The only front where the Soviets still held all the momentum was in the north, where Heinrici had been forced to order the creation of “Festung Belgorod” under Hitler’s direct order, abandoning the 56th Division. Mikhail Katukov’s stunning march and sudden breakthrough had gone nearly half way to Kharkov, threatening the entire rear communications Zone of 4th Army and prompting Zeitzler’s conspiracy to try and save those troops.
Katukov had punched a big hole in the line between Model and Heinrici, and he was going right through it like a cold north wind. The two German Generals had been struggling to close it for the last four days, but that was not to be. Even though Model built up forces near Tomarovka, they were countered by the growing commitment of 5th Guards Army. Models flank was still hanging in the air, but now long promised reinforcements from Army Group Center were finally arriving, the 42nd Infantry Korps under Dostler, with two more infantry divisions.
On the other side of that hole, was Heinrici, struggling to free up enough troops to stop Katukov’s sudden left turn against his communications. The Reichsführer Brigades had halted 3rd Mech Corps at their bridgehead over the Lopan River, but all of 5th Tank Corps was still at large. One spearhead was 36 kilometers north of Kharkov, but when 6th Panzer finally arrived from Germany, Knobelsdorff ordered it to detrain at Kharkov and prepare to join Hermann Balck. Now only 15 kilometers west of the city, the 3rd Shock Army had to be stopped.
Balck decided to attack immediately, throwing his entire division astride the main road from Chuguyev. His troops moved forward with grim determination. Their enemies had driven over 125 kilometers from their Oskol River bridgeheads, and now were within 15 kilometers of grasping their prize.
They would go no further.
Chapter 30
The timely arrival of German Panzer reserves was slowly changing the tide of the battle. The sudden appearance Balck’s division at the point of 3rd Shock Army’s attack was a stunning blow, but Balck soon found out what others before him knew only too well. He was up against at least four rifle divisions and the entire 1st Guards Tank Corps, backed by three breakthrough artillery regiments three Katyusha regiments, and two more artillery regiments from 3rd Shock. The enemy response to his sudden attack was to unleash a barrage of over 300 guns all along the lines of his division.
The iron fell heavily all along the line, and the PzJager Battalion of Korps Raus got the worst of it, the guns particularly vulnerable to the artillery fire. There were casualties, but the division weathered the storm. The Russians then thought the Germans had had enough, for they saw the panzers and halftracks pulling back, but Balck was only maneuvering. He had delivered his first hard punch; now he was going to roll his division south to make room for Hunersdorff’s 6th Panzer Division.
General Hunersdorff brought up 6th Panzer as close to the front as he could by rail, and after assembling, he began an advance. His division would come onto the line just north of Balck’s and with all new tanks fresh from the factories in Germany.
The German tankers saw what they thought were a group of T-34s, and they were correct, but when the enemy tanks fired, the crack of the main guns sounded distinctly different. They were T-34 85’s with an all new main gun that had much better range and hitting power. The arrival of 6th Panzer was the tonic, with all new VK-75 Lions, and a platoon of the better VK-88’s in each battalion. It became a mini-battle of Kursk, with the best new tanks on each side hammering away at each other, and largely bringing both sides to a standstill.
Further south, the rest of General Kuznetsov’s 1st Guards Army was still frustrated by the stalwart defense of 9th Panzer. His attack had been brought to a complete halt. The Udy River flowed down through Kharkov to join the Donets near Chuguyev, and the Germans had been trying to hold that line. Kuznetsov’s troops had fought hard the previous day to gain a small bridgehead over that river, the Germans counterattacked to push him back. He reported the situation to Zhukov, who was getting more news along the same lines with each passing hour.
All his shock groups were slowly being stopped, and Popov in the south had not even waited for the order to move north of the Donets. He crossed near dusk on the 17th, preferring the safety of Andreyevka and a good river behind him rather than having his back to that same river during a possible night attack against his position. 3rd SS had pursued him, nipping at his heels, and then suddenly vanished. The darkness was the German’s friend, and it was time for another stunning night move by Steiner.
Das Reich led the way, its bridging battalions already at the river in a pre-arranged plan to lay a pontoon bridge. They would cross that night, screened by the woods southeast of Balakleya, which would put them behind the line of resistance 2nd Shock Army was trying to build along a wooded stream further east. As dusk fell the sounds of battle continued, rumbling over the steppe as Grossdeutschland Division ploughed into a line of three NKVD machinegun units that had thought to halt the Germans that day. Hörnlein would smash that line in a matter of two hours, his heavy tanks simply unstoppable. The roar of the Lions could be heard far away, and little by little, the morale of Vlasov’s army was ebbing away with the coming of night.
Katukov may have been stopped, but he was not deterred, believing he could maneuver and find a weaker point in the enemy line. In fact, the gap he had driven into the German lines was now 50 kilometers wide, a huge gaping hole that he could move into at any time, and it was completely undefended. but that attack was now of secondary importance. On his right, and behind his position, Rybalko’s 5th Tank Army had probing columns no more than 40 kilometers from Kharkov, steel fingers groping into that emptiness, reaching for their distant objective. Yet even if he did move south, Katukov knew it could still take a very long time to get to the city from his present position.
The Germans had reacted by folding back their lines along the upper Donets, peeling away from the river and then moving to concentrate forces near his spearheads. The same had been done by the enemy 2nd Army on the other side of the breach, where 5th Guards Army was tasked with holding that shoulder. They now reported a growing buildup of German infantry.
They are planning to try and pinch this salient off, he thought, but they won’t get through my troops easily. Yet with all this strength building up on this flank, I cannot move south without taking a great risk that I might not be able to get back again. If we had another army behind me, moving into that gap, things might be different. But those troops are now investing the two German strongpoints at Prokhorovka and Belgorod. I could still move, with Rybalko, but by the time we got to Kharkov, our tanks would be bone dry, and the fuel trucks 50 kilometers behind us…. He went to his signals unit. It was time to inform General Zhukov of the situation, and see what might be done.
East of the city, the big inroad achieved by 3rd Shock Group had finally been brought to a halt. The combination of 11th and 6th Panzer divisions, had brought that attack to a standstill. 3rd Guards Army north of Chuguyev could not be driven back, and it was still pushing hard against the Nordland SS Division, but now Dietrich was sending strong Kampfgruppes to help shore up that line, and beginning to counterpunch. With the appearance of these tough, battle-savvy troops, Nordland Division finally found its backbone, fighting side by side with the senior SS division in the army.