What Battle Resulted in the Most German Casualtys?

[Kitsune]

Red army casualties in Stalingrad numbered around a million, though. A victory, but a costly one. And certainly not the decisive battle in the east. But very important as a symbol: Until then the Wehrmacht seemed to be near invincible.

[Kreigshund]

I couldn't find a figure for those evacuated, however a readers digest reference book puts the casualty rate as follows

"300 000 Germans dead along with 450 000 of their allies, 108 000 men were taken prisoner. Only 5000 would ever see Germany again. The Russians had lost 750 000, including Many Civilians"

Source. The World at Arms, Readers Digest. 1989

Does anyone have more accurate figures than this. The book also puts luftwaffe aircraft losses somewhere around 500.

Regards
Eddie

[Darrin]

The number of ger soilders in stalingrad as it was surrounded by the rus was less than 250,000. The number of specialist which includes tank crews and lightly wounded flown out to the main evac airport was 40,000. The max number of ger dead, mia and pows could be no more than 200,000 over 2+ months. Most of this comes from beevhors stlaingrad book.

While stalingrad was the bigest deafeat to date and certaionly did mark the begining of the decline of the ger forces the decline was pretty gentle at first. It did serve as a great motivator for the rus proving the ger were beatable. In 43 despit the rus having an adv of 2.5-3.5 times the number of people, planes, tanks and arty the rus took over 4 times as many cas. The rus had such high cas they had less time to train troops during the war than the ger. This traing was also second rate during the short time allowed. Since the ger caused more tot pers losses than rus at a rate OVER 4 times faster from 42-44 than the ger thier was little chance to build up an experianced corps.

During 2+ months 22 jun-aug 44 the ger lost 900,000 troops to all casues across the entire eastern front of which 400,000 came from AGC. The loses post DDay in the east certainoly are larger and less replaceable than stalingrad and not conc in one reinforced army but one army group with other ones damaged badly as well. The decline of the ger soilder from this point on is more drastic then earlier but the ger still enjoy an adv over the rus.

[Qvist]

I couldn't find a figure for those evacuated, however a readers digest reference book puts the casualty rate as follows

"300 000 Germans dead along with 450 000 of their allies, 108 000 men were taken prisoner. Only 5000 would ever see Germany again. The Russians had lost 750 000, including Many Civilians"

Source. The World at Arms, Readers Digest. 1989

I think Readers Digest has made the elementary mistake of confusing dead with casualties.

cheers

[Groscurth]

Hi,

Once and for all the German numbers for Stalingrad, I 'll try to translate Beevors Appendix B in his book were he gives some sources and the method off calculation.

THE STATISTIC DEBATE: THE STRENGTH OFF THE 6TH ARMY iN THE KESSEL.

The difference in numbers for the strength off the surrounded 6th Army deserves a clarification. Estimations on the strength off the 6th Army in the Kessel on 19 november differ; especially because off the number off Russians in units off the German forces. They were a part off the German rations but were not mentioned appart. Recently, somme numbers given by Manfred Kehring, the author off Stalingrad: Analyse und Dokumentation einer Schlacht, the book that was published under auspicians off the Militärgechichtliches Forschungsamt in 1974 were questioned by Rüdiger Overmans. Overmans basicly starts from estimations from the Whermacht after Stalingrad (in the beginning a later try to find the number off "Eingekesselten" based on the personalsregisters) and putts the number off surrounded Germans on only 195.000, the Hiwi's on 50.000 and the Romanians on 5000, a total off about 250.000. Kehrig had 232.000 Germans, 52.000 Hiwi's and 10.000 Romanians, a total off about 294.000. Recently an other study comes to a total on 18 november off 268.000 under them 13.000 Romanians and Italians and 19.300 Hiwi's.

Regarding the difference in time and the consequent numbers off losses, these numbers are prety much the same as the one off the Oberquartiermeister of the 6th Army on 6 December. The total off rations in the Kessel was 275.000 men, including 20.300 Hiwi's and 11.000 Romanians. (sources off the Romanian Army say they had 12.600 men in the Kessel. There were also some hundreds italians) When the 15.000 losses between 21 november and 6 December "only in the Kessel" are added, this would mean that on 22 november almost 290.000 men were surrounded.

All authors agree on the number off wounded and specialists evacuated by air (25.000,so not the complete impossibel 40.000 Darrin)) but are less sure on the numbers off KIA and PoWS. With chaos after the Sovietoffensive off 10 januar'43 to destroy the Kessel, the truth will never appear. Between 22 november and 7 januar some less than 52.000 men off the 6th Army died but it is not clear how many off them were Hiwi's. The sovietnumbers off soldiers made POW between 19 november and 31januar are -111.465 besides 8928 in hospitals - they don't specify hos many off them were German or more imporant how many off them belonged to the encircled troops that were made prisonar during operatians Wintergewitter and Small Saturnus.

The heavy attacks off the Soviets with operation Ring added to the outcomeoff dissease, cold, hunger, exhaustion and executions gives the impression that losses went up fast: including the Hiwi's they can be doubled to 100.000. Kehrig ass Overmans estimate the German losses from 22november until the capitulation on 60.000. Off course, they did not try to make an estimation off the number off Hiwi's that died in the fighting. People can imagine that only few survived in the end.

Translated from Dutch out off Beevor's "Stalingrad"

Berg Heil

Groscurth

[Darrin]

Hi,


All authors agree on the number off wounded and specialists evacuated by air (25.000,so not the complete impossibel 40.000 Darrin)) but are less sure on the numbers off KIA and PoWS. With chaos after the Sovietoffensive off 10 januar'43 to destroy the Kessel, the truth will never appear.
Groscurth

My mistake I double cheked and you are right. I was just trying to say that there were 250,000 ger soilders in the kessel when first surronded and some of them may not have been ger soilders but HiWis pressed into service at the last min. Some of the ger soilders were flown out as well. The total number of germans non hiwi non rum non ita that perished or got capturred in stalingrad could be lower than 200,000.

[Groscurth]

Hi Darrin ,

I was always impressed by the number of Hiwi's. Off course only some 5000 Germans returned from captivity and the goelags, but I am sure the Hiwi's were executed immediatly so I don't think that even one off them lived in let's say summer '43.

Best regards.

[Rich]

I know that the Germans were much better than average allied soldier. So does anyone know what battle resulted in the most casualtys pre side?

You do do you? Well, I've worked on the subject for some 17 years now, and I'm still not sure I "know" that. I do know that on average, in the cases I have studied, the Germans were normally tactically superior to their opponents, but I'm not sure that I know that made them "better," except in tactical proficiency. And I rather suspect the opposite, since they lost the war, and the seeds of their defeat were at least partly to be found in their extreme emphasis on tactical superiority.

And your question is meaningless unless you:

1) Define "battle."
2) Define a time-space limitation for your "battle."
3) Define a scale for your "battle."
4) Define "casualty."

For instance, the "Battle" of Stalingrad, Normandy, Cassino, Anzio, and Tunisia were all actually campaigns, fought by corps to army group-sized forces, over large areas and for weeks at a time. The Battle of Mont Castre on the other hand was fought between two division-sized opponents, over a front of about 10-kilometers and took about a week. The Battle of Dom Butgenbach, was fought between two brigade-size forces, over a few kilometers of front, and over the course of two days. And is an MIA who returns to duty the day after he is reported a casualty really a casualty? And if you are injured in action, are you a casualty? Does frostbite at Stalingrad count as a casualty?

Without answering these questions you may as well be asking "how long is a piece of rope?" (Answer - "long enough to hang you with." )

[LukeMiguez]

If we were talking about the bloodiest Year for the Wehrmacht i'd have to say 1944. With the Russians launching Operation Bagration (not sure) and the Allied landings in Normandy the germans lost quite a bit of their operational force.

[Paul_9686]

Good point, Luke. Overlord and Bagration together were probably the worst "double-whammy" any country ever took in a single season. Yet somehow, the Germans not only hung on, but even cobbled together enough for one last throw of the dice in December (the Ardennes).

I wonder how much credit should be given to the Germans for hanging on grimly with everything they had, and how much blame should be attached to the Allies east and west, for not giving Germany the coup de grace that same year?

Yours,
Paul

[Rommel8]

The Official, settle statement was 1.3 Deaths total

200,000 German, around 300,000 Axis Allies, and 800,000 Russians, of which over 20,000 were shot by Commisars and NKVD

Sources: World at War, The Battle for Stalingrad


5000 is way too high. My great uncle was among the 1900 or so to return, but his brother was not

[Osterhase]

If I may respectfully add something here... I have researched this subject and have come up with a few findings. First of all I believe one reason for the tactical superiority of German troops in small unit actions right up to say the corps level, is simply cultural in the military sense of the word. Try a search in Google or whatever your browser is for the word "Auftragstaktik" and read the various definitions of it and you will get a general feel for what I'm suggesting. When you combine the concept Auftragstaktik with the a few other ingredients such as 1)The German army in WWI was static in the West and mobile in the East they had more diverse data to analyze and draw conclusions from than either the Soviets or the Allies. 2) In utilizing this data they had unity of command as far as staff work is concerned (von Seeckt) so that a single vision could move forward quickly and efficiently with minimal bureaucratic friction to reshape the army. 3) The 100,000 man army was actually an advantage in reshaping the army and forming a cadre of leaders who understood the new concepts in "Fuhrung und Gefecht" (1926) and Truppenfuhrung (1933 superceded FuG).
The real key and the short answer to the original question is Auftragstaktik considered in the context of the operations order concept and format(first detailed in Truppenfuhrung H.dv.300 (1933) and used today by the US and Nato).
This is my perception of it anyway....

[Enrico Mölders]

Hi,


I don't think we can say Stalingrad was the battle with the highest german cassualities. We should not forget the battle goes from September to February and cost boths sides about 1.3 Miilions of dead.

If we compare the casulaities for example while the battle of Berlin ( I didn't have the exact numbers at the moment ) so I expect that their where more casualities for the germans in a shorter period of time ( as well as for the russians ).

If we take the battle of Kursk there was with no doubt a much higher rate of cassualities in shorter period of time than in most of all other battles.


No doubt Stalingrad was a horrible battle with huge numbers of cassualities but this battle takes more than 5 months at all and so the number of killings day by day was on other battles higher than with Stalingrad.

We should not forget that 93.000 men survived the battle. The fact that only about 6.000 saw their home again is another story and has nothing to do with the battle cassualities.


By Enrico

[Peter]

does the question also includes the numbers of POW's taken or only wounded and killed? KTB OKW page 376 part 7 mentioned losses on Westfront for OB-West only as 460.000 (from 6.6 till 29.9)!

[4444]

Recently an other study comes to a total on 18 november off 268.000 under them 13.000 Romanians and Italians and 19.300 Hiwi's.

What recent study do you mean?

PS. Many thanks for the effort of translating all that.