Once the Red Army survived the initial onslaught of Operation Barbarossa, Stalin began plotting the first of several massive winter counter-offensives designed to push the Germans away from the suburbs of Moscow from Russia for good. From spies in Tokyo, he knew that Japan would not honor the Tripartite act and invade the Soviet Union. With some measure of confidence, he had STAVKA, or the Soviet General Staff, gradually pull most of the Siberian army to the West to serve as the troops he would need to make his attacks work. These men were largely unaffected by the defeatist attitude the rest of the army felt as they were chased almost to the Capital. In fact, The Siberian Command had a major victory over the Japanese Kwantung Army at Nomohan near the Halha river (Khalklin Gol) in 1939 where they easily manhandled the Japanese Armor and infantry. Over 40 of the 70 available Japanese tanks were destroyed and thousands of infantry were killed in a matter of days with hardly any losses to the Russians.
The Germans themselves also aided Stalin, as they were not fully equipped to fight in a winter war. Thanks to bitter experience won in Finland during 1940, the Soviets had learned several key lessons on fighting in freezing conditions and were in the middle of a massive restructuring program designed to overhaul their entire army when the Germans invaded in 1941. That disorganization, coupled with the hamstringing effects of the Kommissar system, caused much more damage to the Soviets than the Germans could have ever accomplished on their own, but that did not cause the Germans to be unprepared. In fact, German failure had nothing to do with the Soviet winters at all, as even though it was cold, the temperatures did not break any records.
Instead, the source for the lack of German preparedness lay with the Soviet rail and road system. All Soviet Trains rode on a different gauge of track that was slightly wider than the rest of Europe. The Germans knew this and when the invasion commenced, they had their railroad men working feverishly to convert the Soviet system over to the German or European gauge so their supply trains could go further without having to stop and completely transfer their goods over to another train.
The roads were no better. Many were little more than a dirt track when conditions were dry and a bottomless mud hole when any moisture hit the ground. When coupled together, it is truly a wonder that the largely horse-drawn German army received any supplies at all. It was this reason that the average German suffered through the first winter. It simply was a matter of their supply trains and their work crews had not caught up to the far-flung panzers.
In that and every successive winter as the cold grew fiercer, the Germans began huddling around any town, village or shelter they could find for warmth and protection. They nicknamed these positions 'hedgehogs' from the amount of weapons that were supposed to protrude out, giving the appearance of a bristling, curled up hedgehog. Some 'hedgehogs' were so large that they contained entire Corps of German soldiers. The Soviets took advantage of the condensing German line and would push entire divisions or brigades of troops through the gaps. Once in the rear, the groups or brigades would fall on supply columns or quickly overwhelm small garrisons, then fade back into the landscape.
The smaller of these raiding groups were normally equipped with some type of armor. Usually it was light tanks such as the T-26, T-60, or T-70, but it was not uncommon to see T-34s with some groups. The tanks were rarely never more than company strength, or approximately 10 tanks altogether. The bulk or striking power of the Raider groups was actually cavalry. The Soviet Cavalry units were not all Cossacks running around with their fur hats. As the Soviet Army did not view cavalry as being obsolete, they fielded several divisions or independent brigades and actively used them. In contrast, the French Army thought their cavalry was obsolete and placed their horse divisions in the Ardennes where they were essentially 'static' and supposedly safe in 1940. That serene outlook lasted only until Erich von Manstein brushed them aside on his way to the Meuse.
Instead, the Soviets looked at their horsemen as being much more than mobile infantry In Russia, the small Steppe horses could move sixty to 100 Kilometers in a night (about 60 miles). The terrain or weather conditions did not seem to matter to these hardy animals. It could be snow, mud or any other landscape where tanks and trucks either could not move or could become stuck if they tried and the horses would still prevail. The Soviets also discovered that with the vastness of Russia, entire brigades or divisions of cavalry could hide with no difficulty. To give an example of the immense size of the Russia front, if the Axis lined up every tank or assault gun they had by the Table of Organization with no losses or vehicles out of maintenance and placed them all on the front lines, they still would only have just one vehicle every 1. 5 miles!
Each Raiding brigade consisted of several Cavalry squadrons. Each squadron had approximately 100 men equipped with Mosin-Nagant rifles, PPsh-41 Sub Machine guns plus several field guns or mortars. 82mm mortars were normally carried, as they were lighter, easier to disassemble and place on the back of a horse. As an added bonus, the Soviets in a pinch could use captured German mortar rounds as they used a smaller bore (80mm) if they should run low on ammo.
Sometimes accompanying the Horsemen was the Razvedchiki. These well-trained men were tile eyes and ears of the Soviet Army and each Division was supposed to have at least one company to perform scouting duties, They excelled at stealthily approaching German positions, even out in the open. Many German accounts mention the Razvedchiki suddenly exploding out of the snow or brush with a wild shout and burst of automatic fire only yards away from the surprised Wehrmacht soldiers. Even in the openness of the Steppes, the Razvedchiki could still surprise any unwary enemies.
Lastly, partisans frequently met up with the raiding groups and helped them identify targets, act as guides through rough terrain, or show them ideal hiding spots to keep them hidden from German aircraft or troops. Once the raiding group ran low on ammo or needed to rest, they would cross once more through the gaps in the lines back into Soviet Territory. This cycle of raid and recover occurred throughout the war regardless of season as there never was enough infantry in the Axis to completely man the entire front line to keep it from happening.
Our scenario attempts to represent one of those raids Let me set the conditions and background for you: It is winter and the ground has been frozen solid for several weeks now. Snow blankets the landscape and will not begin to melt for at least another ten weeks until the spring thaws arrive. A small wooden town dots the rolling landscape. Its occupants are German soldiers, a mixed collection of signalmen, supply soldiers and elements of a nearby Panzer Division maintenance crews. Overall, they are just one part of a Iong- road of supply hubs from the Train Depot near the Don River to the Front lines in Southern Russia.
The local partisans in the area had once been part of the town, but they were forced out when the Germans decided to garrison the town. The residents trudged off with their worldly possessions to their neighboring village, but even in Russia, the cold affects the people and several of the elderly and children died along the way. The callous treatment quickly hardened the resolve of the others and they formed up with some other partisans in the region. So far, they had been content to sniping at the trucks or garrisons along the way as they had little backing for anything larger. As the winter wore on, however, both sides sought shelter and the area settled into a temporary 'truce' that the Garrison thought should last until spring. In the meantime, the supply trucks continued to move in both directions through the town.
But not all was as quiet as the garrison thought. The Soviets were planning the launch of "Operation Uranus" in late November. It goal was the complete encirclement of the German 6'h Army at Stalingrad. If the tenuous supply situation of the Germans could be made worse, it could greatly affect the outcome of new offensive. To aid them in that cause, the Soviet Front Command released several raiding groups into the rear of the German lines. After meeting up with the local partisans, one group learned of the supply garrison and its lax attitude. Not knowing of the burning desire of the partisans to exact revenge, the raiders followed their advice and prepared to overwhelm the garrison or destroy the depot.
Back to MWAN #119 Table of Contents
Back to MWAN List of Issues
Back to MagWeb Magazine List
© Copyright 2002 Hal Thinglum
This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web.
Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com