The campaign was already exacting its first toll of dead. Leutnant Hubert Becker with Army Group North remembered:
‘It was a hot early summer day, and I had no inkling. We were walking across a meadow and came under artillery fire. That was my baptism of fire – a very strange feeling. You’re told to walk there, then next to you comes an inimitable sound. There is a feeling that any minute you might be full of holes, but you get over that. Standing next to me was my commanding officer and you had to play the hero. You couldn’t just lie down, which would have been easier. And then over there lay a German soldier. His hand was raised in the air which made his wedding ring shine in the sun, and his head – a little reddish and puffed up – had a mouth with lips full of flies. That was the first dead man I had ever seen in my life.’(20)
Gefreiter Joachim Kredel stormed forward with the 67th Infantry Regiment, still mindful of the likely retribution that must soon come to this attack, which had obviously achieved surprise. Casualties up until now had been light. His platoon commander, Leutnant Maurer, observed with satisfaction as Kredel repeatedly hosed bursts of MG34 fire across the aperture of a Soviet bunker barring progress. There was a short pause of some seconds. No answering fire. ‘Move! Bypass it!’ cried the platoon commander, and soldiers scrambled around the flanks of the silenced bunker. It was a nerve-racking moment, the calculated instant of exposure.
On the far side of the fortification, Maurer and the lead elements relaxed from their tense crouching stance to a more upright position and continued to move forward. The burst of fire that spat out from the rear of the overrun position killed Maurer instantly and an NCO with two accompanying soldiers. Suspecting just such a ploy, the Russians had moved their machine gun to the rear of the bunker. Now the shock of the enormity of this first major loss sank in.
Unteroffizier Voss took command of the platoon, and with the support of a direct-firing anti-tank gun, managed with his soldiers to scramble up onto the roof of the bunker. Secure from the Russian beaten zone of fire, the position was held in thrall as the remainder of the company stormed by. Voss, marooned on the roof, could not get at the Russian soldiers inside. They held this ‘tiger by the tail’ the whole night long. Only a few isolated pistol shots punctuated the nervous waiting period. They were too tense to sleep. Much later, at daybreak, Kredel and Voss’s group were evacuated from their exposed position and ordered to rejoin the company. A section of assault pioneers was brought up to reduce the menace with explosive charges.(21)
Surprise had been achieved. The campaign was barely hours old, yet men had already endured experiences that would haunt them for the rest of their lives. Years after these events, Karl Unverzagt, a Fähnjunker (officer-cadet) in a Panzergrenadier division, quietly reflected, pipe in hand, that ‘we had shot into a scene where there had been dancing, drinking and singing, with people dressed in riding boots.’ His unit had burst in upon this celebration. ‘It was awful what our shells had done, something I will carry with me for the rest of my days – it was so terrible.’(22) Josef Zymelka, an engineer, said:
‘Over there, behind the Bug, stood an isolated house. I reckon it was a Customs post. In the early days, before war broke out, we had even swam there, and in the evenings I had always sung “a soldier stands on the banks of the Volga.” Before long, the Russians had also begun to sing, like in peacetime… After the attack I saw that the house was burning. Within four hours I was inside. On entry I saw that the soldiers – there were about 12 of them – had all been shot. They lay amongst burning, half collapsed rafters. They were the first dead I had ever seen.’(23)
At 04.55 hours XIIth Army Corps reported to Fourth Army HQ that ‘until now, the impression is the enemy has been totally surprised’. The corps pointed to Soviet radio intercepts which were asking ‘what should we do?’ among other things.(24)
There had been Soviet troop movements prior to the German onslaught. German comment on this and reactions regarding Soviet preparedness are mixed. Committed National Socialists such as Leutnant Hans Ulrich Rudel, a Stuka pilot who participated in the opening raids, left little room for doubt. His unadulterated view was that ‘it is a good thing we struck.’ Based on in-flight observations, he later wrote:
‘It looks as if the Soviets meant to build all these preparations up as a base for invasion against us. Whom else in the West could Russia have wanted to attack? If the Russians had completed their preparations, there would not have been much hope of halting them anywhere.’(25)
Leutnant Erich Mende, advancing with the 8th Silesian Infantry Division in the central sector, believed ‘the Red Army positions were prepared for attack, not defence. We had, according to one view, pre-empted an assault by the Red Army.’ In the fullness of time, he felt: ‘to support this view directly is wrong. But on the other hand, quite possibly such an operation could have taken place within a few months or a year.’(26) Bernd Freytag von Lorringhoven, a Panzer officer serving on the staff of General Guderian’s Panzergruppe 2, said after the war:
‘At that time we had nothing to support the present view, often repeated, that the Russians planned an attack themselves. It became quickly apparent the Russians had adopted a defensive stance and were partly prepared when the German assault began. Infantry divisions were mainly positioned on the border, while the armour was located further to the rear. If they had been required for an attack, they would have had to be positioned closer to the border.’(27)
Whatever the intention, there had certainly been large-scale Soviet military deployments prior to 22 June. Perception often has paramountcy over facts, and will influence decisions in war. Infantryman Emanuel Selder was in no doubt that ‘at no time’ on the eve of the offensive ‘could anyone seriously calculate the Russians were going to strike first’. His view was that ‘the Red Army was totally surprised by the attack.’ Unimpressed by any ‘preventive war hypothesis’, Selder noted that the Russians in some areas had absolutely no artillery support. ‘Like us,’ he pointed out during interview, the Russians constructed camps within woods near the border.
‘But contrary to our bivouacs, theirs were not camouflaged. They were even showing lights with hanging portraits of Stalin and red flags. All this is basically contrary to the widely held impression that, despite these factors, the Russians were equipped for an attack.’(28)
This view is echoed by examination of the radio logs of attacking German vanguards. XIIth Corps in the central sector near Brest-Litovsk was reporting by 06.15 hours to Guderian’s Panzergruppe 2 that ‘according to radio intercepts and statements from captured officers, the enemy appears completely surprised. Maximum offensive effort by all corps is ordered.’(29)
Lines of motionless Panzers awaiting information from attacking infantry – Sturmtruppen – began to erupt into a haze of blue exhaust-shrouded activity. Dust began to rise as tanks lurched forward and clattered and squeaked toward newly constructed pontoons, or captured bridges. Leutnant F. W. Christians, moving with a Panzer division in Army Group South, remembered how young soldiers were already impressed at the extent to which the battlefield was ‘dominated by our artillery and Luftwaffe’. Another aspect was also evident. Bodies from both sides were already lying by the roadsides. ‘There was also a bitter side to this advance,’ he remarked, ‘the first dead’, which ‘gave the young soldiers a foretaste of what to expect’.(30)
Daybreak… Berlin
The Soviet Ambassador in Berlin, Wladimir Dekanosow, had been attempting to contact the German Foreign Minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop, without success. Valentin Bereschkow, his First Secretary and interpreter, recalled: ‘It appeared that the Reich’s Foreign Minister was not in Berlin, but was at the Führer’s headquarters.’ Dekanosow, irritated, had been denied access. He was still unable to protest against the German border overflights.
In the German Foreign Office, Erich Sommer, a Russian-speaking interpreter, was informed by his legation head, Herr Strack, to call Bereschkow at the Soviet Embassy. Ribbentrop would se
e the Russian Ambassador now. Sommer and Strack drove off to the Russian Embassy to escort the Soviet delegation back. Before they left, Strack informed Sommer that war was to be declared against the Soviet Union, ‘but it had yet to be done’. As the official car drove along the Wilhelmstrasse on the return journey, the sun was only just beginning to rise. The occupants were preoccupied with their thoughts over the coming interview. Dekanosow felt at last he may be able to deliver his long-overdue protest. Sommer recalled his ironic remarks as the car glided past familiar Berlin landmarks. ‘It promises to be a beautiful day,’ the Soviet Ambassador said.(1)
Josef Goebbels, the Reich’s Propaganda Minister, was anticipating the forthcoming radio proclamation and press conference. ‘Radio, press and newsreel are mobilised,’ he wrote in his diary: ‘Everything runs like clockwork.’(2) Telephones had been ringing since 03.00 hours summoning the press. ‘What is it this time?’ many asked. Had the British decided to give up? Was the victorious Wehrmacht announcing a new objective? Cars sped through the dew-covered Tiergarten (zoo) towards the press conference room. It seemed it would be yet another hot stifling day.
Dekanosow and Bereschkow were led in at 04.00 hours to see Foreign Minister Ribbentrop. Erich Sommer, present as interpreter, witnessed all that transpired. The Foreign Minister was leaning lightly on his desk. Dekanosow attempted to raise the issue of certain ‘infringements’ affecting both nations but Ribbentrop did not take the matter up. Instead he indicated to his envoy Schmidt who began to read a memorandum ‘in which,’ Sommer said, ‘the Soviet Union was accused of systematically dismantling German-Soviet co-operation’. As Bereschkow and Sommer were about to interject to translate, the Soviet Ambassador stopped them. For nearly half an hour Schmidt continued reading, itemising Soviet border infringements both in the air and on the ground. The Memorandum continued:
‘Unfortunately, because of these unfriendly and provocative actions on the part of the Soviet Union, the German Government is obliged to meet the threat with all available military means.’
Sommer observed that, significantly, ‘the Memorandum did not end with a declaration of war. Hitler had expressly directed that the words “declaration of war” were not to appear in the text.’(3)
Bereschkow could hardly believe what he heard. The Soviet Union was allegedly threatening Germany. In fact a Soviet attack was pending. Hitler had to protect the German people. Therefore, already – two hours before – German troops had crossed the border.
Ribbentrop stood up and offered the Soviet envoy his hand. ‘The Ambassador,’ Bereschkow said, ‘was very nervous, and I think even a little drunk.’ Dekanosow, not surprisingly, ignored the gesture. ‘He declared that the German invasion was an aggression and the German Reich would soon very much regret launching this attack.’ Sommer saw the Soviet Ambassador ‘go red as a lobster and clench his fists’. He repeatedly said: ‘I regret this so much.’
As Bereschkow followed his ambassador from the room, Ribbentrop unexpectedly approached him and whispered close to his ear that ‘he was against this war. He still wanted to convince Hitler not to begin a war which he himself viewed as a catastrophe for Germany.’ Bereschkow was unmoved. He was damning in his interpretation of these events after the war, declaring: ‘in fact, there was no actual diplomatic declaration of war’. ‘Stalin strove,’ he believed, ‘right up to the last moment, to avoid the war.’ Diplomatic norms had been perverted, in his view, to maximise the military impact of surprise. He stated during interviews:
‘We had not evacuated any Soviet citizens from Germany. Even family dependents and children were still there. All German families had been evacuated from Moscow before 21 June, with the exception of some embassy staff. There were still about one hundred German diplomats in Moscow at the outbreak of war, whereas in Germany something like a thousand remained. It is absolutely clear that when someone initiates an attack, first of all, he evacuates his people. That was not the case with us.’(4)
Shortly after the painful interview, at 05.30 hours Ribbentrop announced to the world’s press that the war was already two hours old. Only 21 months previously he had returned from Moscow with his greatest diplomatic triumph: the German-Soviet Treaty of Friendship.
Meanwhile Liszt’s Les Préludes sounded as a fanfare across countless wireless sets in the Reich. ‘The High Command of the Wehrmacht announced the news of the invasion of Russia to the German people,’ Goebbels grandly wrote in his diary:
‘The new fanfare sounds. Filled with power, booming and majestic. I read the Führer’s proclamation to the German people over all stations. A solemn moment for me.’
Afterwards he drove home to his Schwanenwerder lake residence in Berlin. ‘The burden of many weeks and months falls away,’ he wrote: ‘A glorious wonderful hour has struck, when a new empire is born. Our nation is making her way up into the light.’ Goebbels had every reason to feel pleased with himself. A diplomatic and military triumph was now in the offing. Surprise for this new campaign had most certainly been achieved. At Schwanenwerder the sun was now up ‘standing full and beautiful in the sky’; he allowed himself ‘two hours of deep, healing sleep’.(5)
By the time he awoke, on the new Ostfront, artillery NCO Helmut Pabst was already feeling a hard-bitten veteran. He wrote in his diary on 22 June:
‘The advance went on. We moved fast, sometimes flat on the ground, but irresistibly. Ditches, water, sand, sun. Always changing position. Thirsty. No time to eat. By ten o’clock we were already old soldiers and had seen a great deal: abandoned positions, knocked out armoured cars, the first prisoners, the first dead Russians.’(5)
Josef Deck with Artillery Regiment 71 near Brest-Litovsk vividly remembers a Feldwebel talking in subdued tones on the way to their final firing positions. This NCO did not share the Reich Propaganda Minister’s optimism. His view was that:
‘A war was beginning in the East before that in the West appeared won. Moreover it had occurred to him that Germany had already once before come to grief in a two-front war.’(6)
Chapter 5
The longest day of the year
‘After the first shock, the enemy has turned to fight.’
Halder diary, 22 June 1941
The first Soviet pocket is formed – Brest-Litovsk
Georgij Karbuk had listened to the pleasant melodies of an orchestra in Brest-Litovsk the night before. As dawn broke on 22 June he was rudely awakened by his father. ‘Get up,’ he declared, ‘it’s war!’ Karbuk was immediately aware of the sounds of battle. ‘It was not a case of hearing single shots,’ he remembered, ‘it was a whole barrage. The artillery firing on the fortress.’ Out in the street soldiers were running. ‘What’s up?’ the Karbuks asked. They said: ‘Can’t you see?, It’s war!’(1)
Maj-Gen A. A. Korobkov, the commander of the Fourth Soviet Army, hastily despatched a situation report from his headquarters in Kobrin to the Western Special Military District in Minsk. Released at 06.40 hours, it read:
‘I report: at 04.15 hours on 22 June 1941 the enemy began to fire on the fortress at Brest and the region of the town of Brest. At the same time enemy aviation began to bomb the airfields at Brest, Kobrin and Pruzhany. By 06.00 hours artillery shelling intensified in the region of Brest. The town is burning… ’(2)
‘We youngsters did not want to believe in a war,’ admitted Georgij Karbuk, ‘it was something too far away for us.’ Suppressed suspicions were overtaken by the grim reality of events.
‘We had a foreboding that war would soon break out. We had certainly seen the Germans behind the Bug, but in spite of this we did not want to believe it. Then when we saw the first wounded and dead lying on the pavement and all the blood – we had to believe that now there would be war.’(3)
Katschowa Lesnewna worked as a nursing sister in the surgical hospital located within 36 buildings on the South Island. ‘Immediately with the initial bombardment,’ she said, ‘the buildings forming the surgical clinic went up in flames, as did the others.’ There was out
rage. ‘We thought the Fascists would spare the hospital;’ she complained, ‘there was a large red cross painted on the roof. At the same time there were the first wounded and dead.’(4) Wooden buildings burned furiously.
Unteroffizier Helmut Kollakowsky, a German infantry NCO, spoke in awe of the opening bombardment:
‘Someone told us that at 03.15 hours an overwhelming barrage would come, and it would be so strong, that we would be able to cross the Bug unhindered. It is impossible to contemplate any resistance after such an opening bombardment.’(5)
Gerd Habedanck observed the preliminary barrage secure within the battalion HQ bunker of one of the 45th Infantry Division’s assaulting units. They heard a single artillery report break the stillness, then:
‘We had barely heard it when the earth shook, boomed and rolled. Strong draughts of air blew into our faces… I risked a quick look outside the casement. The sky over us was lit up bright red. An infernal whistling, droning and crackle of explosions filled the air. Young willows were bent over as if in a storm… It is still not yet quite light and thick clouds of smoke darken the sky.’(6)
War Without Garlands: Operation Barbarossa 1941-1942 Page 11
