Even as these operations were going on, the most important part of the drama was taking place neither in the Baltic nor in the Ukraine but with Army Group Center north of the Pripet Marshes in Belorussia. The armored forces, forming the spearheads of the army group, were put on its wings: 3d Panzer Group (Gen Hermann Hoth) on the left and 2d Panzer Group (Gen Heinz Guderian) on the right. Setting out from Suwalki and Brest Litovsk, respectively-the distance separating them was about 200 miles-these spearheads were to converge on Minsk, some 250 miles inside Soviet territory, in order to form a gigantic pocket. Between the two armored spearheads marched the infantry armies-Ninth Army to the north and Fourth Army to the south. This well-thought-out plan, which gave the German forces shorter distances to cover and enabled them to participate in the campaign by sealing off the pocket formed by the armored spearheads, was designed to allow them to form a second and smaller pocket inside the larger one by meeting at a point on the Bialystok-Minsk road some 100 miles to the east of their starting positions. As usual in maneuver warfare, everything depended on speed and boldness in finding the weak spot and then, having burst through it, striking deep into the enemy’s rear. As usual, this could only be achieved by presenting to the enemy long, open flanks that the Luftwaffe had the task of holding and protecting.
The starting positions of Guderian’s tanks were on the river Bug. As usual, when there was a river to be crossed, the effect was to divert the Luftwaffe units on the spot (Fliegerkorps II) from deep strikes to close support, especially since the crossing sites could be dominated by the guns in the ancient fortress of Brest Litovsk. Fliegerkorps II was accordingly directed to this task even before it could achieve full air superiority; its “rolling attacks” (rollende Einsatz), a kind of operation already familiar from the Battle of the Meuse in 1940, afforded Guderian’s rear echelons a safe passage until the fortress finally surrendered. Next, on 23 June units of Luftflotte 2 were instrumental in beating back a furious Soviet counteroffensive at Grodno. It was only after these operations were over that the weight of the attack could be shifted farther to the east. It now fell on the railroads leading into the area of the prospective pocket (interdiction) and also on the roads leading out of them through the Belorussian forest.
Even at this early point in the campaign, growing distances were already creating a situation where the long-range reconnaissance and bomber units could not be brought up fast enough for the latter to attack targets identified by the former. With the results of photoreconnaissance often many hours out of date, it became necessary to resort to armed reconnaissance by having the bombers act in both roles at once and attack targets of opportunity, a method that proved wasteful in terms of the time that the units could spend on mission. Acting in this way, Fliegerkorps II was able to obstruct but not entirely prevent the attempts by forces of the Soviet West Front (Gen D. G. Pavlov) to retreat and break out of the pocket; also, since it could not be everywhere at once, it was unable to intervene against the sorties flown by the Red Air Force against the German cavalry division forming the extreme right flank of Army Group Center. Further north, Fliegerkorps VIII was instrumental in beating off a Soviet counterattack launched against Hoth’s flank on 24-25 June in the Kuznica-Odel’sk- Grodno-Dembrovo area. Since roads in this area were few and far between, it also airlifted supplies to the rapidly advanced 3d Panzer Group. By means of all these operations, the Luftwaffe contributed substantially to the closing of the pocket at Minsk, the first great German victory in this new campaign.
The Battle of Minsk was concluded on 3 July, when the Soviet forces inside the pocket formally surrendered, although it was another five days before resistance came to an end and 290,000 Russian prisoners had fallen into German hands. Meanwhile, the arrival of the infantry had enabled the armor to be disengaged and resupplied. On 9 July, Guderian and Hoth were off again. This time the goal was to close the jaws at Smolensk, 400 miles from the starting positions, thus building another one of those gigantic pockets that were the specialty of the blitzkrieg. The Luftwaffe’s principal task was to prevent the Red Air Force from disrupting German preparations for the crossing of the Dnieper, which it did most effectively but not without causing some friendly casualties. On 23 July the pincers met and trapped a mass of Russians. As one might expect from the vast distances, however, the pincers were at first rather thin. The German infantry divisions, though marching hard, had been left far behind by the panzers. Consequently, it again fell to Luftflotte 2 to do its best to hold the pocket until they could arrive. It did so with only partial success; unlike the French in the previous year, the Russians for the most part did not surrender simply because the map showed that their units had been cut off. Using the wooded terrain to hide during the day, many of them were able to break out at night. Field Marshal Albert Kesselring of Luftflotte 2 later estimated that 100,000 Soviet troops had made good their escape in this way, albeit at the cost of leaving their heavy equipment behind and watching their large units disintegrate.
Although it was not until 5 August that the pocket west of Smolensk could be regarded as properly closed-and even then gaps remained Fliegerkorps VIII had already been taken away from Luftlotte 2. By Hitler’s orders, it joined Fliegerkorps I in its attack towards Leningrad. The remaining formation, Fliegerkorps II, now found its forces strung out thinly across the hundreds of miles forming the front of Army Group Center and attempting to protect its flanks. It had to assist in sealing off the pocket, but at the same time it had to beat off a series of determined Soviet counterattacks against the exposed Yelnya salient across the Dnieper (occupied by Guderian’s troops). To add to its trouble, it was called upon to operate far in the south, using Stukas to strike at Soviet armored boats that appeared unexpectedly on the northern edges of the Pripet Marshes and inflicted stinging losses on the German cavalry division there. By this time, the Red Air Force had found its bearings to the extent that it was able to join in the army’s attacks on the Yelnya salient. Unable to be everywhere at once, the fighters of Fliegerkorps II were often too late to interfere. Attempting to pursue the low-flying, heavily armored Soviet attack aircraft, they were fired at from the ground by every possible weapon. As a result, an order went out to the German ground troops to imitate the Soviets and defend themselves against air attack with machine guns. This was OKH’s first admission that, in these enormous spaces, the army no longer had nor could hope to have all the friendly command of the air it desired.
As the German forces consolidated their hold at Smolensk on the Dnieper, Hitler and the Army High Command engaged in the famous debate as to which objective, Moscow or the Ukraine, should be given priority. On Hitler’s orders, Hoth’s 3d Panzer Group now followed Fliegerkorps VIII in turning to the assistance of Army Group North, though without much success since the country between Smolensk and Leningrad contains some of the largest and densest forests in the whole of Russia. We cannot debate here whether or not it was feasible, let alone desirable, to pursue the offensive against Moscow at this time. Suffice it to say that this author’s research indicates that the logistic basis for this action was not available since the railways supplying the German infantry forces in particular (unlike the armored groups, they did not have their own motorized transport capable of bringing up supplies from the rear) had been left hundreds of miles behind.
