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| Pz.Kpfw. Tiger n°122 of s.Pz.Abt. 503 |
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| Wiking volunteer with fellow Wehrmacht conscripts |
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| Wehrmacht infantry riding on a StuG III Assault Gun |
The Soviet Belgorod-Kharkov Offensive Operation, codenamed Op. Polkovodets Rumyantsev, on August 1943 was to break along an axis from Belgorod to Kharkov to drive the German Army Group South back to the River Dnieper in Ukraine. To ensure the success Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin massed 1,144,000 men and 2,418 tanks according to Russian military historian Grigoriy Fedotovich Krivosheyev and G. A. Koltunov. They faced the 4.Panzer-Armee and Armee-Abteilung Kempf, which had received no respite since the end of
Operation Citadel. They mustered only around 200,000 men and less than 250 tanks and assault guns between them. The vicious fighting during the withdrawal from Kharkov cost SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Das Reich, Totenkopf and Wiking dearly and by this time they were approaching breaking points. Soviet casualties during the autumn offensives were horrendous, but the Soviet High Command was prepared to accept the losses. To prevent his soldiers deserting the front line, Stalin ordered special
'blocking detachments' to shoot all deserters, in other documented cases, the Soviet Red Army marched their own men at gunpoint through German minefields to detonate the mines. As a result, the communist forces suffered heavy casualties in the Belgorod-Kharkov offensive: according to official Soviet sources an estimated 255,566, including 71,611 killed and missing. According to German historian Karl-Heinz Frieser, Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS units suffered 25,068 casualties, including 8,933 killed and missing. Top clip: Tiger n°122 of schwere Panzerabteilung 503 in Ukraine in 1943. Credit: Gabriel Bîrsanu. Die Deutsche Wochenschau. Middle image: an SS-Scharführer of the Wiking division in conversation with regular Wehrmacht troops. The Wehrmacht regarded the Waffen-SS as thoroughly reliable comrades. Respect born of shared frontline experiences. c. Bundesarchiv. Bottom image: Wehrmacht infantry from unknown unit riding on a Sturmgeschütz III Assault Gun somewhere on the Eastern Front in 1943. Credit: Ryan N81. c. Bundesarchiv.
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ReplyDeleteMy Grandfather was a officer (at the end of the war a captain) in the 4th panzerdivision. He always said that everybody was glad when a unit of the waffen-ss fought alongside them or secured one of there flanks. "You could always count on them" he said.
ReplyDelete"Every division wishes it had the Leibstandarte as its neighbor, as much during the attack as in defense. Its inner discipline, its cool daredeviltry, its cheerful enterprise, its unshakable firmness in a crisis, its exemplary toughness, its camaraderie - all these are outstanding and cannot be surpassed." - Commander Eberhard von Mackensen
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