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A meeting was held on 12 September at Führerhauptquartier Werwolf in Vinnitsa. Addressing Colonel General Maximilian von Weichs, Commander of Army Group B, and Colonel General Friedrich Paulus, Commander of Sixth Army, Hitler demanded that Stalingrad be conquered as soon as possible. According to Paulus, Hitler said that Soviet forces were spent and that any resistance they might mount would be of merely local significance, that they were incapable of making any strategic counter-maneuver. Therefore, it was needful to take the city and the adjacent Volga riverbank quickly, so that Stalingrad would not become a long-standing and devouring worry.
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