Reaping Rewards

In the sector of the Russian 1st and 3rd Guards Armies the Axis defensive lines on the Don and the Chir Rivers had been shattered. As Russian mobile formations poured through the line and into Axis rear areas, various formations were cut off. The Romanian 7th Infantry Division …

1942-12-20

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AP045

In the sector of the Russian 1st and 3rd Guards Armies the Axis defensive lines on the Don and the Chir Rivers had been shattered. As Russian mobile formations poured through the line and into Axis rear areas, various formations were cut off. The Romanian 7th Infantry Division was one of these. Since the opening of the LITTLE SATURN offensive this division had been steadily driven back. As the front lines evaporated on December 19th, the 1st Guards Mechanized Brigade and 197th Rifle Division encircled the Romanian Division at the town of Kruzhilin. The next day the Russians launched concentric attacks on the surrounded Romanians.

Kruzhilin, Russia

Operation Saturn, revised as Operation Little Saturn, was a Red Army operation on the Eastern Front of World War II that led to battles in the North Caucasus and Donets Basin regions of the Soviet Union from December 1942 to February 1943. The success of Operation Uranus, launched on 19 November 1942, had trapped 250,000–300,000 troops of General Friedrich Paulus' German 6th Army and parts of General Hoth’s 4th Panzer Army in Stalingrad. To exploit this victory, the Soviet general staff planned a winter campaign of continuous and highly ambitious offensive operations, codenamed "Saturn". Later Joseph Stalin reduced his ambitious plans to a relatively small campaign codenamed "Operation Little Saturn". The offensive succeeded in smashing Germany's Italian and Hungarian allies, applied pressure on the over stretched German forces in Eastern Ukraine and prevented further German advances to the relief of the entrapped forces at Stalingrad. Despite these victories, the Soviets themselves became over extended, setting up the stages for the German offensives of the Third Battle of Kharkov and the Battle of Kursk.

Russian

Romanian

Scenario Type = Standard