Operation Roland

Operation Roland
Operation Roland
Part of Operation Citadel and the Battle of Prokhorovka
	The crew of a Panzer III from the 2nd SS Panzergrenadier Division Das Reich rest after a rainstorm had poured over the battlefield during Operation Citadel.
Operational scope	Local offensive
Planned by	Army Group South of the German Wehrmacht
Objective	To eliminate Soviet salient between two German panzer corps and encircle the defending Soviet units
Date	Began July 14, 1943
Executed by	2nd SS Panzergrenadier Division Das Reich; III Panzer Corps;
Outcome	Successful elimination of the salient; Unsuccessful encirclement of Soviet units;

Operation Roland was a local German offensive inside the Soviet Union during the Second World War on the Eastern Front, and was conducted as a local operation within the overarching German summer offensive, Operation Citadel, on the southern side of the Kursk salient. The German forces of the III Panzer Corps and the 2nd SS Panzergrenadier Division Das Reich of the II SS Panzer Corps attempted to envelop and destroy Soviet forces of the Voronezh Front. This operation was necessitated by the failure of the German II SS Panzer Corps to break through Soviet forces during the Battle of Prokhorovka on 12 July. Therefore, German commanders decided to first link up the III Panzer Corps, which had been lagging behind due to heavy Soviet resistance, with the II SS Panzer Corps, in order to consolidate the German positions into a continuous frontline without inward bulges and enable the two panzer corps to overrun Soviet forces defending Prokhorovka together. The linking up of the two German pincers was planned to effectuate the envelopment of the Soviet 69th Army and other supporting units.

The operation commenced on the morning of 14 July, and by the end of 15 July the two German pincers had linked up, but they failed to trap the majority of the Soviet forces, which by then had already fought their way out of the trap.