- Zemland Offensive
Infobox Military Conflict
conflict=Zemland Offensive
caption=
partof=Eastern Front of World War II
place=East Prussia
date=April 13 ,1945 –April 25 ,1945
result=Soviet Victory
combatant1=
combatant2=flagicon|USSRSoviet Union
commander1=)"
commander2=flagicon|USSRHovhannes Bagramyan (Zemland Army Group )
strength1=
strength2=
casualties1=
casualties2=|The Zemland Offensive was a Soviet offensive on the Eastern Front in the final stages of World War II. It took place inSambia ( _de. Samland); ( _ru. земланд, "Zemland").Role in the conflict
The East Prussian Offensive, which commenced on
January 13 1945, had seen theRed Army clear German forces from much ofEast Prussia . The defenders had been driven into a series of pockets on the Baltic coast and in the city ofKönigsberg , in which they were besieged.oviet planning
Marshal
Aleksandr Vasilevsky , who had taken over command of the3rd Belorussian Front in February, incorporated GeneralHovhannes Bagramyan 's1st Baltic Front into his command fromFebruary 22 , redesignating it as the Zemland Army Group (or Samland Front).Duffy, p.203] Bagramyan's forces initially laid siege toKönigsberg ; the city was eventually stormed onApril 9 . They were then given the task of overcoming the substantial German force still remaining inSambia .German planning
German defence efforts had largely focused on the port of
Pillau at the tip of the peninsula, which was the main evacuation point for casualties and East Prussian civilians. Throughout the siege of Königsberg, Sambia had been defended by Army Detachment Samland under the command of GeneralHans Gollnick , who had tried to maintain a corridor between Königsberg and Pillau. OnApril 7 , the remnants of Second and Fourth Armies, which had been destroyed in encirclements at Danzig and Heiligenbeil respectively, were combined as "Armee Ostpreußen " with the task of defending Sambia, theVistula delta and theHel Peninsula ; Gollnick's troops were incorporated in it.Most of the units of "Armee Ostpreußen" were little more than remnants, and the entire formation was very poorly supplied. During the battle for Sambia, its officers were outraged to discover that the "
Luftwaffe " and "Kriegsmarine " had maintained large underground depots full of stores and fuel in the woods of the peninsula; the supplies had to be destroyed in the retreat.Duffy, p.384]Deployments
Red Army
*
Zemland Army Group (GeneralHovhannes Bagramyan )
**2nd Guards Army (Lieutenant-GeneralPorfirii Chanchibadze )
**11th Guards Army (GeneralKuzma Galitsky )
**5th Army (Colonel-GeneralNikolay Krylov )
**49th Army (Lieutenant-GeneralIvan Grishin )
**43rd Army (GeneralAfanasii Beloborodov )Wehrmacht
*Elements of "
Armee Ostpreußen " (GeneralDietrich von Saucken )
**XXVI Corps (GeneralGerhard Matzky ) (remnants of 58th, 1st, and 21st Infantry Divisions,5th Panzer Division , 28th Jäger Division, and 561st Volksgrenadier Division)
**LV Corps / 'FortressPillau ' (Lieutenant-GeneralKurt Chill ) (remnants of 50th and 286th Infantry Divisions and 558th Volksgrenadier Division)
**IX Corps (GeneralRolf Wuthmann to 20 April, then Lieutenant-GeneralHermann Hohn ) (remnants of 95th, 93rd, and 14th Infantry Divisions, 551st Volksgrenadier Division and "Panzergrenadier Division Großdeutschland")
**Elements of Heavy Panzer Detachment 502 and Heavy Panzer Detachment 505The offensive
The offensive plan called for the 5th and 39th Armies to break through towards
Fischhausen as the main strike force, with the 11th Guards Army in reserve.Bagramyan, p.576] The 2nd Guards Army would attack in the north, with the 43rd Army breaking through on the southern flank. There would also be amphibious landings in the south of Sambia. The 3rd Belorussian Front's head of intelligence suggested that they faced up to 100,000 defending troopsBagramyan, p.575] but by shortening the frontage of each unit the attackers were able to achieve a superiority of two to one in men and three to one in artillery.Bagramyan, p.576] Bagramyan issued a call for the defenders to surrender in exchange for fair treatment and medical assistance for the wounded, but this went unanswered, and the offensive commenced with an artillery barrage and air attacks on 13 April.The initial attack scattered many of the remaining German forces, some falling back towards Pillau. The Soviet 115th Rifle Division broke through and cleared the 551st Volksgrenadier Division from
Rauschen on the north-western tip of Sambia; the German forces in the north of the peninsula, including the 95th Infantry Division and parts of Heavy Panzer Detachment 502, were driven southwards intoPalmnicken and destroyed.Schneider, p.91] By 16 April, Soviet forces broke through near Fischhausen; parts of XXVI Corps, including the 5th Panzer and 28th Jäger Divisions became cut off on the peninsula atPeyse , and were lost.Duffy, p.219] A defence line, the "Tenkitten-Riegel", had been improvised across the narrow strip of land leading to Pillau; to break German resistance, the 11th Guards Army was committed onApril 20 . Fighting intensified atTenkitten , where the commander of the 16th Guards Rifle Corps, Major-General S S Gur'ev, was killed by a shell fragment onApril 22 .Maslov, p.178]The German defensive perimeter was pushed back towards Pillau, which was defended by elements of the 1st, 21st, 58th and other Infantry Divisions; remaining German troops were evacuated to the
Frische Nehrung . Pillau had been heavily fortified, being described by Bagramyan as "Konigsberg in miniature",Bagramyan, p.584] and was supported by fire from naval artillery and coastal batteries. After a stubborn defence, it was eventually stormed by units of 11th Guards Army, including the31st Guards Rifle Division , on April25 , the town being cleared in around 12 hours.Bagramyan, p.586] The last German position to fall was a battery commanded by Major-GeneralKarl Henke , which was overrun by the 16th Guards Rifle Corps onApril 27 .Duffy, p.219 (who misidentifies Major-General Henke as Major Henke)]Aftermath
The Red Army claimed to have killed or taken prisoner 80,000 German troops during the operations in Sambia.Bagramyan, p.588. This estimate seems high, but may include all prisoners taken on the Frische Nehrung.]
The remnants of IX Corps resisted on the Frische Nehrung to the end of the war, though the corps staff was removed to
Bornholm .References
*Bagramyan, H. " [http://militera.lib.ru/memo/russian/bagramyan2/index.html Thus we went to victory] ", Moscow, 1977. (in Russian) _ru. Баграмян И.X. Так шли мы к победе. — М.: Воениздат, 1977
*Duffy. C. "Red Storm on the Reich", Routledge, 2000, ISBN 978-0415228299
*Krylov, N. Разгром земландской группировки противника, "ВИЖ", 1972, 4.
*Maslov, A. "Fallen Soviet Generals", Frank Cass, 1998, ISBN 978-0714643465
*Schneider, W. "Tigers in Combat", Stackpole, 2004, ISBN 0811731715Footnotes
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