Stalingrad

Maskirovka

For centuries, the Russian empire, especially her military, have brought deception to a fine art. The Russian word maskirovka, translating to “masking something”, is designed to manipulate the enemy’s decision-making process so it does, or doesn’t, take actions, which therefore enhance the likelihood of Russian success. These actions might be reinforcing a certain sector of the front, thinking the Russians will attack there, when the Russians all along were going to attack somewhere else – and where the Russians really do attack, now has few enemy troops. Effective deception – maskirovka – often results in achieving surprise, one of the key principles of war.

Soviet reinforcements

It is not enough to just fool the enemy; there must be actual actions that the enemy takes in response to that deception. At Stalingrad in 1942, the Russians portrayed the situation in the Soviet city as on the edge of falling for several months, by only bringing in relatively small reinforcements across the Volga River from Soviet positions east. The Germans, in turn, pulled additional German units in from the flanks north and south of Stalingrad for a final push, and let Romanian, Hungarian, and Italian units take over those flank defensive sectors. Then in mid-November 1942 – wham, the Russians attacked those flanks, surrounding Stalingrad, where the German Sixth Army died on the vine over the next 75 days, a major turning point in the war.

Inflatable “jet aircraft”

The first precept of maskirovka is to “give the enemy the smell that he likes,” an Israeli army colonel once told me. Every enemy has a preconceived notion of how the battle is probably going to unfold; identify that and use that as the deception story – the false scenario and how it will play out. The enemy wants to believe that they guessed right, so all deception measures should reinforce those enemy’s biases. In World War II, the Germans believed the Western Allies would invade France from England at the Pas-de-Calais area of France. First, because the English Channel is at its narrowest at this point, but more importantly, because it was from Pas-de-Calais that Germany intended to invade England in 1940. Therefore, all Allied deception measures were designed to “sell” a Pas-de-Calais invasion, hiding the real invasion at Normandy, where the distance across the Channel was five times that of Pas-de-Calais, and in German minds you’d have to be crazy to try that.

Conceal the real; portray the unreal is the second guide. Not only does good maskirovka depict false operations, but includes tight operational security to hide what is really going on, because if the enemy obtains evidence of your legitimate plan, they may not fall for the deception to hide it. Disseminating battle plans on a strict “need to know” reduces the possibility that those plans get “leaked.” Anything that is leaked, should only be the false battle plans – and then disclosed only in a believable manner. That is sometimes done by double agents – an enemy agent that has been apprehended, threatened with death, and “turned”, so the agent, in addition to feeding inconsequential true intelligence to keep credibility with his original clients, is fed elements of the deception story: “Joe has always given us good information, so this must be good too.”

It isn’t just human intelligence (spies) that is necessary to execute maskirovka effectively; you have to “fool” all the battlefield sensors of the enemy. This includes radar and other electronic detection devices, and aerial photography – and in World War II there were no satellites to fool; now there may be 8,000 in orbit. Audio sensors listen for certain sounds; sensors on the Internet monitor everything from what kind of mouthwash you buy online, to actions that indicate you are probably a firearms’ owner. Motion sensors can measure the movements of deer, or movements of military tanks. If you attempt to shoot down every enemy drone in an area, your opponent may believe correctly that you are up to something in that area. But if make no attempt to shoot down any drones over an area, because you want them to pick up indicators of activity, the enemy might ask themselves why you are allowing those drones to operate.

How do you know what to look for concerning maskirovka? An enemy can portray tank columns moving in certain directions that have nothing to do with the real attack. They can drop leaflets warning citizens to evacuate a certain area when no attack is actually going there. What are difficult to hide are logistical functions. Show us where the fuel points are, and we can determine how many armored vehicles that supports and the area they will operate. Sure, the enemy could deploy empty 55-gallon drums of ‘fuel” at a fake fuel depot as deception, but an empty drum will have a different thermal signature from one filled with diesel.

Follow the Money

For discovering maskirovka operations in the field of political tricks remember the old adage: “follow the money.” But with money now measured by electrons (there are no actual greenbacks in what your bank calls your checking account), that can be difficult, and of course hacked and an account made to look larger or smaller with a couple of keystrokes. But there’s always some idiot that drops off a damaged MacBook laptop at a Delaware computer store to be repaired, and on that computer are various trails of money paid for nefarious deeds, with money trails up to the highest levels possible. Maskirovka? Or real? Constructing fake dossiers (portray the unreal) is another element of maskirovka, and one that was done successfully by the Germans against the Russians, providing Stalin’s intelligence services with fake “evidence” that his generals were about to overthrow him. Stalin bit, and had hundreds of loyal generals shot.

Deception plans of maskirovka are some of the most sensitive, tightest “need to know” restrictions of all. Even knowing that some type of deception is going on is tightly controlled to the point that often high-level decision-makers are in the dark. While it was not part of the deception plan, Vice President Harry Truman was not told about the Manhattan Project – the development of the atomic bomb – until hours after he became President after FDR’s death.

Today, the Russians are still at it with respect to maskirovka, whether that is in the Ukraine, or whether that is interfering with foreign economies and politics by injecting false stories into news cycle, or even potentially manipulating U.S. election results. Can’t happen here? Nobody’s that smart. If you think the Russian aren’t good at maskirovka, ask the roughly 250,000 Germans at Stalingrad who never came home.

Or just watch Operation Mincemeat on Netflix to see the depths of details that have to be accomplished to sell a deception effort.

Maskirovka2023-06-21T14:04:18-05:00

Stalingrad Situation Map for August 16, 1942

Situation Map for August 16, 1942

The book uses many daily situation maps to show where the German divisions and corps were located.  This is one of the Lage Ost maps from the National Archives, where they are in photo format – the originals having been returned to Germany.  The maps were initially prepared by the German Army High Command (Oberkommando des Heeres [OKH]).  They were first printed by the Mapping and Survey Branch; the OKH Operations Branch then annotated then to indicate specific headquarters and unit locations.  New maps were prepared daily.

The good news is that for many of these maps, you do not have to go to Washington DC and the Archives.  Researcher John Calvin (WWII Aerial Photos and Maps) has put many on his own web site, as well as thousands of photos and other maps.

Stalingrad Situation Map for August 16, 19422015-09-08T15:36:35-05:00

German “X” Squad at Stalingrad

German “X” Squad

The base photo is that of an infantry squad just west of Stalingrad in October 1942.  Their unit is preparing to move into the city, probably for the first time.  I have added the red Xs to the photo, indicating that in the aggregate, nine of every ten men going into Stalingrad would become casualties of one sort or another.

German “X” Squad at Stalingrad2015-09-08T15:40:09-05:00

German Squad Leader Whistle found at Stalingrad

German Squad Leader Whistle found at Stalingrad

In the din of battle, signals could be heard much easier from a whistle than by voice.  Two blasts from a whistle for a combat engineer squad might signal to get up and quickly move forward ten meters.  Today, many militaries think of command and control as sophisticated computers, but for the infantryman on the ground, life and death can be determined by understanding quickly what your squad leader wants you to do.

German Squad Leader Whistle found at Stalingrad2015-09-08T15:42:09-05:00

German Infantry Assault Badge from Stalingrad

German Infantry Assault Badge

German Infantry Assault Badge in Silver found after the war in a former German position at Stalingrad.  Anecdotal evidence indicates that some German soldiers at Stalingrad intentionally broke the wreath surrounding the badge to show their private opposition to the campaign.  While this badge is missing part of the wreath at that described location, it is not possible to determine the cause of the damage.

German Infantry Assault Badge from Stalingrad2015-09-08T15:42:45-05:00

Remembrance Card of Soldier Who Died at Stalingrad

Remembrance Card

Jäger Josef Steinbacher was born on December 21, 1923 at Schildorn, near Eberschwang, in Austria.  He was killed in the fighting for Hill 102 at Stalingrad on September 28, 1942, while a member of the 8th Company in the 227th Infantry Regiment of the 100th Jäger Division.  Josef Steinbacher, whose remains were never found for proper burial, is listed in the remembrance book at the German Military Cemetery at Rossoschka.  By showing a remembrance card (Sterbebild) for as many days as possible, we hope to show that while for Germany, perhaps 250 soldiers died on a particular day, for this particular family it was a tragedy beyond compare.  These cards are one type of German World War II relic that are not outrageous in price.

Remembrance Card of Soldier Who Died at Stalingrad2015-09-08T16:00:23-05:00

Friedrich Paulus

Friedrch Paulus before Stalingrad

Friedrich Paulus, Army Field Marshal, was born on September 23, 1890 in Breitenau, Hesse, the son of a school teacher.  His first assignment was with the 111th Infantry Regiment; he fought in France, Macedonia and Serbia from 1914-1918.  After World War I, Paulus was assigned to the 13th Infantry Regiment in Stuttgart, before serving in several General Staff positions in the XVI Corps, the Tenth Army and the Deputy Chief of the German General Staff.

In January 1942, Paulus assumed command of the German Sixth Army and led this formation through the Stalingrad Campaign until 1943, when he and the Sixth Army surrendered.  The winner of the Knight’s Cross with Oak Leaves, Paulus was captured by the Soviets, remained a prisoner, until released from prison in 1953 and allowed to settle in East Germany.  He died on February 1, 1957 in Dresden.  Friedrich Paulus’ remains were later transferred to Baden-Baden, where he was buried with his wife, whom he last saw in 1942.

Iconic photo of Paulus at surrender of Sixth Army. He is to the right; in the center is the Sixth Army Chief of Staff Arthur Schmidt; to the left is Wilhelm Adam, the Sixth Army Adjutant

Paulus was maligned after the war for his conduct of the Stalingrad fight, especially after Soviet forces had surrounded the Sixth Army in November 1942.  But he was in an untenable position.  The following are some quotations of Friedrich Paulus about Stalingrad that show his emotions during the campaign.

“The Stalingrad battle continues along its stubborn course. Things are going very slowly, but every day we make just a little progress. The whole thing is a question of time and manpower. But we’ll beat the Russians yet!” (October 7, 1942)

“I expect you [to a colonel] to carry out the orders of your superior officers.  In the same manner the Führer, as my superior, can and must expect that I shall obey his orders.” (November 1942)

“Unless I concentrate every available man and inflict a decisive defeat on the enemy advancing from the south and west, my Army will be faced with imminent destruction.” (November 23, 1942)

“I still believe, however, that the Army can hold out for some time.  On the other hand – even if anything like a corridor is cut through to me – it is still not possible to tell whether the daily increasing weakness of the Army, combined with lack of accommodation and wood for constructional and heating purposes, will allow the area around Stalingrad to be held for any length of time.” (November 26, 1942)

“You are talking to dead men.” (January 1943)

“The last horses have been eaten up.” (January 19, 1943)

Paulus later in life in East Germany, where he died

Friedrich Paulus2016-03-28T19:36:24-05:00
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