The Panzers of Prokhorovka: The Myth of Hitler’s Greatest Armoured Defeat Spiral-Bound | June 20, 2023

Today the Russian state declares that there are three sacred battlefields in its Motherland where ‘victory’ changed the course of the nation’s history: Kulikovo where the Mongols were defeated the in 1380; Borodino, where Russian troops slowed Napoleon’s Grande Armée before Moscow in 1812; the third is Prokhorovka. The official Russian record is that this is the most critical tank battle of World War II, which saw the annihilation of Hitler’s elite Panzer force in the largest armoured clash in history and left Hitler with no alternative but to halt Germany’s offensive against the Kursk salient. The victory at Prokhorovka on 12 July 1943 allowed the Soviet troops to turn the tide of the war and ultimately march on Berlin.

The Panzers of Prokhorovka challenges this narrative. Based on groundbreaking archival research and supported by hitherto unpublished images of the battlefield, Ben Wheatley argues that Prokhorovka was far from the decisive engagement it has been built up to be, and that German losses were in fact negligible. It tackles the many myths that have built up over the years and presents a new analysis of this famous engagement.