The battle of Senno (or Lepelsky counterattack) that took place on July 6–10, 1941 remained virtually unknown to the descendants, although in terms of the number of tanks involved in it, it was comparable in scale to the battle of Prokhorovka during the Battle of Kursk. Like other activities of the Red Army of that period, this operation was another unsuccessful attempt to stop the German offensive at the initial stage of the Great Patriotic War. Largely precisely because of the failure of the Soviet counterattack in Belarus, he remained an undeservedly rarely mentioned episode of the fierce campaign of the summer-autumn of 1941.
Circumstances of the operation
The bloody battle near Senno was the last attempt of the Red Army to counter-attack with tank units. After the battle, the mechanized corps ended, and further efforts to seize the initiative from the enemy in 1941 came down to attacks by infantry formations. The second week of the war ended, and the Germans had already passed 500 kilometers - half the way from the border to Moscow. When the battle of Senno began, the stunning Wehrmacht offensive had already shifted the front line to Vitebsk and Orsha.
The high command of the German army from the very beginning chose the central sector of the Eastern Front as the main direction of attack on the Soviet Union. Army Group Center was deployed here - in some respects it exceeded the other two Groups South and North combined. The mechanized units of the Germans consisted of the 2nd and 3rd Panzer Group - in total, they had 7 motorized and 9 panzer divisions at their disposal.
Such a scale of the offensive made it possible to carry out deep coverage and encirclement of Soviet troops. Parts of the Western Front were indeed quickly defeated. By July 3, the Germans suppressed the last hotbeds of coordinated resistance. Soviet losses were huge - about two-thirds of all front formations. In the divisions leaving the “cauldrons”, 1–2 thousand people remained. All heavy weapons were lost (aircraft, tanks, artillery). The equipment was thrown right on the roads. The command of the front for this failure was arrested and shot (including General Dmitry Pavlov). In such circumstances, the battle of Senno began. 1941 was the worst year of the war, and the planned counteroffensive promised to be no less serious in terms of human losses than previous attempts to stop the German offensive.
Counterattack plan
The idea of ​​the Lepel counterattack was to attack the tank units of the Wehrmacht before they were to be joined by infantry formations stretching from Minsk. This plan was consistent with one of the key military principles - to smash the enemy in pieces. In addition, the experience of the first two weeks of the confrontation with the Germans showed that a chain of rifle divisions fights tank attacks is extremely inefficient. Therefore, it seemed more logical to take a preemptive strike against the stretched forces of the Wehrmacht. This was supposed to be the battle of Senno in terms of strategy.
July 1941 was not the worst time for a counteroffensive in the region. Most of the German forces did not move east, but northeast - the Wehrmacht leadership sought to force the Western Dvina as quickly as possible . Only two enemy divisions (17th and 7th Panzer) remained in the Soviet strike zone, although they represented a formidable force.
On the eve of the battle
In the evening of July 4, Semyon Tymoshenko (who became the commander of the Western Front that day), German Malandin and Lev Mehlis approved a directive that set the task of preparing a counterattack in the direction of Ostrovno and Senno. The final point of the offensive was Lepel, who gave the name of the entire operation. However, already at the planning stage of the counterattack, the leadership of the Western Front made a serious mistake. The enemy’s capabilities were incorrectly assessed, which was clearly demonstrated by the battle of Senno. Photos from the epicenter of the battle during that operation were almost gone, but from one loss you can understand that the Red Army formations failed their mission.
The command of the Western Front was in a hurry to organize a counterattack also because time worked for the enemy. A week later, the German infantry divisions, having completed the encirclement of the Minsk and Bialystok "cauldrons", were supposed to approach the front line. In this case, the balance of power radically changed. Every day the Red Army found itself in an increasingly difficult situation, and delaying even several hours was extremely expensive.
The 7th mechanized corps prepared for the counterattack under the command of Vinogradov advanced west from the Moscow Military District on June 24. Cars on wheels set off on their own, and tracked vehicles were loaded onto railway platforms. On the way, the mechanized corps received new tasks several times, as the situation in Belarus changed too quickly.
Balance of power
The German 7th Panzer Division was notable for its rare structure. It included 4 battalions. The number of tanks was a record for the entire Eastern Front - 265 combat units, of which 25 were lost in two weeks of fighting. However, the Soviet 7th mechanized corps included twice as many cars.
Most of the fleet of the German division consisted of Czech-made Skoda models produced in 1938. These light tanks had a 37 mm cannon and a body assembled with rivets and bolts. When an enemy shell hit, these elements came off and injured the crew. So it’s extremely difficult to call “Skoda” a technical miracle. In addition to them were still light PZ-II. They were armed with small 20 mm guns. In the Soviet units were present KV and T-34. Technical characteristics allowed them to shoot this entire park in a shootout with the above-described German models, costing minimal losses. It was a similar battle in the picture that the artist Nikolai Nazarchuk demonstrated. The “Battle of Senno” of the Belarusian master became one of the most recognizable illustrations of that battle.
Artillery and infantry
In tank divisions, tanks were “spearheads,” but any such formation also needed a “pole” — infantry and artillery. What was the condition of these units in German divisions? The artillery regiment consisted of 36 guns - for the most part howitzers and several cannons. These figures were much more modest than the Soviet ones. Two tank divisions had almost a hundred guns. A similar ratio was in the infantry: 15 infantry battalions of the Red Army versus 4 at the Wehrmacht.
In the area of ​​advance of the 7th mechanized corps, Soviet numerical superiority was twofold, and that of the 5th mechanized corps was seven to eightfold. A large number of tanks later became an occasion to compare the battle of Senno with the famous Prokhorovsky battle during the Battle of Kursk in 1943.
The 5th mechanized corps had a unique structure in its own way - two additional artillery regiments were attached to it. These units were added from the reserve forces of the Western Front. They were also called corps artillery regiments. An important feature of these formations was the presence of heavy 122 mm and 152 mm caliber howitzers. They created not only mathematical, but also qualitative superiority over enemy artillery.
The battle of Senno could have ended even faster if the Germans had not left in Borisov two of their motorized infantry battalions, a tank battalion and an anti-tank division. These units remained to guard the strategically important crossing across the Berezina. These units were near Senno only on July 7, reducing the numerical superiority of the 5th mechanized corps to two-fold.
Counterattack
July 5, 1941 began preparations for the battle of Senno. The 14th Panzer Division and the 7th Mechanized Corps made a 40-kilometer march and took the initial positions for the proposed counterattack. It was the Ostrovno-Gnezdilovichi-Svetogory region, 10 kilometers east of the Chernogostnitsa River. The other 18th Panzer Division was somewhat delayed. By noon the next day, she concentrated on both sides of the Obolyanka River. The 5th mechanized corps took up positions in the Orsha area.
On July 6, the battle of Senno entered an active phase. Two detachments were formed in the 14th Panzer Division (each included a company of tanks and a motorized infantry battalion). These formations attempted to force Montenegrin and stay on the west bank of the river. One detachment really managed to leave behind a small bridgehead near Lake Sarro. At this time, the forces of the 18th Panzer Division approached the eastern outskirts of Senno and there entered into a stubborn battle with the Germans. In the evening, the enemy was driven out of the city. On this section of the front, Soviet troops went on the defensive. It was their only success for the entire duration of the operation.
Disruption of plans
On July 7, the tank battle at Senno continued. All the previous night, Soviet soldiers were preparing crossings at Montenegro. In the morning, units of the 14th Panzer Division advanced along them to the west bank of the key river. Progress choked after 4 kilometers. Tanks collided with the main forces of the 7th tank division of the Wehrmacht. Soviet units suffered heavy losses and rolled back to the original east coast. Then they returned to Ostrovno and began to evacuate their material part.
Meanwhile, the Germans from the north launched an attack on Senno, where the 18th Panzer Division was defending. The Red Army left the city by noon on July 8th. At this time, the 5th mechanized corps fought a fierce battle with enemy tanks 20 kilometers south of Senno. He managed to break the German column, but the ensuing counterattack restored the status quo.
On July 9, the 14th and 18th Panzer Divisions retreated to the eastern shore of Obolyanka. The Germans from the captured Senno began to advance to the highway to Smolensk. On the 10th, advance detachments entered Oboltsy. By noon, the Germans traveled 40 kilometers and reached the motorway 30 kilometers west of Orsha. The Soviet 5th Mechanized Corps faced the threat of complete encirclement. His command decided to retreat, the remnants of the tank divisions did the same.
Results and causes of failure
So, the tank battle near Senno for the Soviet army ended in nothing. The troops did not fulfill any of the tasks assigned to them. Failed to go half way to Lepel. According to the plan, the main blow was inflicted on the flank of the Polotsk group of Germans, but it did not suffer any losses - they simply did not reach it. Over an incomplete week of fighting, about 70% of the equipment was lost. The remnants of the tank divisions lost their combat effectiveness and continued to roll eastward until they finally disappeared into the "cauldron" near Smolensk.
What was the reason for this failure? On July 17, 1914, near the village of Liozno in the Vitebsk region, senior lieutenant Yakov Dzhugashvili, the son of Joseph Stalin, was captured. During interrogation, he complained about the terrible air attacks of the German junkers. The same point of view was upheld in the command reports to Moscow. Later, she migrated to Soviet historiography and for a long time was considered an indisputable truth. The main reason why the battle of Senno was lost was considered to be the all-devastating and ubiquitous German aircraft, which dived and dropped bombs on the Red Army from morning to night.
However, in reality, everything was much more complicated. Affected by the inability of the command to maneuver and establish communication between various formations. In addition, the Red Army simply did not have experience in conducting such large-scale operations, while the Wehrmacht came to the USSR, having many victories in Europe. All this made the numerical and qualitative superiority of the Soviet troops useless.
The condition of the command staff was undermined after the recent repression. Most of the experienced military personnel, including those who went through the civil war, were shot or sat in camps. This could not affect how the battle of Senno ended. The consequences of rush and wrong decisions at the first stage of the war were reflected in many failures on the Western Front. This trend spread not only to the Lepel counterattack, but also to the entire 1941 campaign.
Losses
In terms of losses, the battle of Senno 1941 corresponded to the typical proportions of that war. The Germans lost about 4 wounded per 1 killed (a total of 468 casualties). About 50 pieces of equipment (tanks) were lost. The biggest losses fell on the battle with the 5th mechanized corps near Senno July 7 - 9.
The Soviet forces had completely different numbers. The 5th and 7th mechanized corps lost almost all of their tanks (in total more than 1,000 units, which is about 20 times more than the enemy). Even today, historians have not exactly been able to figure out where that technique went. The figures that fell into the reports of the command of the Red Army often did not correspond to reality and because of this they can not be reduced to the data of the Germans.
Nevertheless, it is known for sure that when the tank battle near Senno 1941 ended, in the 18th tank division there were no 220 tanks left, in the 14th - 14 tanks remained, in the 13th 5 out of 393 tanks. At the same time, things were better with cars. For example, in the 14th division there are 34 cars and 475 trucks, as well as 56 gas tanks.
Reporting and Facts
The personal losses of the Soviet formations, as in the case of the German ones, fully corresponded to the proportions of the terrible for the USSR in 1941. For example, according to an official report in the same 14th Panzer Division, 193 people were killed, 359 were injured, and more than 3 thousand people were reported missing. However, these figures are in doubt today. They contradict the fact that the regiment was armed with only 552 small arms (rifles) on July 25, while according to the report more than 5 thousand people should remain in the ranks without replenishment.
The monstrous gap between facts and reports can be explained only by the desire of the leadership of the formations to hide and retouch their failures in front of the authorities. At the initial stage of the war, such stories were commonplace. The battle of Senno was no exception. The losses of the Red Army and the Wehrmacht in any case were incommensurable, and it is this indicator that most clearly demonstrates the catastrophe of the beginning of the Great Patriotic War.