“What about 3rd and 5th SS?”
“Let them keep pushing 4th Guards, particularly any mobile units they are fighting. As for Kirchner, if he thinks he can take Velikaya Bereka, have him do so. Otherwise, he is to break off his attack and move at least one division here, to cover this railhead spur off the line coming up from Lozovaya. Any word from Hausser?”
“He’s pulled Das Reich out of the city, and the division is moving to cover the road to Poltava.”
“Well enough. That sector is weak. If he can cut the road between Novaya Vodolaga and Alexsandrovka, all the better. Hausser will know what to do.”
“We’re going on the defensive?”
“Active defense,” said Manstein. “I see no point in trying to push them back over the Donets. We haven’t got the strength in any case.”
“What about Hitler? He most likely expected great things from Donnershlag,” said Speidel.
“I did as well, but there are now at least four armies holding that bridgehead. Pulling Steiner out of the city was the right thing to do. It allowed us to put some credible defense into that gap in the front. So now we will dance with them a while and see whose feet give out first. Tell Hitler we have stopped the enemy advance and restored the front. Tell him anything, but make it sound good.”
“This means Steiner will be on the line,” said Speidel.
“It can’t be helped. Until we get up more infantry, that is where he must stay. The same for Knobelsdorff. We’ve stopped their offensive and restored the front, but it is the best we can do—a stalemate. Hitler will be expecting another miracle, but I don’t have any more tricks in my bag this time around. We need more infantry, and we will need it quickly. The only place I can get it is either from Hansen or from the forces being held for Operation Untergang.”
“Does Hitler really think we can go to Leningrad now?” asked Speidel.
“God only knows,” said Manstein. “I think I must pay a visit to OKW, and I’ll be leaving tonight.”
General Sviridov and the 2nd Guard Mech was only 20 kilometers north of Kirchner’s objective, and he would make a night march, getting to the town before Kirchner could push through to take it. Steiner would never get to Teranovka either, not on that day, nor any other. It would become ‘The Road Not Taken’ for Manstein and the German Army in 1943, and like the final line of that famous poem by Robert Frost, that would make all the difference.
Part IX
Twenty Divisions
“One man’s trash is another man’s treasure… and one man’s pleasure is another man’s pain.”
Chapter 25
“The front has been largely restored,” said Manstein. “Yet there remains one segment, a gap of about 25 kilometers west of Novaya Vodolaga, that is now held by nothing more than a few Panzerjager companies.”
He had flown all that night, and most of the following day to reach OKW headquarters. Keitel knew he was coming, and informed Hitler, but the Führer was in a sour mood. “Have you come all this way to ask for yet another withdrawal?”
Manstein was not pleased with the remark, and his tone clearly communicated that. “When I order a redeployment of forces under my command, and one that might entail a tactical withdrawal, it is done for a sound military reason. You will note that Katukov is not in Akythrya, which is where he would surely be if I had not ordered Kempf’s 4th Army to shorten its lines, and sent Raus to Kharkov. That freed up Steiner, and allowed me to at least contest the expansion of the enemy bridgehead over the Donets. It also freed up 3rd Panzergrenadier Division to reinforce Knobelsdorff, and with four divisions, he was able to stop Katukov. As for Steiner, his Korps now holds a front of 40 kilometers with four divisions, yet his left flank is hanging in thin air, on the road to Krasnograd.”
“Yes, yes, I have heard all your so called military imperatives,” said Hitler, “but when will you drive the enemy back and regain the ground you gave him to make these redeployments? When will you throw him back over the Donets?”
Manstein gave Zeitzler a frustrated look. “I am here, in part, to tell you personally that is no longer possible, at least not with the forces I presently command.”
That brought a moment of uncomfortable silence to all around the map table. Kluge of Armeegruppe Center, waited without saying a word, for he could see that Hitler was very displeased.
“Not possible?”
“Correct,” said Manstein tersely. “You are the supreme commander here. Look at that map. Surely you can see that if Steiner is holding a frontage of 40 kilometers, he cannot concentrate to attack with any real power.”
“Yet you were responsible for these deployments,” said Hitler. “You were the one who dispersed Steiner on such a broad front.”
“Correct again, and that was also necessary. If I had concentrated to a much narrower front, I would have had a stronger attack, but there would have been nothing to hold either flank as Steiner advanced. I will say again—we do not have enough infantry. He would have had to hold the shoulders of any penetration with his own troops, and that would weaken the power of his attack with every kilometer he gained. If we had been facing a single Soviet army, even two, that may not have mattered. But we were facing four, and three of those were Guards.”
“I sent you three infantry divisions from Armeegruppe Center,” Hitler reminded him, “and two more from the Caucasus.”
“That is so, and they helped me stabilize the north, but we needed ten, twelve divisions if possible. I discussed this with you at our last meeting, and told you exactly how they could be found.”
“Yes, by giving up everything we have taken from Ivan Volkov,” said Hitler. “That would certainly satisfy him, would it not? Just throw the Caucasus to the wind—is that your sound military advice now?”
“My Führer, I have given you my reasoning on that earlier as well. Astrakhan and Baku cannot be reached, and Groznyy is useless to us for at least a year. The only objective worth holding there is Maykop. At present, Kleist now has twelve infantry and one Panzer division in the Caucasus. If we reduced our position there to simply hold the Kuban, that could be done with six or seven divisions, because we still have the Rumanian 3rd Army available. That frees up six good German divisions that could be used to hold that enemy bridgehead over the Donets, and then I could pull Steiner off the line, concentrate, and plan a real counterattack. Donnerschlag was a surprise move that caught the enemy off guard, and it worked as planned. Unfortunately, we discovered they had moved four armies into that bridgehead—four armies. Steiner’s troops have performed in an exemplary manner, but three divisions cannot move an enemy force of that size.”
Hitler fidgeted, his lips pursed, eyes shifting about, clearly ill at ease. He could hear the logic of what Manstein was saying, but it was something he did not want to accept. Steiner had been stopped. His enemy had taken ground from him, and Manstein was telling him it could not be regained—not without relinquishing yet more ground taken in the Caucasus, terrain that led him to the oil wells of Groznyy and Baku. Then Manstein riveted home his point by other means.
“I must point out again that if our positions between Kharkov and Izyum are not strengthened, and very soon, then you risk that entire flank. It will compel Paulus to withdraw his 6th Army and yield the entire Donets Basin. Otherwise he will be cut off, along with everything in the Caucasus. So, you must now choose what is most essential. We either relinquish the Terek Region, and fall back on Maykop as I suggest, or you will soon see us struggling to save the Donets Basin. I have stopped them, but they will reorganize. We must do the same before they renew offensive operations. You must do this now, or find some other means of reinforcing Armeegruppe South. Half measures will no longer suffice.”