1st Panzer Army (Wehrmacht)

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Troop association badge of Panzer Group 1 / 1st Panzer Army from June 22, 1941 to the end of 1942. The K referred to the Commander-in-Chief Colonel-General Ewald von Kleist.

The 1st Panzer Army / Tank Army High Command 1 (PzAOK 1) was a major unit of the Army of the Wehrmacht during the Second World War . She was the high command of changing army corps and numerous special troops. It emerged from the renaming of Panzer Group 1, which in turn came from the previously existing Panzer Group Kleist.

history

Tank group from Kleist

On March 1, 1940, the Kleist Panzer Group was set up. Commander in chief was General of the Cavalry Ewald von Kleist , Chief of the General Staff was Colonel Kurt Zeitzler . This tank group was the first such unit of the Wehrmacht that bundled armored and motorized troops in the form of several corps and carried out the first operationally (see also tactics # operational ) independent deployment of the armored forces in war history. It consisted of five armored divisions (half of the armored divisions of the Wehrmacht) and three motorized divisions and thus bundled around half of the battle tanks available for the attack on France. During the western campaign , these troops advanced through the Ardennes , at Sedan over the Meuse to the Channel coast and contributed significantly to cutting off the Allied troops in northern France and Belgium . In the later course of the campaign it penetrated as far as Lyon , Orléans and Bordeaux . In all, it covered 3,000 km in just under eight weeks and made nearly half a million prisoners.

The von Kleist Panzer Group was subordinate to Army Group A under Colonel General von Rundstedt . They were subordinate to von Kleist's Panzer Group

Panzergruppe 1 emerged from Panzergruppe Kleist , which was released on November 16, 1940 under the now Colonel General Ewald von Kleist from General Command XXII. Army Corps (mot.) Was established and was stationed in occupied France until early 1941.

1941

In April 1941 Panzer Group 1 took part as part of the 12th Army under General Field Marshal Wilhelm List in the Balkan campaign in northern Yugoslavia. The Kleist Panzer Group destroyed the Yugoslav 5th and 6th Army in a very short time before occupying Belgrade on April 12, 1941 .

In May 1941, the Panzer Group in Operation Barbarossa , at the beginning of the war against the Soviet Union , was subordinate to General Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt's Army Group South . After the breakthrough on the Eastern Galician border, Panzer Group 1 fought against the Red Army in the tank battle of Lutsk-Dubno until the end of June .

After operations in the Kesselschlacht near Uman (beginning of August), which were carried out together with the 17th Army , the opening to the Dnieper bend followed. The III. Army Corps (motorized) reached Kremenchug on August 15 with the 13th Panzer Division. Troops of the XIV Army Corps (motorized) stormed Dnepropetrovsk at the great Dnieper bend and parts of the 14th Panzer Division and the 60th Motorized Infantry Division occupied the city of Zaporozhye . On August 17 and 18, the German troops built an eastern bridgehead over the river and then secured it in weeks of fighting. In the meantime, the 16th Panzer Division and the SS Leibstandarte advanced south to the port of Nikolaev . At the end of August, von Kleist's tanks had secured the entire west bank of the Dnieper and, on the instructions of the OKW, grouped themselves northwards again. In September, Panzer Group 1 from the Kremenchug bridgehead took part in the Battle of Kiev , where five Soviet armies were surrounded.

In October 1941, Panzer Group while new operations in was Battle of the Sea of Azov in 1st Panzer Army renamed. Under Colonel-General von Kleist, the 1st Panzer Army began its advance in mid-November against Rostov , whose possession should open the gate to the Caucasus . Von Kleist attacked the city with the 13th and 14th Panzer Divisions and the SS “Leibstandarte” brigade and was able to take it on November 20, but the Soviet southern front managed to recapture the city of Rostov eight days later . The 1st Panzer Army had to go back to the defensive position on the Mius at the beginning of December .

1942

On January 29, 1942, the Kleist Army Group , which consisted of the 1st Panzer Army and the 17th Army , was set up as Commander-in-Chief under its namesake, von Kleist. The Kleist Army Group played a major role in repelling the Soviet attack at the Second Battle of Kharkov in May 1942. The following month, June 8, the Army Group was disbanded. The 1st Panzer Army, still led by Kleist, was subordinated to Army Group A under General Field Marshal Wilhelm List in July . Army Group A was tasked with leading the strike against the Caucasus during Operation Blau and taking Grozny and the Baku oil fields . The 1st Panzer Army spearheaded this attack. The attack was initially successful; Rostov, Maikop , Krasnodar and the entire Kuban river basin were occupied.

However, in September 1942, Army Group A's offensive in the Caucasus was stopped, which led to Lists to be replaced. Afterwards Hitler took personal control of Army Group A. On November 21, 1942 he appointed von Kleist as its commander in chief. General of the Cavalry Eberhard von Mackensen took command of the 1st Panzer Army . In December 1942, when the 6th Army in Stalingrad was included, the Red Army launched a successful offensive against Army Group A. It was followed by a hasty retreat from the Caucasus. The 1st Panzer Army was withdrawn through Rostov in January 1943 and thus avoided being trapped in the Kuban bridgehead .

1943

In January 1943, von Mackensen's 1st Panzer Army was subordinated to Army Group Don under Field Marshal Erich von Manstein . In the following month, von Manstein combined the 1st Panzer Army with the 4th Panzer Army in order to repel Soviet attempts to break into its northern flank. The counter-offensive launched on February 25 by the 4th Panzer Army between Pavlograd and Krasnograd and that on the Donets by the 1st Panzer Army in the Slavyansk area against the flanks of the Popov tank group that broke through towards Dnepropetrovsk closed a wide gap in the front. The 1st Panzer Army contributed to the success of the Third Battle of Kharkov in March 1943.

Outline on October 4, 1943

In October 1943, Soviet forces crossed the Dnieper between Dnepropetrovsk and Kremenchug . The 1st Panzer Army started a counterattack together with the 8th Army , but failed to repel the Soviet troops. At the end of the month, as the Red Army approached Kiev , von Mackensen was replaced by General of the Panzer Troop Hans-Valentin Hube .

1944

In March 1944, two Soviet tank armies broke through in Ukraine and threatened to cut off the 1st and 8th armies. A crisis arose in which the 1st Panzer Army, when it was almost surrounded by the two Soviet army groups in the Kamenez-Podolski pocket. On March 26th the Soviet 4th Panzer Army took Kamenez-Podolski, northeast of this city the 1st Panzer Army was almost completely enclosed with around 220,000 soldiers.

  • Mauss group with 7th Panzer Division, parts of 1st SS. Pz.-Div. "Adolf Hitler" and 68th Infantry Division
  • Corps group Chevallerie with LIX. Army Corps (Schulz, from March 22, Röhricht ) - 11th and 19th Panzer Divisions, 96th and 291st Infantry Divisions and XXIV Panzer Corps ( Nehring ) with 20th Panzer Grenadier, 16th and 17th Panzer Divisions, 101st Jäger and 208th, 168th and 371st Infantry Divisions
  • Group Breith with III. Panzer Corps - 1st and 6th Panzer Divisions and XXXXVI. Panzer Corps (from March 22nd Schulz ) with 1st, 82nd and 254th Infantry Divisions
  • Group Gollnick (south of the Dniester) with 75th Infantry Division and 18th Artillery Division

The only escape route was a gap in the Russian front in the south across the Dniester. The Commander-in-Chief of the Army Group, Manstein , however, contrary to enemy expectations and deceiving the enemy to the west, prepared the breakout through the middle of the Russian units attacking southwards. Only after tough negotiations with Manstein did Hitler subsequently give his approval. A successful breakout was carried out in which most of the approximately 220,000 soldiers escaped but the heavy equipment was lost. The losses amounted to “only” 5878 dead and missing. The operation became a well-known example of a strategic movement operation as the "Wandering Kamenets-Podilskyi Cauldron". An early collapse of the Eastern Front could still be avoided. Manstein subsequently lost command of the Army Group on March 30, 1944 while the outbreak was still ongoing. In July 1944, the 1st Panzer Army withdrew from Galicia to the Carpathian Mountains during the Lviv-Sandomierz operation . In August 1944, the troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front reached the north-eastern border of Slovakia. The defeated 1st Panzer Army withdrew behind the San, for example, on the Rzeszów - Sanok - Turka - Stryj line and withstood Soviet offensives at the Dukla Pass and in the Uzhgorod area during the Eastern Carpathian operation . As part of the "Heinrici Army Group", the German troops, together with the Hungarian 1st Army, moved into new positions between the High Tatras and Kosice opposite the 4th Ukrainian Front . The 1st Panzer Army was subordinate to Army Group A as the right wing from September 1944 .

1945

At the beginning of the last year of the war in 1945, the 1st Panzer Army and the 1st Hungarian Army formed the Heinrici Army Group . After the advance of the 1st Ukrainian Front in Lower Silesia, the front extended from the Upper Oder in the Ratibor - Moravian-Ostrava region across the Javorník Mountains to around Brno and was now part of the Central Army Group (GFM Schörner ). After the 4th and 2nd Ukrainian Front launched the attack via Iglau in the direction of Prague at the beginning of May , the 2nd Panzer Army was encircled in the Olomouc area and pushed towards Pardubitz , where the encircled remains of the 1st Panzer Army were also captured by the Soviets fell.

At the end of April 1945, the army under General Nehring still led 6 corps groups with almost 30 divisions, including the remnants of 6 tank divisions, the army high command was dissolved with the surrender on May 8, 1945.

Commander in chief

(Ranks at the time of their function as Commander in Chief of the 1st Panzer Army)

See also

literature

  • Correlli Barnett: Hitler's Generals . Grove Weidenfeld, New York 1989, ISBN 1-55584-161-9 .
  • Georg Tessin : Associations and troops of the German Wehrmacht and Waffen SS in World War II 1939–1945. Volume 2. The Land Forces 1–5 . 2nd Edition. Biblio-Verlag, Bissendorf 1973, ISBN 3-7648-0871-3 .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b History of the Kleist family - Paul Ludwig Ewald. Family association of those v. Kleist e. V., accessed on July 16, 2013 .
  2. ^ Karl-Heinz Frieser : Blitzkrieg Legend - The Western Campaign 1940 . 4th edition. Oldenbourg, Munich 2012, ISBN 3-486-71544-5 , p. 117-121 .
  3. Lapp, Peter Joachim: Battle and fall of the 17th Army in World War II. Helios Verlags- und Buchvertriebsgesellschaft, Aachen 2016, p. 43
  4. Lapp, Peter Joachim: Battle and fall of the 17th Army in World War II. Helios Verlags- und Buchvertriebsgesellschaft, Aachen 2016, p. 48
  5. Karl-Heinz Frieser u. a .: “The German Reich and the Second World War. Vol. 8: The Eastern Front - The War in the East and on the Side Fronts ”. DVA, Munich / Stuttgart. 1350 pp.
  6. DIE WELT March 28, 2014 Why Hitler fired the savior of an entire army

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