Tank Warfare on the Eastern Front, 1943-1945: Red Steamroller

Efficiency Hypothesis

This work is the second part of a two-volume study of armoured operations on the Eastern Front in the Second World War. The first volume, Tank Warfare on the Eastern Front 1941–1942 Schwerpunkt (2014), covered the initial two years of the war during the period when the Germans usually had the initiative. This volume covers the second half of the war, as the Red Army gained the initiative after Stalingrad and kept it all the way to Berlin. These two volumes are not intended to be a comprehensive chronological account of every action involving armour in four years of conflict, which would require many more volumes. Rather, my intent is to attempt to identify the reasons for the eventual outcome in the dynamics of operational and tactical armoured operations. Oftentimes, I choose to focus on battles that lie outside the standard orthodoxy about the war, since there are too many pre-conceived notions about certain well-known battles, while other important actions are completely ignored. A case in point is the well-known Battle of Kursk in July 1943 and the virtually unknown German counter-offensive on the Mius River, which occurred just a few weeks later.

My working hypothesis for this study revolves around relative war-making efficiency. In the first volume, I outlined how German armoured operations in the first part of the war were generally successful because they had superior efficiency in terms of training and use of combined arms tactics. The Wehrmacht of 1940 was tailored to Germany’s limited resources, but the Wehrmacht of 1941–42 was not. In order to mount an operation on the scale of Barbarossa, the Third Reich had to confiscate thousands of captured vehicles from Western Europe as well as captured fuel stocks – but this was a one-time plus-up. Hitler’s Blitzkrieg Army was designed to win before internal weakness made it grind to a halt. Yet when Barbarossa failed, the Germans were not prepared for a protracted war – unlike the Soviet Union – and the inefficiencies in their system, such as low tank production, limited personnel replacements, inadequate theatre logistics and inter-service rivalries began to emerge as serious problems within six months of the start of the war. Thereafter, the German military effort on the Eastern Front – particularly their conduct of armoured warfare that was at the core of their operational-level doctrine – became less and less efficient as the war dragged on.

In contrast, the Red Army started at a very low level of efficiency due to the Stalinist purges and rapid pre-war expansion, but began to gain its footing by late 1942. However, thanks to the pre-war industrialization of the Five Year Plans, the Soviet Union and the Red Army were well prepared for protracted war. This volume begins in January 1943, as the relative efficiency of the German mechanized forces was beginning to decline and the Red Army’s tank armies were finally ready to begin spearheading large-scale offensives. While other works about the Eastern Front have suggested that this or that battle decided the outcome, be it Smolensk, Moscow, Stalingrad or Kursk, this study looks at the decline of German panzer forces and the rise of Soviet tank forces as a holistic process, not a solitary event. Furthermore, it was a process driven just as much by industrial decisions, as by battlefield ones.

German Armoured Units on the Eastern Front

At the start of 1943, the German Army (Heer) and Waffen-SS had five primary types of armoured units:

• Panzer-Divisionen, intended to spearhead mobile combined arms operations. These units comprised one Panzer-Regiment with 1–2 Panzer-Abteilungen (nominally 152 tanks), two motorized infantry regiments with four battalions (one mounted in SPW halftracks), a motorized artillery regiment with three battalions (24 10.5cm and 12 16cm howitzers), a reconnaissance battalion, a Panzerjäger Bataillon (with 14 Marder-type self-propelled tank destroyers), a motorized engineer battalion, plus signal and support troops.

• Panzer-Grenadier-Divisionen, intended to supplement the Panzer-Divisionen with additional infantry. The Panzergrenadiers either had one Panzer-Abteilung or a Sturmgeschütz-Abteilung, but had a total of six infantry battalions.

• Independent schwere-Panzer-Abteilungen (Heavy Tank Battalions) assigned as corps-level units for breakthrough operations. The original ‘Organization D’ of August 1942 consisted of a battalion with two companies, each with nine Tigers and 10 Pz III tanks, but this was replaced with the ‘Organization E’ scheme in March 1943, which had three companies each with 14 Tigers.^{1}

• Sturmartillerie units to provide direct support to infantry units. Each battalion consisted of three batteries, with an authorized total of 22 StuG III and nine StuH 42.

• Self-propelled Panzerjäger units to provide general anti-tank support across a wide front. The earlier Panzerjäger-Abteilungen usually consisted of three companies equipped with 27 Marder-type tank destroyers, but the new schwere Panzerjäger-Abteilungen introduced in 1943 were authorized 45 Hornisse tank destroyers each.

On 1 January 1943, the Germans had a total of 21 Panzer-Divisionen and six Panzer-Grenadier-Divisionen committed to the Eastern Front, which altogether contained 41 Panzer-Abteilungen (battalions).[1] In addition, there were elements of two schwere-Panzer-Abteilungen, with a total of 40 Tiger tanks and 40 Pz III tanks, as well as a few odd company-size tank detachments. Altogether, on paper these battalions had an authorized strength of almost 3,200 tanks. However, after six months of intensive combat, the German Panzer-Divisionen were much reduced in both equipment and personnel strength. Ostensibly, according to numbers provided by Thomas J. Jentz, at the start of the New Year the Germans had 1,475 operational tanks on the Eastern Front, or about 46 per cent of their authorized strength, along with another 1,328 tanks awaiting repairs, which means that total write-offs (Totalausfalle in German terminology) amounted to just 12 per cent.^{2}

Yet these numbers do not reflect the woeful state of Germany’s armoured forces on the Eastern Front and appear to be inflated. Only two Panzer-Divisionen, the newly-arrived 7.Panzer-Division and the veteran 9.Panzer-Division, had 100 or more operational tanks. Most of the remaining German Panzer-Divisionen at the front were ausgebrannt (burnt out) and had been reduced to just 30–40 operational tanks, meaning that they were closer to 25 per cent of their authorized armoured strength. Some particularly decimated units, such as the 3., 4., 8. and 13. Panzer-Divisionen, had barely a dozen operational tanks each. Furthermore, three Panzer-Divisionen (14., 16. and 24.) and three Panzer-Grenadier-Divisionen (3., 29., 60.) – comprising a total of 12 Panzer-Abteilungen – were encircled with the 6.Armee (AOK 6) at Stalingrad. While these trapped divisions still had 94 operational tanks and 31 assault guns, they were virtually out of fuel and on the verge of annihilation.^{3} Thus, the actual number of operational German tanks at the front was likely fewer than 800. Unlike the beginning of the War in the East in June 1941, by 1943 Germany no longer had a mechanized masse de manoeuvre.

At the start of 1943, the main German tanks in use were the Pz III Ausf L and Ausf M models, equipped with the long-barreled 5cm KwK 39 L/60 gun and the Pz IV Ausf G armed with the long-barreled 7.5cm KwK 40 L/43 gun. Under favourable circumstances, both of these medium tanks were capable of defeating their primary opponent – the Soviet T-34 medium tank – at typical battlefield ranges, although the Pz III’s modest level of armoured protection was a liability. Unlike the T-34’s advanced sloped armour, the German medium tanks could only increase their protection by adding bolt-on plates, which increased their weight. As it was, the Pz III and Pz IV were noticeably inferior to the T-34 in terms of mobility, since both used the Maybach HL 120 TRM petrol engine, capable of producing up to 300hp against the Soviet tank’s powerful V-2 diesel engine, which could produce up to 500hp. In addition, neither the Pz III’s torsion bar suspension, nor the Pz IV’s leaf spring suspension, could compare with the T-34’s Christie suspension over cross-country terrain. Furthermore, Germany’s best two medium tanks comprised only 42 per cent of their operational front-line strength – approximately 300 tanks. Nearly one-third of German armour still consisted of older Pz III and Pz IV models armed with short-barreled 5cm and 7.5cm guns, which were greatly-outclassed by the T-34, but these older tanks were kept on hand because newer models were still in very short supply. Another 20 per cent of German armoured strength consisted of obsolete Pz II light tanks and Pz 38t Czech-built light tanks, both of which were no longer useful on the front line. Thus, German armoured strength on the Eastern Front was really built around a remarkably small number of up-to-date medium tanks. While the Tiger heavy tank was on hand in very small numbers and the new Panther medium tank was just entering production in January, it would be many months before they could influence the armoured balance on the Eastern Front.

In addition to the Panzer-Divisionen, Germany had 22 Sturmgeschütz-Abteilungen (assault gun battalions) and 7 Panzerjäger-Abteilungen (tank destroyer battalions) deployed in the Soviet Union. These battalions theoretically comprised another 900 armoured tank-killing weapons, but seven of these battalions were trapped at Stalingrad and the remainder were reduced to 30–50 per cent operational numbers, or roughly 250 assault guns and tank destroyers. Furthermore, while these weapons added to the defensive anti-tank capabilities of German infantry formations, they were not well-suited to the kind of fast-moving manoeuvre warfare favoured by German mechanized doctrine since 1940.

The onslaught of two powerful Soviet counter-offensives – Operations Mars at Rzhev and Operation Uranus at Stalingrad – had caused the Germans to concentrate their armoured strength on the Eastern Front in just two commands: with the 9.Armee defending the Rzhev salient (five Panzer-Divisionen, one Panzergrenadier-Division and three Sturmgeschutz-Abteilungen) and Heeresgruppe Don (six Panzer-Divisionen, two Panzergrenadier-Divisionen and two Sturmgeschutz-Abteilungen). Generaloberst Walter Model’s 9.Armee had just succeeded in repulsing a massive Soviet attempt to sever the Rzhev salient with Operation Mars in November–December 1942, but this effort had necessitated massing virtually all of Heeresgruppe Mitte’s armour in this one sector. Generalfeldmarschall Erich von Manstein’s Heeresgruppe Don was still seized in crisis as the New Year began, attempting to stop the Soviets from advancing to Rostov and cutting off the retreat route of Heeresgruppe A from the Caucasus. Von Manstein enjoyed absolute priority for replacements and would retain this advantage throughout 1943. The rest of the German front was largely denuded of armoured reserves, particularly in the north around Leningrad and in the centre around Orel. Although the Germans still had four nominal ‘Panzer Armies’ on the Eastern Front, these had been reduced to little more than empty husks, with none possessing more than 100 operational tanks.

Between July and December 1942, the German armoured units on the Eastern Front had lost 1,256 tanks as Totalausfalle,[2] while receiving 1,365 replacement tanks – so German tank strength had actually increased slightly during the 1942 campaign. Indeed, when the Soviets began their winter counter-offensives in November 1942, the Germans had 40 per cent more operational tanks than they had possessed at the start of Case Blau in July. However, the Panzer units on the Eastern Front only received 67 per cent of the tanks built in the period July– December 1942 and this percentage actually dropped to just 60 per cent in the final three months of the year due to the crisis in North Africa.^{4} The remaining 33–40 percent of German tank production was not going to the Eastern Front, but to other fronts or retained for training new units. Thus, the Panzer-Divisionen on the Eastern Front received just enough replacements to maintain their authorized strength, with no real theatre reserves of replacements. A normal rule of thumb is that a mechanized army should try to maintain a 10 per cent over-strength of key weapons, like tanks, in a category called ‘Operational Readiness Floats’, which are in-theatre spares to replace losses. Without a reserve of spares, natural attrition meant that German Panzer-Divisionen at the front could not be kept at authorized strength levels. Nevertheless, if German theatre logistics had been adequate, this approach might have sufficed.

The OKH Panzer Reserve was located at Sagan in Silesia. After acceptance from the manufacturers in Germany, new panzers typically arrived by rail at Sagan, where they were either forwarded on to front-line units in Russia or kept temporarily in holding depots at Vienna. The OKH decided the priority of where new tanks would be sent, but the logic employed was arcane; for example, sending Tigers to the Leningrad Front where terrain was clearly unfavourable for the use of heavy tanks. Normally, replacement tanks were sent in small groups, usually 10–20, to specific Panzer-Divisionen. This method of injection kept combat units going and spread the resources around, but prevented them from ever getting back up to full strength.

Furthermore, the weakness of German theatre-level supply greatly undermined German armoured strength on the Eastern Front, which was built on a logistical house of cards. The advances of 1941–42 had brought the German Panzer-Divisionen very far from their logistical support bases in Eastern Europe and the homeland, which greatly complicated field and depot-level repairs on vehicles. In the Caucasus for example, Heeresgruppe A was dependent upon a single-track rail line to supply Panzerarmee 1 (PzAOK 1), which was grossly inadequate for receiving regular supplies of fuel and spare parts. At Rzhev, the main rail line from Vyazma was never converted to standard gauge, so the 9.Armee was forced to fight off Zhukov’s Operation Mars offensive while receiving no more than two supply trains per day.

The lack of standardization in spare parts was a particular disadvantage for German armour, compared to the standardization witnessed in the Soviet and Anglo-American tank fleets. When units lacked adequate spare parts to restore damaged vehicles they were wont to resort to cannibalization (also known as ‘controlled substitution’: taking parts from one or more damaged tanks to repair at least one tank) to keep tanks running, but cannibalization resulted in tanks being stripped for parts. Normally, tanks in heavy use should receive some kind of depot-level service every three to six months to restore their systems, particularly the suspension and engine-train. Field-level maintenance can keep tanks running for weeks or months, but minor problems will gradually escalate into major problems that cannot be readily fixed in the field – like a ruptured fuel cell. Certain types of combat damage could also be repaired in the field and some tanks were ‘knocked out’ multiple times, but usually depot-level maintenance was required to restore a tank to full fighting trim. Sending a damaged tank back to Germany for depot-level maintenance meant that it might be gone for many weeks and in the meantime, the unit was down another tank. Consequently, German under-strength Panzer units tended to keep large numbers of non-operational tanks up-front with them, hoping that through cannibalization and various field expedients they could keep a reasonable number of tanks operational. For example, if a tank had the electrical motor for its turret traverse burned out and there were no spare motors available, the tank could still use manual traverse – even though this put the crew at much greater risk in a tank engagement. The result was that tanks kept at the front, operating in ‘degraded mode’, were rather fragile. When winter arrived, the ‘degraded’ tanks tended to be the first to fall out.

The German logistic infrastructure supporting their panzers tended to fail whenever units were forced to retreat any great distance, when snow/ice/mud turned the Russian roads into glue, or when Soviet partisans succeeded in interfering with the lines of communication. This weakness was particularly apparent when the Soviets broke through Heeresgruppe B’s front along the Don in late 1942. German supply bases were overrun and often had to be abandoned due to lack of transport. This lack of operational mobility – insufficient trains, long-haul trucks and air transport planes – proved to be the Achilles’ heel that nearly brought German armoured strength to its knees in the winter of 1942–43. Essentially, German theatre logistics on the Eastern Front had no leeway and even minor disruptions could halt or delay the timely delivery of critical spare parts, ammunition and fuel to forward areas.

Guderian to the Rescue?

On 28 February 1943, Hitler appointed Generaloberst Heinz Guderian as Inspekteur der Panzertruppen. Guderian had been unemployed in the Führer-Reserve since Hitler had relieved him of command in December 1941, but now Hitler needed Guderian’s organizational talents to restore the depleted Panzer units on the Eastern Front. Guderian demanded a broad authority over all armoured units, included those belonging to the Waffen-SS and the Luftwaffe. However, Guderian lost the bureaucratic battle with the Sturmartillerie branch, which blocked his efforts to gain control over their assault guns, and the Panzerjäger branch also managed to retain considerable autonomy. Guderian wasted no time in drawing up a lengthy memorandum for Hitler on how to rejuvenate the Panzer-Divisionen, which was presented to the Führer on 9 March 1943.

In its main points, Guderian’s memorandum stated:

Hitler agreed with many of Guderian’s points and respected his technical expertise, but failed to back him in the various inter-service and intra-service bureaucratic battles. While Guderian was able to achieve some limited successes in organizational reform and training, his belief in the necessity of rebuilding the Heer Panzer-Divisionen on the Eastern Front met with negligible success. Above all, Guderian’s sound argument for the creation of a sizeable strategic armoured reserve under the control of the Oberkommando des Heeres (OKH) was a complete failure. Yet it should also be noted that in many respects, Guderian was overly attached to a dated, tank-heavy conception of what a Panzer-Division should look like, in that a 100-tank battalion was far too unwieldy and providing a 1943 Panzer-Division with 400 medium tanks was both impractical and unnecessary. In contrast, even a full-strength Soviet tank corps in late 1943 was only equipped with 200 T-34 medium tanks in three tank brigades.

Armour Deployed to the Western Front

The Third Reich had three-quarters of its armour deployed on the Eastern Front, with only small mobile forces deployed in the Western Front. Since the OKH lacked a strategic reserve – unlike the Red Army – the only armoured reserves that it could draw upon to deal with unexpected contingencies were either tired veteran units rebuilding in the West or new, inexperienced formations in training. There were no full-strength, combat-ready panzer units sitting around in reserve – everything was deployed at the front. Inside Germany, the Panzertruppenschule I at Munster and the Panzertruppenschule II at Wünsdorf had a cadre of experienced officers and NCOs, as well as tanks for training, which were not supposed to be used as a pool for forming operational tank units – but that rule would be broken late in 1943. Each Panzer-Division also maintained a Panzer-Ersatz-Abteilung to train replacements in its home Wehrkreis; these too would be tapped for use as ad hoc combat units later in the war.

Up until the end of 1942, Hitler had been able to avoid deploying Panzer-Divisionen to guard Western Europe, since the threat of Allied invasion had appeared negligible. Throughout 1942, France was regarded as a rear-area training zone, where decimated armoured units could be rested and rebuilt for about six months, before heading back to the Eastern Front. During the rebuilding phase, these units had not been required to maintain much ready combat capability and many of their vehicles were sent to depot-level maintenance while the troops were rotated home on leave. Panzertruppen resting in France were more interested in wine, women and sunshine, than in intensive training or coastal defence duties. However, that perception began to change when Commonwealth forces conducted the Dieppe Raid in August 1942, which included landing part of a battalion of Churchill tanks. Although a costly failure, the Dieppe Raid indicated that larger Allied amphibious landings, with much more armour, were a distinct possibility in the not-so-distant future. Emphasizing this growing vulnerability, the Anglo-American Operation Torch in North Africa in November 1942 indicated that Hitler would soon have to commit at least a few Panzer-Divisionen to protect both the Atlantic and Mediterranean coastlines. Consequently, the 1.Panzer-Division, which was pulled out of the Rzhev sector in December 1942, was first sent to France, but in May 1943 it was sent to cover the Greek coast for five months. As the threat of unexpected Allied amphibious landings increased throughout 1943, Hitler directed that a Panzer-Reserve would be created to cover contingencies in Western Europe.

In order to fulfill Hitler’s requirement, in July–August 1943 the Ersatzheer (Replacement Army) simply collected several of its Panzer-Ersatz Abteilung (Tank Replacement Battalions) and assorted other training units and cobbled them together into three new Reserve-Panzer-Divisionen. The 155. and 179. Reserve-Panzer-Divisionen were assigned to France and the 233.Reserve-Panzer-Division was sent to Denmark. These divisions could continue to train replacements, but were also tasked with providing a contingency reserve to oppose Allied landings. Although the 155.Reserve-Panzer-Division had 60 older Pz III and Pz IV tanks, none of these Reserve Divisions had much combat capability and they diverted precious training resources away from supporting the Eastern Front.^{6}

In addition to the Reserve-Panzer-Divisionen, the OKH had begun forming two new Panzer-Divisionen in 1942, but priority was low so their formation occurred over an extended period. The 26.Panzer-Division was formed in Belgium from the battered 23.Infanterie-Division and Panzer-Regiment 202, but it would be mid-1943 before the division would be equipped and trained for battle. Due to Hitler’s paranoid fear of Allied landings in Norway, the 25.Panzer-Division had been pulled together in Oslo from various garrison units and a Panzer-Abteilung equipped with captured French tanks, but it barely amounted to a brigade-size Kampfgruppe before mid-1943. By September 1943, the 25.Panzer-Division was approaching full strength and was transferred to France. Even before the loss of the 14.,16 and 24.Panzer-Divisionen at Stalingrad, Hitler directed the OKH to set aside resources to rebuild these divisions and by spring 1943 this project would divert even more personnel and equipment away from the Eastern Front. Guderian bitterly opposed the formation of these new Panzer-Divisionen since they were depriving him of the resources to restore the divisions on the Eastern Front, but he was over-ruled.^{7}

North Africa: Reinforcing Failure

Russian historians have often attempted to downplay the role of the Western Allies in the defeat of Germany – particularly the Anglo-American campaigns in North Africa – and criticized the lack of an earlier ‘Second Front’ to divert German resources from the Eastern Front. In fact, the North African ‘sideshow’ diverted significant German reinforcements from being sent to Russia and acted as a sinkhole for the limited pool of German armoured replacements, which were needed far more in the East. By January 1943, Generalfeldmarschall Erwin Rommel’s Deutsche Afrika Korps (DAK), which had the 15. and 21.Panzer-Divisionen, had been badly defeated by the British at the Battle of El Alamein in Egypt in November 1942 and was in full retreat into Libya. With the Americans and British having landed in Morocco and Algeria, it was clear that the Axis strategic position in North Africa was rapidly becoming untenable. Rommel recommended pulling these veteran troops back to mainland Europe where they could be re-equipped and provide a formidable mobile reserve for Western Europe.

However, in one of his more foolish strategic decisions, Hitler rejected the idea of evacuating Africa and instead ordered strong armoured reinforcements, including the refurbished 10.Panzer-Division and the newly-formed s.Panzer-Abteilung 501, to be transported to Tunisia to reinforce Rommel’s retreating forces. While this decision delayed the inevitable for five months, Hitler’s decision to send more than 300 tanks (including 31 Tigers) to Tunisia when the German Panzer-Divisionen in the East were reduced to threadbare strength represented a colossal mistake. Had these forces been sent eastward, von Manstein’s ‘Backhand Blow’ counter-offensive at Kharkov in February 1943 would have been nearly doubled in strength. Guderian opposed the diversion of this much armour to North Africa, particularly the Tigers, but he was ignored. Instead, by May 1943 all these reinforcements sent to North Africa would be eliminated, costing Germany three Panzer-Divisionen and a Panzergrenadier-Division, losses that would also have to be replaced out of hide. Like Stalingrad, German losses in North Africa were 100 per cent of equipment. Only small numbers of Panzertruppen were evacuated by air.

Diversion of Armour to the Waffen-SS and Luftwaffe

While the Heer panzer units were being bled to death in Russia and were often forced to make do with obsolete weapons, Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler successfully lobbied Hitler to divert an enormous amount of men and equipment to convert three of his own Waffen-SS divisions to Panzergrenadier-Divisionen. Up to this point in the war, the Waffen-SS divisions had served as motorized infantry units, each with a battery of attached assault guns, and had limited experience with armoured operations. In 1942 the SS-Wiking Division had been given a single SS-Panzer-Abteilung, which was employed in the Caucasus. Yet Himmler did not want his troops to be used merely as a support force for the Heer, and sought to build up his best divisions into a mobile strike force capable of independent operations. During the winter of 1942–43, the SS-Panzergrenadier-Divisionen Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler (LSSAH), Das Reich and Totenkopf were refitted in France and each received a newly-created SS-Panzer-Regiment with two full-strength battalions. At a time when half of the Heer Panzer-Divisionen only had a single under-strength Panzer-Abteilung, Himmler ensured that his troops received the best; over 317 tanks went to outfit these six SS-Panzer-Abteilungen, including brand-new Pz III and Pz IV medium tanks. Himmler even connived to get each of these three Waffen-SS divisions its only schwere-Panzer Kompanie with 10 Tiger tanks. Once completed in early 1943, these three divisions were grouped into the I.SS-Panzerkorps and began preparing to transfer back to the Eastern Front.

There is no doubt that the I.SS-Panzerkorps was a powerful strike force, but the amount of effort put into creating it was enormously detrimental to the revitalization of the Heer Panzer-Divisionen; the Germans were robbing from Peter to pay Paul. Furthermore, it is important to note that at the start of 1943 the Heer had far more experience with the use of tanks in combined arms warfare than the Waffen-SS commanders, who had no direct experience with leading large tank formations. Instead, the Waffen-SS simply appropriated experienced tankers from the Heer as needed; for example, Oberst Herbert Vahl, commander of the Panzer-Regiment 29, was transferred to take over the SS-Das Reich Division’s new SS-Panzer-Regiment. Guderian argued against lavishing resources on the creation of Waffen-SS armoured units. However, Hitler was enamoured of the idea of an armoured ‘Praetorian Guard’ and even granted Himmler permission to form three more Waffen-SS Panzergrenadier Divisions; both the first three and the next three would soon be referred to as SS-Panzer-Divisionen. In another year, Himmler would be suggesting the creation of an ‘SS-Panzer-Armee’ to Hitler. By this concession to Himmler, Hitler allowed a rivalry for resources to develop between the Waffen-SS and the Heer, which would eventually reduce the regular Panzer-Divisionen to second-rate status.

Not to be outdone by Himmler, Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring lobbied to get the Luftwaffe’s Division Hermann Göring converted into a Panzer-Division; by late 1942 this plan was a reality and the division sent a regimental-size Kampfgruppe to Tunisia. In short order this unit was destroyed, but the rest of the division fitted out in Italy. Like the Waffen-SS units, Göring ensured that his new division was provided with a two-battalion Panzer-Regiment and that it only received new-build tanks. However, Göring did not get authorization for Tiger tanks for the HG Division, and instead it received its own Sturmgeschütz-Abteilung. Since the Luftwaffe had virtually no officers or troops experienced in armoured combat, Göring used his influence to pressure the Heer into transferring a number of experienced panzer crews to the new outfit. Thus, between the Waffen-SS and the Luftwaffe, Germany had to find the resources to create eight new Panzer-Abteilungen – a total of over 420 tanks and assault guns. Like Himmler, Göring was not satisfied with controlling a single Panzer-Division and would soon be lobbying for more – all to the detriment of the Heer Panzer-Divisionen at the front. In March 1943, Guderian visited the Hermann Göring Division and was incensed to discover that the Luftwaffe had gathered 34,000 troops into this formation. Guderian later wrote that, ‘the majority of this large number of men were leading a pleasant life in Holland. In view of our replacement problem this was intolerable, even in 1943.’^{8} Nevertheless, Guderian utterly failed to prevent either the Waffen-SS or the Luftwaffe from diverting resources from his programme of revitalizing the Heer Panzer-Divisionen.

German Tactical and Doctrinal Changes

The German Bewegungskrieg (manoeuvre warfare) doctrine that had worked so well during 1940–42 was built around a combined arms team comprised of tanks, mechanized infantry, motorized engineers, self-propelled artillery and other elements, supported by abundant Luftwaffe close air support. In operational terms, the German preference for Bewegungskrieg was to conduct deliberate offensives under the most favourable circumstances – i.e. with full-strength units in fair weather. German armoured strength was to be applied to enemy weakness – an open or vulnerable flank or a poorly-guarded sector like the Ardennes – in order to achieve overwhelming combat power at the Schwerpunkt or decisive point. By focusing priority of tactical effort against a single Schwerpunkt, a decisive breakthrough could be achieved and the mechanized forces would pour into the enemy’s rear and then envelop his main body. After that, it was merely a matter of mopping up the encircled enemy in a Kessel (cauldron) battle.

While the Germans were able to achieve this standard with Operation Barbarossa in 1941, and with Fridericus, Trappenjagd and Blau in 1942, by 1943 the Germans were being forced to violate their own doctrine and conduct offensives without proper combined arms tactics and with less regard for the Schwerpunkt concept. During Operation Wintergewitter, the Stalingrad relief effort in December 1942, Hoth’s panzers had attacked with virtually no infantry and negligible air support. From that point onward, Soviet offensives would force the Germans to mount major armoured operations in winter until the end of the war – usually to save encircled units – and typically conducted as hasty attacks with understrength units. By mid-February 1943, von Manstein would be forced to conduct counter-attacks with Heer Panzer-Divisionen that had been reduced to fewer than a dozen operational tanks and this tended to become increasingly commonplace throughout much of 1943. The necessity of conducting mobile operations even in winter and under less-than-favourable circumstances led to doctrinal modifications.

The foremost modification to German Bewegungskrieg was a realization that Luftwaffe close air support was no longer a given. While the Luftwaffe could still occasionally muster substantial numbers of Ju-87 Stukas and bombers for a major operation like Zitadelle in mid-1943, most relief efforts would receive modest air support at best. The declining ability of the Luftwaffe to support offensive operations meant that manoeuvre units required more organic firepower in order to blast their way through stout defences. At the beginning of the war, German Panzer-Divisionen relied upon speed to accomplish their missions, not firepower or armoured protection. The Pz II, Pz III and Pz IV had been adequate, even against the occasional T-34 or KV-1, as long as the Luftwaffe was available. Indeed, the units that normally formed the Panzer-Division’s Vorausabteilung (advance guard) were the divisional Aufklärungs-Abteilung (Reconnaissance Battalion) and Kradschützen-Abteilung, equipped primarily with armoured cars and motorcycles. However, the increase in Soviet defensive capabilities by late 1942 meant that thin-skinned German tanks and motorcycle units could no longer easily penetrate the enemy’s front line as they had in the past. Thus, due to the shortfall in close air support and improved Soviet defences, German tactics shifted from an emphasis upon speed and mobility, to tactics based upon shock effect and firepower.

Reflective of this trend, in January 1943 the organization of Panzer-Divisionen was modified and all Kradschützen-Abteilungen and the Aufklärungs-Abteilungen were supposedly merged into a new Panzer-Aufklärungs-Abteilung, although it took most of 1943 to implement this new structure. The Panzer-Aufklärungs-Abteilung was a powerful armoured force, authorized 122 halftracks and 18 armoured cars, which gave it the ability to ‘fight for intelligence’ rather than act merely as scouts. As this new structure was introduced, the reconnaissance battalions in German Panzer and Panzergrenadier Divisionen became de facto manoeuvre units and were often used as such. German tactical doctrine was revised to assign a variety of potential missions to these versatile units, including advance guard, rearguard and even counter-attacks.

Another major modification to German manoeuvre doctrine was an increased emphasis upon zone defence, decentralized operations and local counter-attacks. Although German doctrine preferred to maintain a Hauptkampflinie (HKL or main line of resistance) with infantry divisions and to keep Panzer-Divisionen in reserve in the rear, this was no longer possible by January 1943. By that point, most Panzer-Divisionen in Heeresgruppe A and B were forced to hold their own sector of the front, which deprived the army commander of mobile reserves. When a Soviet breakthrough in another sector occurred, local infantry corps commanders would demand that the nearest Panzer-Division respond by dispatching a Kampfgruppen to launch a counter-attack; the inevitable result was that Panzer-Divisionen in defence were parcelled out into small Kampfgruppen to support various hard-pressed infantry units, losing mass and being diluted into the ‘driblets’ that Guderian had decried in 1939–40. Rather than being used properly as an independent manoeuvre force, German panzers were increasingly likely to be used to stiffen infantry units in the defence or mount company-size counter-attacks.

Of course, German tanks and other armoured vehicles were evolving rapidly by 1943, based upon two years of combat experience on the Eastern Front. Several painful encounters with the superior Soviet T-34 and KV-1 tanks had caused the Germans to question the value of their existing tanks and to seek a technical solution that would ensure German armoured superiority. The resulting OKH Panzer Commissions of July and October 1941 began the process of defining the requirements for a new medium tank which resulted in the development of the Panther tank in 1942.^{9} As 1943 began, the Pz V Panther was about to begin serial production and was expected to re-equip one tank battalion in each Panzer-Divisionen as soon as possible. While the Pz V had far superior gunnery capabilities compared to earlier German models, it was a medium tank in name only and its 44-ton bulk would be far too heavy to cross existing tactical bridges. The Panther was also a fuel-hog that used double the amount of fuel to move 100km compared to a Pz III and, like the 54-ton Tiger, it was difficult to recover on the battlefield. Taken together, the shift to reliance upon heavily-armoured and up-gunned tanks like the Panther and Tiger meant that previous German mobile tactics became impractical; these tanks could not slash cross-country, covering up to 100km in a day, and would have to rely upon shock effect rather than manoeuvre.

The introduction of so many turret-less assault guns and thin-skinned Panzerjäger like the Marder series also caused the Germans to revise their armoured doctrine. In the first two years of combat on the Eastern Front, German medium tanks – often outgunned by the T-34 – had learned to manoeuvre in close and seek the opportunity for flank shots. These aggressive tactics usually succeeded for a number of reasons and often resulted in Soviet positions being overrun. Yet while tanks could still overrun an enemy-held position in 1943, it was usually inadvisable to attempt this with assault guns or Panzerjäger, which were better suited for defensive combat. The real threat was concealed enemy anti-tank guns, which were very difficult to spot from a vehicle like a StuG-III assault gun. Instead, the Germans increasingly began to favour long-range, stand-off engagements so that their assault guns and Panzerjäger would not be put at risk from enemy anti-tank guns or infantry ambushes, but this removed a great deal of the shock effect from German armoured operations.

German Tank Training

In the first years of the Second World War, Germany was able to maintain very high standards of training for its Panzertruppen, which gave them an enormous tactical edge over their opponents. However, the edge was beginning to dull as casualties mounted in 1941–42 and the German training system could not keep pace with losses. For example, during the Caucasus Campaign in 1942, the three Panzer-Divisionen (3., 13., 23.) in von Kleist’s 1.Panzerarmee were suffering an average of 600–1,200 casualties per month, including 150–300 killed.^{10} Over the course of four months from July–October 1942, this amounted to 3,000 casualties for 3.Panzer-Division, including 600 dead or missing. Throughout 1942, the 23.Panzer-Division suffered a total of 6,569 casualties, including 2,079 dead or missing; 16.8 per cent of these casualties were in Panzer-Regiment 201 (including 331 dead or missing).^{11} Although Panzertruppen losses were much lower than the Panzergrenadiers, a much higher proportion of tanker casualties were officers or NCOs. Nor were losses only due to enemy action; in addition to frostbite casualties in the long winter months, diseases such as typhus inflicted significant losses on German Panzertruppen – one Panzer Kompanie in Panzer-Regiment 35 suffered 12 dead from this cause.^{12} Approximately two-thirds of all wounded returned to duty with their units. Thus while losses could vary greatly depending upon the operational tempo, the average Panzer-Division on the Eastern Front required something like 400–500 replacement tankers per year in order to keep a 960-man Panzer-Regiment up to authorized strength.

Replacements for the Panzer-Divisionen on the Eastern Front came from the affiliated Panzer-Ersatz-Abteilung in their home Wehrkreis. For example, the 23.Panzer-Division received its Panzertruppen replacements from Panzer-Ersatz-Abteilung 7 in Wehrkreis V (Stuttgart). In theory, a replacement unit like this could train up to about 1,000 new enlisted recruits per year – well above the loss rates on the Eastern Front – but many fewer officers and NCOs. Yet not all recruits passed basic training (some were reassigned to other branches) and even among graduates, not all went to replace combat losses. Obergefreiter Armin Bottger spent two years in a replacement battalion along with a number of his fellow tankers, ferrying tanks to railheads and working at the OKH tank depot at Sagan, before finally going to the front.^{13} By mid-war, the Heer had a long logistical tail and replacements were siphoned off to a myriad of other training and non-combat duties. When the 12 Panzer-Abteilungen were destroyed at Stalingrad, thousands of replacements were diverted to rebuild these units – at the expense of the units in the East. Consequently, the front-line Panzer-Regiments on the Eastern Front generally received 1:1 replacements for enlisted tank crewmen, but an insufficient number of junior officers and NCOs.

German Panzer-Ersatz-Abteilungen used obsolete tanks like the Pz I and Pz II for driver training and initial panzer familiarization, but recruits then moved on to obsolescent short-barreled versions of the Pz III and Pz IV tanks for manoeuvre and gunnery training. The Germans made a particular fetish of producing skilled tank drivers, something to which Soviet training attached no great value. During initial basic training, selected recruits could earn a driver permit for tanks up to 10 tons, but required another four weeks of training to earn the permit for tracked vehicles over 10 tons.^{14} Experience had shown that a good tank driver had to acquire a good deal of situational awareness in moving across the battlefield, using cover and concealment to avoid enemy observation and to keep the tank oriented toward the direction of threat. A good driver was also capable of making his own tactical selection of route, without being constantly told what to do; in contrast, Soviet tank drivers often expected to be told exactly where and when to move. Nevertheless, both fuel and time allotted for driving training in 1943 were much reduced compared to previous years and, in particular, the rush to get units equipped with Tiger tanks to the Eastern Front led to Tiger crews receiving insufficient driver training at Paderborn, which resulted in numerous accidents at the front.^{15}

In 1943, the Heer was forced to shorten basic training for Panzer crewmen from 16 to 12 weeks by introducing a Kurzausbildung (abbreviated training).^{16} By this measure, the Heer intended to increase replacement output by one-third. The new training regime placed greatest emphasis on tank gunnery and teaching ‘battle drills’ that prepared a tank crew for combat in conditions that were as realistic as possible. All classroom training was cut to an absolute minimum and recruits were expected to spend most of their time in a field training environment. Most of the inculcation of old-style Prussian military discipline through marching and drill was abandoned. After basic training, the most promising recruits were sent to NCO training for 4–6 weeks and gunners were sent to advanced gunnery training at sites such as the Putlos range. German gunnery training was very advanced and began with training gunners to conduct a proper boresight of the main gun. Usually strings or wire were affixed in a cross pattern across the muzzle and the loader would look through the open breech and visually lay the gun on a target board approximately 800–1,200 metres distant. Then the gunner would adjust the elevation and deflection knobs on his primary sight, to put the gun tube and sight in synch, followed by a zeroing fire with 3–5 rounds. The zero fire confirmed the accuracy of the boresight and enabled final corrections to the gunner’s primary sight. With a good boresight, a tank crew could be reasonably certain that a gunner had a 25–30 per cent chance of hitting a target at the normal combat boresight ranges of 800–1,200 meters. Boresighting and zeroing were key characteristics that distinguished German from Soviet tankers and enabled them to have a much higher probability of achieving hits. However, boresighting and zeroing required discipline and good small unit leadership, since it needed to be conducted soon after any long tactical road march or movement over rough terrain. It is easy, after a night movement in the rain, to put off such details, but it was the kind of detail that made all the difference on the battlefield.

Soviet tankers were astounded to discover in 1945 that German gunnery ranges included both moving and pop-up targets.^{17} German tank gunnery employed a number of different drills, employing armour-piercing (Panzergranate) against stationary, frontal tank-size targets and moving targets moving obliquely to the tank. Crews were also trained to use high-explosive (Sprenggranate) rounds against anti-tank guns and machine-guns against troop targets. While the ammunition used for training was limited and often not the same calibre that would be used by the crew in actual combat, a panzer crew in 1943 could expect to fire the equivalent of a basic load of ammunition during the course of training. After hard experience in Russia, German tank gunnery training also emphasized low-visibility and night training scenarios to accustom crews to the reality that combat did not always occur under the best conditions.

By 1943, most of the junior panzer officers were former enlisted men or NCOs who were awarded reserve commissions after attending Panzertruppenschule I or II. The term ‘reserve officer’ suggests a callow, hastily-trained officer with limited ability to lead troops in the field, but Germany’s wartime reserve officers were anything but ‘90-day wonders’. Rather, these men usually had the advantage of prior combat service, often in tanks, although some candidates came from other branches as well. One example was 20-year-old Leutnant der Reserve (d.R.) Otto Carius, who had served as a tank loader in the opening weeks of Operation Barbarossa, then was promoted to Unteroffizier in August 1941 before receiving his commission in 1942. By the time he was assigned to schwere Panzer-Abteilung 502 as a platoon leader in January 1943, Carius was a veteran tanker and would ably prove himself as a leader at the front.^{18}

The introduction of the Tiger tank in late 1942 and the Panther tank in early 1943 forced the Germans to make major adjustments to their tank training programmes. Even veteran panzer crews and the unit-level mechanics required extensive training on the new vehicles, since they were so different from the existing Pz III and Pz IV medium tanks. A special unit, Panzer-Ersatz-Abteilung 500, was established at Paderborn to train all Tiger tank crews and mechanics; this unit could train 24 crews at a time. However, the demand for Tigers at the front was so extreme in 1943 that most crews passed through the training course in 4–6 weeks, which was barely sufficient. In March 1943, the Panther Lehrgänge (Training Course) was established at Erlangen, which provided convenient technical support from the manufacturer MAN in Nurnberg. Manoeuvre and gunnery training for Panther crews was conducted at Grafenwöhr, but like the Tiger training, the Panther training was rushed. Important items, such as training crews how to recover a 45-or 54-ton tank on the battlefield, received minimal time. Since the Germans intended to convert one Panzer-Abteilung in each Panzer-Division to the Panther, there was great pressure to push crews rapidly through the training, which would soon cause major problems in combat. Furthermore, neither the Waffen-SS nor the Luftwaffe had their own training structure for Panzertruppen and simply borrowed the Heer’s – which seriously interfered with the introduction of the Panther in 1943.

Impact of Fuel and Spare Parts Shortages

By 1943, shortages of fuel and spare parts at the front were seriously reducing the operational readiness of Germany’s Panzer-Divisionen. The Third Reich went to war with the Soviet Union with completely inadequate fuel reserves and exhausted nearly half its stockpile during Operation Barbarossa in 1941. Although Germany made great efforts to increase synthetic fuel production, during 1942 monthly military consumption of fuel exceeded production in seven out of 12 months. At the end of 1942, Germany’s reserve stockpile of motor gasoline was down to 313,000 tons, equivalent to less than three months’ worth. By 1943, minus civilian consumption, Germany was producing about 136,000 tons of motor gasoline per month and consuming about 120,000 tons – enabling a slight increase in the strategic reserve. In addition, about 47,500 tons of diesel oil per was produced per month.^{19} Thus, Germany’s military machine was living a hand-to-mouth existence that left little or no room for unanticipated losses of production due to enemy action, such as Allied bombing. Nor could the Germans really afford to continue to mount large-scale manoeuvre operations like Barbarossa and Blau without further depleting their reserves; the new norm shifted to mount short-objective operations measured in weeks, not months.

German fuel logistics were measured in Verbrauchssatz (abbreviated to V.S.); 1 V.S. was the amount of fuel required to move every vehicle in a unit 100km. German doctrine stated that a Panzer-Division should possess at least 4 V.S. prior to the start of offensive operations. The amount of fuel in 1 V.S. varied considerably depending upon the type of vehicles in use; the German tanks of 1941–42 were much more economical than the heavier tanks and self-propelled guns of 1943–45. In 1941, 1V.S. of fuel for a Panzer-Division was roughly 150,000 litres (measured in cubic metres, cbm, with 1 cbm equivalent to 1,000 litres) or 150 cbm or 111 tons of fuel. Yet while it only required between 340–360 litres of fuel to move a Pz III or Pz IV 100km, it required 720 litres for the Panther and 711 litres for the Tiger. Likewise, equipping the Panzer-Division with more tracked vehicles such as self-propelled artillery and more SPW halftracks nearly doubled the amount of fuel required for operations. Increased armament and increased armoured protection resulted in much more fuel being consumed, which became something of a vicious circle for the Panzerwaffe.

In order to keep some kind of strategic fuel buffer, panzer units training in Germany and Western Europe were given only modest amounts of fuel for training. Basic driver training on the Pz I was essentially unaffected since this obsolete light tank was fairly fuel efficient, but it had a major impact on the Panther and Tiger conversion courses. Drivers were given less training time on these fuel hogs in order to save fuel for the front, but this meant that many of the new Panther drivers did not get sufficient cross-country experience. Units sent to train in France were shocked to find that there was no stockpile of fuel and ammunition available there for training. One newly-formed unit, the schwere Panzerjäger-Abteilung 560, equipped with the new Hornisse tank destroyer, was sent to France to train in April 1943 but received no fuel and only ten rounds of 8.8cm ammunition per company. Soon afterwards, the unit deployed to the Eastern Front with no driver training and only a familiarization fire for the gunners.

An additional complication with fuel supplies was actually getting the fuel to the forward areas in the Soviet Union, which was a laborious process and fraught with risks from bad weather, partisan activity and Soviet air attacks on rail centres and fuel storage areas. In the first winter on the Eastern Front, about 80 per cent of the Deutsche Reichsbahn’s (DR) trains suffered mechanical failures in the extreme cold, which reduced daily supply deliveries to one-third of required demand. Due to the destruction of railroad bridges over the Dnepr River, the Germans were also forced to send trains on a circuitous route to reach Heeresgruppe Süd during the 1942 campaign. The situation eased a bit in 1943, since the Germans were no longer gaining significant amounts of ground and were able to re-gauge most rail lines so trains could run up fairly close to the front, which helped reduce distribution problems. Nevertheless, the general weakness of the captured Soviet rail net made it difficult for the Germans to achieve the necessary throughput, with the result that trains carrying fuel and spare parts often did not arrive in a timely manner or with the quantities required. In addition to transportation difficulties, the OKH assigned priority of supplies to the main effort, which usually lay in the Heeresgruppe Süd portion of the front; units assigned to Heeresgruppe Mitte and Nord did not have priority and were allotted much less fuel, ammunition and spare parts.

The German Panzer-Divisionen on the Eastern Front were regularly plagued by shortages of spare parts for tanks, as well as wheeled vehicles. Over 1,000 panzers were awaiting repair at the start of 1943. One root cause of these shortages was the lack of standardization, resulting in trying to operate equipment from multiple manufacturers and countries – this was a severe problem in the 1941 campaign. Yet by 1943 virtually all of the Czech-made Pz 38t tanks and French-made trucks were gone, and there were usually adequate amounts of Pz III and Pz IV spare parts reaching the front. Many of the inoperative tanks would be repaired, once the overworked repair units were able to focus on something other than retreating. However, the introduction of the Tiger and Panther complicated the spare parts situation again. First, the Heereswaffenamt (Army Weapons Department) had ordered very few spare parts for the two new tank models, instead preferring to concentrate on production. Consequently, the schwere-Panzer-Abteilung received only one spare engine and one spare transmission for every ten Tiger tanks.^{20} The spare parts situation with the Panther was also quite severe in mid-1943, when faulty components such as the fuel pump malfunctioned more frequently than expected. Normally, it is best not to commit a new weapon system into battle until an adequate stock of spare parts can be accumulated at the front, but Hitler pressured the OKH into prematurely sending both tanks into combat. Nor did it help that the Tiger and Panther used different size road wheels and track, as well as different engines, transmissions and armaments than the Pz III and Pz IV tanks, so the possibility of using any existing parts was almost nil. Taken together, the spare parts crisis hit the new tank models the hardest in 1943, ensuring lower-than-expected operational readiness rates, while the proven Pz IV had a relatively stable logistical pipeline in place.

German Tank Production

After three years of operating well below capacity, the Third Reich finally got serious about increasing its tank production output after the reality of the Stalingrad debacle began to sink in. Prior to Stalingrad, in September 1942, Hitler had ordered production of tanks and Sturmgeschütz (assault guns) tripled from 380–400 units per month over the next two years, which was rather a leisurely build-up. Yet once the 6.Armee was surrounded at Stalingrad and the relief operation had failed, it became increasingly clear to even Hitler and his inner circle that Germany was facing a real crisis and needed to quickly restore its combat power on the Eastern Front as well as preparing for the increased likelihood of a Western Front.

On 22–23 January 1943, Hitler met with Reichsminister für Bewaffnung und Munition Albert Speer, who had gained his position after the death of the less-than-efficient Fritz Todt in February 1942. Hitler now ordered Speer to increase the production of Armoured Fighting Vehicles (AFV) five-fold by the end of 1944. The so-called ‘Adolf Hitler Panzer Program’ that Speer hastily developed called for a monthly production quota of between 1,100 AFVs by early 1944 and 2,000 or more by the end of the year. Yet in January 1943, German factories still built only 248 tanks, including 35 Tigers and 163 Pz IV medium tanks, plus 130 assault guns and 140 tank destroyers; a total of 518 AFVs. In contrast, Soviet industry built 1,433 tanks in January, including 1,030 T-34, plus 57 self-propelled guns. The main German tank, the Pz IV Ausf G, was being out-built 6–1 by its main competitor, the T-34; this production imbalance handicapped the Panzer-Divisionen on the Eastern Front since they were always fighting at a huge numerical disadvantage.

Speer was not without talent, but as economic historian Adam Tooze has noted, his highly-touted ‘production miracle’ was part propaganda and unsustainable improvisations.^{21} The two levers that determined German tank production output were the availability of labour and steel, which were both constrained resources in the Third Reich’s wartime economy. Speer was able to temporarily get more steel for the Adolf Hitler Panzer Program, but as Tooze notes, this still only amounted to 15 per cent of the steel allotted for German armaments production; instead, the lion’s share of the monthly steel allotment went to ammunition and aircraft production. Speer was also able to get forced labor from the occupied countries. In 1941, there were fewer than 50,000 employees working in the entire German tank industry and its sub-contractors, but this was increased to 160,000 in late 1943. One-third of the new workers were low-skill and unmotivated foreign workers.^{22} Furthermore, Germany’s industrial priorities kept shifting between aircraft, ammunition, tanks, U-Boats, the Atlantic Wall project and other flavour-of-the-month projects like the V-2 rocket, which made it difficult to establish consistent levels of output. Shortages of copper and rubber also made it difficult to increase tank production; Germany imported most of its copper and a large percentage of it went for ammunition production, but each Pz IV required 195 kg of copper.^{23} Likewise, tanks needed rubber for their road wheels and by 1943, German factories were forced to make a new type of roadwheel that used 50 per cent less rubber; it worked, but it was noisier and wore out more quickly.^{24} Speer had Hitler’s full backing in centralizing Germany’s armaments industry and increasing AFV production. An easy decision, taken late in 1942, was to terminate Pz III production and instead have the Alkett factory focus exclusively upon StuG III Sturmgeschütz production. By early 1943, Speer’s organizational reforms were beginning to bear some fruit as German tank and assault gun production slowly began to increase, but it would be March before Pz IV monthly production broke the 200-mark and October before it went over 300. Guderian cooperated closely with Speer in trying to increase German tank production and both realized that the only efficient way for Germany to narrow the gap with Soviet tank output was to focus on one or two proven designs. Guderian favored focusing on boosting Pz IV production to at least 400 per month and delaying the introduction of the Panther until it was thoroughly tested and its technical defects remedied. He was ignored.

Hitler respected Guderian, but had limited tolerance for his brash opinions. On the other hand, Dr Ferdinand Porsche, who had developed the Volkswagen in 1936, had Hitler’s ear – even though that project had only been a propaganda success.^{25} Porsche not only joined the Nazi party, but the SS as well, and Hitler recognized him as a ‘great German engineer’. Once the war began, Porsche sought ways to contribute to the military effort – and to stay in Hitler’s inner circle – so he connived to get himself appointed as Hauptausschusses Panzerwagen und Zugmaschinen, in charge of managing tank production – but he was a dismal failure. Next, Porsche decided to try his hand at designing tanks, despite the fact that he had no technical experience at all in designing armoured vehicles. Porsche developed his concepts of tank design from his imagination, not from practical requirements based upon combat experience or the needs of front-line tankers. Indeed, Porsche was particularly enamoured of gargantuan-size tanks, even though these were inconsistent with the German Army’s Bewegungskrieg manoeuvre doctrine – of which he was ignorant. However, what Porsche lacked as a tank designer, he made up for as a sycophant, being able to convince Hitler that his ridiculous projects deserved priority.

The three largest German tank manufacturers in terms of total output in 1943 were the Nibelungenwerke in St Valentin, Austria, VOMAG in Plauen, Saxony and the Krupp-Grusonwerk in Magdeburg. These three plants employed about 9,000 workers and built 52 per cent of Germany’s tanks in 1943. However, the largest manufacturer of AFVs was Alkett in Berlin, which had 3,500 employees and built over 2,000 assault guns in 1943. Altogether, seven German firms with about 25,000 employees assembled almost all of the tanks, assault guns and tank destroyers for the Wehrmacht. Although skilled workers were a critical bottleneck in expanding tank production, particularly welders and electricians, German industry had far greater access to raw materials than their opposite numbers in Soviet industry. Due to the German conquests of 1941–42, the Soviet Union had lost control over more than half of its critical resources such as aluminum, iron ore and coal. Indeed, the Germans were able to send manganese back from the captured mines at Nikopol and Krivoy Rog, which was used in the production of armour plate for German tanks.^{26} Consequently, by 1943 Germany was out-producing the Soviet Union by 4–1 in steel production. The difference was that Germany was also building U-Boats, halftracks and a wide variety of different equipment that the Soviet Union simply opted not to build. Consequently, German industry lost the production battle to Soviet industry in 1942–43 and bears a large portion of the responsibility for the eventual defeat of the Panzer-Divisionen. Why was German tank production decisively out-stripped by Soviet tank production?

A classic example of German inefficiency in tank production is the Nibelungenwerke in Austria, which was built from scratch between 1939–41 at the cost of RM 65.7 million and was intended to produce 150 Pz IV tanks per month in 1942. However, just as the plant was reaching initial operational capability (IOC) in January 1942, the OKH decided to escalate the long-dormant heavy tank program. The Nibelungenwerke was directed to work with Porsche in developing and building his VK 4501(P) Tiger prototype, while Henschel built its own VK 4501 (H) project. Despite the fact that Porsche’s design was plagued with technical problems, the Nazi hierarchy ensured that it was assigned higher priority than Pz IV production and the two largest workshops at the Nibelungenwerke were given over to Dr Porsche’s project. Enter Karl Otto Saur, Speer’s deputy in the Reichsminister für Bewaffnung und Munition. Saur was also an ardent Nazi and issued orders to both Henschel and Porsche that they would complete their prototypes for the Tiger competition by Hitler’s birthday on 20 April 1942. Remarkably, the Nibelungenwerke was able to meet this arbitrary schedule and assemble a single VK 4501(P) prototype, but this came at the cost of restricting Pz IV production to just 2–8 tanks per month for the first five months of the year. Adding insult to injury, Speer recognized that the VK 4501(P) prototype was technically unreliable and terminated the programme, awarding the production contract for the Tiger to Henschel instead. However, Porsche continued to be one of Hitler’s favourites, so he was handed a consolation prize: the Nibelungenwerke would build 90 VK 4501(P) hulls, which Porsche would convert into an as-yet-undesigned Ferdinand heavy tank destroyer. Just as the Nibelungenwerke was ramping up to build 32 Pz IV tanks in November 1942, the staff were informed that the Ferdinand now had top priority and assembly had to be completed by April 1943. Half the workspace of Workshop VII, intended for Pz IV assembly, was handed over to Porsche for his Ferdinand project. Consequently, thanks to Porsche and Saur’s Nazi cronyism, the Nibelungenwerke only built the miniscule total of 186 Pz IV tanks during 1942 instead of the 1,800 planned. The Ferdinand programme prevented any significant increase in Pz IV production for months and it was not until June 1943 that the Nibelungenwerke was able to raise its monthly output to 120 Pz IV Ausf H. Since the Nibelungenwerke was also responsible for producing spare road wheels for the Pz IV, this output was also significantly impaired until spring 1943.^{27} Stalin never tolerated this kind of disruption of critical war production, but it was commonplace in the Third Reich.

Nor were the problems at the Nibelungenwerke unique. In addition to his faulty VK 4501(P) prototype, Porsche wanted to build a super-heavy tank and built a wooden prototype, which was demonstrated to Hitler, Guderian and other dignitaries on 1 May 1943. Porsche intended to build a 188-ton tank, mounting the new 12.8cm Pak gun. Guderian rejected this concept as ridiculous, but Hitler liked the idea and authorized a production run of 150 units, to be known as the Maus. Both Krupp and Alkett were ordered to provide production space and technical personnel to assist Porsche on his fool’s errand of constructing the largest tank in the world. Not to be left behind in the super-heavy field, Henschel began development of its own version of a 140-ton tank armed with a 12.8cm gun in June 1943. Indeed, Hitler was so impressed with the firing trials of the 12.8cm gun that he ordered that it should be mounted on a future variant of either the Tiger or Panther – this was despite the fact that the 7.5cm KwK 42 and 8.8cm KwK 36 were more than adequate to defeat Soviet tanks. Hitler’s whimsical decision meant that just as the Nibelungenwerke was ramping up Pz IV production after Kursk, it was ordered to devote resources to design and produce a new heavy tank destroyer, which would become the Jagdtiger. The ripple effect of Porsche’s unrealistic designs and Hitler’s love of ‘gigantic’ weapons hit the German tank industry hard throughout 1943–44, diverting resources from the production of proven designs in favour of experimentation gone wild.

As if Porsche’s experimentation was not a big enough distraction, most of the German tank plants were still operating well below capacity even after Stalingrad. In Kassel, the Henschel plant, the sole manufacturer of the Tiger tank, continued to devote two-thirds of its production space to the construction of locomotives, not tanks. While it was supposedly ramping up for full-scale production of the new Panther tank, the MAN factory in Nurnberg continued to produce trucks, because they were regarded as ‘essential for the company’s survival in the post-war economy’. Speer’s deputy, Saur, kept trying to get MAN to shut down its truck line in order to expand Panther production, but the company management just ignored him.^{28} Heading into 1943, German manufacturing procedures were still not really geared toward mass assembly of tanks. Many businessmen were concerned that Hitler could shift armaments priorities on a whim – as he had decided to do at the start of Barbarossa in 1941 – and were reluctant to invest capital in developing excess production capacity in military factories when they were assured by the regime once again 1942 that victory was imminent. At mid-war, most German tank plants were still not operating at full capacity due to severe labour shortages and Speer was astounded that the main tank plants were not running a second shift.^{29} Henschel was the first to institute two 12-hour shifts in late 1942 and by early 1943 Speer pressed the other companies into following suit. However, the only way to quickly add additional shifts was to boost reliance on foreign forced labor, including prisoners of war, which further reduced efficiency in the factories.

Another factor that hindered a significant increase in German tank production in 1943 was the over-engineered nature of German tanks and the finicky criteria retained by the Heereswaffenamt inspectors to evaluate completed tanks. For decades, most sources have claimed that the Tiger tank required 300,000 man hours to complete, or roughly double the time required to build a Panther. Yet other sources state that the Panther required 55,000 man hours, and another authoritative source states that a single complete Panther could be built in just 2,000 man hours.^{30} In fact these numbers are over-simplistic, because the production rate of Panther tanks at various German factories varied considerably – there was no standard rate. However, by 1944 the MAN factory employed 4,483 employees directly involved in tank manufacture and assembly, who together spent roughly 1.6 million man hours per month on this task. Since MAN’s production of Panthers in 1944 topped off at 140–155 Panthers per month, this means than a single late-model Panther required at least 10,400–11,500 man hours to complete.^{31} Obviously the early Panther Ausf D, plagued by technical faults, required many more hours than the late-run Panther, but the same could be said about the T-34 or any other tank. It is clear that as German tanks became more sophisticated after 1942, the amount of time and effort required to build just one of them greatly exceeded the amount of time and effort that Soviet industry needed to construct several T-34s. Even after Stalingrad, the Heereswaffenamt inspectors at the Nibelungenwerke were rejecting completed tanks due to ‘un-polished welds’ and ‘non-standard painting’ – i.e. for aesthetics. This kind of nonsense continued until mid-1943 until the Battle of Kursk, after which Speer pushed factories to expedite production by simplifying construction procedures and lowering standards; these changes resulted in much greater output in 1944. Yet based on the numbers from MAN, it is clear that even after Speer’s improved efficiencies, a Panther still required three times as much labour effort as a T-34 to produce.

Allied strategic bombing also had some effect on German tank production, although Alkett was the only factory that was seriously disrupted in 1943. Panther production was temporarily reduced in August 1943 when the MAN plant was bombed twice.^{32} The Henschel plant in Kassel was bombed by the RAF in October 1943 and also suffered some disruption in Tiger tank production.^{33} In November 1943, a major RAF raid on Berlin left much of Alkett’s Berlin-Borsigwalde plant in ruins, which severely disrupted StuG III production for about six weeks. Reacting hastily, Hitler decided in December 1943 to terminate Pz IV production at the Krupp-Grusonwerk AG plant and instead use Pz IV hulls to build the new Jagdpanzer IV assault gun. Guderian opposed this decision, pointing out that Alkett would soon restore StuG III production and that Hitler had already authorized a new tank destroyer to be built on the Panther hull (the Jagdpanther), armed with an 8.8cm Pak 43. It made little sense for Germany to further reduce its tank output in order to produce another assault gun variant, but again he was ignored.

The RAF bombing of the Ruhr in March–June 1943 also caused the Zulieferungskrise (sub-component crisis) in which delays in the arrival of sub-components delayed AFV construction at the main plants.^{34} For example, a Pz IV assembled at the Nibelungenwerke received its turret from Magdeburg, its main gun from Dusseldorf, its engine from Friedrichshafen and various other sub-components from across the Reich. Allied bombing increasingly disrupted rail yards in central Germany, causing delay in the internal transport network. Without a large stockpile of critical sub-components on hand, the main tank plants became increasingly vulnerable to transportation disruptions. Allied bombing also induced second-and third-ordered effects, by causing distribution problems with raw materials and damaging the myriad of small manufacturers who built unique items for tanks.

The Red Army’s Tank Forces

In 1943, the Red Army had six different kinds of armoured units with a variety of missions committed on the Eastern Front:

• Tank Armies, intended to be capable of large-scale mobile operations. Although the Red Army had created five tank armies in 1942, both the 1st and 4th Tank Armies were disbanded after suffering crippling combat losses in August 1942. At the start of 1943, the 2nd, 3rd and 5th Tank Armies were still active. These formations were supposed to consist of two tank corps and one mechanized corps with about 500 tanks, but the tank armies were still rather improvised in nature.

• Tank Corps (consisting of three tank brigades and a motorized rifle brigade), were intended for either independent mobile operations or as part of a larger Tank Army. As defined by Stalin’s Order No.325 in October, the primary purpose of the Soviet Tank Corps was to destroy enemy infantry, not fight enemy tank formations. At authorized strength, the Corps should have 159 tanks (96 T-34 and 63 T-70) in six tank battalions and 3,200 infantry in six motorized infantry battalions and one motorcycle battalion. However, fire support was limited to a single Guards Mortar Battalion with eight BM-13 multiple rocket launchers, which was a serious deficiency.

• Mechanized Corps (consisting of three mechanized brigades and usually a tank brigade or two tank regiments) were intended to act primarily as a breakthrough and pursuit force for the front-level commander. A full-strength mechanized corps should have 170–200 tanks in five tank regiments and almost 6,000 motorized infantrymen in nine battalions. The mechanized corps had additional fire support that the tank corps lacked, including three light artillery battalions (each with 12 76.2mm guns) and additional mortars. However, the mechanized corps was critically short of trucks to move its infantry brigades and was forced to mount a good portion of its infantry on tanks. By late 1944, the arrival of large numbers of Lend-Lease trucks would alleviate this shortage and greatly enhance the mobility of Soviet mechanized corps.^{35}

• Tank Brigades (consisting of two tank battalions and a motorized rifle battalion), were the basic building-block of Soviet manoeuvre warfare. For most of 1943, a tank brigade was authorized 32 T-34 medium tanks and 21 T-70 light tanks (or Lend-Lease equivalents). A medium tank battalion was usually led by a Kapetan or Major and had two tank companies, each with 10 T-34 tanks, plus one for the commander. In terms of support, the tank battalion was authorized a 27-man supply platoon, which was supposed to have 13 trucks (including three for fuel and two for ammunition).^{36} The brigade had only modest reconnaissance capability (a scout platoon with three armoured cars) and no fire support – it was not a combined arms team but rather a tank-heavy formation. Consequently, Soviet Tank Brigades were best used as sub-components in a larger formation, but they could and did serve as independent infantry support units as well. By 1943, the trend was increasingly to incorporate tank brigades into larger formations in order to maximize their shock power.

• Tank Regiments were separate formations used in either the breakthrough or infantry support role, and often equipped with heavy tanks. In January 1943 the tank regiment consisted of either 32 T-34 and seven T-70 or 21 KV-series heavy tanks. Unlike the tank brigade, the tank regiment had no organic infantry component and its armour was usually employed as individual companies, not battalions.^{37} Most of the KV-series tanks were being assigned to newly-formed Guards Heavy Tank Regiments.

• Independent Tank Battalions (OTB) were usually separate formations tasked with the infantry support role. The OTBs were extremely heterogeneous in composition and could include up to five KV-series heavy tanks, 11 T-34s or equivalent Lend-Lease tanks and 20 light tanks. A few OTBs were equipped with flamethrower tanks or captured German tanks. A full-strength OTB had 36 tanks, but these units tended to stay at the front for long periods of time and typical strength was more like 10–20, with some reduced to just a handful of operational tanks.^{38} By 1943, these units were being phased out since they were a relic of the improvisation days of 1941.

On 1 January 1943, the Red Army had a total of 20 tank Corps, 11 Mechanized Corps, 120 tank brigades, 91 tank regiments and 68 OTBs. According to Krivosheev’s data, at that time the Red Army had 20,600 tanks on hand, of which 7,600 were medium tanks (T-34 or M3 Grant) and 2,000 were KV-series heavy tanks. The remaining 11,000 tanks were light T-60s and T-70s or Lend-Lease Matildas, Valentines, Lees and Stuarts.^{39} A small number of American M4A2 Shermans had arrived via the Persian Corridor in late 1942, but were just beginning to be fielded. Some of the Soviet armoured units that had been heavily engaged in the December 1942 fighting, such as the 24th and 25th Tank Corps, had very few tanks operational, but most Soviet tank units had at least 50 per cent of their tanks operational. Unlike the Germans, the Red Army did not divert sizeable amounts of armour to quiet fronts; in 1943 there were some 2,500 tanks (mostly obsolete T-26 and BT-7 light tanks) deployed in the Far East and a few hundred on the Turkish-Iranian borders. The Stavka’s Reserve (RVGK) contained two tank corps, four tank brigades, three tank regiments and three OTBs, amounting to about 700 tanks. In addition, there were over 2,000 tanks in the Moscow, Volga and Trans-Baykal Military Districts. This left approximately 14,000 Soviet tanks at or near the front, with perhaps 7–8,000 operational. This meant that the roughly 1,000 operational German tanks and assault guns on the Eastern Front were outnumbered by more than 7:1, which far exceeded the textbook 3:1 numerical advantage required for a successful attack.

However, only 30 per cent of the Red Army’s armour was deployed in large-scale tank and mechanized corps, while the rest was still employed in smaller units geared toward the infantry support role. The Narodnyi Kommisariat Oborony (NKO or People’s Commissariat of Defence), which directed organizational changes, was acting to change this imbalance by gradually phasing out many of the OTBs and consolidating more brigades within corps-size structures, but this would not be fully realized until 1944. Thus, the maintenance of so many smaller tank units tended to make it difficult for the Soviet fronts to mass decisive combat power and to maintain it through a protracted battle of attrition. Brigade size and smaller tank units could be consumed in a single action, which often caused Soviet offensive pulses to lose momentum at critical moments.

At the start of 1943, the Red Army’s tank units relied primarily upon the T-34/76 medium tank (known to Soviet tankers as the Tridtsat’chetverka), which had the excellent V-2 diesel engine, sloped armour and the decent 76.2mm F-34 gun. Yet while the T-34 had been an impressive weapon in 1941–42, it had seen only modest evolutionary improvement during the first two years of the war due to the NKO’s desire to achieve maximum production, rather than tinker with the design. The basic ammunition load, typically 75 OF-350 HE-Frag rounds and 25 BR-350A APHE rounds indicated that the T-34/76 was primarily intended to attack soft targets, not other tanks. A new hexagonal turret had been introduced in 1942, along with slightly thicker armoured protection, but there was no change in firepower and crew ergonomics – particularly for the commander – were suboptimal. The lack of a commander’s cupola, which German tanks had, seriously reduced the situational awareness of T-34 tank commanders. The T-34 did receive one upgrade in 1943 that made a real difference: more and better tactical radios. Stalin had not appreciated the value of the electronics industry, so it had a low priority in the pre-war Five Year Plans. Consequently, Soviet industry was not able to manufacture enough radios for each tank and during 1941–42 only platoon leaders and above received a radio in their tank. Furthermore, the NKO failed to evacuate pre-war electronics factories eastward in 1941, so Soviet domestic manufacture of tank radios fell off sharply in 1942. However, in 1943 the British began supplying radio components in large quantities to the Soviet Union, which was able to introduce an improved 9R radio for the T-34 and by late 1943, most Soviet tanks were equipped with a radio or at least a receiver.^{40} Brigade and higher-level communications remained problematic throughout 1943, since the Tank Brigade command post was only provided with two 12-RP radio sets with a range of only 8km.^{41}

The Red Army’s other two domestically-built tanks, the KV-1 heavy tank and the T-70 light tank, added little to overall armoured capabilities. Since the beginning of the war, the KV-1 heavy tank had failed to properly fulfill its role as a breakthrough tank due to persistent mobility issues with its inadequate transmission – it was unable to keep up with other Soviet tanks. In order to improve mobility, the KV-1S tank was introduced in December 1942, which was five tons lighter than previous models; this increased off-road speed from 13 to 24km/hour but at the cost of reducing armoured protection by 30 per cent. Consequently, the KV-1S was only marginally faster, but significantly more vulnerable. Recognizing that the KV-1 series was a technological dead-end, the NKO decided to relegate KV-1 tanks to separate heavy tank regiments and to cease production as soon as a better alternative was available. Finally, the ubiquitous T-70 light tank was in most Soviet tank units from battalion to corps as a filler, until more medium tanks were available. The NKO knew that the T-70 could not stand up to even the German Pz III series tanks, but there was little alternative. What the T-70 lacked in firepower and armoured protection, it made up for in sheer numbers.

Unlike the German Heer, the Red Army had failed to make a significant investment in halftracks, which negatively affected the mobility of the mechanized infantry units within tank formations and impaired their logistic support capabilities in mud and snow. There was no Soviet equivalent of the German Sd. Kfz. 250/251 type armoured personnel carriers and the limited number of U.S. M2 and M5 halftracks delivered under Lend-Lease were usually used as command vehicles or prime movers for artillery, not to transport infantry. Instead, the Red Army continued to rely upon tanks to transport a significant amount of infantry on their decks in the desant role. Soviet industry had developed the ZIS-22 halftrack (based upon the ZIS-5 truck) and the GAZ-60 halftrack in the mid-1930s, but only about 1,100 were built before the German invasion and most were lost in the first year of the war. In 1942, the ZIS-42 halftrack entered large-scale production, but this vehicle’s mobility in snow and mud was very poor. Consequently, the Red Army’s tank units were not provided with either the quantity or quality of German tracked support vehicles – an important but often ignored deficiency.

Soviet Tactical and Doctrinal Changes

On 16 October 1942, Stalin had issued Order No.325, which outlined a host of problems noted in the Red Army’s use of tanks in combat. Foremost was a lack of coordination between tanks and supporting infantry, artillery, engineers and aviation, which led to an inability to conduct the kind of combined arms warfare employed by German panzer units. A second significant problem was a failure of tank commanders to conduct proper reconnaissance or to use terrain properly; consequently, Soviet tank units had tended to ‘wander onto the battlefield’, unsure of where the enemy was located and ignorant of obstacles, including minefields. Finally, Soviet tank commanders at brigade and above often attempted to exercise Command and Control (C²) over their units from fixed command posts and did not rely on radios, since they had few. Instead, Soviet tank commanders issued a rigid operations order with a very simplistic scheme of manoeuvre – usually a frontal attack – and expected subordinate battalions and brigades to fulfill it to the letter. This rigid Soviet tactical C² style was the polar opposite of the German doctrine, which relied upon front-line leadership and flexibility through radio-coordinated operations. Consequently, Soviet tank units had been routinely bested by smaller German panzer units, due to their inherently rigid style of battle command. Although he made a fairly accurate assessment of shortfalls in Soviet armoured operations, Stalin failed to note that he was often responsible for causing many of these problems, by bullying commanders to prematurely start offensives and depriving them of time to coordinate with other units or to conduct proper reconnaissance.^{42}

Order No.325 began the process of Red Army tankers learning from their mistakes and trying to close the gap in capabilities between them and their German opponents. The order stressed the importance of a well-planned artillery preparation and close-infantry tank coordination in the attack. Instead of tangling with German tanks – as had often happened in 1941–42 – Soviet tank corps were ordered to focus on destroying the enemy infantry, leaving artillery and anti-tank units to deal with German tanks. The order also stressed proper terrain reconnaissance and the use of surprise and deception (maskirovka) to catch the enemy off guard. Of course, it was easy for Stalin to dictate orders, but this standard became the doctrinal guidepost for the Red Army’s tankers heading into 1943.

One of the foremost tactical and doctrinal changes that the Red Army did begin to adopt in 1943 was the introduction of the Samokhodnaya Ustanovka (SUs or self-propelled guns), which were modelled on the German Sturmgeschütz. The Su-76, which mounted the reliable 76.2mm ZIS-3 anti-tank gun on a lengthened T-70 chassis, could be built in great quantity. The Su-122, mounting a 122mm howitzer on a T-34 chassis, offered Soviet mechanized infantry units a real boost in direct fire support. Altogether, the creation of regimental-size units equipped with SUs reflected a desire within the Red Army to hand off much of the infantry support mission to AFVs other than tanks. Although early technical problems slowed the introduction of the SU-equipped regiments in 1943, this step would gradually free more tanks to conduct offensive manoeuvre warfare rather than being tied to infantry units. Those tanks that remained in the infantry support role were increasingly assigned to the new separate tank regiments.

In 1942, the Red Army had created tank armies and tank corps, but they were really just large collections of tanks with little in the way of supporting arms. This began to change in 1943, as the Red Army absorbed combat lessons learned from the Germans at great cost in 1941–42 and laboured to create their own balanced combined arms formations in line with Stalin’s Order 325. In January 1943, the NKO moved to strengthen Tank Corps by adding a mortar regiment with 36 120mm mortars and an SU Regiment equipped with 8 SU-76 and 8 SU-122s. Furthermore, in order to improve the staying power of the Tank Corps, it was authorized an additional 33 T-34 and seven T-70 as spares; the addition of an extra battalion’s worth of tanks would give Red Army tankers an edge in attritional battles like Kursk. In February 1943, the engineer component in the Tank Corps was upgraded from a company-size unit to a battalion. In March, the same increase occurred with the integral signal unit and an anti-aircraft regiment with 16 37mm guns was added. In April, the NKO decided to increase the anti-tank component of the Tank Corps in response to the improvement of German armoured capabilities, particularly the Tiger tank; each Tank Corps was authorized an anti-tank regiment, which had a mix of 20 45mm, 57mm and 76.2mm guns, and a separate anti-tank battalion with 12 towed 85mm 52-K AA guns. The decision to employ the 85mm 52-K AA gun to counter German heavy armoured vehicles would substantially add to Soviet defensive capabilities at Kursk.

Although a number of Red Army leaders recognized the need to go beyond the tactical prescriptions of Order No.325, and that larger, better-equipped tank and mechanized formations might actually be able to execute something akin to the pre-war Deep Battle (glubokiy boy) doctrine, the risk of failure inclined them towards conservative progress toward this goal, rather than a rapid shift in doctrine. Noticeably, Order 325 really only addressed the tactical breakthrough battle and said very little about operational art. Key leaders in the Red Army, such as Georgy Zhukov and Vasilevsky, recognized the need to improve operational technique rather than just to rely upon mass, which had rarely prevailed in the counter-offensives of 1941–42. The best minds in the Red Army knew that mass was not enough to defeat an opponent as skillful as the Wehrmacht. One of the first steps toward a doctrinal shift at the operational level was the increased use of echelonment in both offensive and defensive formations. Whereas the Germans tended to employ everything they had from the outset of an operation, Red Army leaders were beginning to learn the value of feeding fresh formations in at critical moments in order to keep up momentum. Previously, Soviet offensives had tended to commit all or most of their armour up front, as at Kharkov in May 1942, incurring huge losses and rapid loss of capability. For short periods of time, the Germans demonstrated that they could defeat Soviet mass, but echeloned offensive operations enabled the Red Army to conduct protracted offensives that gradually exhausted a German-style defence. Use of echelonment enabled Soviet commanders to use their numerical advantages to best effect. Echelonment would also be used in defence, at Kursk.

Another subtle change in Soviet armoured doctrine was a growing realization that there would have to be increased emphasis on ‘push’ logistics, i.e. getting fuel and ammunition resupply to fast-moving tank units at the front in order to sustain the pace of advance, rather than just waiting for the rear echelons to arrive. Up to November 1942, the Red Army had spent more time retreating than advancing and had been able to rely upon resupply from nearby railheads. Yet it was the lack of emphasis upon forward logistics that marred the Red Army’s first execution of Deep Operations (glubokaya operatsiya) with the Tatsinskaya Raid in December 1942; the 24th Tank Corps succeeded in capturing this important German airfield, but the Southwest Front was unable to resupply the immobilized corps, which became encircled by two German Panzer-Divisionen and was virtually annihilated. In order to make this change, more trucks, radios and support troops would have to be allocated to Soviet armoured units and the haphazard style of staff planning drastically improved. Thus, the improvement of logistical sustainment over long distances and the staff planning processes to make this occur when and where it was most needed were an essential requirement for the Red Army to begin conducting large-scale advances westward. These changes did not come easily.

Soviet Tank Training

During the first two years of the war, the Red Army had been desperate to crank out as many tankers as possible and had created a plethora of training units. Prior to the war, the Red Army had operated a number of Tank Training Schools (STU, Tankovoye Uchilishche) to train officers; by 1943 there were still more than a dozen STU with two each in Gorky, Kazan and Ulyanovsk and three in Saratov. Each STU could train about 500 tank commanders in a six-month long course. In addition, there were also higher-level courses for battalion and regimental commanders at the VAMM, which was initially evacuated to Tashkent but brought back to Moscow in 1943. Most of the tank training units were stationed near the factories that built the tanks, which simplified the creation of replacement crews. A number of Tank Automotive Training Centres (UABTTS or Uchebnyy Avtobronetankovyy Tsentr) were created around the tank factories to coordinate and supervise subordinate tank training regiments and battalions. Training battalions were broken down by type of tank (heavy, medium and light) and there were separate units to train crews on American or British tanks. The Chelyabinsk UABTTS was the largest and its subordinate units could generate over 2,500 replacement crews in six months. A typical training battalion had about 1,190 students and 171 staff, while the training regiments had over 4,000 trainees.

Early in the war, the NKO had raided tank schools to harvest trained cadre for front-line service, which greatly impacted the quality of training in 1942. However, the situation began to improve when the NKO issued Order 003 on 3 January 1943 to rationalize and improve tank training by combining various separate tank training battalions into tank training brigades. Cadre with frontline experience – often wounded – were sent to revitalize the training schools, but the quality of Soviet tanker training still remained problematic throughout much of 1943. Even the T-34 training battalions still used obsolete T-26 and BT-7 light tanks for training. Most of the instruction for crewmen was rote in nature, producing drivers and gunners who had attained only a modest level of familiarity with their tanks. In the training schools, there was virtually no realistic field training and tanks were taught merely to move using simple line and column tactics. Leytenant Pavlov V. Bryukhov, who trained at the Kurgan Tank Training School from January to April 1943, described training as ‘very weak’. Bryukhov said that, ‘they only taught us the basics – starting the engine and driving straight. We had tactical training, but it was mostly walking about on foot imitating the manoeuvreing of tanks’. Soviet tank platoon leaders were not even trained to read maps, which became a real problem once the Red Army began advancing westward.^{43} Enlisted soldiers were segregated into training battalions that trained a single skill – driver, gunner or loader – which meant that they were not cross-trained in other tasks, as German tankers were.

Driver skills and manoeuvreing training over typical cross-country terrain were extremely basic, but gunnery training remained deficient throughout the war. Indeed, given the amount of effort put into increasing tank production, it is an amazing oversight that the NKO put so little effort into training Soviet tankers to execute their main tasks of manoeuvreing and shooting. Gunnery training was particularly deficient and handed a major advantage to German tankers. Bryukhov noted that after he graduated from the Kurgan Tank School he was assigned to a reserve tank regiment where ‘we received a tank, drove it fifty kilometers to a firing range and fired three rounds from the main gun and one machine-gun ammo drum, after which the tank was considered officially ready for shipment to the front.’^{44} Soviet tank gunners and commanders were taught to engage targets within 10 seconds, which was an eternity on the battlefield; the German standard was five seconds for the first round on the way. In combat, German tankers noted how slowly Soviet tankers fired – which was how they were trained. Nor was any effort made to teach Soviet tankers how to lead a moving target or use boresighting techniques, so Soviet optical sights were not properly aligned with the gun barrel, greatly reducing the accuracy of the main gun. Given these standards, it is truly amazing that Soviet tankers managed to hit as many German tanks as they actually did. The only saving grace for Soviet tankers was that as more tankers survived their first action in 1943–44, the veterans gradually learned essential skills that they should have been taught in training. In 1944, several tank training centres were established for Guards Tank units and crews at these sites received more firing and manoeuvre training, but still only a fraction of what most German tankers received.

Nevertheless, the annual output of tens of thousands of even partly-trained tankers was one of the great wartime miracles of the Soviet Union and helps to explain why the Red Army gradually gained the upper hand. Yet it was a frightfully wasteful method of replacing personnel losses, and had the Red Army built even a single modern gunnery training facility like Putlos and a manoeuvre training area like Grafenwöhr, Soviet tank losses would have dropped significantly and greater losses would have been inflicted on the Germans. Indeed, lack of attention to quality training constituted a self-inflicted wound for the Red Army, which was not resolved during the war. The Soviet Communist approach to warfare was driven by industrial imperatives, not concern for the well being of the ‘little cogs’ at the front.

Soviet Tank Production and Lend-Lease

Initially, Stalin had selected Vyacheslav Malyshev, an engineer with great experience expanding Soviet heavy industry in the Five Year Plans, as his People’s Commissar of the Tank Industry (NKTP). Malyshev had worked wonders during the industrial evacuations of 1941 and jump-starting tank production at Chelyabinsk and Nizhniy Tagil. However, Malyshev was more of an industrial manager and had no direct experience with designing armoured vehicles. In July 1942, Stalin had decided to replace Malyshev as NKTP with Isaac M. Salzman, the former director of the Kirov plant in Leningrad. Salzman was certainly more knowledgeable about tanks, but he was also involved in the rivalries between the three primary Soviet tank design bureaux and he tended to favour engineers and designs that originated from the Kirov group. During Salzman’s tenure, T-34 production hit its highest mark in December 1942, with 1,568 units built. However, Salzman was directed by the NKO not to effect any major changes in existing tank designs that could reduce production output, and the same went for trying to develop new tanks. Consequently, a certain inertia and stagnation settled into the Soviet tank industry on Salzman’s watch, even though he was discouraged from taking proactive steps to match advances in German tank technology.

Thanks to the efforts of both Malyshev and Salzman, Soviet industry was able to expand tank production to outstrip Germany’s industrial output. Automatic welding techniques were introduced to speed up assembly-line procedures. Additionally, constant efforts to cut corners resulted in reducing the man hours required to manufacture a single T-34 tank from 5,300–9,000 hours in early 1942 to 3,700–7,200 hours by January 1943.^{45} The Nizhniy Tagil factory (renamed the Stalin Ural Tank Factory 183) achieved the greatest efficiencies in tank production and was building nearly half of all T-34s. However, the emphasis upon reducing labour input for tank production – although statistically pleasing to Soviet labor officials – resulted in a serious decline in the quality of tanks being built. The new cast turret, introduced in late 1942, was plagued with fractures and the hulls produced at Nizhniy Tagil and Sverdlovsk also had a high rate of cracks. Even the heretofore reliable V2 diesel engine suffered an increased rate of failures and tests in 1942 indicated that the mean-time-between-failure for the engine was 200–300km instead of the design specification of 1,000km.^{46} Consequently, the Soviet tanks that were used in the early campaigns of 1943 tended to be less mechanically reliable, particularly with crews that were ignorant about preventative maintenance.

It is important to note that while Soviet industry was able to consistently out-produce the German tank industry, the Soviet Union only had one front to worry about and its tank factories were not being bombed. Nor did the Soviet Union have to divert steel to naval production, while Germany expended considerable industrial resources in 1942–44 in building up its U-Boat fleet. Furthermore, in order to boost tank production in 1941–42, the Soviets had to convert one of their primary truck factories, GAZ, to manufacturing light tanks. Consequently, Soviet domestic production of trucks was significantly less than that of Germany and the difference was only made up by Lend-Lease. The situation was even worse in terms of armoured halftracks (see Table 1), which were essential for employing mechanized infantry in fast-moving armoured formations. The Soviet Union never developed a vehicle that was analogous to the German SPW and relied entirely upon a small number of U.S.-built M2 halftracks and M3A1 scout cars to outfit the mechanized infantry in a few chosen Guards units. None of the Soviet mechanized infantry units in 1943 were fully motorized and were forced to use the expedient of Desant (landing), whereby at least one battalion in each brigade rode atop tanks. Thus while outnumbered in terms of tanks, German mechanized units retained a significant edge in motorization over the Red Army until mid-1944, when the balance finally shifted in favour of the Soviets.

Lend-Lease also continued to provide important augmentation to the Red Army’s tank strength in 1943–44. During 1943, the Soviet Union received another 2,995 Lend-Lease tanks from the Western Allies: 2,102 from the British (1,776 Valentine, 179 Churchill and 147 Matilda) and 893 from the United States (469 M4A2 Sherman, 260 M3/M5 Stuart and 164 M3 Lee).^{47} In addition, the Soviets received 41 M31s, an armoured recovery vehicle based on the Lee tank, for which they had no equivalent. Although the Soviets often complained about the quality of Lend-Lease tanks, the Shermans and Valentines both proved reliable and were retained in service to the end of the war.

Although Soviet armoured fighting vehicle production exceeded that of Germany, few realize that it essentially hit its ceiling in late 1942–early 1943. Afterwards, the introduction of any new design such as the T-34/85 and IS-2 significantly impacted production. The NKO was considering an upgraded version of the T-34 tank and was interested in a new heavy tank to replace the KV-1, but was unwilling to divert resources to these efforts while the Germans were still reeling from the Stalingrad debacle. The one area where the NKO gave Salzman some leeway was on the SU programme, since it wanted to replace the T-70 light tank with a better-armed vehicle. Salzman put one of his engineers from the old OKMO design bureau, Semyon A. Ginzburg, in charge of developing the SU-76 self-propelled gun. General-polkovnik Nikolai D. Yakovlev’s Main Artillery Directorate provided the 76.2mm ZIS-3 gun for the new vehicle. Using a lengthened T-70 chassis, Ginzburg designed a lightly-armoured housing for the ZIS-3 gun atop the hull and had a prototype ready in December 1942. Salzman approved the prototype for limited production without trials and the first SU-76 were built before the end of 1942. In January 1943, a few of these SU-76 were sent to the Volkhov Front, where they proved to be a complete failure. The T-70’s two GAZ-202 truck engines had been adequate to move the T-70 light tank, but the addition of an extra ton of weight was too much and the SU-76 was difficult to steer and its transmission was inadequate. A clear sign that the vehicle was underpowered was the high number of final drive failures. Salzmann and Ginzburg tried to fix the design problems of the SU-76, but this caused production to cease in April 1943.

Unlike Hitler, Stalin did not tolerate engineering failure and after six months of Ginzburg’s fumbling with the SU-76 project, Stalin issued GKO Decree 3530ss on 7 June 1943, which stated that:

The State Committee of Defence decrees that:

Ginzburg was removed from his position and sent to the front as deputy commander of the 32nd Tank Brigade, where he was killed in action two months later. Salzmann was forced to resign, but was reassigned as a director at Chelyabinsk. Malyshev was brought back to head the NKTP, which he remained in charge of until the end of the war. First, he resolved the problems with the SU-76, which was reissued as the SU-76M. Although still a problematic design, Malyshev ensured that it was built in great quantities and that its main faults were corrected. Next, he began lobbying Stalin and the NKO to approve an up-gunned version of the T-34 as well as a new heavy tank. The whole experience of the SU-76 program ably demonstrates the level of stress and micro-management that Soviet tank industry operated under; engineers and program managers who made mistakes would not remain in their positions. Stalin’s bullying tactics were cruel but effective in getting the desired results within the Soviet industrial system.