Battle of Kursk

by Tom Zola

  A rookie mistake, Engelmann mumbled silently before tensing his body and mentally preparing himself for the battle.

  “Hans! To the left and onto the open field! Russian tanks in the strength of two companies approaching from the north-northwest. Take us as close as seven hundred fifty!”

  “I’ve already seen them,” the driver groaned, and carried out the order.

  “Edi, AP round!”

  Squinting, Engelmann focused his senses on the approaching tank formation. The enemy presented nearly forty tanks that assembled for a counter attack and now stormed onto the plain. The Russians wanted to decrease the distance between them and the Tigers because they knew one thing: Once the Tigers had turned around, the Russians had to get much closer to them in order to penetrate the armor of the German panzers while the Tigers could eliminate medium-sized battle tanks even at a distance of 1.2 miles. Regarding Engelmann’s Panzer IV, it was just the opposite, however; in this situation Elfriede was the weaker opponent and therefore forced to risk dangerously close combat. But the lieutenant had no choice. Forty T-34’s against thirty Tigers – so he couldn’t just sit and watch.

  “Ebbe, let the platoon fan out and attack!”

  “Apropos, the old man says to fan out and attack.” Nitz’s mouth twitched into a quick grin and he tugged on his mustache. Then he passed Engelmann’s orders on to the platoon.

  “Thanks a lot,” Engelmann grumbled.

  Of course, part of the training of a tank commander was knowing the strong points and the weaknesses of various tank models of the enemy, but Lieutenant Engelmann had never been content with the few training sessions at the tank academy. Instead he had always studied the T-34 and others in his spare time as well. He knew that he couldn’t wait until the experiences of the battlefield taught him the correct range and parameter values, because he might not live to see that day. If he wanted to survive the war, he had to know his enemy; and yes, he did. Engelmann didn’t have to waste any precious seconds looking at the tank identification handbook or armor-shooting tables.

  Seventy millimeters turret, forty-five millimeters bow at sixty degrees; that totals ninety millimeters, the data raced through his head. He also cited the penetration capabilities of his own gun: Ninety millimeters at five hundred meters, eighty at one thousand. After the dozens of tank battles he had been in so far, he had gained enough experience to develop the following rule of thumb for himself: 750 meters – four tenths of a mile – were a sound distance when going up against T-34’s and comparable tanks. This definitely gave him the chance to do damage while not being close enough to the enemy to be able to throw his cap at the turret of the Russian tank and hit it. In the area ahead, the T-34’s sped towards the formation of Tigers and shot with everything they had, but most of the German panzers had already turned around and offered the Russians nothing but their massively armored fronts. Tank-piercing projectiles were exchanged between the two formations; then the first tanks went up in smoke or exploded directly. At a blink of an eye, a third of the Russian forces were lost, but the Tiger crews had to pay with blood, too.

  Now Engelmann and the 9th Company attacked the enemy from the side while the rest of the battalion had just reached the plain.

  “Theo, up there, the one on the right next to the two shot down. Seven hundred!”

  “Roger,” Ludwig yelled. His voice was almost swallowed up completely by the battle noise.

  “Fire!”

  And Ludwig fired. The round hit the tracks of a T-34, bursting them. Unable to move, the enemy tank stopped. Unable to move but not yet unable to fight.

  “Load and take another direct shot at it!” Engelmann ordered and struck the edge of his hatch several times with his fist. The T-34 that was hit slowly turned its gun towards Engelmann’s platoon – but it was too slow. Ludwig had already fired again with the main weapon; this time Ivan bought the farm. It started to spit smoke and sparks; then it fell silent forever.

  “Hans, to the right. The smoke’s blocking my view!”

  Münster immediately turned the tank to the right and gained several yards. Engelmann ducked back down into his turret and closed the hatch; now things out there were starting to get too dangerous for him after all. Most of the other German commanders had withdrawn into their tanks, too. Peering through an eye slit, Engelmann tried to look past the thick plumes of smoke that concealed the battlefield in front of him. All around him loud explosions and detonations. The Tigers fired their main weapons, and behind Engelmann the tanks of the 9th Company fired away. As far as the lieutenant could see, most of the Russian tanks had been destroyed. He heard the detonations of the last T-34’s that were shot to steel lumps at that very second. Then for a moment there actually was something like silence – at least if one ignored the noise of the engines and the fires crackling. The despondent crews of two T-34’s and a lighter, smaller Soviet tank were trying to save themselves by escaping between the wrecks of all their dead brethren. Turning around, they stepped on the gas while the Tigers sent their deadly farewells after them. Clumps of soil flew high up into the air; yet the Russians got lucky.

  Suddenly a new enemy showed up on the scene: A KV-2, a heavy tank with a gigantic turret that by itself was as high as a tall man, entered the battlefield at the northern end of the plain and promptly kicked a Tiger’s butt with its 152-millimeter main gun. The others turned around and engaged in combat. Armor-piercing shells hissed past the KV-2 and tore the trees behind it to shreds. Engelmann swallowed hard. It was a giant of a tank, and even though it was alone and the Germans had five hand-full’s of Tigers, they now all faced a murderous battle.

  “Ebbe, have the platoon gather around our position. We’ll avoid the open space on the left, stay at the edge of the woods for two thousand meters and then attack the flank of that SOB!”

  “Are you serious, Sepp?” Nitz hardly ever questioned his commander’s orders but now, in the presence of their new opponent, his voice rang with concern. “I mean, we’ve got the Tigers. That thing’ll tear us to pieces!”

  Engelmann didn’t want to die, either, but after all they did want to win the war – for their fatherland, for their families.

  “I’m serious, Ebbe!”

  Nitz slid behind the radio. Engelmann’s panzer started to move, and at the same time one of the commanders of the other Tigers appeared to anticipate a great opportunity to earn himself an Iron Cross. He broke out of formation and stormed towards the enemy tank that was swallowing two 88-millimeter rounds as if the Germans were shooting at it with water pistols. Of course a Tiger could have been a threat to the KV-2, but not at a distance of over one and a quarter miles and with 110 millimeters of armored steel protecting its bow. The KV-2 had cleverly positioned itself at the edge of the forest so that it could only be tackled from the front.

  While the Tigers kept firing in the background and actually tore a track on that Russian tank behemoth into pieces, the panzer that was approaching fast shot mercilessly, too. The KV-2, on the other hand, had concentrated on the approaching enemy forces and covered them with a cloud of dirt every twenty seconds. Engelmann’s tank raced along the edge of the woods, his platoon directly behind him; yet they were still too far away. Suddenly a Junkers Ju 87 “Stuka” shot across the battlefield, easily recognized by its wing tips, which curved upward; even Engelmann could identify it through his eye slits.

  “Thank God!” he groaned, and the Stuka turned around to get into the right position to attack targets near the Russian wrecks. The Tiger that had broken out of formation had also reached the destroyed Russian tanks by now and used the burning steel wrecks as cover from the KV-2. The pilot of the Stuka flew closer but he was too slow. The KV-2 had used up all the life it had had in it, allowing the Tiger to finish it off with one targeted shot between the turret and the hull. An explosion ripped the side of the tank off, creating a huge hole out of which smoke emerged.

  Done. A sense of relief spread through Engelmann’s body. Then he froze. Why doesn
’t the Stuka turn back? His eyes widened, and a nanosecond later the guns of the aircraft were spitting death and destruction. The lone Tiger in the middle of the Russian wrecks accelerated while dozens of projectiles rained down on it.

  “Shit!” the lieutenant cursed.

  “He thinks it’s a Russian!” Münster groaned.

  When the dive-bomber had reached the interception point of his nosedive, it turned about and gained in altitude, while a 550-pound bomb came loose from under its belly and detonated to the right of the Tiger. The impact of the explosion shook the steel beast but didn’t manage to penetrate it. The Stuka rose higher but then it turned about again.

  “He’s gonna attack again!” Münster gasped. All the soldiers on the battlefield were condemned to doing nothing but watch and pray – all except for the crew of the Tiger. Hatches opened and hectic crew members scrambled out of their tin can. They carried a large red cloth and climbed up onto the hull of their tank, where they hurriedly spread it out. The cloth was not just a simple piece of fabric but the new flag of the German Reich with black-white-and-red stripes that now covered the rear hull. Nevertheless, the pilot prepared for his next attack. Spellbound, the soldiers stared at the sky – too spellbound to flee. The Stuka flew a wide arch. Then it came back … and turned away.

  North of Ponyri, Soviet Union, May 3rd, 1943

  Heeresgruppe Mitte – 75 kilometers north of Kursk

  Platoon Leader Claassen had not exaggerated when he promised Berning an unpleasant conversation. The doctor had bandaged the young sergeant’s wound ─ just a graze wound on his thigh ─ and handed him a note that was not marked with any color, meaning that he was fit for duty and had to report back to his unit. On the way there he was already overcome with worry and fear while the battle far off was underway.

  Berning had enough of the military men who thought they were somebody just because they could yell and issue orders. He didn’t want to be in a war, and he didn’t want to be shot and killed. The light burning sensation in his thigh kept reminding him how real the risk of death was here. Berning didn’t want to be a sergeant any more, either; all he wanted was to get away – go home. His father had signed him up for NCO Academy because they got free meals and accommodations there, and because his family didn’t have much money. But he hadn’t imagined that war would be like this – now that he had had a taste of battle. And nobody seemed to like him here anyway. He felt lonely and left behind. And as he stood in front of his platoon leader who informed him at the top of his lungs how incompetent he was and that he was a disgrace to the whole NCO corps, Berning was close to tears while all the misery that had bottled up inside of him made his lips quiver.

  Together with Obergrenadier Heinz-Gerd Bauer, the private first class everybody called “Hege”, Berning was now cowering in a hole they had dug near the edge of some woods near an open field; the hole was to serve them as a trench in the case of a Russian attack. Here they roughly secured the perimeter to the south, but tonight they didn’t have to worry about anything because the German attack formations were still quite far ahead of them. In the distance he could hear the artillery fire of two armies entangled in their violent clash, while the sun was even now getting ready to leave this part of the planet.

  Every time one of the huge explosions illuminated the sky, it was like lightning twitching over the firmament far ahead. The scenario was eerie but quiet.

  Some of the soldiers in the trenches were chatting calmly, talking about their girls back home or smoking cigarettes, always anxious to cover the glow with their palms to give a sniper no target in the upcoming darkness.

  Claassen obviously wanted to push Berning to the limits. The sergeant had no other explanation for the fact that his platoon leader had assigned him to the squad of this madman – this Staff Sergeant Pappendorf – after his 3rd Squad had been disbanded. Pappendorf was a non-commissioned officer everybody feared – crew cut, always a dapper appearance, and he was able to quote any regulation like a minister could quote from the Bible.

  In addition, Pappendorf was a veritable slave driver, a bastard who abused his men until they broke down. At first there had been complaints about him, but his soldiers had soon realized that this would only cause more pain for them. Berning had already had problems with this guy when he himself had still been a squad leader, since in Pappendorf’s mind he never conducted himself correctly enough and never behaved well enough. And now? Now he was completely at that bastard’s mercy!

  Pappendorf had assigned Berning – after a major dressing-down about trivialities, like the way his stahlhelm sat on his head – to the MG team as its leader. At the same time the sergeant was to accompany the squad as an assistant squad leader, though Berning didn’t want to lead anybody any more. It only meant that he would make even more mistakes and his life here would become even more loathsome.

  And so while dust slowly settled and colored spaces turned gray, Berning sat in his foxhole with stomach pains and timid thoughts and just didn't want to carry on anymore. Next to him, Hege leaned against the wall and stared at the open field. The private first class with the bad teeth was apparently lost in his own thoughts.

  “I still wonder what were those things we saw earlier,” the soldier interrupted the silence.

  Berning didn’t react.

  “Never seen anything like it. Could they have been these new Panthers?”

  Berning just shrugged. How am I supposed to know? He thought. Two hours ago two gigantic tank destroyers had broken out of a lane in the woods to their left and lumbered towards the front line. The soldiers of the reconnaissance squadron had never seen anything like them, and since then Hege hadn’t been able to get rid of the sight of these tremendous things. On the rear half of the hull, which had a length of more than 26 feet, there was an immovable turret of monstrous size from which a giant barrel protruded that was so long that it reached even farther than the hull. From the bottom of the hull to the top of the turret, the tank surely measured at least nine and a half feet. That thing was even larger than the new Tigers and had thrilled the soldiers here in their trenches. They desperately needed sights like this one, after the mixed outcome of the war years of 1942 and 1943. However, apparently Hege now realized that the sergeant didn’t feel like talking and he fell silent again.

  The thunder of the artillery had moved back very slowly during the past few hours, becoming softer. Berning had no idea how the attack was going, and neither did he care.

  Southeast of Lutshki I, Soviet Union, May 3rd, 1943

  Heeresgruppe Süd – 89 kilometers south of Kursk

  The Russian plains ahead of Kursk were already veiled in darkness. The moon now appeared behind thick cloud formations and softly lit up the front sector. Lieutenant Engelmann looked up at the firmament. It was getting cloudy and looked as if it might rain the next day. In the southeast, where the XI and XXXXII Armee Korps had already been stopped by heavy Russian defensive fire only a few miles behind the eastern bank of the Donets, the artillery was still rumbling, but in the area covered by Panzer Regiment 2 it was quiet right now.

  Fortunately Engelmann didn’t have to worry about the safety of his unit since the infantry forces had already passed them when dusk set in. Now the infantry forces positioned themselves half a mile farther up the road. Lieutenant Engelmann leaned against his tank and stared up at the sky. A few stars sparkled between the clouds. Just at this moment an uneasy feeling took hold of him. He sighed deeply. Even though he had never believed in the success of this operation, somewhere deep inside of him there had been hope that Citadel might be successful after all and could turn the war around once again in favor of the Wehrmacht. But now, on the evening of the first day, it became apparent that even though the Russians had been surprised, they definitely were not undersupplied, and would be able to stop the German attack at the front line after only a few miles of territorial gains.

  Although the 16th Panzer Division had accomplished its goal for the day by breaking
through the second defense belt, this was pretty much the only successful action. In the southeast, Kempf’s army was still stuck at the eastern bank of the Donets. As long as no more successes were achieved there, Engelmann’s panzer division couldn’t advance, either, for otherwise it would get too far ahead of the rest of the troops, thus exposing their flanks. So now they had to dig in by the road to Prokhorovka and wait for reports of success from the southeast.

  It’s so fucked up, Engelmann thought, contorting his face while shaking his head. We’re sitting here on the doorstep of Prokhorovka, the next interim goal on our way to Kursk, and all we can do is wait. Every hour they were giving the enemy by waiting would let the Russians hole up better and bring in more reinforcements. Every hour of waiting diminished their chances of success, but there was just no other alternative.

  Things were even worse up north. The enemy’s powerful rocket launcher batteries had prevented the German forces from advancing just about everywhere. Only some elements of the XXXXI Panzer Korps as well as the XXIII Armee Korps stood in the trenches of the second defense belt; all the other formations were stuck somewhere in the first defense belt or even before. The situation was fucked up. Engelmann let out another sigh while his men’s low voices and the faint rustling of clothes reached his ears. His soldiers had prepared a hole as cover under their tank, where they just had finished eating and were now getting ready to catch a few hours of sleep. Münster farted loudly, and while Nitz cursed him out, the originator of the fart and Ludwig cracked up. Apart from that, Nitz’s complaints about his backache, which wouldn’t let him get comfortable, dominated the background noise.