The most important and by far the most voluminous front of the WWII was the Eastern Front. Throughout the entire 2000 mile extent of it, the Russian and German forces had engaged in stubborn inch-by-inch fighting that produced the largest ever casualties in the history of combat.

In fact, there were more German divisions engaged on the Russian Front then on all the other fronts combined. At no time during the Great Patriotic War did Germans have less than 60-70 percent of their entire troop strength at the Eastern Front. Rightfully, Soviet Union bore the full brunt of the war almost alone and ultimately forced the Nazi Germany to surrender!! In the process USSR did suffer incredible casualties that are still unequaled in the annals of history.. Many forget that USSR not only ended facing Nazi Germany's war machine, the Wehrmacht, but it also faced the armies of Hungary, Slovakia, Finland, Romania, and Italy.

Remarkably, the Western Allies only faced Germany, Japan, and Italy. Another point worth noting, Bulgaria, another one of Germany's allies, chose not to support Germany's troops by refusing to send any of their own to aid Wehrmacht, in fact, they announced they were only at war with Western Powers and not with USSR.

Following are several most important American misconceptions about the battles or significant episodes of that mammoth struggle.

If not for Hitler's insistance on turning the tank forces of Army Group Center toward the Ukraine, Germans might have reached and captured Moscow.

It is not clear whether Germany would have reached Moscow if the tanks of the Army Group Center hadn't been turned South. For one thing, these tanks had been moving for close to 2 month without stopping, which was causing wear and tear as well as the separation from their bases. Secondly, after the great holding action at Smolensk, Russians were finally able to get most of their remaining forces from the danger of encirclement. Thirdly, to the East of Moscow there were already 5 new fresh Soviet Armies building up, thanks to that same Smolensk battle. Four, Germans were finding their advance tougher and tougher in the Moscow direction, as the Wehrmacht Generals would note in their diaries and memoirs. Five, the German Army Group South, unlike the other two Army Groups had not actually defeated the Soviet forces that were facing it. More than one million soldiers of the opposing Russian Armies were ominously far West of the forward positions of the Army Group Center, threatening its exposed right flank. Another point worth mentioning is that the Army Group South left flank was almost hopelessly bogged down by the Soviet 5th Army, in the Prypyat marshes which was threatening to open the gap between the Army Group Center and Army Group South (although it is not clear how much the tired Soviet forces of the YugoZapadny Front could exploit that weakness).
Hitler saw an easy opportunity to entrap the Soviet forces that were fighting in a very large bulge around Kiev. Hitler turned out to be a victor, wiping out much of the Soviet YugoZapadny Front and pinning Soviet Yuzhny Front towards Tavrida and Crimea, taking Kiev (the third largest Soviet city) and 600,000 prisoners in process.

Germany kept significant forces in the West, in Africa, in Norway, etc.

In fact, Germany had held 60 to 70 per cent of her manpower in the East. Moreover, the replaced German troops frequently went to the West for rest and relaxation.

Russia had to fight only Germany, while Western democracies had to fight multiple fronts. On the contrary, Russia had had to fight 60-70% of German army, the entire Hungarian Army, the entire Romanian Army, 45-50% of Italian Army, entire Finnish Army, as well as numerous volunteer detachments from Denmark, France, Spain, Portugal, Slovakia, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, in addition to a regular Slovakian cavalry brigade and Spanish Blue Division.

In 1941, German advance on Moscow was halted by General Winter.

It could be argued, that cold is always a great help for defending side. But it is also clear, that by late November, German advance had been running out of steam, while Russian reserves, made up of many Siberian divisions were greatly untouched (in fact, prior to the Soviet counter-offensive, only one Siberian division, led by general Panfilov, had been used (even that not extensively). German Army Group Center was by now not only short of Winter clothing and ammunition, they were bled white and facing very strong defenses filled with determined defenders and hordes of Siberian Regular divisions ready and able to fight in temperatures of 40 degrees Centrograde below zero.

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