Tank Warfare on the Eastern Front 1943-1945: Red Steamroller

Meanwhile, the main body of Sharagin’s 3rd Guards Mechanized Corps (3GMC) advanced westward along the north side of the Manych, heading for Proletarskaya. Sharagin’s corps had only been in action for two weeks and was close to full strength, although it did not have sufficient trucks for its nine infantry battalions. Despite frequent snow showers, Luftwaffe reconnaissance spotted Sharagin’s forces 40km east of Proletarskaya and alerted Generalmajor Nikolaus von Vormann, who had just taken command of the 23. Panzer-Division. This Panzer-Division was in exceedingly poor condition, having just 19 operational tanks in Panzer-Regiment 201 and 4 SPW in the I./Panzergrenadier-Regiment 128.¹⁵ Indeed, the division was so short of infantry that it had been forced to create two ad hoc infantry companies from dismounted tankers. Ammunition and fuel stocks were extremely low. Nevertheless, von Vormann realized that his forces were too weak to defend against a full-strength Soviet mechanized corps, so he opted to attack instead. Both Tiger companies from s. Panzer-Abteilung 503 were attached to von Vormann’s division. The other Tiger company, 2./s. Pz.-Abt. 502 was sent north to Kuberle to assist the 17. Panzer-Division’s rearguard. ¹⁶

On 5 January, both Kampfgruppe Bachmann (Pz. Regt. 201) and Kampfgruppe Post (17 Tigers and 20 Pz III from s. Pz.-Abt. 503) conducted probing attacks eastward and encountered strong resistance from the vanguard of Sharagin’s corps near the village of Stavropol.¹⁷ The next day, von Vormann mounted a deliberate assault upon the Soviet mechanized brigade in Stavropol, with the Tigers mounting a frontal assault while Kampfgruppe Bachmann enveloped the town. The Luftwaffe managed to provide a few Stukas to support the attack, but the Tigers received only limited infantry and artillery support. The attack on Stavropol was noteworthy as the first major combat experience of the Tiger tank on the Eastern Front and the first time that the Germans encountered the new-style Soviet mechanized corps on the defence. In between snow squalls, the Tigers moved across the flat terrain toward the town in several wedge formations, with a thin screen of dismounted infantrymen following. The Soviet mechanized brigade in Stavropol had about 20–25 tanks in support, as well as a battalion of 76.2mm cannons and 12 45mm anti-tank guns. The Soviet 76.2mm guns succeeded in destroying one of the Pz IIIs and inflicted heavy losses on the German infantry, but could not stop the Tigers. Instead, the Tigers knocked out 13 Soviet tanks and several artillery pieces. However, it was the outflanking manoeuvre by the Pz IIIs and Pz IVs of Kampfgruppe Bachmann that forced the Soviet mechanized brigade to retreat. The next day, Kampfgruppe Bachmann continued to pursue the defeated Soviet brigade eastward but by 8 January it had nearly exhausted its supplies; Panzer-Regiment 201 was reduced to just 3–4 Panzergranate rounds and 300 machinegun rounds per tank and about 140 litres of fuel – just enough to make it back to Proletarskaya.¹⁸