Operation Saturn 1634379 215060170 2008-05-26T15:01:03Z TXiKiBoT 3171782 robot Adding: [[vi:Chiến dịch Saturn]] {{FixBunching|beg}} [[Image:Eastern_Front_1942-11_to_1943-03.png|thumb|305px|Soviet advances during Operations [[Operation Uranus|Uranus]], [[Operation Mars|Mars]] and Saturn.]]<!-- Image size to fit it with the infobox--> {{FixBunching|mid}} {{Campaignbox Axis-Soviet War}} {{FixBunching|mid}} {{Campaignbox Operation Blue to 3rd Kharkov}} {{FixBunching|end}} '''Operation Saturn''' was a [[Red Army]] operation on the [[Eastern Front (WWII)|Eastern Front]] of [[World War II]] that led to battles in the northern [[Caucasus]] and [[Donets Basin]] regions of the [[Soviet Union]] from December 1942 to February 1943. The success of [[Operation Uranus]], launched on [[19 November]] [[1942]], had trapped 300,000 troops of General [[Friedrich Paulus]]'s [[German 6th Army]] and [[German 4th Panzer Army|4th Panzer Army]] in [[Stalingrad]]. To exploit this victory, the Soviet general staff planned a winter campaign of continuous and highly ambitious offensive operations, codenamed "Saturn". ==Operation Little Saturn: December 1942== The first stage &mdash; an attempt to cut off the German [[Army Group A]] in the Caucasus &mdash; had to be rapidly revised when General [[Erich von Manstein]] launched [[Operation_Wintergewitter|Operation Winter Storm]] on [[12 December]] in an attempt to relieve the trapped armies at Stalingrad. While General [[Rodion Malinovsky]]'s [[Soviet Second Guards Army|Soviet 2nd Guards Army]] blocked the German advance on Stalingrad, the modified plan '''Operation Little Saturn''' was launched on 16 December. This operation consisted of a pincer movement which threatened to cut off the relieving forces. General [[Fyodor Isidorovich Kuznetsov]]'s [[Soviet First Guards Army|1st Guards Army]] and General [[Dmitri Danilovich Lelyushenko]]'s [[Soviet Third Guards Army|3rd Guards Army]] attacked from the north, encircling 130,000 soldiers of the [[Italian war in Soviet Union, 1941-1943|Italian 8th Army]] on the [[Don River, Russia|Don]] and advancing to [[Millerovo]]. (Manstein sent the 6th Panzer Division to the Italians' aid &mdash; of the 130,000 encircled troops, 45,000 survived to join the Panzers at Chertkovo on [[17 January]]). To the south the advance of General Gerasimenko's 28th Army threatened to encircle the 1st Panzer Army and General Trufanov's 51st Army attacked the relief column directly. In a daring raid, by [[24 December]] tanks of the 24th Tank Corps had reached [[Tatsinskaya Raid|Tatskinskaya]], the air base closest to Stalingrad from which the Luftwaffe had been supplying the besieged troops. The Soviet tanks drove through snowstorms onto the airfield and roamed about for hours, destroying the German transport planes at their leisure. (see main article [[Tatsinskaya Raid]]) With the relief column under threat of encirclement, Manstein had no choice but to retreat back to [[Kotelnikovo]] on [[29 December]], leaving the encircled Germans at Stalingrad to their fate (of the 300,000 soldiers encircled 90,000 survived to be taken prisoner. Only 5,000 lived to return to Germany.) The limited scope of the Soviet offensive also gave General [[Paul Ludwig Ewald von Kleist|Ewald von Kleist]] time to withdraw his [[Army Group A]] out of the Caucasus and back over the Don at [[Rostov-on-Don|Rostov]]. ==Second stage: January 1943== The second stage of operations opened on [[13 January]] [[1943]] with an attack by four armies of General Golikov's Voronezh Front that encircled and destroyed the [[Hungarian Second Army]] near Svoboda on the Don. An attack on the German 2nd Army further north threatened to bring about an encirclement; although the German 2nd Army managed to escape, it was forced to retreat and by [[5 February]] troops of the Voronezh Front were approaching Kursk and Kharkov. ==Third stage: February 1943== With German armies in disorganized retreat fall back all across the southern Ukraine, the third stage was an ambitious operation for the Voronezh Front to advance to the [[Dniepr]] and encircle the German 2nd Army, and for the Southwest and South Fronts to capture Voroshilovgrad and drive south to the [[Sea of Azov]] to encircle Kleist's Army Group A and Manstein's [[Army Group Don]]. These operations began well. Kursk was captured on [[8 February]] [[1943]], Kharkov on [[16 February]], and Rostov was abandoned on [[18 February]]. A gap had been driven between Army Group A &mdash; now squeezed into a small bridgehead opposite the Kerch peninsula &mdash; and Army Group Don, and [[Fyodor Isidorovich Kuznetsov]]'s 1st Guards Army threatened to drive another gap between Army Group Don and [[Günther von Kluge]]'s [[Army Group Centre]] by advancing through [[Dnepropetrovsk]]. Moreover the surrender of Stalingrad on [[2 February]] [[1943]] had freed up [[Konstantin Rokossovsky]]'s Don Front for new operations. An ambitious plan was made to follow up the success at Kursk with an attack on the German [[Army Group Centre]] in the [[salient]] at [[Orel]] before breaking out towards [[Bryansk]]. This time, however, the Soviet general staff had asked more than their exhausted troops could perform. Logistical difficulties in redeploying the armies from Stalingrad 650&nbsp;km (400&nbsp;miles) to the west delayed the start of its offensive until [[25 February]]. And tenacious German defence meant that only minor gains were made west of Kursk and none at all at Orel. Meanwhile, in order to save the position in the south, the [[Oberkommando der Wehrmacht]] took the decision to abandon the Rzhev salient near [[Moscow]] to free enough German troops to make a successful riposte in eastern Ukraine. [[Manstein]]'s counteroffensive, stiffened by a specially trained SS Panzer Corps equipped with [[Tiger I|Tiger tank]]s, opened on [[20 February]] [[1943]] and fought its way from [[Poltava]] [[Third Battle of Kharkov|back into Kharkov]] in the third week of March, upon which the spring thaw intervened. This left a bulge in the front centred on Kursk, and thus led to the [[Battle of Kursk]] in July. ==References== * John Erickson, ''The Road to Berlin'', Harper & Row, 1982. * [[David Glantz|David M. Glantz]], ''[http://www.battlefield.ru/battles/battle13.html Prelude to Kursk: Soviet Strategic Operations February&ndash;March 1943]'' * Ministero della Difesa. Stato Maggiore Esercito. Ufficio Storico. ''L’8° Armata Italiana nella seconda battaglia difensiva del Don.'' Roma, 1977 (Italian) [[Category:Battles and operations of the Eastern Front of World War II|Saturn]] [[Category:Battle of Stalingrad]] [[ca:Operació Saturn]] [[cs:Operace Saturn]] [[es:Operación Saturno]] [[fr:Opération Saturne]] [[ro:Operaţiunea Saturn]] [[fi:Operaatio Saturnus]] [[vi:Chiến dịch Saturn]] [[tr:Satürn Operasyonu]] [[zh:土星行動]]