Schematic plan · World War II (Eastern Front)

Battle of Prokhorovka

12 July 1943
USSR
Victory for USSR

A schematic plan, generated from the statistics of the CAA Database of Battles: the armies' size and width, the hours of fighting, the plan of attack and the outcome are as recorded; the ground and the positions are not.

USSR (Sov Steppe Army Group, 78,000 men under Gen Konev) attacked Germany (Ger 2nd SS Pz Corps, 82,300 men under Gen Hausser) in USSR. The CAA Database of Battles records 24 hours of fighting on a front of 25 km, a frontal attack against hasty defense, and that USSR won. Losses: USSR 5,700 (7%), Germany 5,100 (6%).

This plan is generated from those figures. It shows the shape of the battle the database describes: the size and width of the armies, the plan of attack and the outcome. It does not show where the units actually stood.

The armies

USSR

Gen Konev

Unit	Arm	Men
USSR left wing	Infantry	15,132
USSR centre	Infantry	20,176
USSR right wing	Infantry	15,132
USSR reserve	Infantry	12,610
USSR artillery (1,380 guns)	Artillery	11,700
USSR armour (650 tanks)	Armour	3,250
Gen Konev	Commander	—
In this plan		78,000

Germany

Gen Hausser

Unit	Arm	Men
Germany left wing	Infantry	17,638
Germany centre	Infantry	23,517
Germany right wing	Infantry	17,638
Germany reserve	Infantry	14,698
Germany artillery (419 guns)	Artillery	6,285
Germany armour (505 tanks)	Armour	2,525
Gen Hausser	Commander	—
In this plan		82,301

What the sources report

	USSR	Germany
Strength, this plan	78,000	82,300
Losses, this plan	5,700	5,100

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 497, “Prokhorovka”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting: 24 hours
Winner: the attacker
Terrain: Rolling, Mixed
Weather: Dry, Sunny, Temperate, Summer, Temperate
Defender’s posture: Hasty defense
Front width: 25 km (attacker), 25 km (defender)

Force	Strength	Losses	Horse	Guns	Plan and outcome
USSRattacker	78,000	5,700	0	1,380	Frontal attack; Penetration; Stalemate
Germanydefender	82,300	5,100	0	419	Defensive/offensive plan; Frontal attack; Repulse; Stalemate

Attacker’s advantages morale +1 · logistics +1 · intelligence +1 · air superiority +1

CDB90 (US Army Concepts Analysis Agency, 1990), tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold; data under ODC-BY 1.0.

Notes

On this reconstruction

Generated automatically from the statistics in CDB90. Frontages, depths, distances, the order of events and the terrain are schematic: they follow the recorded strengths, front widths, hours of fighting, tactical plan and outcome, not maps or accounts of the battle. The sources give no hours; the timing is conjectural.

Sources

US Army Concepts Analysis Agency; tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold, CAA Database of Battles (CDB90), no. 497 · ODC-BY-1.0Strengths, losses, front widths, hours of fighting, tactics and outcome.

Facts gathered from Wikidata (CC0), Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0) and Wikimedia Commons (licence per file); the plan and its text are timeastra’s own.