The Psel was the last natural barrier between Manstein’s panzers and Kursk.
By July 11, however, Hoth’s Fourth Panzer Army was in position to capture the town of Prochorovka, secure a bridgehead over the Psel River and advance on Oboyan. On the southern flank, Kempf’s III Panzer Corps, commanded by General Hermann Breith, also encountered tough Soviet resistance. Model’s Ninth Army never came close to breaking the Soviet defenses in the north, however, and soon became deadlocked in a war of attrition that it could not win. Such a victory would have forced the Soviets to delay their operations and might have allowed the Wehrmacht desperately needed breathing room on the Eastern Front. If their plan succeeded, the Germans would encircle and destroy more than five Soviet armies. Konev’s Steppe Military District (renamed Steppe Front on July 10, 1943) was to hold German breakthroughs, then mount the counteroffensive. Chistyakov, and the Seventh Guards Army, led by Lt.
To the south, the Voronezh Front faced the German Army Group South with three armies and two in reserve. Galinin’s Seventeenth Army, was to defend the northern sector. The Central Front, with the right wing strengthened by Lt. Rokossovsky, and the Voronezh Front, led by General Nikolai F. Opposing the German forces were the Soviet Central Front, led by General Konstantin K. Hermann Hoth’s Fourth Panzer Army and the Kempf Army, commanded by General Werner Kempf. General Joachim Lemelsen’s XLVII Panzer Corps planned to drive toward Kursk and meet up with Field Marshal Erich von Manstein’s Army Group South, Col. Josef Harpe’s XLI Panzer Corps on the left. Field Marshal Günther von Kluge’s Army Group Center would attack from the north flank of the bulge, with Colonel General Walther Model’s Ninth Army leading the effort, General Hans Zorn’s XLVI Panzer Corps on the right flank and Maj.
The Germans’ goal during Citadel was to pinch off a large salient in the Eastern Front that extended 70 miles toward the west. But while historians have categorized Prochorovka as a victory of improved Soviet tactics over German firepower and heavy tanks, new evidence casts the struggle at the ‘gully of death’ in a very different light. The high-water mark of the battle was the massive armor engagement at Prochorovka (also spelled Prokhorovka), which began on July 12. The climax of Operation Citadel, the Battle of Kursk, involved as many as 6,000 tanks, 4,000 aircraft and 2 million fighting men and is remembered as the greatest tank battle in history. Battle of Kursk: Germany's Lost Victory in World War II Closeįollowing their disastrous defeat at Stalingrad during the winter of 1942-43, the German armed forces launched a climactic offensive in the East known as Operation Citadel on July 4,1943.
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