At the same time, Rotmistrov and Katukov were continuing to press Breith’s III Panzerkorps hard and managed to drive an armoured wedge between Das Reich and 3.Panzer-Division on 10 August. Counter-attacks by both German divisions temporarily restored the situation and inflicted heavy losses on the 18 TC and 29 TC, but 3.Panzer-Division was nearly combat-ineffective. The loss of Panzergrenadiers in defending static positions in towns was particularly painful and once a Panzer-Division lost a good part of its infantry it could not maintain a coherent front. While Soviet tank losses were heavy, both tank armies continued to receive march companies with new tanks and crews which kept them in business. Furthermore, Katukov and Rotmistrov’s units usually retained the battlefield now, improving the probability that their knocked out tanks would be recovered and repaired. However, the real problem was not shortage of tanks but the insufficient number of wheeled vehicles available to the Voronezh Front, which made it difficult to move artillery and supplies forward in a timely manner to support the advance of the tank armies.
On 11 August, Katukov fought his way across the Merchyk River despite desperate efforts by Totenkopf’s Panzergrenadiers to stop him. Then he sent the lead elements of 6 TC and 3 MC south to Kovyagi, which was a station on the Polatva-Kharkov rail line. Getman’s tankers, with some attached sapper squads, succeeded in blowing up several sections of rail track.{157} Priess committed Edwin Meiderdress’ I.SS-Panzer-Regiment 3 to counter-attack Polkovnik Vladimir M. Gorelov’s 1st Guards Tank Brigade, which had just stormed its way into Kovyagi. The result was another vicious meeting engagement and this one went very badly for Totenkopf; one company commander was killed in his tank and two others were badly wounded.{158} However, Meiderdress had better luck against the 22nd Tank Brigade, which only had seven tanks left and its commander, Major Aleksei A. Laptev, was killed in action.{159} Altogether, Totenkopf knocked out 18 Soviet tanks in its counter-attack. However, Polkovnik Aleksandr F. Burda’s 49th Tank Brigade and the 17th Tank Regiment succeeded in slipping past Totenkopf’s reconnaissance battalion’s screen and some tanks headed west along the rail line to Vysokopol’ye. Burda was one of the most experienced tankers in the Red Army and not afraid to plunge deep into the enemy’s rear areas. Yet Totenkopf’s advance had isolated Burda’s brigade and other forward elements of Katukov’s 1 TA.
Breith’s III. Panzerkorps had significantly slowed the advance of 1 TA and 5 GTA between 7–11 August, but it had not stopped them and Hoth was desperate to stabilize the front. He had been trading space for time while trying to bring up more reinforcements, but time was running out. Hoth wanted to launch a coordinated pincer attack by III. Panzerkorps and XXXXVIII Panzerkorps, but the later would not be ready for days, so he decided to launch it only with Breith’s forces. The one bright spot for Hoth was the arrival of SS-Brigadeführer Herbert Otto Gille’s Wiking, which would give Breith three Waffen-SS divisions.
Rotmistrov’s 5 GTA actually kicked off 12 August by continuing its attack in the Zolochev-Olshany sector, which made it difficult for Wiking to deploy. Hoth began his counter-attack that morning, even though his divisions were not fully deployed. Altogether, Hoth had 130 tanks and 23 assault guns at his disposaclass="underline" Totenkopf (36 tanks, including 3 Tigers), Das Reich (48 tanks, including 3 Tigers), Wiking (33 tanks) and s.Pz.Abt.503 with 13 Tigers. Katukov’s 1 TA had 268 tanks still operational and 5 GTA had 115, giving Vatutin’s forces a 2.4–1 local numerical superiority in armour.{160} Totenkopf began the attack by rolling up Katukov’s units south of the Merchyk River and recapturing Vysokopol’ye, but this proved costly. The six Tigers in the lead bumped into a very strong anti-tank defence that knocked out one Tiger (possibly by an 85mm round from an AA gun) and damaged four more. Seven tankers in Totenkopf’s Tiger company were killed in the action.{161} A number of Soviet tanks, probably out of fuel, were knocked out or abandoned, but many of the tankers retreated to the river. When Katukov tried to rush reinforcements forward in the afternoon he was shocked to find that Totenkopf had already reached the river and blocked his crossing sites. Das Reich contributed to Katukov’s problems by attacking Krivoshein’s 3 MC near Gavrishi around 0930 hours, which threatened to split the boundary between 1 TA and 5 GTA. Rotmistrov sent a brigade from the 29 TC to stop this German armoured drive, resulting in a large tank battle. Honours were about even and Das Reich had over 20 tanks disabled, although 29 TC was badly hurt, as well. Hoth was able to get some Luftwaffe close air support to assist his counter-attack, but Vatutin managed to push two rifle divisions from 6 GA forward to stiffen Rotmistrov’s vulnerable right flank.
On 13 August, Totenkopf deliberately chose a high-risk course of action, by deploying virtually all of the division north of the Merchyk River, but leaving only the SS-Totenkopf-Aufklärungs-Abteilung to screen south of the river. A major combined arms attack with tanks, infantry and artillery support at Nikitovka sent Krivoshein’s 3 MC reeling and smashed in Katukov’s left flank. However, Getman’s 6 TC had launched a renewed attack south of the Merchyk River, reinforced by the 52nd and 90th Guards Rifle Divisions from 23 GRC. Totenkopf’s reconnaissance battalion could not stop this push and Getman’s forces recaptured Vysokopol’ye and linked-up with Burda’s brigade that had been left isolated in this area the day before. Fighting continued on 14 August and on 15 August Totenkopf and Das Reich made a renewed push that smashed in the flank of the 6 TC and recaptured Vysokopol’ye once again on 16 August. Breith believed that this attack destroyed Katukov’s spearhead formations, as well as parts of two rifle divisions.
However, the commitment of virtually all available German armour to stop 1 TA and 5 GTA left only two Sturmgeschütz-Abteilungen to support Raus’ XI Armeekorps in the effort to stop Konev’s advance upon Kharkov. By 14 August, Konev had four armies pressing against the city’s defences from the north and the east and Kempf was unwilling to see his command encircled in Kharkov; he made the mistake of openly complaining about Hitler’s orders to hold the city. Unwilling to risk another commander making an unauthorized withdrawal – which would reflect badly on his authority – von Manstein relieved Kempf of command on 14 August. General der Infanterie Otto Wöhler was brought in to replace Kempf and his former command was soon redesignated as 8.Armee (AOK 8).
While III. Panzerkorps was continuing to spar with 1 TA and 5 GTA, Großdeutschland was delayed by difficulties in the rail transport of its armour to Akhtyrka. Four Tiger tanks and the maintenance section of one Panzer-Abteilungen were lost in the rail movement to Sumy.{162} The III.Panzer-Regiment Großdeutschland then had to conduct a 110km road march to its assembly area near Akhtyrka, which caused numerous mechanical failures in the Tigers. Rather than attacking with a well-organized, combined arms team, Großdeutschland hastily threw together Kampfgruppe von Natzmer from the I. and III.Panzer-Abteilungen (16 Tigers, about 15 Pz III/Pz IVs, 15 Panthers from Hauptmann Heinrich Meyer’s Panzer-Abteilung 51, the divisional reconnaissance battalion and one battalion of self-propelled howitzers). The lack of infantry and pionier support was a severe deficiency. Nor was the Kampfgruppe given adequate time to plan its attack or conduct maintenance before the operation kicked off at 0630 hours on 15 August. With the Tigers in the lead, Kampfgruppe von Natzmer aimed to strike Katukov’s flank south of Akhtyrka. Kravchenko’s 5 GTC had pushed past Kotelva and its flanks appeared to be up in the air, although this was not in fact the case.