15. German Commanders Were Frequently Outgeneralled by their Soviet Counterparts
Examples of the Soviets outgeneraling the Germans include Operation Uranus in 1942, which surprised the Germans and cost them an army at Stalingrad. They also include Operation Bagration in 1944, which wrong-footed the Germans, shattered their Army Group Center, and cost the Wehrmacht about 500,000 casualties. Indeed, during the first year of the war, particularly after the Red Army’s huge losses in Operation Barbarossa, the Germans frequently outnumbered the Soviets on the Eastern Front.
The Soviets eventually gained a numerical superiority and steadily widened the gap. However, they had not enjoyed numerical superiority throughout the entire conflict, and they did manage to hold on when they were outnumbered. By the war’s late stages, the Soviets achieved significant numerical superiority during offensive operations, but it was not because of unlimited manpower, but because Soviet commanders had grown adept at concentration of force, and because the necessary logistics had improved significantly.
