(IV) Typhoon- origins, aims and feasibility

by Luka Bilić

In parts III and IV I analyze German inadequacies that led to failure of Typhoon. Last part focused on the railways and this one is about trucks and fuel.

Trucks

As paramount as it was, railway system by itself wasn’t enough for the army to function. Truck fleets were used to bridge the gap between the railheads, often far in the rear and the units fighting on the front. Thus while railways were the king, system was only as strong as the weakest link, and one couldn’t err too much to consider it to be trucks availability.

Germans began their onslaught with around 600 000 trucks and slightly larger number of horses. There were several reasons for rapid rate of truck loss. Condition of Soviet roads were bad and seriously shortened the life expectancy of trucks, which was exacerbated by tactical usage of trucks to bring supplies forward through terrain they weren’t supposed to operate on.Distances that trucks had to overcome were much greater than was calculated as well, because railheads were always further behind than was expected because railway adaptation was slower than anticipated and captured Soviet rolling and locomotive assets hugely below expectations. This forced the trucks to operate at often multiple distances than predicted which rapidly spent their expected mileage lifespan.

Furthermore trucks were of as diverse origin as possible, assembled and requisited from civilian use across the Europe. This led to impossible problems regarding standardization, spare parts and so on which in turn led to total losses of vehicles even to minor malfunctions or breaks.Results were inevitable, and general quartermaster Wagner informed Halder in August that only minimal replacements for truck fleets are to be expected in foreseeable future. So while hundreds of tanks were delivered to AGC during August/September, nobody worried about not having the trucks to deliver fuel and ammo to existing and let alone new vehicles.One study estimated truck fleets to be below 50% strength as early as September, though there were some other little more favorable reports, but all agreed that what was left was rapidly coming to an end of their run, many having as little as 300-400 km left. A day’s work..With this amount of truck fallout, it’s clear that what remained could had achieved only as much and truck fleets situation was certainly among prime reasons why Typhoon wasn’t very serious operation and rather rested on hope for luck and Soviets giving up.In November only 12% of trucks available in June were still operating (Reinhardt,Overy). Parallelly by November due to unrealistic plans and exhaustion Germans lost some 220 000 horses with another thousand dying daily.OilWhile getting oil to the front was one thing, general fuel availability situation was very serious as well. Just prior to war general Thomas, head of high command’s office for economy and armament warned the high command of woefully inadequate oil production and reserves to conduct operation of Barbarossa’s scale. He warned that by autumn fuel reserves would be exhausted and frontline aviation fuel would be cut down to one half, regular to one quarter and fuel oil to one half of requirements. Command was undeterred by such predictions because they chose to believe that by autumn there would be no more large scale combat operations, only unopposed advance for couple of thousand kilometers toward Barbarossa’s end goals (railway advance, partly experienced by the Germans on the southern Russian front in the last days of ww1 during collapse of the Empire.It was estimated that very minimal daily consumption would amount to 110 000 barrels of fuel for the army and 50 000 for the Luftwaffe. That meant that Germany had fuel for just 60 days of sustained operations. By the time of Typhoon this deadline was up. Wagner was lamenting that low reserves in depots are reason (among others) why so few fuel trains were arriving.In entire month of October 720 000 barrels of fuel were sent to forces engaged in Typhoon. This was actually ridiculously low amount. Soviets for comparison used that amount in single day and Americans later in some 10 hours! Germans were expected to support 6 armies, and an air army during month long offensive hundreds of miles deep with the fuel that single allied nation spends in 10 hours! Magic! Even if we use minimal German calculated amount of 160 000 barrels, of which great majority was used by swollen AGC, then monthly allocation would barely suffice for 4-5 days. Not to mention that bad Soviet roads and conditions caused consumption to rise almost 50% over what was anticipated.(fuel expected to last 100km lasted only 70)Problems with projection of power were actually well known prior to offensive and OKH study clearly showed that railroad-truck supply system for large scale operations could only be supported for the distance of 500 km.General Blumenritt, chief of staff of 4th Army wrote after the war that it was repeatedly stressed before the invasion within the army command (and confirmed with OKH specialist study) that supplies would come to a standstill on the Dnepr at the latest (for large scale offensive operations). Yet after this line was reached and supply situation unfolded very much as predicted, command, undeterred, planned not just sustainment of the army but vast new offensives far to the east.As war diary of Hoth’s PG3 recorded prior to Typhoon, and events would prove- operations could not be sustained beyond Vyazma,some 200 km short of capital.Just as Typhoon couldn’t be supported much eastward from Dnepr Dvina lina, so was Second Army’s advance on Voronez also defeated mostly by inability to logistically support it, as was German advance into eastern Ukraine hampered in similar manner.