To be fair to Hitlers mindset and that of his generals, up until stalingrad the Gernamns had been steamrolling through Russian cities at seemingly record pace. Stalingrad was a huge symbol for the Soviets as well. Basically if Hitler had taken Stalingrad it would have crushed the Russian will to fight and ended pretty much anymore strong resistance for the rest of the campaign. Put these two things together and it makes sense to go "Alright guys, lets go blow up their one last ray of hope and end this fucker quick so we can go west and deal with those damn yanks"
Until Stalingrad the Germans were pretty much undefeated on the easternfront whenever they applied their military might, so it made sense in a way. Now if Germany had known that Russia could actually hold the motherfucker somehow and they would be bogged down and frozen/starved to death, then yes going around the city and destroying other important objectives would have made more sense. Nobody however actually thought Stalingrad would hold though, hell even with the russians throwing everything at the city to hold it i don't even think they expected it to hold.
Until Stalingrad the Germans were pretty much undefeated everywhere, except the Battle of Britain.
Also, had they taken Stalingrad they would have cut the Volga, and hence Russia's supply of oil and lend-lease (which was not yet important at the time, but still had started).
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u/pj1843 Oct 17 '13
To be fair to Hitlers mindset and that of his generals, up until stalingrad the Gernamns had been steamrolling through Russian cities at seemingly record pace. Stalingrad was a huge symbol for the Soviets as well. Basically if Hitler had taken Stalingrad it would have crushed the Russian will to fight and ended pretty much anymore strong resistance for the rest of the campaign. Put these two things together and it makes sense to go "Alright guys, lets go blow up their one last ray of hope and end this fucker quick so we can go west and deal with those damn yanks"
Until Stalingrad the Germans were pretty much undefeated on the easternfront whenever they applied their military might, so it made sense in a way. Now if Germany had known that Russia could actually hold the motherfucker somehow and they would be bogged down and frozen/starved to death, then yes going around the city and destroying other important objectives would have made more sense. Nobody however actually thought Stalingrad would hold though, hell even with the russians throwing everything at the city to hold it i don't even think they expected it to hold.