Manstein persisted, proposing that his forces should at least destroy the Soviet reserves in the southern Kursk salient before Citadel was finally terminated, so that the Soviet fighting capacity in the sector would be depleted for the rest of the summer. Rotmistrov was forced to shift the 18th and 29th Tank Corps over to defence and reinforce them with infantry. A remarkable new history of the largest tank battle of the Second World War and key moment in the 1943 Kursk campaign. Totenkopf and Leibstandarte were to anchor the western and northern flanks of Das Reich, respectively.

The Panzers of Prokhorovka: The Myth of Hitler’s Greatest The Panzers of Prokhorovka: The Myth of Hitler’s Greatest

The German historian Dieter Brand argues that even though the German commanders expected a major Soviet armoured deployment at Prokhorovka, the frontline German troops were indeed largely taken by surprise when the Soviets counterattacked on the morning of 12 July. Russian: Сборник материалов по изучению опыта войны № 11, romanized: Sbornik materialov po izucheniyu opyta voyny № 11). This particular engagement was a tactical defeat for the Soviets, but the charge inflicted enough damage to help stall — and eventually halt — the German army’s Citadel offensive.

In a three-hour battle, the 1st SS-Panzer Regiment engaged the attacking Soviet tanks and repulsed them, reporting that they destroyed about 62 Soviet tanks.

The Panzers of Prokhorovka: The myth of Hitler’s greatest

The German forces involved in the Battle of Prokhorovka were from the three Waffen-SS divisions of the II SS-Panzer Corps: Leibstandarte, Das Reich, and Totenkopf. In doing so, Rotmistrov committed over half of his army's reserves before the Battle of Prokhorovka had begun.It pays limited attention to the wider strategic issues affecting the battle, the history and context leading up to the battle and does not offer the reader much in the way of analysis in command structures, intent, tactics and logistics. Once the link was achieved and the Soviet forces encircled, Prokhorovka would then be attacked shortly thereafter by the combined forces of the II SS-Panzer Corps and III Panzer Corps.

The Panzers of Prokhorovka: The Myth of Hitler’s Greatest

Near the city of Kursk on the Eastern Front, hundreds of Soviet tanks slammed into the 2nd SS Panzer Corps in an enormous conflagration of flesh and metal. The exaggerated figures originated from erroneous Soviet intelligence estimates of German armour reported during and after the battle, and subsequent postwar accounts that repeated this erroneous narrative. Main article: Battle of Kursk Map showing the German plan for Operation Citadel (blue arrows) to cut off the Kursk salient into a pocket, and the deployment of Soviet and German forces ahead of the operation.The Stuka wings, StG 2 and StG 77, made their weakest contribution to the Kursk operation since the 5 July– 150 sorties– down from 1,071 on 5 July, but the small Ju 87G contingent proved effective. On July 12, 1943, counter-attacking Soviet tanks charged across open terrain, taking heavy losses to German tank fire, including from heavily-armored Tiger Is with 88-millimeter guns.

Battle of Prokhorovka - Wikipedia

All of its subordinate corps as of 12 July are listed below; [2] but the divisions, regiments and battalions directly subordinate to the Army's Headquarters are not listed. On the following day, 9 July, a meeting of the commanders of the German forces on the northern side of the Kursk salient concluded that a breakthrough on the northern side of the salient was unlikely. The Soviet historians Grigoriy Koltunov and Boris Soloviev estimate about 300 tanks and self-propelled guns of the 5th Guards Tank Army were damaged or destroyed on 12 July. The 5th Guards Army and 5th Guards Tank Army of the Steppe Front had been brought up from reserve and reassigned to the Voronezh Front on 8 and 11 July respectively.

Due to earlier combat, by 12 July the 2nd Tank Corps had few tanks left, many of which were locked in combat elsewhere outside the battlefield of Prokhorovka and out of contact with their parent headquarters. Peiper's surviving panzergrenadiers engaged the Soviet infantry and attacked the Soviet tanks with Hafthohlladung magnetic anti-tank grenades. To give the prospective reader a feel for the structure of the book, the appendices full of tank loss data start at page 184 of 320. On the Soviet side, all the tank units under Rotmistrov's 5th Guards Tank Army involved in the battle on 12 July suffered heavy losses.