BWPicVolkssturmatKonigsberg

Stavka began planning the Red Army's 1945 winter campaign following
the enormous success enjoyed during the 1944 summer and fall
campaigns. The primary axis of advance would be through Poland
toward Berlin and was designed to destroy the German defensive
positions and army's along the Vistula River. At the same time, the
German army's in East Prussia were to be eliminated while Soviet
forces in Hungary and Slovakia continued what was largely a politically
motivated advance as Stalin sought to cement Soviet gains in Central
and Southeastern Europe. Commensurate with the focus on reaching
Germany proper, the Red Army's greatest striking power was
concentrated in eastern Poland and within Zhukov's 1st Belorussian
Front and to his south Konev's 1st Ukrainian Front. That said, just to
Zhukov's north both the 2nd and 3rd Belorussian Front's, under
Rokossovsky and Cherniakhovsky respectively, had also been amply
reinforced for defeating the still dangerous German forces defending
East Prussia early in January 1945.

On January 13, 1945 Zhukov and Konev's Fronts shattered the
German defensive positions in Poland while Cherniakhovsky's Front
battered its way toward Konigsberg and the 2nd Belorussian Front, led
by the 5th Guards Tank Army, swept around the main German
defensive positions in East Prussia. Though successful in cutting off a
significant parts of Army Group Center within East Prussia the 2nd
Belorussian Front failed to completely destroy German forces west of
Konigsberg and near Danzig. Thus, with the help provided by the
German army's located in eastern Pomerania, the German defenders of
Konigsberg and its surrounding region would hold out from January
until April 1945 in one of the bloodiest sieges in modern history. A
siege featuring the deadliest maritime disaster in history when a
Russian submarine torpedoed the 27,000-ton former German cruise
ship Wilhelm Gustloff on the night of January 30th. The ship had
mostly been carrying civilians fleeing the fighting and its sinking
resulting in an estimated 7,000 people killed. In addition to the
carnage at sea the Red Army had inflicted a severe toll on the
Wermacht. This picture shows clearly, as evidenced by the man in the
foreground, that many of Konigsberg's defenders were far from a prime
age for serving as frontline troops. Yet in spite of the advanced age
of much of those drafted into the Wermacht in the war's final years
quite a few fought suprisingly well.

The January-April 1945 battle for Konigsberg represented the fifth
time that Russia and Germany had fought for control of the city, twice
before in the Seven Years' War, in the winter of 1812-1813, and in
1914 early in the First World War. None of the previous battles came
close to matching the intensity and destruction of the 1945 struggle
for the region. In this final German-Russian battle for Konigsberg and
East Prussia hundreds of thousands were killed on all sides with
Prussia's defenders virtually annihilated and an enormous percentage
of the civilian population killed not just during the battle but
afterward. For instance, when Konigsberg surrendered on April 9th the
remaining civilian population was estimated at 110,000. By June, only
73,000 were left after months of murder, suicide and disease had
swept through the city. That said the Red Army paid a fearful price in
taking East Prussia. Between January and April 1945 alone, the Red
Army suffered 584,778 casualties and lost 3,525 tanks and 1,450
planes in taking this single German province.

Picture Courtesy of Deutsches Bundesarchiv (German Federal
Archive), Bild 183-R98401