Hitler's early decision to hold 6th Army in the Stalingrad pocket and liberate it with a
makeshift force may have been his worst possible option when he imposed it but it
soon became the only one, short of surrender, as the army's low stocks of food, fuel,
and ammunition dwindled sharply. There was a time in the last week of November when
he might have pulled Army Group A out of the Caucasus and gone for Paulus with everything
he could put together, although it would have been very, very difficult. There was also a time,
it is not likely but a possibility, when Paulus might have fought his way out with heavy loss
of life. By early December, however, no course of action lay open other than the one the
Fuehrer had chosen. It was too late to assemble a strong force, and Paulus was almost
immobile. In the circumstances, the Germans mounted an effort that for spectacular futility
is reminiscent of the Charge of the Light Brigade in 1854, with this difference, that instead
of the 673 British cavalrymen who rode into the valley of death at Balaclava they had three
panzer divisions (which were new to the area) and supporting units (which were dazed from
recent combat). It was a strange piece of business. Whether anyone at the High Command
seriously thought 75,000 men and 500 tanks could break through to Stalingrad seventy-five
miles to the northeast or whether this was a sacrificial operation that one conception of military
honor seems to demand may never be known. It is certain, however, they never had a
chance. Everything was against them, time, weather, the terrain, manpower, firepower,
long lines of communication and supply. There were guns to the right of them, guns to the
left of them, and, as always since late July, more Russians out ahead than the generals
realized or would acknowledge.

Hermann Hoth

Preparations were mighty on both sides of the line. On the German side, General Field Marshal
von Manstein was brought down from the Leningrad front to conduct the operation. Manstein
was a good general as generals go, but in this period he had an inhibiting desire to replace
Hitler through Hitler's favor as commander of all forces on the Russian front. Hoth's 4th Panzer
Army headquarters was charged with handling the infantry and cavalry that were largely
Romanian and the command staff of 57th Panzer Corps that was pulled in from the Caucasus
to control the armor 6th Panzer Division from France, the 17th from Orel near Moscow, and the
23rd from the Caucasus. Soon there was a plan. Fifty-seventh Panzer Corps with the Romanians
protecting its flanks would move out of the Kotelnikovo area along both sides of the rail line.
When it reached the Mishkova River, it would be joined for a lunge to the pocket by 48th
Panzer Corps that held a thin bridgehead at the Don crossings. At a suitable moment 6th Army,
without giving up what little territory it held, would come out to meet them. There were,
however, obvious difficulties. Fifty-seventh Corps would start without 17th Panzer because
it was delayed en route. Forty-eighth Corps with 11th Panzer was weak as a cat, and
Paulus was not getting by air lift anything like the supplies he needed to carry out his part
of the plan. There was another difficulty. The weather was rotten, rain, snow, rain again,
thaw, freeze, thaw again. D day was fixed for December 8, then the tenth, finally the twelfth.

Erich von Manstein

Meanwhile, the Russians, thinking they could destroy Paulus before the German attempt, fried
to eat their cake and have it. They strengthened their outer line of encirclement at the expense
of the inner line, then ordered reinforcements to the inner line from far away. On December 1st
they began moving men of the 51st Armyfrom the inner ring toward Kotelnikovo. The 51st had
34,000 men, 77 tanks, and 419 guns and mortars. On the third they activated Malinovsky's
1st Reserve Army as the 2nd Guards and ordered it in a wide sweep from the
distant upper Don to the inner ring. And on the ninth, getting wind of activity near the Don
Crossings where 48th Corps was gathering, they organized a new 5th Shock Army to meet
a threat from that direction. The 5th was hastily put together but it had 71,000 men, 252
tanks, and 804 guns and mortars, strong enough with the 51st, thought Stavka, to block the
Germans until Paulus was crushed.  As late as the eleventh, Stalin (Vasiliev) told Vasilievsky
(Mikhailov) to go ahead with a new plan for destroying 6th Army:

Vasilievsky

TO MIKHAILOV ( PERSONAL ONLY)

1. CARRY OUT OPERATION KOLTSO [RING] IN TWO STAGES.

2. FIRST STAGE : ENTRY INTO BASAROINO AND VOROPONOVO AREAS AND LIQUIDATION OF
ENEMY'S WESTERN AND SOUTHERN GROUPS.

3. SECOND STAGE : GENERAL ASSAULT WITH ALL ARMIES OF BOTH FRONTS TO LIQUIDATE
GREAT BULK OF ENEMY FORCES WEST AND NORTHWEST OF STALINGRAD.

4. LAUNCH FIRST STAGE OF OPERATION NOT LATER THAN DATE FIXED DURING TELEPHONE
CONVERSATION BETWEEN VASILIEV AND MIKHAILOV.

5. FINISH FIRST STAGE OF OPERATION NOT LATER THAN DECEMBER 23RD.

VASILIEV

But General Hoth, who under Manstein's control was in command of Wintergewitter
(Operation Winter Storm), struck first. Not waiting for 17th Panzer to arrive from Tormosin,
he took off on the twelfth with 6th Panzer to the left of the rail line and 23rd Panzer to the right.
The suffering in 6th Army was becoming unbearable, further delay could be fatal.

Stalin hesitated. Could he crush 6th Army and then deal with the relief force, or would it have
to be the relief force and then the encircled army ?

Saturday, December 12, 1942

No decision. Formations of the 51st Army tried to stem the tide.

Sunday, December 13, 1942

Still no decision. Hoth shoved back the 51st and crossed the Aksai River.

Monday, December 14, 1942

With 5th Shock Army Eremenko liquidated 48th Panzer Corps' bridgehead at the Don
crossings, but alarmed by Hoth's penetration of his left he called for reinforcements.
Specifically he asked  Stalin for the 2nd Guards Army that was unloading from trains in the
north and moving down to join Rokossovsky's assault on the ring.

Rokossovsky

Stalin called Vasilievsky, who was at Rokossovsky's command post. What about it?
he asked. Rokossovsky took the phone.

The 2nd Guards?  No, said Rokossovsky. Eremenko could have the 21st Army, a
weaker force, but he, Rokossovsky, needed the Guards. With the Guards he could finish
the 6th quickly, then the relief force could be overcome and all armies move on Rostov to
cut off the Germans in the Caucasus.

Stalin spoke to Vasilievsky again. What did he think? Vasilievsky sided with Eremenko.

All right, said Stalin. Orders would be cut sending the Guards to the stouth. But, objected
Rokossovsky, 6th Army could not be crushed without it. In that case, said Stalin, let it go
for now.

Tuesday, December 15, 1942

Hoth's drive stalled.

Wednesday, December 16, 1942

Seventeenth Panzer Division, long delayed, began to take its place in the German line.

Thursday, December 17, 1942

It snowed during the night and rained during the day, bad tank weather for Hoth, who
resumed his advance west of the rail line with 17th Panzer on his left, 6th Panzer in the
center, and the 23rd to his right. Despite the mud and Russian resistance, 6th Panzer
reached the Mishkova.

But Hoth was in trouble. Forty-eighth Panzer Corps could not come out to join him, and
although he had moved forty miles since Saturday and had only thirty-five to go, casualties
were severe and irreplaceable, the nights long and freezing.

On this day not one transport plane got through to 6th Army, which was thought to have
scarcely enough fuel to move some tank and motorized units eighteen miles out of the
pocket.

Friday, December 18, 1942

Sixth Panzer won a bridgehead on the north side of the Mishkova.

Malinovsky activated his command post beyond the bridgehead. Because his powerful 2nd
Guards Army was strung out behind him, the men marching night and day, Stavka gave him
the 4th Mechanized Corps, the 87th Division, and the remnants of Shapkin's cavalry corps.

Saturday, December 19, 1942

The Guards were pulling in, first the 98th Division of the 1st Corps, then the 3rd Guards of the
13th Corps. K. V. Sviridov's 2nd Mechanized Corps was right behind them.

What did the Germans know about them? Nothing whatsoever. They were not mentioned in
an estimate of the situation which Manstein passed on to Zeitzler this day or in a long,
equivocal "order" he sent to Paulus which seemed to say (a) that Paulus was to come out to
meet Hoth "as soon as possible" but without giving up the pocket (Operation Winter Storm
as approved by Hitler) and (b) that the developing situation might make it necessary for
Paulus to pull out entirely but that he should do so only upon receipt of an "express order"
(Operation Thunderclap, which was not yet, and never to be, approved)." In short, Manstein
wanted Paulus, with the little intelligence available to him, to fight his way through Russian
forces of undetermined strength over a distance for which he did not have the fuel and at
precisely a time when because of the arrival of the Guards the Manstein-Hoth drive was
about stopped in its tracks. Later on, after the war, Manstein would show he tried to persuade
Hitler to approve Thunderclap and say Paulus should have launched it with or without
permission, but no one to this day has been able to explain how Thunderclap or Winter Storm
could have been carried out.

Sunday, December 20, 1942

Hoth, whose men were exhausted now from lack of sleep, gained a few more miles but to
Zeitzler in East Prussia Manstein reported "radio traffic of a new 2nd Army of three corps
in the area northwest of Stalingrad." The Guards were not northwest of Stalingrad; they
were south-west of it and directly before Hoth's panzers.

Monday, December 21, 1942

More Guards units arrived. Their numbers were overwhelming.

Tuesday, December 22, 1942

Hoth had only twenty-two to twenty-five miles to go. If he gained another ten or twelve,
Paulus might have a chance to meet him.
But the turning point had come. The Russian 6th Mechanized Corps reached the field of
battle. Rotmistrov's 7th Tank Corps was shifted from 5th Shock to further strengthen the
Guards.

Hoth could not advance. He could not stay where he was. He must pull back.

Wednesday, December 23, 1942

Sixth Panzer was moved to the west side of the Don to meet a threat to the distant German left.

Thursday, December 24, 1942

The day before Christmas, and the Russians launched a general offensive against Hoth with the
2nd Guards, 5th Shock, and 51st Armies.

Friday, December 25, 1942

Christmas Day, and Hoth was in full retreat. The Russians pushed on until four days later they
took Kotelnikovo, Hoth's point of departure.