Looking for a break in the Christmas season sweetness? Beyond Barbarossa returns you to the Eastern Front in December 1942. Hitler and Stalin's mutual stubbornness collide on the Russian steppe. 

For the Germans of the 6th Army, Christmas 1942 was a hungry Yule in the  freezing Cauldron.

Map 1: Operation Uranus, November and December 1942 

Map 2: Operation Winter Storm: The German relief attempt 

Map 3: Operation Winter Storm stalled 

Failure: Luftwaffe supplies the trapped 6th Army in the Kessel 

Failure: Operation Winter Storm 

German soldiers in the Kessel/Cauldron 

Red Army soldier writes home, December 1942 

By December, the Red Army soldiers' morale was very different from the Germans'.

Episode 63: at the end of 1943, the situation for nazi Germany and communist USSR on the Eastern Front is radically different from the end of 1942. Plus, the Cairo and Tehran Conferences promise to reshape the geo-political world.

Map 1: The Red Army advances to, and past the Wotan Line

Map 2: The front lines, 15 November 1943

Map 3: The front lines, 31 December 1943

Historical photos: The German Panther (Panzer V) vs. the Soviet T-34-85

Soviet photo loading artillery at Nikopol bridgehead

Sources:

Antony Beevor, The Second World War. London, UK: Little, Brown and Co., 2012. 

Prit Buttar, Retribution: The Soviet Reconquest of Central Ukraine, 1943. Oxford, UK: Osprey Publishing, 2019.

Evan Mawdsley, Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941–1945. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016.

Author Clare Mulley and I discuss her latest book, the story of one of the Allies' most valuable intelligence agents, Elzbieta Zawacka, known as Agent Zo. 

Visit Clare Mulley's website: https://claremulley.com/

 Clare Mulley's books: 

The Woman Who Saved the Children

The Spy Who Loved

The Women Who Flew for Hitler

Agent Zo: The Untold Story of a Fearless World War II Resistance Fighter 

Map 1: Molotov and Ribbentrop's division of eastern Europe

Map 2: German invasion of Poland, 1 September 1941 

Map 3: Soviet invasion of Poland, 17 September 1943 

What I thought would be a single episode has turned into a series. Here is Part 2 of the biggest tank battle in history — or at least, of the Second World War.

Map 1: The Eastern Front, 1943-44

Map 2: Battle of Kursk

Map 3: Another map of the Battle of Kursk 

Image 1: The Tiger heavy tank

Image 2: The Panther tank 

Image 3: The Ferdinand or "Elefant" self-propelled gun 

Restored Elefant at the United States Army Ordnance Training and Heritage Center. Source: Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elefant 

After crossing the Dnipro at Bukrin and getting bogged down by the panzers, the Red Army shifts focus northward to take the Ukrainian capital.

Map 1: The Battle of Kyiv, 1943

Source: Warfare History Network.com 

Map 2: German war map of the Battle of Kyiv, 1943

Note the crossing at Ljutesch, German spelling of Lyutizh (Ukrainian) or Liutezh (Russian).

Source:  Alchetron, the Free Social Encyclopedia

Photo 1: Crossing the Dnipro 

Soviet sappers building a raft to cross the Dnipro. The sign reads, in Russian, "To Kiev!" The soldier in the foreground appears to be looking up at approaching aircraft.

Photo 2: Pavel Rybalko, commander of the Third Guards Tank Army

Photo 3: Kirill Moskalenko, commander of the 38th Army during the second Battle of Kyiv

Photo 4: Kyiv after recapture by the Red Army

 Links:

The attack on Stalingrad: Episode 31 

In honour of Remembrance Day, 11 November 2024, this is a special episode available to all. 

A reading from Army of Worn Soles: Volume 1 of The Eastern Front Trilogy. 

Available exclusively on Amazon. 

It's hard to believe we've reached the 60th episode!

This is a big one: the Red Army reaches, and crosses the German East Wall along the Dnipro River in Ukraine. At a cost, of course. Let me know what you think.

Crossing the Dnipro

Map 2: The Bukrin Bend 

Sources:

Prit Buttar, Retribution: The Soviet Reconquest of Central Ukraine, 1943. Osford, UK: Osprey Publishing, 2020.

Evan Mawdsley, Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941–1945. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016.

Anthony Tucker-Jones, Slaughter on the Eastern Front: Hitler and Stalin’s War 1941–1945. Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK: The History Press, 2017

Dr. Lubomyr Luciuk of the Royal Military College of Canada and University of Toronto returns to describe the reality for eastern European people under occupation during the Second World, and draws the line from then to today.

Latest book:

Enemy Archives: Soviet Counterinsurgency Operations and the Ukrainian Nationalist Movement – Selections from the Secret Police Archives 

Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2023.

Available from Amazon and McGill-Queen's University Press

Professor of political geography at the Royal Military College of Canada and Senior Research Fellow of the Chair of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Toronto, shares his knowledge and insight into the experience of Ukraine under occupation by nazi and Soviet forces during the Second World War. 

Map: Ukrainian lands during World War II

 Source: Ukraine: A Historical Atlas, by Paul Robert Magosci and Geoffrey Matthews

Image 1: Dr. Luciuk's latest publication, Enemy Archives.

With Volodymyr Viatrovych. Available from Amazon and McGill-Queen's University Press.

Image 2: An UPA unit in the Carpathian Mountains collecting intelligence.

Image 3: Galicia Division machine gun unit at the Battle of Brody

Smolensk has a war history that is far more significant than its size would suggest. In September 1943, it was a key to Soviet Red Army strategy, and for the German defence.

The best English-language podcast for staying up to date on the war in Ukraine is Ukraine: The Latest from the Daily Telegraph. Its creator and executive producer was David Knowles, who passed away unexpectedly in September.  

My condolences and sympathies to Mr. Knowles' family, friends, co-workers and colleagues.

Map 1: Battle of Smolensk, 1943

Map 2: Operation Suvorov 

Map 2: Smolensk region 

This gives you an idea of where the smaller towns are in relation to Smolensk.

Photo 1: Gen. Yeremenko (right) with Nikita Khrushchev (left) during the Battle of Stalingrad.

 Photo 2: Yeremenko in about 1970

Photo 3: Gen. Vasily Sokolovsky in 1946

Sources:

Antony Beevor, The Second World War. London, UK: Little, Brown and Co., 2012. 

Robert Forczyk, Smolensk 1943: The Red Army's Relentless Advance. Oxford, UK: Osprey Publishing, 2019.

Evan Mawdsley, Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941–1945. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016.

Anthony Tucker-Jones, Slaughter on the Eastern Front: Hitler and Stalin’s War 1941–1945. Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK: The History Press, 2017

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smolensk_operation.