Operation Barbarossa and Germany's Defeat in the East (17 page)

That same morning
Fromm reported to
Halder that stocks of steel and non-ferrous metals were very low. As for food supplies Fromm remarked: ‘We'll muddle our way through 1941.’ The supply of rubber, vital to the production of tyres, was also proving ‘difficult’ and Fromm believed that new synthetics factories would be necessary. The next day General
Paulus highlighted the extent of the rubber shortage, informing Halder that ten panzer divisions were operating at 10 per cent below strength purely as a result of tyre wear. This, together with vehicles undergoing maintenance or repair, resulted in a figure of 20 per cent of wheeled vehicles out of commission.
¹
This was a worryingly high figure considering the army was not engaged in anything other than occupation and training duties.

The increasingly dire economic data also highlights the great dependency Germany had on produce and raw material shipments supplied by the
Soviet Union, raising still more questions about the wisdom of Barbarossa. Only seven of the thirty most important raw materials for the armaments industry were available to Germany in adequate quantities.
²
As early as September 1939 Hitler made it clear that time was working against him and that a long war would not favour Germany either militarily or economically. Speaking to Halder, the dictator stated: “‘Time” will, in general, work against us if we do not use it effectively. The economic means of the other side are stronger. The enemy can purchase and transport. Time does not work for us in the military sense either.’
³
A major study by Adam Tooze focusing on Nazi Germany's economy highlights the alarming shortages in oil, coal, food and industrial capacity for 1940–1941.
⁴
Given such dangerous prognoses, embarking on a major new war against the Soviet Union with
Britain still undefeated is perhaps the best indication of the hubris encompassing not only Hitler and party officials, but also the OKW, OKH, air force and certain quarters of the navy
.
Accordingly, it is not surprising that the Department of Foreign Armies East reinforced many of the disdainful preconceptions regarding the Red Army in its 1 January 1941 report. The report concluded:

The strength of the Red Army is based upon its great mass, the number of its weapons and the simplicity, toughness and courage of its soldiers. The weakness lies in the lack of training, which does not satisfy modern standards, and in the lack of organization, which is obvious in all areas.
⁵

Such notions were not without a basis in fact, but the tone entirely neglects the prospect of an enemy capable of offering sustained resistance, to say nothing of a level of co-ordination able to surprise or disrupt German intentions.

On 9 January 1941 Hitler gathered together many of his most senior commanders, as well as his foreign minister
Joachim von Ribbentrop, to deliver a sweeping survey of the progress of the war and outline his most recent political and strategic forecast. When he finally came to addressing the issue of Barbarossa his justification returned to the theme of defeating Britain, seeing the two as being integrally tied. Britain, Hitler explained, was simply holding out, hoping to build a continental block against Germany together with the Soviet Union and the
United States for which diplomatic preparations were already underway. The possibility of Soviet involvement, Hitler claimed, stiffened British resolve, but he predicted that the British would give in once their last potential continental ally was eliminated. The English had no interest in continuing
a war that offered no chance of victory and could only jeopardise their whole Empire. On the other hand, if Britain was to raise 40–50 divisions and the Soviets and Americans were to join the war, Germany would face a very difficult situation
. Up until that point, Hitler continued, he had always acted according to the principle of smashing his enemy's most important positions in order to advance a step. Following a war with the Soviet Union, Britain would either give in or Germany would face the ongoing struggle under more favourable circumstances. The elimination of the Soviet Union would also enable Japan to concentrate all of her power against the United States, impeding American
intervention in the European war.
⁶

Hitler described
Stalin as ‘the lord of Russia and a clever man’. He would not act openly against Germany but it would have to be assumed that, in situations already difficult for Germany, he would add to those difficulties. Stalin, Hitler presumed, clearly saw that a German victory would leave his nation in a very worrying position. The Soviet Union, Hitler therefore deemed, must be struck and it was better to undertake this now while the Soviet armed forces were leaderless, badly armed and before the development of the armaments industry, through foreign aid, had overcome many of its present difficulties. Hitler identified the time factor in the campaign as particularly important, while he described the
Red Army as ‘a headless clay colossus’. Yet Hitler also warned against complacency, insisting the Soviets were not to be under-estimated and that the German attack must proceed with great force. Under no circumstances should the front be simply pushed back, swift breakthroughs were necessary instead.

If
Hitler was determined to avoid under-estimation among his subordinates he certainly exhibited his own failings in this regard. Pointing to the great distances in the Soviet Union he claimed that these were nothing the German Wehrmacht had not already mastered. He then turned his audience's attention to the post-victory rewards, speaking of the reduction of the army to the benefit of armament production and the use of the newly-won territories for the relocation of the most important industry, safe from aerial attack. With this, Hitler assured: ‘Germany would be unassailable.’ In conclusion Hitler stated that, once in possession of the ‘immeasurable riches’ the Soviet Union offered, Germany would be in a position to wage war against continents and stand impervious to attack. If such an operation were carried through, Hitler predicted, ‘Europe would hold its breath’ (
werde Europa den Atem anhalten
).
⁷

Significantly,
Hitler referred to the ‘rapid severance of the Baltic region’ (
die rasche Abschneidung des Ostseeraums
) as ‘the most important task’ (
die wichtigste Aufgabe
) and for that reason the army's right wing north of the Pripet marshes (
Army Group Centre) was to be made especially strong. Furthermore, Hitler outlined his operational objectives listing in order of priority, ‘the annihilation of the Russian army, seizure of the most important industrial regions and the destruction of the remaining industrial regions’.
⁸
This again clearly relegated Moscow to a position of secondary importance. Yet members of the army asked no awkward questions and raised no objections. The operational objectives, the rationale for a second front and premise for victory were all accepted without the slightest utterance of disapproval.
⁹
Indeed, echoing Hitler, Jodl is said to have exclaimed shortly afterwards, ‘the Russian colossus will prove to be a pig's bladder, prick it and it will burst’.
¹⁰

On 28 January 1941
Halder hosted a conference of senior administrators in the army and Luftwaffe to consider preparations for Operation Barbarossa. Production of trucks, vital to the motorisation of the army and its tenuous logistical apparatus, still remained in a low priority category despite facing a 30 per cent shortfall in the projected quota.
¹¹
The conference opened with discussion of this shortfall, to which the expropriation of French army material and additional deliveries from
Switzerland were deemed the most practical immediate solutions.
¹²
Supply of tyres was another increasingly grave problem, forming an industrial bottleneck affecting not only new stocks but Germany's entire fleet of wheeled vehicles. General
Georg Thomas, Chief of the War Economy and Armaments Department, commented that they must have 13,000 tonnes of rubber a month although German industry could only process 7,300 tonnes. To make matters worse, current stocks would be expended by the end of February and replenishment was dependent on South American blockade runners and 12,000 tonnes of rubber ordered from Indochina. A further 25,000 tonnes had been bought from the French, but the
Japanese were proving reluctant to release the shipment. Fuel stocks were also dwindling with the situation being described as ‘serious’ and projections indicating current supply would suffice for the deployment of forces in the east and just two months of active operations.
¹³
The grim economic data attains an even more menacing significance given
that Halder, after hearing the foreboding assessment of his motorised transportation, made the astounding observation:

Speed
. No stopping! No waiting for the railroads. Everything must be achieved with the motor.
Increased motorisation
(as opposed to 1940)…Since the railway (through destruction, watercourses, different gauge) cannot be counted on for maintaining the pace, the
continuous operation
of supply depends upon the motor.
¹⁴

Only eight days earlier, on 20 January, following a similar meeting concerning preparations for Barbarossa which had ended without a conclusive result (and hence resulted in the current conference), Halder had drawn rather different conclusions regarding his re-supply problem.

Operational mission. Space – no pause; that alone guarantees victory. Continuous movement is a supply issue…Distances! Space relationships in the north…Complications through differing equipment types (troops, trucks, workshops). The railroads provide the only means to maintain the advance without additional transport.
¹⁵

It is probably not too much to assume that Halder's shifting deliberations on the issue, which in each instance disregarded the alternative for its apparent inadequacy, reflect the intractable nature of the problem for which no practical solution existed. Halder could see from the distances and the shortness of the campaigning season that the advance would have to be rapid and in response to his own question: ‘Why is an uninterrupted operation necessary?’ Halder afforded the answer: ‘We must destroy the Russian army without pause over the Dnepr–Duna line (500 kilometres into north Russia and other goals another 500 kilometres, in total 1,000 kilometres).’
¹⁶
Obviously Halder's reckoning between what ‘must’ and what
could
be achieved presented a differentiation he either could not identify or, in the light of his supreme confidence, chose not to consider. As a result, Halder as Chief of the German General Staff must bear considerable responsibility for this failing. Indisputable evidence of the deficiency was before him and, even if doubts did stir within him as some have suggested,
¹⁷
why did he not bring these to Hitler with all the weight of his person, rank and
office?

At the conclusion of the conference on 28 January 1941
Halder set forth instructions that any further unresolved questions concerning the ‘operational direction’ (
Operationsführung
) in the east should be made clear for a final decision by Hitler.
¹⁸
In view of Halder's intransigence over yielding operational direction to Hitler in the case of
Moscow, and the
lengths to which his subversion had already progressed, his willingness for a deferral to Hitler suggests he feared no challenge to his designs. Furthermore, the acceptance of Hitler in the role of ultimate decision-maker testifies to the special privilege Halder afforded himself in his scheming over
Moscow.

Of particular note to 28 January 1941 are the oft quoted doubts Halder expressed concerning Barbarossa. Following his meeting with the senior army administrators
Halder met with
Brauchitsch to discuss the general situation. Referring to Barbarossa, Halder wrote:

Purpose not clear. We do not hit the
British that way. Our economic potential will not be improved. The risk in the West should not be underestimated. It is even possible that
Italy may collapse after losing her colonies and we find ourselves with a southern front through
Spain, Italy and
Greece. If we are then committed against Russia our situation will become increasingly difficult.
¹⁹

Such reservations may well have been influenced to a limited degree by the discouraging reports of the previous meeting, yet there is no evidence to support the theory that Halder or Brauchitsch saw the coming war in the east as a significant military risk. The subject in question was simply whether the invasion of the Soviet Union was the most prudent step towards defeating Britain, a consideration of such well-founded good sense and reason that one wonders why this was not questioned more openly by the army as indeed it was within the navy and from such committed Nazis as Joachim von
Ribbentrop.
²⁰
Characteristically, the army leadership did nothing more than a little private grumbling, believing as they did in the likelihood of their victory and reluctant to reprise their roles as the cynical doubters who had openly opposed the successful ‘Sichelschnitt-Plan’ in the
west.
²¹
There was also a wide-ranging aversion to grand strategic matters within the army; a trend which had begun in World War I and had recast itself in an even more virulent form under the Nazis. Fearing relegation from its traditional position of privilege within German society, the new Wehrmacht
²²
of the Third
Reich became a functional elite largely blind to the costs or problems of Hitler's ideological strategy and opportunist methods.
²³