Dnieper–Carpathian offensive

Dnieper–Carpathian Offensive
Part of The Eastern Front, World War II
Soviet advances in 1943 and 1944.
Date 24 December 1943 to 14 April, 1944 Location south-western Ukrainian SSR Result Decisive Soviet strategic victory
Belligerents
Germany	Soviet Union
Commanders and leaders
Erich von Manstein Hans Hube Walther Model Karl-Adolf Hollidt Maximillian de Angelis Erhard Raus Otto Wöhler Petre Dumitrescu Mihai Racovita	Nikolai Vatutin Georgi Zhukov Ivan Konev Rodion Malinovsky Feodor Tolbukhin Konstantin Rokossovsky Lev Vladimirsky
Strength
	2,406,100 initially
Casualties and losses
unknown	270,198 KIA, missing and other unreturned casualties, 839,330 returned wounded and sick 7532 guns and mortars 4,666 tanks and sp guns, 676 aircraft

Template:Fixbunching The Dnieper–Carpathian Offensive, also known in Soviet historical sources as the liberation of right-bank Ukraine, fought from 24 December 1943 – 14 April 1944, was a strategic offensive operation declared by Stalin to be the "Second Shock", executed by the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th Ukrainian, and the Belorussian Fronts, intended to liberate all of Ukrainian and Moldovian territories occupied by Axis forces. The operation was divided into two phases, and at its conclusion brought the Red Army fronts into Poland and Romania. By the end of the operation, the Soviet high command (Stavka) had succeeded in completely destroying 18 Wehrmacht and Romanian divisions, and reducing another 68 to below half of their establishment strength.

Correlation of forces

The Stavka committed four Fronts to the operation, with the Belorussian Front providing a strategic flank security to the north in the Gomel-Mogilev area. These were tasked with breaching and destroying the "East Wall" held by von Manstein's Army Group South with 4th Panzer Army in the Zhitomir region commanded by Raus, Hube's 1st Panzer Army south of it as far as Cherkassy, the newly formed 8th Army commanded by Wöhler in the region of Kirovograd, the reconstituted 6th Army under de Angelis in the Krivoi Rog-Nikopol area, and the hastily rebuilt 3rd Rumanian Army under command of Dumitrescu in the Tavridia area north of Crimea held by von Kleist's Army Group A . In reserve to the north Mansten had the 1st Hungarian Army in the north-western Ukraine, and the 4th Rumanian Army hastily assembled under command of Racovita in the area of Soviet Moldavian Republic. Air support was provided by the Luftwaffe's 4th Air Fleet.

The Belorussian Front included the 13th and 65th Armies. Vatutin's 1st Ukranian Front had the 60th, 1st Guards and 40th Armies, but possessed massive armoured reserves of the 3rd Guards, 1st, and 4th Tank Armies backed up by the 18th and 38th Armies and the 2nd Air Army. Konev's 2nd Ukranian Front to the south led with the 27th, 7th Guards and 52nd Armies, with reserves including the 5th Guards and 2nd Tank armies, and the 4th Guards Army, all supported by the 5th Air Army. Malinovsky had the 57th, 46th, 8th Guards and 37th armies leading his 3rd Ukranian Front, with the 6th Army in reserve, and the 17th Air Army providing air support. Tolbukhin's 4th Ukranian Front would have the most difficult job in conducting combined operations of his Independent Coastal Army and the Black Sea Fleet while the 5th and 2nd Guards armies would cut off routes of escape over land for the German 17th Army with the support from the 8th Air Army and the Black Sea Fleet naval aviation.

First phase

The offensive was launched on December 24, 1943, against the German 4th Panzer Army By January 6, 1944, the right flank of the attack had reached Gorodnitsa, Poland. Afterwords, the right flank continued on, coming near to the important supply centers of Lvov and Ternopol. The main effort, however, was to the south. The 1st and 3rd Ukrainian Fronts advanced against the 4th Panzer Army and the 6th Army. A 110 mile gap was created between Army Group South and Army Group Center. Due to German reinforcements, the Soviet advance was slowed. The Wehrmacht did have some success by managing to extricate the remnants of XI and XXXXII Panzer Corps from where they were trapped. While the 30,000 troops with these formations were saved, 80,000 troops were lost by the Germans in total, as well as important mining operations at Krivoi Rog and Nikopol. While the offensive temporarily petered out in late February, the Soviets were preparing for the second phase of the strategic operation, on an even larger scale.

Soviet military planners included the following operations in this phase:

• Zhitomir-Berdichev Offensive (24 December 1943 - 14 January 1944)
• Kirograd Offensive (5 January 1944 - 16 January 1944)
• Korsun-Shevchenkovsky Offensive Operation (24 January 1944 - 17 February 1944)
• Rovno-Lutsk Offensive (27 January 1944 - 11 February 1944)
• Nikopol-Krivoi Rog Offensive (30 January 1944 - 29 February 1944)

Second phase

After the slackening of the Soviet effort at the end of February, the German High Command believed any further offensive effort in that sector unlikely. However, the Soviets had, by this time, brought in all six of their elite tank armies to prepare for the second phase. Once this was launched, the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Ukrainian Fronts proceeded 200 to 300 miles, along a front 800 miles wide in the first 42 days. The German front was completely split in half, and was never to recover. On March 10, the 2nd Ukrainian Front destroyed two Panzer Corps by capturing them at the fall of Uman. By March 25, the Prut had fallen and the 3rd Ukrainian Front was dispatched to secure Odessa. The offensive lead to the first reinforcement of the Eastern Front at the expense of the Western Front since November 1943, when II SS Panzer Corps was transferred from France. This was unknown to the Soviets, and the new reinforcements were able to assist the 1st Panzer Army in breaking out of their entrapment. It was a great victory for the Soviets, and their only mistake was in allowing 1st Panzer Army to escape entrapment at the Dniester.

These operations were included in the second phase by Soviet planners:

• Proskurov-Chernovtsy Offensive (4 March 1944 - 17 April 1944)
• Uman-Botoshany Offensive (5 March 1944 - 17 April 1944)
• Bereznegovatoye-Snigirevka Offensive (6 March 1944 - 18 March 1944)
• Polesskoe Offensive (15 March 1944 - 5 April 1944)
• Odessa Offensive (26 March 1944 - 14 April 1944)

Territory liberated

In the course of the operation the Vinnitskaya, Volynskaya, Zhitomirskaya, Kievskaya, Kirovogradskaya, Rovnenskaya, Khmelnytskaya and parts of Poltavskaya oblasts, and the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic were liberated by the Red Army, an area of some 204,000 sq.km.

Modern view

Currently, the operation is not very widely recognized for the great victory that it is in Western history. After the end of the war, some of the commanders involved were disgraced, and Stalin widely eliminated most references of the operation. Also, many Western historians, at least until the end of the Cold War, focused on the small German successes in the extrication of the 1st Panzer Army.

Sources

• Werth, Alexander. (1964). Russia At War: 1941 - 1945. New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., Inc.
• Willmott, H.P. (1989). The Great Crusade: A New Complete History of the Second World War. New York: The Free Press. ISBN 0-02-934715-7.
• Wright, Michael. (1989). The World at Arms: The Reader's Digest Illustrated History of World War II. London: The Reader's Digest Association Limited. ISBN 0895773333.
• Ziemke, Earl (1968). Stalingrad to Berlin: The German Defeat in the East. Washington, DC: The U.S. Army Center of Military History. ISBN 1410204146.