6:30 a.m.

Fighters from both sides fought for air supremacy over Prokhorovka...... Stalin in this direction invested not only the reserves, that is, the 5th Guards Tank Army, but also the 2nd Air Army.

The Soviet Air Force has been reorganized, and they are no longer subject to the operational constraints of the ground forces as before, as before. At this time, they existed in the form of air force groups, each of which had between 500 and 1,000 aircraft of various types.

Usually in key battles, the Soviets would commit two or three air groups to provide air cover for ground forces.

But not necessarily.

Because in some emergency situations, the front-line air group can also be reinforced by aviation corps and divisions from the reserves of the Supreme Command, and the number of aircraft can reach 2500 to 3000 aircraft

For example, the 2nd Air Army, which supported Prokhorovka, was reinforced by an aviation division with 1,500 fighters of various types, while the Supreme High Command was organizing follow-up reinforcements.

This enabled the Soviets to deploy more than 500 warplanes in the first wave to bomb the German defense line indiscriminately.

The Luftwaffe, which had always had air supremacy, was of course not to be outdone, and immediately sent fighters to counterattack.

As a result, almost at that moment, the sky over Prokhorovka was full of the whistling of airplanes and the dense gunfire of machine guns and machine guns, and without even looking up, you could see mosquito-like dense fighters hovering, chasing, and fighting at different altitudes, and from time to time several planes were shot and fell from the sky with black smoke, and you could even see two fighters colliding together and then disintegrating and turning into pieces in the air in a burst of firelight.

Qin Chuan, who was on the ground, had no time to take care of these, because there were already pieces of shells and bombs falling from the air and smashing around the position, and the whole position was like a pot of porridge.

Then, I don't know who shouted: "Here they come, here they come!" ”

Poking his head out of the explosion and looking out, he saw tanks slowly driving out of the jungle opposite.

At the same time, on the other side, in the direction of the railroad tracks on the right flank, tanks also emerged.

A kilometer-wide gap was left between the front and the right flank...... This is a clever approach, because as the tank continues to advance, the two lines of attack at angles to each other will overlap at the angles, which can lead to confusion and even accidental injury. Leaving a gap is all about avoiding this from happening.

However, the gaps in the offensive line are all one kilometer long, and you can imagine how large the Soviet offensive was.

Qin Chuan was right, Rotmistrov invested one-third of his attack in the first wave, that is, more than two hundred tanks.

Because in Rotmistrov's opinion, in the case of tanks that are not as good as the enemy, they must have to fight in close combat, then the more tanks should be invested, the better, especially since they also discovered the weakness of the German "homing rockets".

On the right flank, on the 4-kilometer offensive line, was the 18th Tank Army of the Red Army under the command of Major General Bakharov, with 180 tanks.

The first echelon includes the 170th and 181st tank brigades; The 2nd echelon is the 32nd Motorized Rifle Brigade, the 36th Guards Tank Regiment; The 110th Tank Brigade is ready to follow at any time.

On the offensive line of 7 kilometers on the front, there was the 29th Tank Army of the Red Army under Lieutenant General Kirichchenko, which had 237 tanks.

The forces include the 31st Tank Brigade, the 53rd Motorized Rifle Brigade, the 32nd and 25th Tank Brigades, and the 1446th Self-Propelled Artillery Regiment. Reinforced units include the 1529th self-propelled artillery regiment; The airborne troops of the 9th Regiment of the 28th Guards Airborne Division were to attack on tanks.

There were also the 2nd Guards Tank Corps and the 5th Guards Mechanized Corps, with 190 and 105 tanks, respectively, as reserves for the two offensive lines.

The total number of tanks in each part was 712, most of which were Soviet T34 tanks, followed by American M3 light tanks, and some of the reserves were "Valentine" or "Matilda" tanks from the United Kingdom...... These tanks were too slow for an offensive.

7:11 a.m.

The Soviets launched a pre-shock artillery attack on the Germans.

The original plan for this shelling was 30 minutes, but because the 5th Guards Tank Army rushed to rush to carry not many shells, the shelling was changed to 15 minutes: 5 minutes of forward fire, 5 minutes of shallow and deep fire, followed by 5 minutes of fire extension.

As soon as the artillery fire stopped, Rotmistrov issued a message to the entire army via walkie-talkie: "Steel, steel, steel!" Offensive signals.

The sound of artillery that had just subsided was quickly replaced by the rumbling roar of Soviet tanks, which carried their soldiers through the smoke and charged the German lines.

This is a characteristic of Soviet warfare, or it can also be said to be a characteristic of tank warfare in this era.

Tanks often need infantry to follow, but the infantry can't keep up with the tank.

The British slowed down the tanks so that the infantry could keep up, while the Germans let the infantry get on the vehicles to keep up with the tanks.

Soviets...... They made it more common for the soldiers to lie directly behind the tank, for which they also welded several iron grippers on the back of the tank so that the infantry would not be thrown off by the bumpy tank.

Of course, even so, infantry on tanks is still very dangerous, because tanks can cause a series of accidents if they move at full speed on uneven roads, and these infantry will become obvious targets on tanks, and they will not be able to fight back because they have to hold on to the grip with all their might.

The advantage is also obvious, that the tank will never lack infantry cover at any time, and even if the tank is destroyed on the way forward, it can still bring the infantry to the front line and into battle.

"Fire!" When the enemy rushed to a distance of 1000 meters, Colonel Albridge gave a loud order.

"Boom" With a burst of artillery fire, shells flew out of the barrel and hit the Soviet tank.

One, two...... More than a dozen tanks rushing ahead were hit one after another, and they were powerless to fight back.

However, Soviet tanks continued to charge at the German lines in an overwhelming manner, trying to close the distance between them and the German tanks.

Several tanks ran into anti-tank mines and then stopped in a cloud of smoke and fire.

So Qin Chuan knew that the enemy was only 800 meters away from the defense line.

"Launch!" Qin Chuan ordered loudly towards the walkie-talkie

After several actual battles, Qin Chuan learned from the controller that the distance of 800 meters is the most ideal launch distance for ME63.

This is because at this distance the operator has ample time to adjust and a good view (meaning that the target and the ME63 warhead can be seen well).

Therefore, Qin Chuan chose to attack at this distance.

However, a few seconds later, while ME63 was still on its way to its target, a mortar shell whistled in the sky, aiming at the ME63's firing position.