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Even as Operation Zitadelle foundered at Kursk, the Red Army launched an attack to reduce the Orel salient immediately to the north. General Popov's Bryansk Front recaptured the key road and rail junction at Orel on 6 August and continued to drive westwards. To the south of Kursk the Soviet counteroffensive. Operation Polk-vodets Rumyantsev, drove an armoured wedge into the German lines around the city of Belgorod. The overwhelming strength of the Soviet Steppe and Voronezh Fronts thwarted the efforts of two Panzerkorps, weakened by the Kursk righting, to crush the attack between their armoured jaws. On 6 August a massive bombardment from over 3000 Red Army artillery pieces obliterated the German defences, and Soviet troops swept in to recapture the city. This triumph cleared the way for a drive on Kharkov.