The Battle Of Stalingrad

The Battle of Stalingrad was maybe the harshest battle of World War Two. It is also one of the most crucial battles of the war. The battle took place between the Russians, commanded by Zhukov, who were defending the city of Stalingrad against the Germans led by Paulus, who were invading. The Germans were originally going to capture the oil fields of Caucasus, but they sent about half of the army to capture Stalingrad. Hitler wanted to capture it mainly to wipe the name Stalin, the Russian dictator's name, off of the face of the earth. There were also some other minor reasons to take the city, but those were not very important. Here is the battle for Stalingrad.

First, the Germans were going to try to make a pincer movement, but they realized Stalingrad had a river running through it. A pincer movement is where two sections of the army go partially behind the enemy and sandwich the enemy. The German's equipment, such as artillery, were far more advanced than that of the Russians. The Russians needed to find a way to make the artillery useless. They knew that if they were close enough to the enemy, the artillery would hit them and the Russians. They used this tactic commonly referred to as hugging the enemy. They decided to mainly engage mainly in hand to hand combat. The two armies were so close, there were many Russians and Germans on the same floor in a building! The Russians were much better at hand to hand fighting than the Germans were. Even so, the Russians were steadily being pushed back to the river at the middle of the city.

The Russians were surrounded and were greatly outnumbered. They were using artillery type rockets on German groups secluded from fellow Russians. Things were seeming hopeless, but the harsh Russian winter kicked in. Thousands of Germans were dying everyday from the cold. In the past, Napoleon tried to invade Russia, but about 410,000 out of 422,000 French died of the cold. For the Germans, when it rains, it pours! Long anticipated Russian reinforcements came in behind the Germans and made a pincer movement! Poetic justice was in play. All throughout the war, the Germans had been using the pincer movement over and over again. Now it was being used against them! The Germans knew they were going to lose one of the most decisive battles of WW II. Paulus was a Field Marshal, a very high rank, no Field Marshal in the German army had ever surrendered. Hitler wanted to keep that reputation pure, and the only way to do that was if Paulus committed suicide. He did not want to kill himself, so he just surrendered. The Germans lost the most gruesome battle of WWII, and Hitler was furious. Thousands of civilians living in Stalingrad died, but they, along with the brave soldiers, will always be remembered.

P.S.- Zhukov wins!

~Arthur