Army Group North

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The Army Group North was a major unit of the army of the German Wehrmacht during the Second World War . She was high command of changing armies and numerous special troops.

Career

Army Group North was set up on September 2, 1939 by being reorganized from Army High Command 2. After the attack on Poland was over, it was relocated to the west and renamed Army Group B on October 10, 1939 .

On April 22, 1941, Army Group North was reactivated by renaming the staff of Army Group C in East Prussia. On June 22nd, at the beginning of the attack on the Soviet Union ( Operation Barbarossa ), Army Group North was under the command of General Field Marshal Wilhelm Ritter von Leeb with the 18th Army (Colonel General Georg von Küchler ) on the left, Panzer Group 4 (GenOb. Erich Hoepner ) in the center and the 16th Army (GenOb. Ernst Busch ) on the right wing, with 26 infantry, three armored and three motorized divisions, attacked east across the Memel . On the opposing side, the 8th Army (Major General PP Sobennikow ) and 11th Army (Lieutenant General WI Morosow ) fought in the Soviet Northwest Front (Army General FI Kuznetsov ) , while the 27th Army (Major General NE Bersarin ) acted as reserve .

The first operational objective of Army Group North in the approaching battle for the Baltic States was the reaching of the Daugava between Jakobstadt and Daugavpils by General Hoepner's tank units. Already on June 23rd there was heavy tank fighting near Tauroggen - Schaulen, which the German XXXXI. Army Corps (mot.) (General Georg-Hans Reinhardt ) stayed for several days, while further south the LVI. Army Corps (mot.) (General Erich von Manstein ) made rapid progress on Jakobstadt. On June 28th, the independently operating XXVI. Army Corps win the port city of Libau and by July 1st also Riga as new naval bases. While the Soviet 8th Army tenaciously defended the coastline, the Soviet 11th and 27th Armies were quickly forced to retreat across the Daugava.

Panzer Group 4 reached Lake Peipus by mid-July and threw back the Soviet 8th Army at Narva. Already on August 10th, without waiting for the advancing infantry corps of the 18th Army, the first attack on Leningrad took place , which did not lead to success. Counterattacks by the Soviet 27th Army, brought up from the reserve, stopped the attack by the 16th Army on the southern wing of the Army Group in the Chudovo area . The 18th Army was able to conquer the Estonian capital Tallinn by the end of August and followed the tank units to the Leningrad blockade in September . After the Finnish army under Marshal Mannerheim had stopped their advance on the Karelian Isthmus after reaching their old border, the attack on Leningrad from the north that Hitler had expected was canceled. Leningrad's defense, organized by Army General GK Schukow himself from September 1941 , proved to be too strong for the Wehrmacht in the period that followed. Hitler intended to starve the city, but it successfully withstood the siege until early 1944.

At the end of November 1941, the German tried XXXIX. Motorized Army Corps under General Rudolf Schmidt by pushing Tikhvin to cut off the last open connection between Leningrad and Lake Ladoga to the east. To defend the Volkhov Front there (Army General KA Merezkow ), the Soviets threw three new armies (8th, 42nd and 55th Army) onto the threatened sector and finally brought the German attack to a standstill.

In July 1942, the 18th Army succeeded in completely crushing the Soviet 2nd Shock Army (GenLt. AA Vlasow ) , which had broken into the German lines, in a battle. However, the Soviets were able to make up for their failures again and again with reserve troops and even strengthen them. After the conquest of the Crimean peninsula, the 11th Army that had become free was transferred to the Army Group, and their units came at just the right time to intercept the Soviet counter-offensives on the Volkhov and Luga .

1943 was a year of heavy trench warfare, but without much change in the front line. Only when Army Group Center (Gen. Feldm. Busch) between Vitebsk , Orsha and Mogilew collapsed during the Soviet summer offensive ( Operation Bagration ) at the end of June 1944 did movements begin again. The south wing of Army Group North in the Polotsk area was now unprotected, and the 16th Army (Gen. Inf. Paul Laux ) standing there had to retreat along the Daugava to Riga . The counter-offensive of the Leningrad Front (Army General LA Govorow ) in January 1944 also pushed the 18th Army back to Narva. In September ( Operation Aster ) and October the general retreat of the 16th and 18th Armies to Courland took place via Riga , where they were cut off from the Soviet 1st, 2nd and 3rd Baltic Fronts and in the Courland pocket until the end of the war in May 1945 were able to hold their positions.

On January 25, 1945, Army Group North was renamed Army Group Courland due to the situation . On January 27, the previous Army Group Center in East Prussia was renamed Army Group North, and Colonel General Lothar Rendulic received the supreme command . This formation initially contained the 3rd Panzer Army , the 2nd and 4th Armies . After the shock wedges of the 2nd Belarusian Front (Marshal KK Rokossowski ) split this new Army Group North again at the end of January 1945, the rest of the 4th Army (Gen. Inf. Friedrich-Wilhelm Müller ) fought back on Königsberg and was in the area of the Heiligenbeil cauldron worn down in March. The units of the 2nd Army (General of the Panzer Troop Dietrich von Saucken ) fought their way back to Danzig and the Hela Peninsula, where the East Prussian Army Command was established, whose troops were able to hold out until May 1945.

On April 2, 1945, Army Group North (since March 13, under GenOb. Walter Weiß ) was finally disbanded, its staff then formed Army High Command 12 (AOK 12), which was established on the Elbe in the Magdeburg - Potsdam area. The staff of the released 3rd Panzer Army was used for new formations on the Oder in the Stettin area and subordinated to the Army Group Vistula (Colonel General Gotthard Heinrici ) as the northern wing.

Commander in chief

Structure of the Army Group

Army group troops
  • Army Group News Regiment 537
  • Army Group News Regiment 639 (2nd lineup)
  • Army Group News Regiment 537
Subordinate major associations
date Subordinate major associations
1. Lineup (1939)
September 1939 3rd Army , 4th Army
2nd list (1941–1945)
June 1941 16th Army , 18th Army , Panzer Group 4
October 1941 16th Army, 18th Army
September 1942 11th Army, 16th Army, 18th Army
December 1942 16th Army, 18th Army
March 1944 Army Department Narva, 16th Army, 18th Army
September 1944 16th Army, Grasser Army Division, 18th Army
November 1944 16th Army, Kleffel Army Department, 18th Army
December 1944 16th Army, 18th Army
Further see Army Group Courland *
February 1945 Samland Army Department, 4th Army

* Renaming of Army Group Center to Army Group North at the end of January 1945

See also

literature