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after the heavy losses sustained by the
opening of operation barbarossa the
vermont reached a decisive turning point
they could wait and be pummeled by an
imminent soviet offensive or take the
upper hand and launch its own operation
to encircle and subjugate the red army
the decision came to adolf hitler and
the dictator opted to bet all of his
armored forces and put together a
decisive offensive at kursk code named
operation citadel
however the british let the soviets know
of the exact dates and locations where
the offensive would take place and thus
the battle of kursk began
more than two million men seven thousand
tanks and over four thousand aircraft
would participate in the world's largest
tank battle where the germans were
outnumbered three to one in men armored
vehicles and supplies
the advance was bitter and brutal but
the germans still fought tooth and nail
against a relentless soviet army it had
the resources to drain them out to the
last man bullet and tank
world war ii was the first conflict in
which armored vehicles played a
significant role in battle victories
the tanks have been a mainstay of
combined arms combat since they first
left a mark during the battle of the
somme in the early 20th century
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preparing the offensive
the fuhrer and the military command
believed that during the first months of
operation barbarossa the city of moscow
would fall to the unstoppable german
forces
but they quickly discovered that they
had underestimated the soviet population
despite successfully encircling and
crushing multiple soviet armies that
surpassed 600 000 prisoners of war the
soviets were still able to bring more
fresh recruits out of nowhere
as the germans pushed deeper into enemy
lines the social supply networks failed
to catch up to their blitzkrieg speed
meanwhile the soviets were experiencing
the exact opposite
as they got pushed further back after
adopting a scorched earth tactic to
leave anything but rubble and ashes to
the invaders they concentrated their
forces and counter-attacked in big
masses
stalingrad then became the embodiment of
what combat at the eastern front would
become
when the german sixth army reached
stalingrad in september of 1942 they
were caught off guard by the sheer
amount of enemy resistance civilian and
military alike
by november the germans were outnumbered
outgunned and encircled by the soviets
but as long as there was a fighting
chance and the sixth army could retreat
before being wiped out hitler wanted
them to hold their ground
the promised supplies and reinforcements
never arrived and thousands of germans
perished during the harsh winter season
february 2nd 1943 catholic field marshal
paulus refused to follow hitler's
suicide policy to fight the last man and
surrendered with his surviving troops to
give them a chance to survive
during the conflict the axis lost more
than 260 000 seasoned war veterans that
would be sentenced to die in the
infamous gulags
the lost stalingrad became the turning
point of the eastern front
it pushed the germans to the south of
russia and forced them to adopt a
defensive posture
meanwhile soviet forces took advantage
of the momentum and high morale and they
launched operation little saturn a
series of offensives to put more
pressure on the axis
the ensuing confrontations broke the
lines and left gaps in salience from
leningrad in the far north to the black
sea in the south
a wide gap of more than 200 kilometers
had opened between german army group b
and army group dawn while soviet
advances threatened to cut them off from
army group a operating in the
caucasus
by april of 1943 the communist forces
heritage in kursk and rustop and now
multiple offensives at all fronts
threatened to break through axis lines
and they are at the center of the most
significant salient lake kursk
after defeating the soviets at belgrade
and kharkov field marshal erik van
manstein requested the furor
unrestricted operational freedom to
crush the soviet advance and put germany
back in the offensive again
upon approval the army groups
reorganized and the troops prepared for
a massive offensive
operation citadel
the planned operation was coat named
citadel or citadel and its objective was
the capture of the cursed salient it
called for a double envelopment to seal
off the salient and obliterate the
soviet armies inside it
army group center would form the
northern pincer while army groups south
under the command of hermann hoth would
pierce the south of the
salient western sector of the salient
would be contained by the second army
under the command of valter vice
at the same time the main attack would
be delivered by the second ss panzer
corps of paul hauser
troops ammunition tanks and aircraft
began to arrive by the thousands to the
battlefield
the vermont ultimately amassed more than
700 000 men 3 000 tanks 2500 aircraft
and 10 000 guns and mortars
the russians fearing that something big
was going to happen did the same and
began overproducing as many tanks
artillery and aircraft as they could
within months the red army recruited
more than one million five thousand men
five thousand tanks three thousand
aircraft and over twenty thousand
machine guns and mortars
the germans were now outnumbered three
to one but they did not know it just yet
then in april of 1943 general walter
model met with the fuhrer to discuss his
concerns over the soviets building
defenses around the salient
meanwhile the british were able to
gather information through the enigma
machine and alerted the soviets which
began building 8 000 kilometers of
trenches and eight lines to repel the
germans
some officers argued that the operation
had to be cancelled but others like
kluge opted for an immediate blitzkrieg
style attack
in the end hitler and model opted to
postpone it and give it more thought
during this time albert speer minister
of armament and war production explained
that the industry would not replace the
armored vehicles lost if the offensive
happened
and to make matters worse many of the
new tiger panther and elephant tanks
that would be used for the first time
were still not fully operational
general heinz guderian the master of
armored warfare told hitler quote is it
essential to attack kursk and indeed in
the east this year at all
do you think anyone even knows where
kursk is
the entire world doesn't care if we
capture kursk or not
what is the reason that is forcing us to
attack this year on kursk or even more
on the eastern front
to which hitler replied quote i know the
thought of it turns my stomach
still hitler finally established july
5th as the launch date of the offensive
arguing that if they did not attack the
soviets would do it first
and he was right
tanks vs tanks
on the morning of july 5th 1943 the
soviet air force unleashed a hellish
bombardment to decimate the german armor
advances but it didn't work
the german armored cavalry was not going
to back down easily
and with additional assistance provided
by the luftwaffe the 2000 outnumbered
brave german aces rose to the skies to
halt the communist bombers
as the sky turned grey with smoke and
machine gun fire the hero fired an
artillery barrage on the northern and
southern sections of the salient
the infantry then advanced to the first
soviet lines of defense to clear the
trenches and let the tanks pass
the advance was unsparing
the germans had to get close and
personal to clear the enemy lines but
despite their bravery and superior
strategy numerical superiority was
against them
general hoth's troops also broke through
the second line of defense but soviet
resistance stiffened for every meter one
yosef harpa commanding the 41st panzer
corps then occupied paniri station and
they had to eliminate pockets of
resistance throughout the night
using the light emitted by the burning
buildings the punjab had a tough time
distinguishing friend or foe and german
vehicles began to steadily decrease
despite inflicting superior losses to
the soviets the high kill death ratio of
the tigers panthers and elephants was
not enough to decimate the impetus of
the soviet armor
for every german tank lost the soviets
had three as a backup
the odds were slowly turning against the
reich
in the span of little more than a week
the offensive was brought to a halt
in the north the red army
counter-attacked but model held his
ground and moved two kilometers deeper
by july 10th mortal's ninth army had
lost 20 000 men and 200 plunzers
haute's fifth army was decimated to just
500 panzers out of 916.
two days later the soviets
counter-attacked with overwhelming odds
the heat of the combat took place in the
village of prokhorovka armor to armor
the elite ss panzer divisions led by
hauser then arrived on the morrow and
reported to headquarters the sounds of
tank engines approaching from all
directions
dense fog smoke and the absence of light
did not allow the germans to see the
enemy but the soviets were there and
they could hear the roar of their
engines
the germans did not know that lieutenant
general pavel rutmistrov's fifth guards
tank army was hidden very close to the
village and at 8 00 a.m an artillery
barrage disoriented the waffen-ss
soldiers
minutes later rutmostrov radioed his men
quote steal steal steal
and the tanks rolled in at maximum speed
to confront the ponzers
german aircraft tried to provide support
but smoke and dark sand of melting
buildings and fields made bomb load
deliveries inaccurate and less effective
meanwhile the third ss had trouble
flanking the enemy as it advanced
through minefields and hidden anti-tank
guns and although they were ultimately
successful they lost half their vehicles
a day later the fuhrer began withdrawing
troops after being notified that the
allies had landed on sicily effectively
terminating the kursk offensive
hitler attempted another offensive with
operation roland before sending some of
the troops to reinforce italy but the
soviets then launched operation kutuzov
a massive counter-attack that pushed the
germans beyond operation citadel's
starting point
in the end it's regarded that the
germans won the battle when it came to
military tactics and the overall
performance of their units
despite being highly outnumbered they
inflicted almost twice the number of
casualties on the enemy and even though
the statistics are still debated to this
day historians estimate that the soviets
lost more than 500 000 men while the
germans only lost 200 000
as for equipment germany lost more than
700 tanks and never recovered
meanwhile the russians lost around 6 000
tanks on assault guns
but its superior industry quickly made
up for them
in addition the german aces honored the
luftwaffe by shooting down 2 000 enemy
aircraft at the cost of 680.
kursk proved to be the beginning of the
end for the german presence in russia
and the last german blitzkrieg of the
eastern front
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performance in the largest tank battle
of world war ii