One of the reasons for the early successes of operation barbarossa was Stalins nievity. Even though German aircraft violated soviet airspace Stalin continued to deliver raw materials to Germany punctually. On 13th of April 1941 the USSR signed a neutrality pact with Japan. Neither country wanted a war in eastern siberia. This in the long run helped Russia a lot. Because it allowed the siberian divisions in the russian army to help defend Moscow and these siberian troops were the best Russia had to offer. However Stalin had received at least 80 distinct warnings that the Germans were going to attack however he belived that they were planted by the British to split the Nazi-Soviet pact. However he was wrong and on the 22nd of June 1941 at dawn. The German attack began. The result was an absolute disaster for the Soviet forces on the border. On the first day, German tanks advanced up to 60 kilometres. 1200 soviet planes were destroyed, many on the ground; railways, oil and ammunition dumps were all deveastated.
For the attack on the USSR, Hitler had assembled the most powerful force in history. It constited of ten armies from all parts of Fascist Europe, but was almost 75% German. 4.6 million men and 5000 aircraft, 3700 tanks and 50,000 heavy guns and mortars were used. The USSR had almost 3 million men facing their attackers, but only 1800 MODERN tanks and 1500 MODERN aircraft. The Soviet union had many more aircraft and tanks than the Germans but they were all very old bar some.
After 3 months of war Russia had lost 3 million men nearly their whole army yes it was but they had lots more in reserve. The front line Germans were told to regard the Russians as subhuman however lots of them saw the Russians as superhuman. The Russian tactics were just to keep going backwards and destroying the land that the Germans had to follow on was very demoralising for the Germans. This was known as 'scorched earth' because the Soviets would literally burn the earth. However what this tactic did was give time to the Soviets to prepare.
The Germans continued to advance quickly, killling and capturing hundreds of thousands of Soviet troops. In August they surrounded the USSR's second city, Leningrad. Rather than slow down their march across the Soviet union, they left a force to besiege the city. At the time no0one knew that the siege would last for thirty months.
On 30th september General Von Bock began his drive on Moscow with 1 million men, 1700 tanks and 950 aircraft. His forces broke the main red army resistance but, as they neared the city, they lost momentum. The weather was appalling; first mud, then bitter cold. 30 kilometres from the Soviet capital they came to a halt, exhausted and freezing.This is a good example of if barbarossa had been launched 6 weeks earlier as had been planned then it might not have failed, because this attack by Von Bock failed because the troops were freezing and they couldn't advance quickly enough.However if barbarossa had been launched when it was supposed to the panzers wouldn't have been slowed by the mud as they were and the men wouldn't have frozen to death as many of them did.
Stalin ordered General Georgi Zhukov, to take command of the defense of Moscow. Hitler was not told about this by his intelligence services. By this time the snow and frost had started the roads became terrible. The german panzers could not move as quickly as they liked in these conditions.Also the German troops became very annoyed with their equipment because it wasnt built for use in ice cold conditions. With the panzers not being able to move as quickly as they liked, Zhukov had lots of time to organise the defense of Moscow. 2 million people had left the city by the time the Germans were approaching. Zhukov had 400 tanks to defend Moscow with. Hitler and Zhukov both planned to attack. This is where one of the key turn arounds of WWII. Because Zhukov had 40 divisions posted in Siberia to block the Japanese advance however with the non-agression treaty being signed they were not need their so Zhukov bought them into Moscow. These Siberian divisions were the cream of the Russian army and they were trained to fight in Wintery conditions. The German intelligence had not spotted these Siberian divisions in Moscow. The temperatures were down to -40 at this point the oil in the cars engines froze the German tanks weren't able to advance any more also the German artillery froze up. More men were lost to frost bite than fighting in this period of the war. Then on December 5th 1941, right in front of Moscow Zhukov counter-attacked the Germans. Soon the Germanss were retreating up to 250 kilometres and on the 8th of december the German Army was ordered on to the defensive. Hitler took personal command. During this attack the Russian T-34 Tank was used and it was stupendousk, they had been developing it for a decade the Germans had no idea that it existed and the only way they could destroy them was via aerail attacks of shooting it frim the rear. The T-34 had lots of advantages over the German Tiger, it had very wide tracks so it could go over all sorts of terrain. Also it had a 76mm gun which in those days was absolutly massive.
However by Febuary 1942 the Soviet counter-offensive had ground to a complete stand still. Hundrens of thosands of Soviet troops died in badly planned attacks. These were mainly in the Crimea, the Ukraine and , unsuccessfully trying to end the German siege of Leningrad. More than 1.1 million Germans had been killed, wounded, frostbitten or captured since 22 June 1941. Soviet losses were several times higher than this.
By the summer of 1942, Hitler had managed to find replacements for about half of his losses on the eastern front. However, they were mostly from his 'allies', Romania, Hungary, Italy, Slovakia and even one division of Spanish volunteers. The total number of men, about 5 million on each side was about equal. The USSR had the advantage in tanks though. Hitler's plan for 1942 was to capture the Caspian oilfields. Hitler also had a fantasy of his forces continuing into the middle-east. There they would link up with Rommel coming north out of Egypt. Then this joint German army would move east into Persia(Iran). There it would eventually link up with the Japanese after the latter's planned conquest of India. Such were Hitler's daydreams in 1942.
Hitler could not fail to be attracted to the idea of capturing the 'city of Stalin' (Stalingrad). The generals told him the armies in the south were not strong enough to capture both the oil fields and Stalingrad. At that point, the 6th army was moving on Stalingrad and the 4th Panzer army was poised to attack either target. Hitler used the 4th Panzer army for both goals but in the wrong order. He sent thenm south towards the oilfields where it was not needed. Then he sent it back to Stalingrad by which time the Soviet army had got just enough reinforcements in to hold the city. The 4th Panzer and the 6th armies became trapped in an enormous street-by-street battle in Stalingrad. Meanwhile, further south, the advance on the oilfields came to a halt. Had the 4th Panzer attacked Stalingrad 2 weeks sooner, it might have captured the city. Then it could have handed over to the 6th and gone south to the oilfields.
Stalingrad became the most important battle of WWII in Europe. If the Germans had won, they would have been able to swing north up the volga to take Moscow and Stalin might have had to accept a humiliating peace. Britain and the USA would then have had to decide wheather to continue the war alone.
Barbarossa had already gone sour by this point but stalingrad was a huge victory over the Germans for the Russians and it shaped the turned the tide of the war in our favour.
