Tank Warfare on the Eastern Front, 1941-1942: Schwerpunkt

Model’s forces suffered heavy losses during Operation Mars, but no German units were destroyed or rendered combat ineffective. Yet despite Model’s efficient battle command and defensive tactics, his forces only prevailed because Heeresgruppe Mitte was able to commit six panzer divisions to help hold the Rzhev salient – which was one-third of all the available armoured units on the Eastern Front. Even after defeating Zhukov’s offensive, Model still needed thirty German divisions to hold the Rzhev salient, which was no longer affordable in light of the unfolding disaster with AOK 6 at Stalingrad. After his victory. Model recommended that AOK 9 evacuate the Rzhev salient in order to free up units for operations elsewhere, which Hitler reluctantly began to seriously consider but did not approve until February 1943.

Deep Battle, 16–30 December

Even before implementing Operation Uranus, General-polkovnik Aleksandr M. Vasilevsky, the Stavka director of operations, was developing plans for the next phase of the Soviet winter counter-offensive, which was initially designated Operation Saturn.

Vasilevsky had the best skills for operational planning in the Soviet general staff and he was a student of pre-war Deep Battle theory as described by Triandafillov, Tukhachevsky and Isserson and codified in the prewar PU-36 regulations. He believed that with proper planning, the Red Army of 1942 was capable of conducting the kind of Deep Battle operation envisioned by pre-war theory and that if successful, the next offensive could lead to the disintegration and destruction of the entire Heeresgruppe Don. Vasilevsky envisioned a two-phase offensive, with the 1st and 3rd Guards Armies from General-leytenant Nikolai Vatutin’s Southwest Front smashing the Italian 8th Army, while Romanenko’s 5th Tank Army defeated Armee-Abteilung Hollidt in the first phase, followed by the commitment of the 2nd Guards Army to exploit toward Rostov in the second phase. Operation Saturn was far more ambitious than any previous Soviet offensives and expected advances of up to 250km. Vatutin’s main effort would be General-leytenant Vasiliy I. Kuznetsov’s 1st Guards Army, which had four tank corps (17, 18, 24, 25) with 533 tanks (320 T-34, 161 T-70, fifty-two T-60) and eight rifle divisions. General-leytenant Dmitri D. Lelyushenko’s 3rd Guards Army had seven rifle divisions, the 1st Guards Mechanized Corps and a tank brigade, with a total of 234 tanks.⁹³ Vatutin’s forces would have a 10–1 superiority in armour and 7–1 superiority in artillery in the chosen attack sectors.

Due to Operation Wintergewitter, Vasilevsky had to send his exploitation force – Malinovsky’s 2nd Guards Army – to stop Hoth’s panzers and Romanenko’s sub-par performance against XXXXVIII Panzerkorps on the Chir River reduced his ability to contribute to Vasilevsky’s new offensive. Consequently, on 13 December Vasilevsky was forced to scale back the operation, which was redesignated Little Saturn, but his intent remained to demolish General Italo Gariboldi’s (Italian) 8th Army on Heeresgruppe Don’s left flank, then push strong armoured forces toward Heeresgruppe Don’s lines of communication and the airfields involved in the Stalingrad airlift. The ultimate prize was Rostov, which would result in the isolation of Heeresgruppe A in the Caucasus.

Operation Uranus was a wake-up call for the Germans and von Manstein was aware of the vulnerability of Gariboldi’s 8th Army, but he could send few resources other than the 298.Infanterie-Division, Sturmgeschütz-Abteilung 201 and a few 8.8cm flak guns to stiffen the Italian-held sector. Gariboldi’s 8th Army had very limited armour support; just the LXVII Battaglione Bersaglieri corazzato (67th Bersaglieri Armoured Battalion) with fifty-eight L6/40 light tanks armed with 20mm cannon, and the XIII Gruppo Semoventi, Reggimento Cavallegeri Alessandria (Alexandria Cavalry Regiment) with nineteen Sermoventi 47/32 self-propelled guns, armed with a 47mm gun.⁹⁴ None of the Italian armoured fighting vehicles had a chance against the T-34, nor did the primary Italian antitank gun, the 47mm, offer an effective defense against Soviet armour. In order to make up for the weakness of Italian armour, von Manstein provided Oberst Hans Tröger’s incomplete 27.Panzer-Division as an on-call mobile reserve for Gariboldi; this formation consisted of only one Panzer-Abteilung (sixty-five tanks), two Panzer-grenadier battalions, a Panzerjäger-Abteilung and two artillery battalions. Tröger’s panzers included seven different tank types, but only ten Pz.IIIL/M and five Pz.IVG offered any real ability to stop Soviet armour.