1941 Soviet winter offensive - numbers

I'm back with the numbers I promised (source Glanz - House "When Titans Clashed" which I consider being pretty reliable)

but now I lost the thread

in Army Group Center's area

Germans :

1.700.000
13.500
1.170

Russians :

1.100.000
7.652
774

( = arty)

 

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thanks

 

I really don't think you should trust those numbers. There is no way that is correct. There might be that many german troops in Army Group North, Center and South. I just really dont think there is that many there if I remember my history correctly. Look at Zeimke's work on Operation Barbarossa. Since he was a military historian I think his works are very correct in numbers.

There was only about 51 divisions in Army Group Center. So if you take 51x17000 "The average amount of men in a division." you get =867,000 soldiers. Thats half of what was stated. Seems like your source is trying to glorify the russians.

[ 13. April 2006, 12:29 AM: Message edited by: Reichsfuhrer ]

 

No, my source (Glanz) does not intend to glorify Russians, but the point is I misinterpreted the source, as Kai has already pointed on this thread :

http://www.ww2forums.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=001601

The author himself says these numbers are overestimating German forces.

So, the source is correct and I was wrong, because I thought german numbers were correct as an aggregate of the whole Army Group Center area and the whole dec41-march 1942 timespan (at least I never pretended that Germans could field 1.170 tanks on dec., the 5th of 1941)

 

Reichsführer:

By December 1941, German divisions were down to 50% of their original numbers, you know? Those Iváns thrown into combat with no weapons nor appropriate training took a lot of Jerries with them...

 

I've just come from a forum where a certain poster truly believed that the only thing to stop the Germans was "General Winter", Friedrich!!!!

Army Group Centre was seriously down on numbers even before "Typhoon" was even launched. The summer Offensives had taken their toll on the German OOB.

 

I believe that of 130 German Divisions they actually only had the strength of 83 Full-Strength Divisions

 

And all those divisions had fought since June-July 1941!