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

Although the Soviet spearheads nearest the Dnepr were relatively easy to dispose of, the 6th Army established a coherent defensive position at Lozovaya with General-major Aleksandr V. Kukushkin’s 1st Guards Tank Corps and the 48th Guards Rifle Division. Hoth’s basic plan was to conduct a frontal assault on Lozovaya with Das Reich, while Totenkopf manoeuvred around to isolate the town. As part of this effort, the II./SS-Pz. Regt. 3 sent one of its companies in a movement to contact west of Lozovaya on the night of 24–25 February; this was a tank-pure team with no infantry or artillery support. Even worse, the tanks were low on fuel and ammunition. Moving tanks in hostile territory at night without proper reconnaissance is very reckless and before long SS-Hauptscharführer Fritz Biermeier’s 6 Kompanie was lost. However, the SS tankers continued to press on and just before dawn they blundered into a group of Kukushkin’s T-34s. A short, sharp tank action ensued, with losses on both sides. While recovering from the action, Biermeier’s company was next surprised by Soviet cavalry, who killed and captured some of his crews while they were outside working on their damaged tanks.⁵⁵

Capping off this tactical fiasco, the Das Reich managed to lose one of its three operational Tigers on 25 February in a singular act of stupidity not uncommon among tankers. Tankers are often proud of their mounts and are prone to brag about them to outsiders. SS-Hauptsturmführer Friedrich Herzig, who like many SS tank leaders had no prior experience with tanks, had only been commander of Das Reich’s Tiger company (8./SS-Pz. Rgt. 2) for a week when he made a bet with some Luftwaffe officers that his 54-ton tank could cross a frozen river. Apparently, Herzig failed to notice that a thaw had begun the previous day and that the ice was thinning. After moving only a short distance on to the ice, the Tiger broke through and sank up to the top of its turret. It took three days of effort to recover this Tiger and then the water-logged vehicle, with its electrical system ruined, had to be sent back to Kassel for repair. The report on this embarrassing incident went all the way up to Hitler, who was not amused.[14]

The first part of von Manstein’s counter-offensive culminated with the Battle of Lozovaya on 26–27 February. Since the Das Reich only had 19 operational tanks left, it relied heavily on its artillery, assault guns and Stuka attacks to reduce the Soviet defences. Kukushkin’s tanks were well hidden in the town and put up a tough fight, supported by plenty of anti-tank guns. Kukushkin even managed a counter-attack with his T-34s, but six were quickly knocked out. By 27 February, the Germans had occupied Lozovaya and completed the destruction of Vatutin’s spearheads. Recognizing defeat, Vatutin ordered the survivors to pull back toward the Donets. Von Mackensen’s 1. PzAOK also kept up the pressure on 1st Guards Army, recovering much of the ground lost at the start of Operation Gallop.

Although Golikov’s Voronezh Front was still advancing against Armeeabteilung Kempf with the 40th and 69th Armies, the Stavka recognized that Vatutin’s Southwest Front had suffered a major reverse. Golikov used Vatutin’s defeat to temporarily shift to the defence, allowing his exhausted forces a brief respite, but on 28 February the Stavka ordered him to send Rybalko’s 3TA south from Kharkov to block Hoth’s armour from approaching Kharkov. Given the lack of intelligence about the SS-Panzerkorps’ dispositions, poor logistics and lack of air support, this was a foolish decision. Furthermore, Rybalko barely had 60 operational tanks left between his two tank corps, including at least five Matildas and 20–30 T-70 light tanks, but the Stavka had no replacements immediately available. Indeed, this inability of the Stavka to ensure a steady flow of tank replacements to the front in February–March 1943 illustrates a point that is often lost in macro-level assessments of the Eastern Front, namely that the Soviet Union was out-producing Germany in tanks, but could not always deploy this numerical superiority at the right time and place on the battlefield. At this point, the Stavka had no significant armoured reserves and was forced to transfer Katukov’s 1st Tank Army (1TA) from the Northwest Front to the Voronezh Front to restore Golikov’s armoured strength, but that would take weeks to accomplish.