic counter-offensive of Soviet troops near Stalingrad. The development of the plan was led by G.K. Zhukov and A.M. Vasilevsky. On November 13, the plan, codenamed "Uranus", was approved by Headquarters under the chairmanship of Joseph Stalin. The Southwestern Front under the command of Nikolai Vatutin received the task of delivering deep blows to enemy forces from bridgeheads on the right bank of the Don from the Serafimovich and Kletskaya areas. The group of the Stalingrad Front under the command of Andrei Eremenko advanced from the Sarpinsky Lakes region. The offensive groups of both fronts were supposed to meet in the Kalach area and take the main enemy forces near Stalingrad into an encirclement ring. At the same time, the troops of these fronts created a ring of external encirclement in order to prevent the Wehrmacht from releasing the Stalingrad group with attacks from the outside. The Don Front, under the leadership of Konstantin Rokossovsky, launched two auxiliary strikes: the first from the Kletskaya area to the southeast, the second from the Kachalinsky area along the left bank of the Don to the south. In the areas of the main attacks, due to the weakening of secondary areas, a 2-2.5-fold superiority in people and a 4-5-fold superiority in artillery and tanks was created. Due to the strictest secrecy of the development of the plan and the secrecy of the concentration of troops, strategic surprise of the counteroffensive was ensured. During defensive battles, the Headquarters was able to create a significant reserve that could be thrown on the offensive. The number of troops in the Stalingrad direction was increased to 1.1 million people, about 15.5 thousand guns and mortars, 1.5 thousand tanks and self-propelled guns, 1.3 thousand aircraft. True, the weakness of this powerful group of Soviet troops was that about 60% of the troops were young recruits who had no combat experience.

The Red Army was opposed by the German 6th Field Army (Friedrich Paulus) and 4th Panzer Army (Herman Hoth), the Romanian 3rd and 4th Armies of Army Group B (commander Maximilian von Weichs), which numbered more than 1 million. soldiers, about 10.3 thousand guns and mortars, 675 tanks and assault guns, more than 1.2 thousand combat aircraft. The most combat-ready German units were concentrated directly in the Stalingrad area, participating in the assault on the city. The flanks of the group were covered by Romanian and Italian divisions, which were weaker in terms of morale and technical equipment. As a result of the concentration of the main forces and means of the army group directly in the Stalingrad area, the defensive line on the flanks did not have sufficient depth and reserves. The Soviet counter-offensive in the Stalingrad area would be a complete surprise for the Germans; the German command was confident that all the main forces of the Red Army were tied up in heavy fighting, were bleeding and did not have the strength and material means for such a large-scale attack.

On November 19, 1942, after a powerful 80-minute artillery preparation, the troops of the Southwestern and Don Fronts went on the attack. By the end of the day, the Southwestern Front units had advanced 25–35 km; they had broken the defenses of the 3rd Romanian Army in two areas: southwest of Serafimovich and in the Kletskaya area. In fact, the 3rd Romanian was defeated, and its remnants were covered from the flanks. On the Don Front the situation was more difficult: Batov’s advancing 65th Army met fierce enemy resistance, by the end of the day it had advanced only 3-5 km and was unable to break through even the enemy’s first line of defense.

On November 20, after artillery preparation, units of the Stalingrad Front went on the attack. They broke through the defenses of the 4th Romanian Army and by the end of the day they had covered 20-30 km. The German command received news of the advance of Soviet troops and the breakthrough of the front line on both flanks, but there were virtually no large reserves in Army Group B. By November 21, the Romanian armies were completely defeated, and the tank corps of the Southwestern Front were uncontrollably rushing towards Kalach. On November 22, tankers occupied Kalach. Units of the Stalingrad Front were moving towards the mobile formations of the Southwestern Front. On November 23, formations of the 26th Tank Corps of the Southwestern Front quickly reached the Sovetsky farm and linked up with units of the 4th Mechanized Corps of the Northern Fleet. The 6th field and the main forces of the 4th Tank Army were encircled: 22 divisions and 160 separate units with a total number of about 300 thousand soldiers and officers. The Germans had never experienced such a defeat during World War II. On the same day, in the area of ​​​​the village of Raspopinskaya, the enemy group capitulated - more than 27 thousand Romanian soldiers and officers surrendered. It was a real military disaster. The Germans were stunned, confused, they did not even think that such a catastrophe was possible.

On November 30, the operation of Soviet troops to encircle and block the German group in Stalingrad was generally completed. The Red Army created two encirclement rings - external and internal. The total length of the outer ring of the encirclement was about 450 km. However, Soviet troops were unable to immediately cut through the enemy group in order to complete its liquidation. One of the main reasons for this was the underestimation of the size of the encircled Stalingrad Wehrmacht group - it was assumed that it numbered 80-90 thousand people. In addition, the German command, by reducing the front line, were able to consolidate their battle formations, using the already existing positions of the Red Army for defense (their Soviet troops occupied in the summer of 1942).

After the failure of the attempt to release the Stalingrad group by Army Group Don under the command of Manstein - December 12-23, 1942, the encircled German troops were doomed. The organized “air bridge” could not solve the problem of supplying the encircled troops with food, fuel, ammunition, medicine and other means. Hunger, cold and disease decimated Paulus's soldiers. From January 10 to February 2, 1943, the Don Front conducted the offensive Operation Ring, during which the Stalingrad Wehrmacht group was eliminated. The Germans lost 140 thousand soldiers killed, and about 90 thousand more surrendered. This concluded the Battle of Stalingrad.

Introduction

On April 20, 1942, the battle for Moscow ended. The German army, whose advance seemed unstoppable, was not only stopped, but also pushed back 150-300 kilometers from the capital of the USSR. The Nazis suffered heavy losses, and although the Wehrmacht was still very strong, Germany no longer had the opportunity to attack simultaneously on all sectors of the Soviet-German front.

While the spring thaw lasted, the Germans developed a plan for the summer offensive of 1942, codenamed Fall Blau - “Blue Option”. The initial target of the German attack was the oil fields of Grozny and Baku with the possibility of further development of the offensive against Persia. Before the deployment of this offensive, the Germans were going to cut off the Barvenkovsky ledge - a large bridgehead captured by the Red Army on the western bank of the Seversky Donets River.

The Soviet command, in turn, also intended to conduct a summer offensive in the zone of the Bryansk, Southern and Southwestern fronts. Unfortunately, despite the fact that the Red Army was the first to strike and at first managed to push the German troops almost to Kharkov, the Germans managed to turn the situation in their favor and inflict a major defeat on the Soviet troops. On the sector of the Southern and Southwestern fronts, the defense was weakened to the limit, and on June 28, Hermann Hoth's 4th Panzer Army broke through between Kursk and Kharkov. The Germans reached the Don.

At this point, Hitler, by personal order, made a change to the Blue Option, which would later cost Nazi Germany dearly. He divided Army Group South into two parts. Army Group A was to continue the offensive into the Caucasus. Army Group B was to reach the Volga, cut off the strategic communications connecting the European part of the USSR with the Caucasus and Central Asia, and capture Stalingrad. For Hitler, this city was important not only from a practical point of view (as a large industrial center), but also for purely ideological reasons. The capture of the city, which bore the name of the main enemy of the Third Reich, would be the greatest propaganda achievement of the German army.

Balance of forces and the first stage of the battle

Army Group B, which advanced on Stalingrad, included the 6th Army of General Paulus. The army included 270 thousand soldiers and officers, about 2,200 guns and mortars, about 500 tanks. From the air, the 6th Army was supported by the 4th Air Fleet of General Wolfram von Richthofen, numbering about 1,200 aircraft. A little later, towards the end of July, Hermann Hoth's 4th Tank Army was transferred to Army Group B, which on July 1, 1942 included the 5th, 7th and 9th Army and the 46th Motorized housings. The latter included the 2nd SS Panzer Division Das Reich.

The Southwestern Front, renamed Stalingrad on July 12, 1942, consisted of about 160 thousand personnel, 2,200 guns and mortars, and about 400 tanks. Of the 38 divisions that were part of the front, only 18 were fully equipped, while the others had from 300 to 4,000 people. The 8th Air Army, operating along with the front, was also significantly inferior in numbers to von Richthofen's fleet. With these forces, the Stalingrad Front was forced to defend an area more than 500 kilometers wide. A separate problem for the Soviet troops was the flat steppe terrain, where enemy tanks could operate at full strength. Taking into account the low level of anti-tank weapons in front units and formations, this made the tank threat critical.

The German offensive began on July 17, 1942. On this day, the vanguards of the 6th Army of the Wehrmacht entered into battle with units of the 62nd Army on the Chir River and in the area of ​​the Pronin farm. By July 22, the Germans had pushed Soviet troops back almost 70 kilometers, to the main line of defense of Stalingrad. The German command, hoping to take the city on the move, decided to encircle the Red Army units at the villages of Kletskaya and Suvorovskaya, seize the crossings across the Don and develop an attack on Stalingrad without stopping. For this purpose, two strike groups were created, attacking from the north and south. The northern group was formed from units of the 6th Army, the southern group from units of the 4th Tank Army.

The northern group, striking on July 23, broke through the defense front of the 62nd Army and surrounded its two rifle divisions and a tank brigade. By July 26, the advanced units of the Germans reached the Don. The command of the Stalingrad Front organized a counterattack, in which mobile formations of the front reserve took part, as well as the 1st and 4th Tank Armies, which had not yet completed their formation. Tank armies were a new regular structure within the Red Army. It is unclear who exactly put forward the idea of ​​their formation, but in the documents, the head of the Main Armored Directorate Ya. N. Fedorenko was the first to voice this idea to Stalin. In the form in which tank armies were conceived, they did not last long, subsequently undergoing a major restructuring. But the fact that it was near Stalingrad that such a staff unit appeared is a fact. The 1st Tank Army attacked from the Kalach area on July 25, and the 4th from the villages of Trekhostrovskaya and Kachalinskaya on July 27.

Fierce fighting in this area lasted until August 7-8. It was possible to release the encircled units, but it was not possible to defeat the advancing Germans. The development of events was also negatively affected by the fact that the level of training of the personnel of the armies of the Stalingrad Front was low, and a number of errors in the coordination of actions made by the unit commanders.

In the south, Soviet troops managed to stop the Germans at the settlements of Surovikino and Rychkovsky. Nevertheless, the Nazis were able to break through the front of the 64th Army. To eliminate this breakthrough, on July 28, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command ordered, no later than the 30th, the forces of the 64th Army, as well as two infantry divisions and a tank corps, to strike and defeat the enemy in the area of ​​the village of Nizhne-Chirskaya.

Despite the fact that the new units entered the battle on the move and their combat capabilities suffered as a result, by the indicated date the Red Army managed to push back the Germans and even create a threat of their encirclement. Unfortunately, the Nazis managed to bring fresh forces into the battle and provide assistance to the group. After this, the fighting flared up even hotter.

On July 28, 1942, another event occurred that cannot be left behind the scenes. On this day, the famous Order of the People's Commissar of Defense of the USSR No. 227, also known as “Not a step back!” was adopted. He significantly toughened penalties for unauthorized retreat from the battlefield, introduced penal units for offending soldiers and commanders, and also introduced barrage detachments - special units that were engaged in detaining deserters and returning them to duty. This document, for all its harshness, was received quite positively by the troops and actually reduced the number of disciplinary violations in military units.

At the end of July, the 64th Army was nevertheless forced to retreat beyond the Don. German troops captured a number of bridgeheads on the left bank of the river. In the area of ​​the village of Tsymlyanskaya, the Nazis concentrated very serious forces: two infantry, two motorized and one tank division. Headquarters ordered the Stalingrad Front to drive the Germans to the western (right) bank and restore the defense line along the Don, but it was not possible to eliminate the breakthrough. On July 30, the Germans went on the offensive from the village of Tsymlyanskaya and by August 3 had significantly advanced, capturing the Remontnaya station, the station and the city of Kotelnikovo, and the village of Zhutovo. On these same days, the enemy's 6th Romanian Corps reached the Don. In the zone of operation of the 62nd Army, the Germans went on the offensive on August 7 in the direction of Kalach. Soviet troops were forced to retreat to the left bank of the Don. On August 15, the 4th Soviet Tank Army had to do the same, because the Germans were able to break through its front in the center and split the defense in half.

By August 16, the troops of the Stalingrad Front retreated beyond the Don and took up defense on the outer line of the city fortifications. On August 17, the Germans resumed their attack and by the 20th they managed to capture the crossings, as well as a bridgehead in the area of ​​​​the village of Vertyachiy. Attempts to discard or destroy them were unsuccessful. On August 23, the German group, with the support of aviation, broke through the defense front of the 62nd and 4th tank armies and advanced units reached the Volga. On this day, German planes made about 2,000 sorties. Many blocks of the city were in ruins, oil storage facilities were on fire, and about 40 thousand civilians were killed. The enemy broke through to the line Rynok - Orlovka - Gumrak - Peschanka. The fight moved under the walls of Stalingrad.

Fighting in the city

Having forced the Soviet troops to retreat almost to the outskirts of Stalingrad, the enemy threw six German and one Romanian infantry divisions, two tank divisions and one motorized division against the 62nd Army. The number of tanks in this Nazi group was approximately 500. The enemy was supported from the air by at least 1000 aircraft. The threat of capturing the city became tangible. To eliminate it, the Supreme High Command Headquarters transferred two completed armies to the defenders (10 rifle divisions, 2 tank brigades), re-equipped the 1st Guards Army (6 rifle divisions, 2 guards rifle, 2 tank brigades), and also subordinated the 16th to the Stalingrad Front air army.

On September 5 and 18, the troops of the Stalingrad Front (it will be renamed Donskoy on September 30) carried out two major operations, thanks to which they managed to weaken the German pressure on the city, pulling about 8 infantry, two tank and two motorized divisions. It was again impossible to achieve the complete defeat of Hitler’s units. Fierce battles for the internal defensive line continued for a long time.

Urban fighting began on September 13, 1942 and continued until November 19, when the Red Army launched a counteroffensive as part of Operation Uranus. From September 12, the defense of Stalingrad was entrusted to the 62nd Army, which was placed under the command of Lieutenant General V.I. Chuikov. This man, who before the start of the Battle of Stalingrad was considered insufficiently experienced for combat command, created a real hell for the enemy in the city.

On September 13, six infantry, three tank and two motorized German divisions were in the immediate vicinity of the city. Until September 18, there were fierce battles in the central and southern parts of the city. To the south of the railway station, the enemy onslaught was contained, but in the center the Germans drove out the Soviet troops all the way to the Krutoy ravine.

The battles for the station on September 17 were extremely fierce. During the day it changed hands four times. Here the Germans left 8 burned tanks and about a hundred dead. On September 19, the left wing of the Stalingrad Front tried to strike in the direction of the station with a further attack on Gumrak and Gorodishche. The advance failed, but a large enemy group was pinned down by the fighting, which made things easier for the units fighting in the center of Stalingrad. In general, the defense here was so strong that the enemy never managed to reach the Volga.

Realizing that they could not achieve success in the center of the city, the Germans concentrated troops further south to strike in the eastern direction, towards Mamayev Kurgan and the village of Krasny Oktyabr. On September 27, Soviet troops launched a pre-emptive attack, working in small infantry groups armed with light machine guns, petrol bombs and anti-tank rifles. Fierce fighting continued from September 27 to October 4. These were the same Stalingrad city battles, the stories about which chill the blood in the veins of even a person with strong nerves. Here the battles took place not for streets and blocks, sometimes not even for entire houses, but for individual floors and rooms. The guns fired directly at almost point-blank range, using incendiary mixtures and fire from short distances. Hand-to-hand combat has become commonplace, as in the Middle Ages, when edged weapons ruled the battlefield. During a week of continuous fighting, the Germans advanced 400 meters. Even those who were not intended for this had to fight: builders, soldiers of pontoon units. The Nazis gradually began to run out of steam. The same desperate and bloody battles raged near the Barrikady plant, near the village of Orlovka, on the outskirts of the Silikat plant.

At the beginning of October, the territory occupied by the Red Army in Stalingrad was so reduced that it was completely covered by machine gun and artillery fire. The fighting troops were supplied from the opposite bank of the Volga with the help of literally everything that could float: boats, steamships, boats. German aircraft continuously bombed the crossings, making this task even more difficult.

And while the soldiers of the 62nd Army pinned down and crushed enemy troops in battles, the High Command was already preparing plans for a large offensive operation aimed at destroying the Stalingrad group of Nazis.

"Uranus" and the surrender of Paulus

By the time the Soviet counteroffensive began near Stalingrad, in addition to Paulus’s 6th Army, there were also von Salmuth’s 2nd Army, Hoth’s 4th Panzer Army, the Italian, Romanian and Hungarian armies.

On November 19, the Red Army launched a large-scale offensive operation on three fronts, codenamed “Uranus”. It was opened by about three and a half thousand guns and mortars. The artillery barrage lasted about two hours. Subsequently, it was in memory of this artillery preparation that November 19 became the professional holiday of artillerymen.

On November 23, an encirclement ring closed around the 6th Army and the main forces of Hoth's 4th Panzer Army. On November 24, about 30 thousand Italians capitulated near the village of Raspopinskaya. By November 24, the territory occupied by the encircled Nazi units occupied about 40 kilometers from west to east, and about 80 from north to south. Further “densification” progressed slowly, as the Germans organized a dense defense and clung to literally every piece of land. Paulus insisted on a breakthrough, but Hitler categorically forbade it. He had not yet lost hope that he would be able to help those around him from the outside.

The rescue mission was entrusted to Erich von Manstein. Army Group Don, which he commanded, was supposed to release the besieged army of Paulus in December 1942 with a blow from Kotelnikovsky and Tormosin. On December 12, Operation Winter Storm began. Moreover, the Germans did not go on the offensive with full strength - in fact, by the time the offensive began, they were only able to field one Wehrmacht tank division and a Romanian infantry division. Subsequently, two more incomplete tank divisions and a number of infantry joined the offensive. On December 19, Manstein's troops clashed with Rodion Malinovsky's 2nd Guards Army, and by December 25, the "Winter Storm" had died down in the snowy Don steppes. The Germans rolled back to their original positions, suffering heavy losses.

Paulus's group was doomed. It seemed that the only person who refused to admit this was Hitler. He was categorically against retreat when it was still possible, and did not want to hear about capitulation when the mousetrap was finally and irrevocably slammed shut. Even when the Soviet troops captured the last airfield from which Luftwaffe aircraft supplied the army (extremely weak and unstable), he continued to demand resistance from Paulus and his men.

On January 10, 1943, the final operation of the Red Army to eliminate the Stalingrad group of Nazis began. It was called "The Ring". On January 9, the day before it began, the Soviet command presented Friedrich Paulus with an ultimatum, demanding to surrender. On the same day, by chance, the commander of the 14th Panzer Corps, General Hube, arrived in the cauldron. He conveyed that Hitler demanded that resistance continue until a new attempt was made to break through the encirclement from the outside. Paulus carried out the order and rejected the ultimatum.

The Germans resisted as best they could. The Soviet offensive was even stopped from January 17 to 22. After the regrouping, parts of the Red Army again went on the attack and on January 26, Hitler’s forces were split into two parts. The northern group was located in the area of ​​the Barricades plant, and the southern group, which included Paulus himself, was located in the city center. Paulus's command post was located in the basement of the central department store.

On January 30, 1943, Hitler awarded Friedrich Paulus the rank of field marshal. According to the unwritten Prussian military tradition, field marshals never surrendered. So, on the part of the Fuhrer, this was a hint at how the commander of the encircled army should have ended his military career. However, Paulus decided that it was better not to understand some hints. On January 31 at noon, Paulus surrendered. It took two more days to eliminate the remnants of Hitler's troops in Stalingrad. On February 2 it was all over. The Battle of Stalingrad is over.

About 90 thousand German soldiers and officers were captured. The Germans lost about 800 thousand killed, 160 tanks and about 200 aircraft were captured.