Operation Barbarossa

Operation Barbarossa was the invasion of Russia by Nazi Germany in 1941, during World War II. It was an event critical to the course of the war, opening the Eastern Front and bringing the Soviet Union into the conflict. (PROSE: The Shadow in the Glass)

Origins
Renewed confrontation between Germany and Russia dated back to the First World War and the Russian Revolution of 1917. After the fall of the Russian Empire, Vladimir Lenin's Bolsheviks came to power and began to establish the Soviet Union, a new communist power which generated a lot of worry in Germany. (PROSE: The Wages of Sin)

These fears appeared founded when Soviets attempted to spark a communist revolution in Germany after the end of the First World War. Adolf Hitler and the Nazi movement were able to utilise the population's fear of communism to come to power in January 1933. (AUDIO: The Alchemists)

Under the new Third Reich, Germans were taught to distrust Marxism, among many other ideologies deemed subversive by the Nazis. (PROSE: Just War, AUDIO: Just War) As Germany continued to reclaim territories lost under the Treaty of Versailles, Hitler began preparing for a showdown with the Soviet Union. He expressed a deep hatred for the "Bolshevik scum" and spoke of his desire to conquer Russia, before moving into the Asian continent to take Iran, India and the Far East. (PROSE: Timewyrm: Exodus)

Preparatory theatres
In 1939, the Nazis prepared to conquer Poland. The Germans negotiated a non-aggression pact with Joseph Stalin, stipulating that Poland be divided between the two powers. Hitler fully intended to attack the Soviets but planned to attack his more immediate enemies first, namely the United Kingdom and France who had pledged to aid Poland. (PROSE: Timewyrm: Exodus) Isabella Zemanova was among the Russians who believed the pact meant they would be spared a second war against Germany, but her husband, Lev Zemanova, a schoolteacher who became a captain in the Red Army, felt that Hitler could not be trusted. (PROSE: The Beast of Stalingrad) The Invasion of Poland began on 1 September, beginning the Second World War. (PROSE: Timewyrm: Exodus, AUDIO: Neverland)

In the war's early hours, the War Lords of the Black Coven continued to advance their plans to help the Nazis win the war by ironing out the strategic errors they identified Germany would make. They deemed that the German invasion of the Soviet Union was prematurely launched and instead favoured abiding by the pact for much longer after pacifying Western Europe. During this time, Germany could establish a presence in Africa and Asia while trying to provoke a war between the Soviets and the United States of America. The Coven also began to produce nuclear weapons for the Germans to easily subdue the larger Russian and American landmasses. The strategy was ultimately never put into effect as the Seventh Doctor and Ace overloaded the nuclear reactor hidden inside the Coven's base at Drachensberg, wiping them out. (PROSE: Timewyrm: Exodus)

To pacify the Western Front, Germany launched the Blitzkrieg, knocking out France, Belgium and the Netherlands in the space of a month. However, they subsequently failed to launch an invasion of Britain or force their surrender through other means. (PROSE: Just War) The British earned some respite after the Germans decided to transfer forced to the East. (PROSE: Losing the Audience)

Barbarossa launched
In the summer of 1941, Hitler finally turned Germany's attention towards the Soviet Union, seeking to capture the boundless resources of land, slaves, oil, grain and metals. (PROSE: Just War) Operation Barbarossa was launched, opening the war's Eastern Front. The Russians suffered terribly. (PROSE: The Shadow in the Glass)

Almost two thousand Russian planes of the Soviet Air Force were destroyed by the Luftwaffe on the first day of the attack. The Baltic States quickly fell to the Germans, and the Wehrmacht advanced forty miles into Russia with each passing day as they fought towards Moscow. They had problems establishing their supply lines fast enough to keep up.

More than two million Red Army soldiers, more men than were in the whole British Army, became German prisoners of war after the Battles of Bialystock, Kyiv and Vyazma-Briansk. More Soviet soldiers were captured each day than the Germans could process. The astonishing speed and successes of the campaign were announced on German radio stations. Propagandists were soon told to tone down their reports of victories because Germany citizens were beginning not to believe them. (PROSE: Just War)

Leningrad was surrounded by the Germans. With Panzer divisions just ten miles away, the curator of the Palace Museum prepared to evacuate all the valuables to Siberia so they would not fall into German hands. However, the Amber Room was too fragile to be moved. The curator attempted to hide it by papering it over and covering the floor with sand to make it appear as if it was a normal room, before leaving with the collection to Siberia. The attempts to hide it failed as the Germans discovered the Room within hours of reaching the Palace. They stripped the Amber Room from the Palace and had it transported back to Germany. (PROSE: Cabinets of Curiosities)

Overstretch
Yet the Germans' rapid progress did not last. The campaign's momentum slowed under the strains of Germany's failure to defeat Britain, which meant that she found herself fighting a war on two fronts again, as had happened during World War I.

The Germans had advanced 1,000 miles into Russia along a 2,000 mile front and came within sight of Moscow. However, the already struggling Wehrmacht was finally grinding to a halt after the onset of the Russian winter. The Russians, who were far more prepared for winter warfare, counter-attacked and the Germans were pushed back from the capital.

In the resulting crisis, Oberst Oskar Steinmann and the Luftwaffe zbV were called into Russia from Guernsey to help stabilise the situation. Steinmann's Luftwaffe united proved effective at halting Russian tanks, disrupting Russian supply lines, aiding in the fortification of strategic towns and providing supplies for the occupying German forces. After Moscow, Germany's war began to devolve into a defensive one. (PROSE: Just War)

Aftermath and legacy
On 7 December 1941, Japan attacked the US naval base at Pearl Harbor, bringing the Americans into the war. (PROSE: Only Connect) The Americans mobilised massive amounts of resources and industry to aid both the British and the Soviets. (PROSE: Just War) The British and Americans also deployed naval convoys in the treacherous Arctic Sea to run supplies to the Soviets via the port of Murmansk. (AUDIO: Dark Convoy)

Having already suffered the setbacks outside Moscow, the Germans were forced to end the bombing campaigns against Britain and abandoned Operation Sealion in order to conserve resources now needed for the wider war. Early signs of panic began to sweep Berlin, with officers and civilians beginning to consider that Germany could lose the war. Anyone caught by the authorities of discussing this possibility were punished and purged for defeatism. (PROSE: Just War)

In the ongoing winter weather in early 1942, the Germans began planning another advance on the Eastern Front. Established a temporary base, they began massing Panzer tanks and support vehicles, slowed by the snow, for later attacks in the direction of Stalingrad. The Soviet Air Force, from their own temporary bases, launched "disruption bombing" raids against the German preparations. The base of the all-female 588th Night Bomber Regiment, better known as the Night Witches, was attacked by Panzers after reconnaissance flights confirmed the Germans were active. The Night Witches' top pilot Tatiana Kregki took charge of the fightback. (AUDIO: The Night Witches) The Battle of Stalingrad began at the end of August 1942. (PROSE: The Shadow in the Glass)

Barbarossa brought the Soviet Union into the war, forcing the establishment of an uneasy alliance of convenience among the Allied forces united only by the struggle against Hitler. Winston Churchill reluctantly allied Britain with the Soviet Union on the outbreak of Barbarossa, still conscious of Stalin's pact with Hitler a few years prior. (AUDIO: Human Conflict) The likelihood of a conflict between the capitalist West and the communist East was acknowledged by both sides as early as 1943. (TV: The Curse of Fenric) Towards the war's end, the Russians and Americans were, in the words of Mahalia Nkansah Hernandez, "racing across Germany to begin the Cold War." (PROSE: Cabinets of Curiosities) In 1955, the First Doctor said of the situation: "It is one of the eternal truths of history, that today’s allies become tomorrow’s enemies." (PROSE: Losing the Audience) The tensions lasted until the fall of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. (AUDIO: Protect and Survive)