Belgorod occupied Belgorod from 25 October 1941 to 9 February 1943. The Germans re-captured it on 18 March 1943 in the final move of the Third Battle of Kharkov. On 12 July 1943, during the Battle of Kursk, the largest tank battle in world history took place near Prokhorovka, and Red Army definitively retook the city on 5/6 August 1943. The Belgorod Diorama is one of the World War II monuments commemorating the event. In 1954 the city became the administrative center of Belgorod Oblast. From this time the rapid development of the city as a regional center began. Belgorod is
German tanks in World War II keep pace with Soviet T-34 and KV tanks, which respectively, either had sloped armor or relatively thick armor and both shared 76 mm guns. By 1941, the Panzer III was the most numerous of German tank designs, however, during the later parts of 1943, it was largely replaced by later versions of the Panzer IV and Panzer V "Panther". Its assault gun chassis variant, the Sturmgeschütz III was, with just over 9,400 units built, the most widely produced German armored fighting vehicle of World War II. The Panzer IV was the workhorse of the German tank force during World War