Original subtitles

[dramatic music]

[Narrator] 1943.

New Nazi superweapons power east,

Hitler's last chance to win the war.

-[explosions blasting] -[whistle shrills]

The Red Army scrambles to defend the Soviet Union,

throwing hundreds of T-34 tanks

at the gargantuan German Tigers

in the greatest tank battle ever seen.

Now, rare home movies show life behind the lines.

While newly colorized footage

takes us to the heart of the action.

-[explosion booms] -[gun blasting]

Audacious raids, sabotage, and aerial combat.

[airplane engines whirring]

-As fanatical SS units attack, -[gun blasting]

the Soviet people must rise up to protect their motherland.

[gun blasting]

Kursk, the ultimate clash of the titans.

[suspenseful music]

[upbeat pensive music]

German soldier Gotz Hirt-Reger

has been shooting film throughout the war,

[gun blasting]

and is now assigned to a Ministry of Propaganda

camera crew.

It's an itinerant lifestyle. Wake up. Wash up.

Then check your equipment

and head out to capture the latest news

-from the Eastern Front. -[tense music]

Like the arrival of one of a new generation of Nazi tanks.

A Tiger.

[tank engine revving]

-Hirt-Reger rolls film -[gun blasting]

as its 88-millimeter gun test fires.

[gun blasting]

-It's a powerful demonstration. -[gun blasting]

Cotton balls in the ears provide essential protection.

[guns blasting]

[suspenseful music]

This Tiger is one of 2,700 German armored vehicles

assigned to a vast new offensive in the Soviet Union.

900,000 veteran soldiers prepare for the attack.

They'll be covered by 1,700 Luftwaffe fighters and bombers.

[Matthias] The Germans are building up a massive force.

They hope that this offensive

will regain them the initiative on the Eastern Front.

[Narrator] The driving force behind the German operation

is none other than Adolf Hitler.

He's counting on his elite units,

and the cameramen following them,

to deliver some desperately needed good news.

[tense music]

By mid-1943, the Nazis have seized a vast area of Europe.

But the previous six months

have seen the German advance stall,

and the Allied forces push back.

-[guns blasting] -[dramatic music]

Far in the frozen north,

the Red Army breaks the German Siege of Leningrad.

In the central Soviet Union,

[explosion blasts]

a doomed attempt to take Stalingrad

sees almost one million German

and Italian Axis troops killed or captured.

And to the south, American and British armies

have blown the Axis forces out of North Africa.

[gun blasting]

Buoyed by the recent Allied victories,

US President Franklin D. Roosevelt

and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill

meet in Casablanca, Morocco.

To turn the screws on Hitler,

they announce that the Allies will now accept

nothing less than his unconditional surrender.

And plan a joint invasion of Italy.

By stretching the Germans

as far as possible in North Africa, in Italy,

and potentially, also, in France,

it would give Stalin and the Red Army an opportunity

to finally make the decisive breakthrough

on the Eastern Front, and push towards Berlin.

[ominous music]

[Narrator] The string of defeats dents Hitler's swagger.

[Matthias] The Third Reich's expansion has stalled

and the Germans know that they need to change their strategy

if they want to win, or perhaps, even just survive this war.

[Narrator] Hitler is determined to seize back

the initiative with a major new military offensive.

But first, he must ramp up enthusiasm at home.

[dramatic music]

So the Nazis hold a rally, at Berlin's Sportpalast arena.

German newsreel cameras cover every angle

as propaganda minister, Josef Goebbels,

whips a 14,000 strong, carefully selected crowd

into a frenzy.

[Josef speaks in German]

[crowd cheers]

[Narrator] He announces total war,

the full mobilization of the German economy

to support the military effort.

Senior Nazi Albert Speer is watching.

[Albert] Except for Hitler's

most successful public meetings,

I had never seen an audience

so effectively roused to fanaticism.

[Josef speaks in German]

[crowd cheering]

[Narrator] Energized workers across the Reich

rush to build a new generation of superweapons.

The Panther medium tank has advanced sloping armor,

a 75-millimeter gun, and a top speed of 34 miles an hour.

It sets a new standard for an all-round tank.

[dramatic rock music]

The heavy Tiger is slow but powerful.

Early demonstrations see the 57-ton machine take on trees

-[tank engine whirring] -[house crashing]

and houses, destroying everything in its path.

[Matthias] When the Tiger tank appears,

its combination of a very powerful gun,

together with heavy armament,

means that it can outclass

any Soviet tank on the battlefield.

[guns blasting]

[Narrator] The Ferdinand self-propelled gun

is a tank killer.

Named after its designer,

the car manufacturer Ferdinand Porsche,

its 88-millimeter gun is even longer than the Tigers.

This gives its armor-piercing shells increased velocity

and a range of nearly two miles.

The new wonder weapons are up-armored and up-gunned,

and gave the Germans

a great tactical advantage on the battlefield,

as well as a great psychological advantage over the enemy.

[Narrator] Hitler is convinced

these devastating new machines will put the Reich

back on the path to European domination.

He must now pick the spot to unleash their power.

[majestic music]

280 miles south of Moscow is the city of Kursk,

a major population center and transport hub.

In early 1943 the city is newly liberated by the Soviets

after nearly a year of brutal Nazi occupation.

Roughly 10,000 inhabitants of the city of Kursk

died from malnutrition in the 18 months

that the Germans were there.

[Narrator] Land mines and ruined buildings

are the Germans' legacy.

The city's devastation is obvious.

But the Nazis still want it back.

By the summer of 1943,

the Germans are finding it increasingly difficult

to sustain a very long front in the Soviet Union.

[Narrator] Kursk sits in the center of a large bulge

or salient, protruding 100 miles into German territory.

The Germans' ambition is to remove that bulge

so they can release resources by flattening the line.

[Narrator] In Operation Citadel

Hitler plans attacks to the north and south

that will link up, reclaim the entire area,

and stabilize the front lines.

[suspenseful music]

His military advisers are keen to attack

as soon as the weather allows.

But the Fuhrer decides to wait until early July,

to allow the new generation of tanks

time to reach the front line.

Kursk is do or die for the Germans.

They're really laying everything they have,

all their new weaponry on a single throw of the dice.

If this doesn't work, they're done.

[tense music]

[Narrator] At the Kremlin, Soviet leader Josef Stalin

considers how to react to the impending attack.

In the first two years of the war

the most significant successes that the Red Army enjoy

were at the point where a German advance

had exhausted itself.

And then the Red Army was able to carry out

a large counteroffensive on weaker flanks.

[Narrator] Stalin decides to use Kursk as bait

in a giant trap.

[dramatic music]

The Red Army will build defenses

to stop the Nazis once and for all,

then unleash a massive counterstrike.

Soviet civilians in the area now become a vital resource.

Just two months after being liberated from Nazi rule,

300,000 Kursk residents are pressed into service

for the Red Army

and begin to turn farmland into a fortress.

But trench digging is just the tip of the iceberg.

The Red Army is now becoming

an army, for all intents and purposes, of occupation,

not occupation in the same way

that the Germans occupy the territory, mind you,

but it still needs to be fed.

It still needs to be cared for.

[Narrator] Propaganda films show the civilian population

taking on all aspects of Red Army rear services,

from food supply to medical care.

They build a brand new 60-mile railroad,

to speed hundreds of tanks to the front lines.

It's German Totaler Krieg versus Soviet Total'Naya Voyna.

The total war of half a continent focused on Kursk.

[tank engine whirring]

After two months of concentrated effort,

the fields around Kursk are transformed

into a fortified defensive network of trenches,

gun emplacements, even dugouts for tanks.

One declares "For Stalin" on its side.

The earthworks are so substantial

that they are still visible to this day,

as jagged lines of trees, or shadows in the fields.

Over 3,000 miles of trenches are arranged

in a zig-zag pattern,

to protect defenders from flanking fire and explosions.

Soviet defenses are developed like a spider's web,

in which the Germans would struggle, exhaust themselves,

and then leave themselves open to a counterattack.

[Narrator] On top of 1.3 million soldiers

waiting in the web of trenches,

two massive Soviet armies hold position

to the north and south,

ready to counterstrike, if they get the chance.

The danger of the Soviet plan,

is that if the Germans manage to break through

the Soviet defensive positions,

the Wehrmacht will be able to encircle a large amount

of Soviet troops, and completely annihilate them.

[Narrator] 2/5 of the entire Red Army

now waits for the arrival of the new German superweapons.

The stage is set for one of the biggest battles

the world has ever seen.

[gentle accordion music]

[tense music]

The Red Army braces for a new German offensive at Kursk.

The Nazis are gathering on the edge of the open fields.

Stalin sends political commissar,

and future Soviet leader

Nikita Khrushchev to keep an eye on his generals.

[Nikita] The events unfolding were extremely important.

The outcome of the war was being decided,

along with the fate of our country.

[Narrator] Later that evening,

Khrushchev meets a German deserter,

who claims he has just been issued

with a ration of schnapps.

[suspenseful music]

It's a German military tradition.

Boxes labeled "For front line fighters

"in large-scale combat,"

contain candy, chocolate, cigarettes, and matches.

They are distributed on the eve of battle.

Khrushchev leaves convinced

the German offensive is imminent.

So the Red Army sends a greeting.

-[dramatic music] -[rockets whooshing]

Thousands of Katyusha rockets leave their rails

at 780 miles an hour, with a distinctive metallic howl,

that adds a shock factor to the bombardment.

The Germans are caught by surprise.

[Bernard] The scene was chaotic.

Vehicles were on fire

and there were several corpses lying in the grass,

but we soon recovered.

[Narrator] The attack delays the Germans

but does not stop them.

[guns blasting]

They send a massive artillery and rocket barrage

right back at the Soviets.

[rockets whooshing]

Operation Citadel has begun.

[dramatic music]

To the north of the salient,

the German 9th Army moves out.

Their aim is to penetrate the defenses

and head towards Kursk.

In command is General Walter Model.

He favors defensive tactics, so decides his tanks

and Ferdinand self-propelled guns will initially hold back.

Having seen the sophistication of the Soviet defenses

that he was up against, Model decides to use the infantry

to create the breach,

and then for the tanks to exploit that breach,

and hopefully, break through to victory.

[Narrator] Thousands of infantry push forward,

right into a Soviet minefield.

[explosion blasts]

[Henri] The Soviets had sown

thousands upon thousands of mines,

we could never remove all of them

and those that we removed were replaced.

[explosion blasts]

[Narrator] Red Army crews have it down

to a white knuckle science.

[explosion blasts]

Get to a gap in the line and dig.

Fast.

[explosion blasts]

Drop in an anti-tank mine, cover your tracks, and get out

[explosion booms]

before a German shell finds you.

[explosion blasts]

The Red Army can lay hundreds of thousands of mines an hour.

They use the extensive trench network

to replenish the fields behind the advancing Germans

and swarm at them from all angles.

If you stick your hand into a fire ant mound,

the ants will attack you all the way in.

As you keep penetrating, your entire limb will be attacked,

and so this is the idea.

You absorb the attack and then you destroy the elements

that have made the penetration.

[gun blasting]

[Soviet Observer] The soldiers were deafened

by the thunder of guns and mortars

and the creaking of tracks.

All of the weapons of the infantry

entered the battle to repel the enemy blows.

Such was the sophistication of the Soviet defensive plan,

the German infantry found it very difficult

to bludgeon a hole in the defenses,

and therefore, the armor couldn't exploit it.

[fire whooshes]

-[explosions booming] -[suspenseful music]

[Narrator] The Soviet swarm begins

to bleed the attacking Germans.

Newly restored footage reveals a scouting party,

led by Captain Dmitry Zakrevsky,

returning from an overnight raid.

They're celebrating the capture

of one of the feared Nazi tanks.

[Ilya] We found in the tank secret papers, documents.

There was also a working radio.

[Narrator] The German officers in the north

sense their momentum stalling.

[gun blasting]

[explosion booms]

But they maintain the offensive,

to keep the pressure on.

[guns blasting]

To the south of Kursk,

Field Marshal Erich von Manstein

takes a different approach.

He leads with tanks.

-[dramatic music] -[tank engines whirring]

Brand new, heavy Tigers form up into spearheads,

flanked by the medium Panthers

and an array of older Panzers.

Manstein had seen the very great success

that could be achieved by fast-moving armor,

creating a psychological impact

and a shock impact on enemy defenses,

no matter how sophisticated they are.

[Narrator] Many of Manstein's tank crews

are drawn from the most experienced

and fanatical soldiers Germany has.

The military wing of Hitler's personal guard,

the Waffen-SS.

The SS is the most fanatical

and feared organization in Nazi Germany.

They'll stop at nothing

to enact Hitler's vision for a new Europe.

[tank rumbles]

[Narrator] In early 1943,

newsreel cameras are permitted into the SS training school

at Bad Tolz, south of Munich.

Here, new recruits are groomed for life in the Waffen-SS,

a military organization that fights alongside

the regular German Army, but reports directly to Hitler.

Hitler doesn't really trust the old elites

that he can see within Germany,

for example, also, the old-established officer corps

of the normal armed forces.

[Narrator] SS indoctrination

emphasizes Hitler's dark vision of European domination,

and physical conformity,

to mold a fanatically loyal fighting force.

[Matthias] The fact that Hitler builds up the SS,

means that he has an extremely loyal group of people,

up to 900,000 that are loyal to him and to no one else.

[Narrator] SS Section Leader Johannes Schumacher

carries a personal film camera throughout the war.

He is a member of the Totenkopf or Death's Head division.

The skull and crossbones on their collars

symbolize a willingness to sacrifice their lives

for the Nazi cause.

Schumacher travels to the Eastern Front.

He records the devastation wrought by the SS divisions

tasked with controlling the occupied Soviet Union.

As villages burn, Soviet civilians forced from the area

carry children too small for the march.

[solemn music]

The SS are always training, ready to wreak destruction.

The SS carry out countless war crimes.

They're responsible for atrocities

and massacres across Europe.

They aren't really soldiering,

they're fighting a war of annihilation, of extermination.

They're probably as close to evil

as the modern world has seen.

[Narrator] As the tanks of the Totenkopf Division

arrive at the Kursk battlefield,

Schumacher uses his home movie camera

to film the 57 ton Tigers in close-up.

The fanatical SS divisions now intend to use

these Nazi superweapons to crack the Soviet defenses.

[tank rattles]

-[dramatic music] -[gun blasting]

The SS Panzer Corps will spearhead

the attack to the south of Kursk.

The initial target

is a small Russian village named Prokhorovka.

42 Tigers are followed by a further 450 tanks

and assault guns across an eight-mile front.

It's a slow, methodical advance.

But they can take their time.

The five-man crews inside the Tigers

are protected by four inches of steel armor.

To the Soviets, the tanks appear unstoppable.

[Vassily] Shells hit them but bounced off like peas.

There have been cases where artillerymen

went insane after seeing this.

[Narrator] The tanks plow forward

and reach the Soviet trenches.

They deliberately use their weight

to collapse the earthworks and crush the defenders.

German infantry and engineers

follow to clear the fortifications.

[Stefan] Dropping into a trench system,

my section threw grenades around the corners

and into dug-outs which were then cleared out by men

with sub-machine guns.

[Narrator] Soviet footage reveals

the Red Army's defensive network

beginning to buckle under the attack.

[explosion blasts]

[Mykhailo] Every time they moved, we shot them.

But then we saw that they had a mortar

and before I could open fire, we had been hit.

I was a mess.

Deaf, confused, and unable to stand.

I can still recall the mixture of damp earth,

cordite, and blood which filled my nostrils.

-[mortar shell thuds] -[explosion blasts]

The German tank advance is relentless.

-[gun blasting] -[explosion booms]

The new models slowly chew their way

through the Soviet lines.

Soviet losses are huge.

Six, seven, eight to one in favor of the Germans.

[suspenseful music]

[Narrator] As the German tanks identify enemy positions,

they radio for supporting airstrikes.

Waves of Junkers Ju 87 dive bombers, known as Stukas,

bear down on their targets.

[bombs blasting]

Carrying a 550-pound bomb,

they drop into an almost vertical dive

before releasing with pinpoint accuracy.

[bombs booming]

But to make a dent on the hundreds

of Soviet tanks at Kursk

the Stukas need more than just one bomb per run.

[airplane engine whirring]

German newsreel cameras follow Hans-Ulrich Rudel,

a Luftwaffe fighter ace

who trials a new way of using the aircraft.

His custom Stuka is fitted

with twin 37-millimeter anti-tank guns.

[dramatic music]

They'll skim the battlefield at a much shallower angle,

to fire into the vulnerable side armor of the Soviet tanks.

[Hans-Ulrich] In the first attack,

four tanks explode under the hammer blows of my cannons.

-[airplane screaming] -[guns blasting]

In this aircraft we possess a weapon

which is capable of knocking out

a formidable number of Soviet tanks.

[airplane engine whirring]

[guns blasting]

[Narrator] At Kursk,

Rudel claims 12 Soviet tanks in one day.

He goes on to become the most highly decorated

German service member of the entire war.

[tense music]

After four days of intense fighting,

[gun blasting]

the methodical approach of the SS Panzer Corps pays off.

Their tanks have broken through three lines

of Soviet defenses

and now approach the village of Prokhorovka.

Soon, they will be in the clear, able to circle back

and destroy the remaining Red Army around Kursk.

[tank engine whirring]

1,500 miles away, the Allies activate their long-held plan

to open a second front against a German Army

distracted by events in the East.

[dramatic music]

American Army film cameras roll

as the long-awaited invasion of Sicily,

Operation Husky, begins.

160,000 American, Canadian, and British troops

will land on the island,

and attempt to snatch it from German and Italian forces.

[gun blasting]

As American cruisers soften up the defenses,

landing craft speed to the beaches.

Most make the troops jump the last yards

but some are DUKW amphibious trucks.

These make a fast, rough landing on the beaches,

[trunk engine rumbling]

allowing troops quick access to the Sicilian streets.

[Soldier] This was indeed an auspicious beginning

for the Allied assault upon Hitler's Fortress Europa.

[truck engine whirring]

[Narrator] As US infantry clears the fishing town of Gela,

it becomes obvious that German and Italian forces

do not have the strength to hold the island.

The Allies make plans to move onto the Italian mainland.

[tense brooding music]

At his Eastern Front headquarters, the Wolf's Lair,

Hitler searches for answers.

Operation Husky provides Hitler with a huge dilemma.

He could feel his troops

being stretched further and further.

And he would not only be fighting offensive action

by Stalin's Red Army in the East,

he would also be fighting the Allies

in the soft underbelly of Europe, Italy,

and also, potentially, in France, the next year.

[Narrator] But Sicily is a long way from Kursk,

where the Red Army can still see the German forces

moving toward their jagged defensive lines.

They activate their armored reserve.

Over 800 Soviet tanks head out,

to try and halt the mighty Tigers.

[dramatic music]

The greatest tank battle of the Second World War

is about to begin.

[tank engine whirring]

[suspenseful music]

Embedded camera crews film

as German tanks approach the town of Prokhorovka,

on the outskirts of Kursk.

They have blasted most of the way

through the spiderweb of Red Army defenses.

But what they don't know

is that they are now entering a giant trap.

[Lloyd] Prokhorovka was an ideal place

where the Soviets could unleash their armored reserve.

It is some way behind the lines,

where the exhausted Germans

could be engaged by fresh armored forces.

[Narrator] As the Germans advance,

their scouts send up purple flares

to warn of enemy armor ahead.

Suddenly, over 400 Red Army tanks break cover.

They accelerate straight towards the German lines.

[Rudolf] What I saw left me speechless.

From beyond the shallow rise in front of me appeared 15,

then 30, then 40 tanks.

Finally, there were too many to count.

[Narrator] The Soviet T-34 tank

is the backbone of the Red Army.

It has sloping armor, a powerful V12 engine,

and a formidable 76.2-millimeter gun.

But its main strength lies in numbers.

But its main strength lies in numbers. [machinery whirring]

[machinery whirring]

By 1943, the Soviet Union's own version of total war

sees giant factories far behind the lines

churn out hundreds of T-34s every week.

They are driven straight onto long trains

and sent to the front,

a constant stream of armor heading for the battlefield.

[Lloyd] By this stage, the Soviet total war industry

is easily replacing all losses,

and indeed, increasing the number of tanks, day-on-day,

that Stalin had available to him.

The reverse was true in Germany.

Every single German tank that was lost

would be very difficult to replace.

[Narrator] At Kursk,

the Red Army now tries to use strength in numbers.

-[dramatic music] -[guns blasting]

The T-34 tank commanders know that they can't compete

at long range with the German tanks.

So they rush towards the German tanks as quickly as possible

to fire at point-blank range,

because then they know they stand a chance

of knocking out a tank.

[dramatic music]

[Wilhelm] The T34s came straight for us at full speed

with hardly time even to fire, as though they had gone mad.

I had the feeling of being suffocated,

suffocated by the sheer number of tanks.

[airplane engines roaring]

[Narrator] As the tanks blast away,

the roar of aerial combat fills the sky.

[guns blasting]

[airplane engines whirring]

Red Air Force fighter, bomber,

and ground-attack aircraft assault the German lines.

The Battle of Kursk is not just an armored battle,

it is an air-ground confrontation

that sees a huge amount of air assets

used to gain this massive strategic victory

that both sides are hoping for.

[Mansur] All day long planes fired

at each other in the sky.

There was a hail of splinters and bullets.

Watch out!

You might get killed by a falling aircraft!.

[airplane screaming]

[explosion blasts]

-[gentle tense music] -[airplane engines whirring]

[Narrator] One Soviet pilot above Kursk

is a pioneer of the skies.

21-year-old Lydia Litvyak is the first woman

to shoot down an enemy aircraft in her Yak-1 fighter,

and the first woman to claim five kills

and the title of fighter ace.

She's perfect for propaganda.

[Lydia] When I see a plane with crosses and a swastika,

I have only one feeling, hatred.

This feeling makes my hands harder

when they are lying on the trigger of machine guns.

[gun blasting]

[airplane engine roaring]

[gun blasting]

[suspenseful music]

[Narrator] The Soviet Union is the only Allied nation

to allow women to fly in combat.

They are eager to show they pass inspection.

And have a fighting spirit.

They'll need it.

The 46th Guards Night Bomber Regiment

are only given wood and canvas biplanes, crop dusters,

but they make the most of them.

As they made their approach, they would cut their engine

and fly low to the ground,

and the Germans could hear the whistling

through the guy-wires and supposedly they struck fear

into the hearts of those German soldiers.

[Serafina] We were bombing the German positions

nearly every night, and none of us were ever shot down,

so the Germans began saying these are night witches.

[Narrator] The name sticks.

The Night Witches go down in legend

as a fiercely effective bombing unit.

[airplane engine whirring]

[gentle thoughtful music]

Two other regiments also engage women.

As pilots, navigators, gunners,

mechanics, and armament specialists.

[Valentina] The regiment consisted

of very intelligent girls,

graduates of universities and institutes.

We danced a lot, made fun, teased each other, and laughed.

All of us were obsessed

by the idea that our land must be liberated.

[Narrator] Soviet women pilots fly more than 30,000

wartime sorties, a vital contribution to the war effort.

All the women who served in the Red Army,

they fought in very much the same way as the men.

They were dedicated patriots,

they were Soviet soldiers first and foremost.

They were doing what was expected of them.

[Narrator] At Kursk, Lydia Litvyak

commands her own squadron

and takes down at least three more German aircraft.

-[gun blasting] -[airplane engines whirring]

But during the later stages of the battle,

she comes under Luftwaffe attack.

Her Yak-1 is last spotted pouring smoke,

pursued by enemy Messerschmitts.

Her fate is unknown until 1979

when her remains are identified in a remote village.

She is posthumously awarded the title

Hero of the Soviet Union.

[dramatic music]

Soviet pilots give vital support

to the Red Army's massive attempt

to stop the Germans at Prokhorovka.

[gun blasting]

The clash is often described as the greatest tank battle

of the Second World War, perhaps of all time.

[Pavel] The T-34s were knocking out Tigers

at extremely close range.

On the black, scorched earth

the gutted tanks burnt like torches.

[dramatic music]

[Narrator] The battle enters legend.

Films show recreated and exaggerated scenes

of T-34s storming the German positions.

The Soviets claim to destroy hundreds of German tanks.

However, the reality is far more one-sided.

The elite SS tank crews keep their cool amidst the chaos.

They utilize a well-practiced routine.

Stop, identify a target and fire.

-[guns blasting] -[suspenseful music]

Reposition, identify a target, fire.

[gun blasting]

Cold-blooded tactics that decimate the T-34s.

Sure, there are losses on both sides,

but Soviet losses are far higher than the Germans.

The Germans essentially shot up the Soviets.

[Vasily] It was a slaughterhouse of tanks.

Everything was enveloped in smoke, dust, and fire

so it looked as if it was twilight.

Tanks were burning, trucks were burning.

[Narrator] By the end of the day,

Soviet forces fall back to their starting positions.

The Germans reset their lines, retrieving many damaged,

but intact tanks from the battlefield.

[Narrator] High-resolution photographs

taken by German reconnaissance planes

before and after the battle,

show the impact on the fields around Prokhorovka.

[tense music]

Craters scar the landscape.

German soldiers pose for the newsreels

among piles of destroyed Soviet tanks.

They took out nearly 200 Russian tanks

but only lost 16.

Nearly 4,000 Red Army soldiers are taken prisoner,

wounded, or killed.

From a tactical point of view, the Battle of Prokhorovka

is a complete German success and victory.

The Germans only lose a handful of tanks

but manage to inflict very heavy and severe casualties

on the Soviet forces.

[Narrator] Hitler is still deciding how to react

to the Allied invasion of Italy.

But General Erich von Manstein wants to push on.

He is convinced that another attack

will shatter what remains of the Soviet defenses.

Kursk is within his grasp.

But to the north, the other German pincer

has advanced just seven miles.

It is still stuck in the Red Army's web of fortifications.

And the Soviet generals still have an army in reserve.

Now they plot a counterattack,

to crush the invaders once and for all.

The Soviet counterstrike starts at dawn.

[guns booming]

Operation Kutuzov is directed north of Kursk.

A substantial Soviet force

aims to cut behind the German 9th Army

and trap them in the town of Orel.

[whistle shrilling]

Over a million fresh troops follow 2,400 tanks,

while shells from 26,000 guns,

[guns blasting]

and 3,000 aircraft roar overhead.

[airplane engines rumbling]

Part of the Soviet plan, was to husband resources

around the northern salient shoulder at Orel.

So, when the time was right,

they could unleash those forces and create a dramatic

and decisive counter-attack

that the Germans would find very difficult

to defend against.

[rockets whooshing]

[Narrator] The Nazis still have

their superweapons on their side.

[explosion blasts]

But the sheer scale of the Soviet attack stuns them.

The overwhelmed Germans get little mercy.

[Nikolai] How should we treat the Germans?

We treated them in the natural way,

we gave them a proper beating.

We hated them bitterly.

[Soviet Officer] There were piles of dead Germans

with map holders and all their stuff still on them.

I saw tanks drive over their bodies.

[suspenseful music]

[Narrator] In Germany,

Hitler faces the massive Soviet counter-offensive

as well as the Allied invasion of Sicily.

He calls off the Kursk attack

and orders his SS tank divisions to make for Italy.

[tank engines whirring]

The Germans have taken their best shot at Kursk

and it hasn't had any impact.

And now there's a Soviet counteroffensive.

The Germans have to transition from the offensive

into suddenly scrambling for their lives.

[Narrator] As the Germans retreat,

they film the enaction of a scorched earth policy.

[explosion booming]

Blowing bridges

-[explosion blasting] -and telephone lines.

-[explosion blasting] -[wooden pole crunching]

Metal plows bolted onto trains raze the tracks behind them.

The primary reason to cause all this destruction

is to slow the advance of the enemy force.

[explosion blasts]

You want to deny your enemy military viability.

[explosions blasting]

[fire crackling]

[Narrator] Nazi Germany is now on the defensive.

[gentle upbeat music]

Soviet cameras capture the ecstatic reaction

of the local population,

as the Red Army sweep into the town of Orel

and shred the remnants of Nazi rule.

It's been a painful breakthrough.

Over the six months since Stalingrad,

the Red Army has lost almost as many soldiers

as the United States and Britain do in the entire war.

The civilian population has been right on the front lines.

The home front is usually construed,

certainly in the West, as Rosie the Riveter

or rationing cards.

But the people of Kursk, they're in this liminal zone

between home front and fighting front

and they make significant direct contributions

to the military efficacy of the Red Army.

[Narrator] The Soviet Unions' vast industrial resources

and enormous population have been sorely tested.

But the Eastern Front

withstands the German onslaught.

It's a game-changer for the Allied war effort.

[guns blasting]

Kursk marks the point where the Germans

lost the initiative on the Eastern Front.

You want the initiative, you decide what to do.

The enemy dances to your tune.

But for the rest of this war,

the Germans are the ones who are gonna be doing the dancing.

-[dramatic music] -[tank engine whirring]

[Narrator] The Red Army now sweeps west,

in its own blitzkrieg-style attack.

[guns blasting]

[Lloyd] The Germans were being pushed back

into an attritional-type total war

that they hadn't prepared for,

and mentally, weren't particularly well-suited to.

They didn't have the assets, nor the psychology

to fight in a defensive manner.

[Narrator] As Soviet armies take back their homeland,

they film every town.

The footage proves to the Western Allies

that Germany itself is threatened.

The goal of a German unconditional surrender

can now be taken seriously.

The fight for Europe continues.