- Lublin–Brest Offensive
Infobox Military Conflict
conflict=Lublin–Brest Offensive
caption=
partof=the Eastern Front ofWorld War II
place=Eastern Poland/Western Belarus
date=July 18 ,1944 –August 2 ,1944 (primary operation),September 30 ,1944 (secondary operation)
result=Soviet Victory
combatant1=flagicon|Germany|NaziNazi Germany
combatant2=flagicon|USSR|1923Soviet Union flag|Poland
commander1=flagicon|Germany|NaziFerdinand Schörner (until July 23)Johannes Friessner (from July 25) (Army Group South Ukraine )Günther Blumentritt (until June 28)Walter Model (until August 16)Georg Hans Reinhardt (Army Group Centre )
commander2=flagicon|USSR|1923Konstantin Rokossovsky (1st Belorussian Front )
strength1=
strength2=
casualties1=
casualties2=|The Lublin–Brest Offensive ( _ru. Люблин‐Брестская наступательная операция, 18 July – 2 August 1944) was a part of the
Operation Bagration strategic offensive by Soviet forces to clear Germans from central‐easternPoland . The offensive was executed by the left (southern) wing of the1st Belorussian Front and took place during July 1944; it was opposed by the GermanArmy Group South Ukraine andArmy Group Centre .The operation was accompanied by several other offensives, particularly the
Lvov-Sandomierz Offensive of the1st Ukrainian Front in the south; both offensives launched weeks after the start of the successfulOperation Bagration to the north which cleared German forces from most ofBelarus .After reaching its target objectives, the offensive was continued as the Soviet forces advanced on
Warsaw during August (2 August – 30 September 1944); however Soviet forces did not aid the PolishWarsaw Uprising , which is a matter of some controversy.Opposing forces
On 15 June,
Army Group South Ukraine under command ofFerdinand Schorner was composed of German and Romanian forces, 2 armies strong each:Romanian Third Army ,Romanian Fourth Army , 6th Army (newly reformed after destruction of the previous 6th Army in thebattle of Stalingrad ), 8th Army. [http://www.axishistory.com/index.php?id=6474] TheArmy Group Centre had the 2nd Army, 4th Army, 9th Army and 3rd Panzer Army.The Soviet
1st Belorussian Front under command ofKonstantin Rokossovsky included the 8 Guards, 28th, 47th, 61st, 65th, 69th, and 70th (Combined Arms) Аrmies, 2nd Тank Аrmy, 6th and 16th Air Аrmies, 11th Tank Corps,1st Polish Army , 2nd Guards and 7th Guards Cavalry Corps.The offensive: securing Lublin and Brest
After feinting on 9–10 July to draw German attention away from Soviet offensive preparations at
Lvov-Sandomierz Offensive , and the success of that offensive, clearly visible in the first days (from 13 July),Konstantin Rokossovsky ’s started their own push westwards.When Titans…]On 18 July five armies of the 1st Belorussian Front (including one Polish army, the
Polish First Army ) deployed on the front’s left wing south of thePinsk Marshes , struck and shattered thedefences ofArmy Group South Ukraine 4th Panzer Army west ofKovel . Within hours, the front’s 2nd Tank Army and several mobile corps began exploiting success to the west with the infantry in their wake.Glantz.]Lieutenant General
Nikolai Gusev 's47th Army and Colonel GeneralVasily Chuikov 's 8th Guards Army tore into German defences, and by 21 July they had reached theBug River . The next day, Lieutenant GeneralSemyon Bogdanov 's 2d Tank Army began its exploitation toward Lublin and the Vistula, while 11th Tank and 2nd Guards Cavalry Corps led the drive northwest towardSiedlce to cut off the retreat ofArmy Group Center forces defending around Brest and Bialystok.Although Bogdanov was wounded on 23 July during the fighting for Lublin and was replaced by Major General
A. I. Radzievsky , the rapid advance continued, carrying the lead elements of 8th Guards Army and 2d Tank Army to the shores of the Vistula on 25 July. On 24 JulyKonstantin Rokossovsky ’s forces capturedLublin and pushed on westward towards theVistula River south of Warsaw.. The Stavka ordered Radzievsky to turn his army northward toward Warsaw to help cut off the withdrawal of Army Group Centre.On 28 July Brest was taken. [http://www.brest-belarus.com/History_1900_2005.shtml#section10 Brest, Belarus] .] By 2 August, the 1st Belorussian Front’s left wing armies seized
bridgehead s over the Vistula River atMagnuszew (Chuikov's 47th Army) andPuławy (Lieutenant General V. la. Kolpakchi's 69th Army) and commenced an almost two‐month struggle with counterattacking "Wehrmacht " forces to retain these vital bridgeheads as launching pads for future, even larger-scale offensives into heart of central Poland towardBerlin .Army Group Centre 's XLVI Panzer Corps conducted counter-attacks fromAugust 8 to reduce the bridgehead.Hinze, p.400] The 19th and "Hermann Göring" Panzer Divisions mounted several assaults during early August, but the Soviet lines remained firm.Zaloga, pp.78-79] See also Glantz, "Failures of Historiography"]Further battles of that period included the
battle of Studzianki .The controversy: bridgeheads instead of Warsaw
During the offensive bringing the 1st Belorussian Front’s left wing closer to the Vistula River, the
Polish Home Army ("Armia Krajowa") staged an insurrection in Warsaw; the Soviet advance was one of the factors which accelerated the Uprising, as the Poles both counted on Soviet support and wanted to secure their capital independently (as part of theOperation Tempest ).Only days before the uprising begun in Warsaw (on 1 August), the
Stavka (Soviet General Headquarters) commanded Rokossovsky to dispatch his 2nd Tank Army in direction of Warsaw’s eastern suburbs (Praga ). By 28 July, Radzievsky's army, with three corps abreast, engaged 73rd Infantry Division and theHermann Goering Panzer Division 40 kilometres southeast of Warsaw. A race ensued between Radzievsky, who was seeking to seize the routes into Warsaw from the east, and the Germans, who were attempting to keep those routes open and maintain possession of Warsaw.The 2nd Tank Army was to be protected on the right by a cavalry corps (the 2nd Guards) and the
47th Army , however the tank army reached the region east of Warsaw on 29 July, before the slower 47th Army could provide support; the 47th Army and the 2nd Guards were engaged in the battle aroundSiedlce , 50 kilometres to the east. Germans counterattacked, in what became known as the Battle of Radzymin, with two panzer corps (XXXIX and IV SS). On 29 July, Radzievsky dispatched his8th Guards Tank Corps and3rd Tank Corps northward in an attempt to swing northeast of Warsaw and turn the German defenders' left flank, while his 16th Tank Corps continued to fight on the southeastern approaches to the city's suburbs. Although Lieutenant GeneralA. F. Popov's 8th Guards Tank Corps successfully fought to within 20 kilometres east of the city, Major GeneralN. D. Vedeneev 's 3d Tank Corps ran into a series of successive panzer counterattacks by Model. Beginning on 30 July, the Hermann Goering and 19th Panzer Divisions struck the overextended and weakened tank corps nearRadzymin , north ofWołomin , 15 kilometres northeast of Warsaw. Although the corps withstood three days of counterattacks, on 2 and 3 August, 4th Panzer Division and5th SS Panzergrenadier Division Wiking joined the fight. In three days of intense fighting, 3d Tank Corps was severely mauled, and 8th Guards Tank Corps was also sorely pressed. From 30 July through 5 August German forces succeeded in pushing Soviets back, inflicting heavy losses on the Soviet units. By 5 August 47th Army's forces had arrived in the area, and 2nd Tank Army was withdrawn for rest and refitting. The three rifle corps of 47th Army were stretched out on a front of over 80 kilometers, from south of Warsaw to Siedlce, and were unable to immediately renew the drive on Warsaw or to the Narew River with the strength and speed available to the tank units. German communications lines eastward to Army Group Centre had been damaged but not cut.After that defeat, throughout the entire period up to 20 August 1944, the 1st Belorussian Front’s 47th Army remained the only major Red Army forces deployed across the Vistula River opposite Warsaw. The Soviets made no attempt to aid the uprising, concentrating on securing the west bank. Instead the 47th Army concentrated on securing Soviet positions east of the river, not providing the insurgents even with artillery support. At the time, the bulk of the 1st Belorussian Front’s centre and right wing were struggling to overcome German defences north of
Siedlce on the approaches to theNarew River and, according to Soviet accounts, were unable to support any action to aid Warsaw directly. Western and contemporary Polish accounts claim thatStalin deliberately withheld support for the Polish Home Army as he wanted the Home Army — supporting thePolish government in exile , a competition to the pro‐SovietPolish Committee of National Liberation — to be destroyed.On 20 August the
1st Polish Army of GeneralZygmunt Berling joined the Soviet 47th Army. Red Army forces north of Warsaw finally advanced across theBug River on 3 September, closed up to theNarew River the following day, and fought their way into bridgeheads across the Narew on 6 September. Lead elements of two Polish divisions from the 1st Army finally assaulted across the Vistula River into Warsaw on 13 September but made little progress and were evacuated back across the river ten days later. The Uprising forces capitulated on 2 October; the Soviets would take Warsaw without a major battle during their advance early in 1945. American military historianDavid M. Glantz notes that while the Soviets could have taken Warsaw and aided the insurgents, from a purely military standpoint this would have required diverting efforts from attempts to secure bridgeheads south and north of Warsaw, involved the Soviets in costly city fighting and gained them less optimal positions for further offensives; this, coupled with political factors meant that the Soviet decision not to aid the Warsaw Uprising was based not only on political, but also on military considerations.Aftermath - battle for the Narew bridgeheads
The bridgeheads at
Serock , the confluence of the Bug andNarew Rivers, had been established by the Soviet 65th Army at the end of the Lublin-Brest Offensive. The German XX Corps of Second Army was deployed in defence.On
October 3 elements of the 3rd and 25th Panzer Divisions, supported by the 252nd Infantry Division, were thrown into an attack to eliminate the 65th Army's positions in the bridgehead.See the account of Armin Scheiderbauer in Williams and Rodgers, p.109] On the southern face, German units reached the bank of the Narew byOctober 5 . The memoirs of GeneralPavel Batov , 65th Army's commander, describe committing the 44th Guards Rifle Division in an attempt to halt the German advance.See Batov, В походах и боях, Moscow 1962]An attack on the northern part of the bridgehead was planned for
October 8 , involving the 19th Panzer and Wiking divisions but the gains made were eliminated by a Soviet counter-attack onOctober 14 .Williams and Rodgers, p.110; Batov gives the date asOctober 19 ]Footnotes
References
*
David M. Glantz , [http://www.strom.clemson.edu/publications/sg-war41-45.pdf The Soviet‐German War 1941–45] : Myths and Realities: A Survey Essay.
*David M. Glantz, "The Red Army's Lublin‐Brest Offensive and Advance on Warsaw (18 July – 30 September 1944): An Overview and Documentary Survey", The Journal of Slavic Military Studies, Volume 19, Issue 2 July 2006, pp. 401–41.
*David M. Glantz, [http://leav-www.army.mil/fmso/documents/failures.htm The Failures of Historiography]
*Hinze, R. "Ostfrontdrama 1944: Ruckzugskampfe der Heersgruppe Mitte"
*Zaloga, S. "Bagration 1944: The Destruction of Army Group Centre"
*Williams, S and Rodgers, D. "On the Bloody Road to Berlin", Helion, 2005
* [http://www.mfa.gov.by/eng/index.php?d=belarus&id=6 "When Titans Clashed. How the Red Army Stopped Hitler"] . Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Belarus.
* [http://www.axishistory.com/index.php?id=6474 Axis Order of Battle 15 June 1944]External links
* Maps of Soviet operations near Warsaw, [http://rkkaww2.armchairgeneral.com/maps/1944W/Poland/2TA_Warshaw_Aug44.jpglate July] / [http://militera.lib.ru/science/radzievsky_ai/s11.gifearly August] .
* David M. Glantz, [http://books.google.com/books?ie=UTF-8&hl=en&id=3JWECp_jGssC&pg=PA173&lpg=PA173&dq=warsaw&prev=http://books.google.com/books%3Fq%3Dwarsaw%2Btank%2Bcorps&sig=I8wGRk5piaPHVAEsakYXmatF0sc#PRA2-PA176,M1 The Soviet Conduct of Tactical Maneuver] : spearhead of the offensive, 1991. Maps of the Lublin‐Brest operation: pp. 174–75.
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