Battle of Kursk - Background

Background

In the winter of 1942/43 the Red Army won the Battle of Stalingrad. About 800,000 Germans and other Axis troops were either killed or captured, including the entire German Sixth Army, seriously strengthening the strategic position of the Red Army.

During the months of November 1942 to February 1943, the German position in southern Russia became critical. With the encirclement of the German 6th Army at Stalingrad, a huge hole opened up in their lines. Follow-up Soviet forces pushed west, threatening to isolate Army Group A in the Caucasus as well.

German Field Marshal Erich von Manstein was reduced to desperate measures. Divisions were scraped up by thinning nonthreatened sectors. Noncombat personnel were pressed into service, along with tanks in rear area workshops. Ad hoc units were formed which blunted the Soviet advance spearheads.

In due course, the SS Panzer Corps arrived from France, fresh and up to strength. Other mechanized units such as the 11th Panzer Division arrived from Army Group A, along with the 6th and 17th Panzer Divisions. By 19 February, enough German armor was concentrated to launch a pincer-style counteroffensive against the overextended Soviet forces, notably Armored Group Popov.

The ensuing attack left the front line running roughly from Leningrad in the north to Rostov in the south. In the middle lay a large 200 km (120 mi) wide by 150 km (93 mi) deep Soviet-held salient, or bulge, centered round the town of Kursk between German forward positions near Orel in the north, and Belgorod in the south.

The spring thaw turned the countryside into a muddy quagmire, and both sides settled down to plan their next move.

Field Marshal Manstein initially believed that the German Army should go on the strategic defensive and deliver strong counterblows with their panzer divisions. He was convinced that the Red Army would deliver its main effort against Army Group South. He proposed to keep the left strong while retreating on the right to the Dnieper River, followed by a massive counterblow to the flank of the Red Army advance. This idea was rejected by Hitler, as he did not even temporarily want to give up so much terrain.

At the top of the German High Command (OKH), Colonel General Kurt Zeitzler and others did not approve of Manstein's defensive strategy and instead turned their attention to the obvious bulge at Kursk. Two Red Army Fronts, the Voronezh and Central Fronts, occupied the ground in and around the salient, and pinching it off would trap almost a sixth of the Red Army's manpower. It would also result in a much straighter and shorter line and recapture the strategically useful railway city of Kursk, located on the main north–south railway line from Rostov to Moscow.

In March, the plans crystallized. Walter Model's 9th Army would attack southwards from Orel while Hermann Hoth's 4th Panzer Army and Army Group Kempf under the overall command of Manstein would attack northwards from Belgorod. They planned to meet at Kursk, but if the offensive went well, they would have permission to continue forward on their own initiative, with a general plan to re-establish a new line at the Don River, several weeks' march to the east.

The German commanders favoring the attack were confident and guided by the facts that the distance to Kursk was short, the attacking forces strong, and the Wehrmacht's history was one of always shattering Soviet front lines where it chose to.

Contrary to his recent behavior, Hitler gave the OKH considerable control over the planning of the operation. Over the next few weeks, they continued to increase the scope of the forces attached to the front, stripping other areas of the German line of anything useful for deployment in the operation. They first set the attack for 4 May, but delayed in order to allow more time for new weapons to arrive from Germany. Hitler postponed the offensive several more times. On 5 May, the launch date became 12 June. Due to the potential threat of an Allied landing in Italy and delays in armor deliveries, Hitler next set the launch date to 20 June. On 17 June, he further postponed it until 3 July, and then later to 5 July.

The concept behind the German offensive was the traditional (and for the Germans usually successful) double-envelopment, or Kesselschlacht (cauldron battle). The German Army had long favored such a Cannae-style method, and the tools of Blitzkrieg made these types of tactics even more effective. Blitzkrieg depends upon a mass of armor concentrated at some weak point, followed by rapid breakthroughs where columns of tanks and mechanized infantry penetrate forward and then curve inward toward each other, trapping the enemy forces in between. Essential to such operations is control of the air space, so that one's tanks are not subject to aerial bombardment, but those of the enemy are. Upon encirclement of a portion of the opposing force, defeat follows through disruption of command and supply rather than continuation of a pitched battle.

Such breakthroughs were easier to achieve by attacking in unexpected locations, as the Germans had done in the Ardennes in 1940, Kiev in 1941, and towards Stalingrad and the Caucasus in the summer of 1942.

The OKH plan for the attack on the Kursk salient, "Operation Citadel", violated one crucial principle of war: the element of surprise. As the Germans moved in more men and equipment, it became increasingly obvious what was happening.

A number of German commanders questioned the idea, notably Guderian, who asked Hitler:

"Is it really necessary 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?"
Perhaps more surprisingly, Hitler replied:
"I know. The thought of it turns my stomach."

The German force numbered fifty divisions, including 17 Panzer and Panzergrenadier divisions. Among them were the elite Wehrmacht Großdeutschland Division as well as three battle-hardened Waffen-SS divisions; the 1st SS Panzergrenadier Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler, 2nd SS Panzergrenadier Division Das Reich and the 3rd SS Panzergrenadier Division Totenkopf, which were all grouped into the 2nd SS Panzer Corps.