DOH!!! It was late, and I was drinking!!!

Well thats my excuse...

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"Watch that Fu*ker, he'll 'ave someones eye out!" King Harold at Hastings 1066.

Why do you think I did not post last night!!!
But tonight I promise not to catch too much of a buzz!!!
(On second thought, I'm not making any promises like that...)

And now, back to our regularly scheduled thread...

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Pressure? We feel no pressure. We have come to cry havoc, let loose the dogs of war, and hear the lamentations of your women. Also, we will very likely kick over the cart with all those Jeter Beanie Babies. Because we're that kind of crazy.

Saw the new book about Kursk statistics in Foyles of London today - only a small book - but it's 49 pounds ( that's forty-nine ! ! ).
Sorry guys - I'm dedicated to the Forums, but not that dedicated...

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"Stand by to pull me out of the seat if I get hit" - Guy Gibson

Posting while being drunk is actually very funny!

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

Not to worry, Martin- I'll have it soon enough! Amazon actually has some used copies already, plus some discounted...

Now, on to this Ponyri thing... Ponyri was a small agricultural town/settlement (really small and primitive) located about 12 km south of Model's start position. It was located on a main railroad line running from Orel to Kursk, and Ponyri was also a road junction used to distribute heavy farm machinery. http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/town/av...5/kskmap01.htm
The website we have discussed on Kursk has Ponyri on a map, but I think it should be slightly more south. But I digress...
Germans of the 292nd Infantry Division took the railway embankment and the northern part of town on July 5th. Seems like as soon as they made it to this point, the 292nd started taking heavy russian fire. For the rest of the day, the 292nd held the northern part of town, but was not able to muster enough strength to attack the russians dug in in the southern part of town. Beginning July 6th, Model began feeding more and more units nito the struggle to take Ponyri. Over the next couple days (or possibly all late in the 6th), the 9th and 18th Panzer Divisions along with the 86th Infantry Division were sucked into the fight for Ponyri. (Also, the 292nd had Heavy Jagdpanzer Battalion 653 with it's Ferdinands attached). According to Healy, on July 7th the germans made an attack using around 300 tanks, but the attack ran into T-34s from the Russian 16th and 19th Tank Corps, and resulted no significant gains for either side. From 6 to 9 July the fighting went back and forth, with the focus of the fighting being the schoolhouse, tractor depot, railway station, and water tower. On the 9th, the Germans mounted another attack using 6 Ferdinands as support. Again, inconclusive results. According to Healy, the Ferdinands ran into the same problems as throughout Kursk. The infantry supporting the Ferdinands got pinned down, leaving the TDs defenseless. According to photographs Healy claims are from Ponyri area, at least one of this group of Ferdinands was taken out by a landmine.
And again on July 10th, Model planned yet ANOTHER strong assault against Ponyri. The 10th PanzerGrenadier and 31st Infantry Divisions were moved up the night of July 10/11 to join in the fight for Ponyri. These two divisions made up the last of Model's reserves. In fact, by this point Model had essentially gone over to the defensive in all areas of his front EXCEPT for Ponyri. The assault on Ponyri continued until the 12th or 13th, being one of the last areas the Model withdrew his troops from. Apparently, the germans never actually succeeded in throwing the russians out of Ponyri. Carell suggests that the 10th PzGr. Division (which he claims deployed among other things 7 artillery battalions, one nebelwerfer battalion, one heavy mortar and one assault gun battalion) essentially spent July 10-12 defending Ponyri against Russian counter-attacks.
Carell backs all of this up as well, but those were the only sources I had time for last night...
Impressive that the fight for one small town sucked in at least 6 german divisions and all their attached units- 292nd, 86th, and 31st Infantry, 9th and 18th Panzer, and 10th PanzerGrenadier. Clearly, on the northern (central) front of the attack, the russians were achieving their plan- a battle of attrition the germans could not afford.

I'm still looking for more specific details from the Ponyri struggle, along with some of the other smaller fights, and some more info on the armor deployed. More to come!

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Pressure? We feel no pressure. We have come to cry havoc, let loose the dogs of war, and hear the lamentations of your women. Also, we will very likely kick over the cart with all those Jeter Beanie Babies. Because we're that kind of crazy.

Thanx CrazyD88!

I´ll fall asleep tonight with a smile on my face due to this!

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Ahhh, it is about to get better... my weekly local library search has achived results- one of my local libraries has just this week (finally) gotten a copy of David Glantz's "Battle of Kursk". I've heard alot about this one, and it's listed as available. Should be good stuff!

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Pressure? We feel no pressure. We have come to cry havoc, let loose the dogs of war, and hear the lamentations of your women. Also, we will very likely kick over the cart with all those Jeter Beanie Babies. Because we're that kind of crazy.

Well, crazy. Go and read it! Don't "waste" your time here!

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

Well, crazy. Go and read it! Don't "waste" your time here!

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

Hey, I've got to at least make it LOOK like I'm doing my job...

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Pressure? We feel no pressure. We have come to cry havoc, let loose the dogs of war, and hear the lamentations of your women. Also, we will very likely kick over the cart with all those Jeter Beanie Babies. Because we're that kind of crazy.

Oh, good... disagreement already. Glantz claims that there were 105 Elephants deployed in the 653rd and 654th Heavy Tank Destroyer Detachments. This means, according to only the sources I have (which are really not all that many), there are four different possible numbers of Elephants deployed at Kursk- 90, 91, 96, or 105.
Why am I not suprised?!?!

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Pressure? We feel no pressure. We have come to cry havoc, let loose the dogs of war, and hear the lamentations of your women. Also, we will very likely kick over the cart with all those Jeter Beanie Babies. Because we're that kind of crazy.

'It's deja vu all over again !'

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"Stand by to pull me out of the seat if I get hit" - Guy Gibson

Martin, gald to see you're keeping up with this one...
And yes, I'm not entirely suprised. Somewhat suprised would be more appropriate. Glantz(1999, btw) uses Healy as one of his sources, and Healy clearly states 90 Ferdinands. I'd be curious- if you could- what does Piekalkiewicz (sp?) say about the Ferdinands- does he give a number? But Glantz uses a large amount of new russian materials that have been made available in the last 10 years or so. But the AMOUNT of difference in his numbers does suprise me- his number differs at the least by about 10%. A discrepancy of 9-15 vehicles is pretty sizable in a vehicle with such a small production run. And of course, that immediately makes me wonder...
So how do we regard the rest of Glantz's numbers? I'm reading over some of them as I go, so I'll post something soon on some of his more specifics...

BUT... I did come across some inetersting stuff in his Conclusions section. (It's a history book- it's OK to skip to the end!) Some paraphrasing here...

Glantz has an interesting take on the idea of the russian victory at Kursk being "inevitable"... Looking back from a postwar perspective, some easily claim the russain victory being inevitable, forgetting to acknowledge the hindsight of the fact that the germans did in fact lose the engagement. Said theories then go on to simply find a scapegoat (Hitler) and a reason for the failure. Most often go on the assumptions that one of the alternatives suggested at the time would have been preferable- launching the attack in early spring, going to an elastic defense... presuming that those alternatives would have even been possible, which Glantz claims is not true (not sure if I agree with this part especially). Glantz then goes on to point out some reasons why Hitler was not actually responsible- his generals and advisors were expressing concerns as well, and some of Hitler's information on delaying decisions was actually valid (Martin, the intle issue returns...). He also points out some reasons why, looking at the Kursk offensive from something of a time-period perspective, the russian victory was certainly not inevitable. A concentrated german offensive had never before been stopped at the initial lines... The german halt before moscow was after an 800km offensive, and the german defeat at stalingrad was also at the end of a large german offensive. And France, Poland, etc... Thus, until Kursk, while the germans had been defeated, they had never really been stopped. Furthermore, the russians had far more reserves than earlier sources and estimates had revealed, which gave them immense material superiorit, but there was a huge drawback (and this one I definetely agree with). The russian armaments program, observing the success of the early T-34, geared nearly their entire industry towards mass producing the T-34. Design innovations were actually refused unless they eased manufacture. Thus, at the time of the Kursk offensive, russian armor was at it's LOWEST quality of the war. Glantz claims that it was in fact the armored engagements at Kursk, and the extremely high losses the russians suffered, that pushed the russians towards design innovations in the T-34 and KV series, along with the inception of the IS-2. Thus, Glantz is claiming that despite the vast russian numerical superiority, the german qualitative advanatge was greater than generally acknowledged. Glantz also claims that german recovery and repair forces were at a very good level at this point, allowing percentage of damaged tanks to be kept lower than at time earlier or later in the war.

A quote...(p. 269)
"In the context of the German-Soviet struggle, the Germans, flush with frequent successes from June 1941 to March 1943, naturally clung to outmoded assumptions about their own superiority over their opponents. By contrast, the Red Army systematically reviewed its performance after each failure. By 1943, Soviet doctrine, organization, and expectations were much closer to battlefield reality than were those of the senior German leadership."

Not sure wether I agree with all of his points, but I found it interesting... though it worth posting. More to come from Glantz.
I did find a couple interesting ideas there though, and one thing did stand out a bit- Glantz emphasized the idea of "expectations" more than many. Hmmm....

More to come from myself as well!

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Pressure? We feel no pressure. We have come to cry havoc, let loose the dogs of war, and hear the lamentations of your women. Also, we will very likely kick over the cart with all those Jeter Beanie Babies. Because we're that kind of crazy.

Hi guys. Though at work "the more important things " must be remebered...

Here´s some data on those Ferfinand´s destroyed!

http://www.battlefield.ru/library/bo...s/losses5.html

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Good find, Kai. I found that website a week or so ago, but last week was really busy at work, hence no time to do much with the site (no hispeed at home.). I'm going to check out more this week...
So that gives details for 21 Ferdinands destroyed around Ponyri. That means 21 out of 45 (one battalion committed), of which ~7 were out from the start due to mechanics... that means 21 out of 38 operational vehicles were lost and/or captured. Not too good, if those numbers are correct...

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Pressure? We feel no pressure. We have come to cry havoc, let loose the dogs of war, and hear the lamentations of your women. Also, we will very likely kick over the cart with all those Jeter Beanie Babies. Because we're that kind of crazy.

here´s also a site that has quite alot of data on Kursk. I mean loads of pages and details! I`ll try to read it later today.
If you thought you don´t want to buy a book on the subject, check this....

http://www.geocities.com/armysappersforward/kursk.htm

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I found a polish site, interesting pics to include to this thread.

http://www.panzer.punkt.pl/nowe_pliki/kursk1.jpg

http://www.panzer.punkt.pl/nowe_pliki/kursk2.jpg

http://www.panzer.punkt.pl/nowe_pliki/kursk3.jpg

http://www.panzer.punkt.pl/nowe_pliki/kursk4.jpg

http://www.panzer.punkt.pl/nowe_pliki/kursk5.jpg

http://www.panzer.punkt.pl/artykuly/...sk-galeria.htm

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I think we've found Piekalkiewicz' weak point, Crazy - no statistics ! Not only that, but no comprehensive index, either !
Looking through his book this morning, I can find very few references to 'Elefants' - still looking.....

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"Stand by to pull me out of the seat if I get hit" - Guy Gibson

Aha, Martin! Hmmm... not noting numbers... weakness, or strength? We can't say his numbers are wrong!!
Don't spend your whole day looking it up. I'd bet he claims around 90 Ferdinands were involved. That seesm to be the main line from many of the sources. That number seems to be the leading candidate- 90 or 91. Wihtout more sources coming out, we'll probably just have to make an educated guess based on the variety of sources available.

More good finds, Kai. Now I have even more to print out tonight!!

As far as armor goes, it seems like it may be possible that land mines caused more tank "kills" than any of the other weapons. Interesting- during the "largest armored battle" ever, during a fight where technically impressive tanks made up such large parts of the fighting- interesting that most of the kills possibly came from one of the least sophisticated weapons on the battlefield...

I'm still working on more stuff from Model's offensive on the northern front... more to come!

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Pressure? We feel no pressure. We have come to cry havoc, let loose the dogs of war, and hear the lamentations of your women. Also, we will very likely kick over the cart with all those Jeter Beanie Babies. Because we're that kind of crazy.

It was a German defeat and therefore a Soviet victory. The loser is that who surrendered or withdraw the battle field. We did it. But Kursk is being so much overrated here. It was not at all the turning point of the war and not the largest defeat of the Wehrmacht.

And about those Ferdinands. It is impossible that more than 90 Ferdinands would have been available in Kursk, because there were only built 90. And it is also impossible that 90 would have been destroyed, because then, where the hell did the Elephants in Europe came from?

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun