Greetings I discovered this board and thread while searching for something else so forgive my intrusion. With that said I humbly submit my opinion on this discussion.
I am afraid I would have to disagree with the OP’s opinion, the scale of the war on the Eastern front is often misunderstood. Stalin had 35,000,000 men available for military service, that’s a 35 followed by 6 zeros, Germany at her peak on the Eastern front had only 3,200,000 men.
Standard military doctrine dictates that an attacking army must be three times the strength of the defender. Stalingrad and every major city would have to be laid siege in order to secure the rail heads.
The German army that invaded the Soviet Union was just 15 divisions (they were sent to the Balkans) smaller than the one used to invade France and the area to be controlled more than twice as large (about a million square miles already) having only pushed as far as Stalingrad.
The German supply lines were already over 1,000 kilometers long nearly all their trains boilers had burst and partisans were attacking their supply lines relentlessly.
Throughout the entire war the Eastern front consumed 7/8th of the entire German war effort that means North Africa, Italy and the Western front comprised only 1/8th of the entire war effort.
To consider these points further…
First, have you looked at the map? It is farther from Stalingrad (the farthest German penetration into the Soviet Union) to Chelyabinsk (Tankograd) than it is from the Soviet border to Stalingrad (about 800 miles) and twice as far from Moscow to Chelyabinsk (about 1,200 miles) than from the Polish border to Moscow (about 600 miles).
When Barbarossa kicked off Germany invaded with about 150 divisions and they were facing more than 360 divisions even with Germany taking more than 3,500,000 prisoners Stalin still had more than 20,000,000 more men that served in reserve.
Hitler made some major errors long before Barbarossa even started, first he failed to put Germany on a proper war footing, even as late as 1944 German industry was still producing such things as 13 tons of wallpaper.
Second, Germany failed to develop an adequate 4 engine strategic bomber capable of hitting the factories that in the first 5 months from July to November 1,523 industrial enterprises, including 1,360 large armament plants, were packed up brick by brick and relocated by rail and moved east. 667 of them to the Urals, 322 to Siberia, and to Kazakhstan and Central Asia 308 were moved. All these factories were back into production within 6 weeks of being moved.
Third, the Germans made a fatal miscalculation concerning the Pripet Marshes as well which left a more than 300 mile wide hole, roughly the size of Bavaria, in their lines along the nearly 2,000 mile front which the Soviets used to attack the German flanks because Hitler and his Generals believed them to be inaccessible by AFV’s. Ironically the German leaders had heard lectures about the Pripet Marshes in connection with their studies of the Russo-Polish war of 1920 and used similar misconceptions by exploiting the Ardennes with the invasion of France duplicating the Schleiffen plan of WWI.
Fourth, because the Germans believed they could win in as little as six weeks the Heer units were not supplied with any winter clothing or materials required to winterize their equipment for the harsh winter they would face. In a good year you would be lucky to get 6 weeks of suitable weather for AFV operations when the ground isn’t turned into a quagmire or frozen solid.
Not to mention how do you propose to supply the advancing troops? All of the rail roads went through cities like Stalingrad which were in Russian hands. How will you get supplies to your advancing columns considering that Soviet rail gauge was incompatible with German rail and required the off loading of materials and supplies from German rail to Soviet rail which was largely destroyed as the Soviets retreated giving up space to buy time. There were no passable road systems within the Soviet interior and besides Germany lacked adequate numbers of trucks even if the roads existed.
The Soviets did not need the Caucasian oil fields to continue to supply their units as they had more than adequate oil reserves located 600 miles east of Moscow and still yet fields much further east well outside the reach of Germany.
By the time the Germans had got within 26 miles of Moscow all of the central government had already been evacuated and re-established well out of reach.
Finally and most importantly in the area of production and manpower Germany stood no chance of ever competing with the Soviets as the following production reports and troop reports paint a very grim picture for Germany. Wars are won on the factory floors not the battlefields despite what many people believe.
Aircraft Production 1939-1944
1939 1940 1941 1942 1943 1944
Germany 8,295 10,826 11,424 15,288 25,094 39,275
Soviet Union 10,382 10,565 15,735 25,436 34,845 40,246
The tank production figures are even bleaker and we need really only just look at 1942 to get a grasp on the reality for Germany.
Germany produced 5,056 tanks (a figure that includes self-propelled artillery) compared to the Soviets who produced 24,500 of which 5,000 of these were T-34’s.
The further east the Germans would advance the broader the front would become, the harder the terrain and conditions as well. All of the top German Generals believed that the war in the east was suicidal and could not be won. What the Germans did by attacking the Soviets was very much akin to what Japan did attacking the US, awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible rage. The outcome was determined the moment the first shots were fired. Germany stood no chance of ever defeating the Soviets.
, but just a quick comment.