4th Panzer Group

Hoepner's 4th Panzer Group formed the southern pincer at Vyazma, attacking from the Roslavl area and closing the pocket from the south in the first week of October 1941. It then drove straight east along the Warsaw highway toward Mozhaisk and Naro-Fominsk, becoming the closest German force to the Kremlin in late November. Stopped at Naro-Fominsk and along the Nara river in early December by stiffening Soviet resistance and minus 30 degree cold, it was thrown back by Zhukov's counteroffensive and spent the rest of the winter yielding ground westward. In late November its divisions could see the spires of Moscow through field glasses from the Khimki bridgehead, the closest any German formation came to the Kremlin; Soviet counterattacks around Skhodnya then tore the bridgehead apart, and the group fell back behind the Lama river. Its tank strength had fallen below 100 runners. The tracks recorded here are schematic headquarters-area positions, not surveyed front lines.