The Summer of 1944 saw the conduct of two of the largest military campaigns ever. Yet, while Operation Overlord – the Allied codename for the amphibious invasion of France, which included the D-Day landings – is much better known in the West, it was 2500km away on the Eastern Front where the Germans suffered truly staggering defeats. In Operation Bagration, the Soviets managed to annihilate Germany’s defences across a 200km frontline, decimating an entire army group. By the end of the offensive, some 450,000 Germans had become casualties. At the same time, a further 300,000 would be encircled and cut off from the German homeland for the rest of the war, eventually surrendering. In just 23 days of intense fighting, the Red Army advanced some 725km, completely liberating the Byelorussian SSR, most of Lithuania and Eastern Poland. So, why did an army of nearly one million men, which up to that point had resolutely maintained its position on the Eastern Front for over three years, collapse under the weight of this Soviet advance?
By the spring of 1944, the tide had already started to turn on the Eastern Front. Germany had suffered a humiliating loss in the Battle of Stalingrad in early 1943, in which over 300,000 Germans were encircled and forced to surrender. This gave the Soviets the strategic initiative, and over the next year and a half, the Soviets would make steady progress recapturing the territory lost in Operation Barbarossa – the German offensive into the Soviet Union. The numbers began turning against the Germans. Other factors also began to swing the battle towards the Soviets. he Soviet Union’s army size peaked in 1943 and held steady, while the Germans struggled to replace losses, resulting in a 2:1 manpower ratio in favour of the Soviets on the Eastern Front. Further, the Red Army had become better trained and armed, while the Germans had struggled to keep up with their initial gains in 1941, leading to overstretched supply routes.
However, despite these gains, the German Army remained just about intact. As a result, for the summer offensive on 1944, Soviet generals were determined to cause the wholesale destruction of the Germans’ defence and leave the path to Berlin open. To achieve this ambitious goal, they decided to adopt Glubokaya Operatsiya (Deep Battle). This relied on using the Soviets’ huge manpower to overwhelm the German front line by creating multiple concurrent breakthroughs, through which mobile units could rush into the enemy’s rear and destroy their ability to fight. Unlike the German tactic of Blitzkrieg, Deep Battle allowed the Soviets to continually shift the focus of any attack, keeping the Germans guessing and leading to the whole operational collapse of the front line.
While sound on paper, the Soviets had failed to deploy this tactic on the battlefield previously, whether through meddling from Stalin, poor coordination of armoured forces or logistics, leaving the German Army just about intact. However, for this offensive, Stalin had given his generals much more autonomy. They conceived a succession of four attacks from the First, Second and Third Belorussian armies, as well as the First Baltic Army, which would attack Germany’s Army Group Centre.
Another key to success was deception. The Soviets undertook a huge campaign of Maskirovka (camouflage). The Germans had believed that this summer offensive would be targeted against their Army Group North Ukraine in the south, who had suffered severe losses over the course of the year and were thus significantly weaker than Army Group Centre. The Soviets began a huge, covert buildup of forces against Army Group Centre, utilising camouflage and strict radio silence rules. Troops rotated towards the rear in practice drills, while civilian populations were even evacuated away from the front lines to minimise the risk of Soviet deployments being leaked to the Germans. It was a huge success. The Germans, weeks before the start of Operation Bagration, moved most of their armoured forces south to Army Group North Ukraine, significantly weakening Army Group Centre, which lost 88% of its tanks, 33% of its artillery and 15% of its total divisions. On the eve of the offensive, the Soviets had a 10:1 advantage against the Germans in artillery and an 8:1 advantage in tanks.
But the German Army faced a bigger problem – Hitler. Whereas Stalin was providing more autonomy, Hitler was going the other way. He, like Stalin, knew that an Allied invasion of France was imminent and was desperate to hold on to as much ground in the East as possible, before hopefully throwing the amphibious invasion back into the sea. Consequently, the understrength Army Group Centre was forbidden to retreat, in a move reminiscent of Stalin’s own Order no. 227 in July 1942, in which he called for ‘not a step back’. However, unlike Stalin’s order, the Germans could not afford to maintain such a rigid defence. They lacked the manpower, tanks and artillery to adequately defend their position, while Hitler’s insistence that key transport hubs such as Vitebsk and Orsha be held to the last man allowed the Russians to simply bombard the troops holding these cities, inflicting huge casualties, or bypass them entirely.
The Soviets’ strength and German weaknesses set the stage for a huge German loss. However, the opening move of the operation came not from the Red Army, but rather from partisans resisting German occupation behind the front lines. 140,000 resistance fighters detonated 10,000 charges on railroad junctions, bridges and other crucial operational links. This severely hampered the German ability to deliver reinforcements and supplies, but also forced them to retreat through narrow channels controlled by partisans, where they could be blocked and later destroyed by the Red Army, after they had broken through the front line.
On the 22nd June 1944, the third anniversary of Hitler’s own invasion of the USSR, the Red Army commenced its own offensive. The Soviets had complete air superiority, allowing huge bombing raids to soften up the German defences further. Stalin’s decision to give more autonomy to his generals also allowed for swift strategic changes, facilitating concentrations of troops in breakthrough sectors, with in some areas the Soviets creating a 10:1 imbalance in manpower. Artillery supported these offences, simultaneously attacking both front and rear positions in a ‘rolling double barrage’. Furthermore, some elegant tactics by the Soviets, such as hiding their T-34 tanks until the ground troops had created an opening, meant that they could advance without worrying about counterattacks on their flanks, allowing for stunning progress. The Soviets continued to show an incredible resistance to high casualties, as they crossed river after river, suffering huge casualties at each, but continuing their momentum regardless.
While the Soviets and Germans were the main combatants in this operation, the role of the USA should not be understated either. The rapid pace of advances was only possible through the Lend-Lease Act, by which America delivered over 420,000 trucks by the end of the war. This allowed the Soviets to mechanise their army and supply their troops deep into German rear areas. By the time the Soviets had captured Minsk, the Germans expected them to stop and regroup. However, these trucks allowed the Russians to push onwards. The second phase of fighting in July coincided with the start of other offensives, which saw the Germans pushed back in the South in the long-awaited offensive the Germans had previously been preparing for, while Army Group North was encircled in Latvia after the First Baltic Army exploited the gap between Army Group Centre and Army Group North. This left 300,000 encircled for the rest of the war.
By August, the Soviets had reached Warsaw, having advanced over 700km. In the end, it was not German resistance, but rather Soviet logistics, which forced Operation Bagration to a close. German losses were immense. 28 of the 34 divisions which had previously comprised the Army Group Centre were no more. While the Soviets also suffered terrible casualties – some 770,000 – this was a price they were willing to pay. The Germans could not handle the 450,000 they received. Soon, defences on both sides completely collapsed, as the Allies made deeper inroads into Normandy after their successes on D-Day.
Overall, a mix of Soviet strength and German weaknesses paved the way for the destruction of Germany’s armies on the Eastern Front. The Red Army displayed its strength in this campaign, utilising a highly successful deception campaign alongside tactical flexibility that Soviet generals’ autonomy allowed for. On the other hand, the Germans suffered from a chronic shortage of manpower, while Hitler’s disastrous decision to strip autonomy from his own generals and maintain a rigid defence led to huge casualties through bombardment and encirclements. Ultimately, Operation Bagration was a stunning success for the Soviets, showing how far they had come. Alongside Operation Overlord in the West, the operations paved the way to the German heartland, and the European theatre of World War II would end just nine months later.
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