From the memoirs of the German generals
I would like to dwell on the figure of Zhukov. In our modern liberal literature, he appears as a man of iron will, who, regardless of losses, drives Soviet troops into murderous counterattacks. At the same time, these authors are unable to formulate a more or less sound position on what should have been done.
Let's start with the events on Khalkhin Gol. So, Zhukov arrives in Mongolia as a testing 57 Special Corps. As a result, Commander N.V. is dismissed. Fecklenko and Zhukov are appointed to his post, who immediately starts planning an operation to defeat the “Japanese villains”.
So, the Soviet troops held the bridgehead on the eastern shore of Khalkhin Gol. A plan was developed according to which it was supposed to strike tank battalions north of the bridgehead and make the environment. But the Japanese were one day ahead of us, striking between the bridgehead and the tank group in order to reach the crossings. And it was our great fortune. Their entire strike force came under the counterattack of Soviet tanks. The effect was deafening (Japanese casualties amounted to 800 people killed and wounded from the entire 8000 group of General Komatsubara). At the same time, our losses were moderate. Two weeks will pass and Zhukov will realize his original plan by adding a southern strike group, which will lead to a complete and lightning defeat of the Japanese. Further, the USSR will reap the political dividends of victory in this company, when the Japanese in 1941 did not dare to attack the Soviet Union, saving us from a war on two fronts. At the same time, one might wonder if the Finnish war had demonstrated the effectiveness of the Red Army, the Second World War might not have happened. It is known that Hitler attacked the USSR in many ways in order to persuade England to peace, the country with which Germany has fought since 1939. Consequently, the defense capability of the Soviet Union was rated much lower than the English. Today it can only cause a smile.
German strikes in the summer months of 41 cut and ground our border armies. Although we had numerical superiority over the enemy, but our troops were always inferior in the number of divisions simultaneously entering battle. In the first weeks of the war, our mechanized corps played the role of fire brigades, which delivered flank attacks on the advancing enemy. As a rule, such blows led to the cessation of the existence of this compound. This is the only thing that could counter the Red Army to the Wehrmacht. Here I would like to note the fate of the 6-th mechanized corps. As a result of the wrong choice of the direction of the strike (due to a mistake of intelligence), it ceased to exist due to the lack of fuel and the tanks had to be destroyed by the tankers themselves so that they would not get to the enemy. Very soon, our tank formations ceased to influence the advancement of the German troops and numerous boilers were launched, into which Soviet rifle formations fell, as they could not react promptly to the rapid throws of the Wehrmacht’s mechanized units.
This provision was preserved during the counteroffensive near Moscow, when rifle divisions were introduced into the breakthrough. They hopelessly lacked speed and the Germans always had time to transfer the fur. connections to a threatening site. Part of the problem was removed by the use of cavalry, but such compounds could not become a full replacement for tanks. Therefore, in the winter of the 41-42 of the USSR, it was not possible to achieve the encirclement of the German troops. Under these conditions, Zhukov decided to apply shallow strikes, which led not to the Germans' encirclement, but to their expulsion from the occupied territory. But at the same time, the threat was removed of his shock groups in the boilers. Konev, on the other hand, attempted to carry out a larger operation on the environment, bringing together the 29 and 39 armies, which further led to the severing of these compounds from the main forces.
42 Summer Company of the Year led the German armies to the Volga bank. For the Soviet side, it was important: to deprive the enemy of the initiative and impose battles on him to the north from Stalingrad. As a result, our reserves were brought into battle as they arrived, which did not allow us to create a strong strike force. But at the same time, constant pressure was maintained on the enemy, which prevented him from transferring troops to Stalingrad. The author of this reception was Zhukov. The decision that he took in this situation is rather paradoxical for the Second World War as a whole. You can blame for unjustified losses, but at the same time you should then recognize the loss of Stalingrad. And, as a result, the 6 entourage of Paulus’s army would not have happened. And where then the front would stabilize in the south is unknown and the question of losses also remains relevant.
1943 year most vividly demonstrated how the Soviet army learned how to defend itself at a strategic level, when a counter-attack was launched on the flank of the advancing enemy. Subsequently, the Soviet commanders did not try to guess the direction of the offensive of the Wehrmacht, and this brought success. Although in this period of time the shock capabilities of the Germans increased due to large-scale rearmament, and the Soviet mechanized units lost their dominance on the battlefield.
1944 year characterized by the fact that the opponents switched places and the Wehrmacht also faced the question of how to respond to the Soviet attacks of the tank armies. And he responded with the concept of "cities-fortresses". This led to numerous boilers, which fell into the German part. In general, the 44 year showed that the Soviet army could conduct large-scale offensive operations against a strong and trained enemy, which had no analogues in the world stories. The summer offensive of the Germans in 1941 cannot serve as an equivalent example because It is impossible to put an equal sign between the Soviet troops 1941 of the year and the forces of the Wehrmacht 1944 of the year.
1945 year. Here I would like to stop at the storming of Seelow Heights. If up to this point the “Russians” have bypassed all the fortifications, here they have struck a primitive frontal blow. Why? Well, in the first place, in the spring of 45, information appeared about the possibility of concluding a separate peace between the allies and Nazi Germany, which led to the acceleration of actions to prepare for the operation. As a result, this led to the fact that some of the forces initially aimed at Berlin were sent around it from the north in order to rule out the possibility of an Allied approach from the west. As a consequence, this led to a weakening of the main attack, and not to break through the main line of defense, which led to the commissioning of reserves not into an open breakthrough, but to the cracking of the remnants of the defense. Soviet troops lost time and suffered unjustified losses. In general, the operation was aimed at encircling the troops stationed on the Oder, and the main task was to prevent the withdrawal of these formations to Berlin, which was to simplify the task of storming the city as much as possible.
In essence, George Konstantinovich Zhukov was the man who invented the recipe from the "Blitzkrieg". On the 30 anniversary of the Victory in Paris, posters were hung with his portrait and the signature "The Man Who Won the Second World War."