Leningrad Siege Decision

[S***@argo.rhein-neckar.de]

I just saw a German TV (ZDF 2013) documentary about Leningrad in 1941.
The crucial issue was the German decision not to conquer but to siege the
city. Until a few years ago I only heard that the siege was the concept of
Hitler and OKW to avoid unnecessary German losses.

A few years ago I saw a mainly Russian based TV documentary that put it
very different: The German forces intended to capture the city but failed.
Too weak they decided to siege it. That was a major blow to the Barbarossa
plan. Without the support by forces of AG North the AG Center was too weak
to take Moscow. Without the Leningrad habor the logistics of AG North and
Center got no relieve.

That view seemed more logical and the "siege concept" seems just later
propaganda to cover a military failure. In the new ZDF docu the whole
issue was totally confused. They only presented a Russian "writer" Daniil
Granin as expert. He was an eyewittnes too. His statements about the
German decision record seemed contradictive and approached a mythical
luck / fate perspective. He said he saw no defense preparations in the
city at the time the German forces stopped.

With such a poor German TV record (and ZDF is even the largest and most
"quality" history TV in German language), what is the English / US opinion
on the matter? Had Glantz something?


## CrossPoint v3.12d R ##

[GFH]

Post by S***@argo.rhein-neckar.de
I just saw a German TV (ZDF 2013) documentary about Leningrad in 1941.
The crucial issue was the German decision not to conquer but to siege the
city. Until a few years ago I only heard that the siege was the concept of
Hitler and OKW to avoid unnecessary German losses.
A few years ago I saw a mainly Russian based TV documentary that put it
very different: The German forces intended to capture the city but failed.
Too weak they decided to siege it. That was a major blow to the Barbarossa
plan. Without the support by forces of AG North the AG Center was too weak
to take Moscow. Without the Leningrad habor the logistics of AG North and
Center got no relieve.
That view seemed more logical and the "siege concept" seems just later
propaganda to cover a military failure. In the new ZDF docu the whole
issue was totally confused. They only presented a Russian "writer" Daniil
Granin as expert. He was an eyewittnes too. His statements about the
German decision record seemed contradictive and approached a mythical
luck / fate perspective. He said he saw no defense preparations in the
city at the time the German forces stopped.
With such a poor German TV record (and ZDF is even the largest and most
"quality" history TV in German language), what is the English / US opinion
on the matter? Had Glantz something?

The original plan was a three front attack, with the main
attack in the center. Diversions of the strength of the
center effort to both the south (Ukraine) and the north so
sapped the center that this front stalled.

Did it make a difference in the outcome? I can not say,
nor can anyone else.

GFH
IMHO

[dumbstruck]

Post by S***@argo.rhein-neckar.de
very different: The German forces intended to capture the city but failed.
Too weak they decided to siege it. That was a major blow to the Barbarossa

The english wikipedia writeup pretty much supports that:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Leningrad#German_plans

Hitler was persuaded to transfer a panzer group from north to center, which
to me in hindsight allowed the capture of both Leningrad and Moscow to equally
fail by a whisker. So Leningrad's capture failed due to weakness, although
the fallback plan of a siege was mistakenly calculated to succeed in weeks.
They surely didn't anticipate defenders to even eat their dead to survive.

If you scroll up a paragraph, there's some speculation about Hitler wanting
to save the physical city, although not the inhabitants. They decide no,
although you might cross check Borman's quotes of Hitler in the book
Hitler's Tabletalk. I seem to recall entries just before Barbarossa where
Hitler goes on and on about the architectural beauty of certain cities
and how it would be terrible for them to suffer war damage. He says he
Berlin would be a small (artistic) loss compared to Rome and some other
cities which I think included Leningrad.

Saving architecture became less of a priority later, but note Hitler did
insist on leaving his favorite Florence bridge intact. His generals blew
the other ones, and heaped rubble in order to block the remaining one. I
heard he was advised by Italians that he favored the wrong bridge.

Goebbles diaries of the period may shed light on all such decisions
because he includes pre-censored military status reports, and also is
a snoop for gossip. Some of these haven't been translated into english.

[SolomonW]

Post by dumbstruck
Hitler was persuaded to transfer a panzer group from north to center, which
to me in hindsight allowed the capture of both Leningrad and Moscow to equally
fail by a whisker. So Leningrad's capture failed due to weakness, although
the fallback plan of a siege was mistakenly calculated to succeed in weeks.
They surely didn't anticipate defenders to even eat their dead to survive.

Assuming that the Germans did take Leningrad, what good would it do them?
They could not feed the population, what can they do with the people?

One possible use that the Germans had no intension of doing at that stage
was to use Leningrad as a white Russian capital in an attempt to turn the
war in the East into a Russian Civil War.

Leningrad under siege suited the Germans just fine, for a comparative small
German force, they kept a great Russian army busy and forced a major
diversion of resources North.

[Michael Emrys]

Post by SolomonW
Assuming that the Germans did take Leningrad, what good would it do them?

Well, for one thing, the Germans would have been able to ship supplies
and reinforcements in close to the front, bypassing the bottlenecks of
the Soviet rail system. This in turn might have placed them in a better
position to resist the Soviet winter counter-offensive.

Michael

[SolomonW]

Post by Michael Emrys
Well, for one thing, the Germans would have been able to ship supplies
and reinforcements in close to the front, bypassing the bottlenecks of
the Soviet rail system. This in turn might have placed them in a better
position to resist the Soviet winter counter-offensive.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

The German naval campaign in the Baltic Sea was one of Germany's most
successful military efforts of the entire Second World War. For most of the
Second World War, the Baltic Sea was a virtual German lake.

As late as 1945, the German were able to evacuate nearly 2.5 million Baltic
and German civilians and soldiers from Baltic shores to safety in northern
Germany despite vigorous attempts by the Soviets to prevent them.

[sctvguy1]

Post by SolomonW

Post by Michael Emrys
Well, for one thing, the Germans would have been able to ship supplies
and reinforcements in close to the front, bypassing the bottlenecks of
the Soviet rail system. This in turn might have placed them in a better
position to resist the Soviet winter counter-offensive.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
The German naval campaign in the Baltic Sea was one of Germany's most
successful military efforts of the entire Second World War. For most of
the Second World War, the Baltic Sea was a virtual German lake.
As late as 1945, the German were able to evacuate nearly 2.5 million
Baltic and German civilians and soldiers from Baltic shores to safety in
northern Germany despite vigorous attempts by the Soviets to prevent
them.

Except for the loss of that liner with all those civilians and kids.
Can't remember the name of the ship!

[w***@hotmail.com]

Post by S***@argo.rhein-neckar.de
I just saw a German TV (ZDF 2013) documentary about Leningrad in 1941.
The crucial issue was the German decision not to conquer but to siege the
city. Until a few years ago I only heard that the siege was the concept of
Hitler and OKW to avoid unnecessary German losses.

(snip)

Once again Hitler interferes with Von Leeb and Army Group North by holding
up Hoepner's 4th Panzer Group and their drive to Leningrad, on or about
25th July. Leningrad holds when the main point of attack by 16th Army is
diverted south to support Von Bock's Army Group Center and the drive
towards Moscow. One can imagine the anger that panzer commanders must
have had, when they observed the tug-of-war between Hitler and the OKH
when Hitler initially insisted on forgetting the drive on Moscow and
instead insisted that Von Bock and Von Leeb use their panzer spearheads
to encircle and capture huge amounts of Russians (you'll recall that the
original plan for the attack on Russia was Operation Otto envisaged by
OKW which emphasized an initial strong drive to capture Moscow, then
scrapped by Hitler in favor of Barbarossa when he recalled that Napoleon
had reached Moscow but had bypassed huge Russian armies in the field,
which Hitler believed was Napoleon's downfall). Thus the constant racing
north and south across Russian steppes until Hitler sees the light and
Plan Typhoon comes into play (albeit too late, General Winter also comes
into play), and the Wehrmacht gets as far Krasnaya Polyana, short of Moscow.

And if Hitler and the OKH weren't a big enough headache for Von Leeb,
enter Mannerheim and the Finns. The Finns only drive south far enough
to recapture the territories lost to the Russians in the Russo-Finnish
War of 1939-40. So even tho Leningrad is completely encircled, Army
Group North is greatly weakened and unable to take Leningrad.

Tim Watkins
"Flying is the second greatest thrill known to man - landing is the first".

[WJHopwood]

Post by S***@argo.rhein-neckar.de
I just saw a German TV (ZDF 2013) documentary about Leningrad in 1941.
The crucial issue was the German decision not to conquer but to siege the
city. Until a few years ago I only heard that the siege was the concept of
Hitler and OKW to avoid unnecessary German losses.
A few years ago I saw a mainly Russian based TV documentary that put it
very different: The German forces intended to capture the city but failed.
Too weak they decided to siege it....

I just saw a German TV (ZDF 2013) documentary about Leningrad in 1941.

Post by S***@argo.rhein-neckar.de
The crucial issue was the German decision not to conquer but to siege the
city. Until a few years ago I only heard that the siege was the concept of
Hitler and OKW to avoid unnecessary German losses.
A few years ago I saw a mainly Russian based TV documentary that put it
very different: The German forces intended to capture the city but failed.
Too weak they decided to siege it......

Whatever the wartime reason for the German decision to seige
rather than try to conquer Leningrad, the subject still has
repercussions even now.
According to a NY Times report today, there is presently
an ongoing uproar in Moscow as a result of a viewer poll
conducted by an "independent" Moscow TV station which asked
viewers to answer "yes" or "no" whether or not they thought WWII
Soviet leadership should have surrendered the city to the Germans
in order to save the thousands of Russian lives lost in the seige?
The poll apparently led some in the Kremlin and in the
audience as well to interpret the TV station's motivation in
conducting the poll to be a criticism of the wartime Russian
leadership. This is apparently not a good thing to do in Russia
when it comes to matters related to Russia's victory in the
"great patriotic war."

WJH

[w***@hotmail.com]

On Tuesday, February 4, 2014 7:51:01 AM UTC-8, ***@argo.rhein-neckar.de wrote:
I just saw a German TV (ZDF 2013) documentary about Leningrad in 1941.

The crucial issue was the German decision not to conquer but to siege the

city. Until a few years ago I only heard that the siege was the concept of

Hitler and OKW to avoid unnecessary German losses.


A few years ago I saw a mainly Russian based TV documentary that put it

very different: The German forces intended to capture the city but failed.

Too weak they decided to siege it. That was a major blow to the Barbarossa

plan. (snip)

The original plan was to capture the city, not siege the city. Hitler wanted
to completely destroy the city. One poster in this thread stated that a Moscow TV station was polling the Russian public as to whether or not Stalin and the
Stavka should have allowed the Germans to capture the city, thereby saving
a million or so lives that were lost in the 880 days of siege.

As to the hatred that Hitler had of the Russians and his desire to wipe the
Cradle of Bolshevism off the face of the map, had Von Leeb taken Leningrad,
its my firm belief that at least a million Russians would have perished, and
possibly even more. Thus Leningraders were between a rock and a hard place,
even tho, when Lake Ladoga froze over, the Russians were able to bring some
measure of food and supplies into Leningrad. If Army Group North takes
Leningrad, the population is still going to suffer 4,000 deaths a day from
hunger and the cold, and the Leningraders can forget the food and supply
run across Lake Ladoga. And what happens to the rest of the population in
Leningrad? The same fate as what happened to thousands of Russian POW's?
Three out of 100 Russian POW's ever got back to their homes and families.

Speaking of Hitler's hatred of the Russians, Hitler would have ordered the
complete dismantling and destruction of Leningrad, and possibly envisioned
turning that area into a giant reservoir, as was his wish for Moscow. And
no doubt he would have done the same thing if the Wehrmacht had taken the
city of Stalingrad. One wonders, if Stalingrad at that time had been
Tsaritzin (sp?), the old original name of the city, would Hitler have been
obsessed with taking Stalingrad? No doubt Hitler would have wiped that city
off the face of the map, as the very name of Stalin was abhorrent to him.
The only thing left around Stalingrad would have been the Volga River. And
the only thing around Leningrad would have been Lake Ladoga.

Just another $.02 thrown into the mix.

Tim Watkins

"There are old pilots, and bold pilots, but there are no old, bold pilots".