After the German offensive fizzled out, the Soviets began theirs. The Battle of Kursk was and still is, by some measures, the biggest armored battle in history.
Although the Soviet side suffered far greater losses, it is regarded as their victory, as the USSR had much greater reserves of personnel and industrial capacity, while Germany was about at the end of its rope.
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Fanfare
Opening War Theme
Coro di zingari (“Anvil Chorus”) from Il trovatore
Composed in 1853 by Giuseppe Verdi. Public domain.
Public domain recording. Source.
Closing War Theme
Except when otherwise indicated, the contents of this podcast are © and ℗ 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025 by Mark Painter, all rights reserved. Some music and sound effects used by arrangement with Pond 5.
I’ve heard someone say that while Stalingrad “turned the tides”, it was really Kursk that broke the offensive capacity of Nazi Germany. Between winter 1941, after the Germans stopped encircling hundreds of thousands of Soviet soldiers at a time and were stopped at the edge of Moscow, and Summer 1943 Germany and the Soviet Union were trading blows. While some might have been able to entertain the idea of regaining the initiative after Stalingrad, Kursk put an end to such notions. Though that isn’t to say the Germans couldn’t put up a strong defense.