On 16 January 1943, the dispatch finally mentioned that the 6th Army was fighting the enemy "on all sides", thus acknowledging the encirclement, but little was said about the situation in subsequent reports. Meanwhile, Goebbels was working behind the scenes to advance his program of mobilisation of the population for the "total war", using the impending defeat at Stalingrad as a rallying cry.[17] Getting the go-ahead from Hitler, Goebbels launched the effort in the late winter of 1943.