Cauldron battle
The term Kesselschlacht (synonym: encircling battle ) describes a military situation in which a war party succeeds during a field battle to encompass the enemy with its own troops on one or both sides. The cauldron battle is thus to be distinguished from a pure siege in which one of the parties willingly accepts an enclosure in order to hold a fortified area or a fortress and thus bind the enemy.
Well-known examples of boiler battles are Cannae and, from a German perspective, Tannenberg and the Battle of Stalingrad .
More detailed explanation of terms and tactics
The goal of every cauldron battle is first to contain the enemy. This can happen predictably, but often completely surprising and is possible in both open and narrow areas. It should be noted that troops trapped in open terrain, unlike besieged troops, cannot hide behind prepared, fortified retreats and their supplies, which are often further backwards, also largely come into the possession of the enclosing enemy as a result of the enclosure.
In such a situation, whether initially spacious or narrowed from the beginning ( Vienna 1683 ), even Clausewitz leaves open the possibility of keeping the fortress as a breakwater or to blow up the enclosure in order to preserve troops and material for a shortened front. A trapped unit or unit tends to break out as quickly as possible in order to avoid a certain defeat with depletion of supplies and uncertain aid pledges and services. The demolition of the enclosure - initiated and carried out quickly and accurately - can very well be successful on its own. In the case of a longer duration and already existing exhaustion of the defenders in psychological-physical as well as material terms, the outbreak can ultimately only succeed if, in precise coordination, forces from outside meet the efforts directed at a point on the enclosure front from within.
The war-historical name of the respective “Kesselschlacht” is derived from the region or city concerned (e.g. Kolberg, Breslau, Halbe / Berlin).
In military terms, an encirclement or enclosure begins with an attack on one (example: the Carthaginian cavalry outflanking the Roman army) or - with a little time delay - on both flanks (example Stalingrad ) of the opposing forces that advanced far in an assault. An attack on the flanks is usually fatal for those attacked under such circumstances, as it encounters troops at the rear that are not very ready to defend. What was initially still a weak enclosure increasingly becomes a permanent enclosure. Their aim is to reduce the confinement space until a fortress-like or fortress-like remaining area is exposed to a siege that is excluded from all aid.
Preliminary stage and warning of an impending encirclement is given as soon as units already see the enemy in front of them on three sides (cf. front bulge in the great Donbogen as a prerequisite for Stalingrad ).
For the troops, the completed enclosure - it can also only be three-sided, if the fourth side is given by nature (sea, mountains, river) - an existential threat, since the supply routes are lost. The spreading awareness of this condition has a demoralizing effect and can only strengthen the willingness to fight for some time with massive pledges of help. Supply via an airlift is in principle possible, but requires large resources and security in the case of transport aircraft, their take-off, flight and landing (was missing, for example, at the Battle of Stalingrad).
Use of terms
The everyday usage of the term "Kesselschlacht" shifted especially after the Second World War .
So it is no longer considered that there is no fundamental contradiction to a generally smaller-scale “enclosure” or siege .
Instead, the term `` Kesselschlacht '' now presupposes an initially extensive terrain, on the surface of which the enemy is trapped.
This everyday use no longer corresponds to the conventional definition used in military theory. B. the second siege of Vienna (1683, Turkish siege ) would no longer fall under this term.
Inclusions in Modern History
In the history of war, the idea of the complete destruction of an enemy army and the possibility of bringing about a quick, perhaps immediate end of the war, was only taken up again in the 19th century. The battle of Cannae was seen as a classic example, which is why one often speaks of a "Cannae" when the enemy is encircled and destroyed, although this was not a complete battle of destruction in terms of war history, because 40% of the Roman army were able to save themselves and Rome fought the war as “Fatigue strategy” against Hannibal, who is handicapped by a lack of supplies .
The battle of Sedan and the siege of Metz (September / October 1870), each with the inclusion of an enemy army, did not end the war immediately, but enabled the siege of Paris and the end of the war only a few months later.
During the First World War , the German war plan on the western front provided for a super cannae - the "most fantastic cauldron battle of all time." The French army was to be encircled, encircled and destroyed on the Swiss border by a massive and extensive encircling movement of the right wing of the German army. By retreating, the Allied troops were able to escape the encirclement movement. After the unsuccessful opening offensive, the war of movement finally froze in trench warfare . The actual course of the war did not correspond to the expectations of the military strategists during the entire course of the war on the part of all parties involved - with one single exception: The "Cannae ideal" of the strategist Alfred von Schlieffen (1833–1913 ) was seen in the Battle of Tannenberg (1914) ) Fulfills. There, the numerically inferior German 8th Army succeeded in defeating the 2nd Russian Army with a massive battle.
New technical and tactical developments in the First World War, such as the development of armored weapons and raid troop tactics , aimed at the renewed transition to warfare of movement . However, the use of these means was only based on the intention to achieve a breakthrough, not to bring about the encirclement of the enemy, which is proven by an admission by Erich Ludendorff (member of the Supreme Army Command). When asked about the operational goal of the 1918 spring offensive, he replied: "I forbid the word operation. We'll cut a hole in it. We'll find out more."
From the experiences of the First World War, it was only in the post-war period that the realization emerged that not only penetrations and breakthroughs but also enclosures were possible with it. In Germany this happened in cooperation with the Red Army and their Marshal Tukhachevsky (later liquidated by Stalin) . The cooperation with the Reichswehr under Colonel General Hans von Seeckt began before 1933 with the clear intention of circumventing the Versailles Treaty and its restrictions, as was also the case with the establishment of the Air Force. In France, Charles de Gaulle dealt with it and achieved initial successes, but this too late to be able to assert himself against the far-reaching advances of the German armored divisions. It was mainly tanks that were used in the war with the Soviet Union from 1941 to the end of 1945, first on the German side ( double battle near Vyazma and Brjansk , Kiev ), then on the Russian side ( battle of Stalingrad , Kamenez-Podolski battle , Operation Bagration ). Rapid operations deep into the rear of the enemy and thus the inclusion of entire opposing armies possible.
The term Kesselschlacht, by no means new, became widespread especially since 1941/42 because it was both a question of complete enclosures and the mass of the troops involved justified in some cases to speak of a "battle" and not just of "fighting" (e.g. B. Demyansk ).
Examples of historical cauldron battles
Antiquity
- Battle of the Trebia - the Carthaginian army under Hannibal defeats the numerically stronger Roman opponent in the first recorded battle in history ( December 18, 218 BC )
- Battle of Cannae - the Carthaginian army under Hannibal almost devastatingly defeats the numerically superior army of the Romans ( August 2, 216 BC )
- Battle of Carrhae - the Romans, commanded by Marcus Licinius Crassus , recorded one of the greatest defeats in their history against the Parthians under Surenas , around 20,000 fallen and 10,000 captured Roman soldiers (53 BC)
- Battle of Alesia - Gaius Iulius Caesar besieges Vercingetorix after his retreat to Alesia , repels a relief army and forces the Gauls to surrender (52 BC)
- Battle of the Casilinus - a Frankish army goes down completely against an Eastern Roman army led by Narses (spring 554)
16th Century
17th century
18th century
- Battle of Fraustadt - in the Great Northern War an outnumbered Swedish army defeats the Saxon-Russian armed forces (February 1706)
- Battle of Cowpens - in the American War of Independence , American troops and militia under Daniel Morgan encompass and defeat a British army (January 1, 1781)
- Siege of Mantua - Napoléon Bonaparte defeats the Austrians in the Italian campaign of the First Coalition War (June 1796 – February 1797)
19th century
- Battle of Sedan 1870
- Siege of Paris 1870/71
1900-1945
First World War
- Battle of Tannenberg - the 8th German Army defeats the 2nd Russian Army (end of August 1914)
Spanish Civil War
- Siege of Madrid - marked the end of the Spanish Civil War (October 1936 to March 28, 1939)
Japanese-Soviet border conflict
- Battle of Chalchin Gol - Soviet units under Zhukov thwart Japanese expansion to the north (August 1939)
Second World War
- Battle of the cauldrons near Białystok and Minsk - led to the offensive on Smolensk and Moscow (June 22 to July 9, 1941)
- Kesselschlacht near Smolensk - the Red Army lost 760,000 men (July 10 to September 10, 1941)
- Kesselschlacht bei Uman - Destruction of 20 divisions of the Red Army (July 15 to August 8, 1941)
- Battle of Kiev - 665,000 Soviet soldiers became German prisoners of war (23 August to 26 September 1941)
- Siege of Leningrad - with approx. One million civilian victims (September 8, 1941 to January 27, 1944)
- Double battle near Vyazma and Bryansk - one of the greatest military defeats of the Soviet Union during the Second World War (September 30 to October 30, 1941)
- Battle of Stalingrad - Sinking of the German 6th Army (November 1942 to February 1943)
- Tunisian campaign - In the "Tunis pocket", Army Group Africa surrenders with more than 200,000 soldiers (May 1943)
- Cherkassy basin battle - encirclement of part of the German 8th Army , outbreak with great losses (January / February 1944)
- Kamenez-Podolski kettle battle - outbreak of the 1st Panzer Army by "wandering" the kettle (March / April 1944)
- Battle of Budapest , from December 1944 to February 1945
- Ruhrkessel - Fall of Army Group B , Allies Take 300,000 Prisoners (April 1945)
- Kessel von Halbe - 80,000 German soldiers and thousands of civilians surrounded (April 1945)
- Battle of Berlin - the last major battle of the Second World War in Europe (April / May 1945)
- Soviet invasion of Manchuria - the Red Army conquered Manchukuo , 600,000 Japanese fall (August 1945) in captivity
Since 1945
- Battle of Điện Biên Phủ - Victory of the Việt Minh over France in the first Indochina War (March – May 1954)
- Battle of Mogadishu - despite the short duration of only a few hours, decisive for the further course of the Somali civil war (1993)
- Siege of Sarajevo - with 1,425 days the longest siege in the 20th century (February 1996)
- Battle for Debaltseve - Victory of pro-Russian militias over the Ukrainian military in the war in Ukraine (2015)
literature
- Hans Speidel : From our time - memories (especially from p. 122). 4th edition. Propylaeen Verlag, Berlin 1977, ISBN 3-550-07357-7 .
- Wilhelm Tieke : The end between Oder and Elbe . 2nd Edition. Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 1992, ISBN 3-87943-734-3 .
- Klaus Reinhardt : The turning point before Moscow . Volume 13 of the series, published by the Military History Research Office . Deutsche Verlagsanstalt, Stuttgart 1972, ISBN 3-421-01606-2 .
Individual evidence
- ^ Robert M. Citino: The German Way of War. From the Thirty Years' War to the Third Reich. University Press of Kansas 2005. p. 198.
- ^ Robert M. Citino: The German Way of War. From the Thirty Years' War to the Third Reich. University Press of Kansas 2005. p. 224.
- ↑ Ludendorff quoted from: Michael Sontheimer: "We hew a hole into it" , in: SPIEGEL Special 1 (2004), pp. 103-105 (105).