The Steppe Military District was first formed during
World War II on 15 April 1943 in accordance with a
Stavka directive of 13 April by the renaming of the
Reserve Front, which had been formed from the
41st Army headquarters shortly before. The district served as a strategic reserve for
Stavka, and its headquarters was organised on tables of organisation and equipment for a field
front command. It was initially commanded and organised by Lieutenant General (later Colonel General)
Markian Popov. The district headquarters was located near
Voronezh in the villages of
Somovo,
Novaya Usman,
Babilovo, Rykan, Khrenovoye, and others at various points in time. It initially included the
24th (redesignated the
4th Guards Army on 16 April),
46th,
47th,
53rd,
66th (redesignated the
5th Guards Army on 5 May),
5th Guards Tank, and
5th Air Armies, as well as separate units completing their formation. Its troops were stationed in
Voronezh,
Kursk,
Tambov, and
Rostov Oblasts. The district was tasked with preventing a German breakthrough from
Oryol and
Belgorod towards
Kursk and Voronezh, and to this end a defensive line along the
Kshen River from
Rossoshnoye to
Bely Kholodez was established and preparations made for counterattacking and going on the offensive towards
Maloarkhangelsk, Kursk, and
Oboyan. On 25 May the
27th Army joined the district. The movement of the 27th and 53rd Armies to the district from the
Northwestern Front to the area east of Kursk and the movement of the 46th and 47th Armies from the
North Caucasus Front to the area east of
Kharkov went undetected by German intelligence. The district's troops strengthened defences and received reinforcements and equipment. In June Colonel General
Ivan Konev took command of the district, on the recommendation of
Stavka representative
Georgy Zhukov. When the German offensive
Operation Citadel in the
Battle of Kursk began on 5 July, the 27th Army defended the Kshen line on the left from Rossoshnoye to Nikolskoye, the 53rd Army in the center to Bezlepkino, and the 5th Guards Army on the right to Bely Kolodez. The 47th Army was concentrated in the area of Olkhovatka, Krivonosovka, and Kamenka, while the
4th Guards Tank Corps was in the area of Beduga Station and the
10th Tank Corps near
Stary Oskol. The district's main armored striking force, the 5th Guards Tank Army, included the
29th Tank Corps in the forests west of
Ostrogozhsk, the
5th Guards Mechanised Corps in the Kamenka area, and the
3rd Guards Mechanised Corps in the area of Kuzmenkov. The Steppe Military District also included three cavalry corps: the
7th Guards in the area of Belogorye and
Pavlovsk, the
3rd Guards in the area of
Staraya Kalitva and
Novaya Kalitva, and the
5th Guards in the area of Novo-Markovka, Kirovo, and Nikolskoye. On the morning of 7 July, the 5th Guards Tank Army began its march to the front to fight at Kursk. On the same day the 10th Tank Corps transferred to the
Voronezh Front and began moving to the front. On the night of 8 July, the 47th Army was shifted forward to the area of Khmelevoye and
Korocha, closer to the action. On 9 July, the district became the
Steppe Front. == Second formation ==