Battle of Kursk 1943

The greatest tank battle in world history, known as Operation CITADEL, opened during the early hours of 5 July 1943, and its outcome was to decide the eventual outcome of the war on the Eastern Front. Images of War - Battle of Kursk 1943, is an illustrated account of this pivotal battle of the war on the Eastern Front, when the Germans threw 900,000 men and 2,500 tanks against 1,300,000 soldiers and 3,000 tanks of the Red Army in a savage battle of attrition.

Unlike many pictorial accounts of the war on the Eastern Front, Battle of Kursk 1943 draws upon both German and Russian archive material, all of which are rare or unpublished. The images convey the true scale, intensity and horror of the fighting at Kursk, as the Germans tried in vain to batter their way through the Soviet defensive systems. The battle climaxed at the village of Prokhorovka, which involved some 1,000 tanks fighting each other at pointblank range.

During this vicious two week battle the Red Army dealt the Panzerwaffe a severe battering from which the German war effort was never to recover fully. Kursk finally ended the myth of German invincibility.