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WAR in EUROPE, 1941-45 (3 of 10)

Soviet armies began a winter counteroffensive in December, 1941. In places in the coming three months they pushed the Germans back 150 miles -- almost to Smolensk. The front bogged down in the mud that came with the winter thaw.  During the summer the German offensive resumed, but the Germans were weakened now. They had suffered too many losses for offensives all along the Soviet front, and they focused on a drive into the Caucasus, for the sake of oil, with Baku as the ultimate destination -- Hitler's economists having told him that without oil from that region Germany could not continue the war. By the end of August the Germans were near Grozny. And in September they captured the Soviet navy base at Novorossiisk.

On the way to Baku, Hitler decided to capture the city named after Stalin, Stalingrad, on the west side of the Volga River. Rather than take control of the Volga River north of Stalingrad, cutting the river traffic that was supplying the city, Hitler chose a frontal assault. He refused arguments from General Halder to forget about the city. Hitler had decided that 'the city of Stalin" had to be taken at all costs. In August, 1942, the great battle for Stalingrad began, and the drive toward Baku stopped.

On November 19, 1942, the Soviet Union counterattacked and surrounded the Romanians and Germans in Stalingrad. On December 27 a German force attempting to break through to the surrounded troops was brought to a standstill. Other German troops in the Caucasus regions escaped westward. The troops in Stalingrad were without winter clothing and short of food and ammunition, but Hitler ordered them to stay. Annihilation, he believed, was better than retreat.

North Africa

In late October 1942, the British launched a counteroffensive westward in Egypt, around 100 miles west of Alexandria, at El Alamein, stopping the drive led by Erwin Rommel toward the Suez Canal.  This was followed on November 8 by U.S. and British landings around Casablanca and Algiers in French controlled North Africa. Stalin was unhappy because he wanted a landing somewhere in France -- which Roosevelt had promised would happen that year. Hitler was relieved because he had feared a landing closer to home.

The success of the Americans and British in North Africa included a deal with Admiral Darlan, who had been on the side of the pro-German government at Vichy. Charles de Gaulle, leader of the anti-German "Free French" was outraged. Hitler responded to the Allied invasion by moving troops into what had been the unoccupied area of France, which included Mediterranean coastline. The regime at Vichy accepted this while declaring that it would defend itself against the Allies on its North African territory. French forces had fought with determination against the Allies as they had landed. With Darlan's defection some went over to the side of the Allies, while others continued to resist the invasion, another Allied landing taking place near Tunis in mid-November.