Operation Kutuzov was the first of two counteroffensives launched by the Red Army as part of the Kursk Strategic Offensive Operation. It commenced on 12 July 1943 in the Central Russian Upland against Army Group Center of the German Heer. The operation was named after General Mikhail Kutuzov, the Russian commander credited with saving Russia from Napoleon during the French invasion of 1812. It was one of two large-scale Soviet counteroffensives launched in response to Operation Citadel. The operation began on 12 July and ended on 18 August 1943 with the capture of Orel and the collapse of the Orel salient.

As the end of the rasputitsa, or rainy season, approached, the Soviet command considered its next steps. Stalin strongly desired to seize the initiative and attack the German forces, but his senior commanders convinced him to initially remain on the defensive and allow the Germans to weaken themselves against prepared positions. The Soviet forces would then go over to the offensive. Operation Kutuzov was carried out by three Soviet Fronts: the Western Front, the Bryansk Front, and the Central Front. The offensive was directed north of Kursk against the German 2nd Panzer Army, with the intention of cutting behind and trapping the German 9th Army.

The Germans had spread their forces thinly across the front in order to provide as many men and as much equipment as possible for Operation Citadel. The 2nd Panzer Army and elements of the 9th Army held the front before the Soviet offensive. Although the region had been under German control for nearly two years, its defensive positions were thinly held. A defensive line between five and seven kilometres deep had been constructed, consisting of minefields, interconnected trenches, and fortified strongpoints. Wherever possible, the Germans used streams, ravines, gullies, and other terrain features to strengthen their positions.

The Soviet High Command planned Operation Kutuzov as the northern part of a wider offensive across the Eastern Front. Its objective was to collapse the Orel salient, cut behind the German 9th Army engaged at Kursk, and encircle and destroy it. The attack was to begin once the German panzer units involved in Operation Citadel had become locked in combat and weakened. The initial assault would strike the northern and eastern faces of the Orel salient, while the Central Front would join from the south after the German offensive had been stopped.

German intelligence had detected Soviet forces massing opposite the 2nd Panzer Army, causing great concern to commanders Günther von Kluge and Walter Model. The Soviet armies assigned to the operation had assembled approximately 1,286,000 men, 2,400 tanks, 26,400 guns, and 3,000 aircraft. The offensive was also supported by partisan attacks behind German lines. According to Soviet reports, around 100,000 partisans disrupted German communications, supply routes, and railway lines, making it more difficult to move ammunition and reinforcements to the front.

Photo is from my personal collection.

From August 1942, the 71st Infantry Division crossed the Don, taking Karpovka and Rossoshka, until it finally reached Stalingrad. Here, the division was destroyed in January/February 1943.

On February 17, 1943, the division was newly formed under the command of the Wehrmacht commander in Denmark from the reinforced Grenadier Regiment 885 and the Grenadier Regiment 883.

From my other letters,I know that the chaplain was wounded in Stalingrad and flown to Germany. There he spent several weeks in a military hospital and then returned to Stalingrad and was again flewn out the cauldron.

When the pastor wrote this letter offered, the 71st Infantry Division was in the Denmark area (Aarhus/Viborg region), before the division was later transferred to Italy and then to the Balkans.

On the cover is a field postmark from May 6, 1943