Battle of Kursk

Battle of Kursk, important battle that took place between the Germans and Soviets from July 5 to August 6, 1943, during World War II. The battle occurred at Kursk, in Western Russia, in what was then the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). Involving more than 2 million men and 3000 tanks, Kursk has been called the greatest tank battle in history.

Following the German Army's defeat at Stalingrad (present-day Volgograd) early in 1943, Field Marshal Gunther von Kluge, the German commander on the central Russian front, planned to strike at Kursk, 320 km (200 mi) southeast of Smolensk. The Soviet trenches bulged deep into the German lines at Kursk; for more than a week von Kluge's concentration of 900,000 troops, 2700 tanks and assault guns, 10,000 artillery pieces, and 2000 aircraft battered from both north and south at the Soviet defenses in an attempt to cut them off from the rest of the Soviet line. In furious fighting, the effective new antitank guns of Soviet generals Konstantin Rokossovsky (commanding on the northern edge of the Soviet line) and Nikolay Vatutin (to the south) destroyed about 40 percent of the German armor. On July 12 a counterattack by Soviet General Markian Popov's army at Orel, 160 km (100 mi) north of Kursk, forced von Kluge to abandon his tank attack on July 13. By August 5 von Kluge's defeat was confirmed by the Soviet capture of Orel.

The battle of Kursk was the last general Nazi offensive on the central Eastern Front. The battle cost Germany more than 100,000 men and irreparable losses to its previously invincible tank divisions.