remember untrue told by close family been called a roll meridian. the headlines for you now here in r.t. out of sight out of mind us a veteran say they've been abandoned by the country they fought for as they claim the government is failing its promises to take care of all heroes. growing barbarity female genital mutilations on the rise in the u.k. sponsored forty's efforts to stop illegal practice. more religious drug rehab centers open in russia something that these facilities are simply facades to dangerous sects. sink to safe cranium activists calling for out of use ships from russia's black sea fleet to be

submerged creating artificial reefs to save the ecosystem. well next we bring you the story of the biggest tank battle of world war two what cost as russia continues to mock the sixty fifth anniversary of the defeat of nazi germany. did she know india is a modern day take it's taken in korea come back capabilities make it one of the world's best a restricted access plant in the city of mission to kill in the urals is the only manufacturer of the two hundred ninety in russia each year new tanks are tried out of the special proving ground. the key ninety is

a descendent of the key thirty four the legendary world war two era tank one of the last operating tanks of this kind is still officially in the service of the plant's guards it also perform ceremonial duties in the town streets during celebrations marking the victory over fascist germany. it was the t. thirty four that played a key role in the battle of curse the biggest tank battle of the second world war. when british prime minister winston churchill was summarizing the outcome of world war two at a press conference in one thousand forty five he singled out three types of weapons that had shown the best performance during the war the british artillery the german messerschmitt aircraft and the russian t.v. thirty four tank he said he understood how the first two weapons and been made but he couldn't possibly understand how the team thirty four had come into being. and

how to get into the german had quarters failed to forecast the t thirty four ten comparisons of choice as it was an evident blunder of the german intelligence and of course it should be considered that it was extremely difficult to arrange intelligence against the soviet union not because it was a closed state to be. on the other hand the germans failed because of their pride and then it's enforced but after swift victories in europe they trusted their forces so much they couldn't even suggest that such a fighting machine as the t. thirty four would appear in the soviet union. russian ten cruise referred to the teeth thirty four is their work course this combat vehicle has been recognised as the best medium tank of world war two on the basis of three key characteristics its firepower its armor protection and its mobility. the teacher before was designed at a plant in the city of kut a coast by michelle corsican in one nine hundred forty one after hitler's germany violated the non-aggression pact and attacked the soviet union the plant was moved

east and with great urgency on the eve of the battle of curse in one thousand nine hundred three a train load of t. thirty force was dispatched to the front on a daily basis some one thousand tanks in a month. but ermine's knew they could not produce as many tanks as their phones it's a ball and you know therefore they focus not on the quantity but on the quality of the thus the german tanks tiger and the panther tanks of a new class your home are better than the t. thirty four but it took much longer to produce such tanks on the team thirty four tank. the world's first tank and very built was launched in the soviet union in mid one nine hundred forty three and a top secret plan known only as number one hundred eighty three war time conditions then were specially hard one shift lasted for twelve hours and work continued around the clock pushing life was very hard indeed there are some people even died

of hunger. in wintertime most people preferred to stay of the plant around the clock who would joey spent the night at the plant that you once one of the workers curled up next to a pile of warm cinder woodroof when he saw he was. asleep. but when we checked he was already dead. of survived the war during those years he worked in the factories an assistant steelmaker. showed up at the factory. you quit i had no special skills. i hadn't been trained to anyone. the silly often visits the college to trains workers for the tank plant today's students even have the chance to feel like tank commanders by using special simulators they get all the necessary skills after five years of training them back in one thousand forty three everybody was welcome to work at the plant with or without education

regardless of age at that time worker study tank design examining real life german combat tanks. none of the what sometimes. german tanks were brought to our planet. when we were young then ludwig zan in them and even rotate in the target. in this simple manner of. my early nine hundred forty three german tanks had it all but he braced the advantages of the teacher before the tiger heavy tank was expected to be the main striking force in the battle of courage. the tiger's driver mechanic had no difficulty guiding the tank using the steering wheel with the booster the tank was convenient and comfortable for combat. by contrast it to both the commander a mechanic to steer a russian team thirty four and they did employing

a far less sophisticated method. of the little boy going to method was it is about using the commanding officer have only what he saw through the slit to go by in the car so if you want to the time to turn to the left he hit the driver mechanic on the left shoulder. drive the mechanic knew he should turn to the left and. when the come on the want to the time to turn to the right support to hit the mechanic on the right shoulder. the teacher before had good speed and maneuverability and required no overly complicated skills to assemble but he couldn't compete in open battle with the tiger heavy tank. tiger treated any soviet tank of the day from a distance of two thousand meters but soviet tanks crews only had a range of five to six hundred metres. and the will to cook more than himself along with so that we all still sells how we can cheat the geminids course there were problems with that's in some instances a teeth that are falling when suddenly rush to the right at full speed to archer with the ball in the what gets us as the germans i guess slowly turned around to

allow its guns take aim not another teeth thirty four would rush to the taiga in hates it when the of a sudden it's you but the way to with. the tiger was mainly designed to break through enemy defenses this rare footage shows the german army said vance in the curse of. tiger's move slowly at the head of the offensive the mere look of tigers at a strong psychological effect on russian troops. bunk you can see a big hole of a tank approaching you. are right there a machine gunners and other machine gunners are trailing behind you. lead them through will be destroyed. where not supposed to have been the line of defense is no good for any seeing a creek near die ok but hold your positions for your.

world war two veteran vassily ships off lives in the village of proof of your curse in one thousand nine hundred three he was nineteen years old can on july fourth he and other soldiers from his battalion were waiting for their first taste of combat in this reveal. the men had reason to believe they were unlikely to survive the battle. when we were told to load our weapons and replenish ammunition. secure everything to your body to give you maximum ability. we were told to leave our personal belongings behind. were you will no longer need them they said and read you. very much was also making thorough preparations for the battle tank units were reinforced with specially trained cadets. carl gales dorf was one of them. this is a photograph from his private archive as part of

a test attack company of twenty two tiger tanks he first arrived at the eastern front in early july one thousand nine hundred three a few days before the battle his company received orders to immediately abandon their deployment position in a small village near cursed. mom the rip off when we were leaving your officers were rummaging through houses where we had launched destroying all traces of our presidents bits of documents and even paper left over from letter writing. moreover learned it shortly before the battle to soviet command knew not only all our deployment areas for you but also our plans for an offensive we reasoned then why get in broiled at all. the battle of curse tell great importance for the german high command after a failed advance on moscow and having suffered complete defeat at stalingrad the

very must was keen to take revenge they hope to successful operation a curse might again give them the strategic upper hand that would allow the germans to launch yet another offensive against moscow and strike in the direction of the caucasus if there was well aware of the importance of the battle forthcoming. an excerpt from hitler's order of july fourth one thousand forty. today your embarking on a major offensive operation was calm they decide the course of the war their victory must reinforce the certainty everywhere in the world that any resistance to the german army will be pointless in the end you must know that everything may depend on the success of this combat. the cursed bulge took shape on the eastern front in the course of the fighting in spring nine hundred forty three to great threat to the german verma soviet troops might launch a major offensive from that springboard and after a long period of hesitation the german command decided to forestall the red army

the plan was to cut russian troops off from the main forces to pave the way for wider operations. turned thirteen on the eve of the battle of curse the germans had occupied the village of a chevy it's where he lived with his parents just before the battle broke out yvonne and other boys took up positions nearby tack to scouts watching the movements of german and russian troops. r t thirty four tanks came from there well but it does i'm sorry tanks altogether. because it as if there was no advance intelligence. the germans had what we called their menagerie is niggers panther. in the village. who secured to keep thirty four tanks came under massive shelling. they were forced to pull back one of the soviet tanks hid in

a small gully by the roadside yvonne noticed the spot but couldn't make it to tank before massive bombing and shelling sent in from all sides. us i was hell sheer hell enough an inferno there's no other word for it there were shell fragments all over the place was walking there was a lot of the question of the us quote being a jag and shrapnel was very sharp. cut you. know put on him. through early july nine hundred forty three military action at the cursed boards was mostly limited to small air raids or ground force reconnaissance missions. witnessed one of these local clashes he set out to look for the t. thirty four four days after the russian tanks came under fire. the air was literally scorching with heat and tension soviet troops were anticipating an

offensive operation but the germans were still biding their time by july fourth one thousand nine hundred three the war's longest lall had already lasted a hundred days.

a massive german offensive began in the early morning of july fifth. the first. troops. german had quarters believe it was possible to circle troops on the

course cars planned to do it at the beginning of nine hundred forty three. battle began six months later for those six months the soviet army had made titanic efforts managed to prepare itself on that front it can be said that near course the world's strongest antitank defense was. once again demonstrated to determine the heroism of russian soldiers but they were also up against a staggering ditches. mine fields an anti-tank barriers a total of eight entrenched defensive lines. on the first day my company was committed with twenty two tanks and couldn't two days later we had only ten combat capable tanks left twelve tanks were disabled soley by land. it was a system of defenses unique in the entire history of world war two soldiers and

local civilians built it with speeds and shovels. you could get in and busy in of all was twenty years old at the time shortly before the battle she and hundreds of other young women were building a railway while military men ensured their security. after the war and became part of a railway leading to profit of cars station. in one thousand nine hundred three it was constructed in conditions of total secrecy. the tracks were laid across all of the defensive lines. during the battle the railway carried heavy artillery and ammunition to forward positions. thirty four tanks with the most important part of the cargo. it isn't going to do this israel three it was ready to go to line to. got it decreased by its military railway section is now open for mission to proceed because it is. here god bless let's go. there

was a tourist around the railway the builders lived under shelter of branches set up on the construction site they cooked food by camp fire and they followed a rigid schedule. during the first day i declare the. phone. to wheel barrow. on to the railway that. wanting to play and the railway was to be completed in ninety days the builders worked tirelessly from dawn till sunset the first train was gone when the last spike was set just thirty one days after the start of construction to work went on even under constant bombardment. we were. filming reconnaissance plane would come around. everybody would try to

find shelter over everything good sound which hides behind. that but yeah but it turned out to the end all of us. if we did manage to reach that t. thirty four tank which he saw stuck in the ravine for four days following the german shelling of a convoy of soviet tanks. turning but he was right here in the broad queue. once german sappers came there. they wanted to blow the tank but the mechanic was hiding there in the swamp all the while there was a submachine gun and grenade with him he would never let them blow it up if they tried to i was inspecting the tank when suddenly somebody was a bird. would a boy come yeah i went into that direction and saw a soldier who told me one how would he look i had nothing to eat for four days will

you bring me something that you would. as long as the germans remained in the village the boy secretly supplied them with food. at the time of was just fourteen but after helping us commit to join the soviet tanks unit he carried our reconnaissance throughout the rest of the war. but he never saw such bitter fighting as he did. i can't imagine how we were able to survive in that hell in defies description words fail me the fighting was a nightmare the noise was deafening. this was how most. began firing shells into and the other shelled in response. visibility was very poor couldn't see the tanks only can see with

a burst of fire. very first would not last long he survived along with the rest of his tiger screws but they were just a gauge from the battle and sent to the rear. of my tank. as we pushed forward. i caterpillar was damaged. the tank was no longer combat keep. up with me didn't even come within sight of the first line of soviet defenses the. germans broke through two defensive lines in the village and. realized did nothing but a cultural counter strike to hold them. they would have to launch a head on attack against the positions of the panzer division. on the morning of

july twelfth the soviet tanks were ordered to move in. some speed to get within effective firing range as soon as possible. inclusion knew they were facing almost certain death but there was simply no other option. this is what tuchman did i knew it was the enemy positions exposing themselves to german fun sometimes soviet tanks rammed german tanks on his fields when they couldn't hit them by firing their guns and such acts certainly speak about heroism and great self-sacrifice on cue obviously it produced a strong psychological pressure in germany saudi tank crews went to their deaths honorably in that final. soviet tanks fought literally to the last shell approach there would be no miracle the remnants of the army's fifth armor guards retreated to their original positions

. still they slowed to germany france there were only one and a half kilometer separating them from both of those but the germans never covered that distance only the battlefield itself fell under their control. the. troops had exhausted them they'd suffered such huge losses that they could never recover after the battle of course was the movie that is to say from a strategic standpoint we'd won it. after many consecutive days fighting on the defensive but silly ships selves battalion finally went on the counter offensive. she feared for what fighting is all about but there is no fear what would you become a wild beast you have to kill them off or you'll be killed we just had no time to

worry about survival and. vassily shift so far often visits familiar battlefields he survived in one thousand nine hundred three only because he was wounded it was thanks to that injury that he set out his battalions final action in which nearly all of his comrades were killed. it was a point of no return. as a lie in bed i still can't believe i'm. new here at the general leave it even now. this church has been built to commemorate to soviet soldiers who died in the village of crow one of. it's the world's only orthodox church which was completely

covered in the names of soldiers who gave their lives in battle. there's a bell tower in the field near prophet of god every twenty minutes the bell tolls to honor the dead. on july seventeenth one thousand nine hundred three to begin an organized retreat from the cursed bolch leaving behind piles of twisted military hardware and thousands of dead bodies. operation citadel i've been a failure i tunes troops were always on the defensive after the battle of cursed it was a turning point not only in the german soviet standoff but also in the course of the

entire second world war. from that moment and became clear not only for german generals and officers the war was lost but even average soldiers of the german army under students that if russians could fight in severe winter and take advantage of their weather and also we know in summer the war was lost indeed. stirred one thousand nine hundred three the red army launched a massive off ends of operation all along the front line on aug fifth to germans were ousted from audio limbo going to those events were marked by the war's first gun salute. each passing year sees the death of more and more world war two veterans vassily shifts off the infantry men. who saved

a russian tank commander. the woman who helped build the crucial railway they gathered less and less frequently at this memorial they have a drink from a soldier's bowl to honor those who died in the battle of curse. the tank minima regiment. because those who are dead and those who are alive. can test the same string rest in peace.