A Strange Case of History Repeating
A reflection on the first battle of Kursk and how it exposes the incompetence of Russian rulers today.
On July 5th, 1943, one of the greatest battles of World War II began in a small pocket of land measuring about 100 km (66 mi) in diameter. At the center of this pocket was a small town named Kursk, a relatively insignificant location in the war thus far. But in the ensuing days and weeks, it would become the focal point of the entire Eastern Front and the larger war effort.
Roughly two years prior, Nazi Germany had invaded the Soviet Union and inflicted tremendous losses on the Red Army. However, their advance stalled by September as they reached the outskirts of Moscow. Faced with extreme winter conditions for which they were unprepared and a massive build-up by Soviet forces, the Germans were defeated and forced to retreat. Roughly a year later, they suffered a far greater defeat as the Red Army routed their forces at Stalingrad.
By the summer of 1943, the German forces attempted to recapture the initiative by launching an attack on Kursk. The Soviets were warned about the attack by Allied codebreakers and fortified the area with almost 2 million troops, 5,000 tanks, between 2,700 and 3,500 aircraft, and more than 15,000 artillery guns. Against them, Nazi Germany mobilized almost 1 million troops, 3,000 tanks, close to 10,000 guns, and 2,000 aircraft.
The battle lasted six weeks and witnessed the greatest tank battle in history—the Battle of Prokhorovka — where roughly 900 tanks engaged each other in a tiny land area. Overall, the German forces made limited gains but soon succumbed to the Soviet defenses and were routed by a massive counterattack. The battle was not only a decisive win for the Soviets, it effectively ended any hope for a German victory on the Eastern Front. The situation is best summarized in the following way:
After the Battle of Stalingrad, the Germans questioned whether or not they could defeat the Soviet Union. After the Battle of Kursk, they knew they couldn’t. After two years of desperate fighting and terrible losses, the Soviets had managed to turn the tide thanks to a combination of grim determination, foreign aid, and the fact that Stalin — a brutal, paranoid megalomaniac comparable only to Hitler — was listening to qualified generals for a change!
Flipping the Script
Today, the battle around Kursk is sending a similar message to the two combatants engaged on the Eastern Steppe (albeit with some major role changes). After the string of defeats they endured at Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Kherson in 2022, the Russians were unsure if their “Special Military Operation” (SMO) would succeed. After the Ukrainian capture of Kursk on Aug. 6th, 2024, they knew it wouldn’t.
This time, Russia is the invader and the one facing hardships and a turning of the tide due to poor leadership, overconfidence, international sanctions, and foreign aid to the defender. They have taken on the role of Nazi Germany in the Second World War, and this Battle of Kursk is proving to have the same repercussions for them as it did for the Nazis.
In a few weeks, Ukrainian forces gained more ground in Russia than the Russians managed to gain in Ukraine over months. What’s more, Ukrainian casualties were a fraction of what Russia expended in its assaults in the Donbas during the past year, for which they made only marginal gains.
But what is especially strange is that Putin’s failures (and his attempts to compensate for them) are eerily reminiscent of Stalin’s during the lead-up to the Nazi invasion in July 1941 (Operation Barbarossa) and his failures during the first two years of the invasion.
Barbarossa to Bagration
Between 1936 and 1938, Stalin launched his Great Purge to consolidate his power over the Soviet Union and remove the last traces of “Trotskyism.” As part of this, Stalin purged the Red Army of any officers he considered to be a threat. Obsessed with the prospect of a “Napoleon” who might challenge him, he effectively had every competent officer arrested, tried, and executed.
This included Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky, a prominent military leader and theorist who distinguished himself during the Russian Civil War and was a leading advocate for the development of rapid, mechanized warfare (what the German armed forces referred to as “Blitzkrieg”).
As a result, when the Germans invaded in 1941, the Red Army was run by nothing but incompetents and political officers who knew only to never disobey orders (or be killed). To make matters worse, Stalin froze when the news reached him and retreated into isolation, fearing he would get a knife in the back. His incompetence and inaction meant no one on the front lines had any orders or knew what to do, and the Soviet lines collapsed as a result.
When Stalin returned to take command a few days later, his response was typical of the brutal, incompetent tyrant. Faced with collapsing lines and entire armies surrendering, Stalin issued Order 270, which forbade any soldiers from surrendering without express permission. Those who did would see their families thrown out into the street and deprived of any assistance, which meant they would starve to death.
The order did nothing to stem the tide, and the Soviet Union was saved by the onset of winter, and a very competent officer — Marshall Zhukov, who organized the defenses of the capitol — led to the Nazi defeat at the Battle of Moscow. Unfortunately, Stalin was never one to learn a lesson on the first try and tried once again to terrorize his people into winning just six months later.
In the Summer of 1942, faced with a renewed German offensive that was pushing south towards the Caucasus, Stalin once again resorted to terrorizing his people. It was here that he issued Order 227, which forbade soldiers from retreating without express permission and established “blocking battalions” that were ordered to shoot retreating soldiers on site. It also called for the creation of “penal battalions,” where soldiers accused of cowardice and “defeatism” were sent to perform the most dangerous missions.
Once again, the older failed to reverse the Red Army’s fortunes, and the situation was once again saved by competent officers — particularly Zhukov, Vatutin, Rokossovsky, and Chuikov — who organized the staunch defense of Stalingrad and prepared the massive counterattack that would trap the German Sixth Army within the city, where they eventually capitulated. In 1943, a well-motivated and well-led Red Army defeated the German offensive at Kursk. A year later, this same army destroyed the last of the Nazi occupation with Operation Bagration.
Putin’s Hero
One of the overriding themes of Putin’s rule has been his attempts to restore the Soviet Union and rehabilitate its dictators. Nowhere has this been clearer than with the renewed veneration of Stalin, whom Putin admires greatly. Not only that but Putin’s leadership up to and during the invasion of Ukraine has been (as I said) eerily similar. During his many presidencies, Putin made it a point to build up Russia’s armed forces and made several shows of force to try and bolster his image as a strong leader.
Behind the curtain, the army was run by his political appointees, incompetent cronies such as Yuri Borisov. Between 2012 and 2018, Borisov oversaw Russia’s weapons industries as Deputy Minister of Defense. As Russian forces approached Kyiv, they not only encountered stiff resistance but were plagued by equipment failures, spoiled rations, and a lack of support and proper maintenance.
This was partly due to bad planning, as the Russians underestimated what was needed to invade Ukraine. But it was also the result of corruption and embezzlement on behalf of Borisov and other members of Putin’s inner circle. Much like Stalin, Putin has been in the habit of blaming his appointees and reshuffling his cabinet whenever his latest Minister of Defense fails to turn this military debacle into victory.
But, of course, the members of his inner circle are getting off easy. For the fresh conscripts and “convict soldiers” (many of whom are only convicts for protesting the war), the situation is far worse. After their defeats at Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Kherson, the Russian army was faced with a shortage of qualified personnel. There was not enough time to train replacements properly, so green soldiers were conscripted and sent to the front.
Between the shortage of experienced and well-trained troops and a mass of conscripts, Putin has decided to emulate his hero once again by instituting his own Order 227. According to multiple sources, including Russian prisoners-of-war, it is the poorly trained “stormtroopers” who are sent in to fight and die. Meanwhile, the experienced troops are held in the rear and act as “barrier troops” tasked with shooting anyone who tries to retreat.
Their situation is made worse that Russian forces have also been suffering unsustainable losses in tanks and armored vehicles, so their commanders have resorted to sending in troops by the tens of thousands without support. Like Stalin, Putin has no qualms about throwing bodies at the enemy lines and is indifferent to casualties. He also lets his soldiers know that they will succeed or die, with no other choice because he is an incompetent leader who has no idea how to fight a war.
Another similarity is how Putin has recruited criminals and convicts as a source of replacement troops. What’s more, he’s made protesting the war or resisting conscription into a crime, thus ensuring he has more prisoners to send to the front lines. In other words, he has also established “penal battalions” who are treated as cannon fodder. Only this time, it’s not “cowardice” or “defeatism” that gets you tossed into one of these battalions, but opposition to the war.
It is a strange thing when history repeats itself but with some notable flips in the script. For instance, Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine in 2022 is allegorically similar to Hitler’s decision to invade the USSR with Operation Barbarossa in 1941. Like the Nazi invasion, which proved to be Hitler’s ultimate blunder, this war is becoming a disaster for Putin that could end in his overthrow.
And yet, the way Putin has been fighting the war is no different than what Stalin did during the first two years of Barbarossa. It was only through organizing the USSR for total war, mass conscription, qualified officers, and massive material support from the Western Allies that the Barbarossa became the meat grinder that claimed most of the Nazi war machine.
Putin has none of these things going for him. He can’t push for more conscription without triggering another mass exodus, he can’t send workers to the front lines without hurting production, and he’s under a massive embargo. Combined with skilled labor shortages, Russia’s economy is starting to collapse. On top of all that, he is the invader, so any pretense of this being a “Great Patriotic War” where people must make the ultimate sacrifices to “Protect the Motherland” is lost.
Like I said… strange! But also terribly ironic and tragic!
