With his army trapped inside a ring of Soviet armor, Paulus informed Hitler that he only had 6 days of food for his troops. Similar shortages of fuel, ammunition, clothing and all other materiel needed to sustain an army in the field were now building to a crisis. Morale remained fairly high among the Germans, and they nick-named their position "Der Kessel" - The Kettle. What the world would soon know as "The Stalingrad Cauldron" was no laughing matter. One of the finest armies in history was about to die from starvation, disease and exposure.
Hitler promised to re-supply the 6th Army from the air, and Gen. Wolfram von Richthofen, commanding Luftflotte 4, worked to keep that promise. He knew from the outset that it was a hopeless task. Paulus needed a minimum of 500 tons of supplies flown in daily. This would merely sustain the 6th Army in a defensive posture and only prolong the efforts of the Russians to liquidate the pocket. Hitler did concede that this figure was beyond the capability of the Luftwaffe transport fleet and a daily target of 350 tons was set for the airmen of Luftflotte 4 to deliver to Paulus and his troops.
The work-horse of the Luftwaffe transport fleet was the Junkers Ju-52 trimotor. To meet the supply requirements of the 6th Army, von Richthofen's aircrews would be required to fly some 250 aircraft on 4 sorties per plane every day. Luftflotte 4 didn't have that many aircraft on hand and a good portion of what they did have was down for maintenance. Much of what was still flying was over-due for a major engine overhaul and pilots had already been pushed to the limits of endurance.
After losing some 100 Ju-52s during the invasion of Crete, the Luftwaffe simply did not have the inventory to supplement the airlift. With 150 serviceable Ju-52s on hand, Von Richthofen pressed He-111 bombers into service as transports and struggled to maintain what effort he could. Soviet fighters now controlled the corridors his planes used to approach Stalingrad and the daily toll of aircraft was mounting. The severity of the Russian winter made flying impossible on some days and nothing would reach Paulus' forces. Quite often a transport would crash while attempting to land and the wreckage would block the airstrip from being used by other aircraft. Outgoing transports would be delayed and incoming flights diverted back to their home base while the runway was cleared. In spite of these setbacks, the Luftwaffe did manage on one day to set down 300 tons of materiel at the Gumrak airstrip.
