Hitler brought Great Britain relief by turning eastward and invading the Soviet Union just as the strain on Britain was becoming severe. Until then Britain’s prospects had appeared hopeless in the eyes of most people except the British themselves and the government’s decision to continue the struggle after the fall of France and to reject Hitler’s peace offers could spell only slow suicide unless relief came from either the United States or the U.S.S.R. The German attack on the Soviet Union was to have an immediate and highly salutary effect on Great Britain’s situation. Another factor in the Germans’ calculations was purely political, though no less mistaken they believed that within three to six months of their invasion, the Soviet regime would collapse from lack of domestic support. The effects of the miscalculations were increased because much of August was wasted while Hitler and his advisers were having long arguments as to what course they should follow after their initial victories. The consequence was that, though the Germans succeeded in shattering the original Soviet armies by superior technique, they then found their path blocked by fresh ones. But the Soviets actually brought up more than 200 fresh divisions by the middle of August, making a total of 360. and reckoned that 50 more might be produced. The Germans correctly estimated that there were about 150 divisions in the western parts of the U.S.S.R. A greater hindrance to Hitler’s chances of victory was that the German intelligence service underestimated the troop reserves that Stalin could bring up from the depths of the U.S.S.R. The Soviet tanks were about equal to those of the Germans, however. The Soviet Union had twice or perhaps three times the number of both tanks and aircraft as the Germans had, but their aircraft were mostly obsolete. The Germans’ strength was further increased by more than 30 divisions of Finnish and Romanian troops. It was in effect the largest and most powerful invasion force in human history. Among these were 19 panzer divisions, and in total the “Barbarossa” force had about 3,000 tanks, 7,000 artillery pieces, and 2,500 aircraft. Watch the launch of Operation Barbarossa, the German Wehrmacht invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 See all videos for this articleįor the campaign against the Soviet Union, the Germans allotted almost 150 divisions containing a total of about 3,000,000 men. SpaceNext50 Britannica presents SpaceNext50, From the race to the Moon to space stewardship, we explore a wide range of subjects that feed our curiosity about space!.Learn about the major environmental problems facing our planet and what can be done about them! Saving Earth Britannica Presents Earth’s To-Do List for the 21st Century.Britannica Beyond We’ve created a new place where questions are at the center of learning.100 Women Britannica celebrates the centennial of the Nineteenth Amendment, highlighting suffragists and history-making politicians.
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