Bump! Interesting thread too

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If Kursk had not happened then something else definitly would have. This may be subject to debate but neither side suffered a debilitating/crushing blow at Kursk, they essentially fought one another to a standstill. At the end of the day the Germans had to remove troops from the Eastern front while the Russians had whole armies champing at the bit to get in the fight.

Once the horde was unleashed, it was going to go sosmewhere

I beg your pardon? Even before the Kursk battle was finished the Red Army was already launching Op. Rumiantsev in the North shoulder of the salient aimed at 9th and 2nd Pz Armies, in the general direction of Orel.

This would be followed soon by Op. Kutuzov in the South shoulder, generally aimed at Belgorod-Kharkov.

Consider the battle of Kursk in two phases, defensive and offensive. Both reached their objectives.

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Agreed with Za. Hitler did think that this major battle would at least create a breather until 1944 if did not succeed. However, Stalin had other ideas.

The maps:

Maps WWII Eastern Front 1942-1943

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Seems to me that Kursk drained the strength of German armored forces to a point they never really recovered from. The Germans at Kursk accomplished very little for the amount of forces they lost, whereas the Russians had enough reserves to be ready to go again right afterwards (noted by Za).
Production levels continued to increase after Kursk, but the pool of armored reserves lost wasn't easily replaced.

The Russians and Germans did more or less fight each other to a standstill at Kursk- a standstill that doubled as a major defeat for the Germans, given the circumstances.

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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.

Sorry, I can't agree with you on the standstill part. The Soviet idea was take a defensive stance to try and stop the German attack, and then move over to a counter-attack. As such it does not make sense saying the Sovs were fought to a standstill as they were not attacking.

The Germans were doing all the attacking, in the North by Model's 9th Army - which managed to penetrate some 18km and then could proceed no further, and in the South by v.Manstein's 4th Pz Army.

4thPzArmy was already feeling some difficulties and its component II SSPzKps was already veering towards Prokhorovka as the direct Oboyan-Kursk axis was found to be too difficult. In order to relieve the pressure on the Southern shoulder of the Kursk salient, Stavka started Op. Rumiantsev, an all-the-way counter-attack by the forces that had already fought off 9th Army in the North shoulder, and which were ordered to "come as you are" instead of having a couple of weeks for rest and refit.

Later on, after the German Southern prong was "fought to a standstill" (per your words and this time correctly), then was op. Kutuzov launched as a counter-attack on the Southwestern direction, towards Bielgorod, Kharkov and beyond.

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Kursk was flawed more so when Hitler stripped the rest of the line for this madness which was a bad omen. I bet Hitler was taken back when the Russians went over to offensive operations, for the Russians they knew they could stop the Germans (Moscow) and win a major battle (Stalingrad) now they knew after Kursk they could win the war.

Funny thing is this, Russia could had taken longer to be a major military power than they did. When Hitler's army came crashing in to Russia in that summer of 41 was to turn a battle damaged Soviet army in to a major army for many years after WW2.

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Regards, Richard

Well, the Soviets also stripped the rest of the line to ammass all in the Kursk salient and back...

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They could afford to do it, Hitler was crap at poker.

And yet he would go on to play a few more hands before the end.

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Regards, Richard

Yes, when he had run out of chips

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one of the biggest probs for the Wehrmacht and it is highly overlooked is the Recon roles had not been pursued either on the ground or in the air as it should have been. Kursk for Germany failed right from the start and not because of the in-depth Soviet AT defenses............. the kleine Führer again proved again his inept ability to lead

E ~

Agree completely.

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The war against Russia will be such that it cannot be conducted in a knightly fashion. This struggle is one of ideologies and racial differences and will have to be conducted with unprecedented, unmerciful and unrelenting harshness. -Adolf Hitler

Erich, I find it hard to believe that much as I dislike him the Führer had anything to do with the lack of information collected either by ground or aerial troops or problems in transmitting and processing said information. The ultimately responsible organisation for this job was Fremde Heere Ost (GenMaj Reinhard Gehlen) Abteilung Fremde Heere – Wikipedia

Also bear in mind that Soviet maskirovka (operational security, camouflage, active anti-observation measures) was especially strong for this campaign.

We can't simply blame it all on the Führer, even he was not totally convinced of the benefits of Zitadelle as he said so himself to Guderian.

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How about most of it?

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Didn´t Hitler simply ignore everything Gehlen told? Or even what the other sources mentioned for example the Red Army attacking in the Stalingrad area. I think Hitler even called them lies. Everything AH did not like was "lies". I´m not saying Gehlen was exceptionally good I´m saying any piece of info he gathered Hitler called them all lies because they did not say the German army was winning easily.

Wolff

General Karl Wolff

However, once Gehlen came into the meeting with the Fuehrer in the Chancellery, and after informing Hitler that, despite seventeen months of fighting since the start of (Operation) Barbarossa, and the six or seven million killed or captured Soviets, we could expect a resurgence in the spring. He was especially frightening with his estimates of future partisans we could expect to encounter. Hitler threatened to have him placed in a sanitarium if he ever spouted such nonsense again, and threw him out. This was November 1942 I believe, and General of Fighters [Adolf Galland, [Rudolf von] Falkenhahn, and [Hans] Baur were there, along with Goering, Himmler and several others whom I cannot remember. It has been a long time. Gehlen always told the truth as he saw it and infuriated Hitler on several occasions, such as his denouncing key individuals and calling certain gauleiters incompetent, blaming much of the problem on them.

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I'm not contradicting you, was just responding to Erich that Adolf had nothing to do with the actual collection and interpretation of intelligence. Adolf of course as you say as supreme commander chose not to "give proper regard" to FHO's information as is documented, but that's another matter.

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Yes, I know this. The battle to the south of Kursk (Prokhorovka) stopped the Germans but did not cost either side greatly, the Germans paid dearly in the latter half of July and August though.

I was being too specific.