Operation Zitadelle: Casualties and losses

SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Das Reich
Battle-weary comrades of the Waffen-SS
Kursk salient July 1943
The Battle of Prokhorovka has been hailed by Soviet as a great victory. Soviet propaganda claimed more Tigers destroyed during the battle than the actual number engaged in the whole Operation Citadel. Soviet Chief Marshal Rotmistrov's alleged comment "The Tigers are burning!" is definitely a wild exaggeration. According to microfilm at the U.S. National Archives in Washington 15 Panzerkampfwagen Tigers were damaged on July 12 1943; 7 Tigers at Prokhorovka and 8 elsewhere on the Southern Front. All were returned to service by July 18 1943. According to Russian military historian Grigoriy Krivosheyev Soviet casualties at Kursk during Citadel were 177,874 including 70,330 killed. According to German historian Karl-Heinz Frieser, Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS units suffered 54,182 casualties, including 10,996 killed and missing. Despite the remarkable efforts of the Wehrmacht and the Waffen-SS Panzer Divisions during July and August 1943, the Third Reich found itself in a strategic retreat for the remainder of the campaign in the east. Total casualties and looses in the whole Battle of Kursk, which includes the subsequent Soviet counterstrikes that followed the German offensive Citadel, can be studied at the post Faces of WarTop image: Das Reich Tigers manoeuvre on the Russian steppe west of Yakhontov in the Belgorod Oblast during the Kursk Offensive. Tiger Commander Johann T. Doroschuk can be seen to the left of the picture in the cupola of Tiger S14. Photo by SS-Obersturmführer and SS-Kriegsberichter Friedrich Zschäckel. Commons: Bundesarchiv. Middle image: battle-weary Leibstandarte SS troops during the Battle of Kursk. Photo by SS-Kriegsberichter Johan King. U.S. National Archives. FU. Bottom image: the battlefield grave of an Waffen-SS Machine Gunner. Public domain.

2 comments:

  1. Anonymous21/4/18

    Soviet armored losses were staggering during their suicidal assaults upon the SS panzers at or around Prokhorovka. Despite the ultimate strategic outcome for the Germans, the Battle of Prochorovka was tremendous, one-sided tactical victory for the Waffen-SS panzers.

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  2. Anonymous4/3/19

    Before Kursk, there were unofficial talks in Sweden about ending the war. Russian wanted the pre 1941 borders, Germany the Dnieper River. If that had happened, forget about Normandy. An extra year of German tank and aircraft production without Russian losses would probably have been more than they could have handled.

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