Anyone pick up on the fact it was 64 years that the world's greatest tank battle took place? I only noticed as by sheer chance I'm reading this book. Kursk The Vital 24 Hours by Will Fowler.
I dont think that we will ever see the likes of Kursk ever again, or at least with the same number of tanks.
Just been looking at this myths and reality website. The Battle of Kursk Rather interesting at debunking some preconcieved ideas on what the battle was like. How about this, Given these numbers, it is not likely that the battle at Prokhorovka was the "largest tank battle in history". In fact, it is smaller than a battle that took place between the French and the Germans in 1940. In front of Gembloux on May 14-15, two full-strength Panzer divisions (each with about 300 tanks) squared off with two full-strength French Light Mechanized Divisions (each with about 260 tanks).
Well, 5th Guards Tank Army against II SS Panzerkorps is something you won't see everyday, even if there was not one big Battle of Prokhorovka but rather a series of disjointed smaller confrontations. But yes, I had missed the aniversary, mea culpa.
I suppose calling it the "Kursk Campaign" would be better. Normandy wasn't one big battle but lots of smaller ones. Back to the T34/M4 debate the T-34s at Kursk were getting brewed in similar rates/numbers to M4s in NW Europe.
I dont think that we will ever see the likes of Kursk ever again, or at least with the same number of tanks. USA v China maybe? Give it a few years, it'll happen.
I'm actually scared of Kursk. Seems to have been such a large and confused confrontation with so much going on and with a huge historical debate associated that I've never really understood it. Israeli's & Syrians/Egyptians etc. didn't do too bad in terms of later Mass tank battles.
