it's now i hear a mistake this is the number of us troops that are around would come from love is the song to the group but those who've already were timetables claim they've been told the scrumping by the very country they feel. the u.s. is trying to speed up the process of extra dollars he alleged russian arms dealer to boot from the call and has already dispatched a special kind of collective but new challenges do us both before the extradition was approved could now and then they his departure. women's rights campaigners sound the alarm over the wrongs in the number of female genital mutilation cases in the u.k. although the process is illegal in the country no one's ever been victims of the crime and thousands all considered to be at risk each year. and next we bring you

the story of the big time battle of world war two it course it proved to be a telling point in the fight against mills hegemony. did she know india is a modern day take it's taken a korean come back capabilities make it one of the world's best illustrated excess plant in the city of mission to kill in the urals is the only manufacture of the t. ninety in russia each year new tanks are tried out of a special proving ground. the t ninety is a descendant of the t. 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 cursed 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 it showed the best performance during the war the british artillery the german measure schmidt aircraft and the russian teeth 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 tank appearance 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 germans failed because of their pride and then it's in france but i asked her swift victories in europe why 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 t. 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 question 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. the germans knew they could not produce as many tanks as their phone so to poland you know therefore they focus not on the quantity but on the quality of the thus the german tanks tiger and the bouncer tanks of a new class your palm 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 who in winter time most people preferred to stay of the plenty 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 woodruff what he saw he was asleep already with people when we checked but he was already dead when. have survived the war during those years he worked in the factories an assistant steelmaker. showed up at the factory. 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 nine hundred 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 turret. in this simple manner of. my early nine hundred forty three german tanks had all but he braced the advantages of the tea party for the tiger heavy tank was expected to be the main striking force in the battle of turkish. the tigers driver mechanic had no difficulty guiding the tank using a steering wheel with a booster tank was convenient and comfortable for combat. by contrast it took both the commander in the mechanic to steer a russian team thirty four and they did employing a far less sophisticated method. of the robot going to method was it if you see 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 mechanical the left shoulder. of the mechanic knew he should turn to the left and be on whole spiral so when the come on to 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 meters. more than himself along with so that we all still sells how we can cheat the germans were through with it for a while but that's in some instances a teeth that are falling when suddenly rush to the right at full speed archer with the ball in the what is the german clog a slowly turned around to allow it's going to take

a game not another teeth thirty four would rush to the taiga in haste it reminded me of a silence you put the word to with. the tiger was mainly designed to break through enemy defenses this rare footage shows the german army said vance in the curse coach tigers move slowly at the head of the offensive the mere look of tires and a strong psychological effect on russian troops. bunk you can see a big hulk of a turn to produce. machine gunners and other machine gunners are trailing behind. him he led them through will be destroying their eyes were not supposed to abandon the line of defense is no good to have any seeing but a retreat near di ok but hold your positions for your. world war two veteran vassily shifts off lives in the village of profit of near

cursed 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 ravine. 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 to we were told to leave our personal belongings behind. google no longer needed 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 detached attack company of twenty two tiger tanks he first arrived at the eastern

front in early july nine hundred forty three a few days before the battle his company received orders to immediately abandon their deployment position in a small village near cursed. when we were leaving your officers were rummaging through houses where we had launched from 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 disassociate command knew not only all our deployment areas for you but also our plans for an offensive. we reasoned then why get embroiled at all over. 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 and 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 and forty. today your embarking on a major offensive operation was calmly decide the course of the war victory must frame force 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

a 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. but it says i'm sorry tanks altogether. there was no advance intelligent. germans had what we called their menagerie of yours panther and announce in the village. this year 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 the

tank before massive bombing and shelling set in from all sides. i was hell sheer hell enough an inferno there's no other word for it they were shell fragments all over the place was walking there was a lot of the question of the us quote gave a jag and shrapnel was very sharp. go. 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 big. blinds . from phones to. means for instance nazi dot com.

a massive german offensive begin in the early morning of july fifth one thousand nine hundred forty three. the fighting goes first from the science. of the first line of soviet defenses the germans advance by ten to twelve kilometers in four days though under their citadel plan the germans were to have encircled soviet troops on the fourth day of the offensive when its a german had quarters believe that it was possible to circle troops on the course cars shots if they plan to do it at the beginning of nine hundred forty three however the coast guard battle began six months later for those six months the soviet army had made titanic of birds who managed to thorley prepared self on that front line of norm and chemist sat near course can the world's strongest antitank defense was organized. the battle of curse once again demonstrated to the germans that dogged heroism of russian soldiers but they were also up against a staggering

a ray of ditches minefields an anti-tank barriers a total of eight entrenched defensive lines. on the first day my company was committed with twenty two tanks and a good two days later we had only ten combat capable tanks left twelve tanks were disabled soley by land and. resist system of defenses unique in the entire history of world war two soldiers and local civilians built it with spades and shovels. you could sit in and visit of a 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 killed three it was ready to go to line to pull back here got it decreased by two military railway section is now open to michoud to proceed because if you'll go 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. the air raids during the first day i declare the shop that i filled in the day i. found two wheel barrow and. one to the railway that. quoting the plan 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 the work went on even under constant bombardment. and we would be. out in june and reconnaissance plane would come around to stropping. everybody would try to find shelter over everything could sound with time to behind things. but it turned out to. all of us. 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. dunk they yell the naacp.

was right here not brought you but one 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 underneath with him he would have let them blow it up front if they tried to i was inspecting the tank when suddenly somebody was a bird. would a boy come here i went into that direction yup and saw soldier who told me one hundred my look i had nothing to eat for four days will you bring me something that you would put in your. 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 and words fail me through the fighting it 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 engagement would not last long he survived along with the rest of his tiger screwed but they were disengaged from the battle and sent to the rear. 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. the villages. realized that nothing but a cultural counterstrike to hold them. they would have to launch a head on attack against the positions of division. on the morning of july twelfth the soviet tanks were ordered to move in my. some speed to get within effective firing range as soon as possible. to cruise 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 falling sometimes soviet tanks rammed german tanks on his fields when they couldn't hit them by

firing their guns such accidently speak about heroism and great self-sacrifice on obviously it produced a strong psychological pressure in germany the 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 armored guards retreated to their original positions. still they slowed to germany and france there were only one and a half kilometer separating them from but the germans never covered that distance in the battle field itself fell under their control. the. troops had exhausted them and suffered such huge losses that they could never

recover after the battle of course was the navy 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. a c. fears of 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 in that you're not all. vassily shifts so if 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 sat 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 the 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. it's 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. on this third one thousand nine hundred three the red army launched

a massive off fence of operation all along the front line on aug fifth to germans were ousted from audio limbo good at 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 so if the infantry men. who saved a russian tank commander and. 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.

stay safe rest in peace.

more news today violence is once again flared up. and these are the images go forward has been seeing from the streets of canada. china operation to rule the day .