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

36 THE SOVIET PARTISAN MOVEMENT
disaster was averted, but this "one great achievement" of Hitler's had the
ironic effect of exalting his faith in himself and his inelastic defense,
and, in so doing, foreshadowed the final denouement.
During the same period heavy attacks were launched against Army
Group North. The Eighteenth Army was forced back of the Volkhov
River just south of Lake Ladoga and the line of the Sixteenth Army
below Lake Ilmen was shattered ; the entire II Corps was cut off and had
to be supplied by air for several months, while the principal lateral communications
line between Army Groups Center and North was completely
overrun with the exception of the hedgehog at Kholm.
In the southern sector, the Russians late in January scored a signal
success when they broke through between the Sixth and Seventeenth
Armies at Izyum and drove halfway to the Dnepr bridgeheads, threatening
to cut off and pin the First Panzer and Seventeenth Armies against
the Black Sea coast. They lacked the reserves to follow up and exploit
their gains, however, and were forced to a halt by strong German pressure
on the shoulders of the penetration.
By the beginning of March the Soviet offensives had spent themselves,
and the coming of the spring thaws brought all activity along the entire
front to an end. Both sides began to regroup and prepare for the summer
campaign. There was no further change in the line until May.
The German Summer Offensive, 1942
In making the strategic decision on the objectives of his next offensive
moves, Hitler veered past intermediate goals. Still convinced that the
Soviet nation was tottering, he focused his immediate planning on the
basic objectives of the whole Russian venture: the destruction of Soviet
manpower and the seizure of a source of food supply and raw materials
for the German people and German economy.
Generally the plan called for a stabilized front in the center; a limited
offensive in the north to isolate Leningrad; and an all-out drive in the
south to destroy the Red Army units in the Don River region, block off
the Soviets from the south by cutting the Volga River at Stalingrad, and
capture the Caucasian oil fields.'"
Since the manpower shortage precluded a general attack all along
the southern front simultaneously, the offensive was to he launched to
the east and southeast in a series of strikes unrolling from north to south
in such a manner as to make maximum use of all arms at decisive points.
It was to open with an assault east of Kursk by the Second, Fourth
Panzer, and Second Hungarian Armies to take Voronezh on the Don
16
Hitler Dir 41, OK W/WFSt Nr. 55616/42 g. K. Chefs., 5.IV.42, in "Fuehrer
Directives," op. cit.