With the defeat of Operation Fortress in 1943, the German army on the Eastern Front had completely turned into a strategic defense, the once proud "blitzkrieg" offensive tactics had lost the stage, and what the German army urgently needed now was a variety of effective defensive tactics. Because the northern and central fronts have been relatively stable, the German army has time to build a solid defense position in depth, and in the continuous change of the southern front, the German army has not had time to build a strong defensive line, nor has enough troops to defend, so the German army on the southern flank has been implementing the mobile defense tactics advocated by Manstein. However, with the departure of Manstein, Kleist, and others in 1944, the idea of mobile warfare was announced, and the entire German army on the Eastern Front began to carry out tenacious hard defensive tactics according to Hitler's orders.
Commander of the German Army Group South, Manstein
< h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > german defense-in-depth system</h1>
After more than a year of defense, the German army has summed up a lot of experience in defensive operations, and the most important lesson drawn is to increase the depth of defense as much as possible, so that the Soviet army cannot quickly obtain the freedom of the campaign, because the strength of the German army in the rapid force is far inferior to the Soviet army. In 1944, the Soviet Army had formed 7 powerful tank armies, and several german armored armies had already made their appearances, in fact, no different from ordinary infantry groups, all deployed in the first line of defensive operations, the German army had no group-level rapid reserves on the Eastern Front.
German armored unit equipped with Panther tanks
In 1944, in order to prevent the Breakthrough of the Soviet Army, the German army expanded the depth of defense to 80-120 kilometers, divided into tactical defensive terrain (10-20 km) and campaign defensive terrain (60-100 km), both of which consisted of a continuous system of communication trenches and constructed a sound fortification and firepower system. The main German defensive force (80%) was deployed in the tactical defensive area, which was divided into forward positions and main defensive zones (also known as large-scale combat lines), the forward positions were mainly used to warn and prevent soviet ground reconnaissance operations, and the main defensive zone was the area where the Germans carried out large-scale battles, where the Germans would implement stubborn resistance.
German machine gun positions
The campaign defensive terrain is mainly composed of military reserve positions, generally divided into two defensive zones, with certain defensive fortifications, because the German army has no additional troops to occupy these defensive zones, it is necessary for the troops who have retreated from the tactical defensive terrain to enter these positions to truly form a defensive line, so the so-called campaign defensive terrain is actually an unincorporated air defense line, and only some tactical reserves are defended in some parts. Generally speaking, the military reserves are held in the first defensive zone, and the group army and group reserves of the group army are held in the second defensive zone.
German Assault Artillery Unit
It can be seen that although the defense depth of the German position is as high as hundreds of kilometers, but the real army is only 20 kilometers deep tactical defense area, the German army will generally carry out full defense here, once the tactical defense area is broken, the preferred plan is to put into the armored reserve to implement a counter-impact, only when it is determined that it can not be retaken will retreat to the battle defense area.
< h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > soviet breakthrough tactics</h1>
Experience has proved that it is very difficult to break through the enemy's prepared defensive positions, and the attacking troops will pay a high price, the Soviet army is the best at defense, and naturally knows the difficulty of breaking through the solid defense. The Soviet army's solution to the breakthrough problem was also very simple and crude, that is, to concentrate the superiority of troops and weapons in the direction of breakthrough as much as possible, and directly smash the German defense line like a "giant hammer". In simple terms, the infantry units of the Soviet Army for the breakthrough mission were equipped with a large number of artillery and tank units to comprehensively suppress the German defensive positions and force the breakthrough from the front.
The Soviet infantry and tanks coordinated the attack
Soviet artillery doctrine was developed in the breakthrough campaign, by concentrating a large number of artillery on the breakthrough area to form an absolute fire superiority, destroying or suppressing the German fire support point, and covering the actions of the attacking troops. The Soviet artillery offensive options stipulated: "To ensure that infantry and tanks carrying out assaults are supported by artillery throughout the impact period, not just at the beginning of the battle." "The Soviet artillery offensive will be divided into three phases:
1. Artillery preparation stage: preliminary bombardment of the discovered German positions.
2. Artillery Support Phase: The attacking forces begin to attack, at which time the artillery will continue to carry out concentrated bombardment of german positions, and as the Soviets advance, they will begin to shoot at the depth of the enemy's tactics.
3. Artillery escort stage: The advance of the Soviet breakthrough force has exceeded the support range of the artillery, and the artillery will follow the breakthrough force forward and continue to provide artillery cover for the breakthrough troops.
Soviet "Katyusha" rocket artillery group
It was not enough for the Soviet breakthrough operation to rely solely on a large number of artillery, but also to provide sufficient tank support for the impact infantry, and the direct fire of the tanks directly suppressed or destroyed the remaining fire points of the German army, especially the machine gun fire points that posed a major threat to the infantry, and the German army would often deploy a large number of machine gun positions on the positions, and only the tanks could ignore these machine gun positions to force an attack. In view of the fact that the Germans would also deploy many anti-tank guns on the positions, the density of tanks and self-propelled guns had to be increased so that the German anti-tank firepower could not cope.
Soviet heavy self-propelled howitzer
< H1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > limited retreat tactics of the Germans</h1>
The Soviet breakthrough tactics were not perfect, the German army found that the most serious threat to it was the Soviet artillery strength, because the front line fortifications were mainly composed of field fortifications, such fortifications were difficult to absolutely resist the bombardment of artillery, the Soviet high-intensity artillery bombardment caused serious damage to the German infantry, so that the German defense ability was greatly weakened, unable to resist the incoming Soviet impact troops. To this end, the German army adopted a "limited retreat tactic", that is, the main defensive position was more rear-deployed, at least outside the range of the Soviet medium and below artillery, the vast majority of Soviet artillery was 82/120 mm mortars and 76 mm field guns, the effective range was 2-9 kilometers, could not cover the full depth of the German tactical defense area, so that when the Soviet shock force advanced to the main German defensive zone, only a few heavy artillery could provide fire cover, and the fire intensity of the Soviet army was greatly reduced. Of course, the Soviet ground attack aircraft can make up for the lack of artillery firepower to a certain extent, and suppress the heavy fire targets of the German army in time, but it cannot be continuously suppressed (such as weather effects), and the use effect is not as good as that of the artillery.
< h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > soviet improvements to breakthrough tactics</h1>
Since the Soviet artillery, which was mainly light artillery, could no longer ensure adequate suppression of German firepower, the Soviet army began to equip the impact infantry with more direct fire such as tanks and self-propelled guns to ensure the cover strength of the fire. A Soviet infantry division will be supported by 2-3 tank regiments and 2-3 self-propelled artillery regiments when carrying out the breakthrough mission, so that the Soviets will put in 42-75 tanks and self-propelled guns on a one-kilometer front, and the large-caliber guns installed on Soviet tanks and self-propelled guns will provide timely support fire instead of towed artillery.
Soviet Tank Army Group
The Soviets believed that it was not enough to break through the German defenses, and that it was necessary to achieve a high-speed breakthrough so that the Germans were not given time to use reserves to close the breakthrough or redeploy, that is, the speed of the attack was equally important. The Soviet offensive forces will inevitably suffer large casualties when attacking the German positions, which will lead to a decrease in attack power, so the Soviet army requires the echelon deployment of the attacking troops, and when the offensive ability of the first echelon declines, the second echelon is immediately put into the second echelon to maintain the speed of the attack. With the rapid opening of the breakthrough, the powerful tank army will rush from the breakthrough to the deep rear of the German army, carrying out a large-depth encirclement attack, forcing the German army to turn into a mobile war, and those German infantry divisions with large numbers and low mobility will not be able to escape the Soviet encirclement, and without these infantry divisions the German army will not be able to rebuild the defense line, thus causing the collapse of the entire German defense line.
Soviet armored forces
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > summary</h1>
Simply put, defense is a stronger way of fighting than offense, and it is an effective way for weak armies to fight superior enemies. However, because the defensive side has lost the initiative, it can only passively cope with the attack, and the offensive side can concentrate superior forces in local areas to offset the opponent's defensive advantages, thereby breaking the balance of attack and defense. Therefore, from a strategic point of view, maintaining the offensive and taking the initiative is the strongest way of fighting, only the offensive can win, and the passive defense can only delay the arrival of defeat and cannot achieve the final victory. Although the German army has been improving its defensive tactics, but the initiative of the battlefield has always been in the hands of the Soviet army, the Soviet army can always find the weak point of the German defense to launch an attack (the wide eastern battlefield is particularly easy), the German army may be able to achieve some tactical defensive victories, but in the strategic, campaign will inevitably fail.