On February 2, 1943, the battle on the outskirts of the Don and Volga, unprecedented in its significance, scope and intensity, ended. It went down in history as the Battle of Stalingrad. For two hundred days and nights, the Red Army crushed the elite formations of Germany and its allies. The Battle of Stalingrad, which changed history and turned the tide of the entire Second World War, began on July 17, 1942 and ended with the complete victory of the Soviet troops. The defensive phase of the operation lasted until November 18, 1942, and the offensive phase began on November 19. At various times, troops of the Stalingrad, Southeastern, Southwestern, Don, and left wings of the Voronezh fronts, as well as the Volga Military Flotilla and the Stalingrad Corps Air Defense Area (an operational and tactical unit of the Soviet air defense forces) participated in the fighting.
Why was Hitler so eager to capture Stalingrad
After the defeat at Moscow in the winter of 1941, German troops no longer had the opportunity to advance along the entire front. Therefore, the Wehrmacht command chose one direction as a strategic goal for the summer of 1942 – the Caucasus. Germany needed its rich resources and, above all, oil. First of all, it was about the fields in Baku and Grozny. And if the Soviet Union had lost them, it would have been left without fuel. So, without aviation, tanks, and even without artillery, since there would be nothing to carry it on. In addition to oil, the Germans planned to seize the Kuban and Stavropol grain-growing regions as a result of this offensive, which would allow the Wehrmacht to supply food, as well as Europe occupied by Hitler. And the USSR would be deprived of the most important source of food. A new blow to the Red Army was supposed, in Hitler's opinion, to lead Germany to final victory. On April 5, 1942, the Fuhrer signed Directive No. 41. It set the task "to take Leningrad in the north, and to make a breakthrough to the Caucasus on the southern flank of the front." On April 11, a plan was prepared for an offensive operation codenamed "Blau" – an offensive in the Voronezh direction of the Weihs group (2nd Field and 4th Tank armies) and in Ostrogozhsky by the 6th Army.
According to the plan of the German command, the Weichs group, having reached Voronezh, was supposed to turn south and surround the main forces of the Soviet Southwestern Front, together with the 1st Tank Army advancing to the east. After that, it was supposed to divide the German forces of Army Group South into two independent ones, A and B, which were to advance towards Stalingrad and the North Caucasus. The basis of the power of Group B was the most combat‑ready 6th Army of the Wehrmacht under the command of General Friedrich Paulus. It was supported by tank and motorized divisions.
The order is "Don't take a step back!"
The Battle of Stalingrad began on July 17, 1942, on the far outskirts of the city in a large bend of the Don. The resistance to the Wehrmacht troops here allowed the Soviet command to pull up reserves and restore the combat capability of units and formations that had escaped from the encirclement. However, the Germans were moving deeper into Soviet territory. Gradually, they captured rich industrial and agricultural areas, and oil fields were threatened.
On July 28, 1942, Order No. 227 of the Supreme Commander–in-Chief appeared - it was read out in the units of the active army and became popularly known as "Not a step back!". "To retreat further means to ruin ourselves and ruin our Homeland at the same time."… From now on, the iron law of discipline for every commander, Red Army soldier, and political worker must be the requirement not to take a step back without an order from the high command..." The order ordered that any commanders who allowed their units to withdraw without an order be court-martialed; created penal companies and battalions for soldiers and commanders who had committed crimes; formed barrage detachments within the armies, which were allowed to shoot cowards and alarmists on the spot. "It's time to end the retreat. Don't take a step back! This should now be our main call," the formidable document read.
The main events of the Battle of Stalingrad
August 23-24, 1942 At 4:18 p.m. on August 23, the Germans launched an air assault on Stalingrad. The air squadrons of the German 4th Air Fleet, reinforced by the Air Aviation Corps, were thrown at the city.
The dive bombers came in waves from different directions. The enemy went out in groups of 6-9 planes to bombard the city. Bombing was carried out over the area from a horizontal flight at an altitude of 5-7 thousand meters, and by the end of August 23 – at an altitude of 800-3500 meters. To increase the radius of ground damage, bombs were dropped from a steep turn. Where the air defenses were weakening, the enemy was bombing groups of up to 30 aircraft. Having chosen a target, the Germans went under the target in a circle, diving alternately to a height of 300-500 meters. On the first day of the assault, the enemy carried out 2,000 sorties. The bombing of Stalingrad's residential areas did not stop until August 29. So, on August 24, by 6 p.m., 57 groups of planes flew into the city, they dropped up to 300 high-explosive bombs. From August 23 to September 14, more than 23,000 high–explosive bombs weighing from 500 to 1,000 kilograms and more than 13,000 up to 50 kilograms were dropped on the city. Combined aerial bombs were also dropped, which, in addition to their great destructive power, created large fires. The city was practically reduced to ruins.
August 25 – September 1942 By this time, the Soviet troops had already suffered heavy losses and retreated to the main line of defense of Stalingrad. A battle begins on the outskirts of the city, which turns into the city itself. September – November 1942 The transition from the defensive stage to the offensive stage. Soviet troops under the command of Generals Vasily Chuikov (62nd Army) and Mikhail Shumilov (64th Army) repel about 700 enemy attacks. Already during the defensive battle, the Soviet command began to concentrate forces to launch a counteroffensive, preparations for which ended in mid-November. November 19th, 1942 The beginning of the Soviet counteroffensive. The offensive of the Southwestern Front and the 65th Army of the Don Front began on November 19 after 80 minutes of artillery preparation. By the end of the day, the defenses of the 3rd Romanian Army had been breached in two sectors. The Stalingrad Front began its offensive on November 20. Having struck at the flanks of the main enemy grouping, the troops of the Southwestern and Stalingrad fronts closed the ring of its encirclement on November 23, 1942. It included 22 divisions and more than 160 separate units of the 6th army and partially the 4th tank army of the enemy, totaling about 300,000 people.
The length of the outer encirclement front was 450 kilometers. The distance between the outer and inner fronts of the encirclement ranged from 20-100 kilometers. December 1942 On December 12, the German command attempted to unblock the encircled troops with a strike from the village of Kotelnikovo, but this attempt was unsuccessful. On December 16, the Soviet offensive on the Middle Don began. By the end of December 1942, the enemy had been defeated in front of the outer encirclement front, and its remnants had been pushed back 150-200 kilometers.
Pavlov's House: how an ordinary building became a fortress
The intensity of the fighting in Stalingrad was such that the average life expectancy of a soldier, both on the German and Soviet sides, was only 15 minutes. The fighters under the command of Commander Vasily Chuikov actively used melee tactics and night counterattacks. Assault groups also suddenly broke into buildings and set up impregnable shelters there, and the approaches to the building were mined. The Pavlov House is a world–famous example of such tactics. During the Battle of Stalingrad, an ordinary four–story residential building turned into an impregnable fortress, in which a small group of Soviet soldiers - a total of 31 Red Army soldiers - held the defense for 58 days. This house is known all over the world by the name of Senior Sergeant Yakov Pavlov, who assumed command.
The defense was organized very competently. The building was surrounded by barbed wire, the approaches to it were mined, a tunnel was dug for the delivery of ammunition and a telephone line was laid underground. But the main thing was that the approaches to Pavlov's house were shot from three directions from other positions of the regiment. There were also several concealed firing points outside the building. Only real heroes could withstand the constant Nazi attacks. Sometimes the Germans occupied the first floor of the house, and they had to be kicked out. The coordinated and skillful actions of the Red Army soldiers led to the fact that only three of the 31 soldiers defending the fortress house died in two months of fighting.
Operation Ring
For the final defeat of the German group by the Don Front, under the command of Lieutenant General Konstantin Rokossovsky, Operation Ring was developed and carried out. The plan called for the sequential destruction of the enemy: first in the western, then in the southern part of the encirclement ring, and then the dismemberment of the remaining group into two parts by a strike from west to east and the elimination of each of them.
The operation began on January 10, 1943. On January 26, Soviet troops joined forces in the Mamayev Kurgan area and split the enemy group into two parts. On January 31, the southern group of troops led by Field Marshal Friedrich Paulus stopped resisting, and on February 2, the northern group stopped resisting, which put an end to the destruction of the encircled enemy. During the offensive from January 10 to February 2, 1943, more than 91 thousand people were captured, about 140 thousand were killed. During the Stalingrad offensive, the German 6th Army and the 4th Tank Army, the 3rd and 4th Romanian armies, and the 8th Italian Army were defeated. The total losses of the enemy amounted to about 1.5 million people. For the first time during the war, national mourning was declared in Germany.
How Field Marshal Paulus was captured
On the morning of February 3, 1943, funeral marches were heard from all loudspeakers in Germany, and funeral prayers were heard in churches. For the next three days, the Empire mourned its soldiers, including Field Marshal Paulus, who died in battle with his army. "The battle in Stalingrad is over. True to its oath, the 6th Army, under the exemplary command of Field Marshal Paulus, fell to its last breath in the face of overwhelming enemy forces and unfavorable circumstances... Generals, officers, non-commissioned officers and privates fought shoulder to shoulder to the last bullet," the German newspapers wrote.
But Paulus was alive. On January 31, the commander of the 6th German Army, Friedrich Paulus, was captured by the troops of the 64th Army of Lieutenant General Mikhail Shumilov. The day before, on January 30, Paulus received the rank of field marshal, which Hitler awarded to his military commander by radio message. The promotion was accompanied by a short postscript: "No German field marshal has ever been captured." Paulus was explicitly asked to commit suicide. It was the last straw that broke his will. The next morning, he agreed to negotiate a surrender. "Without issuing a final order to the army, without saying a single word of farewell or gratitude to his soldiers, who with superhuman perseverance went through all the battles and hardships, the newly minted field marshal left the stage and went into captivity. An inglorious end," intelligence officer Joachim Wieder, who witnessed the death of the 6th Army, wrote about this with undisguised sarcasm. By 12 p.m. on January 31, Paulus was taken to Beketovka, where he was met by the commander of the 64th Army, Lieutenant General Mikhail Shumilov. On the same day, the field Marshal was interrogated and soon introduced to the commander of the front, Colonel-General Konstantin Rokossovsky.
He proposed to the surrendered enemy to issue an order for the surrender of the remnants of the 6th Army in order to stop the senseless bloodshed. Paulus refused, because he was now a prisoner, and his generals were subordinate, in accordance with the received directive, directly to Hitler. The order was never given, and on February 2, 1943, the last pockets of resistance of the German troops in the city were finally suppressed. The Battle for Stalingrad is over.
The significance of the Battle of Stalingrad
"Throughout the Second World War, Western armies have not accomplished anything worthy of being on a par with this great feat," noted British historian Anthony Beevor in his book Stalingrad. The Battle of Stalingrad made a decisive contribution to achieving a radical turning point not only during the Great Patriotic War, but throughout the Second World War. The Red Army seized the strategic initiative and held it until the end of the war. The defeat of the fascist bloc at Stalingrad undermined the credibility of Germany on the part of its allies and contributed to the intensification of the Resistance movement in Europe. Japan and Turkey were forced to abandon plans for active action against the USSR.
Memoirs of the participants of the Battle of Stalingrad
Pavel Alekseevich Andreev: "We had to stand to the death, and we did," Pavel Alekseevich Andreev, a veteran of the Great Patriotic War and a participant in the Battle of Stalingrad, told REN TV about how he remembered one of the greatest battles of the 20th century. Pavel Alekseevich served in an artillery regiment. "They accepted me, a young kid, as their own. I was like an adopted son to them anyway at first. Our regiment belonged to the main ones, it was subordinate to Moscow. They were being watched all the time and sent us where it was more difficult. Our commander (...) He pulled us out. Otherwise, there was already a semicircle, it only remained for us to close the exit, and we would not be there," recalls Pavel Alekseevich.
The 100-year-old veteran remembers seeing the columns of captured Germans after the liberation of Stalingrad. Many of them wrapped any rags on their heads to keep warm in the cold. According to the veteran, by that time the Fascists had eaten all the horses and all the animals in general, including birds, as they were literally starving – they had not been supplied with food for several weeks. "Actually, of course, the Germans were committing atrocities, and they were doing everything. And when they were defeated, and how they walked, you can say they were so poor. And they should not have been pitied, but judged for what they did to us. When our offensive began, it was only then that we realized from our hearts that we must help free our citizens from the atrocities of these bandits," Pavel Alekseevich said. On February 2, 1943, the regiment in which Andreev served was transferred across the Volga to help other units. "If we hadn't stood here, they would have gone on and on. It was necessary to stand to the death, and they did. (...) What surprises me is that we read in the newspapers back then that the Germans wrote letters home to themselves about how they were fighting here. Here we are, sitting with the Volga River behind us, and our troops are sitting in the trenches, all wearing what to defend themselves. And the Germans think that the Russians will no longer be able to fight back in any way, not to hear them. And our guys are all sitting ready. And so they go on the attack, and then our guys come out of nowhere and fight back. They think, "Well, what kind of Russians are they, it's impossible for them to rush anywhere, there's a rebuff everywhere." And they wrote to themselves at home in Germany that such and such Russians, it is impossible to overcome them," Andreev noted. Taisiya Ivanovna Nepogodina: "I remember a 19-year-old wounded man with a mother's prayer in his pocket." 101-year-old veteran of the Great Patriotic War, participant of the Battle of Stalingrad, Taisiya Ivanovna Nepogodina told REN TV how she saved the lives of the wounded while working in the hospital. She even kept a unique relic – her tunic from the time of the war. "This is my gymnast. I went through the whole war in her, she saw a lot. I don't even know how I saved it. I worked at the hospital. A doctor, a surgeon, and two sisters. We didn't walk around the city. We only saw the wounded, who either crawled to us or came themselves, or their comrades brought them. In the beginning, the war was far, far away. We only received the wounded, then the evacuees began to appear," said Taisiya Ivanovna.
When the front came closer, it was decided to evacuate Taisiya Ivanovna's hospital. On the banks of the Volga, everyone was heavily bombed. "We saw this bombing only from afar. Later, they told how civilians fled to the steppe during the bombing. My cousin later told me how they ran away, then the bombing ended, she came running, and her aunt was lying dead near the shelter," recalls Taisiya Ivanovna. As a result, the hospital ended up in Baskunchak, where doctors resumed work. "We occupied a hotel. I remember a lot of stretchers there, we have a dressing room here, and we have several tables. We treated several wounded people at once. I remember one case. We just received a wounded man, he was probably about 19 years old. They just put him on the table, and he's dying here. We didn't save him. We stood in our pocket, pulled out a Komsomol ticket, and there was a prayer written in an old man's hand. Nothing saved, neither the Komsomol ticket, nor the mother's prayer. I had to bury a lot of the wounded, but I felt sorry for everyone," said Taisiya Ivanovna.
The veteran is sure that the Red Army managed to win thanks to the courage and perseverance of its fighters. "There was an order, 'Don't take a step back!' We have no land beyond the Volga. I think even the winter helped. Because our soldiers were warmly dressed. There was a German camp not far from the hospital. I saw how they were dressed, light overcoats, hats so light. When they had already driven, hope appeared. We thought that when they reached the border, our troops would go further or not. Let's go. We reached Berlin," said Taisiya Ivanovna. Alexander Vasilyevich Ermishkin: "I'm small, the Germans didn't hit me" Alexander Vasilyevich, a participant in the Battle of Stalingrad, who is now 100 years old, participated in the liberation of Hungary and Yugoslavia, and met victory in Austria. The future hero went to the front in 1942 and served in the army for six years with the rank of sergeant. When 19-year-old Alexander came to the assignment, the command did not know where to send him because of his small stature. As a result, Ermishkin served as a signalman. "He came, and he said to me, 'Where should I put you, kid? They didn't even take the height. (...) I was a kid there. I carried a small coil and kept in touch. They didn't take me anywhere else. I was very small, and my height was heavy. Officer: "Well, where are you going, go home!" They laugh, but what will they do. And I'm crying," recalls Alexander Ermishkin.
The veteran called his keen desire to live his main memory of serving at the front. "What do you remember from the soldier's life? To stay alive. That's all. You don't have to do anything else, just live. We were young people. Basically, children. Did we know at that time what war was? There was nothing to be happy about. I came all the way to Kharkov, then to Stalingrad, back from Stalingrad," said Alexander Vasilyevich. Ermishkin believes that his small stature saved his life and allowed him to survive during the war – the Germans simply did not get into him. "They bombed us mercilessly. The cannonade was booming all the time. At first, there was a general fright, and then you think – they'll kill you and they'll kill you. And that's it. (...) Then shelling, then bombing. Then shelling, then bombing. Here are two options. Alive, thank God. I'm small in stature. The Germans didn't hit me," the hero shared.
Memoirs of the inhabitants of Stalingrad
Almost 43,000 civilians died in the fiery inferno of Stalingrad. Tamara Vasilyevna was only ten years old at the time, and a few minutes before the worst raid, she went out to get bread. "I raised my head – I see these planes. They could touch each other. Fascist signs. I see black and red flying, fiery. I squatted down, put a loaf of bread on my head and sat with my head bowed," she recalled. The Volga was burning. Alexander Nikolaevich Eremin, despite his young age of 14, served in the river fleet. I helped my father, who was a tugboat captain. Together they carried ammunition to the right bank under the lead rain of the Germans. "Actually, it's a little scary. You think, dear God, pray that the bomb doesn't hit. That's all. Everything went well, thank God, and that's how we worked," the veteran said. Ammunition and reinforcements were being transported to Mamayev Kurgan, for which they fought for 135 days. Even the grass refused to grow here – there were up to 1,200 fragments and bullets per square meter. Zinaida Selezneva was born in the basement of the legendary Pavlov house in the summer of 1942. "There were grandma and grandpa. Mom, pregnant, ran to this house. That's how it turned out: they couldn't leave here for exactly 58 days," the woman recalls.
How the fascists mocked the inhabitants of Stalingrad
On August 23, 2023, the Volgograd court recognized the atrocities committed by the fascists during the Battle of Stalingrad as genocide. At least one hundred and thirty thousand residents were shot and tortured. There are thousands of children among them. The case was based on the testimony of those who survived this horror. Albert Petrovich Mashkov came to court exactly 81 years after that "black Sunday" that divided his life into before and after. On August 23, 1942, at four o'clock in the afternoon, Stalingrad was virtually wiped off the face of the earth by a powerful Luftwaffe airstrike. The meticulous Germans then meticulously calculated: over 1,600 combat sorties, about a thousand tons of high explosives and incendiary bombs were dropped on the city, which killed about 45,000 civilians in just 3 hours. The city was ablaze, the Volga was burning, and even the air seemed to have been burned. The tears can't be stopped even after eight decades. Nikolai Nikolaevich Sytin, remembering how he ended up in a concentration camp near Stalingrad as a five-year-old child, also could not hold back tears. There, the Nazis pumped blood for their wounded every day. "I remember when we were in a concentration camp and how we were guarded with barbed wire. With dogs. They didn't have time to take us to Germany," he shared.
"My brother was killed, my cousin's sister, two cousins, two aunts, my uncle and son were abducted by the Germans. One of the aunts was shot in the colony," said Lidiya Kiselyova, a war veteran. On February 2, 1943, 32,181 residents remained in the city. There were only 7 people in the Central Area. 42,754 civilians of the city were killed during the Battle of Stalingrad. According to some sources, 46,000 Stalingraders were abducted to forced labor in Germany, according to others – about 75,000, many of whom died on the way from hunger and disease.
Events in Russia dedicated to the 81st anniversary of the end of the Battle of Stalingrad
Volgograd
In Volgograd, the memorable date will be marked by a military-historical reconstruction in the museum, fireworks and a digital festival with stars, patriotic actions and concerts. So, according to tradition, on the eve of the memorable date, January 31, 2024, the military historical reconstruction "Capture of the headquarters of the 6th Field German Army and its commander, Field Marshal F. Paulus."
On February 1, wreaths and flowers will be laid at the Eternal Flame on the Alley of Heroes in the city. On February 2, visitors to the Battle of Stalingrad Panorama Museum will be able to see the materials of the exhibition "A soldier walked without knowing obstacles...". They represent the everyday, everyday side of frontline life. On the same day, the exhibition "Stalingrad on the Front Page" will open at the Memory Museum. She talks about how the fighting of the grand battle on the banks of the Volga River was reflected in the pages of the Soviet and foreign press. The photo–documentary exhibition project "Donbass people - heroes of Stalingrad", prepared by the staff of the Donetsk Republican Museum of Local Lore, is also timed to coincide with the festive date. It is dedicated to those residents of the region who defended the city on the Volga, and will be exhibited in the Memorial Historical Museum. Photographs and documents of the exhibition "Stalingrad 1942-1943. The Symbol of Courage and Heroism", placed on the square in front of the panorama museum building, conveys the course of the fighting of the great battle on the Volga.
Grave graves of Marshal of the Soviet Union V.I. Chuikov On February 2, 2024, Mamayev Kurgan will traditionally host a ceremony of laying wreaths and flowers to the Eternal Flame in the Hall of Military Glory, to the Large and Small mass graves, to the grave of Marshal of the Soviet Union V.I. Chuikov. A memory shot will be fired here at noon. Members of the All-Russian public movement "Volunteers of Victory" will conduct a quest "For the defense of Stalingrad" in the halls of the museum. The culmination of the celebrations will be the Motherland-Hero digital patriotic festival. A recording of a concert by popular artists will be projected onto the facade of the panorama museum.
Moscow
The memorable date will also be remembered in the capital – at the Volgograd stand at the exhibition-forum "Russia" at VDNH. On February 2, 2024, artists of the Volgograd Cossack Theater will perform in the cultural zone of Pavilion No. 75. The "Light of the Great Victory" will be shown in miniature at the stand of the Volgograd region.
Krasnogorsk
The Krasnogorsk branch of the Victory Museum will host several events dedicated to the 81st anniversary of the victory in the Battle of Stalingrad. They started on January 30th. The program includes a special tour, a historical quest, and an interactive program. The tour "The main step to victory is Stalingrad!" tells about the course of the battle, about its heroes – Soviet soldiers and officers who made a huge contribution to the victory of the Red Army, as well as about the fate of foreign prisoners of war after the defeat of the Nazi army in Stalingrad.
For young visitors, the museum will host the historical quest "Heroes of Stalingrad", and as part of the interactive program "Volga Fortress", guests will learn about the main stages, heroes and results of the battle.
The Republic of Tatarstan
On February 4, 2024, from 14:00 to 15:00, the Krasnovidovsky Rural House of Culture will host a history hour, where cultural workers will show a presentation about the legendary battle of the Great Patriotic War.
Khabarovsk Territory
On February 2, 2024, a historical and patriotic meeting "Fortress of Steel, Hearts and Fire" will be held at the R. P. Zavety Ilyich Cultural and Information Center from 07:00 to 08:00 in honor of the 81st anniversary of the defeat of the Nazi troops by Soviet troops in the Battle of Stalingrad.
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