Third Spring

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• After seeing his forces in Ukraine repeatedly outmaneuvered by Vatutin and Konev, Adolf Hitler relieves Erich von Manstein of command of Heersgruppe Sud and Paul von Kleist of command of Heersgruppe A, replacing them with Walter Model and Ferdinand Schörner respectively.

 

Von Manstein und von Kleist. Neither will be offered another command. They will both know about the conspiracies against Hitler and keep silent but will not take part. Von Manstein will invest his substantial wealth in purchasing an enormous estate in Pomerania only to have to abandon it shortly afterward as the Soviets overrun it. Both will be arrested after the war and found guilty of numerous war crimes.

 

- Von Kleist will die in a Soviet prison in 1954 but von Manstein will be released after serving 4 years of his 18 year sentence. B. H. Liddell Hart will write a hagiography of von Manstein that is influential in his early release and official rehabilitation. Von Manstein will write numerous reports for the Allies which will create and perpetuate the myth of a “clean Wehrmacht” blaming the SS and auxiliaries for all the atrocities perpetuated by Germany. He will also falsify the historical record in his memoirs and in the official records to divert blame for losses from himself, which will be accepted in large part as fact up to present day."

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "

• Reichsminister for Foreign Affairs Joachim von Ribbentrop orders all deliveries of food supplies to Finland to cease. This is in retaliation for the Finnish peace talks with the Soviets. General der Infanterie Waldemar Erfurth threatens the Finnish Chief of General Staff, Erik Heinrichs, that Finland will suffer the same fate as Hungary, which Germany recently occupied, if she tries to make peace with the Soviet Union.

 

• 1. Panzer Armee continues attacking westward to escape the Kamenets Podolsky Pocket and meet with 4. Panzer Armee and Hungarian First Army.

 

• LIX Armeekorps of Heersgruppe Mitte retakes Kovel in a counterattack the relieve German units stuck in the Pripet Marshes.

 

Soviet soldiers taking a break in Belorussia April 1944"

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• Siegfried Lederer escapes from Auschwitz-Birkenau camp. He will make it to Czechoslovakia and warn the Elders of the Council at Theresienstadt about the atrocities being committed at Auschwitz.

 

• The II SS Panzerkorps attacks from the 4. Panzerarmee flank in order to meet with the elements of the 1. Panzerarmee that are breaking out. Zhukov and Konev attempt to reinforce the XVIII Guards Corps between them as well as push in pursuit of the retreating Germans, but the rasputitsa works both ways.

 

Soviet 122mm howitzer M1938 Spring 1944

 

• U-23 is attacked by machine gun fire from Soviet patrol boat SKA-099 in the Black Sea. The Type IIB submarine replies with her 2cm gun and damages the motorboat.

 

• Having been largely replaced by the Lavochkin La-5, the underpowered and heavy LaGG-3 is retired from front line service with the Soviet Air Forces. It had been rushed into production in 1941 with a little more than 6,500 built.

 

Hero of the Soviet Union Andrei Kulagin with his LaGG-3 in 1943 - Kulagin is credited with 22 victories with the type and will survive the war with 30 solo victories"

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• German forces encircled near Tarnopol make desperate, but unavailing, attempts to break out. This newsreel will be released later in the month:

 

 

• Elements of 2nd Ukrainian Front take Dorohoi, Siret, and Botosani in Romania. Reconnaissance elements reach the Slovakian border.

 

• Yesterday, General der Gebirgstruppe Ferdinand Schörner completed an inspection of German 17. Armee defenses in the Crimea, pronouncing them in excellent shape. He reported to OKW that they can be held for a long time, making one of the least accurate predictions of the war.

 

- Two armies of the Fourth Ukrainian Front assault from the north while the Soviet Independent Coastal Army, which had gained a beachhead on the Kerch peninsula in the fall, assaults from the east. The German and Romanian defenses will be penetrated in numerous locations, collapsing and forcing a retreat to the “Gneisenau Line” in only two days.

 

Fighting in Kerch

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• In Romania, the Großdeutschland Panzergrenadier Division (with 160 tanks in support, including 40 Panther and 40 Tiger models) counterattacks Târgu Frumos from the east while the Romanian Divisia 1 Blindata (armored) and Divisia 7 Infanterie attack from the south. The Soviet 206th Rifle, 3rd Guards Airborne and 93rd Guards Rifle Divisions are preparing to resume their assault southwards when they are hit head on by the Romanians. The Soviet rear guard and logistical subunits are then attacked by Großdeutschland. Amid heavy fighting, the three divisions of the XXXV Guards Corps have no choice but to retreat. Târgu Frumos is retaken before midnight.

 

Großdeutschland Panzer-Vs in Romania April 1944

 

• German Sperrbrecher 193 is bombed by Soviet aircraft and run aground on the Romanian coast.

 

• In the Crimea, German XXXXIX Gebirgskorps is forced to retreat by Soviet Second Guards Army, and Fifty-first Army concentrates on Romanian Divisia 10 Infanterie to pierce the front. V Armeekorps is also forced to retreat and the entire 17. Armee is falling back to the “Gneisenau Line”. This allows the dug-in Soviet Independent Coastal Army to advance from Kerch. Casualties in the first ten days number 13,131 Germans and 17,652 Romanians.

 

• In Ukraine, the Soviet Eighth Guards and Forty-Sixth Armies have driven Axis troops across the Dniestr and besieged Odessa, which capitulates today. On this front in the past three weeks, the Germans and Romanians have had 26,800 soldiers killed, 10,680 captured, and 443 armored vehicles destroyed. In the course of the operation the Vinnitskaya, Volynskaya, Zhitomirskaya, Kievskaya, Kirovogradskaya, Rovnenskaya, Khmelnytskaya and parts of Poltavskaya oblasts were liberated by the Red Army, an area of some 204,000 square kilometers.

 

- The Aeronautica Regală Română is taking heavy losses in all of these actions.

 

Soviets inspecting downed Romanian Henschel-129 in Crimea

 

Soviets inspecting a downed Romanian IAR-81C"

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• Soviet forces of the 2nd Ukrainian Front break through the German lines north of Iași, Romania. The Sassuntsi-Davit Tank Regiment, comprised primarily of ethnic Armenians, destroys a screening force and devastates supply depots of 6. Armee.

 

Սասունցի Դավիթ tankers in late winter 1943.

 

- 6. Armee reserves will seal the breach but the loss of supplies forces planned counterattacks to be suspended, then cancelled.

 

• Soviet troops liberate Kerch in the Crimea.

 

 

 

Edited April 11, 2024 by cardboard_killer

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• The evacuation from Sevastopol continues.  A convoy is attacked by four Ilyushin Il-4s that land some near misses but don’t inflict damage. Four A-20 aircraft then attack the Romanian 5,700 ton Alba Iulia in a dive, with one bomb hitting the water and caving in a ten meter section of the hull while another bomb hits the ship. Some 500 Soviet POWs aboard are killed.

 

Convoy under air attack during the Sevastopol evacuation.

 

- The Alba Iulia takes on a 10º list to port and is down by the head, bringing her prop out of the water. The soldiers aboard panic and began to jump overboard. Seven seaplanes from Constanța fly out to retrieve survivors while German trawler UJ-104 attempts to tow the ship, but makes little headway as the rudder is jammed.

 

- Three Soviet Il-4 bombers and five torpedo equipped A-20s then attack the stricken vessel, but score no hits with two A-20s shot down by AA fire from Romanian destroyers Regele Ferdinand and Regina Maria.

 

- By nightfall, Alba Iulia had taken on a 20º list and is abandoned. Two Romanian tugs will arrive overnight while damage controlmen from Regele Ferdinand unlock the rudder. She will reach Constanța on the 20th and be under repair for the rest of the war.

 

- Later in the day, Soviet submarine L-6 fires torpedoes and barely misses the Hungarian 1,000 ton steamer Kassa. Romanian ASW gunboat Ghiculescu counterattacks and with the assistance of a seaplane that reports bubbles following her first attack, sinks L-6 with all hands. Ghiculescu was completed in 1918, and will serve in the Romanian Navy until 1960, after which she will operate as a government survey vessel until 2002.

 

NMS Sublocotenent Ghiculescu

 

- German Vizeadmiral Helmuth Brinkmann, commanding Black Sea naval forces, will give credit for the sinking of L-6 to German trawler UJ-104 which later depth charges the oil slick coming from the submarine wreck.

 

• Soviet sniper Roza Shanina receives the Order of Glory for bravery in the face of the enemy. Entering combat for the first time in April, she has so far killed a confirmed 13 Germans while under gun and artillery fire as part of the 184th Rifle Division.

 

- She had volunteered after her brother Mikhail was killed at Leningrad, and by the time she is disemboweled by German artillery less than a year from now at age 20 in East Prussia, will have 59 confirmed kills.

 

Sergeant Roza Shanina in November 1944 with her scoped M1891 Mosin–Nagant"

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• A major Soviet attack is launched towards Târgu Frumos in Romania. It is preceded by a 60-minute artillery barrage against the Romanian Divizia 1 Garda followed by a wave of infantry and tanks of the 8th Guards Airborne Division and XVIII Tank Corps. After several hours of intense fighting the Soviets break through the Romanian positions south of Helestieni. By noon they have cut the Pascani-Târgu Frumos road and the Romanians had withdrawn to a secondary fortified line.

 

- Mobile counterattacks by Romanian and German armor as well as the commitment of the Romanian Grupul 5 Bombardament, Grupal 8 Asalt, and Grupal 9 Vânătoare (fighter) will halt the Soviet offensive by 07 May.

 

Romanian Henschel 129B-2s of Grupal 8 Asalt in early 1944

 

Fighting around Târgu Frumos 1944"

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• Lavrentiy Beria is named the deputy chairman of the Soviet State Defense Committee (GKO) and the chairman of the Operational Bureau of the GKO.

 

• The I Czechoslovakian Army Corps is formed in the USSR from several independent Czech units composed of exiles, and Slovakian POWs who agree to join the unit. It will be assigned to First Ukrainian Front.

 

{Yak-9D fighters from the 6th GvIAP of Soviet Naval Aviation}

 

• The Soviet Fourth Ukrainian Front begins the final assault on Sevastopol with an attack by the Second Guards Army on the on the north end of the German 17. Armee line. This is a feint, and when Generaloberst Erwin Jaenecke rushes his reserves there, General Fyodor Tolbukhin’s main assault comes in from the south with the Fifty-first Army assaulting the German V Armeekorps. The Soviets breach the lines and within two days reach the Sapun Heights. This gives them a clear field of observation and access to the Inkerman Valley. Jaenecke will receive permission from Hitler to withdraw to the Khersonnes Peninsula.

 

- Less than two weeks earlier, Jaenecke had reported to OKW, "At Sevastopol stands the Seventeenth Army, and at Sevastopol, the Soviets will bleed to death."

 

Soviet troops on the Sapun Heights"

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• Rudolf Höss orders the expansion of the rail platforms, the activation of Crematorium V, the reactivation of Bunker 2 (gas chamber in preparation for the arrival of Hungarian Jews at Auschwitz.

 

• Soviet troops take Sevastopol, overrunning the last airfield. More than 20,000 Axis troops surrender while the remainder have retreated to the Kresones peninsula from where the evacuation continues.

 

- German ASW trawler UJ-2314 is sunk by Douglas A-20s of Soviet Naval Aviation off Sevastopol.

 

Soviet troops liberating Sevastopol

 

Soviet Marines T-34 in Sevastopol"

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• Marshal Aleksandr Vasilevsky is wounded in Sevastopol when his vehicle is damaged by a mine. After recovering in Moscow, he will be transferred to coordinate the offensives of the 1st Baltic and 3rd Byelorussian Fronts during Operation Bagration.

 

• Axis ships off Khersones are overloaded with evacuees from the Sevastopol when they are attacked by twenty-one Ilyushin-2s from 8 GshAP and the modern German diesel-electric passenger freighter Totila is hit by three bombs, sinking very fast with an estimated 5,000 men aboard. Of these 3,000 Germans and 2,000 Romanians, only 1,100 are saved. Later in the afternoon, eleven A-20 Bostons from 13 GDBAP appear over the ships and bomb the Romanian steamer Teja which sinks with another 3,000 men aboard, 400 of whom are rescued by R-boots and seaplanes.

 

- German landing craft PiLB-319 and PiLB-402 and four Sturmboot 42 are sunk by Soviet fighter-bombers.

 

Soviet troops celebrating in Sevastopol

 

SS Teja under attack"

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• Soviet submarine L-4 torpedoes the German 7,300 ton tanker Friederike in the Black Sea off Constanța. Repairs are begun but she never reenters service.

 

Friederike after the attack.

 

• As the evacuation from the Crimea continues, Il-2s attack the Romanian steamers Romania and Danubius, sinking them both. The German transport Helga is damaged and run aground, where she will be destroyed by subsequent airstrikes.

 

• Romanian destroyer Regele Ferdinand is attacked repeatedly but skillful use if high speed and anti-aircraft artillery result in no hits and the loss of two or three Soviet aircraft. While covering the evacuation, she is taken under fire by a Soviet 152mm battery, returning fire against it. Later in the day another air attack puts a bomb into one of her fuel tanks, but it fails to detonate. With 21 killed and 28 wounded, the destroyer heads for Romania, using up most of her AA ammunition before running out of fuel and being towed into Constanța.

 

- She will be incorporated into the Soviet Black Sea Fleet as Likhoy when Romania changes sides, and returned in 1951, serving the Romanian People's Navy for another ten years.

 

• Soviet torpedo cutter TK-353 torpedoes and sinks German auxiliary sub chaser UJ-104 off Crimea.

 

• Type IIB submarine U-9 fires a homing torpedo at a Soviet convoy and damages escort vessel Shtorm, which will be towed to port. U-9 is counterattacked by smaller escort vessels and an MBR-2 flying boat, taking light damage."

 

 

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years and one day ago] "• Forceful deportation of the entire population of the Crimean Tatars (approximately 230,000 or 19% of the total population of Crimea) to Central Asia begins on the orders of Stalin on the grounds that they had collaborated with the Nazi occupation, as well as enlisted with the Germans to form units such as the Crimean Tatar SS Legion.

 

Crimean Tatar security battalion with German officer

 

- NKVD troops will arrive at a village and the residents will be given thirty minutes to collect belongings. Locations will be then given Russian names and opened to settlers. Approximately 109,000 Tatars will perish from starvation and disease between now and 1947 in what the Tatars refer to as the "Sürgün" (Exile). The Soviet government will drop the collaboration charges in 1967 but do nothing to help the exiles return home.

 

Crimeans being loaded aboard trains bound for Uzbekistan.

 

Spoiler

- Under post-Soviet Ukraine conditions will improve for Tatars who had been able to remain or were able to return home, with repression returning following the 2014 Russian invasion and occupation. Monuments will be taken down, the Crimean Tatar self-governing assembly (Medjlis) dissolved and public references to the Stalinist deportations banned."

 

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• The German 900 ton steamer Ingeborg is torpedoed and sunk in the Baltic by a Soviet A-20. Soviet naval aviation will sink 13 merchant ships [in the Baltic] massing 32,800 tons in 1944.

 

Soviet Naval A-20s"

[cardboard_killer]

[80 years ago today] "• Still believing that the main Soviet summer offensive will be in the south, the Germans launch a series of limited attacks around Iași, Romania, in order to improve their defensive lines. 8. Armee forces will be halted by the 2nd Ukrainian Front tomorrow.

 

Grossdeutschland troops wave to a Stuka near Iași in summer of 1944"