With this authorisation, O. K.H., between the 19th and the end of February, effected the evacuation of the "fortress” of Demy’ansk, which was linked to the 16th Army’s front line only by a narrow corridor under constant threat. The withdrawal was an orderly one and permitted a front line economy of seven divisions.
Next, starting on March 2, Operation "Buffie”, whereby 30 divisions of the German 4th and 9th Armies withdrew 100 miles, was set in motion. Once again, the actual manoeuvre failed to justify the Fiihrer’s apprehensions, feigned or real. Rzhev, Gzhatsk, then Vyaz’ma were one after the other evacuated in the course of a manoeuvre which lasted more than three weeks, without the Russians, who in the event were considerably delayed by numerous minefields, showing themselves particularly aggressive. The evacuation of the salient, which had a front of410 miles, was completed on March 25. Field-Marshal von Kluge was thus able to deploy his armies along a front slightly less than half as long (230 miles), thus releasing 14 divisions.
Two comments seem appropriate here. Firstly, that the 21 divisions pulled back out of salients, in February and March 1943, were more or less equivalent in numbers to the Rumanian 3rd Army and the Italian 8th Army, whose destruction had sealed the fate of the German 6th Army in the Stalingrad pocket. What might the result have been if it had been they who were called on to reinforce Army Group "B” when Paulus reached the Volga? The question is one of pure speculation, however. Secondly, if the Rzhev salient was defended by one division for every 16 miles of front, Operation "Buffie”, which left Kluge with 16 divisions in order to hold 240 miles, made no appreciable difference to his own situation (15 miles per division). And proof of this would be given no later than July 13 following, on the occasion of the
Soviet offensive directed against the Orel salient. But how could anything else have been done?
World History
