The final destruction of the German pocket at Stalingrad was to involve seven armies commanded by Rokossovsky?s Don Front. Three of these were transferred from Yeremenko?s Stalingrad Front, which on 1 January 1943 was renamed the South Front. This was to continue the attacks against von Manstein.

The final destruction of the German pocket at Stalingrad
30 December 1942 Stavka directive that the attack at Stalingrad was to take place on 6 January.
On 3 January, because of delays in deploying troops and moving up supplies, Rokossovsky and the Stavka representative with the Don and Voronezh Fronts, Nikolai Voronov, asked for postponement. Stalin grudgingly allowed them foe days.

8 January 1943 Rokossovsky offered Paul us surrender terms, which were rejected.

10 January Soviet offensive opened.
This was aimed at rolling up the pocket from west to east. Sixty-Fifth Army advanced five miles on the first day, despite determined German counter-attacks, but in the north and south progress was slower.

12 January The western nose of the pocket overrun.
It cost the Don Front 26,000 casualties and half its force of 257 tanks. German casualties were also high.

13 January Karpovka airfield captured.
This was the most westerly of the seven airfields in the pocket.

14 January Hitler ordered Field Marshal Erhard Milch to take over the air resupply of the Stalingrad pocket.
Because of the increasing distance to Stalingrad on account of the continuing Soviet attacks against von Manstein and losses in aircraft, the daily supply of the pocket had dropped to 40 tons. Milch was Secretary of State for Air and Goering?s deputy, with a high reputation as an organizer. He joined von Manstein at his HO at Taganrog two days later.

16 January Pitomnik airfield overrun.
This was the only airfield with a night flying capability. A day later only Gumrak was still in German hands. From now on, air supply had to rely increasingly on parachuted containers because of the problems of landing at Gumrak. Milch did, however, manage to increase the tonnage supplied to 60 per day. One additional airstrip was hastily constructed.

17 January Rokossovsky wanted a pause of 2-3 days in the attacks.
This was so that he could regroup. The attacks continued, however. By this stage conditions within the pocket were becoming increasingly grave. Food was desperately short. This and the extreme cold inflicted the defenders with ever greater lethargy. It was now hardly possible to evacuate the wounded, and many of them died. None the less there were still enough officers and men who were determined to fight on.

22 January The final phase of the assault on the German pocket began.
Paulus sent a signal to Hitler emphasizing his desperate shortage of food and ammunition and hinting at surrender, but Hitler refused to countenance this. The airfield at Gumrak fell and forward elements of the Soviet Twenty-First Army made contact with Chuikov?s sixty-second Army, which had been tying down German forces in Stalingrad itself. The Sixth Army was now split into two small pockets in the north and south of the city.

23 January The last German aircraft flew out of the pocket.
It was an He I I I and carried nineteen wounded and seven bags of mail. From now on, all supplies, had to be air-dropped.

24 January Hitler forbade any break-out, even by small groups of men.
In the southern pocket, Paulus moved his HQ into the basement of the Univermag department store. Such was the shortage of food that Paulus laid down that no food should be given to the wounded and sick, of whom there were now some 30,000.

Night of 29/30 January Milch succeeded in flying-in 124 aircraft to drop supplies into the pocket.
This constituted the highest number of sorties flown for some time, but was too late to affect the inevitable course of events

30 January Special radio broadcast by Goering on the anniversary of Hitler's accession to power.
'A thousand years hence Germans will speak of this battle with reverence and awe.' Paulus signaled Hitler: 'The swastika flag is still flying above Stalingrad. May our battle be an example to the present and coming generations, that they must never capitulate even in a hopeless situation, for them Germany will emerge victorious.' Hitler now decided to promote Paulus to Field Marshal in the hope that he would commit suicide rather than surrender. A number of other officers in the pocket were also promoted.

31 January Paulus surrendered.
This happened at 19:45 hours local time and after the Univermag building had been surrounded, it was Vassili Chuikov?s Sixty-Second Army which had the honour of accepting his surrender. The northern pocket continued to fight on.

2 February The northern pocket surrendered.
This had been reduced to a small area around the Tractor Works and was subjected to a final massive bombardment with a density of guns of no less than 300 per kilometre. The battle for Stalingrad was now over.

3 February Hitler announced the fall of Stalingrad to the German people.
He declared four days of mourning, with the closure of all places of entertainment.

The Germans lost 110,000 killed during the battle and a further 91,000 were made prisoner. No details of the total Soviet casualties are available, but they were high. Of the Germans captured at Stalingrad, some were put to work rebuilding the city, while the others were marched east and ended up in camps from the Arctic Circle down to the borders with Afghanistan. Many died as a result of a typhus epidemic in spring 1943 and others of exhaustion and lack of food. Eventually only some 5,000 returned to Germany long after the war was over. Some high-ranking prisoners, including Paulus himself, disillusioned by what they viewed as Hitler?s betrayal of them, were eventually persuaded by the Russians to make propaganda broadcasts to encourage German troops to surrender. Stalingrad was undoubtedly a major turning-point. not just on the Eastern Front but of the whole war. It was a dramatic reverse for German arms, but need never have happened if Hitler had been less obstinate. For the German armies on the Eastern Front, however, there was little time to grieve, for they were now having to deal with renewed Soviet offensives in the Caucacus and Ukraine.