Battle of the Kerch Peninsula

Battle of the Kerch Peninsula
Part of the Crimean campaign during the Eastern Front of World War II
German bombs fall on the Kerch Peninsula, May 1942 45.260752231734244, 35.46772926230884
Date 26 December 1941 – 19 May 1942 (4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days) Location Crimea, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union Result Axis victory
Belligerents
Germany Romania	Soviet Union
Commanders and leaders
Erich von Manstein W. F. von Richthofen	Dimitri Kozlov Lev Mekhlis Filipp Oktyabrsky
Units involved
11th Army 8th Air Corps	Caucasus Front[a] Crimean Front 44th Army 47th Army 51st Army Separate Coastal Army Air Force of the Crimean Front Black Sea Fleet
Strength
8 May 1942: 232,549 men (2 May)[1] 200 tanks[2] 57 assault guns[3] 800+ aircraft[4] 95,000 men (2 May)[1]	8 May 1942: 249,800 men[5] 238 tanks[6] 404 aircraft (Air Force of the Crimean Front)[4]
Casualties and losses
38,362 Breakdown Kerch losses: 21 December – 31 December: 6,654 men[7] 1,108 killed 5,287 wounded 259 missing January 1942 – April 1942: 24,120 men[8] 8 May 1942 – 19 May 1942: 7,588 men[9] 1,703 killed or captured 5,885 wounded 8–12 tanks destroyed[10][9] 3 assault guns destroyed[10] 9 artillery pieces destroyed[10] 37 aircraft destroyed[11]	570,601 Breakdown Kerch losses: 26 December – 2 January: 41,935 men[12] 32,453 killed or captured 9,482 wounded or sick 1 January 1942 – 30 April 1942: 352,000 men[13][8] 8 May 1942 – 19 May 1942: 176,566 men[5] 162,282 killed or captured 14,284 wounded or sick 258 tanks destroyed 1,133 guns lost 417 aircraft destroyed (315 from Air Force of the Crimean Front)[11]

The Battle of the Kerch Peninsula, which commenced with the Soviet Kerch-Feodosia Landing Operation (Russian: Керченско-Феодосийская десантная операция, Kerchensko-Feodosiyskaya desantnaya operatsiya) and ended with the German Operation Bustard Hunt (German: Unternehmen Trappenjagd), was a World War II battle between Erich von Manstein's German and Romanian 11th Army and the Soviet Crimean Front forces in the Kerch Peninsula, in the eastern part of the Crimean Peninsula. It began on 26 December 1941, with an amphibious landing operation by two Soviet armies intended to break the Siege of Sevastopol. Axis forces first contained the Soviet beachhead throughout the winter and interdicted its naval supply lines through aerial bombing. From January through April, the Crimean Front launched repeated offensives against the 11th Army, all of which failed with heavy losses. The Red Army lost 352,000 men in the attacks, while the Axis suffered 24,120 casualties. Superior German artillery firepower was largely responsible for the Soviet debacle.^[14]

On 8 May 1942, the Axis struck with great force in a major counteroffensive codenamed Trappenjagd which concluded by around 19 May 1942 with the liquidation of the Soviet defending forces. Manstein used a large concentration of airpower, heavily armed infantry divisions, concentrated artillery bombardments and amphibious assaults to break through the Soviet front in its southern portion in 210 minutes, swing north with the 22nd Panzer Division to encircle the Soviet 51st Army on 10 May and annihilate it on 11 May. The remnants of the 44th and 47th armies were pursued to Kerch, where the last pockets of organized Soviet resistance were eradicated through German aerial and artillery firepower by 19 May. The decisive element in the German victory was the campaign of airstrikes against the Crimean Front by Wolfram von Richthofen's 800 aircraft VIII. Fliegerkorps, which flew an average of 1,500 sorties per day in support of Trappenjagd and constantly attacked Soviet field positions, armored units, troop columns, medical evacuation ships, airfields, and supply lines.^[15] German bombers used up to 6,000 canisters of SD-2 anti-personnel cluster munitions to kill masses of fleeing Soviet infantrymen.

Manstein's outnumbered 11th Army suffered 7,588 casualties, while the Crimean Front lost 176,566 men, 258 tanks, 1,133 artillery pieces and 315 aircraft in three armies comprising twenty-one divisions.^[16] Total Soviet casualties during the five-month-long battle amounted to 570,000 men, while Axis losses were 38,000. Trappenjagd was one of the battles immediately preceding the German summer offensive (Case Blue). Its successful conclusion allowed the Axis to concentrate their forces on Sevastopol, which was conquered within six weeks. The Kerch Peninsula was used as a launching pad by German forces to cross the Kerch Strait on 2 September 1942 during Operation Blücher II, a part of the German drive to capture the Caucasus oilfields.

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