Ironically, Hitler’s optimism regarding the impending summer offensive stemmed not so much from his belief in German strength as from his assessment of Soviet weakness. His operational thinking in 1942 was based on the assumption that the Red Army was at the end of its strength and had only limited powers of regeneration. This assessment, in turn, resulted not only from the compulsory optimism afflicting those at Führer Headquarters but also from incorrect information. That spring, Hitler had received reports detailing a severe lack of food and widespread cannibalism among both Soviet civilians and Soviet soldiers, while the state of equipment in the Red Army was said to be abysmal. In a reprise of its costly tendency to miscalculate the strength of the Russian enemy, Foreign Armies East also reckoned in April that Soviet manpower reserves were “by no means inexhaustible” and, if subjected to losses such as those suffered in 1941, would run out by the onset of the muddy season. In the event, this assessment suffered from two key flaws: Soviet manpower reserves were larger than assumed, and German forces would be unable to inflict devastating losses on the Red Army. In 1942, the Soviets would not cooperate in their own destruction, largely evading encirclement.68
Economically, as well, the plan was flawed. German analysts had misjudged the extent of Soviet industrial production in the eastern part of European Russia, the magnitude of the factory evacuation program, and the speed with which production could be resumed in the Urals area. Even during the second half of 1941, despite the enormous losses inflicted on its key economic areas and the strain of industrial evacuation, the Soviet Union had nearly equaled the entire German yearly production of tanks, aircraft, artillery, mortars, machine and submachine guns, and rifles. Moreover, since the Soviets could count on Lend-Lease aid from the United States, a fact the Germans realized would result in a “substantial strengthening of the Soviet Union’s power of resistance,” a key goal of the summer offensive was to cut the Allied supply line via Persia and the Volga River. By the spring of 1942, however, the bulk of shipments were already reaching the Soviet Union through Murmansk and Archangel. Even if the Ostheer had succeeded in reaching the Volga and seizing the oil fields of the Caucasus, then, a fatal weakening of the Soviet ability to continue fighting would not likely have resulted. Even the Führer seemed dimly to recognize this dilemma, remarking to Goebbels, despite his assertion that the Soviet Union was on its last legs, that it would be necessary to build a stronger defensive line this coming winter. Seared by the savage winter fighting, Hitler also revealed to Goebbels that he no longer wished to see snow; it had become physically repulsive to him.69
Germany thus faced the same ticking time bomb as in World War I: inferiority in resources and economic production would eventually prove decisive on the battlefield. German economic and manpower resources were overburdened, while the production, transportation, and supply problems that shackled German efforts in the last months of 1941 could not possibly be resolved in time to bring German units anywhere near the combat strength of the previous year. Speer’s efforts would, ultimately, pull German production back to Soviet levels by 1944, but, by then, it was too late: 1942 was the pivotal year. Hitler clearly understood the risks involved in the new operation but believed that he had no choice. His window of opportunity had been reduced to a few months; if he had any hope of a successful outcome of the war, he had to cripple the Soviet Union by the end of autumn. “If it proved impossible in 1942 to defeat Russia definitively, or at least get as far as the Caucasus and the Urals,” General Thomas noted anxiously in May, “Germany’s war situation must be judged as extremely unfavorable, if not hopeless.”70 The Red Army had suffered staggering casualties in 1941; perhaps, the Führer thought, it could not now resist another German onslaught. Having concentrated his forces in the south and phased even that operation into staggered assaults, he had made, he believed, sufficient allowance for the Ostheer’s loss of strength. His grand strategic vision reduced to little more than an operational advance on a distant target that might, in any case, not provide the necessary oil to continue fighting, Hitler risked everything on yet another calamitous miscalculation.
6
All or Nothing
If in early 1942, as opposed to the previous spring, Hitler and the German military leadership had the comfort of operational clarity, they also faced a number of vexing problems, an unwelcome reminder of the winter’s desperate fighting, that had to be resolved before Operation Blue could commence. Foremost among them was control of the Crimea, important both as a springboard to the Caucasus and, if left in Soviet hands, as a persistent threat to the vital Rumanian oil fields. The Soviet Black Sea Fleet’s naval air arm had already bombed the oil production facilities and refineries on numerous occasions, and, while the raids were generally ineffectual, a few had caused significant damage and disruption. From Hitler’s perspective, concern over the safety of his sole source of oil, coupled with his belief that Soviet long-range bombers posed a constant threat, justified an operation to seize the Caucasus. Moreover, the Führer had repeatedly expressed interest in the Crimea, which was to be cleansed of its native population and resettled by “pure Germans,” as a key area of colonization that would secure German Lebensraum as far as the Urals. Complete control of the peninsula, including the fortress of Sevastopol, would also limit the effectiveness of the pesky Soviet Black Sea Fleet as well as possibly influence the neutrality of Turkey. Finally, army planners saw strong Soviet formations in the Crimea as a persistent threat to communications and supply lines along their long, exposed southern flank.1
In bitter autumn fighting that resulted in staggering casualties, Manstein’s Eleventh Army had seized the Kerch Peninsula, the gateway to the Caucasus, and all of the Crimea except for Sevastopol, only to be thrown back by fierce Soviet counterattacks. By the time the fighting had stopped in April 1942, the Germans still controlled the bulk of the Crimea, excluding Sevastopol, but were blocked from the Kerch Peninsula by stout Soviet fortifications along the Parpach line. Retaking Kerch, Manstein realized, would be a formidable undertaking. Not only did the Soviets outnumber his forces in terms of both men and materiel, but they had also erected what seemed a nearly impregnable series of defenses. Although the narrow isthmus was only about ten miles across, at Parpach the Red Army had massed some 210,000 well-equipped troops behind three extensive defense lines. The first, the Parpach line, was protected by two wide antitank ditches, behind which lay thick mine-fields, barriers of barbed wire, iron hedgehogs made of welded railway tracks, concrete emplacements, and disabled tanks that served as protected machine-gun nests. Five miles to the rear lay the second position, the Nasyr line, while beyond it the Sultanovka line, the so-called Turkish Wall, cut across the Kerch Peninsula at its widest point. Because the sea on either side of the Parpach line excluded the possibility of flanking attacks, the only option looked to be a frontal assault. The port of Kerch, forty miles to the east, seemed a world away.2