As a result of the defeats of the Bryansk and Southern fronts and the impending threat of encirclement of the troops of the Southwestern Front on October 24, 1941, Kharkov was left without serious resistance. Soviet troops, conducting rearguard battles, retreated 60-150 km, gaining a foothold on the eastern bank of the Seversky Donets River.
The state of the opposing sides
By the end of 1941, the region of Kharkov and Donbass was defended by the troops of the Southwestern (Kostenko) and Southern (Malinovsky) fronts, consisting of the 38th (Maslov), 6th (Gorodnyansky), 12th (Koroteev), 18th (Kolpakchi), 9th (Kharitonov), 37th (Lopatin) and 56th (Tsyganov) armies. They were opposed by the group of German armies "South" (Runstedt), consisting of the 6th (Reichenau), 17th (Goth) field, 1st tank (Kleist) armies and the Italian expeditionary corps.
The situation at the front in the region of Donbass and Kharkov in December 1941 was characterized as an unstable equilibrium with mutual attacks with a fairly stable front. Soviet troops carried out a successful Rostov operation in November-December 1941 and drove the Germans out of Rostov-on-Don.
After the defeat of the Germans near Moscow, the Supreme Command Headquarters demanded a total offensive of all Soviet fronts from Ladoga to the Sea of Azov. The command of the South-West direction (Timoshenko) at the end of December 1941 set the command of the South-West (Kostenko) and South (Malinovsky) fronts to prepare an offensive operation in the region of Kharkov and Donbass in order to quickly reach the Dnieper in the region of Dnepropetrovsk and Zaporozhye, forcing the water barrier on the ice and the seizure of bridgeheads on the right bank, as well as the liberation of Kharkov and Donbass. At the first stage, the operation was called Kharkov, and from the end of January 1942 Barvenkovsko-Lozovskaya.
The operation was carried out (18-31) January 1942 by the forces of the Southwestern and Southern fronts.
In the area of Balakleya, Lozovaya and Barvenkovo, the enemy's defense was organized in the form of a number of strong points. The plan of the operation consisted in a joint strike of two fronts with the aim of breaking through the defenses between Balakleia and Artyomovsk, entering the rear of the Donbass-Taganrog enemy grouping, pushing it back to the coast of the Sea of Azov and destroying it. The troops of the Southwestern Front, the 38th Army (Maslov), were supposed to attack Kharkov, and the 6th Army (Gorodnyansky), in the zone of which the 6th Cavalry Corps (Bychkovsky), was to be introduced into the breakthrough, to cover its attack from the south, and from the side of Izyum, the troops of the Southern Front - the 9th and 37th armies.
On the Izyum-Barvenkovo direction in the enemy line of defense, there were two infantry divisions and two in reserve in the area of Lozovaya, Barvenkovo, Slavyansk. In the Artyomovsk direction in the defense zone there were 5 infantry divisions, an Italian expeditionary corps and one infantry division in the Konstantinovka area. The lowest density of enemy defense was in the Izyum area, but the advancing troops had to face strong enemy defense units in Slavyansk, Balakleya and Barvenkovo. The most dangerous was the defense center in Balakleya, with a fortified bridgehead on the left bank of the Seversky Donets.
On January 1, 1942, the regrouping of the troops of the 9th and 37th armies of the Southern Front from Rostov to the Izyum-Barvenkovo direction began, and by January 17 it was completed.
The troops of the 6th Army of the Southwestern Front had one and a half superiority over the troops of the 6th Army of the Wehrmacht in manpower and tanks, but were three times inferior in artillery.
The troops of the 37th and 9th armies of the Southern Front were inferior to the opposing German group of Schwedler in manpower and weapons. With limited offensive resources and no general superiority over the enemy, the command of the Southwestern and Southern fronts was going to conduct a large-scale offensive operation, the goals of which did not correspond to the operational situation at the front.
The terrain in the region of Balakleya and Izyum helped the enemy organize a long-term defense with limited forces. The floodplain of the Seversky Donets was wide on the left and narrow on the right bank. The sloping left bank was covered with swamps and oxbows along its entire length. The steep right bank with a narrow strip of the floodplain nestled against the chalk slopes reaching a height of 80-160 m, from which the entire left bank was clearly visible.
The basis of the enemy's defense was settlements adapted for defense as strong points, and in the interval between settlements, in addition to trenches for riflemen and machine guns, bunkers were arranged. Thus, a well-fortified defensive line of sufficient depth was created by the enemy on the right bank of the Seversky Donets.
The beginning of the offensive
After artillery preparation on January 18, 1942, the troops of the Southwestern and Southern Fronts launched an offensive against the Kharkov and Donbass enemy groupings from Volchansk to Artyomovsk. Already in the first days of the offensive, the enemy launched rather powerful counterattacks.
At the first stage of the offensive, the main role was assigned to the fresh forces of the 57th Army, which delivered the main blow in the direction of Barvenkov and Lozovaya. East of Kharkov, the troops of the 38th Army launched an offensive, south of Kharkov, the troops of the 6th Army struck a blow from the bridgehead captured the day before on the right bank of the Seversky Donets.
By January 21, 1942, Soviet troops completed the task of breaking into the enemy's defenses and reaching the operational space. But the troops of the 38th and 6th armies, covering Kharkov from the north and south, advanced to a limited depth of up to 10 km, after which the offensive on Kharkov stalled. Tymoshenko decided to abandon a further offensive on Kharkov pending results in the main direction of the strike.
The fresh 57th Army, which, according to the results of the first battles, was supposed to reach the maximum penetration depth, did not live up to the expectations of the command of the South-Western direction. Tymoshenko reoriented the 6th Army to attack in the main direction - to the Western Donbass and the bend of the Dnieper. Now the 57th and 6th armies were advancing at the junction of the Southwestern and Southern Fronts.
The offensive on Barvenkovo
According to the plans of the operation, the region of Kharkov was to be captured by the South-Western Front, and the Southern Front had completely different tasks - to reach the bend of the Dnieper. In the process of implementing the plan, the main forces of the two fronts were aimed at solving the second task and the command set a goal for tactical encirclement of the Slavic-Kramatorsk enemy grouping by intercepting communications in the rear of the resistance node, which was Barvenkovo. In this city, the roads converged to Slavyansk, Kramatorsk, Balakleia, Lozovaya, Krasnoarmeyskoye. Barvenkovo was also a rear supply base for the enemy grouping and the important Lozovaya-Slavyansk railway passed through it.
Given the enormous importance of the defense center in Barvenkovo, located between Slavyansk and Lozova, the command of the South-Western direction gave the order to advance on Barvenkovo to the right-flank divisions of the 57th Army, the 1st and 5th Cavalry Corps.
The elimination of this resistance node provided a double gap in communication between the Kharkov and Donbass enemy groupings, and the isolation of the resistance center in Lozovaya deprived the Kharkov and Donbas groupings of communication and, as a result, the supply of the enemy's Donbass grouping was disrupted.
The next day, January 22, the troops of the 57th Army, which had previously been advancing parallel to the troops of the 6th Army in a westerly direction, began to turn south-west, in the direction of Barvenkovo. Thus, the Lozovaya - Slavyansk railway was cut in the area west of Barvenkovo for a subsequent offensive and bypassing the resistance node from the southwest. By the evening of January 22, thanks to the bypass maneuver of horsemen, the city was liberated, and 7 settlements in its vicinity were also liberated.
On January 25, the 57th Army was tasked with reaching the line of Semyonovka, Bogdanovka, Bogodarov, Viknin, Novo-Grigorovka, Ivanovsky, Nikolsky to ensure the maneuver of the main forces of the 5th Cavalry Corps from the southwest. Having overcome the resistance of the enemy, the horsemen rushed to Stepanovka. For a joint strike in the Kramatorsk direction, the 6th tank brigade was sent to the zone of action of the 255th rifle division. On the morning of January 27, the 5th Cavalry Corps crossed the river. Bull, broke into Kryvyi Rih and defeated a battalion of the Croatian "devilish" regiment of the 101st Infantry Division.
On January 27, units of the 1st Cavalry Corps began to develop an offensive in the Constantine direction, penetrating deep into the rear of the enemy. On the same day, units of the 270th Rifle Division occupied Lozovaya, Panyutino, Yekaterinovka and the surrounding area.
However, this was the last notable success of the troops of the South-West direction in the January offensive, which was consolidated in the subsequent February battles. The cavalry corps was ready to throw on Krasnoarmeyskoye, but the enemy completed the regrouping of the troops of Army Group South by the end of January and launched a counteroffensive.
The turning point in the offensive
The turning point of the operation in the West Donbass direction was approaching. In view of the stubborn resistance of the enemy in the area of Slavyansk and Artemovsk, the commander of the Southern Front, Malinovsky, decided to take advantage of the advance to the west of the 57th Army and go to the rear of the stubbornly resisting Slav group of the enemy. This task was supposed to be solved by a strike in the converging directions of the 1st, 5th cavalry corps and the 9th army, bypassing Slavyansk from the west, and the 37th army from the east.
The transfer of the efforts of the troops of the Southwestern and Southern Fronts to the flanks, to Balaklea and Slavyansk, led to the fact that the development of the operation by the end of January 1942 practically stopped. With the beginning of the spring thaw and as a result of fierce enemy resistance, the offensive of the Soviet troops on January 31 was stopped.
The German "Kollerman strike group" managed to recapture Petropavlovka and restore movement along the main communications of German troops in the Donbass. Formally, this day can be considered the end of the maneuverable phase of the operation. After that, the battles moved into a positional phase. Attempts to crush the defenses near Slavyansk and Balakleya continued for almost a month, until the end of February 1942.
At the same time, Grechko's Cavalry Corps and the 57th Army were conducting mobile combat operations against the "Mackensen Group" advancing north of Krasnoarmeyskoye. The main task of the German troops at this stage was the formation of a stable front along the perimeter of the Barvenkovsky ledge formed as a result of the offensive of two Soviet fronts.
The first days of February raged with snowstorms, which forced the troops of Army Group South and the two Soviet fronts to abandon large-scale attacks on each other's positions. However, after the weather improved, starting on February 7, the opponents began offensive operations in key directions for each of the sides. Von Mackensen's group gradually pushed the troops of the 57th Army away from the main communications of troops in the Donbass.
In March, the offensive impulse of both sides exhausted itself. On March 24, the snow began to melt and a period of spring thaw came to the front. March and April became a time of operational pause, when both the Wehrmacht and the Red Army were recovering from the winter campaign and were intensively preparing for the summer offensives.
Operation results
The tasks assigned by the Supreme Command Headquarters to the troops of the Southwestern and Southern Fronts to reach the Dnieper, intercept the communications of the enemy's Donbass grouping and liberate Kharkov as a result of the Barvenkovsko-Lozovskaya operation were not fulfilled. The incompleteness of the operation was largely due to the slow development of the breakthrough and the untimely adoption of measures to expand it towards the flanks.
The enemy, holding these strong points at the base of the breakthrough, with his counterattacks created a threat to the flanks and rear of the strike forces of the Southwestern and Southern Fronts. In this regard, it was necessary to abandon the use of the 9th Army for the development of the operation in depth and send it to eliminate the enemy grouping in the area of Slavyansk and Artemovsk.
As a result of the offensive in the southwestern direction in January-February 1942, the Barvenkovsky ledge was formed, which could become both a springboard for a new large-scale offensive, and a trap for the armies that occupied it. The situation was worsened by the division of a rather narrow ledge between the two fronts. The northern part of the Barvenkovo ledge was under the jurisdiction of the South-Western Front, and the southern part was under the jurisdiction of the Southern Front.
The German command did not have large reserves in the southern sector of the front, and the Soviet offensive was repulsed mainly by regrouping within Army Group South with the traditional dismantling of the strike group in the Rostov direction in such cases.
The main task - to encircle and destroy a large German grouping - was not fully completed by the Soviet troops. They also failed to liberate Kharkov. In conditions of the general superiority of the enemy forces, the Soviet troops did not act decisively enough, did not take timely measures to expand the breakthrough on its flanks. This allowed the Germans to pull up reinforcements. Nevertheless, thanks to this operation, the German command could not transfer troops from here to Moscow, where Soviet troops successfully launched a counteroffensive.
By the spring of 1942, Soviet troops occupied the vast Barvenkovsky ledge, 90 kilometers deep and 110 kilometers wide, on the right bank of the Seversky Donets River. This ledge hung from the north over the enemy's Donbass grouping (army group "Kleist"), and from the south covered his Kharkov grouping (6th German Paulus army). At the same time, German troops, holding the areas of Balakliya and Slavyansk, occupied an advantageous position for delivering counter-attacks under the base of the Barvenkovsky ledge. As a result, the 38th and 6th armies of the Western Front, the 9th and 37th armies of the Southern Front found themselves on a ledge with a rather narrow base.
A few months later, the German command took advantage of this, eliminated the Barvenkovsky ledge and ensured the breakthrough of its troops to Stalingrad and the Caucasus.
