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

198 THE SOVIET PARTISAN MOVEMENT
become very efficient and was passing an increasing volume of accurate
and up-to-date information across the front to the east. German
Counteraction Throughout most of the winter the security commands
were haunted by their old nemesis, shortage of manpower, and in the face
of the numerical superiority of the partisans they were able to offer little
more than token resistance to their consolidation of the countryside.
Lacking sufficient troops to perform even routine functions, any offensive
moves they undertook always had to be at the expense of fundamentally
necessary static security. Occasional operations of battalion or regimental
scope accomplished little of permanent military value when they
were launched. In most such instances the bands followed their old tactics
of refusing battle and slipped away deeper into the forests and swamps
where they merely waited for the enemy to retire before they returned,
knowing from experience that their enemy had too few troops to garrison
any region cleared. Only when a probing force penetrated too near one of
their primary bases would they react positively; then they resisted fiercely
from prepared positions. For the most part the security commands
confined their active efforts to maintaining contact with the bands for
reasons of intelligence and to attempting to curtail the partisans'
espionage activities which were causing more and more concern at army
group headquarters. As a result, the bands had things very much their
own way. With the coming of the spring thaws indicating the nearness of
the operating season, the Germans became increasingly conscious of the
bands concentrated along the army group's life lines to the west. They
correctly deduced the plans of the Soviet high command for the use of the
partisans and realized that, if they were to mount any sort of ef- fective
defense against the Red Army attacks which were sure to come or
withdraw as an integrated force should the pressure prove too great, they
would have to regain at least a modicum of control over their rear. Since
the partisans in the rear of the Second Army had shifted much of their
strength and the majority of their operations well to the west, the most
critical portion of the army group rear in terms of partisan strength and
strategic importance for German defense was that behind the Third
Panzer Army and the left wing of the Fourth Army, the region comprising
the territory about the towns of Ushachi, Lepel, and Senno West of
Vitebsk and Orsha. This area dominated the two major east- west
corridors. In view of the large number of divisions the Soviets had
massed opposite it, at least one arm of the Red Army main effort seemed
sure to come through it. The Germans knew that the Soviets