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ORD: Myths of the Second World War: About the largest tank battle. First tank battle of World War II

Since the First World War, tanks have been one of the most effective weapons of war. Their first use by the British at the Battle of the Somme in 1916 ushered in a new era, with tank wedges and lightning-fast blitzkriegs.

Battle of Cambrai (1917)

After failures with the use of small tank formations, the British command decided to launch an offensive using a large number of tanks. Since the tanks had not lived up to expectations before, many considered them useless. One British officer noted: "The infantry thinks that the tanks have not justified themselves. Even the tank crews are discouraged."

According to the plan of the British command, the upcoming offensive was supposed to begin without traditional artillery preparation. For the first time in history, tanks themselves had to break through the enemy defenses.
The offensive at Cambrai was supposed to take the German command by surprise. The operation was prepared in strict secrecy. Tanks were brought to the front in the evening. The British were constantly firing machine guns and mortars to drown out the roar of tank engines.

In total, 476 tanks participated in the offensive. The German divisions were defeated and suffered heavy losses. The well-fortified "Hindenburg Line" was broken through to a great depth. However, during the German counter-offensive, the British troops were forced to retreat. Using the remaining 73 tanks, the British managed to prevent a more serious defeat.

Battle for Dubno-Lutsk-Brody (1941)

In the first days of the war, a large-scale tank battle took place in Western Ukraine. The most powerful grouping of the Wehrmacht - "Center" - advanced to the north, to Minsk and further to Moscow. Not so strong army group "South" was advancing on Kyiv. But in this direction there was the most powerful grouping of the Red Army - the South-Western Front.

Already in the evening of June 22, the troops of this front received orders to encircle and destroy the advancing enemy grouping with powerful concentric strikes by mechanized corps, and by the end of June 24 to capture the Lublin region (Poland). It sounds fantastic, but this is if you do not know the strength of the parties: in a giant oncoming tank battle 3128 Soviet and 728 German tanks converged.

The battle lasted a week: from 23 to 30 June. The actions of the mechanized corps were reduced to isolated counterattacks in different directions. The German command, through competent leadership, managed to repel a counterattack and defeat the armies of the Southwestern Front. The rout was complete: the Soviet troops lost 2648 tanks (85%), the Germans - about 260 vehicles.

Battle of El Alamein (1942)

The Battle of El Alamein is a key episode in the Anglo-German confrontation in North Africa. The Germans sought to cut the most important strategic highway of the Allies - the Suez Canal, and rushed to the Middle Eastern oil, which the Axis needed. The pitched battle of the entire campaign took place at El Alamein. As part of this battle, one of the largest tank battles in World War II took place.

The Italo-German forces numbered about 500 tanks, half of which were rather weak Italian tanks. The British armored units had over 1000 tanks, among which were powerful American tanks - 170 "Grants" and 250 "Shermans".

The qualitative and quantitative superiority of the British was partly offset by the military genius of the commander of the Italo-German troops, the famous "desert fox" Rommel.

Despite the British numerical superiority in manpower, tanks and aircraft, the British were never able to break through Rommel's defenses. The Germans even managed to counterattack, but the superiority of the British in numbers was so impressive that the German shock group of 90 tanks was simply destroyed in the oncoming battle.

Rommel, inferior to the enemy in armored vehicles, made extensive use of anti-tank artillery, among which were captured Soviet 76-mm guns, which proved to be excellent. Only under the pressure of the huge numerical superiority of the enemy, having lost almost all the equipment, the German army began an organized retreat.

The Germans had just over 30 tanks left after El Alamein. The total losses of the Italo-German troops in equipment amounted to 320 tanks. The losses of the British armored forces amounted to approximately 500 vehicles, many of which were repaired and returned to service, since the battlefield was eventually left to them.

Battle of Prokhorovka (1943)

The tank battle near Prokhorovka took place on July 12, 1943 as part of the Battle of Kursk. According to official Soviet data, 800 Soviet tanks and self-propelled guns and 700 German ones participated in it from both sides.

The Germans lost 350 armored vehicles, ours - 300. But the trick is that the Soviet tanks that participated in the battle were counted, and the German ones were those that were generally in the entire German group on the southern flank of the Kursk salient.

According to new, updated data, 311 German tanks and self-propelled guns of the 2nd SS Panzer Corps against 597 Soviet 5th Guards Tank Army (Commander Rotmistrov) participated in the tank battle near Prokhorovka. The SS men lost about 70 (22%), and the guards - 343 (57%) units of armored vehicles.

None of the parties managed to achieve their goals: the Germans failed to break through the Soviet defenses and enter the operational space, and the Soviet troops failed to surround the enemy grouping.

A government commission was set up to investigate the causes of the heavy losses of Soviet tanks. In the commission's report fighting Soviet troops near Prokhorovka are called "a model of an unsuccessful operation." General Rotmistrov was going to be handed over to the tribunal, but by that time the general situation had developed favorably, and everything worked out.

Battle of the Golan Heights (1973)

The major tank battle after 1945 took place during the so-called Yom Kippur War. The war got its name because it began with a surprise attack by the Arabs during the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur (Judgment Day).

Egypt and Syria sought to regain territories lost after the crushing defeat in the Six Day War (1967). Egypt and Syria were helped (financially and sometimes with impressive troops) by many Islamic countries - from Morocco to Pakistan. And not only Islamic ones: distant Cuba sent 3,000 soldiers to Syria, including tank crews.

On the Golan Heights, 180 Israeli tanks opposed approximately 1,300 Syrian ones. The heights were the most important strategic position for Israel: if the Israeli defenses in the Golan had been broken through, the Syrian troops would have been in the very center of the country in a few hours.

For several days, two Israeli tank brigades, suffering heavy losses, defended the Golan Heights from superior enemy forces. The most fierce fighting took place in the Valley of Tears, the Israeli brigade lost from 73 to 98 tanks out of 105. The Syrians lost about 350 tanks and 200 armored personnel carriers and infantry fighting vehicles.

The situation began to change radically after the reservists began to arrive. Syrian troops were stopped and then driven back to their original positions. Israeli troops launched an offensive against Damascus.

Perhaps it would not be an exaggeration to say that the tank battles of the Second World War are one of its main images. How are the trenches an image of the First World War or nuclear missiles of the post-war confrontation between the socialist and capitalist camps. Actually, this is not surprising, since the tank battles of World War II largely determined its nature and course.

Not the last merit in this belongs to one of the main ideologists and theorists of motorized warfare, the German General Heinz Guderian. He largely owns the initiatives of the most powerful blows with a single fist of the troops, thanks to which the Nazi forces achieved such dizzying successes on the European and African continents for more than two years. The tank battles of the Second World War especially gave brilliant results at its first stage, defeating outdated morally Polish equipment in record time. It was Guderian's divisions that ensured the breakthrough of the German armies near Sedan and the successful occupation of French and Belgian territories. Only the so-called "Dunker miracle" saved the remnants of the armies of the French and British from total defeat, allowing them to reorganize in the future and protect England in the sky at first and prevent the Nazis from concentrating absolutely all their military power in the east. Let's take a closer look at the three largest tank battles of this whole massacre.

Prokhorovka, tank battle

Tank battles of World War II: the battle of Senno

This episode took place at the very beginning of the German invasion of the territory of the USSR and became an integral part of the Vitebsk battle. After the capture of Minsk, the German units advanced to the confluence of the Dnieper and Dvina, intending to launch an offensive against Moscow from there. From the side of the Soviet state, two combat vehicles numbering more than 900 participated in the battle. The Wehrmacht had at its disposal three divisions and about a thousand serviceable tanks, backed up by aircraft. As a result of the battle on July 6-10, 1941, the Soviet forces lost more than eight hundred of their combat units, which opened up the opportunity for the enemy to continue their advance without changing plans and launch an offensive towards Moscow.

The largest tank battle in history

In fact, the biggest battle took place even earlier! Already in the first days of the Nazi invasion (June 23-30, 1941) between the cities of Brody - Lutsk - Dubno, in Western Ukraine, there was a clash involving more than 3200 tanks. In addition, the number of combat vehicles here was three times greater than near Prokhorovka, and the battle lasted not one day, but a whole week! As a result of the battle, the Soviet corps were literally crushed, the armies of the Southwestern Front suffered a quick and crushing defeat, which opened the way for the enemy to Kyiv, Kharkov and further occupation of Ukraine.

Battle of Cambrai (1917)

Battle for Dubno-Lutsk-Brody (1941)

Battle of El Alamein (1942)

The qualitative and quantitative superiority of the British was partly offset by the military genius of the commander of the Italo-German troops, the famous "desert fox" Rommel.

Battle of Prokhorovka (1943)

A government commission was set up to investigate the causes of the heavy losses of Soviet tanks. In the report of the commission, the military operations of the Soviet troops near Prokhorovka are called "a model of an unsuccessfully conducted operation." General Rotmistrov was going to be handed over to the tribunal, but by that time the general situation had developed favorably, and everything worked out.

About the real power of the KV in relation to German tanks and the heroism of the Russian soldier ...

The events near Leningrad in August 1941 developed according to a very dramatic scenario. On the night of August 7-8, the German Army Group North launched an attack on Leningrad. The 41st motorized corps from the 4th tank group and the 38th army corps attacked the settlements of Ivanovskoye and Bolshoi Sabsk towards Kingisepp and Volosovo. Three days later, the enemy approached the Kingisepp-Leningrad highway. On August 13, German troops captured the Moloskovitsy station and cut the railway and highway Kingisepp - Leningrad. They also managed to cross the Luga River on the right flank of the front, and the city was between two fires. On August 14, all divisions of the 41st motorized and 38th army corps, having entered the operational space, rushed to Leningrad. On August 16, Narva and Kingisepp were occupied.

On August 10, the 56th motorized corps attacked the Soviet troops in the Luga region. On the same day, heavy fighting began in the Novgorod-Chudov direction. The next day, the Germans broke through to the Oredezh River. A threat loomed over the left flank of the troops defending the Luga sector. On August 13, the 34th and part of the forces of the 11th armies of the North-Western Front in the area of \u200b\u200bStaraya Russa and Lake Ilmen struck in the rear of the units of the 10th Army Corps. The German command began to hastily transfer the 56th motorized corps, the SS division "Dead Head" and the 39th motorized corps, which had just been transferred to the Army Group "North" from near Smolensk, to this direction.

On August 16, units of the 1st Army Corps captured the western part of Novgorod. There was a real threat of a breakthrough of German troops to Leningrad.

On August 18, the commander of the 3rd tank company of the 1st tank battalion of the 1st Red Banner tank division, senior lieutenant Zinovy Kolobanov, was summoned to the division commander, General V.I. Baranov. The division headquarters was located in the basement of the cathedral, which is a landmark of Gatchina, which was then called Krasnogvardeisky. Kolobanov received the task personally from Baranov. Having shown on the map three roads leading to Krasnogvardeysk from Luga, Volosovo and Kingisepp (through the Tallinn Highway - author's note), the divisional commander ordered:

Shut them down and fight to the death!

The situation near Leningrad was such that the commander of a tank company took the order of the division commander literally.

Kolobanov's company had five KV-1 tanks. Each tank was loaded with two rounds of armor-piercing shells. This time, the crews took the minimum amount of high-explosive fragmentation shells. The main thing was not to miss the German tanks.

On the same day, Kolobanov advanced his company towards the advancing enemy. The senior lieutenant sent two tanks - lieutenant Sergeev and junior lieutenant Evdokimenko - to the Luga road (Kiev highway - author's note). Two more KVs under the command of Lieutenant Lastochkin and Second Lieutenant Degtyar went to defend the road leading to Volosovo. The tank of the company commander himself was to ambush the road connecting the Tallinn highway with the road to Marienburg - the northern outskirts of Krasnogvardeisk.

Kolobanov conducted a reconnaissance with the commanders of all crews, indicated the places of firing positions and ordered to dig two shelters for each vehicle - the main and the spare, and then carefully disguise them. The crews had to keep in touch with the company commander by radio.

For his KV, Kolobanov determined the position in such a way that in the sector of fire there was the longest, well-opened section of the road. A little before reaching the Uchkhoz poultry farm, it turned almost 90 degrees and then went to Marienburg. It was crossed by another, unpaved road, along which, apparently, local residents took hay from the fields after haymaking. All around you could see uncleaned haystacks, they stood not far from the position chosen by Kolobanov. On both sides of the road leading to Marienburg stretched vast swamps. There was even a small lake with ducks floating carelessly on it.

Digging a caponier for a tank like the KV is a very difficult task. In addition, the ground is strong. Only in the evening did they manage to hide the tank in a caponier dug up to the very turret. A spare position was also equipped. After that, not only the tank itself was carefully disguised, but even traces of its tracks.

Gunner-radio operator Senior Sergeant Pavel Kiselkov suggested going to an abandoned poultry farm and getting a goose, since the people who worked on it, fearing the invasion of the invaders, left it, and the crew, exhausted by hard work, needed to reinforce their forces. Komroty agreed, ordering the radio operator to shoot the bird so that no one would hear:

in no case was it possible to unmask their position. Kiselkov carried out the order exactly, the goose was plucked and boiled in a tank bucket. After dinner, Kolobanov ordered everyone to rest.

Closer to the night approached military guards. The young lieutenant reported to Kolobanov. He ordered the infantrymen to be placed behind the tank, to the side, so that in which case they would not come under gunfire. The outpost positions also had to be well camouflaged...

Zinoviy Grigoryevich Kolobanov was born in 1913 in the village of Arefene, Vachevsky district, Nizhny Novgorod province. At the end of eight classes of secondary school, he studied at a technical school. In 1932 he was drafted into the ranks of the Red Army according to the Komsomol recruitment. In 1936 he graduated with honors from the Orel Armored School named after M.V. Frunze.

The war for the 28-year-old senior lieutenant Kolobanov was not a novelty. As part of the 20th heavy tank brigade as a company commander, he happened to participate in the Soviet-Finnish war of 1939-1940. The brigade in which he served was the first to reach the Mannerheim line, and his company was at the forefront of the blow. It was then that Kolobanov burned for the first time in a tank. In the battle near Lake Vuoksa, he again pulled forward with his company, and again had to escape from a burning car. The third time it burned during a raid on Vyborg. On the night of March 12-13, 1940, a peace treaty was signed between the USSR and Finland. Upon learning of this, the soldiers of the two previously opposing armies rushed to meet each other for "fraternization".

Unfortunately, this very "fraternization" cost Captain Kolobanov very dearly: he was demoted in rank and, depriving him of all awards, was dismissed into the reserve.1

With the beginning of the Great Patriotic War Kolobanov was called up from the reserve to the 1st Panzer Division, which was created on the basis of the 20th Heavy Tank Brigade, in which he fought during the war with the Finns. Since he already had combat experience, Kolobanov was promoted to the rank of senior lieutenant and was appointed commander of a company of heavy KV tanks. True, I had to forget about the previous awards, I had to start all over again, from scratch.

Tankers received combat vehicles at the Kirov Plant. Here, at the plant, tank crews were also formed in a separate training tank battalion. Each of them took part together with the workers in the assembly of their machine. The break-in distance was from the Kirov Plant to Srednyaya Rogatka, after which the cars went to the front.2

In the battle near Ivanovsky, Kolobanov managed to distinguish himself - his crew destroyed an enemy tank and gun. That is why, knowing about the solid combat experience of Senior Lieutenant Kolobanov, General V.I. Baranov entrusted him with such a responsible task - to block the way for German tanks to Krasnogvardeysk with his company.

The 41st motorized corps of Army Group North, advancing on Leningrad, bypassed Krasnogvardeysk. Only one of his divisions, the 8th Panzer, was supposed to support the advance of the 50th Army Corps and the 5th SS Division towards Krasnogvardeysk from Volosovo and Luga. The 6th Panzer Division suffered heavy losses in previous battles and by mid-August 1941, it actually existed only on paper, so participation in the battles

I couldn't take it for Krasnogvardeysk. The 1st Panzer Division advanced on Leningrad from the side of Torosovo, on Syaskelevo and further on to the northern outskirts of Krasnogvardeysk - Marienburg. In the event of a breakthrough to Marienburg, parts of this division could strike at the rear of the Soviet troops occupying the defenses on the borders of the Krasnogvardeisky fortified area, and then, having gone through the old Gatchina parks to the Kyiv highway, almost unhindered to move towards Leningrad.

In the early morning of August 19, 1941, Kolobanov's crew was awakened by the disgusting, intermittent rumble of German dive bombers going at high altitude towards Leningrad. After they had passed, silence and tranquility were again established under the Troops. The day started clear. The sun rose higher and higher.

At about ten o'clock shots were heard from the left, from the side of the road leading to Volosovo3. The senior lieutenant recognized the distant "voice" of the KV tank gun. A message came on the radio that one of the crews had engaged in battle with German tanks. And they were still calm. Kolobanov summoned the commander of the outpost and ordered him that his infantrymen open fire on the enemy only when the KV gun spoke. For themselves, Kolobanov and Usov outlined two landmarks: No. 1 - two birch trees at the end of the intersection and No. 2 - the intersection itself. Landmarks were chosen in such a way as to destroy the lead enemy tanks right at the crossroads, to prevent the rest of the vehicles from turning off the road leading to Marienburg.

Only in the second hour of the day did enemy vehicles appear on the road.

Prepare for battle! - quietly commanded Kolobanov.

Having slammed the hatches, the tankers instantly froze in their places. Immediately, the commander of the gun, senior sergeant Andrey Usov, reported that he saw three motorcycles with sidecars in the sight. The order of the commander immediately followed:

Do not open fire! Skip exploration!

The German motorcyclists turned left and rushed towards Marienburg, not noticing the camouflaged KV standing in ambush. Fulfilling the order of Ko-lobanov, the infantrymen from the outposts did not open fire on reconnaissance either.

Now all the attention of the crew was focused on the tanks moving along the road. Kolobanov ordered the radio operator to report to the battalion commander Captain I. B. Spiller about the approach of a German tank column and again turned all his attention towards the road, onto which tanks painted in dark gray crawled out one after another. They walked at short distances, substituting their left sides almost strictly at right angles to the KV gun, thus representing ideal targets. The hatches were open, some of the Germans were sitting on the armor. The crew even distinguished their faces, since the distance between the KV and the enemy column was small - only about one hundred and fifty meters.

At this time, the battalion commander Shpiller got in touch with the company commander by radio. He asked sternly:

Kolobanov, why are you letting the Germans through?! Spiller already knew about the morning battle in the Luga and Volosovo directions and about the advance of German tanks towards Kolobanov's position, and he could not help but be disturbed by the rather protracted silence of the HF tank company commander.

There was no time to answer the battalion commander: the lead tank slowly drove into the intersection and came close to two birches - landmark No. 1, marked by the tankers before the battle. Kolobanov was immediately informed about the number of tanks in the column. There were 22 of them. And when seconds of movement remained before the landmark, the commander realized that he could no longer delay, and ordered Usov to open fire ...

By the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, Senior Sergeant Usov was already an experienced soldier. Drafted into the Red Army in 1938, he participated in the "liberation" campaign in Western Belarus as an assistant platoon commander of one of the artillery regiments, fought on the Karelian Isthmus during the Soviet-Finnish War. After graduating special school commanders of guns of heavy tanks, became a tanker ... 4

The lead tank caught fire from the first shot. It was destroyed before it even completely passed the intersection. The second shot, right at the crossroads, destroyed the second tank. A bottleneck has formed. The column shrunk like a spring, and now the intervals between the rest of the tanks have become completely minimal. Kolobanov ordered the fire to be transferred to the tail of the column in order to finally lock it on the road.

But this time, Usov failed to hit the trailing tank with the first shot - the projectile did not reach the target. The senior sergeant corrected the sight and fired four more shots, destroying the last two in the tank column. The enemy is trapped.

At first, the Germans could not determine where the shooting was coming from and opened fire from their guns on the haystacks, which immediately caught fire. But they soon came to their senses and were able to discover the ambush. A tank duel of one KV against eighteen German tanks began. A whole hail of armor-piercing shells fell on Kolobanov's car. One by one, they hammered at the 25 mm armor of the additional screens mounted on the KV turret. There was no trace left of the disguise. The tankers suffocated from powder gases and became deaf from the numerous blows of the blanks on the tank's armor. Loader, he is also a junior driver, Red Army soldier Nikolai Rodenkov worked at a frantic pace, driving shell after shell into the breech of the gun. Usov, not looking up from the sight, continued to fire at the enemy column.

Meanwhile, the commanders of other vehicles, which held the defense on three more roads, reported by radio on the situation in their defense sectors. From these reports, Kolobanov realized that fierce battles were going on in other directions.

The Germans, realizing that they had fallen into a trap, tried to maneuver, but the KV shells hit the tanks one by one. But numerous direct hits by enemy shells did not cause much harm to the Soviet car. The clear superiority of the KV over the German tanks in terms of firepower and armor thickness had an effect5.

The infantry units moving behind the column came to the aid of the German tankers. Under the cover of fire from tank guns, for more effective shooting at KV, the Germans rolled anti-tank guns onto the road.

Kolobanov noticed the preparations of the enemy and ordered Usov to hit the anti-tank guns with a high-explosive fragmentation projectile. The military outposts located behind the KV entered the battle with the German infantry.

Usov managed to destroy one anti-tank missile along with the calculation, but the second managed to fire several shots. One of them broke the panoramic periscope, from which Kolobanov was monitoring the battlefield, and the other, hitting the tower, jammed it. Usov managed to destroy this gun as well, but the KV lost the ability to maneuver fire. Large turnings of the gun to the right and left could now be done only by turning the entire hull of the tank. In essence, the KV has become a self-propelled artillery mount.

Nikolai Kiselkov climbed onto the armor and installed a spare instead of a damaged periscope.6

Kolobanov ordered the senior driver, foreman Nikolai Nikiforov, to withdraw the tank from the caponier and take up a reserve firing position. Before the eyes of the Germans tank in reverse got out of his hiding place, drove off to the side, stood in the bushes and again opened fire on the column. Now the driver had to work hard. Fulfilling Usov's orders, he turned the KV in the right direction.

Finally, the last 22nd tank was destroyed.

During the battle, which lasted more than an hour, Senior Sergeant A. Usov fired 98 shells at enemy tanks and anti-tank guns, of which all 7 armor-piercing shells were used up. Further observation showed that several German tanks were able to break through to the Voiskovitsy state farm from the south.

The battalion commander got in touch with the crew. Spiller asked in a loud voice:

Kolobanov, how are you? Burning?

They burn well, comrade battalion commander!

The senior lieutenant reported that the crew had destroyed an enemy tank column of 22 combat vehicles. Its crew is not able to hold its position any further, as the ammunition is running out, there are no armor-piercing shells at all, and the tank itself has received serious damage.

Shpiller thanked the crew for the successful completion of the combat mission and said that the tanks of Lieutenant Lastochkin and Second Lieutenant Degtyar were already on the way to the Voiskovitsy state farm. Kolobanov ordered Nikiforov to join them. Having planted the infantrymen who remained from the outposts on the armor (many of them were wounded), the KV with a landing on the armor rushed to the breakthrough. The Germans did not get involved in the battle with the Russian tank, and the KV freely reached the outskirts of the state farm. Here Kolobanov met with the commanders of approaching tanks.

From them, he learned that in the battle on the Luga road, the crew of Lieutenant Fedor Sergeev destroyed eight German tanks, the crew of Junior Lieutenant Maxim Evdokimenko - five. The junior lieutenant died in this battle, three members of his crew were wounded. Only the driver Sidikov survived. The fifth German tank, destroyed by the crew in this battle, was on the account of the driver: Sidikov rammed him. At the same time, the HF itself was disabled. The tanks of junior lieutenant Degtyar and lieutenant Lastochkin burned four enemy tanks each that day.