![]() Luftflotte 2 had only 549 serviceable machines, including 158 medium and dive-bombers and 172 fighters, available for Operation Typhoon. German aerial strength, however, had been severely reduced over the summer's campaign the Luftwaffe had lost 1,603 aircraft and 1,028 had been damaged. Up to two million German troops were committed to the operation, along with 1,000–2,470 tanks and assault guns and 14,000 guns. The forces committed to Operation Typhoon included three infantry armies (the 2nd, 4th, and 9th) supported by three Panzer (tank) Groups (the 2nd, 3rd and 4th) and by the Luftwaffe 's Luftflotte 2. With the end of summer, Hitler redirected his attention to Moscow and assigned Army Group Centre to this task. The move was successful, resulting in the loss of nearly 700,000 Red Army personnel killed, captured, or wounded by 26 September, and further advances by Axis forces. But Hitler overruled his generals in favor of pocketing the Soviet forces around Kiev in the south, followed by the seizure of Ukraine. This view was shared by most within the German high command. Franz Halder, head of the Army General Staff, was also convinced that a drive to seize Moscow would be victorious after the German Army inflicted enough damage on the Soviet forces. When Walther von Brauchitsch, Commander-in-Chief of the Army, supported a direct thrust to Moscow, he was told that "only ossified brains could think of such an idea". He felt this could be accomplished by seizing the economic resources of Ukraine east of Kiev. įurther information: Battle of Moscow order of battleįor Hitler, the Soviet capital was secondary, and he believed the only way to bring the Soviet Union to its knees was to defeat it economically. When that advance resumed on 30 September 1941, German forces had been weakened, while the Soviets had raised new forces for the defence of the city. ![]() This delayed the German advance on Moscow. In part to address these risks, and to attempt to secure Ukraine's food and mineral resources, Hitler ordered the attack to turn north and south to eliminate Soviet forces at Leningrad and Kiev. Īt this stage, although Moscow was vulnerable, an offensive against the city would have exposed the German flanks. On 15 July 1941, German forces captured Smolensk, an important stronghold on the road to Moscow. By July 1941, Army Group Centre crossed the Dnieper River, on the path to Moscow. ![]() The German Army Group North moved towards Leningrad, Army Group South took control of Ukraine, and Army Group Centre advanced towards Moscow. On 22 June 1941, Axis forces invaded the Soviet Union, destroyed most of the Soviet Air Force on the ground, and advanced deep into Soviet territory using blitzkrieg tactics to destroy entire Soviet armies. Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion plan, called for the capture of Moscow within four months. As a result of the failed offensive, Field Marshal Walther von Brauchitsch was dismissed as supreme commander of the German Army, with Hitler replacing him in the position.įinal Wehrmacht advance – to 5 December 1941 It was a major setback for the Germans, and the end of their belief in a swift German victory over the USSR. As the German offensives were halted, a Soviet strategic counter-offensive and smaller-scale offensive operations forced the German armies back to the positions around the cities of Oryol, Vyazma and Vitebsk, and nearly surrounded three German armies. Initially, the Soviet forces conducted a strategic defence of the Moscow Oblast by constructing three defensive belts, deploying newly raised reserve armies, and bringing troops from the Siberian and Far Eastern Military Districts. The German Strategic Offensive, named Operation Typhoon, called for two pincer offensives, one to the north of Moscow against the Kalinin Front by the 3rd and 4th Panzer Armies, simultaneously severing the Moscow–Leningrad railway, and another to the south of Moscow Oblast against the Western Front south of Tula, by the 2nd Panzer Army, while the 4th Army advanced directly towards Moscow from the west. Moscow was one of the primary military and political objectives for Axis forces in their invasion of the Soviet Union. The Soviet defensive effort frustrated Hitler's attack on Moscow, the capital and largest city of the Soviet Union. The Battle of Moscow was a military campaign that consisted of two periods of strategically significant fighting on a 600 km (370 mi) sector of the Eastern Front during World War II, between September 1941 and January 1942.
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