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

With the main German attack on the verge of collapse, the Ferdinands were ordered to move through the cleared lane and overrun the enemy defences. The Ferdinand was designed as a long-range tank destroyer, not an assault vehicle. Its 200mm thick frontal armour was virtually impregnable to 76.2mm gunfire, but its tracks had no special immunity to mines and the 70-ton vehicle was very slow. Inside their buttoned-up Ferdinands, the German crewmen only had a vague idea where the cleared lane was through the smoke from burning steppe grass and explosions, which caused many of them to roll over mines. Some suffered track damage and were immobilized, but one Ferdinand struck five mines and kept rolling. However, the shock of mine explosions damaged the batteries in many Ferdinands, for which no replacements were available in AOK 9. On the first day of the offensive, the Ferdinands had 30 batteries destroyed by mine damage, sidelining these vehicles for many days.⁸³ Eventually, a few Ferdinands and StuG IIIs made it through the lane and began to reduce the Soviet defences at point-blank range. The Soviet 15th Rifle Corps commander committed his armoured support, consisting of 34 KV-1 heavy tanks, 21 T-34s, 18 light tanks and 16 Su-122s.

Harpe also committed General-major Karl-Wilhelm von Schlieben’s 18.Panzer-Division and the 292.Infanterie-Division to clear out the area west of the rail line. Von Schlieben’s division was severely understrength, with only 72 tanks, most of which were older models or the Pz III Ausf N version with the short 7.5cm infantry support howitzer. The division’s panzergrenadiers started Zitadelle with just 22 SPWs. Lacking firepower and mobility, Harpe used the 18. Panzer-Division as a mop-up force to clear bypassed Soviet strongpoints, rather than as an exploitation force. After hours of fighting, Harpe’s corps finally managed to advance about 4km by nightfall, but it had not completely eliminated the enemy first line of defence in its sector.

On Harpe’s right flank, Lemelsen’s corps attacked the 15th Rifle Division (15RD) with the 6.Infanterie-Division, supported by the Tigers of Major Bernhard Sauvant’s s. Pz.Abt. 505. Here, the BIVs also had difficulty clearing lanes and six of Sauvant’s 31 Tigers were damaged by mines in the opening minutes. Army and Division boundary lines are acknowledged as tactically vulnerable areas since, if inter-unit coordination is not properly done, an enemy can sometimes find or create an opening. Pukhov’s left flank was held by the 47th Rifle Regiment of 15RD, which had been badly disrupted by the German artillery preparation and had lost wire communications with its division command post. The German infantry from 6.Infanterie-Division were able to create a breach in this sector and after two hours, Lemelsen sent Generalmajor Mortimer von Kessel’s 20.Panzer-Division forward to exploit the opening.[20] Kessel moved a mixed Kampfgruppe through the breach, which included his only company of SPWs and some medium tanks. Once through, the Kampfgruppe moved through dead space (i.e. not visible from the enemy positions) and managed to get through a small gap in the enemy defences and outflank one of the 47th Rifle Regiment’s battalion strongpoints. A rapid Panzer assault, supported by Sauvant’s Tigers, infantry and artillery, succeeded in overrunning this one position, which soon led to an unravelling of the 15 RD’s forward line of defence and a panicked retreat by another battalion. One Soviet battalion strongpoint held out as ordered, but was bypassed and encircled by 6.Infanterie-Division. While mopping up continued, Sauvant was level-headed enough to take advantage of the disruption in the enemy defence and he pushed south with his Tigers and two small Kampfgruppen from 20.Panzer-Division. He succeeded in partially overrunning the 15 RD’s second line of defence and surprised an anti-tank position in the town of Soborovka. The Soviets committed the T-34s of 237th Tank Regiment to block any further advance. By this point, Sauvant was low on fuel and ammunition and decided to halt, but he had a good day and his advance of 8km was AOK 9’s furthest penetration on the first day of Zitadelle.