James Kinnear took a 1300km road trip to visit the site of one of the most famous battlefields in World War Two history
Being based in Moscow has had some particular advantages. Over the years I’ve visited wartime Russian Front battlefields on what is today the territory of the Russian Federation and now independent Belarus and Ukraine. All these visits have been particularly thought provoking and poignant, but it was only recently that the opportunity arose to visit one of the most famous battlefields in Soviet World War Two history; the battlefields near a provincial Russian city that is widely known across the world even by those with no particular knowledge of history or warfare - Kursk
The Battle of Kursk was the greatest clash of armour in history. Following as it did after the defeat of the German 6th Army at the Battle of Stalingrad, it was the definitive turning point of World War Two on the Eastern Front, and the beginning of Red Army offensive operations that would eventually see Red Army tanks parked up outside the Reichstag in Berlin.
The Battle of Kursk, or more correctly the plural Battles of the Kurskaya Duga was not actually a set-piece battle, but rather a series of ongoing engagemen…
