Inferno - Max Hastings [108]
On 5 December, the Russians launched a massive assault which caught the Germans almost literally frozen in their positions. The Stavka had awaited the assistance of General Winter. The thermometer fell to 22 degrees below zero Fahrenheit, so that German lubricants hardened while Russian weapons and tanks still worked—the T-34 had a compressed-air starter, immune to frost. A stunned infantryman named Albrecht Linsen described the response of his unit to the Soviet assault: “Out of the snowstorm soldiers were running back, scattering in all directions like a panic-stricken herd of animals. A lone officer stood against this desperate mass; he gesticulated, tried to pull out his pistol and then simply let it pass. Our platoon commander made no attempt at all to stop people. I paused, wondering what to do, and there was an explosion right next to me and I felt a searing pain in my right thigh … I thought: ‘I am going to die here, 21 years old, in the snow before Moscow.’ ”
The Russian offensive smashed into the two exposed German salients north and south of Moscow, then exploited westward. The unthinkable became reality: the invincible Wehrmacht began to retreat. “Each time we leave a village, we set it alight,” wrote the panzer lieutenant Gustav Schrodek. “It is a primitive form of self-defence, and the Russians hate us for it. Yet its grim military logic is clear—to deny our pursuing opponents shelter in the terrible cold.” Lt. Kurt Grumann wrote from a field dressing station: “Eighty men were brought in here today, half of whom have second- or third-degree frostbite. Their swollen legs are covered in blisters, and they no longer resemble limbs but rather some formless mass. In some cases gangrene has already set in. What is it all for?” Many tanks and vehicles were abandoned, immured in snow and ice. “The ghost of the Napoleonic Grande Armée hovers ever more strongly above us like a malignant spirit,” wrote gunner Josef Deck.
For ten days the Wehrmacht staggered back through a white wilderness landmarked with huddled corpses and the blackened carcasses of abandoned vehicles. Most German commanders favoured a major withdrawal. Hitler, displaying an obstinacy which mirrored that of Stalin, called instead for “fanatical resistance.” The ardent Nazi general Walther Model played a hero’s part in stabilising the line. Stalin, against Zhukov’s strong advice, insisted upon extending operations. On 5 January he ordered a counteroffensive along the length of the front. Once more following Hitler’s example, by spurning an opportunity to concentrate forces against the weak point in the German line Stalin threw away the possibility of a great victory; Rokossovsky later offered a scornful catalogue of the blunders made, chances missed. The Germans still resisted fiercely, mowing down attackers in tens of thousands. Soviet reserves were soon exhausted, and their advance ran out of steam. Model recovered some lost ground, and Zhukov’s hopes of encircling Army Group Centre were frustrated. But the decisive reality persisted: the invaders had been pushed back between 60 and 150 miles. The Russians held Moscow.
EVEN AS THE FATE of Russia’s capital was decided, farther west a parallel drama unfolded, of almost equal magnitude and embracing even greater human suffering. From the northwest and south, in the autumn of 1941 Axis forces closed upon Russia’s old capital, Leningrad. Barbarossa persuaded the Finns to avenge their 1940 defeat: in June 1941 Finland’s army, reequipped