Chapter 1180

In Prokhorovka, after two days of fighting, the battle between the German 2nd SS Panzer Army and general rotmistrov finally came to an end. Although the number of Soviet tanks they destroyed was several times more than their own, because the Soviet tanks could be restored in time and put back into the battlefield, and gradually gained absolute superiority in number, the German troops with fewer tanks had to retreat.

The combat effectiveness of the SS is stronger than that of the ordinary troops. Even in retreat, they still show their tenacious combat effectiveness. Although they lost nearly 100 more tanks, they succeeded in breaking through the defense line of the Fifth Army of close guard tanks on the 14th and retreated to the starting point of attack on July 5th.

When Kravchenko came to the headquarters to see me, looking at the gauze wrapped around his forehead, I asked with concern, "Comrade General, how did you get hurt?"

He replied with a smile: "when the German forces broke through, they bombarded our positions with artillery. The shell landed near my headquarters and exploded. A stone, which was blown away by the waves, just hit me standing in front of the lookout. In this way, the head was hit by a stone, it was injured, but the injury doesn't matter, it should be OK soon

I'm relieved to hear that his injury doesn't matter. I then asked, "how many tanks do you have left in your tank army? If we are going to attack, are your troops on assault duty?"

"No problem, general oshanina." Kravchenko said excitedly: "although we only have more than 50 tanks left, as long as the superior gives us additional troops, even if we go to Berlin, there will be no problem."

"General Kravchenko," Danilov said with a smile as he finished, "you don't have to go that far, just need your troops to rush into Belgorod first."

"Please sit down, Comrade General." After I asked him to sit down, I said in a smooth tone: "at present, our defense line has returned to the state before the outbreak of the campaign. Next, although we will fight with the German army, the scale is not large, so you should take time to rest and recover the combat effectiveness as soon as possible. "

Kravchenko was surprised to hear that. "General oshanina, have you heard something? Are we going to attack the enemy? "

I said to him with a smile: "Comrade General, the Germans have been attacking for the past two years. We defend and counter attack them when the conditions are right. Now, it's time for us to attack. "

We were just talking when ahlomeyev came over and handed me a telegram he had just received. At the same time, he said, "Comrade commander, this is the telegram just sent by the headquarters of the front army."

As soon as I heard the telegram from the headquarters of the front army, I could not help but feel a thump in my heart. My heart said, what's the matter? If I didn't make a phone call, I actually sent a telegram. When I finished reading the above, I felt relaxed. I handed the telegram to Danilov and looked at kirilov and said, "the headquarters of the front army has informed us that from now on, all divisions of the sixth group army of the close guard will be organized into two close guards: the 22nd army and the 23rd army. The 22nd army is composed of the 67th, 71st and 90th divisions of the guards, with colonel sivakov as its commander; The 23rd army is composed of the 51st and 52nd guard divisions and the 375TH infantry division. Major general tavartkiraze is the commander of the 23rd army. And the 89th division of the guard of Col. Xie Liujin is directly under the group army. "

As soon as I finished, the telephone rang on the desk. I picked up the phone, but when I heard that the caller was watujing, I got up from my seat and said respectfully, "Hello, general!"

"Comrade oshanina, have you received the telegram I sent you?" Maybe there is a lot of good news in the past two days, and watujing is also very happy. He asked with a smile: "do you have any idea about the adjustment of the superior?"

"Senior general," seeing that he was in a good mood, I jokingly said, "it's not good to just give him the number. You have to give me some additional troops. If the 51st, 52nd and 67th divisions of the guards were in the early stage of the battle, the losses would not be small."

"Don't worry, the reserves have been ready for you. It's estimated that they will arrive tomorrow and the day after tomorrow." "Each division of the two guards has made up 10000 people, plus other tank brigades and artillery regiments, your troops are close to 100000 people," said watujing with pride

I was very glad to hear that the headquarters of the front army was going to supply so many troops for us. However, I was not overjoyed. I also asked, "is there only one group army, or do all the group armies need to supply soldiers and weapons this time?"

After hearing my question, vatukin sighed and said, "in the past ten days of defensive operations, the first group army of katukov's close guard tanks and the fifth group army of rotmistrov's close guard tanks have suffered heavy losses. There are less than 300 tanks left in each group army. In order to make them recover their combat effectiveness as soon as possible, Moscow will supply them with new tanks recently. "

When he said this, I took a look at Kravchenko, who was sitting next to me, and then interjected, "Comrade General, I don't know if the Fifth Army of Kravchenko's close guard tanks can also be supplemented. We should know that in their recent defensive operations, tanks have also lost more than half of their capacity. If they can not replenish them in time, they will completely lose their ability to continue to fight. " When Kravchenko heard that I was helping him to ask for a new tank from vatukin, his eyebrows first picked up, and then he showed a surprise expression.

In response to my request, vatukin snorted and said, "o'shanina, now help Kravchenko get a new tank. Next, are you going to get tanks for your 33rd army? "

"Yes, yes, Comrade General." I was hesitating about how to ask watujing for tanks to supplement Colonel berey's tank army. Since he mentioned this first, I quickly took over the topic and said, "if you have any extra tanks, please supplement one or two hundred for Colonel berey's tank army."

"One or two hundred!" When vatujing heard my lion open his mouth, he said with a bitter smile, "do you think our tank production is like baking bread, one baking is tens of hundreds? No, absolutely not. I can give you 30 tanks at most, and all of them are T-34. There is no new tank. General Kravchenko's tank army is the same. They have been given 70 additional tanks, all of which are T-34. "

Vatukin's words confused me, because I heard Ustinov say that after the mass production of t-5455 tanks began, I planned to stop the production line of T-34 tanks completely. Why are all the tanks supplied to the army now T-34? With this question, I asked, "Comrade General, I don't know why there is no new tank."

"There are plenty of new tanks, but under the current circumstances, we can't equip a large number of troops for the time being." "That is to say, in the next year or two, the tanks used by our tank forces will still be mainly T-34 tanks," he added

After listening to what he said, I became more and more at a loss. "Comrade General, I don't understand. Why are there so many new tanks, but why are they used to equip the army, or the old T-34? "

"Don't you understand?" Watujing said helplessly: "it's not enough for the production capacity of the supporting shells of the new tank. If the whole army is equipped with new tanks, how can there be so many supporting shells? A tank without shells, no matter how advanced it is, will be the enemy's target when it is on the battlefield. "

"Oh, I see." Vatukin's words let me understand that for a long time to come, Soviet tanks will only be attacked by German Tiger tanks.

"Don't sigh, comrade oshanina." Vatukin may have noticed my disappointment and continued: "I have another good news for you. This time, at least two assault rifles of the whole division will be provided to your army. As for ammunition, you don't have to worry. I promise that it will be open to you."

"Great, that's great, Comrade General." To tell you the truth, in the next series of battles, infantry will play the leading role. Only by improving their equipment, can their combat effectiveness be improved qualitatively. So I was very happy to hear that we would be equipped with assault rifles from two divisions.

After I put down the phone, I immediately told akhromeyev: "major, call the division leaders immediately, ask them to come here for a meeting, and announce the reorganization of the troops to them."

After listening to my instructions, akhromeyev asked me for instructions and said, "Comrade commander, commander of the 67th division of the guards, Colonel barksov, returned to his command post yesterday because his injury has basically recovered. I don't know whether I should inform him to come to the meeting or Lieutenant Colonel chejerikov? "

"Let's call together." In order to let him understand what I mean, I also made it clear: "although the rank of lieutenant colonel xijerikov is low, recently, he has been commanding the 67th division of the guards. In many cases, he knows better than baktsov."

"Yes, I see." Akhromeyev agreed and went to make a phone call.

An hour later, the teachers who received the notice came one after another. After everyone came in and saluted me, they began to murmur in a low voice, "what's the matter with calling us at this time?"

"Maybe we should continue to consolidate the defensive zone and prepare for a protracted war with the German army?"

Although I was sitting not far from them, no one dared to inquire about me or other members of the headquarters, so I could only sit in the lower seat and whisper and guess.

As soon as he came in, he saw that the headquarters was almost full of people. So he searched around with his eyes, trying to find out from his acquaintances what it was that I called all the teachers to have a meeting at this time. Then the teachers who came earlier than him still knew nothing. Facing his consulting eyes, they could only shrug their shoulders and spread their hands to show that they knew nothing.

Seeing that all the people who should have come were complete, bzikov stood up and announced in a loud voice, "comrades, since all the people are here, we will have a formal meeting next."

When he said that, the headquarters became silent. "Next, please announce to us the order to form the 22nd and 23rd armies of the guard infantry."

It was said that a new guard infantry army would be formed. The commanders below could not help but be astonished. However, we all knew that we could not talk casually at this time, so we had to look at each other and cast a meaningful look at each other. After I stood up and glanced at each commander who was present at the meeting, I picked up the telegram on the table and began to read it out: "according to the order of the higher authorities, from now on, all divisions of the sixth group army of our guards will form two guards: the 22nd army and the 23rd Army..."

When I finished reading the reorganization order, I put the telegram on the table and asked casually, "comrades commander, who has anything to say?" As soon as the words came to an end, nikolasov, the commander of the 52nd division of Jinwei, stood up and asked respectfully, "Comrade commander, our division suffered a great loss in the defensive operations some time ago. The soldiers were cut by half and the commanders by one third. I don't know when we can replenish our troops and the weapons and ammunition consumed in the battle? " When I heard his question, I knew that it was a problem that existed in all divisions of the group army to varying degrees. Instead of answering him directly, I looked at everyone and asked, "do you have the same question?"“ Yes, comrade commander. " The teachers sitting below answered neatly“ Don't worry. "Hearing that everyone had the same question, I immediately gave them a reassurance:" after receiving the reorganization order, I also asked the commander of the front army about this matter. " At this point, I couldn't help smiling, "commander watujing said that in addition to supplying 10000 soldiers to each division, he would also supply us with 20000 assault rifles. As we all know, this assault rifle is a good thing. Whether it's positional warfare or street warfare, it's much better than the submachine guns and rifles we use now. "“ However, comrade commander, "as soon as I finished speaking, tawalter killaze, the new commander of the 23rd army of the close guard infantry, stood up and asked me in embarrassment," 20000 assault rifles are obviously not enough for our division. Which two divisions do you plan to equip first? " Instead of answering his question immediately, I turned to Danilov sitting next to him and said with a smile, "Comrade deputy commander, it's up to you to decide the distribution of assault rifles." Before the arrival of the division commanders, we had a detailed discussion on the distribution of rifles. We thought that in order to make a bowl of water level, it would be better for each army to have one division. In the end, it was decided to equip assault rifles to the 51st and 67th divisions of the guards, because in the early fighting, the fighting was the hardest and the casualties were the largest. After adding a large number of new recruits, if you have good weapons, it will also have a lot of benefits for the improvement of the combat effectiveness of the troops. Therefore, when Danilov said that the two divisions should be given priority to equipped with assault rifles, all division commanders understood and agreed with the allocation plan of the group army command.