Hitler had the strongest army. Why he could not win the USSR?

Question

Did Hitler wanted to kill all Slavs or only make them slaves?

Answer 1

I think it is a good question... Before getting in to war with USSR the best military generals had been wrongly accused with spying towards fascist Germany... For very long victory was on the side of the Germany. Battle of Stalingrad was the key point when Victory run from Germans. Some strange stories about super natural and religious things happened during that battle. Before war all churches had been in great or nearly total repression but Stalin actually re opened all churches and all mesas where on place during the war when all hopes are gone... Germans did have a very good supplies, they did have enough men... It was a spirit that put everything in different way.

Answer 2

The USSR as with all other wars before in the modern era have been almost the same sort of tactics by the Russians. Retreat from set piece battles and use the Space inside the country to extend the attackers supply lines and then use insurgent tactics against them, so forcing units to be spread along these lines diffusing the attacking force.
Also with the size of the Russian Land, troops are kept on the other borders facing different countries and replacements can be huge.
The German and Russian (Western) armies where roughly matched in size to begin with, after the initial defeats the Germans then came up against the Central Armies of Russian forces which had been transfered in which where defeated by October, then in the Winter the forces of Germany which by then where quite exhausted came face to face with the Eastern Armies of Siberia which where very battle hardy after Japan remained Neutral in the war.
Also Hitler sacked his 3 main generals when they did not win the battles in late September and October, replacing them with decent generals but could not force Hitler to stop the dilution of forces to other means. hitler by that time had taken over command of the Armed Forces and wanted to split attacks between Lenningrad, Rostov and the Causican area (which turned into the Stalingrad battle area of 1942) and Moscow. If the attack had been concentrated on one or possibly two areas then the outcome may have been a little different.
Also the Germans did not attempt to cut off the areas of the White Sea (Murmansk / Archangel) to the Russian forces, which would have seriously restricted the Lend Lease arrangements to the Soviets.

Answer 3

Hitler delayed Operation Barbarossa by six weeks in order to over run the Balkans in order to protect is Southern Flank this Delay would prove fatal as Hitler only envisaged a six month campaign in order to defeat Russia. Indeed despite the fact that the Luftwaffe had lost considerable numbers of Aircraft in the Battle of Britain, Hitlers War Machine made considerable Gains in the opening Campaign moving quickly into the Russian Interior but with the delayed start and the onset of one of the worst winters in memorable history the campaign stalled, with the Russian Army Fortified in both Moscow and Leningrad the focus shifted to the South and
Stalingrad as Hitler pushed towards the oilfields in the Caucuses with disastrous consequences.
The Russian Front was now entrenched in a War of Attrition
on a incomprehensible scale, as Stalin moved his industries
beyond the Urals in the far east and out of the range of Luftwaffe the Russian Army was able to rebuild its forces utilising the recently released troops from its Eastern Borders after the threat of a Japanese Invasion never Materialised. After the Great Tank Battle at Kursk in 1943
Hitler had virtually exhausted all his reserves in a last bid to break the deadlock and would eventually succumb to the Russian Steamroller. In the final anaylsis it as to be said that
the vastness of the Soviet Union and the severe winter of 1941 proved Hitlers undoing as did the lack of planning for an extended and ill prepared Campaign.

Answer 4

Russia did what China did in the Korean War; they threw millions of soldiers at the the German army (sometimes these soldiers weren't even armed yet.) Sheer numbers of troops and the rediculous industrial capacity of Stalanist Russia made it impossible for Germany to win if the war went longer than 2 years (coming from German generals not hindsight). Guess what, it did and Germany lost.

German troops also outran their supply lines and found themselves fighting a war while under equipped against a far more numerous enemy. When winter set in problems just got worse for Germany. Supply trips were slwoed by snow, and evn by mud during the spring; aircraft couldn't deliver supplies fast enough.

The barbarity of SS troops on the eastern front alos hurt Germany's war effort. Had they (the SS) not been so brutal to Russian civilians the populace may have rebelled against Stalin. IN fact many Russians, and even the Cosacks, fought with the Germans against Stalin. The racist ideology of the Nazi party prevented a more humane approach to slavic peoples which only left room for SS barbarism.

Hitler wanted to eventually eliminate the Slavs in order to give the german people room for expansion. For the time being he seemed content to use them as slaves, killing only dissidents and Jewish slavs. He did however have Soviet POW's killed at times (Stalin did the same to German troops).

Answer 5

Wermacht was not prepared for the Russian winter.
According to a recently popularized theory, the Nazi army wasn't prepared for Russian winter, because Hitler never intended to attack Russia.
He was forced to attack on June 22nd, 1941 after Nazi intelligence had learned that the Soviet army was about to attack the Reich in early July, 1941 in order to take over all of Europe.
As for the Slavs: not all of the Slavic nations were considered inferior by the Nazis. As an example: there was a Ukrainian SS division, called SS Galizien (Galichina). Only people of the so called master race were allowed to serve in the SS.

Answer 6

Unlike Stalin, Hitler never caught on to the concept of total war until 1944 (too late), never fully mobilizing the German economy or people. The German military, though tactically adept, was organized for short campaigns not a long war on multiple fronts. Germany's forte did not include Intelligence, logistics, or strategic planning. One example: the German army still depended upon horse power for mobility , only a tiny portion of their forces were mechanized. And, as other here have indicated, Hitler should have taken a hint from Charless XII and Napoleon, think twice before jumping on Russia. If you do go to war with Russia, don't decalre war on the US at the same time!

Answer 7

Hitler couldnt win in Russia purely because of a) the russian winter and b) the manpower of the russian army. the russians had no shortage of men 2 fight, they could recruit wherever they needed 2.
he believed the slavs were 'racially inferior' to the aryan race and wanted 2 make sure that aryans were masters over racially 'inferior' peoples.

Answer 8

Command and Control. The major decisions for Operation Barbaraso where made at strategic command level i.e Hitlers Headquarters, This left no option for mission command for field commanders of the German Army at the front to make command decisions and were totally dependant on decisions made above.
Secondly: Hitler probably took no advice from his Generals to actually what was happening at the front line in respect of resistance, combat service support, attrition etc.
Thirdly: Hitler was probably more intent in destroying Stalingrad than the overall strategic objectives i.e oilfields etc.

Answer 9

Operation Barbarossa's failure has been a source of debate for nearly 70 years - though the simplistic uneducated answer is "Russian Winter"

There were countless compounded errors, none of which led in and of itself to the defeat of the Wehrmacht- bear in mind that despite the winter, supply lines, multiple fronts, involvement of the US, etc- the Germans still fought for FOUR years.

To simplify it- The germans could have and should have defeated the Soviets in the first campaign season-

it was time that defeated the Germans-

every day longer the war went on- the less likely their sucess became- they knew this going in, yet still acted in many ways and made many decisions that underminded and worked against a quick victory.

Answer 10

Napoleon tried to conquer Russia, too. No one has been able to do it. From the European side the front is too wide, and the weather too severe. No army has been able to survive the winters--not enough supplies have been able to be gotten to the foot soldiers. Hitler wanted to kill everyone who wasn't Aryan and perfectly formed. I don't know if the Slavs were Aryan or not.

Maggie