L'avis de David Glantz qui est loin d'être le dernier venu (désolé si c'est en engliche...)
The Soviet-German War 1941-45 : Myths and Realities : A survey Essay
# The Warsaw Uprising:
No case of Red Army action or inaction on the Soviet-German front has generated
more heated controversy then its operations east of Warsaw in August and September
1944 during the Polish Home Army’s Warsaw uprising against German occupation
forces. While most Western historians have routinely accused Stalin of perfidy and
deliberate treachery in permitting the Germans to destroy the Warsaw Poles, Russian
historians counter by asserting the Red Army made every reasonable attempt to assist the
beleaguered Poles.
In fact, in late July 1944 the Stavka ordered its 2nd Tank Army to race northward
to Warsaw with the 47th Army and a cavalry corps in its wake. After encountering two
Wehrmacht divisions defending the southern approaches to Warsaw, the tank army tried
to bypass the German defenses from the northeast but ran into a counterstroke by four
Wehrmacht panzer divisions, which severely mauled the tank army and forced it to
withdraw on 5 August. During the ensuing weeks, while the Warsaw uprising began,
matured, but ultimately failed, the forces on the 1st Belorussian Front’s right wing
continued their advance against Army Group Center northeast of Warsaw. For whatever
motive, however, the forces on the 1st Belorussian Front’s right wing focused on
defending the Magnuszew bridgehead south of Warsaw, which was being subjected to
heavy German counterattacks throughout mid-August, and the forces on the front’s left
wing continued their advance to the Bug River north of Warsaw and attempted to seize
crossings over the river necessary to facilitate future offensive operations.
Throughout the entire period up to 20 August 1944, the 1st Belorussian Front’s
47th Army remained the only major Red Army forces deployed across the Vistula River
opposite Warsaw. On that date the 1st Polish Army joined it. Red Army forces north of
Warsaw finally advanced across the Bug River on 3 September, closed up to the Narew
River the following day, and fought their way into bridgeheads across the Narew on 6
September. Lead elements of two Polish divisions finally assaulted across the Vistula
River into Warsaw on 13 September but made little progress and were evacuated back
across the river ten days later.
Political considerations and motivations aside, an objective consideration of
combat in the Warsaw region indicates that, prior to early September, German resistance
was sufficient to halt any Soviet assistance to the Poles in Warsaw, were it intended.
Thereafter, it would have required a major reorientation of military efforts from
Magnuszew in the south or, more realistically, from the Bug and Narew River axis in the
north in order to muster sufficient force to break into Warsaw. And once broken into,
Warsaw would have been a costly city to clear of Germans and an unsuitable location
from which to launch a new offensive.
Carte Opération Bagration de Jean Lopez
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