1942 1943 1944 The Kholm Pocket (German: Kessel von Cholm; Russian: Холмский котёл) was the name given for the encirclement of German troops by the Red Army around Kholm, south of Leningrad, in World War II's the Eastern Front, from 23 January 1942 to 5 May 1942.
A much larger pocket was meanwhile surrounded in Demyansk, about 100 km (62 mi) to the northeast.
[1] The air supply of Kholm and Demyansk was successful but led to an overconfidence in the German High Command on the Luftwaffe's ability to supply encircled forces by air, which would lead to disastrous consequences at the Battle of Stalingrad in late 1942 and early 1943.
[1] Members of the Reserve-Polizei-Bataillon 65, a police unit from Gelsenkirchen, were questioned after the war by the state prosecutor in Dortmund for their involvement in ethnic cleansing in Eastern Europe.
The unit was found to have taken part in a minimum of 5,000 executions and many deportations to concentration camps.