Adolf Hitler, ordering his troops last week to stand fast on the Eastern Front, justified the demand by recalling that German troops fought successfully through four winters in Russia during the campaigns of 1914-17. But German Armies then did not winter in the open, nor did they get within 350 miles of the forward positions they now hold, far from their sources of supply.
Glorying in the bitter weather that Germans found nearly unbearable, the Russians continued their systematic pressure against Novgorod and the siege of Leningrad. Encircled and facing annihilation were German...