Why didn't Army Group Center head straight for Moscow?
Why didn't Army Group Center head straight for Moscow?
Luis Roberts
Elijah White
>What are flanks.
they did in fact try to get to moscow and got within 50 meters but this is really a normie topic, they still would have had to actually take moscow and looking at stalingrad as an example it wouldn't have been easy. They also were running out of oil and shiiet.
Joseph Reed
Good point
Charles Thomas
Because Army Group South had been underperforming (regardless of all the blunders of the Red Army in Ukraine) and Center would have been vulnerable to attack from Ukraine and southern Russia were they not diverted to help them.
Of course, that was a waste of valuable time nonetheless, and Moscow wasn't attacked as early as planned as a result.
Attacking the USSR at all was a dumb move and G*rmans never stood a chance, there weren't really any right choices to be made. Everything was a mistake.
Kayden Jenkins
>that map
Anthony Morgan
elaborate
Levi Gomez
>Stalingrad being one of the initial targets
Jordan Williams
>Attacking the USSR at all was a dumb move
this^100
What would have been much smarter was to wait for the Russians to build up their industry and prepare for full-scale war then wait for their inevitable offense instead, followed by utterances of "I totally wasn't expecting Stalin to attack a conflict weakened Europe with ambitions of global communism".
Brayden Wood
I read the whole wikipedia article on Barbarossa yesterday
almost an epic tale and a tragic end
the German attacked with such speed and force that they completely overwhelm the Soviets, who are superior in numbers
I guess they got overconfident, and they got fucked in the end
it makes one think what would have happened if they secured Russia's strongholds in Europe
Xavier James
It never claimed that it was an initial target. It shows where Stalingrad is on the map, and the direction army group south was going in the first place.
Christopher Foster
Army group south would've been initially heading towards just Kiev and other places in Ukraine.
Lucas Gray
Attrition for once.
They had to cross the distance as long as Germany over shit roads while being shot at. A good chunk of the army vehicles was quickly turning non functional.
Bentley Clark
>Let's go invade Russia without having harmonized equipment production, simple designs or functional logistics planning or executions
Andrew Rodriguez
They certainly did not plan to just stop their advance at Kiev
Jaxon Bell
They were going for oil fields in the caucausus no?
Nathan Mitchell
not to mention that Stalingrad is nowhere even close to where it's marked on the map, they marked Rostov and called it Stalingrad
John Wilson
desu, AGS had it the worst, since the best Soviet divisions were placed in Ukraine.
Lucas Rodriguez
Also, unlike the other two army groups, it was only about half German units by composition. It had a shitton of Hungarian and Romanian formations, which weren't trained or armed nearly up to German standards. They also had the one Italian Army along for the ride.
en.wikipedia.org
Jack Scott
yeah, i'm reading evans' third and final book on the third reich atm. they've just invaded the soviet union, it's crazy
>As the days went by, [Stalin] became increasingly dispirited by the scale and speed of the German advance. At the end of June, he left for his dacha, saying, in his inimitably coarse way, 'Everything's lost. I give up. Lenin founded our state and we've fucked it up.'
Eli Reed
I remember during the siege of Stalingrad when the Germans got encircled the Italian Tank division on the flank was ordered to charge to break the encirclement an absolute suicidal move, but the Tank Commander got on his tank and on radio told his tank leaders to move forward to death as he personally led the assault and died along with most of his men.
Camden Nguyen
>one Italian army along for the ride
Kek
>"HEY-A GERMANIA, CAN I-A COME WITH YOU TO FIGHT-A THE COMMUNISTS?!?"
>Fine, just please stay in the back and don't do anything
>"HOW DO I THROW-A GRENADE AGAIN GERMANIA??"
Austin Gomez
The italian and romanian thing is kinda a meme, they were left on their own with basically zero support with like 1 man per 1km of the front, no wonder the Russians encircled them.
Justin Kelly
The entire campaign wasn't Stalingrad, you twit. Especially since the thread is talking about 1941.
Oliver Myers
They were a very convinient scapegoat for German mistakes.
Jacob Sullivan
>grandma grew without a father because germanshits were bad at planning
FUCKING MORONS REEEEE
Easton Young
>Attacking an inevitable while it was at its weakest was a mistake
Why do think nothings even come into these threads
Jonathan Hughes
If only he did give up..
Christian James
*inevitable adversary
Leo Baker
This desu fampai. Germany and the Soviet Union were already both preparing to go to war and planned to later on, Germany decided to attack as soon as possible before the Soviets were fully prepared.
If Germany didn't attack the Soviet Union, they would be given time to prepare a huge offensive into Germany and possibly the rest of Europe as well.
Honestly Germany never stood a chance to begin with, they would have had to have had every little thing go right for them in order to succeed.
It's like a lottery ticket. Germany didn't have the first number, they were already going to lose. Just because they got the next couple numbers didn't mean they were going to win. It just meant they were close.
Jack Thomas
>those proportions
>those borders
>those city locations
>army
More like an understrength 3-division corps at the beginning of barbarossa. It grew to an army later and was mangled to shit around Stalingrad and was subsequently withdrawn. Even the romanians weren't so shit. At least they have this
en.wikipedia.org
Last cavalry charge in history.
David Brooks
What the fuck is with that border and geography between finland and the USSR?I also don't remember Crimea having such a large land bridge.
Justin Reed
>Crimea
That's the least of its shitness. Look at fucking romanian northern dobrudja, stalingrad and moscow.
Cooper Walker
I miss Calvary charges. They were so fucking a e s t h e t i c, and horses are beautiful animals. Of course, they were a lot less beautiful when covered in machine gun bullet wounds, but you get what I mean.
Cameron Ortiz
Look at Romania
Anthony Davis
Moscow and the north was strategically unimportant.
after securing the baltic nations. they should have focused everything on driving through ukraine and going to the caucasus region and the urals. once the russians were cut from the southern resources. the germans could then work on blocking reinforcements from siberia and the far east.
Brody Evans
>Trumpeter Carenzi, having to handle both trumpet and pistol, shot by mistake his own horse in the head.
fucking pastaniggers I swear.
Easton Allen
This is the most triggering map ever
Justin Myers
Moscow wasn't an objective. Hitler was very adamant that the decisive victory would occur well west of it, and as far as he thought of it at all it would just be a mopping up operation of little interest. Barbarossa can be summed up as a series of increasingly confused attempts at winning a decisive battle further and further east.