Over the years, the turning point of Barbarossa has been a hot potato among historians. There are three choices (Moscow, Stalingrad, Kursk) and a secondary one (Op. Bagration 1944). Which of these is the decisive moment?
The vast majority of the public seems to consider Stalingrad the turning point, and this is put into the history textbooks. In a survey done on the Internet by the author, 29% were for Moscow, 14% for Kursk, while the majority (57%) of the votes went to Stalingrad. None of the respondents voted for Bagration. One typical proponent, ‘Irma’ gives his view.
I
chose Stalingrad as it resulted in heavy German losses, and the situation in
the front became quite unfavourable for Germany, but if the battle had been won,
it would have been the opposite. By the way, I believe that the battle was lost
first and foremost because Paulus couldn't think of breaking Hitler's order to
hold troops in the city at any cost. I think that if Reichenau hadn't died, he
would not have hesitated to have his own way and would have acted according to
Manstein's plan: the 6th Army breaks through to meet the troops under
Manstein's command.
However, recently historians have changed and looked upon Kursk as the turning point of the war. Richard Overy notes in his Why the Allies Won, “It has always been tempting to choose Stalingrad as the turning point in the war.” But is Moscow, Kursk, or Stalingrad the turning point? Let’s examine what Germany lost in the battles.
Moscow
Ø Failure to take the Soviet capital
Ø Changing blitzkrieg war into long war
Ø Temporary handing of the initiative to the Soviets (for six weeks)
Stalingrad
v Loss of 250,000 men
v Halving of German force in southern Russia
v Handing of the operational initiative to the Soviets (for three
months) after which initiative lies with the better commander
Kursk
q
Irrevocable handing of operational
initiative throughout the entire front to the Russians
q
Loss of thousands of tanks
As can be seen, tide can be said to turn at one of the three points. But which of these three? First let us take a look at the definition of ‘turning point’.
turning
point.
The point
at which a very significant change occurs; a decisive moment.
Which of these is a ‘very significant change’? Is it the changing of Barbarossa into a long war, is it the turning of the initiative for the medium term, or is it the irrevocable handling the aforementioned? All of them are clearly significant changes. The turning of Barbarossa into a war of attrition would not definitely mean a loss for Germany even though it was inferior in manpower and industrial strength: The Caucasus was at the doorstep of German forces already in the Donets. A German capture of this region would deprive the USSR of most of its oil and its ‘breadbasket’.
The loss of a quarter million of the finest German troops shook the entire army. But was the loss of it and the initiative decisive? We will come back to this question later.
The permanent transfer of the initiative at Kursk was definitely decisive. So the only unanswered question was if the war was lost before Kursk. Let’s consider the situation on 3rd February 1943. The last of German resistance in Stalingrad has just been crushed. The Red Army is advancing quickly. However, the German Army is not yet crushed. It still has a vast area for conducting strategic operations. Moreover, the rapid Soviet advance had stretched supply and communications lines. (A thrust at Kharkov easily liberated the city.) However, the two factors did not signify that Germany still winning. It was like a chess game in which, as many masters say, “White has a significant advantage, but that in itself is not big enough to win.” Indeed, ‘Black’, though losing, still had a significant chance to win. It only took several mistakes by the German Army in mid-1943 (before and during the battle of Kursk) to hand the victory over to the Soviets on a platter.
Therefore, I conclude that while Stalingrad had a big contribution,
Kursk was the death knell for the German Army.