Eastern Front
Situation Report August 26th 1943 Turn 41
Army Group Centre
In late May Operation Zitadelle had been launched, the plan to capture Tula, Voronezh and Moscow, which was hoped to bring a quick end to the war in the East, while the operation had achieved great success with Tula being taken and Voronezh encircled and the Red Army losing hundreds of thousands of men and vast amounts of materials, Moscow was still in Stalin's control and the enemy had launched offensive after offensive across the entire Eastern Front in an effort to thwart our forces from taking the Soviet Capital.
Now in the 14th week of the operation Army Group Centre was now ready for the final drive on Moscow.
Operation Nordpol (ii)
The offensive would begin with a mechanized assault on Moscow's North and South flanks, and would consist of 4 Armies, in the North 8th Armee and 9th Armee, in the Centre and South 4th Armee and 3rd Pz Armee. The plan will be to smash through Soviet lines with Panzer units for a envelopment movement encircling the city then the Panzer troops will dig in countering any attempts by the enemy to break the encirclement and reach Moscow until reinforcing Infantry arrive to establish a defensive perimeter.
https://codenames.info/operation/nordpol-ii/
With the enemy distracted with there own offensive against parts of 9th Armee in the Kalinin area the offensive begins firstly with a diversionary attack towards Ryazan by parts of 4th Armee, the city is captured, Pz Units from 4th Armee and 3rd Pz Armee punch through Red Army lines, Kolomna is retaken then Voskresensk and Kurovskoe.
After withstanding the Soviet attacks at Kalinin 9th Armee and part of 3rd Pz Armee begin to go over on the offensive with Pz Units leading the way, the enemy is driven back and there forces cutoff. Istra is retaken in a bitter fight.
The Red Army throws the last of its Moscow Reserve forces into battle but these are defeated and forced back.
General Ferdinand Schaal's LVI Pz Korps ( 4th Armee ) along with 3rd Pz Armee's Das Reich SS Pz Gren Div capture Noginsk and link up with General Christian Hansen's X ArmeeKorps ( 8th Armee ) North of the town, cutting off all land routes to the Soviet Capital, Moscow is no encircled with the nearest outside Red Army units almost 50 miles East of Stalin's city.
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While the German assault on Moscow is taking place the Soviet offensives in the Tambov and Voronezh regions continue to rage, 2nd Armee defending a 250 mile front line manages to force back enemy units giving it the breathing space to plug the gaps in its line and retake some territory lost the previous week and in the process trap a Soviet Tank Corps on the west bank of The Don River near the town of Repyovka.
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