[10] According to Barbarossa's operational plan, the Wehrmacht's Army Group South, under the command of Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt, was supposed to dominate the strategic area of Ukraine.

[21] On the same day, due to the ineffectiveness of earlier counter-attacks, Stavka ordered Kirponos to withdraw his forces to new defensive positions by 9 July, in the fortified areas of Korosten, Novgorod-Volynski and Letychiv along the 1939 Soviet-Polish border, known as the Stalin Line.

Despite the delay in the advance of the German III Motorized Corps due to the Kirponos counterattack,[22] by the arrival of the 11th Panzer Division at Berdichev on 7 July, the Stalin line was also broken and a gap was created between the Soviet 5th and 6th Armies south of Novgorod-Volynski.

[25] On the same day, the 13th Panzer Division of the III Motorized Corps created a defensive gap known as the "Zhitomir Corridor" that reached the Irpen River, just 15 kilometers west of Kiev.

At this time Hitler did not want to assault Kiev, and prioritised the capture of a bridgehead on the Dnieper, subject to the destruction of large formations of Soviet forces west of the river.

Rundstedt was confident that Kiev would be captured by the III Motorized Corps in its rapid advance, but Hitler, after consulting with Field marshal Walter von Brauchitsch, commander in chief of the German army, felt that such a move would "unnecessarily sacrifice" panzer forces.

Finally, Generaloberst Ewald von Kleist, commander of Panzer Group 1, was advised that if his offensive in coordination with the 6th Army provided a suitable opportunity to capture this city without the risk of being pushed back, then he was free to do so.

[citation needed] The heavy counterattacks of the Red Army on this position targeted the Germans from three sides, but the Wehrmacht forces, with the support of the Luftwaffe aircraft, including the 22nd Italian fighter group, repelled them.

[citation needed] Due to the German Army High Command's emphasis on Moscow, in order to preserve the necessary resources for the future advance to the east, the number of units initially assigned to Panzer Group 2 for the new operation was limited.

[citation needed] The next day, the lack of fuel forced Generel der Panzertruppen Leo Geyr von Schwepenburg, the commander of the XXIV Motorized Corps, to inform Guderian's headquarters that the capture of Novozibkov, 70 kilometers east of Gomel, was not feasible.

[51] However, on 23 August, the German Army High Command, in planning to pursue a simultaneous offensive towards the south and Moscow, split the Panzer Group 2 and ordered XLVIII Motorized Corps to remain in the Smolensk region as a mobile reserve.

[64] Panzer Group 2 resumed its advance to the south on 25 August, attacking the Soviet central front through Gomel and Starodub, driving it back in disarray towards the Desna River.

Facing this danger, Marshal Budyonny immediately ordered the Soviet 38th Army under the command of Major General Feklenko, to destroy the German forces that had crossed the river.

On 25 August, Stavka ordered them to carry out concentrated counter-attacks in the Smolensk-Yelnia-Novozibkov axis to repel Guderian's invasion, and in the process to confront the entirety of Army Group Center.

[93] Following this inconclusive air operation, two days later Stavka again ordered the whole Bryansk Front to launch another counterattack towards Roslavl and Starodub, and destroy Guderian's forces at Pochep, Novgorod-Sversky and Novozibkov, and subsequently further advance to reach the Petrovich-Klimovichi-Schers line by 15 September.

Guderian stated that the German 2nd Army, advancing towards the southwest, was in an operationally diverging course from Panzer Group 2, and was now separated from the right wing of the XXIV Motorized Corps, which created a 75 km gap between them.

Considering the pressure exerted on the long defensive line of the Army Group Center and its need to have a mobile reserve, Bock, in consultation with Halder, initially agreed only to move the 1st Cavalry Division closer to the right flank of the XXIV Motorized Corps.

[102] After four days of halting their armored spearhead at the Desna river crossing and receiving sufficient supplies, the advance of the Panzer Group 2 to the south was resumed on 31 August.

[112] On 13 September, at the suggestion of Zhukov and by order of Stalin,[113] Stavka replaced Budyonny with Marshal Semyon Timoshenko in command of the Soviet Southwestern direction without issuing a withdrawal authorization.

Reorganizing his forces, he ordered for Guderian's left wing to be targeted again to cover the created gap by the 18 September offensive, and to connect with the units of the southwestern front.

[citation needed] A small battle group from the 3rd Panzer Division, consisting of three tanks, eight armored reconnaissance vehicles, six artillery pieces, and an anti-tank company, advanced southward and captured the city of Lukhvitsa and its bridge over the Sula River.

The command of the army group opposed this request due to the distance of this division from the intended target, and wanting to suffer minimum attrition before the upcoming attack against Moscow.

[120] In the early morning of 14 September, Major General Vasily Tupikov, the Chief of Staff of the Soviet Southwestern Front, sent a personal telegram to Shaposhnikov that stated: "The disaster has begun and will show itself to you in a few days".

[citation needed] In a sharp response, Shaposhnikov described Tupikov as "panicky" and called for "calmness and not to yield to panic" at all levels of command and to stop the retreat of the Soviet 21st and 5th Armies.

However, after Bagramian delivered Timoshenko's verbal order to the commander of the Soviet Southwestern Front on September 17, Kirponos avoided implementing it until reception of written confirmation.

[citation needed] Despite the breakdown in communications, Kirponos finally received a withdrawal confirmation from Shaposhnikov on the night of 17 September, but he was only allowed to leave Kiev without retreating all the way to the Psel river.

These breaches caused the front line of the units to be mixed up and created a confused situation for the forces of both armies; noting this, a German soldier wrote in his memoirs: "Often one does not understand who is surrounded; Bolsheviks or us!".

Attempts were made to find and disarm these traps, but on 24 September, an explosion next to the main post office in a captured weapons and ammunition depot started a large fire that quickly spread.

Reserve forces of the [Soviet] High Command, which had been used in September to fill the gaps in the southwestern sector, could have been used in an attack on the flank and rear of the central group of the German armies advancing on Moscow.

[161] Ultimately the implementation of the Hunger Plan in occupied Kiev was restrained by the fears of an uprising behind the lines,[162] and the city was only forcibly evacuated and subjected to widespread looting and burning during the German withdrawal in September–November 1943.