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Russian tank battle kursk10/24/2023 Now, there is not much question that the tank ditch existed. There may be others, but I have not located them. It appears that these are the only two accounts for the tank ditch story. Was the Tank Ditch encountered in the morning, the afternoon, or both? As it is, Zamulin’s used Roes account in Zamulin’s claim the tank ditch was encountered in the early afternoon. There may a more detailed Wilhelm Roes’ account in German sources, but I have not taken the time to chase them down. In this case, I drew his account from Zamulin’s writing, and his source is footnoted that the story came from the “author’s personal archive” (see page 328, footnote 64 in my Prokhorovka book). The only other source for the tank ditch story is an account from Wilhelm Roes of the 7th Panzer Company. So there was reason to believe that this account is valid, even though it was originally published in a publication that was raising funds for SS veterans (see page 933, footnote 36 in my Kursk book or page 320, footnote 60 in my Prokhorovka book). I still moved forward and accepted his account, but only after Major General Brand (Bundeswehr, ret) had discussed it with him and Ribbentrop had again discussed it with one or more crew members that were with him at the time. As he was the eldest son of the German foreign minister, there is reason to be concerned that he may not have given an unbiased or unvarnished account. The primary source for this story of Captain Rudolf Ribbentrop’s account, who was the company commander of the 6th Panzer Company and was in the midst of the fight. This is always an uncomfortable basis from which to build an account from. It is entirely based upon post-war interviews and post-war accounts. The story of the Soviet tank ditch disrupting the operations of one or more attacking Soviet tank brigades at Prokhorovka is not based upon any documented records. Figure 12 showing the tank ditch on 16 July 1943
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