Задание

Match the headlines to the paragraphs

The defeat of Nazi Germany’s movement forward

The beginning

Planning revenge

Resources

The way to victory

The liberation of cities

An unknown hero

At the height of the battle on July 12, the Soviets began to counterattack, having built up by then a marked preponderance of both troops and tanks. Their subsequent successes encouraged them to develop a broad offensive that recovered the nearby city of Orel (nowOryol) on August 5 and that of Kharkov (now Kharkiv, Ukraine) on August 23.

The salient was a bulge in the Soviet lines that stretched 150 miles (240 km) from north

to the south and protruded 100 miles (160 km) westward into the German lines. In an attempt

to recover the offensive on the Eastern Front, the Germans planned a surprise attack on

the salient from both north and south, hoping to surround and destroy the Soviet forces

within the bulge.

The German assault forces consisted of almost 50 divisions containing 900,000 troops,

including 17 motorized or armoured divisions having 2,700 tanks and mobile assault guns.

But the Soviets had surmised the German attack beforehand and had withdrawn their

main forces from the obviously threatened positions within the salient.

An extra headline

The Battle of Kursk was the largest tank battle in history, involving some 6,000 tanks,

2,000,000 troops, and 4,000 aircraft. It marked the decisive end of the German offensive

capability on the Eastern Front and cleared the way for the great Soviet offensives of 1944–45

The Germans launched their attack on July 5, but they soon encountered deep antitank

defences and minefields, which the Soviets had emplaced in anticipation of the attack. The

Germans advanced only 10 miles (16 km) into the salient in the north and 30 miles (48 km)

in the south, losing many of their tanks in the process.

The battle of Kursk (or the battle of Kursk bulge), (July 5–August 23, 1943), is known as

unsuccessful German assault on the Soviet salient around the city of Kursk, in western

Russia, during World War II.