The Nikopol–Krivoi Rog offensive (), known on the German side as the winter battles of the 6th Army in the great Dnieper bend in the Nikopol bridgehead and in the area of Nikopol - Apostolovo - Krivoy RogArmee-Oberkommando 6, Ia, Mai 1944. Die Winterschlachten der 6. Armee im großen Dnjepr-Bogen im Brückenkopf Nikopol und im Raum Nikopol - Apostolowo - Kriwoj-Rog vom 10.1. bis 18.2.1944. Bearbeitet durch KTB Führer, Major Dr. Franck. Bundesarchiv-Militärarchiv (BA-MA) 20-6/358, fol. 1. (), was an offensive by the Red Army's 3rd Ukrainian Front and elements of the 4th Ukrainian Front against the German 6th Army in the area of Nikopol and Krivoi Rog in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast in central Ukraine between 30 January and . It took place on the Eastern Front of World War II and was part of the wider Dnieper–Carpathian offensive, a Soviet attack against Army Group South to retake the rest of Ukraine that fell to Germany in 1941.

Following the Soviet advance to the Dnieper in the Battle of the Dnieper during late 1943, German forces managed to hold to the Nikopol bridgehead on the left bank of the Dnieper, the area of manganese ore mines of crucial importance to German war production that Adolf Hitler insisted on holding.

In November and December, the 3rd and 4th Ukrainian Fronts conducted multiple unsuccessful attacks against the bridgehead, a salient centered around the supply base and rail junction of Apostolovo, and German troops in the Krivoi Rog area. Following another failed attack in mid-January, the Nikopol–Krivoy Rog offensive was launched by the 3rd Ukrainian Front to the north of the salient on 30 January, and elements of the 4th Ukrainian Front to the south of it joined in a day later.

The Soviet troops broke through the 6th Army's lines, capturing Apostolovo on 5 February, splitting the army in half. Nikopol fell on 8 February, but despite heavy losses the troops in the bridgehead, including the German IV Army Corps, were able to retreat across the Dnieper. The IV Army Corps launched an unsuccessful counterattack against Apostolovo around this time, resulting in a temporary Soviet pause in order to prepare for the advance against Krivoi Rog, in the northwest portion of the salient.

Two armies of the 3rd Ukrainian Front began the advance towards that city on 17 February, and captured it on 22 February. Other armies from the front then resumed the advance and captured several bridgeheads over the Inhulets river, which became the next German defensive line. Fighting in the area died down, but the Soviet gains paved the way for subsequent advances during the second phase of the Dnieper–Carpathian offensive. The offensive resulted in the loss of the German salient and at least 25,000 total casualtiesSee aftermath section. being inflicted on the units of 6th Army in the fighting. Due to heavy personnel and material losses, most of the divisions of the 6th Army were greatly reduced in their combat effectiveness after this offensive,Der Oberbefehlshaber der 6. Armee A.H.Qu., 20. Februar 1944. Zusammenfassende Stellungnahme zu den monatlichen Zustandsberichten. NARA T312, R1497, F000661-64. being fit for limited defensive operations only.Armeeoberkommando 6, Ia. Werturteile zu den wöchentlichen Zustandberichten vom 21.2.1944. NARA T312, R1497, F000665-7. 6th Army was given little respite, as Soviets launched the Bereznegovatoye–Snigirevka offensive one week later and the German Inhulets river front soon collapsed.

Background Following the Soviet advance in the Battle of the Dnieper in late 1943, the German 6th Army, commanded by Generaloberst Karl-Adolf Hollidt, escaped a threatened Soviet encirclement and retreated to the Krivoi Rog area, with its IV and XXIX Army Corps clinging on to the Nikopol bridgehead over the Dnieper, the easternmost protrusion of a salient centred on the key rail junction of Apostolovo. On 3 November, these two corps were temporarily transferred to the 1st Panzer Army, and within weeks they became part of Group Schörner under the command of General der Gebirgstruppe Ferdinand Schörner along with the XVII Army Corps to the north. During November and December, the 3rd and 4th Ukrainian Fronts launched a series of unsuccessful assaults against the Nikopol bridgehead and the Krivoi Rog area, which formed a salient. The 3rd Ukrainian Front directed its assaults against the northern part of the salient, while the 4th Ukrainian Front moved against the southern part.

Since its capture by the Germans in 1941, the rich deposits of manganese in the area of Nikopol had been used in Germany for the production of high-strength steel. Adolf Hitler repeatedly stressed the crucial importance of this area, telling his commanders that the "Loss of Nikopol would mean the end of the war." The Nikopol bridgehead also held operational significance because it could serve as a springboard for an assault to relieve German troops trapped in Crimea, and Hitler refused demands by Army Group South commander Generalfeldmarschall Erich von Manstein for its evacuation. As a result, the bridgehead was heavily fortified, with three lines of trenches in its first defensive line, strengthened by barbed wire belts and minefields. All heights and settlements immediately behind the front were turned into fortified strongpoints. These positions were what remained of the fortified German Dnieper line.

Despite Hitler's obsession with the bridgehead, the mining of manganese ore ceased during the winter of 1943 and 1944 and the previously mined stocks "could not be moved" due to a lack of transport, according to 6th Army chief of staff Generalleutnant Max Bork. On 1 January, 6th Army was transferred from Army Group A, which held the southernmost part of Ukraine west of the Dnieper, to Army Group South, whose sector ran from north of Krivoi Rog to the Pripet marshes in the northernmost portion of Ukraine. Around this time, Manstein transferred the 1st Panzer Army to the northern sector, leaving a few of its infantry divisions behind in the Nikopol bridgehead; these joined the 6th Army. On , Manstein flew to Führer Headquarters expressly to persuade Hitler to allow a withdrawal from Nikopol and Crimea in order to shorten the front, but his request was denied.

There were also formidable natural barriers in the area – the Kamenka River in the 3rd Ukrainian Front's sector, and the Dnieper in the 4th Ukrainian Front's sector. Behind the German front line in the Nikopol bridgehead was the marshy floodplain of the Dnieper, which rarely froze in the winter. The only exits from the bridgehead were a temporary bridge in the northern sector east of Nikopol and a pair of one-lane pontoon bridges at the far southern end of the bridgehead at Velikaya (Bolshaya) Lepetikha. The remainder of the 6th Army sector, facing north and slightly east, stretched between positions north of Krivoi Rog and north of Apostolovo, where the sole rail line supplying the army branched north and towards Nikopol. The positions ran across open steppe divided at right angles by numerous ravines and the watercourses of five major rivers.

A single hard-surfaced road passed through the army's sector, designated Through Road IV, but it was unusable due to its proximity to the frontline, except for a small area at Krivoi Rog. Due to a total lack of suitable road building materials, the German forces were unable to construct hard-surfaced roads. As a result, when the roads turned to mud (rasputitsa) in the wet winter weather, the railway and tracked vehicles were the sole reliable transportation method, which meant that if Soviet troops could capture Apostolovo they would have effectively cut off the German forces in the bridgehead.

Prelude

Preliminary attacks At the end of 1943, the 3rd Ukrainian Front, commanded by General armii Rodion Malinovsky, was entrenched on the line of Veselyye Terny, Tomakovka, and Belenkoye. It included the 8th Guards, 6th, and 46th Armies, the 17th Air Army, and the 23rd Tank Corps. The front included only nineteen rifle divisions and a tank corps, and faced the German LVII Panzer, XXX, and XVII Army Corps. General armii Fyodor Tolbukhin's 4th Ukrainian Front included the 3rd Guards, 5th Shock, and 28th Armies, the 8th Air Army, the 2nd and 4th Guards Mechanized Corps, and the 4th Guards Cavalry Corps, operating against the Nikopol bridgehead. These elements of the front fielded 22 rifle divisions, three cavalry divisions, and two mechanized corps. They faced the IV and XXIX Army Corps in the Nikopol bridgehead.

The 3rd Ukrainian Front and elements of the 4th Ukrainian Front were tasked in January with destroying the German forces in the area of Nikopol and Krivoi Rog, eliminating the Nikopol bridgehead, and pushing the German troops back behind the line of the Inhulets and the Southern Bug. On 29 December 1943, Marshal Sovetskogo Soyuza Aleksandr Vasilevsky, the representative of the Soviet high command, Stavka, reported that the defeat of the German troops opposing the 1st Ukrainian Front in the Zhitomir–Berdichev offensive and the redirection of the 2nd Ukrainian Front towards an attack on Kirovograd forced a reconsideration of the operational plans for the 3rd and 4th Ukrainian Fronts. He concluded that a German withdrawal from the Nikopol bridgehead was likely and thus advocated a renewed attack to begin between 10 and 12 January 1944.

Stavka approved his plan, and after preparations between 10 and 12 January, the 3rd and 4th Ukrainian Fronts began the attack. The former's 8th Guards and 46th Armies advanced towards Apostolovo against XXX Army Corps on 10 January, and the latter's 3rd Guards, 5th Shock, and 28th Armies attacked the IV and XXIX Army Corps in the Nikopol bridgehead on 12 January. The attack of the 3rd Ukrainian Front on 10 January, spearheaded by what a German report estimated as 80 tanks, and preceded by an artillery barrage, included nine rifle divisions from both armies, advancing in two waves. It was stopped after gaining by two German panzer divisions, which claimed to have destroyed two-thirds of the Soviet tanks after the latter outran their supporting infantry.

Continued German counterattacks reduced the breach to about a mile by the end of the day. In four to five days of stubborn fighting, the Soviet troops were unable to make decisive gains. The 3rd Ukrainian Front wedged into the German line between through preponderance in infantry, but could not break through due to German resistance, shortages of ammunition and its lack of tanks, which prevented the creation of a strong attack group. Hollidt briefly considered withdrawing the 24th Panzer Division from the Nikopol bridgehead to lead a counterattack against the Soviet gains in the north, but decided against it after the 4th Ukrainian Front began its attack against the bridgehead. The 4th Ukrainian Front suffered a similar lack of success and the attacks were halted by 17 January to allow the troops to consolidate their positions and to plan a more thorough offensive.

Between 11 and 20 January, in the period which included these attacks, the 3rd Guards, 5th Shock, and 28th Armies of the 4th Ukrainian Front suffered total casualties of 3,191 killed and 9,938 wounded, with the 3rd Guards and 28th Armies bearing the brunt of the casualties. In the ten-day period between 11 and 20 January that included the Soviet attack, the German 6th Army reported casualties of 1,339 killed, 4,865 wounded, and 446 missing. Casualties of 834 killed, 3,214 wounded, and 419 missing were reported in the next ten-day period between 21 and 31 January.

Soviet planning and preparations