Chapter 692 The Empire Strikes Back
"Comrade Commander, the Supreme Command agreed to our request. The Front Command can be moved to the Brest Fortress or in Poland. The 20 armies belonging to the Western Front can be used for the Polish-Western Ukrainian operations. All the original Belarusian defense zones of the Western Front were handed over to the reserve front. In addition, Comrade Bonomarenko will no longer serve as the military member of the Front, and the military membership will be held by Comrade Burganin."
At 7 pm on July 21, Western Front Chief of Staff Rimoskik told General Pavlov the instructions from the Supreme Command that he had just received. The strength of the Western Front on the books has not increased, and there are still 20 armies. However, several armies originally deployed in Belarus can now be used for combat in Poland.
In addition, the Western Front Military Commissioner Bonomarenko finally threw out the hot potato, and the person who took over the deadly errand was Stalin's confidant, Nikola Alessandrovich Burganing, Vice Chairman of the People's Committee and President of the Soviet State Bank.
This Bulganin has no experience in joining the army. He was a Cheka warrior. However, he has been engaged in economic and government work since 1922. He is an experienced senior government official and economic expert. So Stalin also gave him another position, General Advisor of the Third International Bolshevik Party in Poland, and is actually the Supreme General Secretary of Poland. In addition to leading the political work of the Western Front, his mission is to help the Polish Bolsheviks establish the people's regime as soon as possible.
Hearing the decision of the Supreme Command, Pavlov sighed softly, "Call back to the Supreme Command, the Western Front Command will move to Minsk in the Mazovsk province of Poland in the shortest time. By the way, send another telegram to Comrade Pogdanov (Commander of the Reserve Front), and ask him to come to Minsk as soon as possible to discuss Belarus's defense."
"Comrade Commander, Comrade Pogdanov doesn't have to come to Minsk," said Rimoskik. "The Supreme Command has just issued an order to be commanded by Deputy Chief of General Staff Comrade Vasilevsky as the commander of the reserve front."
Huasilevsky is now the representative of the Supreme Command's Western Front. He is familiar with the situation on the Polish front and Belarus, and is very suitable to serve as the commander of the new reserve front.
Pavlov nodded, "It's Comrade Huaseylevsky...that's good, then I'm relieved. With him as the commander of the reserve front, there will be no danger in our rear."
"By the way, have there been any changes in the front line?" Pavlov asked about the latest situation on the front line again.
"It was quite calm before dark," Rimoskik replied, "Our 3rd Army could not be mobilized during the day because of the German bombing, and their two armored clusters did not launch an attack. The cluster north of the Vistula River was still near the town of Zachrochim, and it was probably waiting for the troops to arrive... This should be a very large cluster, probably at the level of the army! The heavy armored cluster that captured Lazimin had no idea why, and did not move forward to the Vowomin or the Reinav River."
"Not taking action yet?" Pavlov touched his head and frowned. The heavy armored cluster has been delayed for almost 10 hours. What are you waiting for? Will there be more heavy tanks to arrive in Razimin?
Thinking of this, the cold sweat on Pavlov's forehead began to gather again.
...
"Have all been fixed?"
"Sir, most of them have been repaired. Now the 501st Battalion has 41 Tiger tanks to use."
"Sir, most of the tiger-styles in the 502nd Battalion have been restored, and there are 40 units to be activated."
"Sir, there are 42 tiger-style units in the 503rd Battalion that can be used."
Major General Hubei, the commander of the German "Hubei Heavy Armored Division", was also wiping sweat beads at this time. The sweat beads were not hot, but emerged in a hurry. Because most of his Tiger tanks were broken after more than 20 hours of continuous combat. Either the gears of the gearbox cracked, or they burned themselves while walking, or the common faults of tracks and load-bearing wheels. If replaced with No. 4 or No. 3 assault guns, the faults of tracks and load-bearing wheels are minor problems, but on Tiger tanks, they are
It's different. Because the Tiger uses interlaced load-bearing wheels, once a failure (mainly wear), several load-bearing wheels must be removed at the same time before repair. The track replacement of the Tiger tank is also troublesome because the tank is too heavy and difficult to drag to a temporary repair point. Three SDKZ9fa half-track trailers are needed to tow a Tiger tank. Moreover, the tracks collapse too tightly, and the track cannot be removed by removing the pins alone. Sometimes, oxygen cutting is even required to fuse the tracks.
Fortunately, Germany now has the best team of technical workers in the world, otherwise the problem of tiger repairs alone would have driven the armored commanders on the front line crazy.
During the battle from the early morning of the 20th to the morning of the 21st, there were only 6 Tiger tanks that were truly damaged by Soviet artillery fire, while there were nearly 40 Tiger tanks that were damaged due to various faults.
So much so that Major General Hubei did not dare to let these delicate tanks that "destroy as soon as they are used". After capturing Laziming, he ordered all tanks to stop and repair them quickly. Those that are not damaged must be inspected carefully and replaced with a few easily damaged parts to avoid losing their chains when they go to the battlefield again.
Hearing that the battalion commanders of the three heavy armored battalions reported that most of the tiger styles could be used, Major General Hubei breathed a sigh of relief. He turned his head and smiled bitterly at his superior General Reinhardt: "Admiral, our heavy armored division can be put into use again. Should we start attacking now, or wait until dawn tomorrow?"
"It's time to act now, but not attack, but defend." Admiral Reinhardt attacked an adjutant beside him, who immediately spread a military map in front of Huber. Reinhardt pointed to the small town of Ruda, located between the Lazimin and the Reinav Rivers above the map. "Three heavy armored battalions, the Hungarian assault artillery brigade and the SS Valon Brigade were set off here to set off for defense. Today, the air force reconnaissance during the day found that a huge mechanized cluster of the Soviets began to turn east after being blocked by Mandofir's cavalry, and was expected to cross the river from the pontoon bridge near Serotsk tonight."
"We're blocking them in Ruda?" Hubei already understood Reinhardt's intention.
Now the Luftwaffe has remote-controlled gliding bombs and has control over most of the air supremacy in the war zone. It is not difficult to blow up the pontoon bridge. Since the Air Force has not exploded the bridge, it must have wanted to let the Soviet tank cluster go across the Reinav River.
"Yes, Hans, you go guard Luda and teach the Russians a lesson with the Tiger tank!" Reinhardt said. "I'll guard Razimin and use Black Panther and No. 4 to clean up the Russians who are heading north!"
Hubei found that the plan had changed and asked, "Shou Lazimin? Don't attack Vovoming?"
"I won't attack Vovoming," Reinhardt smiled. "It was just a short attack. How many troops are we? It is impossible to repel millions of Soviet troops. If they can kill them to the maximum extent, they will achieve their goal. The reconnaissance of the Air Force also found that the Soviet army was still in a tendency to gather at Vovoming, and it was obviously preparing to attack us with the Soviet armored cluster on the west bank of the Renaf River. We just took the opportunity to give them some great taste!"
...
"Marson, will there be a decisive battle tonight?"
In the conference room of the Berlin Command, Hitler (who had just rushed back from Paris to discuss the French war with Marshal Betan), as soon as he saw the Chief of Staff Kesselin, he immediately asked about the war.
"The leader, there is no decisive battle, it's just a short assault." Kesselin replied, "About 2 military-level armor clusters will be invested, and we will have more than 900 tanks/assault artillery to participate in the battle."
"Isn't the battles involving more than 900 tanks/assault guns a decisive?" Hitler was surprised when he heard the number of tanks/assault guns in the battle. "So how many tanks/assault guns will be invested in a decisive attack?"
"About 8,000 tanks/assault artillery will be held, accounting for two-thirds of the armored forces of the National Defense Forces." Hessman, who presided over the meeting of the Command Department, interrupted at this time. "The short attack that began in the early morning of the 20th was only to further attract the main Soviet troops to the Warsaw battlefield and create favorable conditions for the large counterattack in the blue plan."
Speaking of the large counterattack in the blue plan, Hitler's mustache moved and showed a proud smile: "Martyr Betton and General Wei Gang agreed to send 10 artillery divisions, a total of 1,620 suppressed artillery more than 150mm to support our operations. By mid-August, another 10 French artillery divisions will arrive on the front line, and by the end of August, another 10 artillery divisions will be sent. At that time, 30 artillery divisions will have 4,860 suppressed artillery more than 150mm to be used for us. In addition, the French will also send a cluster of railway artillery, with hundreds of large-caliber railway guns participating in the battle against Soviet cities and fortresses.
The Imperial Marshal, with so many French cannons joining, there are no Russian cities and fortresses that we cannot capture, right?"
"Leader, the Soviet Union is a big country!" Hessman glanced at Hitler and smiled, "We cannot take down all the cities, we can only take key attacks."
Hitler nodded, "So where are we going to focus on attacking now?"
Marshal Keselin replied: "The General Staff's opinion is to focus on attacking Minsk and at the same time, he feinted Leningrad. After capturing Minsk and defeating the Soviet Western Front, he turned to attack Ukraine with his troops."
Chapter completed!