Beyond Barbarossa: The Eastern Front of World War 2

In summer 1944, "the Red Army’s seemingly unstoppable streamroller took Stanislav in the Carpathian foothills, Bialystok in northern Poland, Dvinsk in Latvia and the Siauliai (also spelt Shaulyai) rail junction between Riga and East Prussia.” — Anthony Tucker-Jones. Even so, the steamroller suffered ferocious mauling.  If you can transcribe the morse code signal during “What else is happening in the war,” send an email to scott@beyondbarbarossa.ca. If you’re correct, I will send you a free autographed copy of The Eastern Front Trilogy. Map 1a: The Eastern Front, July 1944 Map 1b: The front, August 1944   Map 2: The Lvov-Sandomierz Offensive, detail     Map 3: The Narva Offensive Music by Nicolas Bury. Morse code from Thane Brown.  Some sound effects from Zapsplat.com.

Stalin’s one-two punch against Germany is the Lvov-Sandomierz offensive, hitting in Ukraine as Bagration smashes into Byelorussia. It also lays bare the brutality within the Red Army.  Map 1: The Byelorussian Balcony   Map 2: The Lvov-Sandomierz Operation   Map 3: The Eastern Front, 15 June 1944   Map 4: The Eastern Front, 15 July 1944   Map 5: The Eastern Front, 15 August 1944   Ivan Konev, commander, 1st Ukrainian Front   Lt. General Pavel Rybalko, commander, 3rd Guards Tank Army   Josef Harpe, Commander, Army Group North Ukraine   Sources: Antony Beevor, The Second World War. London, UK: Little, Brown and Co., 2012.  Prit Buttar, Retribution: The Soviet Reconquest of Central Ukraine, 1943. Oxford, UK: Osprey Publishing, 2019. Evan Mawdsley, Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941–1945. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016.  Anthony Tucker-Jones, Stalin’s Revenge: Operation Bagration and the Annihilation of Army Group Centre.  Barnsley, South Yorkshire, UK: Pen and Sword Books, 2009.   

Today, Beyond Barbarossa fulfills a promised made at the start of this podcast: a meaningful donation to help refugees of Russia’s unjustifiable war of aggression against  Ukraine, to the Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal. We’re joined by Valeriy Kostyuk, Executive Director of the Canada-Ukraine Foundation, which runs the appeal. Links Canada-Ukraine Foundation Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal Medical javelins Thornhill Medical and their MOVES SLC mobile life-support system. 

Did the Lend-Lease program save the Soviet Union? For the Season 3 finale, Angus Wallace of the World War 2 podcast joins to offer a nuanced interpretation.    Angus Wallace, host and producer of The World War 2 podcast     The Lend-Lease Act      British Valentine tanks to be sent to USSR under Lend-Lease, 1942.   The Bell P-39 Aircobra, one of the fighters the U.S. sent to the Soviet Union under Lend-Lease.    A Hawker Hurricane fighter sent for the Red Air Force.     Fleets of Studebaker, Ford and Chevrolet trucks sent to the Soviet Union under Lend-Lease.    U.S. jeeps sent to the Soviet Union under Lend-Lease made Life magazine.       The Western Allies sent millions of tons of food aid to the Soviet Union during World War 2.    The Red Army moved tanks to the front by rail, on flatcars, with locomotives often supplied by the U.S. Much of the rail was also supplied by the U.S.     The “Big Three,” Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin, at the Yalta Conference in 1945. Roosevelt was clearly unwell by this point. This conference decided the post-war division of Europe between West and East, meaning USSR. Maps Map 1: Lend-Lease shipping routes Lend-Lease shipping literally spanned the globe.   Map 2: The Arctic route (polar projection)      Map 3: The Persian Corridor. Ships arrived in Persian Gulf ports, then goods were transshipped by train through Iran to be loaded onto ships again at the Caspian Sea.    Map 4: The Pacific route.   Note the proximity to Japan as ships approach Vladivostok in the Russian Far East.     

The USSR’s answer to D-Day in June 1944 takes the Germans by surprise—and annihilates a whole army group. Map 1: The Vyborg-Petrozavodsk Offensive, the end of the Continuation War against Finland      Map 2: The "Byelorussian Balcony”      Map 3: Attack on Vitebsk     Map 4: Rokossovsky’s attack on Bobruisk   Map 5: Attack on Minsk     Photos Minsk, July 1944   Destroyed German armour on road to Minsk   German POWs in Moscow, July 1944   Soviet and Polish Home Army (AK) soldiers together in Vilnius, July 1944. The AK soldiers were then arrested by the NKVD and sent to Gulags.

Author Craig W.H. Luther joins us to compare two anniversaries on the same date, 22 June, three years apart: Operations Barbarossa in 1941, and Operation Bagration in 1944.  Craig W.H. Luther The First Day on the Eastern Front: Germany Invades the Soviet Union, June 22, 1941  Barbarossa Unleashed: The German Blitzkrieg through Central Russia to the Gates of Moscow, June–December 1941  Guderian’s Panzers: From Triumph to Defeat on the Eastern Front, 1941   Map 1: Operation Barbarossa, 22 June 1941   Map 2: The Byelorussian balcony, June 1944   Map 3: Operation Blue, summer 1942   Craig W.H. Luther Archive: https://www.barbarossa1941.com/

A major army, 400,000 strong, made a major difference in World War 2. Yet it doesn’t get enough attention in the West (nor, unfortunately, on this podcast). It’s the Armia Krajowa, the Polish Home Army. From exposing the Holocaust, to breaking the German Enigma Code, to helping destroy V-2 rockets, the AK bridged the Eastern and Western Fronts of the Second World War. Map 1: German invasion of Poland, September 1939 Map 2: Soviet invasion of Poland, September 1939 Historic photos Flag of the Armia Krajowa, Polish Home Army Gen. Michal Tadeusz Tokarzewski-Karaszewicz second-in-command of the Army of Warsaw Wladyslaw Sikorski, Prime Minister of Polish Government-in-Exile Elzbieta Zawacka, “Agent Zo" Elzbieta Zawacka’s story, Agent Zo by Clare Mulley   Jewish resistance fighters in the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, 1943   SS burns the Warsaw Ghetto, 1943   SS transports Jewish survivors of the Warsaw Ghetto to extermination camps AK fighters  Polish Boy Scouts in AK, 1944   Women members of AK   Enigma, the German coding machine The three Polish cryptologists who broke the German Enigma code: left to right, Marian Rejewski, Jerzy Rozycki, and Henryk Zygalski       Sources: Antony Beevor, The Second World War. London, UK: Little, Brown and Co., 2012.  Richard Lukas, The Forgotten Holocaust. New York: Hippocrene Books, 1986, and University of Kentucky Press, 1986. Home Army Museum/Muzeum Armii Krajowej, https://muzeum-ak.pl/ Wikipedia, various pages.

It’s been a year of stunning, swift change on the Eastern Front of World War 2. And momentous events are coming soon — so it’s high time for a recap of the past year. Links Episode 50: Looking back, taking stock https://beyondbarbarossa.podbean.com/e/looking-back-taking-stock-episode-50/ The Battle(s) of Kursk Episode 51: Summer 1943 planshttps://beyondbarbarossa.podbean.com/e/summer-1943-plans-season-3-opener-episdoe-51/ Episode 52: Zitadelle, the Battle of Kursk, Part 2https://beyondbarbarossa.podbean.com/e/zitadelle—the-battle-of-kursk-part-2-episode-52/ Episode 53: The Battle of Kursk, part 3https://beyondbarbarossa.podbean.com/e/the-battle-of-kursk-part-3-episode-53/ Episode 67: The Red Army has the momentum https://beyondbarbarossa.podbean.com/e/the-red-army-has-the-momentum-episode-67/ Friedrich Paulus, commander of the German 6th Army in 1942, the only German Field Marshal ever to surrender Maps Map 1: The Axis’ high-water mark, Europe Map 2: Axis’ high-water mark, Asia-Pacific Map 3: North Africa, summer 1942 Map 4: Germans advance to the Volga Map 5: Operation Winter Storm Map 6: 4th Battle of Kharkiv Map 7: Battle of Kursk Map 8: Operation Little Saturn Map 9: Rzhev Salient Map 10: Korsun/Cherkassy pocket Map 11: Crushing blows: the front lines in the Eastern Front, April 1944

On 2 May 1945, Red Army soldiers raised the Soviet Red Banner with hammer and sickle on the cupola of the Reichstag in Berlin. For the 80th anniversary of that famous photograph, Anthony Tucker-Jones joins the ‘cast to discuss the Fall of Berlin.   “Raising a Flag over the Reichstag” shows Red Army soldier Aleksei Kovalev hoisting the Red Banner over the cupola of the Reichstag. This was staged on 2 May 1945, after the Red Army had taken full control of the building.   Historian and author Anthony Tucker-Jones   Two of his books  Learn more about Anthony Tucker-Jones on his website.    Map 1: Three Red Army Fronts advance on Berlin   Map 2: The final battle for Berlin   Movies cited: Downfall, in German with subtitles Come and See, in Russian  

This episode, we jump forward for the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War in Europe. To guide us through the battles for Berlin, we are joined by the author of The Fall of Berlin: The Final Days of Hitler’s Evil Regime.  Author Anthony Tucker-Jones His website and books: https://atuckerjones.com/ Maps Map 1: The front lines, 15 April 1945    Map 2: The front lines, 1 May 1945     Map 3: Final operations, April-May 1945      Map 4: The Red Army’s Vistula-Oder offensive      Map 5: 1st Belorussian Front’s drive through the Seelow Heights to Berlin     Map 6: The battles for Berlin at the end of April 1945  Books     

In 1944, the Red Army delivers its third crushing blow on the Axis forces in eastern Europe: two major offensives to recapture the rest of Ukraine, and the Crimean peninsula.  Map 1: Northern Black Sea coast and southern Ukraine  The range where the two mighty blows were delivered. Ploesti, Romania is to the far left of the map, just north of Bucharest.   Map 2:    Map by Scott Bury   Map 3: The Red Army’s Crimean offensive, 1944   Image 1: Issa Pliyev, Commander, Cavalry-Mechanized Group     The Red Army, 4th Guards Cavalry Corps advancing across southern Ukraine, 1944   Miklós Horthy, Regent of Hungary, with Adolf Hitler in Budapest, 1938     The Red Army marches into “liberated” Odesa, 1944   Note the women soldiers in the ranks.  Sources: Prit Buttar, The Reckoning: The Defeat of Army Group South, 1944. Oxford, UK: Osprey Publishing, 2020. Evan Mawdsley, Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941–1945. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016. Anthony Tucker-Jones, Slaughter on the Eastern Front: Hitler and Stalin’s War 1941–1945. Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, The History Press, 2017.  Wikipedia: The Crimean Offensive https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crimean_offensive — The Odesa Offensive https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odessa_Offensive 

From the beginning of Russia’s illegal and brutal assault on sovereign Ukraine, Ukraine: The Latest has covered the war every week day. Francis Dearnley, Executive Editor for Audio for Ukraine: The Latest, joins the podcast to look at the historical links and parallels with the Eastern Front of World War 2. Francis Dearnley, Executive Editor for Audio, Ukraine: The Latest, from The Telegraph  Ukraine: The Latest, daily podcast from The Telegraph    David Knowles, creator of the Ukraine: The Latest podcast  Links Ukraine: The Latest on Apple https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/ukraine-the-latest/id1612424182 and available on all major podcast platforms. Francis Dearnley’s interview with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy  Winston Churchill’s World War II memoirs   Guy Sajer’s The Forgotten Soldier    Antony Beevor’s Berlin 1945 

Episode 63: at the end of 1943, the situation for nazi Germany and communist USSR on the Eastern Front is radically different from the end of 1942. Plus, the Cairo and Tehran Conferences promise to reshape the geo-political world. Map 1: The Red Army advances to, and past the Wotan Line Map 2: The front lines, 15 November 1943     Map 3: The front lines, 31 December 1943    Historical photos: The German Panther (Panzer V) vs. the Soviet T-34-85   Soviet photo loading artillery at Nikopol bridgehead Sources: Antony Beevor, The Second World War. London, UK: Little, Brown and Co., 2012.  Prit Buttar, Retribution: The Soviet Reconquest of Central Ukraine, 1943. Oxford, UK: Osprey Publishing, 2019. Evan Mawdsley, Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941–1945. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016.

Beyond Barbarossa is no longer the only podcast focusing on the Eastern Front of World War II. David Sumner, host and producer of the Europe at War podcast, joins to discuss the Battle of the Halbe Pocket.  The Europe at War podcast on all platforms: https://pohttps://tr.ee/faCigcYaE5   David Sumner, podcaster Map: The Battle of the Halbe Pocket, April 1945   Photos from David Sumner   The Halbe forest, 2025     A defensive hole dug in the floor of the Halbe Forest   A bullet shell with the round still inside it, the outer shell which corroded from being in the ground for eight decades.      The comb David Sumner found in the Halbe Forest   From the Halbe Pocket battle   General Theodor Busse     General Walther Wenke      Arden nazi Ferdinand Shorner 

Russian occupation of Ukraine today is not the first time. Here are some readings that can make it real for today’s listeners.  Map: Ukraine under occupation, 1941–1943 Source: Ukraine, A Historical Atlas by Paul Robert Magosci and Geoffrey J. Matthews Sources Lubomyr Luciuk, The Galicia Division: They Fought for Ukraine. The Kashtan Press, 2023. Scott Bury, Under the Nazi Heel. Ottawa, ON: The Written Word Communications Co., 2016.  

A special episode of Beyond Barbarossa. What happened in Washington DC on 28 February 2025 has echoes of 1938, and ominous omens for the future.

In January and February 1944, Stalin's "broad front" strategy takes hold and the Red Army gains the momentum in the war on the Eastern Front. Map 1: The Korsun-Cherkassy Pocket    Map 2: The Advance on Narva   Map 3: The Battle of Narva and Lake Peipus What looks like "Hapba" is Cyrillic script for "Narva." The inset shows the southern end of Lake Peipus and the Red Army's temporary  bridgehead on the west side. Map 4: The Panther Line      Map 5: The breakout to Lysyanka    Map 6a: The Eastern Front 15 January 1944   Map 6b: The Eastern Front 15 February 1944      Image 1: Ivan S. Konev, commander of the 2nd Ukrainian Front    Image 2: Nikolai Vatutin, commander of the 1st Ukrainian Front     Sources Antony Beevor, The Second World War. London, UK: Little, Brown and Co., 2012.  Evan Mawdsley, Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941–1945. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016. Orest Subtelny, Ukraine: A History. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1988. Anthony Tucker-Jones, Slaughter on the Eastern Front: Hitler and Stalin's War 1941–1945. Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK: The History Press, 2017. Wikipedia, various pages.             

The first two of ten "crushing blows" against the German invaders of the USSR in 1944: Zhitomyr and Leningrad.   Map 1: The Zhitomyr-Berdichiv Offensive    Map 2: Cherkassy or Kherson Pocket     Map 3: Leningrad, 1941–1943 Map 4: Leningrad lifeline     Map 5: Operation Iskra    Map 6: Operation Polar Star    Map 7: Liberation of Leningrad, push to Panther Line   Sources Antony Beevor, The Second World War. London, UK: Little, Brown and Co., 2012.  Evan Mawdsley, Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941–1945. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016. Anna Reid, Leningrad: Tragedy of a City Under Siege, 1941–44. Toronto: Allen Lane Canada, 2011. Anthony Tucker-Jones, Slaughter on the Eastern Front: Hitler and Stalin's War 1941–1945. Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK: The History Press, 2017. Prit Buttar, Retribution: The Soviet Reconquest of Central Ukraine, 1943. Oxford, UK: Osprey Publishing, 2019.

What was the USSR doing between September 1939 and June 1941? It was allied with nazi Germany, of course. Historian Roger Moorhouse, author of books including The Devils' Alliance, describes the lasting impact of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, and the strategic factors that ended it.  Roger Moorhouse   The Devils' Alliance    Roger Moorhouse's books: https://www.rogermoorhouse.com/books  Map: The division of eastern Europe according to the secret protocols of the pact 

The nazi-Soviet non-aggression pact of 1939 gave Hitler and the nazis the green light to invade Poland and start World War 2. Two weeks later, Stalin's Red Army joined the nazis in dismembering Poland.  Historian and author Roger Moorhouse has dived deep into this notorious but poorly understood alignment in The Devils' Alliance: Hitler's Pact with Staline, 1939–1941. He joins the podcast in a two-part discussion of the importance of the agreement between the 20th century's two bloodiest tyrannies. Roger Moorhouse   The Devils' Alliance   Roger Moorhouse's books: https://www.rogermoorhouse.com/books   The famous  cartoon by David Low   Hitler: "The scum of the earth, I believe?" Stalin: "The bloody assassin of the workers, I presume?" Map: The division of eastern Europe according to the secret protocols of the pact