Pavel Alexeyevich Rotmistrov

Pavel Rotmistrov ( Russian Павел Алексеевич Ротмистров ; born June 23, ^jul. / 6. July  1901 ^greg. In Skoworowo (now Rajon Selischarowo, Tver Oblast ); † 6. April 1982 in Moscow ) was a Soviet main marshal of armored troops and professor at the Military Academy of Armored Forces of the Red Army . He was the commander of large Soviet tank units during the German-Soviet War and the Cold War .

biography

Rotmistrow grew up in a large farming family. He had a total of eight siblings. Due to his origins, he initially had a low level of schooling that did not go beyond a higher elementary school certificate in 1916. Then he made his way as a casual worker and was employed by the railway in Peno and woodcutter on the Upper Volga. In 1917 he came to Samara , where he worked as a loading assistant.

Russian civil war

Attack on the Kronstadt Fortress (March 1921)

In Samara, Rotmistrov did not appear during the revolutionary turmoil and the brief retaking of the city by White troops until the end of 1918. In March 1919 he participated in the suppression of the anti-Bolshevik uprising in the Melekessk Ujesd ( Russian Чапанная Война , Tschapan war). In April 1919 he joined the Red Army and became part of the Samar Workers Regiment. At the same time he became a member of the Russian Communist Party . After joining the Red Army, he took part in the fighting against the troops of Admiral Kolchak (June 21, 1919 - January 7, 1920) and in the Soviet-Polish War (January 1920 - December 1920). In March 1921 he took part in the suppression of the Kronstadt sailors' uprising. Rotmistrow was one of the first soldiers loyal to the Soviet Union to break into the fortress at Fort No. 6. He was wounded in combat, but was able to take out a machine-gun nest of the defenders. He was awarded the Order of the Red Banner for his bravery .

Interwar period

After the end of the civil war, Rotmistrov graduated from the Smolensk Infantry School . He served as a political officer in Ryazan in the 149th and 51st Rifle Regiment. In 1924 he completed a course at the "WZIK" military school and was then employed as a platoon leader. From March 1928 to October of the same year he was used as the commander of a battery of the 11th Artillery Regiment. He then became deputy commander of a battalion of the 34th Rifle Regiment in the Leningrad Military District. In 1931 he successfully graduated from the Frunze Military Academy in Moscow and was then employed as the first staff officer in the 36th Rifle Division in Chita. From March 1936 he was the first staff officer in the Special Red Banner Far East Army .

Rotmistrov was one of those officers in the Red Army who profited from the Great Terror . In June 1937 he became the commander of the elite 63rd Red Banner Regiment " MW Frunze " in the 21st two-fold Red Banner Navy Rifle Division " SS Kamenew " . In October 1937 he was transferred from the Far East to Moscow to the Tactical Institute of the Military Academy for Mechanization and Motorization of the Red Army "IW Stalin" . In 1939 Rotmistrow began his doctoral thesis on the use of armored troops in war. A little later he was denounced as having connections to enemies of the people and expelled from the CPSU. However, he was not arrested for appealing against the decision of the party bureau of the military academy. A few months later, on the instructions of the Central Committee of the CPSU, he was re-admitted to the Soviet ruling party; the exclusion was replaced by a reprimand. In 1940 he defended his dissertation, received his doctorate in military science and was promoted to lieutenant colonel.

Winter War and the time shortly before the outbreak of the German-Soviet War

In the spring of 1940 Rotmistrow was transferred to the front of the Winter War to gain experience in fighting with armored forces. He was officially used as the commander of a reserve group on the Northwest Front. At his personal request, he became the commander of a T-26 tank battalion of the 35th Light Tank Brigade of the 7th Soviet Army. He participated in the breakthrough of the Mannerheim Line and the inclusion of Vyborg. The 35th Light Tank Brigade was awarded the Order of the Red Banner for its successful operations at the end of the Winter War. Rotmistrow received the Order of the Red Star .

In December 1940 Rotmistrow was appointed deputy commander of the 5th Panzer Division of the 3rd Mechanized Corps in the special Baltic military district in Alytus (now Lithuania ). From May 1941 he was Chief of Staff of the 3rd Mechanized Corps in Kaunas .

German-Soviet War

The German-Soviet war began for Rotmistrow in Lithuania. Like many other Soviet tank units, the 3rd Mechanized Corps was only equipped with light tanks of the T-26 and BT series . The corps' losses were devastating. On the fifth day of the war, German troops captured the administration building and the headquarters of the 2nd Panzer Division, which housed part of the corps staff. For more than two months after the annihilation of the 3rd Mechanized Corps, Rotmistrov made his way through the forests of Lithuania and Belarus about 500 kilometers to Bryansk to the Soviet lines in a group of soldiers and officers. For this performance he was promoted to colonel.

Battle for Moscow

In September 1941 Rotmistrow was appointed commander of the 8th Panzer Brigade of the 11th Army on the Northwest Front. In October 1941, the brigade, consisting of a tank regiment and a mechanized infantry battalion, was moved in night marches over a distance of 250 kilometers from Waldai to Dumanowo. On October 14, the brigade approached the village of Kalikino near the city of Kalinin (now Tver ). There she was used as part of an operational group under the command of Nikolai Fyodorovich Watutin in the defense of the Leningrad highway in the section Mednoye - Kalinin. (→ Battle of Moscow ) In December 1941 Rotmistrov took part in the Soviet counter-offensive off Moscow and was involved in the recapture of the city of Klin . Then the 8th Panzer Brigade was integrated into the 30th Soviet Army of the Kalinin Front . There she took part in the fighting for the city of Rzhev . In January 1942 the 8th Panzer Brigade was renamed the 3rd Guard Panzer Brigade on an honorary basis. Rotmistrov received the Order of Lenin for his services during the Soviet winter offensive .

Fight at Voronezh

In March 1942 Rotmistrow received the order to form the 7th Panzer Corps from the 3rd Guard Panzer Brigade near Kalinin. In April 1942 he became the corps commander of the newly established corps, which remained deployed in the area of ​​the front arc of Rzhev. On June 28, 1942, the German offensive began under the cover name Fall Blau . The German troops broke through the Soviet front line in the Ostrogoshsk area and quickly advanced on Voronezh. The Rotmistrov corps was hurriedly loaded onto trains and attached to the 5th Panzer Army at Jelez under Major General Alexander Ilyich Lisjukov .

The 5th Panzer Army was given the task of immediately countering the German Panzer Group near Voronezh. The 7th Panzer Corps attacked the 11th German Panzer Division at Jelez and repulsed them. Due to the clumsy and hastily organized organization of the operation, the goal of breaking up the German units was not achieved. Three well-equipped tank corps were sent into battle two days apart, without success. In July 1942 Rotmistrow was promoted to major general of the armored forces.

Battle for Stalingrad

On August 25, 1942, the 7th Panzer Corps was transferred to the 1st Panzer Army on the Stalingrad Front . In September 1942, the 1st Panzer Army received the order to immediately break through the German lines around Stalingrad and repel the enemy. This attack, initiated again hastily and clumsily, ended in disaster. After three days of fighting, only 15 of the original 180 tanks of the 7th Panzer Corps were still operational. The remnants of the corps were transferred to the reserve.

After the necessary refreshment, Rotmistrow's Corps was involved in defending against the German counterstrike, Operation Wintergewitter , which was supposed to enable the trapped German 6th Army to break out of Stalingrad. On December 24th, Rotmistrow's 7th Panzer Corps attacked the front line of Army Group Hoth together with the 2nd Guard Army and pushed them back. On December 28, the Kotelnikowo corps captured the German airfield near the city in the afternoon of the same day. This counterattack sealed the fate of the German troops trapped near Stalingrad. For the quick capture of the airfield, the 7th Panzer Corps was renamed the 3rd Guards Panzer Corps “Kotelnikowo” on December 29th.

In January 1943, the 3rd Guards Panzer Corps and the 2nd Guards Army were used in the Soviet counter-offensives that led to the retaking of the city of Rostov-on-Don in February . For the good leadership of the 3rd Guard Panzer Corps, Rotmistrow received the rank of Lieutenant General of the Armored Troops on February 22, 1942. He was awarded the Suworoworden, second class, and received command of the 5th Guards Panzer Army , which was to be newly established in March 1943 .

Tank battle near Prokhorovka

Obelisk in memory of the tank battle near Prokhorovka

For the following months, until the start of the German offensive of Operation Citadel, Rotmistrov's army was in a reserve position on the Voronezh Front . Their first use took place on July 12, 1943 in the Soviet counterattack on the southern German attack spearhead near Prokhorovka .

At the beginning of the fighting, Rotmistrov's army consisted of 838 combat vehicles ready for action, a reserve of 96 tanks was still brought up. Rotmistrow's attack plan provided for two attack wedges consisting of around 400 and 200 tanks, respectively, which were to attack the German units. By July 9, he managed to move his enormous armed force over a distance of around 330 km from the German reconnaissance, unnoticed, near the front near Prokhorovka.

When he and Marshal Wassilewski were approaching the front southwest of Prokhorovka, they both watched a column of tanks approaching them from a distance. Wassilewski asked Rotmistrow why the tanks of the 5th Guards Panzer Army would go for a walk in broad daylight in front of the Germans. It was only when the tanks opened fire that they both realized that they were German troops.

Wassilewski overreacted and demanded an immediate counterattack from Rotmistrow, which was to take place on July 11 at around 8:00 p.m. After some postponements, the 5th Guards Panzer Army actually went to attack on July 12 at 7:30 am without having carried out a sufficient investigation of the area. The success of the attack would have been inevitable if Rotmistrov and his staff had not overlooked a Soviet anti-tank trench into which the bulk of his tanks drove during the hasty preparation of his attack plan caused by the Stawka .

This factor and the technical superiority of the new German tank models, as determined by Rotmistrow himself, meant that the 5th Guards Panzer Army lost around 53 percent of its tanks on July 12 without causing any significant losses on the German side. Stalin personally addressed Rotmistrow with the words: "What have you done to your magnificent tank army?" and intended to try him before a court martial. This did not happen because the Stawka itself was responsible for the unsuitable time of deployment and the remaining tanks of the 5th Guards Panzer Army could quickly be put into operational readiness again.

Operation Rumyantsev

At the beginning of August, Rotmistrow's Panzer Army was ready to launch another attack on the German lines. (→ Belgorod-Kharkov Operation ) On August 3, the 1st Soviet Panzer Army and Red Mistrov's 5th Guards Panzer Army broke through the German defensive positions north of Belgorod and advanced south. This time the deployment of the 5th Guards Panzer Army was successful, because Belgorod was recaptured on August 5, 1943. The Soviet tank advance was only stopped at Boguduchow from August 12, 1943 by a counterattack by the SS Panzer Grenadier divisions “Das Reich” and “Totenkopf” . During the fighting there that lasted until August 17, the 5th Guards Panzer Army lost almost all of its remaining tanks. On August 28, 1943, it only consisted of 50 operational vehicles. In September 1943 Rotmistrow was promoted to colonel general of the armored forces.

Recapture of Ukraine

From September 1943, the 5th Guards Panzer Army took part in the Battle of the Dnieper , where it was constantly refreshed. In January 1944, during the Dnepr-Carpathian operation , the army was involved in the containment of around 80,000 German soldiers near Korsun. Rotmistrow was promoted to Marshal of the Armored Forces for his services during this kettle battle. In March 1944, the 5th Guards Panzer Army was involved in the Uman-Botoşan operation, and Rotmistrow managed to cross the Prut River on March 28, 1944 while moving.

Operation Bagration

Marshal Rotmistrow giving instructions (Borissow, July 1, 1944)

In April 1944 the 5th Guards Panzer Army was detached from the front in the Ukraine and relocated to the Soviet hinterland to refresh. The army was assigned to the 3rd Belarusian Front and was to form the northern attack wedge in the planned encirclement of the German Army Group Center. (→ Operation Bagration ) After the start of the Soviet offensive, the 5th Guards Panzer Army, now equipped with IS-2 tanks, overran one of the last defensive positions of the 3rd German Panzer Army near Bogushevsk and then penetrated southwest along the Minsk - Moscow motorway in front. In front of Borissow , the 5th Guards Panzer Army met the 5th German Panzer Division on June 27, 1944 and was involved in violent fighting there, which led to great losses. It was not until July 1, 1944, that Rotmistrov succeeded in crossing the Berezina near Borissow and advancing towards Minsk. The Belarusian capital was captured on July 3, 1944 by the tanks of the 5th Guards Tank Army. After that, the army swung in the direction of Vilnius and took part in the battles to recapture this city until July 14, 1944.

After the end of the Battle of Vilnius, the combat strength of the Soviet 5th Guards Tank Army had shrunk to 50 operational tanks of the type IS-2 due to high losses. On July 16, 1944, Rotmistrov was released from his front command at the request of Army General Ivan Danilowitsch Tschernjachowski .

For the remainder of the German-Soviet war, Rotmistrow received no further front command. Instead, he was appointed deputy commander of the armored and mechanized forces of the Red Army.

Life after the end of the German-Soviet war

After the German-Soviet War, Rotmistrov was the commander of the armored and mechanized forces of the Red Army group in Germany and then in the same function in the Far East. Since 1948 he was deputy head of the Higher Military Academy “KE Voroshilov” . In 1956 he completed his habilitation and in 1958 became a professor at the military academy of the armored forces. At the same time he took over the management of the academy until 1964.

For his services in developing the military theory of tank combat and in training Red Army officers, Rotmistrov was promoted to Chief Marshal of the Armored Forces in 1962.

Since 1964 Rotmistrov was a deputy of the Ministry of Defense of the USSR in the higher military educational institutions. On May 7, 1965 he was awarded the Order of Hero of the Soviet Union and the Order of Lenin . From 1968 he was in the group of inspectors general of the Ministry of Defense of the USSR.

Publications

• Танковое сражение под Прохоровкой (The tank battle near Prokhorovka); Moscow 1960
• Время и танки (time and tanks); Воениздат (Military Publishing House of the USSR) Moscow 1972 ( online )
• Танки на войне (tanks in war); Moscow 1975
• Стальная гвардия (Steel Guard); Moscow 1984;

Falsification of history

The disastrous course of the tank battle in Prokhorovka was covered up shortly after the events by a silent cartel made up of Stalin, Rotmistrov, Army General Watutin and Front Commissioner Khrushchev . During this time Rotmistrow created the myth of a tank encounter battle that should have led to the destruction of the II SS Panzer Corps and the destruction of 400 German tanks. According to this representation, which was reproduced in all of Rotmistrov's publications, Prokhorovka was the “grave of the German armored weapon” .

In addition, Rotmistrow invented the story of another tank battle between the 6th German Panzer Division , which was advancing as reinforcements, and the reserve of the 5th Guards Panzer Army. Such a fight never took place, apart from a minor skirmish near Rschavets. According to the German military historian Frieser, Rotmistrow presented this fight in such a way that he could not be accused of having split his forces. This story was even borrowed from German propaganda writer Paul Carell in his portrayal of the Battle of Kursk.

In view of the extensive censorship measures in the Soviet Union , which were not noticeably relaxed in 1987, it is also questionable whether Rotmistrov, if he had intended to portray the events of Prokhorovka correctly, could ever have published this pamphlet.

literature

• Karl-Heinz Frieser (Ed.): The German Reich and the Second World War. Volume 8: Karl-Heinz Frieser, Klaus Schmider , Klaus Schönherr , Gerhard Schreiber , Krisztián Ungváry , Bernd Wegner : The Eastern Front 1943/44 - The War in the East and on the Secondary Fronts. Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Munich 2007, ISBN 978-3-421-06235-2 . ( online )
• Валерий Николаевич Замулин ( Valery Nikolajewitsch Samulin ): Прохоровка - неизвестное сражение великой войны (Prokhorovka - unknown war) АСТ 2005; ISBN 5170227434
• В.Н. Замулин: Засекреченная Курская битва. Неизвестные документы свидетельствуют (Secret battle of Kursk. Unknown documents clear up.); Яуза, Эксмо (Jausa, Exmo) Moscow 2008; ISBN 978-5-699-28288-3 .
• В.Н. Замулин: Курский излом. Решающая битва Великой Отечественной. (The Breakthrough of Kursk. The decisive battle of the Great Patriotic War); Яуза, Эксмо (Jausa, Exmo) Moscow 2008; ISBN 978-5-699-27682-0 ( online )
• David M. Glantz: Soviet Military Deception in the Second World War ; Frank Cass 1989; ISBN 0-7146-3347-X

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Samulin: Secret Matter Battle of Kursk , p. 230
2. ↑ Rotmistrow: Steel Guard , p. 182
3. ↑ Samulin: Secret Matter Battle of Kursk , p. 238
4. ↑ Samulin: Geheimsache Battle of Kursk , page 261
5. ↑ Frieser: The German Empire and the Second World War , Vol. 8, p. 183
6. ↑ Frieser: The German Empire and the Second World War , Vol. 8, p. 117
7. ↑ ^{a b} Frieser: The German Empire and the Second World War , Vol. 8, p. 133
8. ^ Glantz: Soviet Military Deception , p. 217
9. ^ Frieser: The German Empire and the Second World War , Vol. 8, p. 135

Remarks

1. ↑ The Tschapan is a piece of clothing similar to the caftan . A prominent holder of a Tschapan is the Afghan President Hamid Karzai .

Web links

• Article Pawel Alexejewitsch Rotmistrow in the Great Soviet Encyclopedia (BSE) , 3rd edition 1969–1978 (Russian)http: //vorlage_gse.test/1%3D097804~2a%3D~2b%3DPawel%20Alexejewitsch%20Rotmistrow