Category Kursk

The Meaning of the Morning Reports – 12 July 1943

This is the follow-up post to “Morning Reports LSSAH”: Morning Reports LSSAH – 12 July 1943 | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org)

The original plan on 12 July was for the Fifth Guards Tank Army to launch it attacks from in front of Prokhorovka at 1000 AM (Moscow time). At the last minute, the Voronezh Front command moved the time up of the attack to 0830. Both the Fifth Guards Tank Army and the Fifth Guards Army stated that they attacked at 0830. The Fifth Guards Army was to the northwest of the Fifth Guards Tank Army and was engaged with Totenkopf SS Division in addition to other German units. The Fifth Guards Tank Army was primarily engaged with the Adolf Hitler SS Division (LSSAH), although it was partly engaged with its neighbor on the left, Totenkopf, and its neighbor on the right, the Das Reich SS Division.

Berlin time is one hour ahead of Moscow time, so a 0830 attack (Moscow time) occurred at 0730 (Berlin time). Added to that, the times listed are the times the reports were sent or filed, not when they occurred. In some cases, they report the time the event occurred. So for example, at 0740 Totenkopf reports an event at 0630 and another event at 0705. The same occurs at 0822 (event was at 0745), at 0825 (event was at 0740),  at 0955 (event was at 0930), and so on.

So at 0500 (Berlin time) they report hearing “tank noises.”

At 0600 they received a regimental strength attack along the line of Prochorowka-Petrowka. See map below. 

I have no idea what generated this report. This attack is at least a hour-and half before the Soviets claim they attacked. If could be a small recon in force not otherwise reported, a false report and a confused time. 

At 0630 Totenkopf is being infiltrated and fired on (at 0630 or 0740?) and under a very heavy infantry attack at 0705.  Again the 0630 and 0705 Berlin times do not match with the Fifth Guards Army 0830 Moscow time start time.

At 0822 Totenkopf, which can see most of the XVIII Tank Corps attack positions, reports “two enemy regiments and about 40 tanks from the northeast, observed entering Michailowka and hills to the southeast at 0745.” This is clearly the XVIII Tank Corps attack. The report almost perfectly matches with a 0830 Moscow time. Assuming it takes a few minutes from when the orders are given to everything gets moving, spotting this movement at 0745 Berlin time pretty much confirms that the XVIII Tank Corps attack started at 0830 Moscow time. Rotmistrov was at his command post at height 252.4 (it is on the map on the road between Prokhorovka and Voroshilov Sovkhoz). Marshal Vasilevkii, the Stavka representative, was there with him. The XXIX Tank Corps was supposed to start its attack at the same time. From height 252.4, Rotmistrov could see most of the XXIX Tank Corps and parts of the XVIII Tank Corps. So, I am guessing that the XXIX Tank Corps attack also started at 0830.

Just for reference, the Germans held height 252.2 and Oktyabrskii Sovkhoz opposite the XXIX Tank Corps.

Now, I gather one could put together an argument of a later attack by the XXIX Tank Corps from the 1000 hours report from LSSAH that says “Enemy attacks on all fronts (At 0915 hours, 40 tanks from Jamki against Swch. Stalinsk, 35 tanks from Prochorowka along the road to the southwest, 40 tanks from Petrowka against Swch. Iktjabrskiy, and the heaviest artillery support. But… I don’t think this report really does indicate that the XXIX Tank Corps attack started at 1000 Moscow time.

Anyhow, I still don’t see a strong reason to overrule multiple reports by both the Fifth Guards Tank Army and the Fifth Guards Army that they initiated the attack at 0830 Moscow time. It does seem that these German records report spotting the XVIII Tank Corps attack at 0745 Berlin time, which would be 15 minutes after the Soviets said they attacked.

Morning Reports LSSAH – 12 July 1943

Seems like I never quite get away from the Battle of Kursk and move onto other work. As a result of piece I was working on, I ended up checking back in my files. This material below is quoted (translated) from a narrative of events kept by the SS Panzer Corps (file T313, R368). For 12 July 1943 they report:

0500 hours: Morning reports
LSSAH: Contact with Totenkopf established. Numerous tank noises along our front. Heavy enemy air activity.
Das Reich: Night passed quietly. Regiment Deutschland is ready to follow the right wing of LSSAH’s attack.
Totenkopf: Strong artillery and small arms harassing fire, heavy enemy air activity.

0600 hours: Enemy attack in regimental strength along the line Prochorowka-Petrowka drive off on LSSAH’s front.

0740 hours from Totenkopf:
0630 hours slow infiltration of the flank positions at the barracks (west of Klljutschki). Very heavy artillery and salvo-gun fire. Advance to the northeast still not specified.

0740 hours from Totenkopf:
0705, very heavy infantry [attack?] 3 km east of Petrowka.

0822 hours from Totenkopf:
Two enemy regiments and about 40 tanks from the northeast, observed entering Michailowka and hills to the southeast at 0745.

0825 hours from Totenkopf:
0740 hours, an enemy battalion attacking into the Psel area from the north.

0900 hours from Totenkopf:
Last elements crossed over into the bridgehead at 0900. Using the panzer battalion that crossed over yesterday, began advancing against the barracks at 0400 hours. Barracks captured by 0715.

0910 hours from VIII Air corps:
Two Stuka groups have been dispatched against the enemy group moving southwest from Petrowka.

0955 hours from Totenkopf:
Enemy attacking west from Michailowka with tank support.
At 0930 hours our armored group jumped off from Hill 226.6 to the northeast.

1000 hours from LSSAH:
Enemy attacks on all fronts (At 0915 hours, 40 tanks from Jamki against Swch. Stalinsk, 35 tanks from Prochorowka along the road to the southwest, 40 tanks from Petrowka against Swch. Oktjabrskij, and the heaviest artillery support).

1110 hours from Totenkopf:
Enemy attack in regimental strength out of Wassiljewka to the southwest. Additional attacks south of Wesselyj and Ilinskij.

Aerial reconnaissance reports the advance of additional enemy forces, predominantly infantry, in the area south of Oboojan.

1115 hours from Totenkopf:
We will attempt to cross the Psel at Michailowka and move in behind the enemy that is south of the river.

1130 hours from LSSAH:
Localized enemy breakthrough at Hill 252.2

1145 hours from Das Reich:
Enemy attack against Kalinin and west of Storoshewoje. After repelling this attack, we plan to counterattack to seize Storoshewoje.

1315 hours from LSSAH:
[Enemy] breakthrough taken care of, all infantry attacks driven off.

Just for reference: The LSSAH is the Adolf Hitler SS Panzer Grenadier Division. It was located to the southwest of Prokhorovka. The Das Reich is the Das Reich SS Panzer Grenadier Division which was located to the south (right flank) of LSSAH. Totenkopf is the Totenkopf SS Panzer Grenadier Division which was located to the north (left flank) of LSSAH and was across the Psel River. The Russian names above are as transliterated into German (vice English).

German records were reported in “Berlin time” while Soviet records were reported in “Moscow time.” It is my understanding that at this time of the year in July 1943, Berlin time was one hour behind Moscow time.

Now, I ended up looking this back up because there is an author (Toeppel) who claims that the Soviet attack that their records state occurred at 0830 (Moscow time) actually occurred at 1000. I have in the past been dismissive of this claim, but wanted to make sure I properly examined it. I will address this in more detail in a post tomorrow morning.

Censoring Remarks?

We usually don’t place any restrictions on incoming remarks. So far, this has not been an issue except for one remark a while back that looked suspicious. Our commentators on this blog have always been very respectful. We received another comment the other day that seemed odd. It referenced a paper on Kursk by an author I was not familiar with. A quick glance at the paper clearly showed that this was a bizarre piece not worthy of further attention. So, do I post the remark and let each person make their decision on the referenced paper, or do I decide that this should get no more attention and not post the remark?

Let me quote the third paragraph from the paper which will show why I really don’t want to bring any attention to it:

“To support his enunciation, Kellerhoff quotes only one source – an obscure British historian Ben Wheatley, who allegedly found some obscure aerial photographs in American archives 75 years after the war. And those photographs, allegedly made by the Luftwaffe planes, are Kellerhoff’s only argument for what he called the “disastrous defeat of the Red Army at Prokhorovka.”

Now, I have not read the referenced article by Kellerhoff, but I am familiar with Dr. Wheatley’s work and have blogged about it before. I also went into those same photo files over a decade ago and there is a 32-page aerial photo section in my big Kursk book. He did not reference my work in his paper. I found out about these aerial photo files from John Sloan, a retired Sovietologist who runs the Xenophon Group (link is in our sidebar). So, these files are certainly not “allegedly found” and “allegedly made by Luftwaffe planes.” They are also not that “obscure” (nor is Dr. Wheatley). A couple of Italian Advanced Squad Leader module designers are currently developing their game map sheets from these Luftwaffe aerial photos. See: http://advancingfire.com/

The rest of the article is filled with similar crap. It was bad enough that if I posted it, then I would be obligated to immediately respond to it.  A point-by-point refutation of a ten-page paper would take a while. It sometimes takes more time to refute bad “research” then it takes for the author to make their claims. I do have better and more important, things to do with my time right now. Therefore, I decided not publish the remark and give the referenced article any visibility.

It does appear that the comment is from Russia or a Russian although they use a Chinese appearing name. We will, with some judiciousness, not publish remarks that are obviously deceptive, propaganda-like and based upon poor data. The one other such remark that we did not publish was similar.

More Combat Results Tables from War by Numbers

Now, the purpose of War by Numbers was not to create Combat Results Tables (CRT) for wargames. Its real purpose was to test the theoretical ideas of Clausewitz, and more particularly, Trevor N. Dupuy to actual real-world data. Not as case studies, but as statistical compilations that would show what the norms are. Unfortunately, military history is often the study of exceptions, or exceptional events, and what is often lost to the casual reader it what the norms are. Properly developed statistical database will clearly show what the norms are and how frequent or infrequent these exceptions are. People tend to remember the exceptional cases, they tend to forget the norms, if they even knew what they were to start with.

Chapters 3, 4 and 5 of War by Numbers is primarily focused on measuring human factors (which some people in the U.S. DOD analytical community seem to think are unmeasurable, even though we are measuring them). As part of that effort I ended up assemble a set of force ratios tables based upon theater and nationality. The first of these, on page 10, was in my previous blog post. Here are a few others, from page 11 of War by Numbers.

Germans attacking Soviets (Battles of Kharkov and Kursk), 1943

 

Force Ratio                          Result                                    Percent Failure   Number of cases

0.63 to 1.06-to-1.00             Attack usually succeeds      20%                        5

1.18 to 1.87-to-1.00             Attack usually succeeds        6%                      17

1.91-to-1.00 and higher      Attacker Advances                 0%                       21

 

Soviets attacking Germans (Battles of Kharkov and Kursk), 1943

 

Force Ratio                          Result                                    Percent Failure   Number of cases

0.40 to 1.05-to-1                  Attack usually fails                70%                      10

1.20 to 1.65-to-1.00             Attack often fails                    50%                      11

1.91 to 2.89-to-1.00             Attack sometimes fails          44%                       9

 

 

 

Pacific Theater of Operations (PTO) Data, U.S. attacking Japanese, 1945

 

Force Ratio                          Result                                    Percent Failure   Number of cases

1.40 to 2.89-to-1.00             Attack succeeds                        0%                     20

2.92 to 3.89-to-1.00             Attack usually succeeds        21%                      14

4.35-to-1.00 and higher       Attack usually succeeds          4%                     26

 

Their Wehrmacht was Better than our Army

Poking around the internet, I ran across an article from 1985 by the British journalist and historian Max Hastings, rather provocatively titled “Their Wehrmacht was Better than our Army.” It was published in the Washington Post. I had not seen it before (as I went to work for Trevor Dupuy in 1987):

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/1985/05/05/their-wehrmacht-was-better-than-our-army/0b2cfe73-68f4-4bc3-a62d-7626f6382dbd/

A few highlights:

  1. The language in the first couple of paragraphs is also pretty provocative. 
  2. The discussion then goes to Liddell Hart.
  3. The discussion then goes to Trevor Dupuy and Martin Van Creveld.
  4. From Dupuy: “On a man for man basis, German ground soldiers consistently inflicted casualties at about a 50 percent higher rate than they incurred from the opposing British and American troops under all circumstances. This was true when they were attacking and when they were defending, when they had a local numerical superiority and when they did not, when they won and when they lost.”
  5. From Hastings: “A spirit of military narcissism, nourished by such films as “The Longest Day,” “A Bridge Too Far” and “The Battle of the Bulge,” was perpetuated mythical images of the Allied and German armies.”
  6. From Hastings: “Yet to be a soldier in America has never been the honorable calling, outside a few thousand Army families. It has traditionally been the route by which young men of modest origins…may aspire to build a career.”

It is worthwhile to read the entire article.

Now, these claims were controversial in the 1980s, and a number of U.S. Army officers and people out at Leavenworth personally and professionally went after Trevor Dupuy over this issue. There was a long unpleasant discussion of that story written up by the lawyer Thomas Nutter. He was going to turn into a book, but I gather that effort was never completed.

I do address the subject of the relative performance of armies in combat in Chapters 4 through 7 of my book War by Numbers. 

 

The Soviet General Staff study on Kursk compared to Unit Records (part 3 of 3 – Conclusions)

What we did was a simple comparison of the Soviet General Staff study data on the air fighting in the south compared to the daily records we gathered from the Second and Seventeenth Air Armies. What we found was their were minor differences in the sortie counts, but overall that was close to what was reported in the unit records we had.

On the other hand, the reports on casualties was not. There were outrageously incorrect estimations of enemy losses, which is typical of Soviet accounts. But as significant, the reports of their own losses were low. In particular, our count of Second Air Army losses from 5-18 July was 481, their count was 371. This Soviet General Staff study only reported 77% of their losses. Does this mean that if I draw losses reports from the Sixteenth Air Army from the Soviet General Staff study (as I don’t have the unit records), should I “inflate” them by 30%? (the inverse of 0.77).

Added to that, they simply left out the Seventeenth Air Army losses (182 aircraft). It may have been an oversight or a deliberate effort to downplay their losses.

But, just to focus on the Second Air Army losses, the staff study has the total losses for the 5th – 18th as 371: 172 fighters, 31 bombers, and 168 assault. We have the Second Air Army’s losses for 5 to 18 July 1943, taken from their daily reports, as 481 (See Table IV.32 of Kursk: The Battle of Prokhorovka). This includes 248 fighters, 48 bombers, 180 assault and 5 night bombers. So actual losses of the Second Air Army were 30% higher than what was reported in the Soviet General Staff study, or 28% if one leaves out the night bombers.

One does wonder about the process where even the internal classified post-operation staff studies understate their losses (in addition to many other errors). They did have the unit records available to them. In particular, their table is vastly off on the 5th of July when the Second Air Army lost 114 planes and the Soviet General Staff study reports only 78, but it consistently underreports for every single day. They also do not report the losses for the Seventeenth Air Army, which according to our count was another 182 or 221 planes lost (see Tables IV.34 and Tables IV.35). This does argue that the reported losses for the Sixteenth Air Army may be low compared to reality.

In the bigger picture, the Soviet General Staff studies are secondary sources, not primary sources. Furthermore they are secondary sources with considerable bias and errors. They invariably (grossly) overplay German losses and seemed to try to minimize their own losses. Furthermore their narrative of accounts often downplays certain aspects of their operations. They do have be used with extreme caution, as opposed to treating them as somewhat authoritative.

Now, Niklas Zetterling & Anders Frankson offer a similar discussion of the problems of relying on the Soviet General Staff studies in their book The Korsun Pocket: The Encirclement and Breakout of a German Army in the East, 1944. It is clear that these are secondary sources with biases that must be used with considerable caution.

The Soviet General Staff study on Kursk compared to Unit Records (part 2 of 3 – Airplane Losses)

This is the second part of my comparison of the data provided in the Soviet General Staff study on Kursk that was prepared in March-April 1944 compared to the Second and Seventeenth Air Army records that I have.

Losses:

            There are one table on losses in the Soviet General Staff study on Kursk that relate to the Second and Seventeenth Air Army. They are provided below. I have broken it into two tables for this blog:

The Air Struggle Along the Enemy’s Main Axis

                             Air          Enemy Losses:

                             Battles   Fighter   Bomber  Total

5 July                       81           71           83         154

6 July                       64           40           65         105 

7 July                       74           44           78         122  

8 July                       65           54           52         106

9 July                       62           49           22           71

10-14 July              152         112           93         205

15-18 July               43           45           27           72

Totals                     541         415         420         835

 

                            Second Air Army Losses:   

                            Fighter  Bomber  Assault   Total

5 July                       36           15           27           78

6 July                       23           —             22           45

7 July                       24           —             13           37

8 July                       24             1           16           41

9 July                       16             1           15           32

10-14 July                49           14           75         138

15-18 July              (the figures in the line above cover from 10-18 July)  

Totals                       172           31         168         371

            Now, these figures have been discussed before. The losses of the German VIII Air Corps was 111 planes, vice the 835 claimed here. The losses of the Second Air Army according to the records we reviewed was 481 planes from 5 to 18 July: see Appendix IV, Table II.32 (page 1424) of Kursk: The Battle of Prokhorovka), vice the 371 reported here. This report also does not include Seventeenth Air Army claims or losses. The Seventeenth Air Army’s losses were significant (182 planes). So, it does appear that the Soviet General Staff study basically leaves out 292 out of their 663 airplanes losses (44% of their losses), effectively under reporting their air losses by almost half.

       This is concerning, for it does appear that Soviet General Staff study is understating the Second Air Army losses, omitting the considerable losses from the Seventeenth Air Army and of course, grossly overclaiming the number of German aircraft shot down. This was in an internal classified report that was supposed to be an analysis of the battle. Hard to properly analyze if your data is not correct.

The Soviet General Staff study on Kursk compared to Unit Records (part 1 of 3 – Sortie Counts)

Yak-9 at war memorial, northeast of Yakovlevo, Belrorod-Oboyan road

For my on-going Aces at Kursk book I was asked by the publishers to include a Chapter on the air war in the north from 5-11 July 1943. For the original Kursk project we were able to access the Second and Seventeenth Air Army records in the south. We did not attempt to obtain the Sixteenth Air Army records at that time (1993-1995). Therefore I was forced to rely on the Soviet General Staff study on Kursk that was prepared in March-April 1944 for the count of sorties and losses. As the staff study also reported the sorties and losses from the south, and I had the records for the air armies involved in that, I decided to do a little comparison and added a write-up of this to an appendix of the book.

Sortie Counts (I left out the table of the sortie count from Soviet General Staff study) :

          The Soviet General Staff study data on sortie counts is similar to the data we have assembled. The data we have for the Second and Seventeenth Air Armies operations are taken directly from the daily air army reports as drawn from the archives. The Soviet General Staff study may used these same reports, or used higher level reports or other assembled reports for their study. But there are minor differences between ours and their reports, so most likely they used other higher level or assembled reports for their study. For example, we have the Second Air Army flying 1,296 daytime sorties on 5 July. The Soviet General Staff study has them flying 1,274. There are also minor differences the next two days, but the two sets of counts are the same for 8 and 9 July and then vary slightly for most of the subsequent days (except for the 15th and 16th, where they again match). After the 5th, the largest difference is on the 12th, where our reports record 10 more daytime sorties. These are very minor differences. The Second Air Army nighttime sorties match in all cases between the counts we assembled from the air army daily reports and what the Soviet General Staff study reports.

            The Seventeenth Air Army is a little more complex as some of their missions were flown into the battle area while other of their missions were flown completely out of the battle area defended by the Voronezh Front. For the Kursk database project, I ended up reviewing each reported mission as to where it operated and made a judgment as to whether this mission was in the area of the Belgorod offensive or not. It does not appear that the Soviet General Staff study did that. For the 5th through the 16th, their estimate more closely matches with the total number of sorties flown by the Seventeenth Air Army than it does with my lower count of the number of sorties flown in the battle area. On eight of those 12 days in question, their totals matches the total we drew from the Seventeenth Air Army daily reports. The day they most differ was on 7 July when they reported 50 more sorties than we counted. We did re-check the original report and our total is 639. Suspect their number of 689 is a typo. As the Soviet General Staff study may have been drawn from a later aggregate report, there are multiple opportunities for typos.

           On the other hand, in the table we assembled of Seventeenth Air Army daytime sorties we had a lower count for “only those that were in the Belgorod Area or attacked the VIII Air Corps” (see table in Chapter Four). It is consistently lower from the 5th through the 16th, which the worse variance being on the 7th, where we count 588 as valid sorties in the battle area, whereas the Soviet General Staff study reports 689. On the 17th we count none in the area and on the 18th we count 12 sorties.

           Still there are a couple of observations we can make from this comparison. First, is that the Soviet General Staff study reports of Soviet sorties flown is fairly accurate in that it matches with records we have from the Second and Seventeenth Air Armies. This is important to note as we rely on the Soviet General Staff study for the count of sorties for the Sixteenth Air Army.

Waffen-SS Tiger Crews At Kursk

Just wanted to make you aware of a book that has just been released written by Col. French L. Maclean (USA, ret.) called “Waffen-SS Tiger Crews at Kursk” (Schiffer Military, Atlen, PA, 2020). I am graciously listed in his acknowledgements, although my involvement was minimal (a few emails exchanged and one long pleasant meeting for coffee). It may be a while before I actually sit down and go through it, as I am busy finishing up a book about the things that are flying over the Tigers.

When we first set the blog up we decided not to do book reviews on this blog. I will probably hold to that. There are a number of reasons for that: 1) I know of lot of these people, 2) it is hard to review a book if you are not an expert in the area (and there are very few areas I am expert in), 3) it is hard not to find errors in books on subjects that  you are an expert (and sometimes it is as often as much as one error a page), 4) if you do know the subject, then it ends up taking a lot of time (man-weeks) as you check and cross-check each point, 5) I tend to be hyper-critical, and 6) I have been known to get somewhat sarcastic and caustic when it is late at night and after a few drinks….so….I don’t review books.

 

Soviet Artillery in Proportion

A miniature wargaming website in the UK came to my attention because he quoted from my Kursk book (actually probably from my blog). The link is here:

https://notquitemechanised.wordpress.com/

Now, this was one of the many asides that I developed during the writing of the book and I felt one of the more significant discussions in the book. I am always concerned that a number of major points in that book were drowned in the 1,662 pages. I am glad he was able to identify and pull that one out.

The quote is in his blog post, but for the battle we estimated that the Germans fired 51,083 tons of ammunition while the Soviets fired 21,867 tons. I don’t think anyone else have made such a calculation.

For the Soviet rocket launchers (Katyushas) they fired an estimated 2,422 tons of ammo, while for the German rocket launchers (Nebelwerfers) they fired 5,916 tons of ammo.

This is subject that probably could be the basis of a complete stand-alone study or book. I suspect if this was the case at Kursk, where the Soviet army had three months to prepare and stockpile, then it is very much an issue for other, especially more mobile, operations.

 

P.S. The complete quote is also in this earlier blog post:

German versus Soviet Artillery at Kursk