Tank Warfare on the Eastern Front 1943-1945: Red Steamroller

By early April, the situation along the Panther Line had stabilized for Heeresgruppe Nord. The defence of Narva was difficult and resource-consuming, but the fanatical defence of the city brought Govorov’s advance to a halt. The Soviets became too engrossed with taking Narva, rather than pressing hard at other sectors of the Heeresgruppe Nord front. Consequently, the rest of AOK 16 and AOK 18 were able to establish a new defensive line on the border of Estonia, although the army group lacked mobile reserves. As it was, the Leningrad Front came close to breaking Heeresgruppe Nord in February and it was the lack of large armoured mobile groups that reduced the scale of the Soviet victory. With all the tank armies committed to the Ukraine, Govorov and Meretskov had to make due with combining various tank brigades and regiments into ad hoc groups, which was little better than the Red Army tactics of 1941–42. For the Germans, it was equally unnerving to realize how little armoured support they had when a positional campaign transitioned to mobile warfare.

The Evisceration of Heeresgruppe Süd, January–March 1944

There was no pause in Vatutin’s offensive as January 1944 began and his troops succeeded in capturing Berdichev and Belaya Tserkov by 5 January. Vatutin had created a large gap between Heeresgruppe Süd and Heeresgruppe Mitte north of Korosten, into which Vatutin sent three infantry armies, but he had no tanks for exploitation in this sector. Rybalko’s 3 GTA was reduced to only 59 operational tanks by 8 January and was soon pulled out of the line to refit, leaving Katukov’s 1 TA to continue the advance.⁶ During the first 10 days of January 1944, Vatutin lost 314 tanks and then another 294 in the next ten days. A steady stream of tank replacements kept Vatutin’s armour advancing, but just barely. Meanwhile, Zhukov directed Vatutin and Konev toward a singular goal, which was a massive pincer effort to push back both PzAOK 1 and PzAOK 4 in order to encircle and destroy the German salient near Cherkassy. Recognizing that the front was collapsing, von Manstein pleaded with Hitler to allow him to pull back from the Dnepr in order to create a new front, but this was refused. Hitler regarded the propaganda value of holding part of the Dnepr line as more important than the military value of conserving his remaining forces. Unable to withdraw, von Manstein opted to quietly begin shifting parts of Hube’s PzAOK 1 westward to shore up his broken left flank, held by the remnants of Raus’ PzAOK 4. Von Manstein conducted these transfers without authorization from the OKH and knowing that Wöhler’s AOK 8 would be hard-pressed to hold the right flank.

While Vatutin pushed Katukov’s armour toward the main German supply base at Uman and von Manstein’s headquarters at Vinnitsa, Konev began his own offensive against east of Kirovograd on the morning of 5 January. While the 5 GA and 53 Army achieved some success, Hube was able to prevent Konev’s first-echelon forces from breaking through his front and deftly used 11.Panzer-Division to mount local counter-attacks. Easily frustrated, particularly when Zhukov was looking over his shoulder, Konev committed Rotmistrov’s 5 GTA to the attack only two hours after the operation had begun.⁷ Rotmistrov’s armour ran straight into a still solid German defence and lost 139 tanks on the first day. Eventually, Konev shifted Rotmistrov’s 5 GTA to a more favorable axis on the second day of the operation, but continued to misuse his armour. Hube was force to evacuate Kirovograd on 8 January, but managed to not only maintain a coherent front, but also to transfer some forces to reinforce Raus’ PzAOK 4. Indeed, Hube was so steadfast that he was given command authority over the VII and XXXXII Armeekorps holding the Korsun salient on the Dnepr. Like von Manstein, Hube pleaded to evacuate the salient, but was ignored. Throughout mid-January, Vatutin and Konev continued to grind forward, slowly overwhelming one German-held town after another. Katukov’s 1 TA enjoyed the most success, threatening to overrun both Uman and Vinnitsa.