Background
The Red Army had encircled the Wehrmacht's 6th Army in Stalingrad with Operation Uranus, begun on 19 November 1942. By the middle of December, the German relief effort, Operation Winter Storm, reached within 48 km of the encirclement ring, and the airlift trying to supply the encircled army was in full swing. In this situation, STAVKA decided to launch Operation Little Saturn, to encircle all of German Army Group A, by penetrating to the south and the coast of the Sea of Azov. The danger this operation created was so serious that the German command had to give up any hope of relieving the 6th Army, and instead turned its attention to fighting the advancing Red Army formations, while simultaneously trying to move as many formations as possible to the west. As a consequence of the threat, the most potent of the German divisions involved in the relief effort, 6th Panzer Division, was turned west, and ordered to first clear the raiding force from Tatsinskaya, and later to establish a new frontline towards the north of the airfield. With that decision, any hope of breaking through to 6th Army had vanished.
Read more about this topic: Tatsinskaya Raid
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