Eighty-two years ago, the Soviet Red Army broke the back of Nazi Germany at Kursk – and changed the course of World War II

In the summer of 1943, Nazi Germany launched what it hoped would be a decisive blow on the Eastern Front. Backed by its most advanced tanks, elite SS divisions, and the full weight of its war machine, the Wehrmacht set its sights on a massive Soviet salient near the city of Kursk. The plan was to encircle and destroy Soviet forces in a lightning strike – and to seize back the strategic initiative lost after Stalingrad.

Instead, what followed was a disaster for Hitler’s armies. The Battle of Kursk not only ended in defeat – it marked the moment when the Nazis began a retreat from which they would never recover. From this point on, Germany was no longer fighting to win the war. It was fighting not to lose it too quickly.

By August 1943, the Red Army had repelled the German assault, launched a sweeping counteroffensive, and recaptured key cities like Orel, Belgorod, and Kharkov. The tide of the war had irrevocably turned.

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RT takes you inside the battle that shattered Hitler’s plans and reshaped the course of World War II – a clash of steel, fire, and resolve that still defines the legacy of the Eastern Front.

From the Volga to the verge

“We were wherever the smoke and fire were thickest,” recalled General Vasily Chuikov, commander of the Soviet 62nd Army, describing the inferno of Stalingrad.

By early 1943, after months of brutal fighting on the banks of the Volga, the Red Army had not only stopped the Wehrmacht – it had encircled and destroyed Field Marshal Paulus’s 6th Army. Stalingrad shattered the myth of German invincibility. It was the beginning of the end – the first true turning point of World War II. And the Red Army didn’t stop there.

In a sweeping winter offensive, Soviet forces liberated key cities across the Voronezh and Kursk regions, pushing westward with momentum and fury. The euphoria in Soviet headquarters was palpable: the Germans were in retreat, and the path to the Dnieper seemed wide open.

Troops of the Waffen-SS Panzer Division Das Reich with a Tiger I tank, in June 1943 before the battle. © Wikipedia

But the winter of 1942–43 punished both sides. Soviet troops, overextended and cut off from supply lines, faced snow-choked roads, immobilized armor, and dwindling reserves. In March, Field Marshal Erich von Manstein launched a devastating counterattack with Army Group South, retaking Kharkov and Belgorod in a matter of days. The Soviet advance came to a halt.

The front stabilized just west of Kursk, where a massive Soviet-held bulge – 150 kilometers deep and 200 wide – jutted into German lines. It was here, on what Soviet commanders would call the Kursk Salient – and the Germans the “Kursk Balcony” – that the fate of the Eastern Front would be decided.

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The last gambit of a fading Reich

By the spring of 1943, Nazi Germany was on the defensive – not only in the East, but across the globe. In North Africa, British and American forces had crushed the remnants of the Afrika Korps. In Italy, Allied landings were imminent. Within Hitler’s high command, doubts about Germany’s long-term prospects were growing louder.

But Hitler believed one last, crushing blow in the East could turn the tide. The Red Army had overreached, he insisted. Its forward positions around Kursk were vulnerable. What Germany needed was one decisive victory – a bold counteroffensive that would destroy Soviet forces and restore strategic momentum.

The plan was codenamed Operation Citadel.

Its goal was simple in concept and massive in scale: a double envelopment of the Kursk Salient. German forces would strike simultaneously from north and south, encircling Soviet troops in a giant pincer and collapsing the entire front. From the north, the 9th Army under General Walter Model would attack from the Orel region. From the south, the 4th Panzer Army under Hermann Hoth and a strike group under Werner Kempf would advance from Belgorod.

(L) Walter Model; (C) Hermann Hoth; (R) Werner Kempf. © Wikipedia; Heinrich Hoffmann / ullstein bild via Getty Images; Global Look Press / Scherl

But while Hitler was determined, his generals were anything but convinced. Many believed the element of surprise had already been lost – and that the Soviets were more than ready. Some pleaded to cancel the operation altogether. It wouldn’t win the war, they warned, but it might squander Germany’s last real reserves.

Hitler didn’t listen. Political desperation outweighed military caution.

To prepare, Germany poured everything it had into the coming offensive. Rear-echelon units were stripped of personnel. Women replaced men in factories. The Nazi war economy shifted into overdrive. The Wehrmacht’s armored corps was restocked with its most formidable weapons yet.

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Citadel was delayed for weeks as Germany built up its forces. When the attack finally began in July, it would be the largest concentration of German armor ever assembled on the Eastern Front.

Holding the line

Soviet commanders knew what was coming.

Thanks to intelligence from partisan networks, reconnaissance reports, and possibly Allied intercepts, the Red Army had a clear picture of Germany’s buildup near Kursk. Inside the Soviet high command, the question wasn’t whether the Germans would attack – but how to meet the blow.

Some argued for a preemptive strike. Others favored digging in. In the end, the Soviet Supreme Command – the Stavka – made a bold choice: take the hit, absorb the impact, and then counterattack. It was a risky call – but a calculated one.

On the southern face of the salient, the Voronezh Front under General Nikolai Vatutin prepared to confront Hoth and Kempf. In the north, Marshal Konstantin Rokossovsky’s Central Front would face Model’s 9th Army. Behind them, General Ivan Konev’s Steppe Front stood in reserve, ready to be unleashed when the time came.

(L) Nikolai Vatutin; (C) Konstantin Rokossovsky; (R) Ivan Konev. © Wikipedia

In raw numbers, the Red Army appeared to hold the advantage: 1.3 million men, over 3,400 tanks and self-propelled guns, 20,000 artillery pieces, and nearly 3,000 aircraft. Facing them: 900,000 German troops, roughly 2,700 tanks, and fewer guns and aircraft.

But those figures told only part of the story.

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The Germans had concentrated their best divisions for Operation Citadel. Their Tiger I and Panther tanks – 281 and 219 respectively – featured long-range, high-velocity guns and heavy frontal armor that most Soviet tanks simply couldn’t penetrate. The Ferdinand tank destroyers – 90 in total – were mechanical monsters weighing 65 tons, protected by thick steel plating and armed with 88mm cannons. Soviet anti-tank weapons were nearly useless against them.

Then there were the radio-controlled demolition vehicles, the Borgward IVs – early kamikaze-style drones designed to clear Soviet minefields. It was the most technologically advanced armored force Germany had ever fielded.

And it was aimed squarely at the Soviet lines.

Fire and steel

At dawn on July 5, 1943, German artillery lit up the northern face of the Kursk Salient. Shells poured down on Soviet lines as aircraft roared overhead and engineer units moved in to clear minefields for the assault to follow.

By 6:00 AM, the full-scale offensive was underway.

German plan of attack. Coloured areas show the position on 4 July, arrows the planned direction of German attacks, broken lines the division between German army groups and Soviet fronts, and circled areas the approximate location of Soviet reserves. © Wikipedia

General Walter Model’s 9th Army struck hard at Soviet positions held by the 15th and 81st Rifle Divisions. But almost immediately, the plan began to unravel.

Soviet artillery responded with devastating counter-battery fire. German engineers, working under intense bombardment, failed to clear safe lanes through the dense Soviet defenses. The result was chaos. The Ferdinands – 65-ton tank destroyers with no machine guns – hit mines, lost tracks, and stalled in the open. Critical minutes were lost. By the end of the first day, only 12 out of 45 Ferdinands in the main assault group remained operational.

Still, the Germans managed to break through the first Soviet defensive belt – only to run headlong into the second.

At the rail junction of Ponyri, known as the “Stalingrad of the Kursk Salient,” the fight turned into a grinding standstill. A single Soviet rifle division – the 307th – held off one German armored division and three infantry divisions. For three days, the Germans tried to break through. They failed.

One German column of 150 tanks and assault guns attempted to bypass Ponyri – and drove straight into a Soviet trap. First came another minefield. Then artillery fire from three directions. Then airstrikes. Dozens of German tanks were destroyed. Twenty-one Ferdinands were knocked out – some by artillery, others by infantry armed with Molotov cocktails. Without machine guns, the tank destroyers were helpless against close-range attacks once immobilized.

Soviet troops inspecting destroyed Ferdinands on the Orel sector. © Wikipedia

By July 10, it was clear: the northern prong of Operation Citadel had failed.

Model’s 9th Army had lost two-thirds of its tanks and advanced no more than 12 kilometers. On July 12, Soviet forces launched a counteroffensive in this sector, pushing the exhausted Germans back.

At the same time, the southern front was about to erupt in one of the largest armored clashes in history.

Prokhorovka – clash at the edge

While Model’s push in the north was collapsing, the Germans had made deeper gains in the south. After a week of heavy fighting, Manstein’s panzer divisions had advanced up to 35 kilometers, punching through Soviet defenses and heading toward the rail hub of Prokhorovka.

There, on July 12, the battle reached its climax.

Disposition of Soviet and German forces around Prokhorovka on the eve of the battle on 12 July. © Wikipedia

To stop the German breakthrough, Soviet high command deployed its main reserve: the 5th Guards Tank Army under General Pavel Rotmistrov. It was rushed forward in a forced march of nearly 300 kilometers to launch a counterattack against the elite II SS Panzer Corps, commanded by Paul Hausser. His forces included the best of the Waffen SS – the Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler, Das Reich, and Totenkopf divisions.

What followed was one of the largest tank battles in military history.

The battlefield was narrow and confined – wedged between the Psel River on one side and the rail line on the other. There was barely five kilometers of open space between them. That left no room for maneuver. The two armored forces collided head-on in a brutal, chaotic clash.

On the Soviet side: mostly light and medium tanks – T-34s and T-70s, fast but lightly armored. On the German side: heavily armed Panthers and Tigers, designed to destroy enemy armor from long range.

But here, in the dust and smoke of close-quarters combat, advantages blurred.

An estimated 1,000 tanks and self-propelled guns took part in the fighting. For nine hours, the two sides battled at point-blank range. Shells exploded at such close distances that armor-piercing rounds often passed through one tank and into another. Some crews rammed enemy vehicles. Others fought from burning wrecks.

Soviet troops of the Voronezh Front counterattacking behind T-34 tanks at Prokhorovka, 12 July 1943. © Wikipedia

By the end of the day, nearly 70% of all armor involved had been destroyed or disabled.

Soviet losses were heavy. Rotmistrov’s army failed to achieve a tactical victory. But it didn’t have to. The counterattack stopped the German advance cold.

The SS divisions, which had advanced 35 kilometers the week before, were now pushed back two. After several more failed attempts to break through, the German southern thrust was halted. And on July 17, Soviet forces began their own counteroffensive in the south.

The turning point

July 12, 1943 marked more than a bloody clash at Prokhorovka. It was the day the strategic balance of World War II shifted – irreversibly.

On that same day, while the SS panzer divisions were being pushed back in the south and the 9th Army was reeling in the north, the Red Army launched a massive counteroffensive across the entire front.

Soviet counteroffensive, 12 July – 23 August 1943. © Wikipedia

The northern push became known as the Orel Offensive. By August 5, Soviet troops had liberated both Orel and Belgorod, driving a deep wedge into German-held territory. Just days later, in the south, the Red Army launched the Belgorod-Kharkov Offensive, breaking through German lines once again and recapturing Kharkov by August 23.

The Battle of Kursk was over – and Germany would never recover.

More than just a tactical or even operational defeat, Kursk was a turning point in the global war. It shattered the myth of German superiority. It exposed the limits of Nazi mobilization. And it proved, beyond doubt, that the Red Army could not only withstand the best the Wehrmacht had to offer – it could destroy it.

The impact rippled far beyond the Eastern Front.

By the fall of 1943, Italy had surrendered and joined the Allied cause. At the Tehran Conference later that year, Stalin, Roosevelt, and Churchill laid out coordinated plans for a final assault on Nazi Germany. The long-awaited Second Front in France was now inevitable — and Germany’s war on two fronts had become unwinnable.

From Kursk onward, the question was no longer whether the Third Reich would fall.

It was how soon – and how completely.

Shells

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