Hitler Moves East, 1941-1943 (13 page)

On the following day Marshal Timoshenko personally assumed supreme command of the Russian Western Front. Yeremenko became his second-in-command.

During the night of 2nd/3rd July, however, the Berezina was crossed yet again between the key points of Borisov and Bobruysk. Units of the 69th and 86th Rifle Regiments of 10th Panzer Division established a bridgehead at Berezino before daybreak and succeeded in holding it even though the wooden bridge behind them went up in flames.

On the same day—3rd July 1941, the twelfth day of the German campaign in the East—Colonel-General Halder, Chief of the German General Staff, wrote in his diary:

Generally speaking, the enemy can now be regarded as written off in the Bialystok bend, with the exception of quite insignificant remnants. Along the front of Army Group North 12 to 15 enemy divisions can likewise be considered to have been completely wiped out. In front of Army Group South the enemy has also been battered by ceaseless heavy blows and is now largely smashed. Generally speaking, it is therefore already possible to say that the task of smashing the Soviet armies in front of the Western Dvina and Dnieper has been accomplished. It would probably be no exaggeration to say that the campaign against Russia has been won within the first fortnight. Naturally, this does not mean that it has been concluded. The vastness of the country and the stubborn resistance offered us in every possible way will keep our forces busy for many more weeks.

It is worth noting that these words were written not by Hitler but by the coolly calculating Chief of General Staff, Halder. He too was impressed by the headlong German advance and the breathtaking losses of the Red Army. To an officer thinking in Central European terms they were bound to spell the complete collapse of the enemy.

And, in fairness, what Field-Marshal von Bock, C-in-C Army Group Centre, wrote in his Order of the Day on 8th July was enough to go to anyone's head:

The double battle of Bialystok and Minsk is over. The Army Group was engaged against four Russian Armies in the strength of about 32 infantry divisions, 8 armoured divisions, 6 motorized or mechanized brigades, and 3 cavalry divisions. Of these, 22 infantry divisions, 7 armoured divisions, 6 motorized or mechanized brigades, and 3 cavalry divisions were smashed.

Even the formations which succeeded in evading encirclement have been weakened in their fighting strength. The enemy's casualties are exceedingly high. Counting of prisoners and booty up to yesterday has yielded the following totals: 287,704 prisoners, including several divisional and corps commanders; 2585 tanks captured or destroyed, including some super-heavy types; 1449 guns and 242 aircraft captured. To this must be added large quantities of small arms, ammunition, and vehicles of all kinds, as well as numerous stores of foodstuffs and fuel. We must now exploit the victory.

How could it possibly not be exploited?

But Stalin and his marshals saw matters differently. To them 300,000 men did not mean the earth. Russia was 46 times as big as the German Reich in its 1938 frontiers. The Soviet Union had 190,000,000 inhabitants/Some 16,000,000 men of military age could be mobilized. A huge armaments industry had been built up behind the Urals. Ten million soldiers could be called to the colours without difficulty even after the loss of Western Russia—provided the Soviets were given a little time.

Time was what the Soviet Command was fighting for in July 1941. "Gain time! Stop the eastward rush of the German tanks! Build up a line of defence whatever the cost!" That, in effect, was the order which Marshal Timoshenko gave his deputy Yeremenko.

Timoshenko realized clearly that unless the Germans, who had now crossed the Berezina, were held on the Dnieper and on the lower Western Dvina they would drive on from Borisov and Vitebsk to Smolensk. Once Smolensk had fallen, Moscow would be no more than 230 miles behind the fighting line. If Moscow also was lost, then the Soviet Union would be deprived of its political, spiritual, and economic heart. Would its separate parts continue in existence? Would they obey? Would they obey a Central Government in some remote provincial metropolis? Maybe they would. And maybe they would not. The fate of the Soviet Union would clearly be decided before Moscow. Victory or defeat would be determined outside the gates of the Soviet capital. Stalin realized this and acted accordingly.

There were surprised faces at 18th Panzer Division headquarters in the Borisov bridgehead when, on 3rd July, a signal was received from the division's air unit: "Strong enemy armoured columns with at least 100 heavy tanks advancing along both sides of Borisov-Orsha-Smolensk road in the area of Orsha. Among them very heavy, hitherto unobserved models."

"Where do they come from?" General Nehring asked in surprise. "These Russians seem to have nine lives."

It was, in fact, the 1st Moscow Motorized Rifle Division under Major-General I. G. Kreyzer, whom Yeremenko had sent into action against Guderian's armoured spearhead. It was a crack unit, the pride of the Soviet High Command.

The aerial reconnaissance report proved to have been entirely accurate. For in his memoirs Yeremenko writes: "The division had at its disposal about 100 tanks, including some T-34s not previously employed on the Central Front."

T-34s! Now it was the turn of the Central Front to experience that wonder-weapon which had made its appearance on the southern sector during the first forty-eight hours of the war, spreading terror and fear wherever it moved.

Six miles east of Borisov, near the village of Lipki, Nehring's and Kreyzer's armoured spearheads made contact. The 18th Panzer Division, from Chemnitz, to-day called Karl-Marx-Stadt, clashed with a crack unit from the centre of Karl Marx's world revolution.

When it first hove into sight the T-34 struck a good deal of terror among the German armoured spearheads and Panzerjägers. But abreast of it, at a distance of about 100 feet, came an even bigger monster—a KV-2, weighing 52 tons. The light T-26 and BT tanks between the two giants were soon set on fire by the German Mark Ills. But their 5- cm. shells made no impression whatever on the two giants. The first Mark III received a direct hit and went up in flames. The other German tanks scuttled out of the way. The two Soviet monsters continued to advance.

Three German Mark IVs, nicknamed "the stubs," hastened to the scene, with their 7-5-cm. short-barrel cannon. But the heaviest German tanks then in existence were still some three tons lighter than the T-34, and the range of their guns was considerably less. However, the German commanders soon discovered that the crew of the T-34 were unsure of themselves and very slow in their fire. The German tanks underran its fire, weaved round it, and dodged its shells. They got the giant between them. They shot up its tracks. The Soviet crew got out and tried to escape, but ran straight into a burst of machine-gun fire from a Mark III.

Meanwhile the huge 52-ton KV-2 with its 15-2-cm. cannon was still shooting it out with two German Mark Ills. The German shells penetrated into the Russian tank's plating as far as their driving bands, and then got stuck. Nevertheless the Russians suddenly abandoned their vehicle—probably because of engine trouble.

This incident reveals the cardinal mistake of the Russians. They employed their T-34s and super-heavy KVs not in formation, but individually among light and medium tanks, and as support for the infantry. Those were very outdated tank tactics. The result was that these vastly superior Soviet tanks were smashed up one by one by the German tank companies, in spite of the terror they originally struck among them. In this way General Kreyzer's counter-attack near Lipki collapsed.

Open-mouthed, Nehring's men inspected the Soviet armoured giants. The general himself stood thoughtfully in front of a KV, counting the tank shells lodged in its plating —11 hits and not a single penetration.

Colonel-General Guderian also saw his first T-34 on the Moscow highway, west of Borisov. Three of these giants had got stuck in marshy ground and had thus fallen undamaged into German hands. Guderian was full of admiration for the tank's excellent and purposeful design, and was particularly impressed by its powerful cannon.

The 1st Moscow Motorized Rifle Division continued to resist the German 18th Panzer Division with all the strength it possessed. The T-34 and the KV continued to be their most dangerous weapons. The German infantryman was faced with his first ordeal of the war in the East. This emerges clearly from the war diary of 101st Rifle Regiment, which contains the following accounts of engagements by its 2nd Battalion:

5th July.
Russian tank attack on the near side of Tolo-chino. One of their tanks got stuck in the forest. Sergeant Findeisen with men of 6th and 7th Companies finished it off with close-combat weapons. Ten T-26s appeared in front of our lines, on the motor highway. Second Lieutenant Isenbeck, leading a Panzerjäger platoon, blocked the road with a 5-cm. anti-tank gun. The Russian tanks were advancing well spaced out. Isenbeck knelt by his gun, firing shell after shell. The leading T-26 was on fire. The second slewed into the roadside ditch. The third one, its track shot to pieces, stood motionless by the side of the road, a sitting duck. Change of target. Fire! Five more tanks were knocked out. The ninth was hit just below its turret at 30 yards' range and was now blazing like a torch. The tenth, behind it, was able to turn and get away by zigzagging wildly.

7th July.
Renewed Russian tank attack. Second Lieutenant Isenbeck's leading anti-tank gun was hit. The crew were killed or wounded. A 52-ton tank steam-rollered our anti-tank barrier. But presently it got stuck. Even so, it continued to paste the company's positions with its heavy gun.

Second Lieutenant Kreuter, leading the headquarters company of 101st Rifle Regiment, worked his way up to the colossus with a dozen men. A machine-gun, firing special hard-nosed anti-tank bullets, gave them cover. But the missiles bounced off like so many peas.

Sergeant Weber leaped to his feet. Corporal Kühne followed suit. They ran towards the Russian tank regardless of its machine-gun fire. Mud and earth spurted up in front of them. But they managed to get into the dead angle of the machine-gun. They had tied some hand-grenades together to make heavy explosive charges. Weber threw first, then Kühne. They flung themselves down. A flash, a burst, the clatter of fragments. The upper part of Kühne's arm was torn open. But the turret mechanism of the KV had been damaged. It could no longer traverse its gun.

Like hunters stalking some prehistoric beast, Kreuter's men lay on the ground around the giant with their machine- pistols and machine-guns. The second lieutenant jumped up on to the steel box. He ducked under the gun-barrel of the massive turret.

"Hand-grenade!" he called. Private Jedermann lobbed a stick hand-grenade up to him. The lieutenant caught it, pulled the pin, and thrust the grenade down the fat barrel of the cannon. He leapt down from the tank and rolled over. He was only just in time. Like a clap of thunder came the burst of the hand-grenade, and a moment later that of the shell in the breech. The explosion must have blown the breech-block into the turret, for a hatch was flung open. Corporal Klein, with great presence of mind, and even greater skill, chucked in an explosive charge at 25 feet range. A blinding flash and an explosion. The heavy turret was blown 15 feet into the field. For hours the giant blazed like a torch. It was still smouldering when, in the evening twilight, Captain Pepper, the battalion commander, came round the company's positions with Second Lieutenant Krauss.

"What a crate!" said Pepper. "Just look at . . ." He did not finish. A Russian automatic rifle cracked twice. Pepper and Krauss flung themselves under cover. This time they were lucky. But on the following day the battalion commander was picked off on his way to regimental headquarters. The bullets came from a Russian tree-top sniper. Pepper was killed instantly, and Second Lieutenant Krauss, who was again accompanying him, was gravely wounded and died in hospital a few hours later. The sniper, a slightly wounded Russian who had hidden in a tree, survived the captain by only a quarter of an hour. He refused to surrender.

Thus far the war diary of 101st Rifle Regiment. On the same day, 8th July 1941, the 17th Panzer Division also had its first encounter with a T-34—farther north, in the area of Senno, in the historic strip of land between the Western Dvina and the Dnieper. Yeremenko had brought up fresh units of the Soviet Twentieth Army and moved them into the strategically important strip of land between Orsha and Vitebsk in order to bar the road to Smolensk from this side also, the road which Hoth's and Guderian's Panzer divisions were trying to force.

At dawn the leading regiment of 17th Panzer Division moved into action. They went through waving grain crops, across potato-fields, and over shrub-grown heath. Towards 1100 hours Second Lieutenant von Ziegler's platoon made contact with the enemy. The Russians were in well-camouflaged positions and opened fire at close range. At the first shots the three battalions of 39th Panzer Regiment fanned out on a broad front. Troops of anti-tank artillery raced up to protect their flanks. A tank battle began, a battle which earned a place in military history—the battle of Senno. Fierce fighting raged from 1100 till nightfall. The Russians operated with considerable skill. They tried to take the Germans

in the flank or in the rear. The sun was burning down upon them. The vast battlefield was dotted with blazing and smouldering tanks, German and Russian.