Article using Luftwaffe wartime reconnaisance imagery of battle of Kursk drives media attention

[Slayer]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_c...&v=k7hZBUK3TQw

[igorrB]

Originally Posted by Dan History

Any journalistic sensationalism that Kellerhof may have engaged in does not in the least excuse the completely inadmissible behaviour by Sherin.

Inadmissible in what? He didn't say that germans must kill Kellerhof. Only to investigate his appeals to destroying of monument. This is normal reaction for barbariс words. Kellerhof already say that he was misunderstood and didn't wish to destroy smtg in reality.

Originally Posted by Dan History

The German retreat from Prokhorovka was occasioned by the collapse of the Axis defences in Sicily and by the Soviet offensive on the northern flank of the Orel Bulge held by Heeresgruppe Mitte, not by Soviet actions around Prokhorovka itself. Manstein was even asking Hitler for permission to conduct further offensive action, something which illustrates the magnitude of Soviet problems in this specific geographical area.

And you can proove this with documents, not with Manstein's memoirs?

Originally Posted by Dan History

Zamulin has indeed followed up Lopukhovsky's pioneering study from 2005,

Reality is vice versa, first Zamulin's work about Prokchorowka dated 2002, and he started to gather archive materials as early as 1997. Also he is professional historian and not amateur as Lopukhovsky

Originally Posted by Dan History

The problems in the approach taken by many modern Russian historians are on display in the article "An Undoubted victory of the Red Army on the fields at Prokhorovka", written by the popular historian Alexei Isaev

This is article made by anonymous using some Isaev's these. Real article is here - https://warhead.su/2019/07/10/prohor...zabyt-die-welt. It has completely another title

Originally Posted by Dan History

states that the surprise arrival of fresh Soviet reserves, namely the 5th Guards Tank Army, marked the failure of the offensive by Heeresgruppe Süd, because the German forces were unprepared for this eventuality. This is a nonsensical argument, since the surprise counter-attack on 12 July was defeated with very heavy losses.

Isaev didn't say that surprising arrival of 5 gv.TA was main reason of german defeat in all Zitadelle. He gave german unawareness just like one example how bad was situation on german side. There was 5 tank corps arrived plus one more army. Germans even can't capture huge army stocks near Prokhorowka. Advance was stopped, almost stay still to 16 July. You consider this as German victory?

[Dan History]

Originally Posted by Broncazonk

They were joined by Fw 190 single engine fighter-bombers and Hs 129 twin-engined ground-attack aircraft, both equipped with 3-centimetre (1.2 in) anti-tank cannon.[120]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle...vka#Air_combat

Bronc,

It is not a good idea to refer to Wikipedia as a source, in most cases. In this instance, the source cited is Christer Bergström's short book on the battle of Kursk published in 2007, which provides a good summary of German operations, though of course it suffers from the fact that only fragments of documents from the Russian side are available to researchers, even now. Christer made a minor error in the quoted extract, the Fw 190s did not have 30 mm cannon at this time, of course. The Hs 129s did have such cannon, and the newer MK 103 cannon was first used during the battle of Kursk.

One would have to conduct a detailed survey of the available German and Soviet primary sources to understand the course of air operations over Prokhorovka on 12 July. What is readily available is the general summary of Luftwaffe sorties on that day, on Pawel Burchard's excellent website, see http://www.yogysoft.de/pawel/_kursk/tagesmld/120743.htm

Note that many more strike sorties were flown in the northern sector of the Kursk salient, by Luftflotte 6, than in the southern. This was because of the Soviet offensive against the northern flank of the Orel bulge, which I have mentioned above.

Kind regards,

Dan

[Dan History]

Originally Posted by igorrB

Inadmissible in what? He didn't say that germans must kill Kellerhof. Only to investigate his appeals to destroying of monument. This is normal reaction for barbariс words.

Inadmissible because it is a gross violation of the basic principle of free speech. Furthermore, this manufactured scandal is based on a gross misrepresentation of a single line in Kellerhof's article. What he actually wrote was 'Eigentlich müsste dieses Denkmal sofort abgerissen werden.' Translated into English, this would read, 'As a matter of fact, this monument would have to be demolished immediately.' This does not in any sense constitute a call to action or 'barbaric words'. Kellerhof simply drew attention to the hypocritical nature of this specific monument, something that he was perfectly entitled to do.

Russia's state television has turned this into an occasion for some ridiculous propaganda:

"German Revisionists Want to Dismantle WWII Memorial Commemorating Tank Battle of Prokhorovka!"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-HQjMNF1EI

It would be much more interesting and substantive to discuss Luftwaffe operations on this day. It is interesting that while Luftflotte 4 reported several losses of Hs 129s and Fw 190s to anti-aircraft fire, not a single loss to enemy aircraft was reported on this day. One might suggest that German reports are not necessarily authoritative, but it is an interesting contrast that Lutflotte 6 did report losses in air combat on 12 July.

Regards,

Dan

[sidney]

Originally Posted by Dan History

Inadmissible because it is a gross violation of the basic principle of free speech. Furthermore, this manufactured scandal is based on a gross misrepresentation of a single line in Kellerhof's article. What he actually wrote was 'Eigentlich müsste dieses Denkmal sofort abgerissen werden.' Translated into English, this would read, 'As a matter of fact, this monument would have to be demolished immediately.' This does not in any sense constitute a call to action or 'barbaric words'. Kellerhof simply drew attention to the hypocritical nature of this specific monument, something that he was perfectly entitled to do.

Does this mean that the Russians are now not entitled to have a monument commemorating a major battle of the Second World War erected on their own land?

There is nothing hypocritical about thousands of soldiers who laid their lives in defence of their homeland. The monument acknowledges that fact.

The so-called basic principle of free speech went too far this time. No country in the world would tolerate such article, and I do not see why should Russia.

[Broncazonk]

Originally Posted by Dan History

Bronc,

It is not a good idea to refer to Wikipedia as a source, in most cases. In this instance, the source cited is Christer Bergström's short book on the battle of Kursk published in 2007, which provides a good summary of German operations, though of course it suffers from the fact that only fragments of documents from the Russian side are available to researchers, even now. Christer made a minor error in the quoted extract, the Fw 190s did not have 30 mm cannon at this time, of course. The Hs 129s did have such cannon, and the newer MK 103 cannon was first used during the battle of Kursk.

One would have to conduct a detailed survey of the available German and Soviet primary sources to understand the course of air operations over Prokhorovka on 12 July. What is readily available is the general summary of Luftwaffe sorties on that day, on Pawel Burchard's excellent website, see http://www.yogysoft.de/pawel/_kursk/tagesmld/120743.htm


Note that many more strike sorties were flown in the northern sector of the Kursk salient, by Luftflotte 6, than in the southern. This was because of the Soviet offensive against the northern flank of the Orel bulge, which I have mentioned above.

Kind regards,

Dan

Thank you, Dan. But your reply is exactly why I did it. Sometimes, quoting Wikipedia is the only way to get the experts talking! ;-)

[Nick Beale]

Originally Posted by sidney

The so-called basic principle of free speech went too far this time. No country in the world would tolerate such article, and I do not see why should Russia.

You would hope that most countires in the world could find someone able to recognise a German subjunctive when they saw it. The conditional statement Dan cites, "would have to be pulled down", is a very different from "must be pulled down".

Originally Posted by Broncazonk

Thank you, Dan. But your reply is exactly why I did it. Sometimes, quoting Wikipedia is the only way to get the experts talking! ;-)

And sometimes it just winds people up for no good reason. If you want the views of "the experts" it's usually simpler just to ask.

[Steve Coates]

It's even ended up on the BBC: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-48963295

[Dan History]

Originally Posted by Nick Beale

You would hope that most countires in the world could find someone able to recognise a German subjunctive when they saw it.

If you want the views of "the experts" it's usually simpler just to ask.

Thank you, Nick, I entirely agree with your sentiments.

Originally Posted by Steve Coates

It's even ended up on the BBC: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-48963295

Thank you for mentioning this, Steve. Ben Wheatley and Sven Kellerhof have helped this topic to come alive a little bit! Unfortunately, there is still more heat than light. The Times has followed up with a short note from its Moscow correspondent:

Russia takes aim at Battle of Kursk ‘failure’
Tom Parfitt, Moscow
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/r...lure-kzw3trfqz

"Vladimir Medinsky, the culture minister, likened Ben Wheatley’s assertion to those of Nazi generals trying to twist facts about the war in their memoirs."

"Mr Medinsky said that it was an attempt to rewrite history by “political propagandists in the West”."

Kind regards,

Dan

[Broncazonk]

Originally Posted by Nick Beale

And sometimes it just winds people up for no good reason. If you want the views of "the experts" it's usually simpler just to ask.

And Nick, when did, "Did the Luftwaffe participate in this battle: air superiority, ground attack, ISTAR?" stop being a question?

And if quoting the information in Wikipedia, "winds people up" THAT ALONE is reason enough to do it. Right?

And also, I was just being polite.

Bronc