The race for the east was on. In the North and the South, German divisions were reporting… …heavier than expected resistance
by the Red Army, and in the sky, the Soviet air force… …was giving the Luftwaffe
a run for its money. Mud and mines slowed the advance. Operations were behind schedule
at almost every point. But at the same time,
Soviet high command… …was receiving reports of breaches… …in the first line of defense… …all along the front. Messages were coming in… …about the ferocity of the Tiger corps. For the first time
since the war in the east began, the T-34 was outclassed. Soviet tankers now had to contend… …with crack German crews… …with equipment that bested their own. In the North, the Germans had made it… …to the outskirts
of the crossroad town of Ponyri… …in the second defensive ring. As the second day began, the Soviets prepared a counter attack. Red Army troops
would sweep back the invaders. But the reality on the ground was different. Messages got mixed, lost somewhere along the way, and only some of the troops
supposed to attack engaged. The attack was smashed, leaving nearly 70 Soviet tanks
smouldering in its wake. Now it was the German's turn… …to renew the offensive. But now too it was the German's turn… …to be turned away at high cost. Forces began to be siphoned off, the front began to shrink. But the real fight was at Ponyri. With no decisive breakthrough, it turned into the same type
of house to house fighting… …the Germans had faced at Stalingrad. The town swung back and forth… …as attack and counter attack… …swept away the gains of previous day, or at times even previous hours, from whatever side had made them... ... and the front narrowed further. By the 9th, operations were down… …to a roughly
one mile stretch of the front. The German command staff met. There was a disagreement. Not about whether
the assault had stalled, or whether the operation had failed. In that they were all
in morbid agreement. Rather the remaining question
was whether they withdraw… …or continue to try to apply
pressure on the north… …simply to divert resources away… …from the defense of the south, Germany's last hope… …for a resolution
to the war in the east. Opinion was divided, but at last… …the resolution was to stay. Because in the South
things fared better for the fascist army. The breach was larger. The Soviets were holding
at the second line of defense… …but the German tanks
were pressuring them hard. There were no counterattacks here… …just a desperate attempt to hold on. Vatutin, the local Soviet commander, decided to dig in his T-34s. Literally dig in. He didn't just throw up
defenses in front of them, he had them buried up to the turrets. So, in the middle
of this sweltering and humid July, his men were out, burying their tanks. Turning these mobile beasts
into small hills, or rather small hill fortresses. Because the truth was that,
in the South… …there was a stronger Tiger presence, the T-34s
were getting hammered in the field, but by burying them, they essentially became
highly defensible anti-tank guns. The small profile of the turret… …meant that the Tigers
would have to get close enough… …that their superior range
was no longer an advantage and the T-34s turret
was so stoutly constructed… …that even a direct hit, …as difficult as that would be… …on a target that small,
might not disable it. These dug in tanks provided… …far more of a hindrance
than their mobile counterparts had. They had to be cleared one by one. They couldn't be driven off, or easily neutralized from afar. And when coupled with
the occasional unentrenched tanks… …which launched surprise attacks, they proved especially disruptive. Still the panzers advanced, slowly carving their way forward
through the second line. And as more reserves were called up, the third line began to look paper thin. If the Germans weren't halted here, they could potentially drive forward… …and achieve what would be
so disastrous for the Soviet cause: the encirclement of the Kusrk salient. A breakthrough here
would be a true breakthrough. More reserves were released. Two tank corps were pulled forward. The 5th Tank Army and the 5th Guard Army
were moved towards the front. But Stalin was willing to play
a dangerous game. They had another strategy in the works. If the forces at Kursk could simply
pin down the Germans for long enough, other Soviet forces could sweep
around them in a crushing counterattack, but this meant reserving troops
for this counterattack force, which in turn meant
that not every able body, tank and rifle
could be committed to the defense. The southern front would have to hold
with what it now had. But then the mist and rain swept in, bogging down the Germans,
again causing delays. Still they pushed on. Slowly they clawed their way forward, under artillery fire, through minefields
and past entrenched tanks. But just as it looked as though
the front might crack, the Soviets swept in
with a massive tank counterattack. It was beaten back,
but again it slowed the advance. Even still, the southern German front
was continuing to press forward. Especially the SS divisions which fought
with the ferocity and madness... ...that had come to characterize
these war criminals and butchers. One SS rifle division was pinned down
by a railway. Their company commander was wounded, and second lieutenant
Joachim Krüger took over. He fought like a savage. Twice wounded, he continued to fight. A T-34 flanked his company... ...and he charged it by himself. Then in the hail of fire, a bullet ignited a smoke grenade
he had been holding in his pants pocket. He ripped off his pants and undergarments
and continued to lead the fight... Against such madness
what could the Soviets do. But the order came down from on high... ...that the front must hold,
and so they would. It would be a fight to the last, because after this line
there was nothing. Just open ground and the possibility
of a lot of trapped men As each day passed
attrition favored the Soviets, but held ground meant
that the Germans had a chance... ...to repair any damaged vehicles
that now stood in the rear. Still, even with these repairs, the German tank corps were
but a fraction the strength... ...that they initially started
this offensive with, and their infantry reserves had run out. The decisive showdown had to come, and on July 12th it did
on the fields of Prokhorovka. The Germans were on the verge
of the breakthrough they needed... ...to seal Operation Citadel. Something had to be done. The Soviets’ 5th Tank Army,
which had been brought up, was finally deployed to surprise
and cut off the German advance. On the morning of the 12th,
with artillery raining down, 1000 tanks met in the field. Caught off guard, the Germans met,
then fought off the Soviet charge. Hundreds of Soviet tanks
were left smoldering ruins, while fewer than 50 German tanks
were damaged beyond repair. But the breakthrough the Germans
so desperately needed did not happen. The advance had been halted for the day,
again. And then word started came down:
the allies had invaded Sicily. Hitler ordered the operation called off, the troops recalled to fight
a European invasion. His officers protested.
They were so close. But he would not hear of it -
the order was given. Manstein planned one last push,
but even as this was getting underway, Stalin's long planned counterattack
was beginning to roll out. The Soviets would hit
the Nazi German forces... ...with a force size and ferocity
they were not expecting. It was a total rout. The Eastern front collapsed. After this the Germans would never again
go on the offensive in the East. They would never again have
a major victory against Soviet forces. They would fall back
and back and back... ...untill, nearly 2 years later,
Soviet troops entered Berlin. Subtitles provided by Wargaming.net
