Obviously looking back at World War II with knowledge of the end it is evident that Barbarossa was the beginning of the end, but to argue that it was a grave mistake is to ignore what Germany’s aims were in World War II.. Different circumstances and different decisions following 22 June 1941 might have led to a very different conclusion. A few examples:
Victory in Europe without victory in Russia would have, in Hitler’s mind, been failure. The invasion of France was a step on the way to war with Russia. Having said that, when would a more opportune time to invade Russia have been? Russia in the process of recovering from the purges of the late 1930s, and by Operation Bagration (also launched 22 June, two years later) is evidence of the progress being made. At the start of Barbarossa German tanks went over 100 km, in some places, before meeting any resistance. By the end of offensive season of 1941 Leningrad was under siege and German tanks commanders could see the Kremlin without binoculars on a clear day. Had it not been for heavy rain in the fall and an extreme cold in the winter (worst winter since 1815 when Napoleon made his Russian excursion) Hitler might have been wintering in the Kremlin in 1942.
Regardless of the initial failure of Barbarossa, at the start of 1942 German defeat was not a foregone conclusion. Any number of later decisions might have changed the outcome. Had the Germans convinced the Japanese to pose even the smallest threat in the East, the Russians might not have been able to pull some of their elite troops from Siberia back to defend the capital. If Germany had focused on Moscow and not Stalingrad in their offensive campaigns of 1942 Moscow might have fallen; or if they would have simply taken the resources that they sought in the South, bombed Stalingrad to the ground, and turned north things might have turned out differently. Perhaps if the Germans had detected the SIX MILLION Russians who surrounded them at Stalingrad in the winter of 1942-43 they might have been able to orchestrate some kind of strategic retreat, although at that point perhaps the war was unwinnable.
Hitler’s ideology, the driving force behind aggressive German foreign policy, demanded the destruction of Russia. A failure in this area meant failure in his goal for increased Lebensraum, a failure which was, in Hitler’s mind, unacceptable. In this light, Barbarossa is only a mistake when viewed with knowledge of the end of the war, something no one had in 1941 (Churchill even believed Russia would fall in six weeks). In the end, World War II played out more like the Napoleonic invasion of 1815 than World War I in regard to Russia. While Barbarossa was indeed a failure in the long run, not invading Russia would have been just as grave a failure for Hitler’s Germany.
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Obviously looking back at World War II with knowledge of the end it is evident that Barbarossa was the beginning of the end, but to argue that it was a grave mistake is to ignore what Germany’s aims were in World War II.. Different circumstances and different decisions following 22 June 1941 might have led to a very different conclusion. A few examples:
Victory in Europe without victory in Russia would have, in Hitler’s mind, been failure. The invasion of France was a step on the way to war with Russia. Having said that, when would a more opportune time to invade Russia have been? Russia in the process of recovering from the purges of the late 1930s, and by Operation Bagration (also launched 22 June, two years later) is evidence of the progress being made. At the start of Barbarossa German tanks went over 100 km, in some places, before meeting any resistance. By the end of offensive season of 1941 Leningrad was under siege and German tanks commanders could see the Kremlin without binoculars on a clear day. Had it not been for heavy rain in the fall and an extreme cold in the winter (worst winter since 1815 when Napoleon made his Russian excursion) Hitler might have been wintering in the Kremlin in 1942.
Regardless of the initial failure of Barbarossa, at the start of 1942 German defeat was not a foregone conclusion. Any number of later decisions might have changed the outcome. Had the Germans convinced the Japanese to pose even the smallest threat in the East, the Russians might not have been able to pull some of their elite troops from Siberia back to defend the capital. If Germany had focused on Moscow and not Stalingrad in their offensive campaigns of 1942 Moscow might have fallen; or if they would have simply taken the resources that they sought in the South, bombed Stalingrad to the ground, and turned north things might have turned out differently. Perhaps if the Germans had detected the SIX MILLION Russians who surrounded them at Stalingrad in the winter of 1942-43 they might have been able to orchestrate some kind of strategic retreat, although at that point perhaps the war was unwinnable.
Hitler’s ideology, the driving force behind aggressive German foreign policy, demanded the destruction of Russia. A failure in this area meant failure in his goal for increased Lebensraum, a failure which was, in Hitler’s mind, unacceptable. In this light, Barbarossa is only a mistake when viewed with knowledge of the end of the war, something no one had in 1941 (Churchill even believed Russia would fall in six weeks). In the end, World War II played out more like the Napoleonic invasion of 1815 than World War I in regard to Russia. While Barbarossa was indeed a failure in the long run, not invading Russia would have been just as grave a failure for Hitler’s Germany.
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