'Tiger and Panther tanks… Ferdinand mobile guns… General Model to attack from the north. General Hoth from the south… The pick of the German generals… a huge mass of their elite divisions. This is a colossal force. If it is true we could make our own dispositions and destroy them.'
'Could I ask,' Vassilevsky began casually, 'what is the record of this Woodpecker-Lucy espionage ring so far?'
'The information has always proved correct.'
'So it could be correct again. At some moment we have to take our courage in both hands, and gamble everything on the belief that Lucy is right…'
'Zhukov?'
Stalin, who was also standing in the gloom of his office lit only by the shaded desk lamp, glanced sideways at the General. Vassilevsky sighed inwardly. Stalin was up to his old tricks – enticing others to express opinions which could be employed against them if there was a disaster.
The trouble was Stalin had never lost his crafty Georgian origins. Treacherous and devious by nature, he saw trickery everywhere – and Lucy could be Hitler's pawn, luring the Red Army into a gigantic trap from which it would never extricate itself.
Zhukov did not hesitate. The only general capable of contradicting Stalin to his face, he spoke out vehemently.
'Woodpecker tells us D-Day is 5 July – three days from now. He further tells us H-Hour for the attack is 1500 hours, a most unusual time for the launching of a German offensive, so it has the ring of truth. I wish to return immediately to GHQ to make our dispositions on the basis that Woodpecker is telling the truth.'
'You would take full responsibility for such a decision?'
'Yes, Generalissimo!'
'We must consider the problem further, gentlemen. Prepare yourselves for a long night,' Stalin replied.
At 2.30 pm on 5 July Colonel Jaeger's old leg wound began to play him up. Perched in the turret of his enormous Panther tank, he was commanding a section of an armoured division of General Model's 4th Army which was to drive a hammer-blow south at the base of the Russian 'thumb' to link up with General Hoth's 9th army advancing from the south. Between them the two armies would amputate the thumb – encircling one million enemy troops.
It was a hot sultry afternoon as Jaeger checked his watch and surveyed the endless rows of tanks drawn up for battle. His leg wound always troubled him just before the start of a great offensive. Looking across to the next Panther he saw Schmidt wiping sweat off his forehead.
'In half an hour it will be really hot!' he shouted jovially. 'Save your sweat for then!'
There was the sound of laughter from the turrets of tanks nearby. Jaeger was a commander who had the gift of breaking almost unbearable tension with a joke.
'Colonel!' Schmidt shouted back. 'Your sweat pores differ from ours. When the time comes you will sweat beer!'
There was another burst of laughter. Jaeger, anything but a stiff-necked, Prussian-type officer, was always ready to bandy words with his men regardless of rank. At precisely 1500 hours he gave his driver the order through his throat-mike.
'Forward! And don't stop till you see the whites of General Hoth's eyes!'
The immense leviathans began to rumble southward on their massive tracks. There was the thump of heavy artillery opening up a non-stop barrage. The endless, mind-wearying steppes of Russia spread before them as Jaeger's Panther pushed ahead of the vast tracked armada. Ignoring the shell-bursts which began to crater the sun-bleached earth, Jaeger directed his Panther straight ahead. South – ever south – until the link-up with Hoth and the pincers closed behind the Red Army cooped up inside its huge salient.
Altogether, on that humid July day, Field Marshal von Kluge had over half a million German troops under his command. They included seventeen Panzer divisions equipped with the monster new Tiger and Panther tanks, countless mobile guns – all backed up by motorized infantry. It was the largest force ever thrown against a single objective. Citadel.
H-Hour, the starting time – three in the afternoon – should certainly have taken by surprise the enemy who was accustomed to dawn attacks. It was anticipated that before Zhukov grasped what was happening he would find himself surrounded.
And in addition, the 2nd Army – comprising six Panzer and two infantry divisions – was attacking the tip of the 'thumb', as a diversion to draw Soviet troops away from the main battle area.
Earlier than he had expected, Colonel Jaeger found himself staring at two Soviet T-34 tanks advancing towards him about one hundred metres apart from each other. An average commander's reaction would have been to slow down, to wait for reinforcements to catch up with him. Jaeger was not an average commander.
'Increase speed!' he ordered.
As he had foreseen, he could see the huge gun like a telegraph pole on each tank traversing to aim at him. Their traverse was too slow because the last reaction they had expected was for the Panther to continue on course at higher speed: on a course which would naturally take the German tank between the two Soviet T-34s with fifty metres to spare on either side.
The Russian guns began to move more rapidly to bring their muzzles to bear on Jaeger at point-blank range. The Colonel timed it carefully. Just before the traverses were completed he spoke again into the mike.
'Maintain course. And give me everything you've got. Go like hell!'
The Panther rumbled forward, suddenly at top speed. The guns of the T-34s were traversing a little too slowly. Jaeger was midway between them when the Soviet commanders realized this maniac was continuing to advance past them.
They ordered their gunners to traverse to an angle of ninety degrees. The guns went on turning. Jaeger went on advancing. The Soviet commanders gave the order simultaneously.
'Fire…!'
A second earlier Jaeger passed beyond them. The guns of the two T-34s faced each other. The shells passed each other in mid-flight and detonated. Looking back, Jaeger saw the tanks burning, flames leaping from the turrets. So far he had not fired a shot.
'Continue to advance on the same course…'
Earlier he had seen the two tanks approaching, one behind the other before they separated to avoid bunching into a solid target. Jaeger could clearly see the marks of their tracks and he guided his Panther along the same avenue.
Minefields! The everlasting gut terror of all tank commanders. By keeping to the track course of the burning T-34s Jaeger knew he was safe from mines. The wisdom of his judgement was vindicated a moment later when he heard a series of explosions.
To his left and right three Panthers were disabled or destroyed. One had a track sheared off the chassis and stood motionless in the battlefield. Two more were burning where they had encountered mines. Jaeger wirelessed back to the remainder of his squadron.
'Follow in my tracks. Precisely. Pathway through major minefield.'
As he completed his instruction to his operator Jaeger began to worry. Instinctively the incident he had survived told him something strange was happening. Minefields…
The Russians had sown no fewer than 40,000 mines in a single night , each mine capable of disabling a Panther or Tiger tank.
They had sown these lethal weapons in each sector where they knew the Panzer divisions were coming. In the early hours of the morning of 2 July inside the Kremlin, Stalin had finally decided to trust the Woodpecker signals. Given the go-ahead, the Soviet generals had reorganized their entire defences inside the Kursk salient, converting it into the greatest military death-trap in history.
The Germans still fought hard. Low-flying Stukas equipped with cannons swept over the battlefield, wiping out a large number of T-34 tanks. Across a vast area savage tank duels were fought but Hitler had lost the vital element of surprise.
It does not take all that much skill to win a battle if you know in advance exactly what the enemy plan is. The two men who really won the turning-point battle of Kursk were absent from the field of carnage. Woodpecker was at the Wolf's Lair in East Prussia. The middle-aged, shabbily-dressed Rudolf Roessler was in Lucerne.
