Eighty years ago this week, Hitler rolls his last dice on the Eastern Front

 

The Germans launched Operation Zitadelle aimed at pinching out the Soviet salient at Kursk, beyond which the operation had no serious strategic purpose. Hitler had insisted on some form of offensive on the Eastern Front for reasons of prestige in the teeth of his generals' advice, notably Manstein's. They would have preferred to husband resources for counter-offensive action; with an Anglo-US incursion into continental Europe a growing certainty, German forces were spread ever thinner. But standing on the defensive would have admitted strategic defeat. Worse, the attack had been postponed repeatedly because of weather and for the introduction of the new Panther and Tiger tanks, which were supposed to reverse the superiority of Soviet types. The Germans got the worst of both worlds; their new types were brought into service still with many teeething problems and the Soviets had had time to prepare defensive positions.

General Sikorski, the political and military leader of the free Poles was killed when his B-24 transport crashed taking off from Gibraltar after a tour of inspection in the Middle East. It was a catastrophe for the Poles. Sikorski was not just an astute and pragmatic politician but an inspiring leader. There had already been one attempt to kill him and rumours spread that he had been murdered. Suspicion of Soviet responsibility was all the more intense because of the recent revelation that many of the Polish elite had been murdered by the Soviets. No evidence has ever emerged but the crash was probably due to a technical defect on the aircraft, which might have been sabotage. Also killed were two British MPs both serving as Colonels in the Army; Victor Cazalet was the liason to Sikorski.

In the Far East General Macarthur's forces launched an attack on Japanese held New Georgia; it was the next step towards the major Japanese base of Rabaul. The Japanese were determined to avoid a repetition of the loss of Guadalcanal where the intitial American landings had not been contested. 4,000 troops were inserted by destroyer to bolster the defences.