However, the Axis forces protecting German flanks were made up of weak, undermanned, and undergunned Romanian and Italian forces. .
This massive Soviet buildup of troops was unknown to the Germans. Unknown until the Soviets swept around the Germans and through the weak Italian and Romanian troops to cut off German troops, under General Paulus. The Soviet troops completely surrounded the now 250,000 troops that were fighting in the city. Paulus requested permission from Hitler to attack back to link up with German troops, but he denied him. Hitler had convinced himself that troops in Stalingrad could be supplied completely by air, but this was impossible. The Battle for Stalingrad had become a personal fight between Josef Stalin and Hitler. For Stalin because the city bore his own name, and for Hitler because the city bore Stalin's name. .
However, the city was virtually worthless. The relentless Luftwaffe bombing turned the once beautiful city literally into a pile of rubble with an occasional factory that still functioned. In February of 1943, General Paulus, along with approximately 90,000 troops, surrendered against Hitler's orders. Of those 90,000 that surrendered to the Soviets, only about 5,000 ever returned to Germany. .
All the time this fighting in the Soviet Union was going on, Stalin was urging Allied leaders, Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt to open a second front to take some of the burden off of the Eastern Front. Finally, in June of 1944, after years of planning, the largest amphibious invasion known to man was launched on the coast of Normandy, France. During planning, it became a large controversy on where to land the troops. Some pushed for the landing to be at Calais, because that was the closest distance to England. However, that was where the Atlantic Wall was at it's strongest. Also, there was a large German troop buildup behind this location. The other possibility was in Normandy.
