the soviet partisan movement 1941-1944 by edgar m. howell

90 THE SOVIET PARTISAN MOVEMENT
The Rear Areas and the 1942 Offensive
German preparation in the Rear 140
The German Army's plan for the 1942 campaign stated that as a necessary
prelude to the attack the entire length of the line in the east was to
be re-formed and straightened in a number of limited offensives and
the rear area mopped up immediately after the close of the muddy
141
season.
In the southern sector the only Soviet penetration during the winter
had been contained and later successfully pinched off, but further to
the north the situation was confused and far from bright. Hitler's
rigid tactics had for the most part succeeded in denying the Soviets
any gains of a strategic nature, but at the same time had opened the
German rear to a number of deep penetrations and left the Wehrmacht
with a difficult mop-up job.
Direct rail and road communication between Army Group North
and Army Group Center had been completely severed and a deep wedge
driven between the two. Army Group North's right flank, held by
the II and X Corps, had been rolled up tight against Lake Ilmen, and
the II Corps cut off. To the rear of these corps Red Army units and
mixed groups of Red Army personnel and partisans in large part
dominated the situation. In the middle of January a task force of
the XXXIX Corps (mot) had opened a drive from the southwest
to relieve the Kholm hedgehog on the Rollbahn Nord and reestablish
control over the highway. To complement this attack, in February
two other task forces (later replaced by the Luftwafe Division Meindl)
had attacked southward from the line of the Dno-Staraya-Russa railroad
to clear the rear of the beleagured II Corps and close the breach
in the Sixteenth Army's line. Kholm was relieved by 5 May and by
30 June the Luftwafe Division Meindl had reestablished control of a
sort along the Rollbahn Nord, though with a discontinuous line, while
a Landesschuetzen regiment garrisoned the area just to the west. Still
further to the west, the north-south Dno-Novosokolniki rail line, although
under nominal German control remained open to interdiction
along its entire length.
The situation in the rear of Army Group Center was hardly less difficult.
Von Kluge's left flank had been rolled back on the Ninth Army,
and several Soviet units had advanced from the north dangerously
close to army group headquarters at Smolensk. At the time of the
opening of the Caucasus offensive this portion of the line had not been
wholly straightened, and direct communication with Army Group North,
though reestablished, remained exceedingly tenuous.
140 Unless otherwise stated, the material in this section is taken from Lagen Ost.
10.I.-10. VII.42.
141 Directive No. 4 1, OKW/WFSt Nr. 55616/42 g. K. Chefs., 5.V.42., in "Fuehrer
Directives," op. cit.