Talk:Third Battle of Kharkov


 * Archive 1 (14 June 2006 - 19 May 2008)
 * Source for/Verification of Casualty figures etc · To an editor · First sentence · Third Battle of Kharkov · Casualties and strength

DYK
Good article, but the narithmetic confuses me. It is said that SS Panzer Corps had a strength of 20,000 and near the end casualty figures are given. It is said that SSPanzer Corps lost 44% of it's strength. That is about 8,800, but the toitals for officers and elisted men onloy add up to about 3500. What about the other 5300? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.97.194.138 (talk) 05:44, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

... that the 1943 German Donbas Operations led to the destruction of 52 Soviet divisions, and the recapture of the cities of Kharkov and Belgorod from the Red Army? added to this page by &mdash; Ed 17   for President   Vote for Ed  15:01, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

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 * Image changed. JonCatalán(Talk) 16:40, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Aftermath: Red Army losses
From the text: "The German Donets Campaign cost the Red Army fifty-two divisions,[85] including around 70,000–80,000 personnel losses. Of these troops lost, an estimated 45,200 were killed or went missing, while another 41,200 were wounded." Adding estimated KIA/MIA and wounded troops yields over 86,000 -- should the first sentence be changed to read "...including around 80,000-90,000 personnel losses."? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.170.97.116 (talk) 10:22, 13 January 2009 (UTC)
 * No because the source cited claims 70,000, and the 80,000 was included to take into consideration the claim in the following sentence. I could change "around" to "over", though. JonCatalán(Talk) 15:59, 13 January 2009 (UTC)


 * If possible it'd be nice if a Soviet casualty or fatality number were in the intro where it says 52 Soviet divisions (!) were destroyed, for readers unfamiliar with the term "division". Anyone?  Tempshill (talk) 01:42, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Reverse chronological order?
2 minor criticisms - the 70,000-80,000 immediately above - it's jarring when things don't add up like that. And the use of the word "hassled" seems much too informal in this context. "Distracted" might not be the right term, but I think it would be better

1 major criticism in lede "on 25 February expanded its offensive against both Army Group South and Army Group Center. However, months of continuous operations had taken a heavy toll on the Soviets and some divisions were reduced to 1,000–1,500 combat effectives. On 19 February," This looks like reverse chronological order. I'm sure if I tried harder I could figure out what's happening and why it's put in reverse order (or maybe it should be January 25?) - but I don't think the reader should have to work so hard. Smallbones (talk) 22:22, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
 * The problem is that Soviet and German operations tended to unfold upon themselves simultaneously... unplanned. So, although the 25 February is after 19 February, one corresponds to the Red Army while the other corresponds to the Wehrmacht.  I think that putting them in chronological order would make it more confusing (since it would switch back and forth between what the Germans and Soviets were doing), and would give the false impression that one took place because of the other. JonCatalán(Talk) 05:30, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Kharkov or Kharkiv?

 * The Third Battle of Kharkov was a series of offensive operations undertaken by the German Army Group South against the Red Army, around the city of Kharkov (Kharkiv), between 19 February and 15 March 1943.

The intro says "Kharkov (Kharkiv)" without explanation. I find this weird. The link shows the city is currently called "Kharkiv" but the word "Kharkov" is in a couple of places there also. In order to clarify, it'd be nice if it said "Kharkov (later Kharkiv)" or "Kharkov (also Kharkiv)". Does anyone know whence came name #2? Tempshill (talk) 01:44, 15 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Kharkiv is the Ukrainain name and Kharkov the Russian version. Both were in use at the time but in the 1940s the Russian version was the most common one, both in Soviet Union and Germany. As you can see at the Kharkiv article the name is often discussed. But in this article I think Kharkov should be used just like we talk about the battle of Stalingrad and not Volgograd. Närking (talk) 08:13, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
 * I would think it would be appropriate to use "Kharkiv" in the information box, but the body of the article should use "Kharkov," as that was by far the most common name throughout the Soviet era. A good parallel is the article on the Battle of Austerlitz, near a town which was always called Slavkov u Brna by the native Czech population, but was then known to the world by its German name of Austerlitz. We call the place Slavkov today, but when referring to the context of the battle there, we refer to Austerlitz. Same goes for "Stalingrad," as Narking said. Jsc1973 (talk) 12:48, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Sounds sensible to me. ChoraPete (talk) 07:59, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Photo PD?
File:Ger Inf Russia 1941 HDSN9902655.JPEG is tagged for deletion at the Commons with a note saying it's presumably PD in the US but isn't in Germany, and the photo should be moved to en in preparation for moving to the front page. Is it true this photo is considered PD in the US? Were Nazi records like this placed in the public domain somehow when they were taken by the US military? Tempshill (talk) 05:08, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Hi. For both of these questions, the primary contributor, User:Catalan is on a wiki-break for most of February. I'd suggest leaving any comments on his talk-page, where he's most likely to see them! Skinny87 (talk) 08:05, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

52 Soviet divisions
According to our article on Division (military), a division is 10,000-30,000 men. This article is dealing with the death/capture of far fewer than the minimum of 520,000. Is the mistake there or here, or in my reading of it? --Dweller (talk) 13:15, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Ah, I see that "some divisions were reduced to 1,000–1,500 combat effective soldiers". That makes an utter nonsense of the "52 Divisions" fact - it's a good example of where something is true but nonetheless misleading. I suggest that the 52 Divisions and the size of the 52 are bracketed together, or the 52 Divisions claim is removed from the Lead and retained only in the article where it can be better explained. --Dweller (talk) 13:19, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
 * My understanding was that 52 Soviet divisions were rendered combat ineffective (is that correct term?), which doesn't necessarily mean that all of their members were killed, wounded, captured, or missing. –Black Falcon (Talk) 20:47, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Hitler's two options
Third Battle of Kharkov: "Following the German success at Kharkov, Hitler was presented with two options."

This is a minor point, but perhaps worth raising. Did someone (a general, an advisor, the General Staff?) present to Hitler these two options during an actual meeting or communication or does the sentence just use the passive voice to convey that Hitler had two options. If it's the former, does the source indicate who did it? A very informative article, by the way, and a pleasure to read. Thank you, –Black Falcon (Talk) 21:03, 19 February 2009 (UTC)


 * I know that the majority of the German High Command favoured an encirclement of the Kursk salient - an unusual occasion where both Hitler and his generals were in full agreement with one another. Of course, the fact that the German military liked such an operation made it even plainly obvious to the Soviet command that it was on the cards, before even being corroborated by the lucy spy ring or defectors. --AnAbsolutelyOriginalUsername42 (talk) 20:12, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

casualties wrong?
70.000 seems to be to low. Woronesch-Charkow-Offensive (13.01.1943 - 03.03.1943) = 153.000 casualties + Charkow-Defensive (04.03.1943 - 25.03.1943) 86.469. numbers from krivosheev. the battle box says 19 Feb - 15 March so the casualties MUST be higher. i change to 80-90.000 --HROThomas (talk) 21:21, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Back hand manoeuvre
Am surprised to see this term not used anywhere, this was the term von Manstien used for these battles and the overall offensive was it not?

Regards —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.17.0.3 (talk) 14:57, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Article need major work to stay FA
This article needs a lot of work to remain a FA. Per WP:FACR a FA must be:

1.
 * (a) well-written: ; No problems with the style that I can see
 * (b) comprehensive::
 * Major work needed. For an article that is a direct link on the Eastern Front template, it does not much describe what exactly happened between Stalingrad and Kharkov. Neither does it include any detail on the wider Soviet Kharkov Offensive, which was not limited to the area surrounding Kharkov, but included all the fighting from January 13, 1943. It does show how this was a German strategic victory (which it was, notably the last strategic victory on the Eastern Front).
 * In addition there is no good description of the area, and directions of attacks are not explaining a lot. A map or two would help.
 * (c) well-researched: Major work needed, see WP:MILMOS. References to Manstein's nad Mellentin's memoirs are not the sources that should be used in a FA. Clark, Cooper and Sykes are very outdated books and also inappropriate. Glantz is  a good, but he has written books on the subject more recently (as recently as 2009), so using 15-19 year old books is not the best either.
 * (d) neutral: The use of poor sources makes the article include nonsense about destroying 52 Soviet divisions, back hand maneuvers and the like, and overstating the importance and genius of Manstein.
 * (e) stable: No isssues here

2. It follows the style guidelines: No problems here.

3. Media. No Problems with licensing, but the lack of any map or maps of the battle is making it difficult to follow.

4.Length. No major issues here.

I intend to put this article for WP:FAR in the next couple of weeks, but hope we can get as many issues resolved as possible before that.D2306 (talk) 23:48, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

I totally agree. No offence to those that did well to get it to FA in the first place, but the above does challange FA status. May I also add the complete lack of discussion on the massive air battles that took place. I could help should anyone choose to revamp this article. Dapi89 (talk) 12:33, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Please note I have put this on the the Milhist talk page. The replies so far agree with concerns about sources.D2306 (talk) 17:31, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Comparison of forces
"Between 13 January and 3 April 1943, an estimated 500,000 Red Army soldiers took part in what was known as the Voronezh–Kharkov Offensive.[1] In all, an estimated 6,100,000 Soviet soldiers were committed to the area, with another 659,000 out of action with wounds. In comparison, the Germans could account for 2,200,000 personnel on the Eastern Front, with another 100,000 deployed in Norway."


 * "500,000 Red Army soldiers took part in what was known as the Voronezh–Kharkov Offensive" out of a total of "6,100,000 Soviet soldiers were committed to the area"... area is wrong: it must be the entire Eastern Front.
 * "In comparison, the Germans could account for 2,200,000 personnel on the Eastern Front, with another 100,000 deployed in Norway." What has Norway to do with this? That is thousands of kilometers away from Kharkov and 2,2 million is way to low a figure, because after adding 800.000 men until
 * "May 1943, when the German armed forces were at their highest strength since the beginning of the war, with 9.5 million personnel", but then the German Army only deployed 25% of its strength in the east... out of around 9 million soldiers the Wehrmacht deployed around 5-6 million in the East.

in short: all the numbers in this sentence seem arbitrary and wrong. Can someone check them and correct them? If not I will remove the sentence in question. noclador (talk) 17:54, 17 February 2011 (UTC)


 * a) The 100000 in Norway are relevant to the Eastern Front as they represent General Dietls units facing the Soviets near Murmansk (mainly defending the Petsamo nickel mines). b) The '9 million' figure are not all soldiers. This is simply the total number of personnel in the Wehrmacht. The 2.2 million would represent those attached to front-line units, of which the number that are combat soldiers would be even lower. I have seen figures that show (the relatively highly efficient) German divisions managing to achieve 44% of personnel as combat soldiers, compared to 23% in the case of British divisions. The rest of personnel would presumably be involved in logistics, signals, medics etc. Also the 5-6 million figure you list would probably include personnel operating in rear areas (anti-partisan units/einsatz gruppen(RSHA)(?), railway personnel, drivers, maintanance and guard units and may or may not include the Reich Arbeits Dienst, Organisation Todt, etc. etc. that is where the confusion arises. Also, the Baltic states were under a German civil administration at the time which may further contribute to the confusion of numbers.1812ahill (talk) 17:31, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

But same principle is valid for Red Army they also have gross number of soldiers and than nett number which represent only combat troops.....so why purposely put "Gross" soviet numbers and compare it to "Nett" German one? Creation of mith? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.137.149.131 (talk) 10:35, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Numbers in infobox?
70,000 Russian soldiers? 11,500 casualties? Something is definitely wrong here... --Paracel63 (talk) 19:55, 26 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry – now I see that Axis is to the right and Soviet to the left. This surprised me.--Paracel63 (talk) 20:16, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Ah..ok! 70,000 Axis soldiers??? Only 2nd SS Corp with 3 full panzergrenadire division had near that number.. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.137.149.131 (talk) 10:37, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Nature of Hausser's disobedience?
In the article on Paul Hausser it states that he defied Hitler's order to evacuate the city, in the article on the battle however it sounds like he disobeyed Manstein's order not to attack the city directly (but to encircle it).Historian932 (talk) 19:49, 4 September 2012 (UTC)
 * He did both. He ordered a retreat from Kharkov on 15 February, disobeying an order from Hitler, an order from Manstein and an order from Hubert Lanz to defend the city. On 10 and 11 March Hausser ignored orders by Manstein and Hermann Hoth to encircle the city and instead attacked Kharkov directly. So in total he ignored like a dozen orders and did as he liked. noclador (talk) 20:04, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Kharkov / Kharkiv
So, are we calling it Kharkov or Kharkiv? The latter may be its official name today, but at the time I think it was known to both sides as Kharkov (Russian: Харьков; German phonetic spelling: Charkow). Sca (talk) 16:12, 15 March 2013 (UTC)


 * The spelling of the city name here was boldly changed on -7- 21 February with the edit summary “to reflect common English usage & for consistency within this article and with the one on Kharkiv”. I have reverted these changes, as the rationale is wholly incorrect.
 * First, it is highly debateable that this city's name in English is is “Kharkiv” (and here are three pages of debate on that very subject). If NYT has 365 articles which use “Kharkiv” as the spelling, it has 2,370 that use “Kharkov”; and while the BBC has 222 articles that use “Kharkiv”, most of them (146) are sports pages that re actually talking about the city’s football team. Also, whatever the common English name for the place is now, it was indisputably “Kharkov” before 1990.
 * Second, the result of the edits are not in any way consistent as required by WP:CONSISTENCY: the spelling in the text was changed to “Kharkiv” while the article title and the section headings were all using “Kharkov”.
 * Third, the guidelines actually linked to in the consistency claim is WP:NC(Geographical names), which says pretty clearly “if…the article deals only with a place in a period when it held a different name, the widely accepted historical English name should be used”. As this article is, in fact, about an occurrence in 1943, the spelling we should use is the one used in English then, and the one used in all the sources given (ie. “Kharkov”). Xyl 54 (talk) 23:38, 15 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Addendum: The same changes were made for the articles on the First and Second Battles of Kharkov, with the same rationale: So I have reverted them for the same reasons.
 * Also, there was a discussion (now deleted) about this at the "On This Day" page; the content is here. Xyl 54 (talk) 00:21, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Sorry for the late response.... I had some computer problems... It seems that I incorrectly interpreted Wikipedia rules and I am sorry for doing that. Although the article did not follow Wiki standards before my edits also. Thanks for these edits; because of them the Battle of Kharkov articles are finally correct (on the "Kharkov Vs. Kharkiv" issue at least). —  Yulia Romero  • Talk to me!  17:57, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
 * PS It is not highly debateable that this city's name in current common English is is “Kharkiv”. As the New York Times 365 articles which use “Kharkiv” are about current Ukraine and the 2,370 that use “Kharkov” are all about WWII; and the BBC has used "Kharkiv" 64 times in its news items against 12 for “Kharkov”. —  Yulia Romero  •  Talk to me!  19:03, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

The issue of the Russian tanks at Zaporizhia when Hitler was leaving . ..
This always struck me as odd, and I suspect it's historically inaccurate.

The first time I encountered this was in Irving's HItler's War and I see it's repeated in this article's cite to a separate work.

I think Irving is confusing the fact that Popov's tanks got to within 20 miles of the Donetz in mid-February, not 20 miles to Manstein.

Moscow to Stalingrad Decision in the East mentions the former but nothing about the latter.

Furthermore, the Lage Ost situation maps for February and March 1943 show no Soviet formations within 80 miles of Manstein. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.242.14.31 (talk) 20:28, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

How to nominate this page ?
I've just read this page and found it to be interesting, according to the truth (such as I've read and watched TV-documentaries about) and NPOV, etc. And I have not contributed one single byte to its contence myself. But I think this article by the very least should get the green "good page". Perhaps even feutered, but I would very much like to nominate this page as "good" - but how do I progress from here ? I've never nominated any page before. Boeing720 (talk) 06:35, 13 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Thank you for the interest to the topic. Steps to nominate an article are as follows:


 * 1) Peer review
 * 2) Good article nominations
 * As the main contributor to the Russian version of the article I will be interested to follow the discussion as well as to see the result. Сергей Олегович (talk) 15:35, 14 June 2014 (UTC)

Manstein as source
Per the above (Article need major work to stay FA), I will edit the article to address some of the concerns around use of Manstein's Lost Victories

Quoting from D2306:


 * Article need major work to stay FA


 * (c) well-researched: Major work needed, see WP:MILMOS#SOURCES. References to Manstein's and Mellentin's memoirs are not the sources that should be used in a FA. Clark, Cooper and Sykes are very outdated books and also inappropriate. Glantz is a good, but he has written books on the subject more recently (as recently as 2009), so using 15-19 year old books is not the best either.
 * (d) neutral: The use of poor sources makes the article include nonsense about destroying 52 Soviet divisions, back hand maneuvers and the like, and overstating the importance and genius of Manstein.

--K.e.coffman (talk) 03:47, 20 November 2015 (UTC)


 * Since they are memoirs of a witness, Manstein's book is a critical source for the article. But its nature of being memoirs dictates that content is given as such and not as academically corroborated facts. This is but obvious.


 * There is no guarantee that Glantz' numbers are correct. He investigated Soviet archives and, afaik, reversed a number of his claims in the past years because he put too much trust in Soviet reporting. Not only do we have proof that Soviet commanders faked numbers (as seen in Rotmistrov's report on Prokhorovka), using his sources to override other claim is wrong. There is only one quote provided in the Soviet strength estimates (the lowest I believe) when there should be at least a few and their differences properly explained.


 * "Schlag aus der Nachhand" (the backhand blow) is the term used by Manstein himself and was the adaptation of tactics of light cavalry. It was practiced by other German generals too. The post war conferences with von Mellenthin and Balck saw practicing precisely this type of tactic for the "Fulda gap" scenario of defence against Soviet invasion (https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA097704.pdf). When exactly this became spread, I cannot say, but tactics of Napoleonic wars, wars of Frederick the Great and of ancient times formed a pool of military solutions, taught on German war academies and they often found their way into German operational and tactical planning. The follow up "rolling up" of Soviet bridgehead on Donets, with a flanking pressure, was another old tactic practiced by Napoleon.


 * Overstretching the units in breakthrough wasn't a disadvantage that befell Soviets but a deliberate and unavoidable consequence of implementing a theory of "deep operations". The logic lies in sacrificing the flanks to penetrate deep into the undefended opponents rear and collapse his logistic and communication network before he can reorganise his defenses. Soviet failures also are not a consequence of lack of resources or manpower but of wrong decisions based on poor evaluation of the situation. Manstein's defence was luring the spearhead beyond the flanking defence of the point of breakthrough, where Soviets could still protect flanks. The Soviet failure was the consequence of Popov's misidentification of feigned retreat for rout. That was Manstein's original plan and he clearly outsmarted his opponent. If you think there is a case of his overstated importance, you should provide another cause for success of the operation.Ddelete013 (talk) 12:42, 12 August 2021 (UTC)

52 divisions
I see that this has been discussed several times before. Does anybody have access to the source and can verify what it says? 52 divisions is about half of what Army Group Center lost in the summer of 1944, so it conjures an image of a catastrophe, rather than a tactical failure from an overextended Red Army at the tail end of a long, bruising Stalingrad campaign.

In Wehrmacht Retreats, Citino mentions one army destroyed and two more badly mauled. In Glantz & House When Titans clashed, a Soviet "army" at the end of 1942 is described as having half a dozen divisions. So it's about 18 (in my calculations). The number of casualties also do not amount to a "catastrophe" (by Eastern Front standards).

Unless this source can be double checked (i.e. what time it covers, etc), I suggest removing his reference from the article. Please let me know if there are any objections. K.e.coffman (talk) 04:54, 2 February 2016 (UTC)


 * That's nonsense. 50 divisions would have been more than 500,000 casualties. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dona Deda (talk • contribs) 19:52, 3 February 2016 (UTC)


 * Since there's one up vote, and not down votes, I will go ahead and remove this reference. K.e.coffman (talk) 03:05, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

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