Sure, because you refuse to actually read the maps you post, accept the given strengths, and accept that the Germans were human beings and not automatons capable of endlessly operating for what was approaching two weeks at this point with zero rest, resupply, and refit. Citing the previous track record tends to ignore these facts. The German tank crews since Prokhorovkha had basically been running on pervetine and their supply of those had run out by July 17th.
And yes, they were coming at the flanks. The XXXXVIII Panzer Corps was guarding the left flank of the advance, with the front constituting the II SS Panzer Corps and III Panzer Corps facing to the northeast.
No resupply or replacements? They'd been getting both, but the rest part is a point (though there were pauses in the advance). Thing is they'd do exactly all that and more over longer periods, like say in Barbarossa, during the retreat over the winter of 1942-43, and so on in many other cases. Besides other than the reinforcements coming in on the Soviet side, the majority of Soviet units were in the same situation.
Also the XXXXVIII PC was advancing itself, the flank was the LI AC, which was not facing major Soviet infantry or armor reinforcements. The SS PC and III PC were part of the overall armor advance, not the sole part of it. XXXXVIII PC isn't going to get 200 Panthers (aka all of them in service) and a unit of Tigers to be simply a flank guard.
They were still deploying in the tactical rear, of course their still relatively spread out. But the assertion that once they go into the line they'd hit more then one panzer corps is baseless. They very much could deploy against any individual panzer corps they wished too (or even the flagging LII Infantry Corps on the extreme left). The Germans just withdrew before they could deploy into the line. That they were merely "reinforcing depleted units" is directly contradicted by the order issued to them.
They were to be sent forward according to you, which means 4GTC and 27th Army going against XXXXVIII PC and 1MC+53rd Army against the SS. I didn't say they'd hit more than one PC, just that they'd each hit different ones. Thing is those PC had just smashed entire tank armies at limited cost to themselves and they'd have the strength to sit on the defensive and do it again against much smaller armor units than they had previously faced. It is doubtful that the 4GTC+27th Army could or would go against the extreme right flank given the Soviet practice to that point ramming their armor against German PC to stop their advance and the road situation, as the map really only shows one significant major road leading south from their positions on the 15th, which is aimed directly at the XXXXVIII PC and wouldn't require any significant river crossing, while advancing obliquely to the far west flank would not have that luxury.
How would they not be reinforcing depleted units? Sure they'd be attacking, which was what the shattered Tank Armies had already been doing, they'd be keeping that up, which was an extremely costly effort that only had limited or stopped German forward movement, not actually pushed them back operationally.
LAH and DR would be off to the East, facing their own troubles from the remained of the still unbeaten 5th Guards Tank Army and had exhausted themselves achieving what they did at Prokorovkha as I described. They didn’t have the strength to pull off a repeat. They had fully enmeshed themselves on Soviet AT offensives as they had not yet at Prokhorovka. You might think that the German ubermensch can just shrug off their unit stocks of ammo and fuel running out, literally collapsing from physical exhaustion, and having their equipment on the verge of breaking down an-laser, but that just indicates your existence in OKH fantasy land then the actual reality of the Eastern Front.
Unbeaten 5GTA? That unit was virtually combat ineffective. It was so badly beaten that Stalin rebuked the commander of the unit personally. They had lost (damaged or destroyed) some 600-650 AFVs in couple of days.
If the Soviets are going to throw fresh men and machines into the offensive meat grinder the Germans are going to be on the defensive, so Soviet AT defenses aren't going to be a significant factor. Where are you getting that they weren't getting more ammo? Resupply is covered here:
https://books.google.com/books?id=A...#v=onepage&q=artillery ammo use kursk&f=false
Repairs were happening to machines and they were getting more. I'm not arguing that the German advance would be continuing, that was already effectively stopped; likely they'd be pushed back a bit by the fresh Soviet troops. Also it isn't as if there weren't repeated historical examples of troops fighting continuously for weeks without significant break, like say during Barbarossa, which was months of advance and constant combat, with low supplies yet still massive victories. Kursk was relatively much lower intensity than say the Bialystok-Minsk pocket battle and Smolensk immediately after, not to mention a hell of a lot shorter distance to travel.
If the German panzers were so worn down that Soviet infantry armies could prevent them from advancing, then they would be too exhausted to withstand a concentrated Soviet counterattack by that point.
Its not that the machines themselves were worn down, rather than the masses of infantry and artillery would stiffen the lines so that any further advance into fortified belts wouldn't be possible given the relative lack of infantry in the Panzer Corps. Soviet infantry advancing on the attack was something quite different, as the casualty rates during Soviet attack periods in the Kursk fighting showed. Soviet casualties were at their worst when they attacked, the least bad when they were sitting in their fortified belts and letting the defenses absorb the attacking force. At Prokhorovka as an example the Soviets attacked not just with a tank army, but multiple infantry units against a single Panzer corps and lost over 6 times as many men despite grossly outnumbering the Germans.
The 4th Panzer Armies air support was largely being negated by having to focus on the VVS, hence it's overall miniscule impact on the battle, and it’s artillery support was increasingly outweighed by that of the Soviet forces now pouring into the region plus the supply problems of trying to get ammo forward past threatened flanks and through a penetration corridor under constant artillery fire.
Yet in Glantz's accounts the Soviets mention repeatedly the heavy German air attacks; as it was the Luftwaffe was generating double the sorties of the Soviets while suffering a fraction of the loss rate (~0.7% vs 4.95%). Soviet air superiority was only achieved on the Northern Flank, while in the South the Germans maintained it during their offensive. For example the Soviets committed nearly all their available air support to the 5th GTA at Prokhorovka...which didn't really seem to help:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Kursk
Vatutin ordered a powerful counterattack by the 5th Guards, 2nd Guards, 2nd and 10th Tank Corps, in all fielding about 593 tanks and self-propelled guns and
supported by most of the Front's available air power, which aimed to defeat the II SS Panzer Corps and therefore expose the right flank of XLVIII Panzer Corps. Simultaneously, the 6th Tank Corps was to attack the XLVIII Panzer Corps and prevent it from breaking through to the free Soviet rear. Although intended to be concerted, the counterattack turned out to be a series of piecemeal attacks due to poor coordination.
[245]The 10th Tank Corps' attack began on the dawn of 8 July but they ran straight into the antitank fire of the 2nd and 3rd SS Divisions, losing most of its forces. Later that morning, the 5th Guards Tank Corps' attack was repelled by the 3rd SS Division. The 2nd Tank Corps joined in the afternoon and was also repelled.
[245] The 2nd Guards Tank Corps, masked by the forest around the village Gostishchevo, 16 km (10 mi) north of Belgorod, with its presence unknown to the II SS Panzer Corps, advanced towards the 167th Infantry Division. But it was detected by German air reconnaissance just before the attack had materialized, and was subsequently decimated by German ground-attack aircraft armed with MK 103 anti-tank cannons and at least 50 tanks were destroyed.[246][247] This marked the first time in military history an attacking tank formation had been defeated by air power alone.[248][249] Although a fiasco, the Soviet counterattack succeeded in stalling the advance of the II SS Panzer Corps throughout the day.
[250][249]
The Germans also used 300% more artillery ammo during Kursk than the Soviets did. (The link with the info is unfortunately down due to site upgrades)
Manstein was the one arguing for a continuation of Citadel, which would implicitly include AG Center continuing it’s own offensive. He managed to get Hitler to accept a watered down version limited to Army Group South that, due to the panzers being spent after Prokhorovka, went nowhere before it too was quickly called off and the panzers withdrawn.
Manstein's proposal was only to have the Southern pincer continue, as that was his area of command and it was clear the Northern Pincer had been stopped and was already retreating due to Soviet attacks against Orel. His goal was the continued attrition of Soviet armor, which would have happened had he not been ordered to pull back due to Soviet counteroffensive plans, but that simply meant a stalled offensive and fighting off Soviet attacks from there on out.