Operation Bagration

Operation Bagration
Part of the Eastern Front of World War II

Deployments during Operation Bagration
Date22 June – 19 August 1944
(1 month and 4 weeks)
Location
Soviet Union (present-day Belarus, Baltic states, and Ukraine), and Eastern Poland
Result Soviet victory[2]
Territorial
changes
Red Army retakes all of Byelorussian SSR, most of the Lithuanian SSR and gains foothold in Eastern Poland.
Belligerents
 Germany
 Hungary[1]
 Romania

 Soviet Union


Air support:
 France
Commanders and leaders
  •  Ernst Busch
  •  Walter Model
  •  Hans Jordan
  •  Georg-Hans Reinhardt
  •  Kurt von Tippelskirch
  •  Walter Weiß
  •  Vincenz Müller (POW)
Units involved
  • Army Group Center
  • 9th Army
  • 3rd Panzer Army
  • 4th Army
  • 2nd Army
  • 1st Baltic Front
  • 1st Belorussian Front
  • 2nd Belorussian Front
  • 3rd Belorussian Front
  • 1st Polish Army
  • Fighter Squadron 2/30 Normandie-Niemen
Strength
Initially:
486,493 combat personnel[3]
~849,000 total[4]
118 tanks[5]
452 assault guns[5]
3,236 field guns and howitzers[5]
920 aircraft[5]
In total (Soviet sources):[6]
1,036,760 personnel
~800 tanks
530 assault guns
7,760 field guns
2,320 anti-aircraft guns
~1,000–1,300 aircraft
Initially:
1,670,300 personnel
3,841 tanks and 1,977 assault guns[5][7]
32,718 guns, rocket launchers and mortars[5]
7,799 aircraft[5]
In total (Frieser):
~2,500,000 personnel
~6,000 tanks and assault guns[5]
~45,000 guns, rocket launchers and mortars[5]
~8,000 aircraft[5][8]
Casualties and losses

Zaloga:
300,000–375,000 killed, missing or captured[9]

~150,000–225,000 killed or missing
~150,000 captured

Frieser:
399,102[10]

26,397 killed
109,776 wounded
262,929 missing and captured

Glantz and House:
~450,000 combat casualties[7]
Isayev:
~500,000 combat casualties[11]
Soviet sources:
539,480 killed, missing or captured[12][13]

~381,000 killed
158,480 captured

Glantz and House:[14]
770,888 (including ≈550,000 combat casualties)

~180,000 killed or missing
~340,000–590,848 wounded or sick
2,957 tanks and assault guns[15]
2,447 guns[16]
822 aircraft[16]

Operation Bagration[a] (Russian: Операция Багратион, romanized: Operatsiya Bagration) was an operation by the Red Army of the Soviet Union against the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany that happened on the Eastern Front of the European theatre of World War II and took place from June - August 1944. The operation was targeted at German army group center stationed in german occupied Soviet Byelorussia. Two weeks earlier Operation Overlord was started by the Western Allies restarting the Western Front and now germany and the other european axis powers had to fight on three fronts. the eastern front, the Italian Front, and the western front. It is to be considered to be one of the greatest military defeats in german history with 450,000 casualties.[17]

Notes

  1. Named after Prince Pyotr Bagration

Citations

  1. Baxter, Ian (2020). Operation Bagration: The Soviet Destruction of German Army Group Center, 1944. Casemate. ISBN 978-1-61200-924-7.
  2. Roberts, Geoffrey (2006). Stalin's Wars: From World War to Cold War, 1939–1953. Yale University Press. p. 202. ISBN 978-0-300-11204-7.
  3. Frieser 2007, p. 531.
  4. Citino 2017, p. 171.
  5. 5.00 5.01 5.02 5.03 5.04 5.05 5.06 5.07 5.08 5.09 Frieser 2007, p. 534.
  6. Glantz & Orenstein 2004, p. 4.
  7. 7.0 7.1 Glantz & House 1995, p. 132.
  8. Glantz & House 1995, p. 201.
  9. Zaloga 1996, p. 71.
  10. Frieser 2007, pp. 593–594.
  11. Алексей Исаев. Цена Победы. Операция «Багратион» Эхо Москвы. 17.08.2009
  12. Glantz & Orenstein 2004, p. 176.
  13. "Наша Победа. День за днём — проект РИА Новости". Archived from the original on 2013-07-28. Retrieved 2010-07-07.
  14. Glantz & House 1995, p. 298.
  15. Krivosheev 1997, p. 371.
  16. 16.0 16.1 Krivosheev 1997, p. 203.
  17. Norman Davies, "Europe at War", Swedish ISBN 978-91-37-13109-2, chapter 1, p. 40 in the Swedish translation (table of killed soldiers in the largest battles and campaigns)

Bibliography

  • Niepold, Gerd (1987). Battle for White Russia: The Destruction of Army Group Centre June 1944. Translated by Simpkin, R. London: Brassey's. ISBN 008033606X.
  • Watt, Robert N. (December 2008). "Feeling the Full Force of a Four Front Offensive: Re-Interpreting the Red Army's 1944 Belorussian and L'vov-Peremshyl' Operations". The Journal of Slavic Military Studies. 21 (4). Routledge Taylor & Francis Group: 669–705. doi:10.1080/13518040802497564. S2CID 143413006.
  • Willmott, H. P. (1984). June, 1944. Blandford Press. ISBN 0713714468.
  • Zaloga, S. (1996). Bagration 1944: The Destruction of Army Group Centre. Osprey. ISBN 978-1855324787.
  • Ziemke, Earl F. (1969). Battle For Berlin: End of the Third Reich. London: Macdonald.
  • Zimmerman, Joshua D. (2015). The Polish Underground and the Jews, 1939–1945. London & New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1108432740.

Further reading

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