Chapter 17
While this action was being fought, word came from Knobelsdorff in the north to report that the Russians were renewing their attack. There was growing pressure all along the line, mostly by the rifle divisions of 6th and 8th Guards, the former being the troops of 21st Army which had just been awarded Guards status for their defense against Zitadelle. Yet 15 kilometers northwest of Tomarovka, a strong group of mechanized infantry had swarmed through the lines of 39th Division.
Identified as 3rd Mech, the Germans thought they were being hit by the same nemesis that had stopped their attack the previous week, and reported that 1st Tank Army was attacking their sector. They were not aware that the Russians had shuffled their cards, and this was instead the new 5th Guards Tank Army under Rodmistrov. Knobelsdorff had no choice but to commit Scheller’s 9th Panzer to stop them, even though that division needed rest and refit after the grueling drive towards Kursk.
3rd Battalion of 677 Grenadiers was already surrounded and bypassed by the fast-moving halftracks, and Scheller threw the bulk of his division in to remedy the situation. The Germans drove back the troops of 1st Mech Regiment, but there was another right behind it, this time supported by the 12th Guard Tank Brigade.
A lot of the German infantry had dug into hedgehog positions, a strategy they often used against Russian offensives. It was dangerous if they were hit by too much force, for the Soviet infantry would flow around the strongpoints like French cavalry breaking on British squares. Yet in such events, it was the only way for that infantry to survive, even if it might soon find itself behind the advancing tide of the enemy attack. The men of the 39th were glad that 9th Panzer was a hand, but Scheller’s troops were now in a very difficult fight. It was not only 3rd Mech that had been sent in. The 4th Guards Tank Corps had also been added to that attack, and now Rodmistrov sought to get revenge for the death of 23rd and 24th Tank Corps, and the loss of the former 5th Tank Army Commander himself, General Rybalko.
Some 20 kilometers to the east, between Tomarovka and Belgorod, the infantry of Chiukov’s 8th Guards was hitting the German front manned by the 161st Division. Knobelsdorff had posted 6th Panzer behind that segment of the line, and it was also needing refit after Zitadelle. The initial German reaction was to move up local reserves and answer the enemy push with artillery. Thus far there had been no sign of enemy attacks, and Knobelsdorff was still laboring under the assumption that Katukov was hitting his left…. But he was wrong.
Behind Chiukov’s lines, Katukov had formed up his revitalized 1st Tank Army. 6th and 31st Tank Corps were forward, backed by the new 5th Guard Mech that he had stolen away from Rodmistrov’s army in exchange for his old 3rd Mech. He was forward with that unit, walking down the columns as they formed up, his hand running over the sleek, smooth sides of his brainchild, the new Soviet B.M.P. The three brigade columns extended many kilometers to the rear, the engines only now thrumming up and the SMG laden infantry mounted through the rear hatches. Katukov peered inside the lead vehicle, giving the men inside a smile.
“Fight hard,” he told them, his face now set and serious. “Fight for the Rodina. We stopped them in front of Tula, and by god, we stopped them here as well. Now we throw them out.”
The tip of that long deadly metal spear was the three brigades of heavy tanks assigned to this Corps, each fielding 36 of the best tank the Soviets had—the Kirov-I. This division would soon vie with Kuznetsov’s 1st Guard Tank as the best in the Army, and it was now poised like an iron bolt about to be catapulted at the German line. The 161st Infantry Division was going to have a very bad night.
Katukov had been encouraged by the news from Rotmistrov to the west. 3rd Mech had led the way, and in spite of intervention by the German 9th Panzer Division, they were breaking through. Now it was time to unleash his new war horses. Just after midnight, he strode up to the head of the column and whistled loudly, circling his finger in the air as a sign for the vehicles to start their engines. One by one, they thrummed to life, like a line of planes on the deck of a carrier readying for takeoff.
Katukov rapped on the hatch of the lead vehicle, and a Lieutenant peered out. “My old 3rd Mech Corps has just broken through to the west. I want you to beat them in the race.”
The Lieutenant smiled, and his driver gunned the engine, ready to roll. Katukov looked at his watch, the second hand ticking off to midnight. Then, precisely on schedule, he heard the loud crack of artillery beginning to fire behind him. The distinctive sound of heavy 107 and 120mm mortars joined them, followed soon after by the roaring howl of the Katyushas.
They had been called that when the troops saw the bold letter “K” painted on the trucks, which was just a marker to indicate they had been produced at the Komintern factory at Voronezh. But they soon began to sing an old favorite song called “Katyusha,” the name of a Russian woman longing for her lost love gone off to the front. It had bolstered the morale of the troops when they heard it, reminding them that they also had lovers and family waiting for them back home, and that so many had already lost their homes to the steel tide of the advancing German Army. Now their rocket launchers would sing another song, one of vengeance, retribution, reprisal.
When the Germans heard it, it had the effect that their own Jericho Horns on the diving Stukas once had on their enemies, producing a blood curdling fear. They called them “Kirov’s Organ,” and knew enough to look for any cover they could find when they heard its deep throated roar.
Katukov was coming through.
The plan was a simple one, and it had been dress rehearsed the previous month by Katukov himself. They would break through to either side of Tomarovka, bypass Belgorod, and then run down either side of the Vorskla River. In that first attempt, they had stayed well east of that river, briefly touching base at Borisovka before turning towards the Donets to try and force the withdrawal of 4th Army. Hitler’s stubborn intransigence had kept that army in place, though Heinrici’s backward steps had later resulted in his dismissal to a new post on the “Northern Front,” where Operation Downfall was still being prepared.
This time Katukov had no intention of turning. He knew if he broke through, and ran for Akythrya, the Germans would have to give up their last hold on the upper Donets. Phase one of the plan had already forced the enemy to cancel their Zitadelle offensive, and pull all of Steiner’s elite divisions south to defend Kharkov, but Katukov had no intention of making a direct approach to the city either. If he went for Akythrya, the threat would bring strong forces behind the German defense of Kharkov, and they would have to answer that threat. The only force they would have in hand to do that was Steiner, and that would then weaken the defense of Kharkov.
It was envelopment of the city by their mobile elements that the Russians really wanted, while their infantry continued to keep up strong pressure all along the front. Yet Manstein’s surprise in the south was already complicating General Kuznetsov’s envelopment operation. The recon battalion of 1st Guards Tank reported a long train arriving south of Novaya Vodolaga. The Wiking Division was now going to be a big factor on that front.
The “Heroes of Damascus” had returned to the Ostfront, and with an assortment of new equipment that no other division had seen. Porsche had been busy designing a whole new line of vehicles that they were trying to ramp up in production. They had already used the 90 chassis of their failed Tiger project to build the formidable “Ferdinand” tank-killing assault gun. Now they opened their barn doors and let out a flock of creatures that were to be found nowhere else on the front.