Chapter 1525

I thought I could sleep in quietly when I got back to Moscow. But the next morning, I was awakened by a quick and regular knock on the door. I vaguely opened my eyes and looked at my watch. Before five o'clock, I turned to the door and asked, "who's out there?"

"Comrade commander," came the voice of the guard platoon leader outside the door, "just received a call from the general staff."

I heard that there was a telegram from the headquarters of the general staff. I quickly got out of bed, rushed to the door barefoot, threw my coat on the coat rack, quickly buttoned it, and then opened the door.

The platoon leader, standing upright outside the door, saw me at the door and immediately repeated what he had just said: "Comrade commander, I just received a call from the general staff."

I saw that he didn't ask me to answer the phone immediately, but directly reported the content of the phone to me. I knew that the content of the phone didn't matter, so I went back to the room, picked up the boots by the bed, sat on the chair and asked, "Comrade lieutenant, the phone is calling. What did you say?"

"The call is from Colonel Tkachenko, the director of the campaign transportation department," the platoon leader of the guard respectfully reported to me. "He said that the train to zhylobin, Belarus, will leave at 6:30 on time. Please get to the railway station early and join Marshal Zhukov."

"Campaign delivery?" When I heard the name of this strange organization, I could not help but stop my work, looked up at the second lieutenant at the door, and asked in some surprise, "what department is this? Why have I never heard of it?"

"This department is subordinate to the combat Department of the general staff," the platoon leader of the security platoon explained to me in a daze: "it is responsible for the management of the military transportation and the dispatch of military trains. Without them, our army would be unable to do anything. "

Knowing the authority of this special department, I asked, "Lieutenant, are all our people up?"

"Yes, comrade commander." The guard platoon leader replied, "after answering the phone, I gave the order to get up. But we may have to wait for a while to start, and it will take half an hour to pick up our car from the station. "

"Since it's still early, let the soldiers have breakfast." I waved to the lieutenant and said, "don't let them starve like they did yesterday."

After a simple breakfast, our car hasn't arrived yet. The guard platoon leader took the soldiers away from the restaurant and lined up at the door. After chatting with the person in charge of the hotel for a while, I went out of the hotel and came to the street.

In later generations, I have been here many times. Arbat street, the famous pedestrian street of later generations, close to the Moscow River, is one of the symbols of Moscow. Although the street is less than one kilometer long and more than ten meters wide, the Russian style is very strong. On the streets paved with square bricks, you can see not only the most traditional and simple things, but also the most modern and fashionable things.

On both sides of the street, in addition to the shops dealing in Russian arts and crafts, there are open-air bars and restaurants, where tourists can sit and enjoy the street view while tasting good wine or coffee. Most of the roadside is a next to a painting stand, spend two or three hundred roadside, the artist can draw a portrait or caricature for you on the spot. Stalls in the middle of the road are filled with dolls, crystal ornaments and large scarves with Russian characteristics.

The former residence of the famous poet Pushkin is located in this street. In addition to seeing tourists taking pictures in front of the statues of Pushkin and his wife Natalia, we can also see some literature lovers reading Pushkin's poems aloud in the street with a thick book of poems.

Unfortunately, apart from the antique buildings on both sides of the street, there is no scene I am familiar with. There are no open-air bars and restaurants, no stalls full of goods, no bustling tourists, and even no sculptures of the Pushkin couple.

Just as I was staring at the bare street in a daze, there was a sound of car horns behind me. Then the guard platoon came to me and reported, "Comrade commander, our car has arrived. We can get on."

As soon as the train arrived at the station, a colonel came out to meet me. He ran down the steps, stopped in front of us, raised his hand and said politely, "Hello, general oshanina, marshal is waiting for you on the platform."

I turned to the guard behind me and asked, "Comrade Colonel, what about my guard platoon?"

The colonel looked behind me, then said with a smile, "let them come along. Anyway, we are a special train. There are enough cars for them."

Seeing that Zhukov had even considered the problems of my entourage, my heart immediately became more secure, so that I didn't have to place them any more. So we followed the Colonel through the crowded waiting hall and headed for the platform.

On the heavily guarded platform, there is a Zhukov special train. In addition to the armored vehicle, there is also a carriage carrying 37mm anti-aircraft guns at the front and back. There are five cars in the middle. Through the introduction of the colonel, I know that the distribution is a dining room car, a Zhukov's office car, a sleeper car and two guard cars.

The captain called a lieutenant and asked him to take the guard platoon to the rear compartment of the guard force. Then he took me to the middle compartment and politely said to me, "Comrade General, the marshal is working here."

As soon as he got in the car, he yelled to the outside, "get ready to drive!" The soldier or conductor standing at the door of several carriages immediately transmitted his command to the bridge by word of mouth. The driver sounded a long whistle, and then the train started slowly.

I went into Zhukov's office carriage and saw him sitting at his desk looking at a document. He quickly went forward and raised his hand to salute him. According to the regulations, he reported: "marshal, I have been ordered to come..."

"Sit down," he said before I finished, then raised his hand to the empty seat opposite him. "I'll talk to you after I finish reading this document."

After I sat down in the position opposite to him, I kept a serious posture, staring at the document, secretly guessing what he would say to me later.

After about five minutes, he finally put down the document in his hand, looked up and asked me, "Rita, what else do you think we have to do before we launch the offensive campaign in Belarus?"

"It's easy to say, comrade marshal." Hearing that he asked such a simple question, my original nervous mood suddenly relaxed, and then casually replied: "of course, it's to supplement the offensive troops with soldiers, weapons and ammunition, and all kinds of necessary military materials."

"No," said Zhukov, shaking his head. "These are the preparations we have to do before every campaign." Seeing my blank face, he specially reminded me: "before answering my question, you should consider the overall situation."

"Consider the overall situation?" I frowned at Zhukov's words, but I didn't know where to find the answer. Zhukov saw that I had not spoken for a long time, so he lowered his head and continued to read his papers

On the map spread out on the table, with red and blue pencils densely marking the situation of enemy and ourselves, I forced myself to concentrate and try to find the answer Zhukov wanted from it.

I watched for almost half an hour, not only looking at the current situation of the enemy and ourselves in Belarus, but also looking at Ukraine and the Baltic coast, but I never came up with an ideal answer.

"Didn't you think of it, Rita?" Zhukov pushed the finished documents aside and said to me earnestly: "as a qualified commander of the front army, he should not only consider the situation of the enemy and ourselves in his own defense area, but also care about the situation of the friendly forces. If we want to launch a large-scale offensive campaign in Belarus, the first thing to consider is how to eliminate the factors of instability and ensure that our offensive will not be affected. "

Zhukov's words made me realize what I might have overlooked. I pondered over his words to see if I had missed anything important. To the south of Belarus is Ukraine, where our army currently has absolute superiority, and the German army is not willing to act rashly; Although the three Baltic states in the northwest belong to the inner lines of the German army, they are hardly a threat to our powerful forces.

When I finally stopped to the north of Belarus and saw the "Leningrad" surrounded by the blue arrow, my confusion was immediately solved. I pointed to the map and said to Zhukov, "marshal, if we want to launch the campaign of Belarus, we must first solve the enemy around Leningrad."

Zhukov looked at me with a surprise expression on his face, raised his chin at me, and then said, "go on."

"Although on January 27 this year, Leningrad was completely liberated from the 880 day siege of the enemy and returned to the embrace of the motherland, we should see that the German threat to Leningrad still exists." Although few people know about the capture outside Leningrad, it is a great shame to me. I pointed the blue arrow near Leningrad with my hand and said fiercely: "before launching the battle of Belarus, we should first concentrate our superior forces to attack the German army in the South and west of Leningrad, as well as the Finnish army in the north. While forcing Finland to withdraw from the war, we should destroy or severely damage the forces of the German northern army group."

"You have a good analysis, Rita. It seems that your overall view is becoming more and more mature. " Zhukov picked up his red and blue pencil, pointed the mark representing the German and Finnish troops near Leningrad, and said: "Comrade Stalin discussed this issue with me last night. He thought that as long as we eliminate the enemy in this area and force Finland to withdraw from the war, we can launch offensive campaigns in the area of Belarus without worries."

Seeing that Zhukov praised me like this, I laughed with embarrassment, then turned away from the topic and said, "our army now has three front armies in Belarus. I don't know whether they are holding still or actively launching small-scale harassment attacks on the enemy."

Zhukov heard my question and said with a smile: "I know rokosovsky. He is a busy man. Even if we don't take Belarus as the main attack direction in the next round of attack, he will take the initiative to attack the German defensive positions and push the enemy out of the occupied area bit by bit."

"It's also very good. It's piecemeal. Although the results are not obvious every time, over time, the results will be amazing." In order to make Zhukov agree with me, I will give him some examples. I was worried that he could not understand what he said about "nibbling" or "crumbling candy". He also explained in a way he could understand: "the enemy's defensive position is like a huge piece of black bread. We can't eat it in one gulp. But if we take a bite here today and cut a piece there tomorrow, we will soon digest this big bread. " After listening to my metaphor, Zhukov hesitated for a moment, then nodded slightly and said with approval, "Rita, your metaphor is very appropriate. If we take a small-scale offensive, it will not stimulate the sensitive nerves of the German army. In this way, in the area under attack, they will not use heavy defense, which is very beneficial to our next offensive action. " I understand in my heart that the reason why rokosovsky is constantly taking this small-scale offensive is to test the strength of the German army and to advance his starting point of attack. However, as far as the actual effect is concerned, because the German army has established solid fortifications and dispatched heavy troops on the road that our army may attack, rokosovsky's exploration can achieve some results, but at the same time it will cause the army to pay more casualties. But I can't guess Zhukov's mind at the moment. I didn't tell him the problems of this small-scale trial attack. I plan to wait until the headquarters of rokosovsky, and then find a suitable opportunity to put forward to them, which is more convincing than now. Zhukov raised his hand to look at his watch, and then waved to me, "Rita, it will take us a day and a half to get to zhylobin. Now it's none of your business. Go to the sleeping car first and have a rest." With that, he reached out and rang the electric bell on the table, and soon the colonel who showed me the way appeared at the door. Zhukov pointed at me and said, "Colonel, take Rita to her room to rest."“ Yes, comrade Marshal The Colonel agreed, walked up to me, bent slightly, and said politely, "general o'shanina, please follow me. I'll show you to your room."