Was the battle of Stalingrad the turning point of the war (the hinge on which fate swung, as Churchill called it)? A grand total of one and a half million men from Germany, Russia, Hungary, Bulgaria, Italy and Rumania died in this massive series of battles. The Soviet victory at Stalingrad set in motion the chain of events that led to the battle of Kursk, and it gave the Soviet Red Army the momentum it needed. Do you think that the battle was the 'hinge on which fate swung'? :smok: :kill: :smok: :kill: :smok: :kill: :bang: :bang: :bang:
No the eastern front was stabilized with the Battle of Kharkov by the Waffen-SS in February 16, 1943–March 15, 1943
Stalingrad was, more or less, the battle that lead up to the decisive battle in Russia. Germany claimed victories after Stalingrad, but after Kursk, the arm of the Nazi war machine was kaput.
no...as i said b4 elsewhere i opted for moscow 1941 as being the turning point of the war..after the battles around mosocw form oct41 - feb 42 the germans were never logistically going to be able to defeat the soviet union. the german army had never planned on a long war with russia and had no plan b...by the time of stalingrad the capablites of the germans was much reduced..and any victory here would have only postponed the inevitable
Well, we were logistically able to defeat the soviet union and the wehrmacht drove to the south after "Operation Taifun" failed. We nearly got it, but fortunarely not.
as can be seen the germans were only able to mount an offensive in one sector of the front and not across the enitre front as the year before. they were not strong enough to attack along the entire front..and had lost a large amount of seasoned troops the year before..by mid 1942 the germans were outnumbered in all areas by the russians and only their tactical superiority and experince mangaged to enable them to prevail. no matter what happened at stalingrad IMHO the germans had lost the war already with the failure to knock out the soviet union in 1941and americas entry into the war.
I agree with you Cheeky_Monkey, but for these small points: 1) Fall Blau was definitely a plan B, which you say the Germans didn't have. It was a well-thought-out strike at the heart of Russian resources, at a point along the front where Russian resistance was weak. 2) As of Kursk, the Germans were unable to succeed even in minor offensives in the East or anywhere else. This is quite different from the situation in December 1941.
when the germans invaded in june 1941 there was no plan B. they had gambled on winning the campaign in 4 months...case Blue was an operation born out of the situation that faced them in the spring of 42. The final operation was not the one orginally conceived and its final goals were thought by many in the german army to be over ambitious and unatainable.
Operation Blue should never have happened, according to von Manstein. Hitler ordered his men to stop right after capturing Smolensk, crushing three Soviet armies. By the time Army Group Center attacked again, the Soviets had completely regrouped. If Manstein was allowed to move forward immediately after capturing Smolensk, they would have at least gotten to within a mile of Moscow. POSSIBLY, they could have taken it if General Winter had held up for another month.
manstien wasnt in command of army group centre in 1941..i think you talkin about operartion typhoon..operation blue was the german summer offensive in southern russia in summer 1942. in july 1941 the german generals after the capture of smolensk wanted to push straight on and capture moscow..hitler divereted the bulk of centres armour south to subdue the ukraine..before returning back north to attack moscow in october 1941.
I was talking about Operation Typhoon. The Germans should have carried that out as soon as the capture of Smolensk was announced by the Russians.
Stalingrad was an important battle, but it seems like it was kind of over rated. If the germans won the battle they could have also gotten most of the oil fields, but they would still be driven back eventually Russia would still win the war but only slow them down a few months. I need to find out more on the battle though.
The Germans should have focused more on capturing the Grozny and Baku oilfields. It would have made them at least easier to capture. I'm not saying it would have been possible, because it may easily have failed.
