Soviet General Staff

The Budapest Operation (29 October 1944-13 February 1945): An Operational-Strategic Study examines in detail the Red Army's operations on the approaches to Budapest and the city's ultimate capture following a long siege. The first part of the study deals with the Red Army's arrival in central Hungary, following the successful conduct of the Iasi--Kishinev operation in late August 1944 and the subsequent development of the offensive through Romania, Bulgaria and eastern Yugoslavia. By mid-October the Soviets were poised to continue the offensive into Hungary and its capital of Budapest, the capture of which would clear the path for a subsequent advance into Austria and southern Germany. This study examines the rapid advance to the outskirts of Budapest, where stubborn German-Hungarian resistance forced them to halt, after which the Soviets sought to surround the city, finally closing the ring at the end of December. Also examined are the Germans' repeated attempts to break the siege by launching several counter-offensives to the west and south of the city. However, these were all beaten back in heavy fighting and the enemy garrison was forced to capitulate on 13 February. This study also devotes considerable attention to the combat arms (artillery, tanks and mechanized forces, aviation, and engineering troops) during the operation. The other study is an internal General Staff Academy document dealing with the activities of the Third Ukrainian Front during the Budapest operation. Throughout the greater part of the operation the Third Ukrainian Front played a decidedly secondary role, charged with protecting the flank of the Soviet advance through Yugoslavia and Hungary, with the Second Ukrainian Front slated to receive the accolades for taking Budapest. However, the bitter enemy resistance along the approaches to Budapest gradually forced the Soviet high command to increasingly shift its efforts to the right bank of the Danube River, first to help in isolating the Budapest garrison inside the city, and then to fend off repeated German counter-offensives to relieve the city. It was the Third Ukrainian Front's successful repulse of these efforts that enabled the Soviets to finally bring about the garrison's capitulation and the end of the operation.

An Operational-Strategic Study

The Budapest Operation (29 October 1944-13 February 1945)

Richard Harrison

"The Battle of Moscow, 1941–1942: The Red Army’s Defensive Operations and Counteroffensive Along the Moscow Strategic Direction" is a detailed examination of one of the major turning points of World War II, as seen from the Soviet side. The Battle of Moscow marked the climax of Hitler’s “Operation Barbarossa,” which sought to destroy the Soviet Union in a single campaign and ensure German hegemony in Europe. The failure to do so condemned Germany to a prolonged war it could not win. This work originally appeared in 1943, under the title "Razgrom Nemetskikh Voisk pod Moskvoi" (The Rout of the German Forces Around Moscow). The work was produced by the Red Army General Staff’s military-historical section, which was charged with collecting and analyzing the war’s experience and disseminating it to the army’s higher echelons. This was a collective effort, featuring many different contributors, with Marshal Boris Mikhailovich Shaposhnikov, former chief of the Red Army General Staff and then head of the General Staff Academy, serving as general editor. The book is divided into three parts, each dealing with a specific phase of the battle. The first traces the Western Front’s defensive operations along the Moscow direction during Army Group Center’s final push toward the capital in November–December, 1941. The study pays particular attention to the Red Army’s resistance to the Germans’ attempts to outflank Moscow from the north. Equally important were the defensive operations to the south of Moscow, where the Germans sought to push forward their other encircling flank. The second part deals with the first phase of the Red Army’s counteroffensive, which was aimed at pushing back the German pincers and removing the immediate threat to Moscow. Here the Soviets were able to throw the Germans back and flatten both salients, particularly in the south, where they were able to make deep inroads into the enemy front to the west and northwest. The final section examines the further development of the counteroffensive until the end of January 1942. This section highlights the Soviet advance all along the front and their determined but unsuccessful attempts to cut off the Germans’ Rzhev–Vyaz’ma salient. It is from this point that the front essentially stabilized, after which events shifted to the south. This new translation into English makes available to a wider readership this valuable study.

Soviet General Staff

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