The Road to Berlin (163 page)

IVMV
, 10, pt 1, ch. 2(3), Vistula–Oder operation, operational narrative, German losses put at 35 divisions destroyed, 147,000 prisoners, pp. 70–88; ch. 3(2), E Prussian operations, pp. 99–111. (More terse, restrained account than
IV0VSS
, 5).

‘Vislo–Oderskaya operatsiya v tsifrakh’,
VIZ
, 1965 (1), pp. 71–81. (Vistula–Oder operation, statistical information/tables, strength/deployments, command (down to corps).)

Babadzhanyan, A.Kh.
et al., Lyuki otkryli v Berline
(1st Guards Tank Army), pp. 231–49, Vistula–Oder operation, drive to Poznan, one brigade assigned to blockading force, drive to the German frontier. (Operational narrative based on Soviet military archives.) See also Marshal (Tank Troops) A. Babadzhanyan,
Dorogi pobedy
(Moscow: Mol. Gvardiya, 2nd edn 1975), pp. 212–36, Vistula–Oder operation. (A racy, highly personalized account with Babadzhanyan as corps commander.)

Blinov, S.I.,
Ot Visly do Odera
, p. 58–125, 60th Army operations, drive on Cracow. (Detailed operational narrative.)

Galitskii, K.N.,
V boyakh za Vostochnuyu Prussiyu
, pp. 218–25, 11th Guards Army operations, unsuccessful start Jan. 13, operations with 5th Army, assigned to junction 39th and 5th Army, advance on Wehlau, drive on Insterburg. (Extremely detailed operational narrative by 11th Guards commander, frank and full disclosures of shortcomings, useful and illuminating ‘cross-checking’ with post-war German records, ‘captured documents’, including Third
Panzer
materials.)

Gladysh, Colonel S., ‘2-ya udarnaya armiya v Vostochno–Prusskoi operatsii’,
VIZ
, 1975 (2), pp. 20–28. (Detailed operational narrative/analysis, 2nd Shock Army/E Prussia, Jan. 45.)

Kharitonov, A.D.,
Gumbinnenskii proryv
(28th Army operations), pp. 60–95, Soviet breakthrough, fall of Gumbinnen, beginning of drive westwards.

Kir’yan, M.M.,
S Sandomirskovo platsdarma
, pp. 95–158, breakthrough and pursuit, 5th Guards Army, ‘Czestochowa axis’. (Extremely detailed narrative.)

Koniev, I.S.,
Year of Victory
, pp. 17–45, break-out 1st Ukrainian Front, rapid advance on Cracow, problem of taking Silesian industrial area, wide envelopment with armour, force Germans out of encirclement into open country, success of Rybalko (3rd Guards Tank) and Lelyushenko (4th Tank), Silesian trap closed, link with 1st Belorussian Front, Oder bridgeheads.

Korovnikov, Col.-Gen. I., ‘Udar na Krakov’,
VIZ
, 1975 (1), pp. 51–6. (59th Army operations, Cracow.)

Matsulenko, V, ‘Operativnaya maskirovka voisk v Vislo–Oderskoi operatsii’,
VIZ
, 1975 (1), pp. 10–21. (Deception/camouflage, Vistula–Oder operation.)

Platonov, Lt.-Gen. S., ‘Kratkii obzor veonnykh deistvii’,
VIZ
, 1964 (2), pp. 14–24. (Soviet operations in Poland; see also Maj.-Gen. Pavlenko, on Soviet military art, pp. 25–36.)

Radzievskii, General A., ‘Stremitel’nye deistviya tankovykh armii’,
VIZ
, 1965 (1), pp. 8–15. (On tank army operations, Vistula–Oder.)

Rokossovskii, K.K.,
A Soldier’s Duty
. On the first phase of Jan. offensive, weather precludes air support, improvement Jan. 16, breakthrough from Lomza to mouth of Narew, thrust for the Vistula, pp. 276–80. ‘On two fronts’, Jan. 20 orders to turn N and NE into E Prussia, ‘complete surprise’ and total change of plans (from directive of Nov. 28/44), many errors of judgement in planning E Prussian campaign, problem of lagging behind Zhukov, rebuke from Zhukov for this, 50th Army failure to detect German withdrawal, fall of Marienburg, Elbing unsuccessfully rushed, German blow Jan. 26, danger to 48th Army, movement of Volskii’s tanks, Oslikovskii’s cavalry to the rescue, on conduct of Soviet troops, call for ‘highest discipline’, pp. 281–9.

Rokossovskii, K.K., ‘Na berlinskom i vostochno-prusskom napravleniyakh’,
VIZ
, 1965 (2), pp. 25–8. (Interview, on E Prussian operation, on the conduct of Soviet troops—‘violation of prescribed norms’.)

Vysotskii, F.I.,
Gvardeiskaya tankovaya
(2nd Guards Tank Army), pp. 147–56, 2nd Guards Tank, Vistula–Oder operation.

Zhukov, G.K.,
Vospominaniya …
, vol. 2, pp. 294–8, successful breakthrough, German withdrawal from Warsaw,
Stavka
directive Jan. 17, Zhukov–Stalin discussion Jan. 25 (p. 297), Zhukov request not to stop his offensive, blockade of Poznan, redeployment to face possible threat from E Pomerania.

Polish materials

Dolata, B.,
Wyzwolenie Polski 1944–1945
, pt II, pp. 95–233, operations 2nd and 3rd Belorussian Fronts, 1st Belorussian Front, Polish forces, liberation of Warsaw, 1st Ukrainian Front operations/Silesia, pp. 95–233. (Extremely detailed operational narrative, with enormously detailed appendix on the military chronology, communiques, Soviet–Polish formations/units with commanders.)

Poplawski, General S., ‘1-ya armiya Voiska Pol’skovo v boyakh za Varshavu’,
VIZ
, 1965 (1), pp. 47–53 (1st Polish Army, Warsaw, Jan. 45). See also
Towarzysze frontowych drόg
(Warsaw: MON 1965), ch. XI, liberation of Warsaw, p. 172.

Slawecki, R.,
Manewr ktόry ocalil Krakόw
(Cracow: Wydaw. Lit., 2nd edn 1971). Collection of materials (including Soviet memoirs), liberation of Cracow, 1st Ukrainian Front (60th Army).

Sobczak, K.,
Wyzwolenie pόlnocnych i zachodnich ziem polskich w roku 1945
(Poznan: Wydaw. Poznanskie 1971). See chs II-IV, Soviet–Polish operations Jan. 45. (Political and military narrative, using variety of archival materials.)

On ‘the Berlin axis’ pp.
469
–
476

Note:
With respect to the ‘battle of Berlin’, I had the opportunity to discuss and explore both the planning and the execution with senior Soviet commanders, as well as having access to the relevant Soviet documentation
(Stavka
directives, operational orders, war diaries, etc.). The conversations and exchanges I duly recorded and preserved in my OW ‘MOSCOW notebooks’, While the documentation speaks for itself. One example may suffice: it was possible to conduct a lengthy review with Marshal Koniev of his own initial operational plan (submitted to the General Staff, January 28) involving a thrust on to Berlin, the point being the discrepancy between
Stavka
provision that only the right flank of 1st Ukrainian Front would be so involved while Marshal Koniev had the ‘main body’ of his Front in mind (with orders properly formulated and prescribed). By the ‘main body’ Marshal Koniev was clearly thinking of his tank armies (3rd and 4th Tank Armies under Rybalko and Lelyushenko), operating under a specific operational design long contemplated and well formulated, hence Marshal Koniev’s rebuke to me for suggesting that he ‘swung’ (the verb was
povernut’)
his armies about. His ‘January plan’ made full planned provision for such movement, thus diminishing if not actually resolving an apparent contradiction, for Marshal Koniev was steadily shifting his main weight to the right flank, thus making his ‘right-flank forces’ virtually synonymous with his ‘main force’. My own impression was that Marshal Koniev had duly registered Berlin as ‘his’ target in these late January days and planned accordingly. By the same .oken it was important to have Marshal Rokossovskii’s own commentary upon and elucidation of his command decisions and assessments—and so to quite a number of Soviet commanders.

KTB/GMD

OKH/GenStdH/Op. Abt
. KTB Anlagen: signals/reports,
Festungen Glogau, Posen
(details of strength, weapons) for February 1945. See under T-78/R304, 6255440–785.

FH0(I)
. Signals Heeresgruppe Kurland; telegrams Heeresgr. Nord, Festungskommandant Danzig/also Königsberg, Armeeabteilung Samland. T-78/R477, 6459238–837.

Soviet materials

Bagramyan, I.Kh.,
Kak shli my k pobede
, pp. 511–17, operation
Zemland
(Samland), blockading of German forces, prospect of further German heavy resistance, Chernyakhovskii reports Stalin’s concern that Rendulic (commander Army Group North) might be able to withdraw in good order, hence orders to eliminate German Fourth Army, pen-portrait of commander 11th Guards Army (Galitskii), problem of diminished Soviet strength, lack of tanks, death of Chernyakhovskii.

Chuikov, V.I.,
The End of the Third Reich
(translation), ch. VII, on miscalculations, Chuikov’s celebrated—or notorious—assertions that an assault on Berlin in February was quite feasible: that the Supreme Command displayed ‘excessive caution’, especially with respect to the threat from Pomerania; that there were sufficient forces with Zhukov’s 1st Belorussian Front to strike on Berlin (five armies, plus 3–4 from 1st Ukrainian Front), while the concern for 1st Belorussian Front right flank was ‘groundless’ (p. 117); that Zhukov’s ‘orientation’ was, in fact, disorientation (although Chuikov does point in this version to serious logistical shortcomings). In this account also Chuikov recounts a command meeting with Zhukov (Feb. 6), a meeting interrupted by Stalin’s telephone call and Zhukov’s sudden ‘postponement’ of the Berlin attack. See also V.I. Chuikov, ‘Kapitulyatsiya gitlerovskii Germanii’,
Novaya i noveishaya istoriya
, 1965, No. 2, p. 6, where this meeting is dated February 4, but with the same interruption from Stalin. (Zhukov demolished this in devastating fashion.) A completely revised version has now been supplied in Chuikov’s
Ot Stalingrada do Berlina
, pp. 563–69, citing Zhukov’s order/directive Jan. 26, also the directive of Feb. 4 (with a fresh insertion on Franco–Hoare conversations!). In general, this volume conforms to the general thesis of the threat from Pomerania and the need to redeploy 1st Belorussian Front to meet it.

Galitskii, K.N.,
V boyakh za Vostochnuyu Prussiyu
, pp. 306–28, 11th Guards Army, Frisches Haff, German counterblows against left flank 11th Guards, heavy German losses (Third
Panzer)
but 11th Guards badly mauled (12 Feb. divisions down to 3,500–4,500 men, companies reduced to 20–35 men, p. 327), already Feb. 9 Front commander ordered turn to defensive, preparations for a full assault on Königsberg, 11th Guards regroups.

Koniev, I.S.,
Year of Victory (Moscow)
, pp. 50–51, from the Oder to the Neisse, planning of Lower Silesian operation late Jan. 45, initial plan submitted Jan. 28—encirclement of Breslau, drive with ‘main group’ on to Berlin—encirclement of Breslau and Glogau completed, impossible to carry through ‘Lower Silesian operation’ to its full depth.

Vorob’ev, F.D., Parotkin, I.V. and Shimanskii, A.N.,.
Poslednii shturm (Berlinskaya operatsiya 1945 g.)
(Moscow: Voenizdat, 2nd edn 1975). See pp. 39–42, on
Stavka
strategic design/evaluation, decisions at Front level: analysis at end Jan. 45 led Soviet command to believe in feasibility of rapid thrust on Berlin (p. 40), General Staff operational map duly ‘marked up’ Jan. 19 with Berlin as objective and to be taken by 1st Belorussian Front, but to avoid blundering the
Stavka
did not take a final decision, asked for news of Front commanders once Soviet troops on Bromberg–Poznan–Breslau line, Zhukov and Koniev submitted operational appreciations (Jan. 26 and Jan. 28 respectively), both received
Stavka
approval Jan. 27 and Jan. 29; beginning Feb. growing concern over threat from E Pomerania, danger to flank and rear of 1st Belorussian Front, 33 German divisions in E Pomerania (13 on ‘the Berlin axis’), 1st Belorussian Front forces perforce swung northwards leaving Zhukov with only 3½ armies pointed along the Berlin axis, also heavy losses incurred by 1st Belorussian Front and 1st Ukrainian Front (divisional strength down to 4,000–5,000 men), logistical difficulties and shortages particularly ammunition. (This is certainly the standard Soviet work on the Berlin operation; it is also one which affirms the ‘Zhukov line’ and is presumably intended to sweep away all traces of Chuikov’s assertions about the feasibility of a February thrust on Berlin.)