Giffard Le Quesne Martel the Head of the Military Mission to the Soviet Union. He assessed the effectiveness of the Soviet order of battle and tactics during a visit to the frontline in the Kursk-Oryol region between 11 and 19 May 1943. In his autobiography, Martel describes advising the Soviet High Command, Stavka, to allow the Germans to strike first at the Battle of Kursk. To what extent his advice affected the course of the battle is debatable since his first conference with Stavka did not occur until late May 1943 while the Soviet Western Front commander, Marshal Georgy Zhukov, had been advocating the
Kursk Kharkov, with trains also linking the city to Voronezh and Kiev. The Kursk Vostochny Airport provides domestic flights. Public transport includes buses, trolleybuses, and trams. Since 2007, the public transport introduced a satellite navigation system. The total length of the road network of the city of Kursk is 595.8 km, of which 496.2 km of roads are paved. Roads of the city have access to federal highway M2 "Crimea", as well as on the highway A144 (Kursk - Voronezh - Saratov) and P199 (border with Ukraine). Kursk bound intercity bus routes to cities and towns Kursk region and neighboring regions