Lurking behind such routine was not so much a morbid fear of death, rather a healthy regard for the unexpected. Catastrophe was something that happened to others and it was unhealthy to dwell upon it for too long. Götz Hrt-Reger, a keen amateur cine cameraman, describing scenes he had taken during the war from his armoured car, remarked:
‘This was a shot through the side window showing the grave of our driver. I had just left the vehicle to operate the radio when it received a direct hit, killing the whole crew. Changing cars can be advantageous – eh?’
His view was that death struck in a haphazard way. There was scant time or scope to sentimentalise about its impact.
‘It’s pure chance if you’re hit or not. You might consider it’s tragic, but that is that. What more can you say? You could have been hit yourself and that’s war. You can’t expect a fighting unit to hang around tending each grave for a day, or think about the dead – because there are too many. If we had, then the German Wehrmacht would have made no headway at all!’(20)
On to Smolensk
The German Army was making headway but at some cost. The original conception of a great pocket extending from Bialystok to Minsk broke into several fragmentary pockets created during desperate fighting, first around Bialystok and then around Volkovysk. General Günther Blumentritt, Fourth Army Chief of Staff, explained:
‘The conduct of the Russian troops, even in this first battle, was in striking contrast to the behaviour of the Poles and of the Western allies in defeat. Even when encircled, the Russians stood their ground and fought.’(1)
There were insufficient German troops in Panzer units to seal off the larger encirclement completely. Motorised units obliged by necessity to fight on or near roads were powerless to prevent Russian columns using forest tracks to slip away eastward at night. In the large trackless spaces between German units, Russian units were left unmolested. Confusion reigned in uncertain circumstances. During one battle the I/‘Grossdeutschland’ Regiment drove into a village on captured Russian trucks and fought a mobile engagement with Russian troops driving out with captured German vehicles. ‘Everyone fired at everyone else – it was pure chaos,’ related the unit historian.(2) The greatest pressure was on the eastern side of the pockets, the focus for Russian attempts to break out.
Commanders were presented with a dilemma. Panzers disrupted Soviet units by cutting their rearward communications, providing the optimum conditions for further advances. But because of the imperative to keep moving forward, they were unable to create solid rings around encircled Soviet forces. These pockets could only be closed and reduced by the 32 infantry divisions of Army Group Centre forced-marching their way forward. Unexpectedly bad roads and tough fighting on the edges of pockets with Russian formations which refused to surrender disrupted the previously assumed schedules of marching performance. Inevitably the gap between marching infantry and driving Panzers widened. The infantry was the substance of Wehrmacht fighting power; its role was to grind down and crush resistance. Panzer thrusts bludgeoned the enemy, but were incapable of inflicting the coup de grâce. Panzergruppen commanders strove to maintain momentum to exploit surprise and disrupt Soviet command and control. These were the basic conditions that ensured success. Von Bock confided his exasperation with High Command’s apparent inability to recognise this basic tenet. He declared in his diary:
‘They are even toying with the idea of halting the Panzer groups. If the latter happens, they will have failed to exploit the bloodily-won success of the battle winding down; they are committing a major error if they give the Russians time to establish a defensive front at the Dnieper and the Orscha-Vitebsk land bridge. In my opinion we have already waited too long.’(3)
It was becoming increasingly clear that manoeuvring alone onto tactically advantageous positions was not going to finish this enemy.
The Bialystok-Minsk battles fought from 24 June onwards were nearing conclusion on 8 July. They cost the Soviets an estimated 22 rifle divisions, seven tank and three cavalry divisions, and six motorised brigades. During the fighting two Panzergruppen, numbering nine Panzer and five motorised divisions, were employed to seal the pockets. These were joined by 23 more infantry divisions, which closed and annihilated them.(4) In short, 50% of the entire strength of Army Group Centre, 51 divisions, was tied to destroying units of its own comparable strength; a devastating blow. The experience in Poland and the West was that Blitzkrieg tactics achieved operational success once armies had been outmanoeuvred. Denied space and resources, the enemy’s political will collapsed when faced with pointless casualties. Surrender invariably followed. In Russia established norms became perverted when Soviet units fought on in hopeless conditions with no prospect of success. Up to 50% of German attacking potential was thereby constrained during the first decisive phase without achieving the initial operational objective. This was the Smolensk land bridge, the historically significant jump-off point required to mount an offensive against the political heart of the Soviet Union – Moscow.
Although out of reach of German land forces, the Luftwaffe already had this operational prize firmly within its sights:
‘Smolensk is burning – it was a monstrous spectacle this evening. After a two and a half hour flight we did not need to look for our objective; the blazing torch lit our way through the night from far away.’
Hans August Vowinckel’s Heinkel He111 bomber avoided ‘a spire’ shape of searchlights and Flak before negotiating a series of wide curves and setting course for the city centre. ‘The inside of the aircraft was as light as day,’ he later wrote to his wife. As his aircraft flew over the River Berezina on its return, Vowinckel found himself reflecting upon Napoleonic history.
‘Smolensk – once the point of destruction for a great conqueror; Berezina, where the downfall occurred. The sound of these names produce a strange historical thrill from the past. But they will not be repeated, their meaning has altered.’
It was a tiring flight, 9½ hours from taking-off at 18.00 hours until landing at 03.30 hours. Artillery fire could clearly be seen on the ground far below, where the advance continued unabated. On return to his home base Vowinckel ironically found time to read Friedrich Holderlin’s The Peace. ‘Everything that is important,’ he wrote to his wife, ‘is already in there.’ But he was never to experience it. Two days later, flying in formation during a dogfight, a Russian fighter shot into flames by another German bomber collided with his aircraft from above. His commanding officer wrote to his wife explaining, ‘the whole crew were likely killed in the crash.’ As the incident occurred well beyond the advancing German line, he had sadly to conclude:
‘The crash site cannot be investigated yet, and due to the expanse of the Russian area, we could not say for certain whether later he might be found.’(5)
When the Minsk pocket capitulated to Army Group Centre on 9 July, General Günther von Kluge was already far beyond, creating an even larger encirclement at Smolensk. His two Panzergruppen, 2 and 3, had continued moving considerable Panzer formations eastward, despite daily crises keeping existing pockets closed. It had been a calculated risk. On 3 July German Army Commander-in-Chief Walther von Brauchitsch, merged the two Panzerkampfgruppen forming Fourth (Panzer) Army, under von Kluge, rationalising the necessary command arrangements to achieve a breakthrough in the direction of Moscow. It was accepted the infantry would follow at best speed, but at a distance. Fourth Army units were taken under the new command of Second Army under General Maximilian Frhr von Weichs.