The Raid on Tatsinskaya was a Soviet armoured raid deep into the German rear conducted by 24th Tank Corps under the command of Major General Vasily Mikhaylovich Badanov in late December 1942. It took place during Operation Little Saturn, on the heels of the successful encirclement of the Wehrmacht's 6th Army in the Battle of Stalingrad. The raid was designed to force the Germans to divert forces attempting to relieve the 6th Army. The Soviet force captured its objective, the Luftwaffe's airlift hub at the Tatsinskaya Airfield. The Soviet forces destroyed over 72 aircraft on the ground, but was left cut off and without supplies. Despite the loss of most of the tank corps during the ensuing breakout, the raid was a great operational victory. Background The Red Army had encircled the Wehrmacht's 6th Army in Stalingrad with Operation Uranus, begun on 19 November 1942. By the middle of December, the German relief effort, Operation Winter Storm, reached within 48 km of the encirclement ring, and the airlift trying to supply the encircled army was in full swing. In this situation, Stavka (Soviet High Command) decided to launch Operation Little Saturn, to encircle all of German Army Group A, by penetrating to the south and the coast of the Sea of Azov. The danger this operation created to the German strategic position was so serious that the Wehrmacht command had to give up any hope of relieving the 6th Army and instead turned its attention to fighting the advancing Red Army formations, while simultaneously trying to move as many units as possible to the west. As a consequence of the threat, the most potent of the German divisions involved in the relief effort, 6th Panzer Division, was turned west, and ordered to first clear the raiding force from Tatsinskaya, and later to establish a new frontline towards the north of the airfield. With that decision, any hope of breaking through to 6th Army had vanished. The battle Soviet planning The Soviet 24th Tank Corps (later the 2nd Guards Tank Corps) belonged to the 3rd Guards Army, which was commanded by General Dmitri Lelyushenko, which was a part of the Southwestern Front under the command of Nikolai Vatutin. The corps was designated as the army's exploitation force, in line with the doctrine of Deep Battle. It was therefore not to be committed during the initial breaching of the tactical defenses of