3104 RUSSIAN OFFICER, KURSK

The Battle of the Kursk (German code name: Operation Zitadelle) is widely recognized - not quite accurately - as the largest armored battle in World War II and the largest armored battle on the Eastern Front. It happened after the German defeat at Stalingrad in February 1943, but also after the successful German counter-offensive at Kharkiv in March of the same year. The German side, joining the battle, counted on the full acquisition of the strategic initiative, on the task of the Soviet side with the greatest possible losses, as well as on the nipple of the Soviet offensive expected in the summer of 1943. The Red Army adopted a defensive stance, trying to bleed the attacking Germans out of the blood in the initial phase of the operation, and then proceed to a counter-offensive. The battle on the Kursk arc began on July 5, 1943, and along with the Soviet Orłowo and Belgorod operations it lasted until August 23 of the same year. In its course, despite the involvement of significant forces by the German army and the newest Tiger and Panther tanks as well as the Ferdinand tank destroyers, the Soviets achieved victory, who prepared themselves very well for this battle, and despite suffering huge losses - they were able to go to the counteroffensive. The Battle of the Kursk region turned out to be one of the turning points in World War II. It is estimated that as a result (from July 5 to August 23), the German army lost approx. 240,000 soldiers - killed, wounded and captured, approx. 1,300 tanks and approx. 1,000 aircraft. The losses of the Red Army were undoubtedly greater.The Soviet officer corps began to form in the course of the civil war in Russia that broke out after the October Revolution of 1917. After its definitive end at the turn of 1922/1923 (although the main activities came to an end already in 1919), as well as after the defeat in the war with Poland (the Peace of Riga - 1921), conclusions were slowly drawn from these armed conflicts, which influenced in the shape of the Soviet officer corps and its theoretical and military views. This process accelerated at the turn of the 20s and 30s of the twentieth century, when in the USSR appeared the theory of the so-called deep operation, and their works were published by Tukhachevsky or less known, but very important for the development of Soviet military thought, Triandafilov and Isserson. However, in the mid-1930s, the Soviet officer corps was decimated in the course of the Stalinist purges, which was bad for his professionalism, and perhaps even more for the independent thinking of individual officers. This fact was not changed by the introduction of the professional officer corps in 1935. As a result of these purges, high command positions were given to officers with insufficient preparation, considerable lack of theoretical knowledge, but completely loyal to the apparatus of the communist state. Moreover, at the turn of the 1930s and 1940s, the Red Army underwent intensive quantitative development and generally suffered from considerable shortages in the officer corps. The shortcomings in this regard were already underlined by the Winter War with Finland (1939-1940), and they were fully heard in the first period of the war with Germany, especially in the period 1941-1942. Even the first great victory in this war (the counteroffensive from Moscow in 1941) was achieved more thanks to the enemy's exhaustion and weather conditions than thanks to Zhukov's commanding talents. With time, however, at the cost of a huge tribute of blood, the Soviet officer corps was professionalized and was able to carry out really large-scale land operations more and more skilfully. One example is Operation Bagration in 1944. Also such generals and marshals as Rokossovsky, Konev and Batov turned out to be equal opponents for the German commanders. Moreover - especially the former can be counted as one of the best commanders of the Second World War.