Buoyed by their victories over Poland and France, on the 22 June 1941 the Germans launched Operation Barbarossa, and over 3 millions men advanced over the border to attack Russia. The opening of the Eastern Front would be one of Hilter’s most momentous decisions of WWII.
Having only signed a nonaggression pact with German in 1939, Stalin was taken by surprise. The opening weeks of the offensive were wildly successful for the Germans, but as the Panzer formations rapidly advanced the infantry struggled, on foot, to keep up. At Kiev, the Germans would take over half a million Russian soldiers prisoner. Barbarossa was a campaign where one Panzer Divisional commander queried if the Germans were ‘winning themselves to death’.
Joining me for this episode is now regular of the podcast Jonathan Trigg. In episode 55 and 77 Jon and I looked at foreign recruits to the SS, in 102 we looked at D Day from the German perspective and in episode 115115 – To VE Day Through German Eyes we talked about the end of the war for Germany. Jonathan has been busy and has a new book available, Barbarossa Through German Eyes.
Patreon: patreon.com/ww2podcast
146 - Stop Lines
145 - Bomb Aimers
144 - Alan Brooke: Churchill's Right-Hand Critic
143 - The Battle for Madagascar
142 - Mackenzie King
141 - Eighth Army versus Rommel
140 - How to kill a Panther tank
139 - German Uniforms of WWII
138 - Hang Tough: Major Dick Winters
137 - Operation Lena and Hitler's Plots to Blow up Britain
136 - The Defeat of Army Group South, 1944
135 - Spaniards in the British Army
134 - The Original Jeeps
133 - Rome
132 - The 746th Far East Air Force Band
131 - Economists at War
130 - The Texel Uprising: Night of Bayonets
129 - The Guadalcanal-Solomons Campaign, November 1942–March 1943
128 - The Doolittle Raiders and their Fight for Justice
127 - The Longest Campaign
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