Zamulin on Losses

Zamulin: "For example, the talk of five tanks that the Germans lost on July 12th. Losses of both sides at Prokhorovka on July 12th is a significant and still unsolved mystery. The claims of Western researchers that the SS Corps lost only 5 tanks on July 12th is nonsense. This evaluation is based on, first of all, the absence of necessary documents. There are no document for the divisions. Either they were destroyed, or they were never written, or they are lying somewhere where researchers have not gotten to them yet. Documents that state precisely how much the SS Corps lost on July 12th does not exist. Yes, we know how much the corps had on the evening of July 11th, and how much they had on the 13th, in the afternoon. We can estimate the amount of losses, but this estimate is a bit of a cheat. Why?

I spoke with, I personally know very well and spoke with this man, about this issue, a participant in the battle from the German side, the commander of the 7th company of the Leibstandarte tank regiment, Rudolph von Ribbentrop. "

Interviewer: "Ribbentrop's son?"

Zamulin: "Yes, his eldest son. He came to me with Artem Drabkin in 2015 to Prokhorovka field, we walked around, I drove him around these places. I asked a question about tanks. He said "I cannot speak for every division. I can say that officially my company had 4 tanks on the 11th, that's it. Immediately before the attack, another PzIV was given to me that was not recorded in any papers. I also received a message that after some time another tank will arrive. Turns out there was six. It's impossible to, based on the data by Swedish researches, this book that came out, Zetterling and Frankson, it says that they analyzed the documents and on the evening of the 11th Leibstandarte had only 77 vehicles, but that was in the evening and only based on documents. We have no idea what the division looked like at that moment. Ribbentrop says that two more tanks came in the morning, regular tanks that took part in the fighting."

Interviewer: "And how many came to other companies?"

Zamulin: "Exactly, yes, and how many arrived during the day? Consider that Leinstandarte's tanks effectively played the role of stationary guns that day. They fired through an anti-tank ditch and fought at a large distance, and I don't think that if Leibstandarte took losses these would be losses that could not be repaired after some amount of time, but they were losses nevertheless. Imagine if two corps, the 18th and 29th, they had 360 tanks together, attacking in echelons. 150 in one, 150 in another, and combined arms divisions from the 5th Guards Army behind them. All of this was moving and shooting. Positional fighting, counterattacks, imagine that 360 tanks over 10 hours, and this is just tanks, to say nothing of artillery, knocked out only 5 enemy tanks. How?"

Interviewer: "Maybe 5 were total losses. They'll never tell."

Zamulin: "Exactly, now we come to this. Maybe it was only total losses. Maybe it was a fabrication. Maybe it was something else."

Interviewer: "It's hard with German losses in general. These 10-day reports..."

Zamulin: "Yes, yes. But look at what's published in the media. The Welt German newspaper, the Russian edition at least, published a teeth-shattering article for the 75th anniversary where it said that the Russians lost Prokhorovka based on Töppel and Frieser's research, the former Bundeswehr military historian, retired colonel, he also writes about five tanks and so on. I consider that if the Ministry of Defense made such an unprecedented step and put so much information online for free access, we must perform a complete, thorough, and scrupulous investigation, to understand for ourselves..."

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