Since seeing the World at War episode in the 70's I've always wondered...

[Georgio]

...why the Axis forces didn't take all of Stalingrad in the first few days?

 

I mean the Russians lost 90% of Stalingrad, which surely would be a loss that would be impossible to recover from. I don't know much about the history or events but did the Axis hold back from the killer blow or did they deliberately hold back and regroup after the initial assault.

Either way it's seems a costly decision as Stalingrad seems to have been the beginning of the end for the Germans.

[Rama]

No, the Russian didn't lost 90% of the Stalingrad in the first few days. The assault against the city itself started in mid-September (13/11), and ended mid-November. So it took 2 month to take 90% of the city with fierce combats.

And the Germans forces lost a lot of forces doing it (around 52000 casualties). So the assault stop wasn't deliberate, they had no choice.

Uranus started on November 19th.... then the Germans had something else to care of than to end Stalingrad conquest.

[Sternjaeger]

had they not lost 3 weeks to get to the Dnepr coal reserves, they would have made it all the way to Moscow and delivered a huge blow to Russia. It would have been far from a final victory, but it might have changed a lot of things. 

 

The Germans should have avoided Barbarossa completely, the lack of vision and of a sound control strategy over such a vast territory was appalling, but typical of Hitler's foolish plans.

[DD_fruitbat]

If you really want to know a lot more, try reading this,

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Stalingrad-Antony-Beevor/dp/0141032405/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1388688936&sr=1-1&keywords=stalingrad+antony+beevor

 

Good book indeed.