Warmatrix

In the the Battle of Kursk, part of World War II, the initiative in the war on the eastern front switched from the German army to the Soviets.
In 1943 CE, after a temporarily pause caused by the spring "rasputitsa", the spring rains, both sides on the eastern front sought a suitable place for a summer offensive. The Germans aimed for a limited operation, as the Wehrmacht had lost the capability for a large one. They found one at Kursk, where the fighting of the previous year had left the Soviet front with a large westward bulge. Kurt Zeitler and others devised a plan of attack, Operation Citadel. It aimed to cut off the forward Soviet forces from the rest of the Red Army by launching two attacks, one from the north and another from the south, to meet in the center. The German high command was divided on the subject. Walter Model and Heinz Guderian were against it; Adolf Hitler did not know what to do; Erich von Manstein, who favored a defensive stance followed by a counterattack, eventually endorsed it. Hitler kept postponing the operation, which was originally planned for May, to 5 July. The time was used to re-organize and train the army and to bring up new weapons.
The Soviets, supplied with good intelligence, were aware of the German preparations. Stalin wanted to strike quickly but was persuaded by General Georgy Zhukov to wait also. The time was used to fill the 150 kilometer wide salient at Kursk with a massive army and to construct several lines of defense, studded with mines, barbed wire, pillboxes, anti-tank ditches, anti-tank guns and mobile reserves. To confuse the Luftwaffe, many dummy airfields and supply depots were set up and most movements took place at night. The Soviet soldiers too were trained, for example to wait in ditches for German tanks to drive over them, then attacking from underneath with explosives.
The German army entered the battle with 780,000 men, 2,700 tanks, and 10,000 guns; this represented 20% of German infantry and even 70% of the armor available in the east. These included many heavy Tiger tanks, 260 brand new medium Panther tanks and 90 Ferdinand self-propelled guns, which were not properly tested and readied for battle. The Luftwaffe provided air support with 2,100 aircraft. The Soviets had 1,900,000 men, 5,100 tanks, 25,000 guns and 2,900 aircraft, 70% of them crammed into the salient itself. These included the upgraded T-34/76 tanks and a small number of mobile heavy anti-tank guns. The total force represented about 25% of the total manpower of the Red Army and almost 50% of its tank strength. The buildup on both sides ensured that Kursk was no longer a limited offensive; neither party could afford to lose without suffering a major setback.
On the evening of 4 July there were some skirmishes and in the early morning of the next day the Soviets fired an artillery barrage. When the Germans realized that that was not the start of a real offensive, they launched their main attack. In the north Model's army struggled forward, advancing 10 kilometers on the first day. Soviet mines, guns and counterattacks made the going steadily more difficult. The front gradually narrowed from 50 kilometers wide to just 2 kilometers on 10 July. By that date Model's army had advanced only 12 kilometers, but could go no further.
The Soviets had put most of their forces in the north because they expected the heaviest attack there. In fact the German southern arm was the strongest, including three fanatical SS Panzer divisions. These troops progressed 35 kilometers in 4 days, reaching the village of Prokhorovka. Alarmed, Stalin by then had already ordered his strategic reserves to make a forced march to strengthen the south. They covered the 370 kilometers in 3 days, hampered by summer heat, dust and air attacks. At Prokhorovka, the two armies clashed with each other on 12 July - 15 July in the greatest tank battle in history. Rain, smoke and dust obscured the battlefield, prohibiting most artillery and air support. Despite massive losses, around 850 Soviets tanks halted 210 German ones and with them, the attack in the south.
Meanwhile the western allies had landed in Sicily and Hitler wanted to relocate many forces to Italy. Despite protest from von Manstein, who wanted to capitalize on the German efforts, on 13 July Hitler called off Operation Citadel. But the battle was not over. A day earlier the Soviets launched a counteroffensive, Operation Kutuzov, in the north. Later Operation Rumyantsev opened up in the south. Throughout the rest of the year the Red Army launched a series of further offensives that drove the Germans back some 350 kilometers. Kharkov was liberated in late August; Kiev in early November.
Losses in the battle are hard to estimate as numbers supplied by both sides are riddled with propaganda exaggerations. The Germans lost roughly 55,000 men, 300 tanks, 500 guns and 150 aircraft against Soviet losses of 175,000 men, 1,800 tanks and guns plus 450 aircraft. Thus it proved much smaller than Stalingrad, though with a higher proportion of tanks and self-propelled guns, which reflects the shift towards heavier armor in the second half of the war.
Had von Manstein not been halted by Hitler, he might have broken through, though this is far from certain. By fortifying the area around Kursk, the Soviets forced the Germans into a battle of attrition rather than maneuver. Despite suffering far greater losses, it gained them a strategic victory, as they could replace the losses while the German army could not. After Kursk, the stage was set for massive Soviet counterattacks in 1944 CE and 1945 CE, which would destroy the Third Reich.