 He later wrote that the city was completely destroyed without any worthwhile further targets.In the evening, Soviet searchlights illuminated the sky as the city burned bright, spewing smoke and flames into the sky, a sight that "Generalmajor" Wolfgang Pickert, commander of the 9th Flak Division, described as "fantastic".Stalin resisted the evacuation of civilians, in part due to the importance of the city's factories to the war effort.