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Before Germany reaches the city.
This was a very important part of the battle. At first, it was looking great for the Stalingradians the battle was being won. -
Stalingrad mistakes.
Stalin (the leader of Stalingrad) issued Order No. 227 which stated "Not one step back" making the army fight harder and the civilians didn't get the right to evacuate. This led to thousands of innocent deaths. -
Beginning of the end
The Soviets lost their momentum they were struck and the Germans drove all the way down to the western bank of the Volga River and the suburbs of Stalingrad -
civilian story's.
By the time the German air armada approached the city in the evening of August 23, only about a hundred thousand residents had been evacuated from the total population of seven hundred thousand. The bombing of Stalingrad lasted for a week and left death and desolation in its wake: ninety percent of the housing stock was obliterated, and up to seventy thousand lives were lost. -
Almost lost.
In September and October during the battle, the German soldiers had around 90% of the city, and 90% of the city was already destroyed -
Counter force
Georgy Zhukov a Soviet commander launched counter-attack Uranus. He decided that instead of attacking the Sixth Army and Fourth Panzer (The German army) head-on, he made the decision to attack their flanks and surprise them. The German army could only delay the counter-attack. He used an attack called Pincers. -
The pincers
The pincer attack is an attack where you split up your army in two and both go in separate directions so you can attack from two sides. The Soviets used this method in the counter-attack, Uranus. On Nov 23 1942 the two pincers met up and attacked the German army. The two Soviet pincers meet at Kalach, a vital Don River crossing about 60 miles west of Stalingrad -
Operation thunderclap.
This was another desperate attempt to save the stuck German soldiers in Stalingrad. But it was too desperate and failed so all the surviving soldiers in Stalingrad had to surrender. The reason it failed was because Hitler ordered the Sixth Army to stay in Stalingrad and wait for rescue,
The Sixth Army was surrounded by the Red Army after Operation Uranus,
The Sixth Army was low on supplies and ammunition, and the soldiers were freezing and starving. -
Operation Winter Storm
Operation Winter Storm was a German attack launched by Erich von Manstein, one of Germany's most talented generals and field marshal, in an attempt to breach the encirclement from the southwest. This attack failed it failed because the operation was reduced to a small force of about 50,000 men and 250 tanks
Red Army generals quickly responded and by the next day the advance began to dangerously slow
The 4th Panzer Army failed to break the Soviet encirclement -
Allies victory.
In the end, all the remaining German soldiers (91,000) had to surrender but only 6,000 made it home. The many German mistakes overwhelmed them and added to the loss. This German loss hit them very hard making them lose 300,000 to 500,000 German soldiers' lives. -
work cited
“What You Need To Know About The Battle Of Stalingrad.” Imperial War Museums, https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-battle-of-stalingrad. Accessed 23 February 2025. Stein, R. Conrad. World War II in Europe: "America Goes to War". Enslow Publishers, 1994.