The Battle of Kursk - Biggest clash of armor.

[parsifal]

A few more shots for you guuys, mostly of Soviet forces. Some of the photos have captions, if you can read them, and understand Russian, wouldnt mind a translation


This first photo is of Soviet Infantry and armour on the attack just after the Battle. The shot was taken, I believe, just north of either Kharkov or Belgorad

The second shot has a caption, which i cannot read. i believe, however, this is a shot of Soviet armour in the 'ring of stell", the encircling forces around SAtalingrad in late 1942-early 1943

The third shot is of Soviet infantry attacking in May 1943 (I think). Again it has a caption, which would be great if someone could interpret....

Lastly I have included a photo of stalingrad in wht I believe is the late summer or early Autumn of 1942, to give an idea of the devastation in the city

[Ramirezzz]

Originally Posted by parsifal

The second shot has a caption, which i cannot read. i believe, however, this is a shot of Soviet armour in the 'ring of stell", the encircling forces around SAtalingrad in late 1942-early 1943

according to the caption here this is a tank desant entering the village at Cuban , autumn 1943.

The third shot is of Soviet infantry attacking in May 1943 (I think). Again it has a caption, which would be great if someone could interpret....

"assault on stanica Krymskaja, May 1943" . I believe it's in Kuban region as well.

[parsifal]

Thanks Ramirezz. I didnt think i could guess correctly. I stand corrected

[parsifal]

Originally Posted by Ramirezzz

BTW it's not a typical Stalingrad infantry assault pictured here. Russians as well as Germans used small squads with heavy firepower there.

Yeah, ther are a lot of biases against the russian capability in places like this. They forget that the Russians for most of the war on the eastern front were attacking, and as a result their losses were inherently heavy.

Also more than 50% of Russian caualties were inflicted in the first 18 months of the war, thereafter, whilst russian casulaties were never light they were much closer to those being sustained by the Germans in the last half of the war

[Ramirezzz]

Originally Posted by parsifal

Yeah, ther are a lot of biases against the russian capability in places like this. They forget that the Russians for most of the war on the eastern front were attacking, and as a result their losses were inherently heavy.

Also more than 50% of Russian caualties were inflicted in the first 18 months of the war, thereafter, whilst russian casulaties were never light they were much closer to those being sustained by the Germans in the last half of the war

no wonder - actually the only sources available to the western researchers in the postwar period were the German vet's memoirs.

[Erich]

ah is this thread about Kursk or Stalingrad or maybe I missed something along the way ?

E ♫

[parsifal]

Your right Erich, sorry, to get onto that detour...I have a question, do you have figures on the air battle losses for each side during Kursk. There are so many conflicting reports on this subject, so its a question that people are going to need patience to answer properly

[Erich]

I believe what you wish for is in book form but not sure if Christer Bergstrom and a Russian author have or are doing this or not. For me no I do not have anything for losses or kills except for individual JG histories. Nothing in total for the Schlacht units either.

[Ramirezzz]

Originally Posted by Erich

I believe what you wish for is in book form but not sure if Christer Bergstrom and a Russian author have or are doing this or not.

I believe the latest volume of their book covers only a period till late 1942.

[Ramirezzz]

Originally Posted by parsifal

Your right Erich, sorry, to get onto that detour...I have a question, do you have figures on the air battle losses for each side during Kursk. There are so many conflicting reports on this subject, so its a question that people are going to need patience to answer properly

according to my sources (although they seem to be a little bit outdated) during the period from 5.07 to 23.08.1943 the VVS lost 1934 planes.

[CharlesBronson]

Kursk Bulge defences.

[CharlesBronson]

122mm howitzers and 14,5 Simonov antitank rifle emplacements.

[parsifal]

Fantastic pics Charles!!! What is the source????

[CharlesBronson]

Thank you.

Source is "Images of Kursk: History's Greatest Tank Battle" By Nicholas Kornish.

German weekly newsreel dealing with the battle, very good footage of german armor and self propelled artillery.

Left clik only

Wochenschau-Archiv

[parsifal]

The air battle at Kursk is very interesting, and because of the lack of hard data on losses, a still very much disputed battle as to outcome and impact (on the ground campaign). there are many that argue the VVS was inneffective in the battle, and that throughout the LW continued to dominate. I respect that point of view, but i dont agree with it.

My basic position on the air battle is that in many ways it mimicked the the ground campaign. The Soviets were still far behind the Germans in terms of qualitative edge. However they now enjoyed a considerable quantitative edge 9they had that previously as well, but now they possessed sufficient grasp of Command & Control Issues as to exploit that advantage properly. At the beginning of the battle the Soviets actually deployed less aircraft into the battle zone than the germans, about 1800 aircraft, but they were supported by a further 5-6000 aircraft outside the salient, and more importantly outside the range of a german pre-emptive strike. That was not the limit of Soviet reserves....these are just the front line units. There were about 8000 airframe replacements behind that as well. In comparison, the german replacement parks and reserve units were virtually nil

The Russians attempted a pre-emptive strike themselves, which failed dismally, however the battle of attrition that their deployments obviously were geared towards did eventuate, The result was that whilst the germans started with a very high success and sortie rate, as the battle progressed the german sortie rate plummetted, as spares and replacements ran out very quickly, and the balance of forces began to tip in favour of the Russians. Losses i think at the end of July were running still slightly in the germans favour, but the gap was narrowing very fast. This will no doubt be disputed, and frankly there are not reliable figures on osses for the russians particularly. However the Germans sorite rates were down to about a quarter of the levels being achieved at the beiginning of the battle. Soviet sortie rates reflected the huge reserves that they possessed. My best estimate is that by the end of the battle, the Soviet sortie rate was about 8 times that of the germans, and consequesntly air superiority had in fact passed to the Soviets, despite the heavy attrition being inflicted by the Luftwaffe. For the Soviets, the important thing was not so much the killing of the Luftwaffe, as achieving the primary misssion of supporting their advancing ground formations. I think they achieved this objective in spades. There conduct of the battle, given the limitations of qualtity, and their advantages in numbers and support, was near perfect, IMO