Königsberg offensive operation in 1945. The truth about the storming of Koenigsberg
Gennady Viktorovich Kretinin graduated from the Kaliningrad Higher Military Engineering School and the Military Engineering Academy. Doctor historical sciences, candidate of military sciences, professor of the Baltic federal university them. I. Kant, full member of the Academy of Military Sciences, Academy military history, Head of the Baltic Regional Information and Analytical Center RISS (Kaliningrad).
He deals with the problems of the Baltic region, aspects of relations between Russia and the EU in relation to the Kaliningrad region, and regional history. He has more than two hundred publications, including in Germany, Poland and Lithuania.
About the number of those who fought and the losses on both sides
AT1945 one of the largest strategic operations of the Red Army against Nazi Germany became East Prussian. It began on January 13, 1945 and ended, according to official data, on April 25, 1945. 1 . The grouping of Soviet troops participating in it consisted of formations of the 2nd Belorussian, 3rd Belorussian and 1st Baltic fronts with the support of Baltic Fleet and aviation.
East Prussia was of major political and strategic importance for Germany, so the Nazis concentrated significant forces there. Using defensive lines and positions prepared in advance, the enemy troops put up stubborn resistance to the advancing units of the Red Army, as a result of which fighting took on a protracted character.
As part of this strategic offensive operation, the Soviet command planned, organized and carried out a number of front-line operations 2 that ultimately led to the defeat of the main enemy forces and the liberation of East Prussia from fascist troops. Each of these operations had its own purpose and solved a specific problem. Undoubtedly, in military-historical terms, any of them is of interest to researchers. However, until now, it is precisely around the Königsberg offensive operation (the assault on Königsberg) that ideological battles have not stopped, the leitmotif of which is the idea that has been established in domestic and foreign literature about significant losses of troops on both sides and casualties among the civilian population of the fortress city. They allegedly give grounds to accuse the Soviet command of bringing down a powerful grouping of troops on a weak German garrison, which, in addition to military tasks, was supposed to protect a large civilian population 3 .
In the minds of Russians, the assault on Koenigsberg remains a symbol of mass heroism Soviet soldiers, a victory worth many sacrifices. Meanwhile, for a number of reasons, it is quite difficult to restore the true picture of the events of the first decade of April 1945 in the Königsberg area. Conflicting data from the Soviet Information Bureau and German sources on the number of friendly and enemy troops, estimates of the number of civilians remaining in the city for a long time were not checked and not commented on, despite the fact that free treatment of them was possible on both sides. Over time, these data became "generally accepted" among historians, depending on their position.
In open sources general figures losses of Soviet troops in the operations of the Second World War appeared only at the turn of the XX-XXI centuries. Judging by these data, human losses in the East Prussian strategic offensive operation of 1945 amounted to 584,778 people, of which 126,464 were irretrievable 4 . However, data on losses in army and front-line operations are still extremely rare, which creates the basis for various insinuations, biased conclusions and generalizations both in foreign and domestic publications.
An even more difficult task faced German researchers, participants and witnesses of the events of April 6–9, 1945, since Königsberg was under siege and documentary sources simply did not survive. The German publications on the subject under study are based solely on the memoirs of city residents and military personnel, often corrected by later authors.
Military garrison of Königsberg. Number of local residents
AT the first generalized data on the number of German troops defending Koenigsberg was presented by the head of the department for the use of war experience of the operational directorate of the headquarters of the 3rd Belorussian Front Colonel A.Vasiliev. In September 1945, he reported that "on the front of the armies" prepared for the assault on the city, the German command concentrated the 548th, 561st, 367th and 69th infantry divisions, the 2nd fortress and 75th security regiments - a total of 23,300 personal composition, 425 artillery pieces, 16 tanks and self-propelled artillery mounts (ACS). In addition, according to him, "in front of the front of the armies" were German regiments and reinforcement battalions with a total strength of approximately 20 thousand people, 220 guns, 25 tanks and self-propelled guns. The 1st Infantry Division (6.1 thousand people, 124 guns, 8 tanks and self-propelled guns) was in the reserve of the German command, and in positions east of Koenigsberg- units from the 61st Infantry Division (3.5 thousand people, 60 guns). Thus, in combatants parts the enemy had 52.7 thousand personnel with 819 guns, 49 tanks and self-propelled guns.
In addition to them, special and rear units, as well as Volkssturm units, were stationed in the fortress. The prisoners reported that among the defenders there were many drafted from military factories, Air Force servicemen, automobile units, artillerymen and military sailors. These non-combatants parts also took part in the fighting. A. Vasiliev clarifies: “In total, in the Königsberg garrison, together with the rear units, as it turned out later, there were more than 130 thousand people.” In fact, the last figure was a tracing-paper from the operational report of the Sovinformburo for April 10, which also reported that the Germans during the assault on Königsberg lost up to 42 thousand people killed, and more than 92 thousand soldiers and officers surrendered.
Soviet historiography unequivocally accepted the report of the Soviet Information Bureau on faith, and indicated figures included in almost all official publications, memoirs and research.
It should be noted that A. Vasiliev prepared a section of the report using the data of his intelligence and combat reports of the troops. Naturally, these data needed to be clarified, including with the use of German sources. However, the documents of the German command, as already mentioned, were not preserved, and by that time it was already poorly oriented in the situation. Polls of prisoners of war were processed later, although to date they have not yet become the subject of careful study. Soviet data military intelligence, of course, were not completely accurate. But be that as it may, on the eve of the assault, the Soviet command was firmly convinced that the encircled group of Germans numbered about 60 thousand people.
A different situation developed in German historiography. The commandant of Königsberg, General of Infantry Otto von Lyash, during interrogation called the number of the German garrison - "more than 100 thousand." Moreover, he repeated this figure twice (“The total number of troops subordinate to me, together with the Volkssturm and police units, was more than 100 thousand people” and a little later: “We lost the entire 100 thousandth army near Königsberg. There were up to 30 thousand people wounded, killed too there were many").
Later, returning from Soviet captivity, in which he spent about 10 years, O. Lyash began to write memoirs, using the memoirs of German generals and officers, eyewitness accounts. His book “So Koenigsberg Fell” has no documentary basis, does not contain analytical conclusions and generalizations, but is replete with emotions. In it, the former commandant of the fortress speaks of a 35,000-strong garrison.
The figures given in his memoirs are highly questionable. For example, talking about the preparation of the city for defense, O. Lyash writes: “How many infantry battalions, machine-gun and anti-tank companies formed the headquarters of Würdig during the siege of Königsberg, I can no longer say, because the data is lost. According to my calculations, about 30 thousand people were sent to the front through the headquarters for the formation of troops ... "
However, there were actually many more different formations. For example, Fritz Haase, a resident of Königsberg, who was detained at the location of the 50th Army in the Kvednau 5 area, during interrogation on March 16, 1945, reported that party committees were involved in the formation of Volkssturm battalions. Back in February, the party committee "Pregel" formed a battalion V-92 6 . Battalions of up to 400 people each had 3-4 companies. O. Lyash mentions 8 Volkssturm battalions, but, judging by the numbering, there were much more of them.
So, according to O. Lyash, there were 30 thousand soldiers and officers in the newly formed German units during the siege of Koenigsberg. In addition to them, a significant number of German troops were at the forefront, defending the city. It is necessary to take into account the replenishment of the garrison from external sources, which was carried out by the German command right up to the assault itself. So, in December 1944, a marching battalion of 300 people was formed in Horn (Austria), which in February 1945 took up positions in the area of the Palmburg bridge. Apparently, according to Lyash's memoirs, the figure of "35 thousand servicemen" who made up the Königsberg garrison in March-April 1945 is clearly not accurate, but other German researchers took it on faith.
Meanwhile, during the assault on Koenigsberg, it became clear to the Soviet command that the size of the German group exceeded the calculated one. This became clear from the reports of the headquarters of the armies about the losses of the enemy. Judging by these reports, information about the losses of friendly and enemy troops was provided to a higher authority at the end of the day, at the end of the operation, or for a particular period upon request. During the fighting in East Prussia, the reporting system was supplemented by ten-day loss reports, which could contain clarifications for each day, for several days, etc.
For example, the head of the operational department of the operational directorate of the headquarters of the 3rd Belorussian Front, Colonel Berlin, presented to his chief data on enemy losses in the period from April 1 to April 10 along the entire front line: 96,479 people were captured, 61,023 were killed. At the same time, he also compiled a certificate about enemy losses only in the Königsberg area for the period from April 6 to April 9, specifying that these data are preliminary. In accordance with this certificate, 696 prisoners were taken in the front line of the 39th Army, and 32,000 Germans were killed; in the front line of the 43rd Army - 16,000 and 7,500, respectively; in band 50 - 6625 and 6200; 11th Guards Army - 22 885 and 7720. On the certificate with a red pencil without a signature, the final losses of the Germans are marked: soldiers and officers - 70 826, guns - 1721, mortars - 580, tanks and self-propelled guns - 114, etc.
Naturally, the data for a decade looked more impressive and did not contradict the truth: at that time, the fighting took place mainly in the Königsberg area. These data formed the basis of the information presented to the Headquarters immediately after the assault on the fortress.
It should be noted that as of April 6, 1945, after previous battles, there were already 19,146 prisoners in the front-line network. During the reporting period, another 1396 Germans were taken prisoner by other armies and various units. If we add up these and other data, we get an amount very close to the report of the Sovinformburo of April 10 - 91,088 people. By the way, on one of the documents at the bottom left, such a calculation was made in pencil. Apparently, the front command was already trying to figure out the numbers.
By and large, on April 6–10 and even on April 11, all or almost all German military personnel and the bulk of the civilian population who were in the city were captured and detained in Königsberg. In practice, a kind of census of the conditional population of the city was carried out as of April 10, 1945.
However, according to German data, which some domestic experts agree with, in Königsberg before the assault there were from 90 to 130 thousand soldiers. civilians, which allegedly confirms the fact that many tens of thousands of civilians died during the assault.
It is worth paying attention to the spread in the data - from 90 to 130 thousand. The difference in indicators reaches almost 50%, and this suggests that information can be arbitrary or distorted for a specific purpose. Indeed, the information of the commandant of the fortress O. Lyash looks at least strange. The civil and military authorities of the city, right up to the very assault, managed to maintain a system for providing the population with food, albeit at greatly reduced rates. This makes it possible to determine quite accurately (at least with a much smaller error than 50%) the total number of civilians remaining in the city at the time of the assault. The commandant of the fortress, of course, could not help but know their number.
In German historiography, Jürgen Thorwald was one of the first to indicate the figure of 130 thousand civilians back in 1950 (though without reference to the source). However, he himself attributed it to the end of January 1945. Taking into account the mass exodus of the population from the city in February-March through the corridors formed during the fighting along both banks and along the ice of Frisches Huff Bay, by the time of the assault, the number of civilians in the city should have been significantly reduced. This was confirmed by the taken German "tongues", which reported that "there are few people left in the city", and in some areas it is "almost completely evicted" 7 .
Immediately after the end of the fighting, the military authorities of the 3rd Belorussian Front began to count the number of the German population remaining in the city. On April 26, 1945, 23,247 German citizens were registered by military authorities in Königsberg. On May 1, their number amounted to 22,838 people, on May 6 - 26,559. The order of numbers practically corresponds to the above data of Colonel Kolesnikov.
It is very difficult to determine and, apparently, it will no longer be possible, the number of those who died during the assault from the German side (military personnel and civilians). It would be possible to establish it at least approximately by burials. However, the fighting in East Prussia continued throughout April and the first decade of May 1945, and the maximum that the regular funeral teams of divisions and armies in the depths of the Zemland Peninsula could do during this time was to bury the Red Army soldiers who fell in Königsberg.
After the assault, only military commandant's offices remained in the city, due to their small number, they were not able to carry out mass graves. The military commandant of Koenigsberg, Major General M. Smirnov, decided to involve German prisoners of war and the local population in this. In daily reports to the head of the rear of the front, he reflected the dynamics of the registration of the population of Königsberg and the burial places of the dead Germans, without taking into account their social status (the reports indicated: "Germans", "corpses of soldiers and officers").
In total, as of May 4, 1945, 33,778 dead Germans were buried. Given that the townspeople were in shelters during the assault, and those who participated in the battles were under fire, it is logical to assume that the Wehrmacht and Volkssturm soldiers made up the bulk of the dead.
On the number and losses of Soviet troops
L In the summer of 1945, Colonel Vasiliev, analyzing the preparation and assault on Königsberg, without reference to sources, cited “approximate”, as he wrote, data on the number of armies advancing on Königsberg: the 39th Army - 34,400 personnel, the 43rd Army - 36,590, right flank of the 50th Army (two rifle corps and one rifle division) - 28,296, 11th guards army(without one rifle division) - 38,014 people. According to him, the number of Soviet troops near Königsberg before the storming of the city was 137,250 people (although Vasiliev is not accurate in his calculations, in fact - 137,300). Subsequently, this figure became a textbook. It was brought by I. Bagramyan and K. Galitsky, it is reported in official publications.
The study of archival documents made it possible to estimate the real number of troops participating in the assault on Koenigsberg, and it turned out to be significantly lower than according to Colonel Vasiliev's data - 106.6 thousand people 8 .
Already in the course of hostilities, it was decided to change the organizational structure of rifle divisions. The fact is that the rifle divisions of the 3rd Belorussian Front, formed according to the state 04 / 550-578, entered East Prussia, according to which they were supposed to have 9543 personnel, 12 122-mm howitzers, 14 76-mm and 36 45mm cannons, 21 120mm and 83 82mm mortars, other weapons. However, in protracted battles, the divisions suffered heavy losses, which did not have time to be replenished at the expense of marching units. In the reports of the army commanders, it was reported that the number of rifle divisions often did not exceed 3 thousand people, which means that they actually could not fulfill the combat missions assigned to them, which, when planning the operation, were determined based on full-fledged formations and according to established operational-tactical standards ( the width of the offensive zone, the breakthrough area, the depth of the offensive, etc.).
In mid-February 1945, the headquarters of the 3rd Belorussian Front changed the staff structure of rifle divisions. The army headquarters were instructed to switch to new organization schemes, which made it possible to have 3-3.5 thousand personnel in rifle divisions. Guards armies, of course, had divisions of a more complete composition.
In connection with the new staffing structure, the divisions were adjusted not only to the standards for conducting combat operations, but also to the nature of the weapons. Taking into account the previous experience of fighting in East Prussia against an enemy defending in field shelters and permanent fortifications, and anticipating battles in large settlements, the front command tried to increase the relative firepower of the division, primarily due to artillery pieces of a larger caliber.
The new staff of the rifle division of the "front" type not only increased the reliability of its management, but also significantly increased its combat capabilities, which was not slow to affect the effectiveness of military operations, especially during the assault on Koenigsberg.
It is necessary to pay tribute to the commands of the front and the armies, which, in difficult conditions, managed to fully equip the armies according to the new staffing table and carry out the necessary training of soldiers, officers and generals for the operation.
When analyzing the number of Soviet troops participating in the assault on Koenigsberg, it is necessary to pay attention to the term, which was used for the first time in the historiography of the East Prussian operation by Colonel A. Vasiliev, which requires a separate comment.
Naturally, not all of the 106,000-strong group of Soviet troops took a direct part in the assault. The fortified lines and positions of the enemy were overcome by specially trained subunits: assault groups and assault detachments, which were based on rifle companies from active fighters. There were 9-10 thousand of them in each army. According to TsAMO and the “Journal of Combat Operations of the Front Troops for April 1945” (see note 8), the total number of active fighters was 24,473.
Thus, in immediate assault Königsberg participated divisions, on numbers much inferior defending. Of course, with the support of the forces and means of all types of troops of the 3rd Belorussian Front. The relatively small number of attackers predetermined the relatively small losses of the Red Army.
In general, the question of the size of the losses of the Soviet troops in the battles for Königsberg remains open to this day. Attempts have been made to answer it, but not entirely successful. For example, the official catalog "The History of Wars of the 20th Century in Monuments to Their Participants" contains information about Soviet soldiers who fell in battle and were buried in mass graves on the territory of today's Kaliningrad - a total of 5597 people. However, it should be noted that in the post-war period, burials were enlarged and memorials were reconstructed, during which participants in the East Prussian operation who died outside Königsberg were reburied in mass graves in Kaliningrad. Therefore, the available information does not provide an accurate answer to the question posed.
An attempt was made to calculate the losses of Soviet troops during the assault on Königsberg, using indirect evidence. So, S.A. Golchikov in the book "Battlefield - Prussia" (Kaliningrad, 2005) there were figures of 9230 dead and 34,230 wounded, that is, a total of 43,460 people.
An even more incredible figure is given by V. Beshanov, who claims that “own ( then eat Soviet troops. - G.To.) losses in Königsberg are known only approximately - more than 50 thousand people were killed and wounded.
The fact that Soviet military science did not publish the figures of the losses of the Red Army in the operations of World War II for the entire post-war period allowed not only foreign, but also domestic historians to talk about the victory "due to the human resource." And this opinion has become widespread. Finnish journalist Anna-Leni Lauren wrote quite recently: “Moscow managed to survive only thanks to a few competent generals and practically unlimited human resources ... The Soviet leadership sent millions of soldiers to the front as “cannon fodder” - without training, without enough weapons, ammunition and decent uniforms.
Indeed, during the war years, Soviet troops not only won victories, but also suffered bitter defeats. However, they learned to fight. The operation of the 3rd Belorussian Front to capture Königsberg has every right to be classified as one of those operations in which losses managed flatten to minimum, although the city had to be stormed, prepared in advance for defense.
Data on the losses of the armies that took Koenigsberg were submitted daily, and after the end of the operation - in total. As a rule, operational information included columns on the dead (irretrievable losses), wounded (sanitary losses) and the total. In particular, according to reports from the armies, the losses for April 6 were: in the 43rd Army - 197 killed and 720 wounded; in the 50th Army - 258 killed and 705 wounded; in the 11th Guards Army - 307 killed and 1452 wounded. In total, during the first day of fighting for Königsberg, the armies lost 762 people killed and 2877 wounded.
But most often, loss data were presented by decades. They were recorded in the final report of the headquarters of the 3rd Belorussian Front, and it is they that can be considered the price for the capture of Königsberg, since its assault lasted from April 6 to April 9, and on other days of the decade, for obvious reasons, there were practically no active hostilities. From April 1 to April 10, 1945, 3,506 people were killed, 215 were missing, and 13,177 were wounded.
The word "Königsberg" forever inextricably merged the joy of a well-deserved, hard-won victory and the tragedy of the civilian population of the city, which was under siege. However, for a long time, the lack of real data on participants, military losses and civilian casualties gave reason to belittle the achievements of Soviet military art, the talent and organizational skills of Soviet military leaders, the courage and heroism of officers and soldiers of the Red Army. On the other hand, the same lack of information made it possible to extol the actions of the defenders of the city, primarily its military leadership, which allegedly defended the civilian population to the last.
Without going into an analysis of the course of the assault, it should be noted that the actions of the German troops, especially on April 6–7, were indeed organized and courageous, one might even say heroic. And it's only natural since they protected mine a city with a truly fateful history.
Our study showed that as a result of the assault on Koenigsberg, Soviet troops captured 70.5 thousand people. After the assault, 33.8 thousand of the fallen were buried, a significant part of which were soldiers and officers of the Wehrmacht. Thus, the number of the defensive grouping of Königsberg reached 100 thousand. In addition, 23-28 thousand civilians remained in the defeated city, which means that before the assault there were a total of about 130 thousand military personnel and civilians in the city. These figures coincide with the statement of General O. Lyash during interrogation after a fleeting defeat. It turns out that the commandant still knew the true number of besieged by April 6, 1945?
However, upon returning from Soviet captivity, he “forgot” about his own testimony and, in his memoirs about how Königsberg “fell”, he cited other data (90 thousand people and 30 thousand military personnel), which were later adopted by the German military historians, and also got on the pages of the works of some Soviet and Russian authors.
Ideological influence, excessive secrecy of sources of information, their inaccessibility to researchers led to the formation of the Soviet public, and then Russian historians stable ideas about the extremely difficult and bloody assault on Königsberg, taken in the end due to the absolute advantage of the Soviet troops in military equipment and weapons. Of course, they also talk about the talent of commanders, but special studies on the leadership of troops during the preparation and implementation of the operation were not carried out.
All this really was - and a bloody assault, and technical and combat superiority, and the talent of commanders. But let's compare: in October 1944 - January 1945, in the battles for the small East Prussian town of Pilkallen (now the village of Dobrovolsk, Kaliningrad Region), according to incomplete data, about 5 thousand Soviet soldiers and officers died (the search and perpetuation of the dead continues). And during the assault on Koenigsberg - a much larger operation - 3721, including the missing.
It is necessary to pay tribute to the command of the 3rd Belorussian Front, the organizational skills and military skills of the chiefs of staff, generals and officers. The purposeful work of the Soviet military command in preparing troops for the assault, planning and organizing the interaction of all types and branches of the troops made it possible to avoid heavy losses in the ranks of the attackers. In conditions when two large groupings of troops (each at least 100 thousand people) converged against each other in a limited space, with the massive use of all means of destruction, irretrievable losses of 3-4 thousand are actually considered small.
Transience, success and relatively low losses incurred Soviet troops in the Königsberg operation against an enemy blocked in a heavily fortified defensive area, they say that it was carried out in accordance with one of the principles of Suvorov science - to win not by numbers, but by skill.
Notes
1 The latest research suggests that the East Prussian operation ended on May 8, 1945 (see: Cretinin G. On the periodisation of the battle for East Prussia in 1944–1945 // Baltic region. 2010. No. 2 (4). Kaliningrad: I.Kant State Univ. Press, 2010. P. 91–98).
2 In the modern interpretation, the historical periodization of the East Prussian operation (in the zone of the 3rd Belorussian Front) includes the Insterburg-Königsberg (January 13 - February 10, 1945), Koenigsberg (April 6-9) and Zemland (April 13-25) operations. It should be borne in mind that the list of front-line operations of the 3rd Belorussian Front immediately after the end of the war included the defeat of the enemy's Heilsberg grouping and the capture of the Frische-Nerung spit.
3 See, for example: Gause F. Koenigsberg in Prussia: The history of a European city / Per. W. Herdt, N. Kondrad. Recklinghausen: Bitter, 1994, pp. 255–257; Lyash O. So Koenigsberg fell: Memoirs of the commandant of the Koenigsberg fortress / Per. with him. M.: Akvo-Ink, 1991); Glinski G., Wurster P. Koenigsberg: Conigsberg–Konigsberg–Kaliningrad: Past and Present: Sat. Art. Berlin; Bonn: Westkreuz-Verlag, 1996; and etc.
4 See, for example: Russia and the USSR in the wars of the twentieth century: Losses of the Armed Forces: Stat. research / Under the total. ed. G.F. Krivosheev. M.: OLMA-Press, 2001. S. 304.
5 Kvednau - now Severnaya Gora, Kaliningrad region.
6 The Roman numeral denoted the number of the party committee, and the Arabic numeral denoted the serial number of the battalion.
7 TsAMO. F. 405. Op. 9769. D. 461. L. 104, 120; and etc.
8 Information on the staffing of rifle companies of the Zemland Group of Forces as of April 1, 1945 // TsAMO. F. 241. Op. 2593. D. 709 (Directives to the troops of the Zemland group of forces to defeat the enemy's Königsberg garrison, blocking and capturing the city of Königsberg). L. 35. See also: Journal of combat operations of the front troops for April 1945 // Ibid. D. 686. L. 225.
Operation plan
The defeat of the Heilsberg grouping and the reduction of the front line allowed the Soviet command to regroup forces in the Königsberg direction as soon as possible. In mid-March, the 50th Army of Ozerov was transferred to the Koenigsberg direction, by March 25 - the 2nd Guards Army of Chanchibadze, in early April - the 5th Army of Krylov. Castling required only 3-5 night marches. As it turned out after the capture of Koenigsberg, the German command did not expect that the Red Army would so quickly create a strike force to storm the fortress.
On March 20, Soviet troops received instructions "to break through the Koenigsberg fortified area and storm the city of Koenigsberg." The basis of the battle formations of units during a breakthrough enemy defense and, especially for urban fighting, assault troops and assault groups were laid. Assault detachments were created on the basis of rifle battalions, and assault groups - rifle companies with appropriate reinforcement.
The directive of March 30 presented a specific plan for the Koenigsberg operation and the tasks of each army. The start of the offensive was scheduled for the morning of April 5, 1945 (then postponed to April 6). The command of the 3rd Belorussian Front decided to launch simultaneous attacks on the city from the north and south in converging directions, encircle and destroy the enemy garrison. The main forces were concentrated in order to deliver powerful strikes on narrow sections of the front. On the Zemland direction, they decided to launch an auxiliary strike in the western direction in order to divert part of the enemy grouping from Königsberg.
The 43rd army of Beloborodov and the right flank of the 50th army of Ozerov attacked the city from the northwest and north; The 11th Guards Army of Galitsky advanced from the south. The 39th army of Lyudnikov delivered an auxiliary strike to the north in a southerly direction and was supposed to go to Frisches-Haff Bay, cutting off the communications of the Königsberg garrison with the rest of the forces of the Zemland task force. The 2nd Guards Army of Chanchibadze and the 5th Army of Krylov delivered auxiliary strikes in the Zemland direction, on Norgau and Bludau.
Thus, Königsberg was to be taken by three armies - the 43rd, 50th and 11th Guards armies. On the third day of the operation, the 43rd army of Beloborodov, together with the right flank of the 50th army of Ozerov, was to capture the entire northern part of the city to the Pregel River. The 50th army of Ozerov also had to solve the problem of capturing the northeastern part of the fortress. On the third day of the operation, the 11th Army of Galitsky was supposed to capture the southern part of Königsberg, reach the Pregel River and be ready to force the river to help clear the northern bank.
The artillery commander, Colonel-General N. M. Khlebnikov, was instructed a few days before the decisive assault to begin processing enemy positions with heavy artillery. Soviet artillery of large caliber was supposed to destroy the most important defensive structures of the enemy (forts, pillboxes, bunkers, shelters, etc.), as well as conduct counter-battery combat, striking at German artillery. During the preparatory period, Soviet aviation was supposed to cover the concentration and deployment of armies, prevent the approach of reserves to Königsberg, take part in the destruction of long-term enemy defenses and the suppression of German artillery, and support the attacking troops during the assault. The 3rd Air Army of Nikolai Papivin received the task of supporting the offensive of the 5th and 39th Armies, the 1st Air Army of Timofey Khryukin - the 43rd, 50th and 11th Guards Armies.
Commander of the 3rd Belorussian Front Marshal Soviet Union A. M. Vasilevsky (left) and his deputy General of the Army I. Kh. Bagramyan clarify the plan for the assault on Koenigsberg
On April 2, Vasilevsky held a military conference. In general, the operation plan was approved. Five days were allotted for the Koenigsberg operation. On the first day, the armies of the 3rd Belorussian Front were supposed to break through the external fortifications of the Germans, and in the following days to complete the defeat of the Königsberg garrison. After the capture of Königsberg, our troops were to develop an offensive to the northwest and finish off the Zemland group.
In order to strengthen the air power of the strike, front-line aviation was reinforced with two corps of the 4th and 15th air armies (2nd Belorussian and Leningrad fronts) and aviation of the Red Banner Baltic Fleet. The 18th Air Army of heavy bombers (former long-range aviation) took part in the operation. The French fighter regiment "Normandy - Neman" also took part in the operation. Naval aviation received the task of inflicting massive strikes on the port of Pillau and transports, both in the Königsberg Canal and on the approaches to Pillau, in order to prevent the evacuation of the German group by sea. In total, the aviation grouping of the front was reinforced to 2,500 aircraft (about 65% were bombers and attack aircraft). The general command of the air forces in the Koenigsberg operation was carried out by the commander of the Red Army Air Force, Chief Marshal of Aviation A. A. Novikov.
The Soviet grouping in the Königsberg area consisted of about 137 thousand soldiers and officers, up to 5 thousand guns and mortars, 538 tanks and self-propelled guns. In manpower and artillery, the advantage over the enemy was insignificant - 1.1 and 1.3 times. Only in armored vehicles did it have a significant superiority - 5 times.
German vehicles on Mitteltragheim street in Königsberg after the assault. StuG III assault guns on the right and left, JgdPz IV tank destroyer in the background
Abandoned German 105-mm howitzer le.F.H.18 / 40 in position in Königsberg
Abandoned in Königsberg German technology. In the foreground - 150-mm howitzer sFH 18
Koenigsberg, one of the fortifications
Storm preparation
Preparations were made for the assault on Koenigsberg throughout March. Assault squads and assault groups were formed. At the headquarters of the Zemland group, a model of the city was made with the terrain, defensive structures and buildings in order to work out the issues of interaction with the commanders of divisions, regiments and battalions. Before the start of the operation, all officers, up to platoon commanders, were given a plan of the city with a single numbering of quarters and the most important buildings. This greatly facilitated the management of troops during the assault.
A lot of work was done to prepare artillery for the assault on Königsberg. We worked out in detail and carefully the procedure for using artillery for direct fire and the use of assault guns. Artillery battalions of large and special power with a caliber from 203 to 305 mm were to take part in the operation. Before the start of the operation, the artillery of the front smashed the enemy defenses for four days, concentrating its efforts on the destruction of permanent structures (forts, pillboxes, dugouts, the most durable buildings, etc.).
In the period from 1 to 4 April, battle formations Soviet armies were compacted. In the north, in the direction of the main attack of the 43rd and 50th armies of Beloborodov and Ozerov, 15 rifle divisions were concentrated on a 10-kilometer breakthrough. The artillery density in the northern sector was increased to 220 guns and mortars per 1 km of the front, the density of armored vehicles to 23 tanks and self-propelled guns per 1 km. In the south, on the 8.5-kilometer section of the breakthrough, 9 rifle divisions were ready to strike. The artillery density in the northern sector was increased to 177 guns and mortars, the density of tanks and self-propelled guns - 23 vehicles. The 39th Army, which delivered an auxiliary strike on an 8-kilometer sector, had 139 guns and mortars per 1 km of the front, 14 tanks and self-propelled guns per 1 km of the front.
To support the troops of the 3rd Belorussian Front, the Soviet Headquarters instructed to use the forces of the Baltic Fleet. For this purpose, a detachment of river armored boats was transferred by rail to the Pregel River in the area of \u200b\u200bthe city of Tapiau from Oranienbaum. At the end of March, in the area of Gutenfeld station (10 km southeast of Koenigsberg), artillery of the 404th railway artillery battalion of the Baltic Fleet was deployed. The railway artillery division was supposed to interfere with the movement of German ships along the Königsberg Canal, as well as strike at ships, port facilities, piers and the railway junction.
In order to concentrate the efforts of the fleet and organize closer interaction with the ground forces, at the end of March, the South-Western Marine Defense Region was created under the command of Rear Admiral N. I. Vinogradov. It included the Lyubavskaya, Pilausskaya, and later the Kolberg naval bases. The Baltic Fleet was supposed to disrupt enemy communications, including with the help of aviation. In addition, they began to prepare an amphibious assault for landing in the rear of the Zemland group.
The positions of the German air defense troops after the bombing. On the right is the sound pickup
Königsberg, destroyed German artillery battery
Operation start. Breakthrough of enemy defense
At dawn on April 6, Vasilevsky ordered the offensive to begin at 12 o'clock. At 9 o'clock artillery and aviation preparation began. The commander of the 11th Guards Army, Kuzma Galitsky, recalled: “The earth trembled from the rumble of cannonade. Enemy positions along the entire front of the breakthrough were covered by a solid wall of shell explosions. The city was covered in thick smoke, dust and fire. ... Through the brown veil one could see how our heavy shells were demolishing earthen coverings from the fortifications, how pieces of logs and concrete, stones, and warped parts of military equipment were flying into the air. Katyusha shells roared over our heads.
For a long time the roofs of the old forts were covered with a significant layer of earth and even overgrown with young forest. From a distance they looked like small hills overgrown with forest. However, with skillful actions, the Soviet artillerymen cut off this layer of earth and reached the brick or concrete vaults. The dumped earth and trees quite often blocked the view of the Germans and closed the embrasures. Artillery preparation continued until 12:00. In the offensive zone of the 11th Guards Army, 09:00. 20 minutes. a long-range army group hit the German batteries, and from 9 o'clock. 50 min. until 11 o'clock. 20 minutes. struck at the identified firing positions of the enemy. At the same time, the Katyushas crushed the active German mortar batteries and strongholds in the nearest depth. From 11 o'clock. until 11 o'clock. 20 minutes. guns, set on direct fire, shot targets at the front line of the enemy. After that until 12 noon. all artillery of the army struck to a depth of 2 km. Mortars focused on suppressing enemy manpower. Divisional and corps artillery was concentrated on the destruction of fire weapons and strongholds, the artillery of the army group conducted counter-battery combat. At the end of the artillery preparation, all means hit the front line.
Due to unfavorable weather, Soviet aviation was unable to fulfill its assigned tasks - instead of the planned 4,000 sorties, only about 1,000 sorties were made. Therefore, attack aircraft could not support the attack of infantry and tanks. Artillery had to take over part of the tasks of aviation. Until 13 o'clock. aviation operated in small groups, significantly increasing activity only in the afternoon.
At 11 o'clock. 55 min. "Katyushas" dealt the last blow to the main strongholds of the enemy. Even in the course of artillery preparation, the Soviet advanced units got close to the front line of the enemy. Under the cover of artillery fire, some units attacked the stunned Germans and began to seize the advanced trenches. At 12 o'clock the Soviet troops went to storm the positions of the enemy. The first to go were assault detachments with the support of tanks; they were created in all rifle divisions. The divisional and corps artillery, and the artillery of the army group shifted their fire deep into the enemy defenses and continued to conduct counter-battery combat. The guns that were in the combat formations of the infantry were brought to direct fire, and they smashed the positions of the enemy.
The awakened German troops offered stubborn resistance, fired heavily and counterattacked. A good example of the fierce fighting for Koenigsberg is the offensive of the 11th Guards Army. In the offensive zone of the 11th Guards Army, the powerful 69th German Infantry Division was defended, reinforced by three regiments of other divisions (in fact, it was another division) and a significant number of separate battalions, including the militia, workers, construction, fortress, special and police units. In this area, the Germans had about 40 thousand people, more than 700 guns and mortars, 42 tanks and self-propelled guns. The German defense in the southern sector was strengthened by 4 powerful forts (No. 12 Eulenburg, No. 11 Denhoff, No. 10 Konitz and No. 8 King Friedrich I), 58 long-term firing points (bunkers and bunkers) and 5 strongholds from solid buildings.
The 11th Guards Army of Galitsky brought all three corps to the first line - the 36th, 16th and 8th Guards Rifle Corps. Galitsky's army dealt the main blow with formations of the 16th Guards rifle corps in cooperation with the strike groups of the 8th and 36th Guards Rifle Corps. Each guards rifle corps fielded two rifle divisions in the first echelon and one in the second. The commander of the 8th Guards Rifle Corps, Lieutenant General M.N. Zavadovsky, delivered the main blow with the left flank along the Awaiden-Rosenau line. The corps commander singled out the 26th and 83rd guards divisions to the first echelon, the 5th guards rifle division was located in the second echelon. The right flank of the corps was covered by an army reserve regiment, army courses junior lieutenants and a combined cavalry regiment of mounted scouts. The commander of the 16th Guards Rifle Corps, Major General S.S. Guryev, aimed troops at Ponart. He sent the 1st and 31st divisions to the first echelon, the 11th division was in the second. The commander of the 36th Guards Rifle Corps, Lieutenant General P.K. Koshevoy, struck with the right flank of the corps in the direction of Prappeln and Kalgen. In the first echelon were the 84th and 16th divisions, in the second - the 18th division. The left flank of the corps near Frisches Huff Bay was covered by a flamethrower battalion and a company of cadets.
Parts of the 26th, 1st and 31st Guards Rifle Divisions of the 11th Guards Army, operating in the main direction, captured the second trench of the enemy with the first blow (the Soviet troops took the first position of the fortress and Fort No. 9 "Ponart" back in January). Guardsmen of the 84th division also broke into enemy positions. The 83rd and 16th Guards Rifle Divisions advancing on the flanks were less successful. They had to break through strong defenses in the area of German forts No. 8 and 10.
So in the zone of the 8th Guards Rifle Corps, the 83rd Division fought a hard battle for Fort No. 10. The Soviet guards were able to get close to the fort at 150-200 m, but they could not move further, the strong fire of the fort and its supporting units interfered. The division commander, Major General A. G. Maslov, left one regiment to block the fort, and the other two regiments, hiding behind a smoke screen, moved on and broke into Avaiden. Maslov brought assault groups into battle, and they began to knock the Germans out of the buildings. As a result of an hour-long battle, our troops occupied the southern part of Avaiden and broke through to the northern outskirts. The 26th division of the 8th corps also advanced successfully, supported by the tanks of the 23rd tank brigade and three batteries of the 260th heavy self-propelled artillery regiment.
The 1st Guards Rifle Division of the 16th Guards Rifle Corps, reinforced with tanks and self-propelled guns, by 2 p.m. went to Ponart. Our troops went to storm this suburb of Koenigsberg. The Germans fiercely resisted, using the guns left after the artillery preparation and dug into the ground tanks and assault guns. Our troops lost several tanks. The 31st Guards Rifle Division, which was also advancing on Ponart, broke into the second line of enemy trenches. However, then the offensive of the Soviet troops stopped. As it turned out after the capture of the capital of East Prussia, the German command expected the main blow of the 11th Guards Army in this direction and was engaged in the defense of the Ponart direction with special attention. Disguised anti-tank guns and tanks dug into the ground caused serious damage to our troops. The trenches south of Ponart were occupied by a specially formed battalion of an officer's school. The fighting was extremely fierce and turned into hand-to-hand combat. Only at 4 p.m. The 31st division broke through the enemy defenses and joined the battle for Ponart.
The Guardsmen of the 36th Corps also had a hard time. The Germans repulsed the first attacks. Then, using the success of the neighboring 31st division, the 84th Guards Division with the 338th heavy self-propelled artillery regiment, at 1300. broke through the German defenses and began to advance towards Prappeln. However, the left-flank regiment was stopped by Fort No. 8. And the remaining forces of the division could not take Prappeln. The division stopped, launched an artillery strike on the village, but it did not reach the target, since the divisional guns could not reach the concrete and stone cellars. More powerful weapons were needed. The front command ordered to regroup forces, blockade the fort with 1-2 battalions, and move the main forces to Prappeln. Army artillery was given the task of suppressing the fortifications of Prappeln with large caliber guns.
By 15 o'clock. the regrouping of units of the 84th Guards Division was completed. The artillery strike of the army artillery led to a positive effect. The guards quickly took the southern part of the village. Then the offensive stopped somewhat, as the German command transferred two militia battalions and several assault guns to this direction. However, the Germans were successfully pushed back, capturing house after house.
Street fight in Koenigsberg
Broken enemy equipment on the streets of Koenigsberg
Thus, by 15-16 hours. Galitsky's army broke through the first position of the enemy, advancing 3 km in the direction of the main attack. The intermediate line of defense of the Germans was also broken through. On the flanks, Soviet troops advanced 1.5 km. Now the army began to storm the second position of the enemy, which passed along the outskirts of the city and relied on buildings adapted for all-round defense.
The critical moment of the operation has arrived. The Germans brought into battle all the nearest tactical reserves and began to transfer reserves from the city, trying to stabilize the front. The guards corps fought stubborn battles in the area of Prappeln and Ponart. Almost all rifle regiments have already used the second echelons, and some of the last reserves. It took an effort to finally turn the tide in their favor. Then the army command decided to throw divisions of the second echelon of corps into battle, although initially they were not planned to enter the battle on the first day of the operation. However, it was not practical to keep them in reserve. At 14 o'clock. began to push forward the 18th and 5th Guards Divisions.
In the afternoon, the clouds began to dissipate, and Soviet aviation stepped up their operations. Attack aircraft of the 1st Guards Air Division under the command of the Hero of the Soviet Union, General S. D. Prutkov and the 182nd Attack Air Division, General V. I. Shevchenko, under the cover of fighters of the 240th Fighter Air Division of the Hero of the Soviet Union, Major General Aviation G. V. Zimin, inflicted powerful attacks on enemy positions. "Ily" operated at a minimum height. The "Black Death", as the Germans called the Il-2, destroyed manpower and equipment, crushed the firing positions of enemy troops. Attempts by individual German fighters to thwart the attack of the Soviet attack aviation were repulsed by our fighters. Air strikes on enemy positions accelerated the movement of the Soviet guards. So after our attack aircraft suppressed enemy positions south of Rosenau, the troops of the 26th Guards Division took the southern part of Rosenau.
Parts of the 1st and 5th divisions fought heavy battles in the area of the railway depot and the railway. The German troops counterattacked and even pressed our troops in places, regaining part of the previously lost positions. The 31st division fought fierce battles for Ponart. The Germans turned the stone houses into citadels and, with the support of artillery and assault guns, actively resisted. The streets were blocked by barricades, the approaches to them were covered by minefields and barbed wire. Literally every house was stormed. Some of the houses had to be demolished by artillery fire. The Germans repulsed three division attacks. Only in the evening did the guards advance somewhat, but they could not build on the success, the division had exhausted its reserves. At 19:00, the division went on a new attack. Assault detachments were active, which successively took house after house. Heavy self-propelled guns were of great help, the shells of which pierced houses through and through. By 22 o'clock. The 31st division captured the southern outskirts of Ponart.
The 18th Guards Rifle Division of the 36th Corps (Second Echelon Division) stormed Prappeln. The Germans stubbornly resisted, and only in the evening the division captured the southwestern part of Prappeln. The 84th Division made little progress. Fort No. 8 was completely surrounded. The 16th Guards Rifle Division took Kalgen by the end of the day.
Results of the first day of the offensive
By the end of the day, the 11th Guards Army advanced 4 km, broke through the first enemy position on a 9-kilometer section, an intermediate defensive line on a 5-kilometer section, and reached the second position in the direction of the main attack. The Soviet troops occupied the border crossing northeast of Fort No. 10 - the railway depot - the southern part of Ponart - Prappeln - Kalgen - Warten. The threat of dismemberment of the enemy grouping, which was defending south of the Pregel River, was created. 43 quarters of the suburbs and the city itself were cleared of the Germans. On the whole, the task of the first day of the offensive was completed. True, the flanks of the army lagged behind.
In other directions, Soviet troops also successfully advanced. The 39th army of Lyudnikov wedged into the enemy defenses for 4 kilometers, intercepting railway Koenigsberg - Pillau. Parts of the 43rd Army of Beloborodov broke through the first position of the enemy, took Fort No. 5 and surrounded Fort No. 5a, drove the Nazis out of Charlottenburg and the village southwest of it. The 43rd Army was the first to break into Koenigsberg and cleared the 20th quarter from the Germans. Only 8 kilometers remained between the troops of the 43rd and 11th Guards Army. The troops of Ozerov's 50th Army also broke through the enemy's first line of defense, advanced 2 km, took Fort No. 4 and occupied 40 blocks of the city. The 2nd Guards and 5th Armies remained in place.
The German command, in order to avoid the encirclement of the Königsberg garrison and fend off the blow of the 39th army, brought the 5th into battle tank division. In addition, additional troops began to be transferred from the Zemland Peninsula to the Königsberg area. The commandant of Koenigsberg, Otto von Lyash, apparently believed that the main threat to the city came from the 43rd and 50th armies, which were rushing to the center of the capital of East Prussia. From the south, the city center was covered by the Pregel River. In addition, the Germans feared the encirclement of Koenigsberg, trying to fend off the offensive of the 39th Army. In the southern direction, the defense was strengthened by several reserve battalions, and they also tried to keep forts No. 8 and 10, which held back the flanks of the 11th Guards Army and hastily created new fortifications in the path of Galitsky's army.
ROADS OF VICTORY. STORM OF KONIGSBERG.
10:36 9.04.2012 , Gladilin Ivan
Assault on Koenigsberg
"Absolutely impregnable bastion of the German spirit" was taken by Soviet troops in just three days.
Today is the anniversary of the outstanding feat of arms of our grandfathers and fathers. 67 years ago, on April 9, 1945, the Soviet Information Bureau solemnly announced: “The troops of the 3rd Belorussian Front, after stubborn street fighting, completed the defeat of the Koenigsberg group of German troops, stormed the fortress and the main city of East Prussia, Koenigsberg - strategically important node German defenses in the Baltic Sea. The remnants of the Koenigsberg garrison, led by the commandant of the fortress today, at 21:30, ceased resistance and laid down their arms. Thus fell the age-old foothold of the expansion of the Germans into Rus' and Russia.
The Germans themselves did not expect such a swift denouement. During interrogation at the headquarters of the 3rd Belorussian Front, the captured German commandant of the city, General Otto Lasch, admitted: “It was impossible to imagine that such a fortress as Koenigsberg would fall so quickly. Russian command well designed and perfectly carried out this operation. Near Koenigsberg, we lost the entire 100,000-strong army. The loss of Koenigsberg is the loss of the largest fortress and German stronghold in the East.
Hitler was enraged by the fall of the city and in impotent fury sentenced Lasch to death in absentia. Still: after all, before that, he declared Koenigsberg "an absolutely impregnable bastion of the German spirit"! And the city, indeed, seemed to be ready to give a decisive battle to the advancing Red Army. From large colored posters pasted on street bollards, a Red Army soldier in Budyonnovka times looked at the inhabitants of the city civil war. Baring his mouth brutally, he raised the dagger over a young German woman clutching a child to her chest. Written on public buildings capital letters: "Fight like the Russians in Stalingrad!". And in the very center of the city, on the banks of the Pregel River, on the brick wall of the castle of the Prussian kings, there was an inscription in Gothic type: “The weak Russian fortress of Sevastopol held out for 250 days against the invincible German army. Koenigsberg - the best fortress in Europe - will never be taken!
But it was taken, and even in a matter of days: the assault on Koenigsberg itself began on April 6, and by the evening of the 9th, the “absolutely impregnable bastion of the German spirit”, the city from where all the “drangi nach Osten” began, fell. The spring of power of the Red Army, compressed to the limit by the Germans near Moscow and Stalingrad, unclenched, was already unstoppable.
But for many centuries, according to the site russian-west.narod.ru, the rulers of East Prussia have turned Koenigsberg into a powerful fortress. And when the troops of the Red Army approached the borders of East Prussia, and then invaded its borders, the German high command in a hurry began to modernize the old and build new fortifications around the city.
The first line of defense was occupied by fortress forts named after German commanders and statesmen. They were hills covered with mighty centuries-old trees and shrubs, with wide ditches half-filled with water and surrounded by rows of wire fences, with reinforced concrete bunkers, mounds of pillboxes and bunkers, narrow loopholes for firing from all types of weapons. Speaking about the impregnability of the forts, Gauleiter of East Prussia E. Koch called them "nightgowns" of Koenigsberg, meaning that one can sleep peacefully behind their walls.
Map of the assault on Koenigsberg
Numerous stone buildings on the outskirts of the city became the basis of the second line. The Germans barricaded the streets, built reinforced concrete caps at the intersections, installed a large number of anti-tank and assault guns.
The third line of defense was in the city itself, along the line of the old fortress wall. There were bastions, ravelins, towers with brickwork 1-3 m thick, underground barracks and depots of ammunition and food.
Under these conditions, General I.Kh. Bagramyan, “perhaps the most difficult mission this time fell to the lot of the head of the engineering troops, General V.V. Kosyrev. Indeed, in ensuring the overcoming of such fortifications that were created around the city and in the city itself, the engineering troops had to play at least important role than aviation and artillery ... With the start of the assault, the engineering troops had to clear mines and restore paths for the advancement of tanks, artillery and other types of military equipment, and then clear the streets of the city and build crossings across the Pregel River and numerous deep canals. And all this work was carefully planned and completed in a timely manner.”
On April 6, 1945, the Soviet troops of the 3rd Belorussian Front launched a decisive assault on Koenigsberg, the capital of East Prussia. The capture of the city was to be the crown of the entire East Prussian operation, which the Soviet troops had been conducting since January 1945.
The commander of the 3rd Belorussian Front, Marshal Alexander Vasilevsky, assessed the significance of this operation in his memoirs: “East Prussia has long been turned by Germany into the main strategic springboard for an attack on Russia and Poland. From this bridgehead, an attack was made on Russia in 1914 ... The fascist hordes moved from here in 1941.
During 1941-1945. East Prussia was of great economic, political and strategic importance to the German High Command. Here, in deep underground shelters near Rastenburg, until 1944, Hitler's headquarters was located, nicknamed by the Nazis themselves "Wolfsschanze" ("Wolf Pit"). The capture of East Prussia, the citadel of German militarism, was an important page in the final stage of the war in Europe. The fascist command gave great importance holding Prussia. It was supposed to firmly cover the approaches to the central regions of Germany. On its territory and in the adjacent regions of the northern part of Poland, a number of fortifications were erected, frontal and cut-off positions strong in engineering terms, as well as large defense centers saturated with long-term structures. The old fortresses were largely modernized; all structures were firmly interconnected in terms of fortification and fire. The total depth of engineering equipment here has reached 150-200 km. The relief features of East Prussia - lakes, rivers, swamps and canals, a developed network of railways and highways, strong stone buildings - in to a large extent contributed to the defense. By 1945, the East Prussian fortified areas and defense zones with fortresses included in them, combined with natural obstacles, were not inferior in their power to the West German "Siegfried Line", and in some areas surpassed it. The defense was especially strongly developed in terms of engineering in the main direction for us - Gumbinnen, Insterburg, Koenigsberg.
The powerful fortifications of East Prussia were supplemented by a very large grouping of German troops. These were the troops of the Center Army Group (since January 26, 1945 - Army Group North) recreated after the defeat in the summer of 1944 in Belarus in Belarus - the 3rd Panzer, 4th and 2nd armies. By mid-January 1945, the army group included 43 divisions (35 infantry, 4 tank, 4 motorized) and 1 brigade, according to Soviet estimates, with a total of 580,000 soldiers and officers and 200,000 Volkssturm. They had 8200 guns and mortars, 700 tanks and assault guns, 775 aircraft of the 6th Air Fleet. Led by the Army Group "North" Colonel General Rendulich, and then - Colonel General Weichs.
As Vasilevsky explained in his memoirs, “the East Prussian grouping of the Nazis had to be defeated at all costs, because this freed the armies of the 2nd Belorussian Front for operations in the main direction and removed the threat of a flank attack from East Prussia against the Soviet troops that had broken through in this direction. ". According to the intention, common goal The operation was to cut off the armies of the Center group, defending in East Prussia, from the rest of the fascist forces, press them to the sea, dismember and destroy in parts, completely clearing the territory of East Prussia and Northern Poland from the enemy. The success of such an operation from a strategic point of view was extremely important and was important not only for the general offensive of the Soviet troops in the winter of 1945, but also for the outcome of the Great Patriotic War generally.
First, the troops of the 3rd and 2nd Belorussian Fronts were to cut off the East Prussian grouping of the enemy from its main forces with coordinated concentric strikes and press it to the sea. Then the troops of the 3rd Belorussian and 1st Baltic fronts were to surround the enemy troops and destroy them piece by piece. At the same time, part of the troops was transferred from the 3rd Belorussian to the 1st Baltic Front, and from the 2nd Belorussian to the 3rd Belorussian. The Stavka sent additional military reinforcements from its reserve to these fronts. It was assumed that during the operation the 2nd Belorussian Front, in close cooperation with the 1st Belorussian Front, would be redirected for operations in the main direction - through Eastern Pomerania to Stettin. In accordance with the produced General Staff calculations, the operation was to begin in mid-January 1945.
Indeed, in January 1945, the Soviet offensive began to develop in two directions: through Gumbinnen to Königsberg and from the Nareva region towards the Baltic Sea. Powerful forces were involved - over 1.66 million soldiers and officers, more than 25,000 guns and mortars, almost 4,000 tanks and self-propelled guns, over 3,000 aircraft. And yet, unlike the parallel Vistula-Oder operation, the advance of the Red Army in East Prussia was slow. The battles for the "cradle of Prussian militarism" were distinguished by great stubbornness and bitterness. Here the Germans created a defense in depth, which included 7 defensive lines and 6 fortified areas. In addition, the thick fog, characteristic of these places at this time of the year, made it difficult for the successful use of aviation and artillery.
And yet, by January 26, the troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front, having come out north of Elbing to the Baltic coast, cut off a significant part of Army Group North from the main German forces in the West. Having repulsed the persistent attempts of the Germans to restore the coastal corridor, the Red Army began to dismember and liquidate the German troops cut off in East Prussia. This task was assigned to the 3rd Belorussian and 1st Baltic fronts. By the beginning of February, the East Prussian grouping of Germans was cut into three parts. The largest of them was located in the Hejlsberg area (south of Koenigsberg), the other was sandwiched in Koenigsberg itself, the third was defending on the Zemland Peninsula (west of Koenigsberg).
On February 10, south of Konigsberg, the liquidation of 19 divisions began in the Heilberg Pocket. The fighting in this region, rich in defensive structures, took on a cruel and protracted character. The fortification system of East Prussia had an incredible density of concrete structures - up to 10-12 pillboxes per square kilometer. In the winter-spring battle of Hejlsberg, there was practically no maneuver. The Germans, who had nowhere to retreat, fought to the end. The army was actively supported by the local population. The militias made up a quarter of the total defenders this region troops. Frontal bloody battles lasted a month and a half. The commander of the 3rd Belorussian Front, General Ivan Chernyakhovsky, died in them. Instead of him, Marshal Vasilevsky took command of the front. Finally, on March 29, the remnants of the German troops desperately fighting in the Heilsberg cauldron could not withstand the onslaught and capitulated. During these battles, the Germans lost 220,000 men killed and 60,000 prisoners.
After the defeat of the Heilsberg grouping, units of the Red Army began to converge on Koenigsberg, the assault on which began on April 6. By this time, the united 3rd Belorussian Front included the 2nd Guards, 43rd, 39th, 5th, 50th, 11th Guards, 31st, 28th, 3rd and 48th combined arms armies, 1st and 3rd air armies.
The commander of the defense of Koenigsberg, General Otto Lasch, also put almost all men capable of carrying weapons into the ranks of the defenders of the city: SD (security service), SA (attack aircraft), SS FT (military guard groups), youth sports groups "Strength through Joy", FS ( volunteer guards), units of the NSNKK (fascist motorized groups), parts of the construction service of Todt, ZIPO (security police) and GFP (secret field police). In addition, the Koenigsberg garrison included 4 infantry divisions, a number of separate regiments, fortress units, security units, Volkssturm detachments - about 130,000 soldiers, almost 4,000 guns and mortars, more than 100 tanks and assault guns. 170 aircraft were based at the airfields of the Zemland Peninsula. By order of the commandant of the fortress, an airfield was built right in the city.
Our troops have already suffered serious losses. The combat composition of the units was sharply reduced, and the strike force of the front decreased. Replenishment almost did not arrive, because the Supreme High Command continued to direct all efforts towards the Berlin direction. The front experienced great difficulties with the material support of the troops, especially with the supply of fuel. The rear lagged far behind and were unable to provide troops in a timely manner. In such a situation, after the liquidation of the Heilberg pocket, Vasilevsky decided to continue to beat the Germans in parts: first, with all his might, attack the troops gathered in the city, and only then engage in grouping on the Zemland Peninsula.
This is how he describes the beginning of the assault on the East Prussian stronghold: “... battles on the southern coast of the Frisches-Haff Bay. spring flood brought the rivers out of their banks and turned the whole area into a swamp. Knee deep in mud soviet soldiers through fire and smoke made their way into the middle of the fascist group. Trying to break away from our troops, the enemy in a panic rushed to the barges, boats, steamers and then blew up the dam. Thousands of Nazi soldiers remained under the waves that rushed onto the plain.
The plan for defeating the Koenigsberg group was to cut through the forces of the garrison with powerful blows from the north and south in converging directions and take the city by storm. Troops that were part of the Zemland group were involved in the assault operation: the 43rd, 50th, 11th Guards and 39th armies. The main role during the storming of the city was assigned to artillery fire of all calibers, including weapons of special power, as well as the actions of aviation, which was supposed to accompany the troops and completely demoralize the defending enemy.
The headquarters provided the front with additional, most powerful means of suppression from the reserve of the Supreme High Command. By the beginning of the assault, the front had 5,000 guns and mortars, 47% of them were heavy guns, then large and special power - with a caliber from 203 to 305 mm. For shelling the most important targets, as well as in order to prevent the enemy from evacuating troops and equipment along the Koenigsberg Sea Canal, 5 naval railway batteries were intended (11 130-mm and 4 180-mm guns, the latter with a firing range of up to 34 km) . The troops advancing on the city were assisted by large-caliber guns (152-mm and 203-mm) and 160-mm mortars allocated to the commanders of rifle divisions. For the destruction of especially strong buildings, structures and engineering structures, corps and divisional groups were created, which were given rocket artillery of special power. Assault military groups were also saturated with artillery to the limit: they had up to 70% of divisional artillery, and in some cases heavy guns.
The operation involved two air armies of the 3rd Belorussian Front, part of the aviation forces of the Leningrad, 2nd Belorussian Fronts and the Red Banner Baltic Fleet and heavy bombers of the 18th Air Army of Long-Range Aviation under the leadership of Air Chief Marshal A.E. Golovanov - up to 2500 aircraft in total!
After artillery and aviation processing of enemy positions, by the evening of April 6, the unified defensive system of Koenigsberg no longer actually existed. The Germans feverishly erected new fortifications, barricaded the streets, blew up bridges. The fortress garrison was ordered to hold out at all costs. On the night of April 7, the fascist command tried to establish a broken control and put their battered units in order. On the morning of April 7, heated battles unfolded in the suburbs and in Koenigsberg itself. The desperate enemy launched furious counterattacks, throwing hastily assembled Volkssturm units into battle. The Nazis carried out a hasty regrouping of forces and brought the last reserves into battle, transferring them from sector to sector. But all attempts to stop the attackers failed. The second day of the struggle for the city was decisive. Our fighters advanced another 3-4 km, captured three powerful forts and occupied 130 blocks.
Having overcome the stubborn resistance of the enemy on the inner defensive perimeter of the fortress, the 43rd Army cleared the northwestern part of the city. At the same time, the 11th Guards Army, advancing from the south, crossed the Pregel River. Now it was dangerous to conduct artillery and mortar fire: it was possible to hit our own. The artillery had to be silenced, and for the whole last day of the assault, our valiant soldiers had to shoot exclusively from personal weapons, often converging in hand-to-hand combat. By the end of the third day of the assault, 300 quarters of the old fortress were occupied.
On April 8, Marshal Vasilevsky, trying to avoid aimless victims, turned to the German generals, officers and soldiers of the Koenigsberg group of forces with a proposal to lay down their arms. However, a refusal followed, and on the morning of April 9, the fighting flared up with renewed vigor, but it was already the agony of the garrison. By the end of the fourth day of continuous fighting, Koenigsberg fell, and its commandant, General Lasch, also surrendered.
4 days after the capture of Koenigsberg, Soviet troops began to eliminate the 65,000-strong German group on the Zemland Peninsula. By April 25, they captured the Zemland Peninsula and the seaport of Pillau. The remnants of the German units (22,000 people) retreated to the Frische-Nerung Spit and surrendered there after the surrender of Germany.
In the city and suburbs, Soviet troops captured about 92,000 prisoners (including 1,800 officers and generals), over 3,500 guns and mortars, about 130 aircraft and 90 tanks, many cars, tractors and tractors, a large number of various warehouses with all kinds of property.
The Battle of East Prussia was the bloodiest battle of the 1945 campaign. The losses of the Red Army in this operation exceeded 580,000 people (of which 127,000 were killed). The damage of the Red Army in equipment was very large: in terms of tanks and self-propelled guns (3525) and aircraft (1450), it surpassed other operations of the 1945 campaign of the year.
The losses of the Germans only in the Hejlsberg cauldron, Koenigsberg and on the Zemland Peninsula amounted to about 500,000 people (of which about 300,000 were killed).
Decades later, traitors were found ...
The assault on Koenigsberg showed examples of the mass heroism of our soldiers and officers. The guardsmen, without hesitation, went to the most dangerous places, boldly entered into an unequal battle, and if the situation demanded, they sacrificed their lives, says the Orthodox Warrior website. Guardsmen Lazarev, Shayderyavsky, Shindrat, Tkachenko, Gorobets and Veshkin pulled ahead and were the first to cross the Pregel River, which blocked the path to the city center. The Nazis managed to surround a handful of brave men. The warriors took an unequal battle. They fought to the last bullet and all died the death of the brave, retaining their guard honor and immortalizing their names forever. On the site where the Russian soldiers fought, there were 50 dead Germans. At the battle site, our fighters found a note in which it was written: “Guardsmen fought here and died for the Motherland, for brothers, sisters and fathers. They fought, but did not surrender to the enemy. They fought to the last drop of blood and life.
Motherland appreciated feats of arms their sons. All participants in the storming of Koenigsberg were presented with gratitude from the Supreme Commander-in-Chief and the medal "For the Capture of Koenigsberg", approved by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in June 1945, which was usually done only on the occasion of capturing the capitals of states. 98 formations received the name "Kenigsberg", 156 were awarded orders, 235 soldiers were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
In accordance with the decisions of the allies, Koenigsberg and part of East Prussia became part of the USSR, and the city itself was soon renamed Kaliningrad. And now decades have passed, and in our country (and in its leadership) there were people who thought of returning the Kaliningrad enclave to Germany! In May 2010, the authoritative German magazine Der Spiegel reported that in 1990, when negotiations on the future unification of Germany were in full swing at the initiative of Mikhail Gorbachev, Soviet representatives approached West German diplomats in Moscow with a proposal to discuss the status of the Kaliningrad region. And the fate of Kaliningrad was then actually saved by the Germans themselves: after an introductory conversation held at the Moscow embassy of the FRG, they refused to continue negotiations. And if they agreed, the Gorbachev leadership would certainly not flinch ...
Thank God that the above named guardsmen Lazarev, Shayderyavsky, Shindrat, Tkachenko, Gorobets and Veshkin, as well as 127,000 of our soldiers who fell on the battlefields in East Prussia, and all those who stormed Koenigsberg in 1945, but did not live to see 2010, did not know about this betrayal. Eternal memory to them. And eternal shame to the traitors from the Soviet leadership.
For a long time it was believed that during the assault on Koenigsberg, the number of troops on both sides was almost equal: 130 thousand people in the German group and 137 thousand 250 soldiers in the Red Army.
These figures first appeared in the 1945 manuscript “East Prussian Operation of the Third Belorussian Front. Abstract for analysis prepared by the Department for the Study and Use of War Experience. The data are in the archive, they were subsequently used by our historians, specialists and authors of textbooks. The figures were considered correct, for a long time no one questioned them at all.
But over the past few years, objective data have appeared that are confirmed by documents. The “Book of Memory” was released in Kaliningrad, and it already contains new information about the number of both sides and losses during the assault on Koenigsberg.
Finally, Kaliningrad historians studied archival documents and calculated how many people actually were on both sides.
Doctor of Historical Sciences, Head of the Baltic Information and Analytical Center of the Russian Institute strategic research Gennady Kretinin has dealt with this issue since the early 1990s, working in the central archive of the Ministry of Defense, with documents that were once secret.
Here are the arguments he makes.
Soviet troops
In reality, a group of 106.6 thousand people took part in the assault on Koenigsberg from the side of the Soviet troops, and not more than 137 thousand, as previously stated.
First. in our and foreign literature, textbooks, there was a belief that four armies were involved in the assault on the capital of East Prussia: the 50th, 43rd, 11th Guards and 39th. At the same time, the 39th Army operated outside of Koenigsberg, providing support from the western side. She was not directly involved in the assault on Koenigsberg. This is the "extra" 30 thousand people. At the same time, the 39th Army, like other armies of the 3rd Belorussian Front, played an important role in the operation and we will not underestimate its merits.
Second. The remaining 106.6 thousand people from the three armies do not go on the attack simultaneously and together. Attacking the first echelons, advanced units. I find in the documents an interesting term that I have not seen anywhere. These are "active fighters" - the personnel of rifle companies. On April 1, 1945, there were 24,473 such fighters. These people were directly involved in the assault. Yes, the rest also participated, fought, provided, supported. But it was these 24.5 thousand people with grenades and machine guns who went on the attack, taking on the fire. So they stormed Koenigsberg.
German side
After surrendering during interrogation, the commandant of Koenigsberg, Otto Lyash, says: “We lost the entire 100,000-strong army near Koenigsberg. There were up to 30,000 wounded." Later, after returning from Soviet captivity, in which he spent about 10 years, Lyash writes in his memoirs about the 35,000-strong garrison. These figures are questionable.
In reality, in February 1945, there could be 130 thousand civilians in Koenigsberg. But in February, the encirclement of the city was broken and the population poured into Pillau, and no one could get into the city from outside. So the population has decreased significantly.
Otto Lyash says: "The population is about 130,000, of which 30,000 are military." But here Lyash makes a substitution. Most likely, and the results of the assault subsequently confirmed this, the civilian population was 30 thousand, and the military personnel - about 100 thousand.
prisoners
The summary of the Soviet Information Bureau reports 92 thousand captured German soldiers and officers in Koenigsberg. Another 40,000 died. This figure is in all the memoirs of high officials: Vasilevsky, Bagramyan, Galitsky. This is classic data.
And according to documents and reports, 70.5 thousand people were captured in the city! Why such a difference? The fact is that, occupying city blocks, Soviet troops cleared the territory - they removed all the people from the basements, from the ruins. They were concentrated in the assembly points of prisoners of war, and already there they figured out who was a civilian and who was a military man. Thus, over 90 thousand people were indeed captured. This figure was included in the summary of the Sovinformburo. But out of the total mass, about 25-30 thousand were civilians.
"learned how to fight"
Official reports on the losses of the troops of the third Belorussian Front from April 1 to April 10, 1945, and active hostilities during this period were carried out only during the assault on Königsberg, report: 3,700 people were killed. For some reason, this figure of minimal losses does not sound anywhere. But this report was compiled immediately after the assault. There was no point in embellishing or minimizing. Today, the numbers are distorted. They say 5 thousand, 10 thousand, but somehow I heard the figure of 22 thousand people. It is a myth.
During the capture of Vilnius by Soviet troops, more than 4 thousand people died. In Koenigsberg, similar in size and number, but in the fortified and prepared for defense, 3,700 people died. Given the number of opposing factions, such losses can be considered small - 3%, there is only one conclusion - they learned to fight.
To the assault on Koenigsberg Soviet side prepared very well. They knew what they were getting into. Reduced staffing mortars, 45-mm cannons, replacing them with 76-mm guns: it was necessary to fight with the enemy, located not in open areas, but in long-term shelters. Specially prepared assault squads. Soldiers were taught to overcome obstacles, throw grenades at window openings, interact with tanks and artillery, and so on.
The whole operation was prepared and carried out in accordance with one of the principles of Suvorov science - to win not by numbers, but by skill.
Red Army:
Grouping - 106 thousand people
Field guns - 2567 barrels
Heavy artillery - 2358
Tanks and self-propelled guns - 538
Aircraft - 2174
Germans:
Grouping - 100 thousand people
Field guns - 3216
Mortars - 2220
Tanks and self-propelled guns - 193
Aircraft - 120
Trophies in Königsberg:
Guns of various calibers - 2023;
Tanks and self-propelled guns - 89;
Mortars - 1652;
Machine guns - 4673;
Armored personnel carriers - 119;
Armored trains - 2;
Cars - 8560;
Tractors and tractors - 137;
Steam locomotives - 774;
Wagons - 8544;
Boats and barges - 146;
Warehouses with military property - 441.
The Koenigsberg operation (April 6-9, 1945) is a strategic military operation of the USSR armed forces against German troops during the Great Patriotic War with the aim of eliminating the Koenigsberg enemy grouping and capturing the fortress city of Koenigsberg, part of the East Prussian operation of 1945.
The history of Koenigsberg is the history of the creation of a first-class fortress. The defense of the city consisted of three lines encircling Koenigsberg in a ring.
The first lane was based on 15 fortress forts 7-8 kilometers from the city limits.
The second defensive line ran along the outskirts of the city. It consisted of groups of buildings prepared for defense, reinforced concrete firing points, barricades, hundreds of kilometers of trenches, minefields and barbed wire.
The third strip consisted of fortress forts, ravelins, reinforced concrete structures, stone buildings with loopholes, occupied most of the city and its center.
The main task facing the command of the 3rd Belorussian Front was to take the city, reducing the number of victims to the limit. Therefore, Marshal Vasilevsky paid great attention to intelligence. Aviation continuously bombed enemy fortifications.
Day and night there was a thorough preparation for the assault on the city and the fortress of Koenigsberg. Assault groups were formed with strength from a company to an infantry battalion. The group was given a sapper platoon, two or three guns, two or three tanks, flamethrowers and mortars. The artillerymen had to move along with the foot soldiers, clearing the way for them to advance. Subsequently, the assault confirmed the effectiveness of such small but mobile groups.
STORM TEAM
What were the new ways of fighting, what were the main features of the use of various types of troops in street battles?
Infantry
The experience of the assault on Konigsberg shows that the main place in the combat formations of the infantry should be occupied by assault detachments. They penetrate the enemy's battle formations relatively more easily, dismember them, disorganize the defenses and pave the way for the main forces.
The composition of the assault detachment depended on the nature of the buildings and the nature of the enemy's defense in the city. As experience has shown, it is advisable to create these detachments as part of one rifle company (50-60 people), reinforced with one or two 45 mm anti-tank guns mod. 1942, two 76 mm regimental artillery mod. 1927 or 1943, one - two 76 mm ZIS-3 divisional guns mod. 1942, with one 122 mm howitzer M-30 mod. 1938, one or two tanks (or self-propelled artillery mounts), a platoon of heavy machine guns, a platoon of 82 mm battalion mortars mod. 1937, a squad (platoon) of sappers and a squad (platoon) of flamethrowers.
By the nature of the tasks performed, the assault detachments were divided into groups:
a) attacking (one - two) - consisting of 20-26 shooters, machine gunners, light machine gunners, flamethrowers and a squad of sappers;
b) reinforcements - consisting of 8-10 riflemen, a platoon of heavy machine guns, 1-2 artillery pieces and a squad of sappers;
c) fire - as part of artillery units, a platoon of 82 mm mortars, tanks and self-propelled guns;
d) reserve - consisting of 10-15 shooters, several heavy machine guns and 1-2 artillery pieces.
Thus, the assault detachment, as it were, consisted of two parts: one, actively operating in front (attacking groups), which had light small arms (machine guns, flamethrowers, grenades, rifles), and the second, supporting the actions of the first, had heavy weapons (machine guns, guns, mortars, etc.).
The attacking group(s), depending on the object of the attack, could be divided into subgroups, each consisting of 4-6 people.
Preparing for the battle for the city
FEATURES of the use of various types of troops in the battle for the city also determined the variety of forms of combat training of troops. At the same time, special attention was paid to the training of assault squads. During these classes, the personnel learned to throw grenades at the windows, up, down; use a trench tool; crawl and quickly run from cover to cover; overcome obstacles; jump over ditches and fences; quickly climb into the windows of houses; lead hand-to-hand combat in fortified buildings; apply explosives; block and destroy firing points; to storm the fortified quarters and houses from the street and bypassing the yards and gardens; move through gaps in the walls; quickly turn a captured house or quarter into a powerful stronghold; to force water barriers in the city on improvised crossing means.
At the same time, the main emphasis was placed on working out the issues of interaction between the groups of the assault detachment and within the groups.
Tactical exercises of assault units were carried out on specially equipped training fields. These fields, depending on the conditions, as a rule, had a defensive line consisting of 1-2 lines of trenches; barbed wire and minefields; a settlement with solid stone buildings and 2-3 strongholds for practicing combat techniques in depth.
Units learned to attack to a depth of 3-4 km with access to the opposite outskirts locality and fixing on it. After the classes, a debriefing was conducted, in which the groups were practically shown how to perform one or another technique or maneuver.
The training of assault detachments was carried out on the basis of a specially developed instruction for storming the city and fortress of Koenigsberg and forcing the river. Pregel in the city.
BY THE EYES OF A SOLDIER
On the night of April 5-6, we carried out reconnaissance in force. We met with strong resistance, there were, of course, losses. The weather was also lousy: drizzling fine and cold rain. The Germans retreated and occupied the first line of defense, where they had a bunker. Ours approached him at 4 o'clock, at dawn, planted explosives and blew up the wall. We smoked out 20 people from there. And at 9 am began artillery preparation. The guns started talking and we crouched on the ground.
I. Medvedev
On April 6, we approached Koenigsberg from the south, where Baltryon is now. We hunted for "cuckoos" - individual soldiers or groups of soldiers with radio stations that transmitted information about the movement and concentration of our troops. I caught such “cuckoos” twice: they were groups of three people. They hid in the fields, in cellars on farms, in pits. And Il-2 planes were constantly flying over our heads, the Germans called them the Black Death. I saw so many planes only when we took Vilnius!
N.Batsev
Kaliningrad veterans remember the assault on Koenigsberg. TVNZ, April 9, 2009
BY THE EYES OF THE COMMANDER OF THE REGIMENT
Exactly at five, the strongest volley of guns struck, followed by the second, third, the Katyushas hit. Everything was mixed up and drowned in an unimaginable rumble.
Artillery beat continuously for about an hour and a half. During this time it finally dawned, and it was possible to make out the outlines of the fort. Two shells, one after the other, hit the main gate. They swayed and collapsed.
Shoot! I shouted to Shchukin.
The adjutant fired his flare gun. A moment, another - and the soldiers got out of the trench. All over the field in front of the fort, a cheer sounded.
The assault group was the first to burst into the collapsed gate and hit with bayonets. The third and sixth companies crossed the moat. And soon we saw a wide white banner, slowly, reluctantly crawling up the flagpole of the fort King Frederick III.
Hooray! shouted the officers and soldiers.
Telephonists and radio operators were in a hurry to convey the order:
The enemy has surrendered. Stop the fire.
The shooting stopped. We got out of the trench. One of the radio operators shouted:
Captain Kudlenok reports: the fascists are leaving the casemates without weapons, they are surrendering!
MARSHAL'S EYES
On April 8, in an effort to avoid aimless casualties, I, as commander of the front, turned to the German generals, officers and soldiers of the Königsberg group of forces with a proposal to lay down their arms. However, the Nazis decided to resist. On the morning of April 9, the fighting flared up with renewed vigor. 5,000 of our guns and mortars, 1,500 aircraft delivered a crushing blow on the fortress. The Nazis began to surrender whole units. By the end of the fourth day of continuous fighting, Koenigsberg fell:
During interrogation at the headquarters of the front, the commandant of Koenigsberg, General Lash, said:
“The soldiers and officers of the fortress in the first two days held firm, but the Russians outnumbered us and took over. They managed to covertly concentrate such a quantity of artillery and aircraft, the massive use of which destroyed the fortifications of the fortress and demoralized the soldiers and officers. We have completely lost command of the troops. Coming out of the fortification into the street to contact the headquarters of the units, we did not know where to go, completely losing our bearings, so destroyed and burning the city changed its appearance. It was impossible to imagine that such a fortress as Koenigsberg would fall so quickly. The Russian command worked out well and perfectly carried out this operation. Near Koenigsberg, we lost the entire 100,000th army. The loss of Koenigsberg is the loss of the largest fortress and German stronghold in the East.
Hitler could not come to terms with the loss of the city, which he declared the best German fortress in the history of Germany and "absolutely impregnable bastion of the German spirit", and in impotent rage sentenced Lasch in absentia to death.
In the city and suburbs, Soviet troops captured about 92 thousand prisoners (including 1800 officers and generals), over 3.5 thousand guns and mortars, about 130 aircraft and 90 tanks, many vehicles, tractors and tractors, a large number of various warehouses with all kinds of property.
While the trophies were counted, a joyful report flew to Moscow. And on the night of April 10, 1945, the capital saluted the valor, courage and skill of the heroes of the assault on Koenigsberg with 24 artillery volleys from 324 guns.
"FOR THE CAPTURE OF KONIGSBERG"
After the end of the war, awards for the liberation by the Red Army were established. major cities Europe. In accordance with the task, medals were developed: for the liberation of Prague, Belgrade, Warsaw, the capture of Berlin, Budapest, Vienna. Standing apart among them is the medal for the capture of Koenigsberg, since it was not a medal for the capture of the capital, but for the capture of the city of the fortress.
The medal "For the Capture of Koenigsberg" was established on June 9, 1945 by the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. The awarding of the medal took place after the end of the war, in total, approximately 760,000 people were awarded the medal "For the Capture of Koenigsberg"