Going back an hour, the German captain led his troops to the right bank of the Dnieper River Bridge.
When the soldiers guarding the bridge saw a figure approaching, they immediately raised their guns and asked alertly: "Stop, command!"
The German captain quickly raised his right hand to signal his troops to stop. Then he put down the big box in his hand, walked towards the sentry, and said with a smile: "Comrade soldier, we are from the 73rd Infantry Brigade.
, on the order of the brigade commander, some trophies should be sent back to the city."
Hearing that the people coming were from the infantry brigade, the sentry put down his gun. He knew very well that the unit closest to the right bank of the bridge was the infantry brigade. It seemed logical to send people back to the city to deliver the loot at this moment.
matter.
Seeing clearly that the officer walking in front of him was a captain, the sentry quickly raised his hand to salute him and asked politely: "Comrade Captain, it's so late, do you still want to deliver trophies to the city?"
"No way." The German captain shrugged his shoulders, spread his hands, and said helplessly: "We captured a large number of important documents during the battle and need to send them to the army headquarters overnight." After speaking, he raised his hands.
He waved to the team parked not far away and motioned for them to come over.
The sentry saw that the soldiers who came over were all carrying a large box, and he easily believed what the German captain said, thinking that the box contained important documents that had just been captured and were about to be sent to the headquarters.
The German captain took the opportunity to observe the surrounding environment and found that except for the sentry in front of him, in the two machine gun bunkers made of sandbags at the head of the bridge, the two machine gunners were sleeping with their backs against the sandbags. Apart from this, no one else was seen.
But out of caution, he tentatively asked the sentry: "Comrade soldier, why are you the only one on duty?"
The sentry didn't know that the other party was testing him, and he replied generously: "Comrade Captain, our place is in the depth of defense, and there will be no Germans at all. Therefore, when on duty every night, one person is arranged on the right bank and one on the left bank.
Sentinel, the rest of the people are resting in the room."
After understanding what he wanted to know, the German captain suddenly pointed in the distance with his hand and said urgently: "Look, someone seems to be coming over there again."
Hearing that someone was coming, the sentry instinctively looked in the direction pointed by the German captain. At this moment, the German captain moved. He covered the sentry's mouth with his left hand, pulled out a dagger with his right hand and touched the sentry's neck.
Seeing that their commander had killed the sentry, two soldiers immediately put down the big box in their hands, pulled out their daggers and jumped into the machine gun bunker. They used the daggers to kill the two sleeping machine gunners.
When the German captain saw that the three Soviet troops on the bridge had been killed, he made a gesture to his subordinates standing at different positions, instructing them to go inside and deal with the sleeping Soviet troops. After seeing his gesture, his subordinates all
He pulled out his dagger, carefully entered the room where the Soviet troops were resting, and started massacring the sleeping soldiers inside.
The German soldiers were very fast and the battle was resolved quietly in less than five minutes. A German second lieutenant came over and asked the captain: "Mr. Captain, what should we do next?"
The captain looked towards the other bank and could vaguely see the bridgehead on the left bank a few hundred meters away. There was a sentry carrying a rifle walking back and forth. If he led people through the bridge and entered the left bank, he would definitely be discovered by the other party. Instead of being exposed,
For your own goal, it is better to place the explosives near the right bank, which can also destroy the bridge.
"Second Lieutenant, take a few people to get off the bridge from here, and place the explosives we carry at key locations to ensure that the bridge can be effectively blasted."
The second lieutenant agreed, called to a few soldiers, jumped over the railing and climbed under the bridge, and began to plant explosives in preparation for blowing up the bridge over the Dnieper River.
Placing explosives seems simple, but if you want to blow up this strong bridge, you must find the key support points of the bridge. The best blasting point must be in the middle of the bridge. But in order not to be discovered by the Soviet army on the left bank, the German army could only
The blasting point was placed near the right bank. With the help of moonlight, the second lieutenant searched for more than half an hour before he found a suitable location.
Just as the Germans began to plant explosives, the soldiers on duty saw a convoy approaching from the left bank and quickly reported to the captain: "Mr. Captain, I see a convoy approaching from the left bank."
The German captain was worried that the convoy crossing the bridge by itself would expose his small team, so he quickly came out to observe the situation. After watching for a while, he found that his whereabouts might have been discovered by the Soviet army, because the convoy stopped at the bridge and then got down.
Hundreds of Soviet soldiers.
He quickly turned around and ordered: "Put those two machine guns here. Once you find something is wrong, shoot immediately. Before we blow up the bridge, we must not let the Russians get close."
As soon as the two turntable machine guns were in place, there were dozens of Soviet soldiers on the left bank, spread out in formation, and came towards the right bank along the bridge. I saw the Soviet soldiers passing through the center of the bridge, getting closer and closer to me.
, the captain suddenly waved his hand and shouted loudly: "Fire!"
The crazy machine gun fire knocked down seven or eight soldiers who were caught off guard. The rest either lay down on the spot or hid behind the steel beams of the bridge to avoid the dense bullets fired by the Germans. The German captain was lying on the side of the bridge.
, the probe pointed towards the bridge and asked loudly: "Second Lieutenant, how long do you have to complete the blasting preparations?"
The second lieutenant who was placing explosives under the bridge heard the captain's shout and quickly raised his head and replied: "Mr. Captain, the explosives cannot be directly fixed on the blasting point. We are trying to find a way to tie it up. It may take more than ten minutes."
time."
"Hurry up." Although the German captain was anxious, when he heard what the second lieutenant said, he had no choice but to say to the other party: "The Russians have already rushed up. I don't think I can stop them for long."
"I'll do it as soon as possible, Mr. Captain."
When the special company launched an attack from the left bank to the enemy-occupied right bank bridgehead, several companies of the infantry brigade had already arrived near the bridge and were ready for battle.
In fact, Mikhailev had arrived here half an hour ago. He observed the movement on the bridge through the telescope and saw two sentries walking back and forth on the bridge. In the two machine gun bunkers piled with sandbags,
The machine gunner looked in all directions warily.
Seeing this scene, Mikhailev had a question in his heart: Could it be that there was something wrong with his judgment? The enemy's goal was not to blow up the bridge at all? In order to find out what was going on, he ordered the troops to stop approaching the bridge.
To avoid misunderstandings with the soldiers guarding the bridge.
After the troops quietly left the vicinity of the bridge, Mikhailev ordered everyone to search the riverside to find out where the suddenly missing enemies had gone.
It was during the search process that Mikhailev commanded the troops. After receiving a call from Askel, he immediately realized that there was a problem with his judgment. The Germans did not disappear out of thin air, but captured the bridgehead on the right bank.
, and disguised themselves as Soviet soldiers and continued on duty at the bridge, making themselves mistakenly believe that the Germans had not approached the bridge at all.
At this time, intensive gunfire came from the bridge, occasionally mixed with the sound of grenades exploding. Mikhailev quickly issued an order to the three company commanders, asking them to rush to the bridge immediately to eliminate the German squad entrenched there.
Narva once went with Mikhailev to observe the movement at the bridge. After hearing Mikhailev's order, he asked tentatively: "Comrade Battalion Commander, I see that the sentries on the bridge are wearing the uniforms of our army. Wait."
If a fight breaks out soon, how will we distinguish between ourselves and the enemy?"
Narva's words stopped Mikhailev. Yes, the Germans were also wearing Soviet uniforms. Moreover, it was night and the visibility was low. If the Germans saw that the situation was not good, they would fall to the ground and pretend to be dead. Wait.
When troops merge with friendly troops, if they blend into the team, they will be unable to identify them.
"Comrade Captain," Mikhailev felt that since he could not distinguish between ourselves and the enemy, Narva might have some good ideas, so he asked, "Do you have any good ideas?"
Narva thought for a while and replied: "Comrade Battalion Commander, judging from the current situation, the enemy has occupied the bridgehead on the right bank, and the friendly forces are attacking from the left bank. When we reach the bridge, we only need to eliminate the enemy forces staying on the right bank.
Everyone should be able to annihilate all enemies."
But Mikhailev said with concern: "What if there are still soldiers of our army at the right bank bridge? If we kill them all indiscriminately, wouldn't we accidentally injure our own people?"
"No, Comrade Battalion Commander." Narva had fought with Sokov for so long, and his perspective on the problem was naturally different from Mikhailev's. He explained to him: "The Germans' purpose is to bomb
Destroying the bridge, in order to prevent their whereabouts from being exposed, no one who comes into contact with them will be left alive. I can boldly conclude that all our soldiers at the bridge on the right bank have been unfortunately killed."
Mikhailev, who was still a little cautious at first, felt much more at ease after hearing Narva's explanation. He quickly issued a new order: "Okay, then cooperate with the friendly forces from the left bank to eliminate all the enemies at the bridgehead on the right bank.
."
There are only 20 German troops occupying the bridgehead on the right bank. Six of them have planted explosives, and eight others are blocking the Soviet troops from the left bank. At this moment, there are only six people left, including the German captain. Don't see all their submachine guns, but
It is not an easy task to block infantry brigade commanders and fighters coming from different directions.
Less than five minutes into the battle, Narva's 1st company and Yegor's 2nd company rushed onto the bridge one after another, shooting to death the Germans who resisted. Then, they rushed towards the Germans who were shooting wildly towards the left bank.
The German soldiers fired at their backs. After a burst of gunfire, the German soldiers who were shooting wildly were beaten into pieces.
After the gunfire on the bridge stopped, Mikhailev came to the bridge. He found that the friendly troops coming from the left bank had stopped attacking, probably to observe the situation here. He called a soldier and ordered him: "Soldier
Comrade, when you contact our friendly forces in the past, tell us that we are from the 73rd Infantry Brigade and have come to support them on the orders of the brigade commander, Major Guchakov."
When the soldiers went out to contact friendly forces, Narva walked up to Mikhailev and said to him: "Comrade Battalion Commander, I think we should conduct a good search to see if there are any enemies who have slipped through the net."
Mikhailov nodded. Before he could speak, he saw Yegor coming out of the room next to him and asked him: "Captain Yegor, how is the situation in the room?"
"Dead, all dead." Yegor said through gritted teeth: "Our soldiers were all sleeping and sacrificed by the enemy cutting their throats with daggers."
"These damn Germans." Although Mikhailev did not know the specific number of the bridgehead defenders, from the scale of the fortifications, he guessed that there might be dozens of people. Now that they all died in the hands of the Germans, he could not help but be disappointed.
He was itching with hatred: "Sooner or later we will make them pay back this blood debt."
"Comrade Company Commander," a soldier discovered the rope hanging on the railing of the bridge and guessed that someone must be under the bridge, so he called Narva loudly: "Look there is a rope here, there may be enemies under the bridge."
As soon as they heard that there might be enemies under the bridge, the surrounding soldiers immediately rushed to the rope to see if there were any enemies hidden under the bridge. Unexpectedly, a soldier heard several gunshots and several shots just after he put his head down.
The bullets flew past his ears, scaring him into a cold sweat and he hurriedly retracted his body.
Samoilov, who was commanding the battle on the left bank, met the soldiers sent by Mikhailev to contact him. He learned that the comrades of the infantry brigade had eliminated the enemy on the opposite side, so he took Serelkov and Sapochuk away.
Came over.
After coming over, he learned that there were still enemies hiding under the bridge. He immediately realized that these enemies were there to plant explosives. If they were not dealt with as soon as possible and allowed them time to place the bombs in place and detonate them, not only would the bridge be blown up, but the bridge would also be destroyed.
Causing huge casualties to his subordinates.
Thinking of this, he quickly said to Mikhailev: "Comrade Captain, in order to prevent the Germans from jumping over the wall and blowing up the bridge, we must immediately evacuate the soldiers on the bridge, leaving only a few people to deal with the enemy."
For the Soviet commanders and fighters who were under orders, it took less than a minute for the three to four hundred people who were originally crowded together to be reduced to less than thirty, and the rest retreated a hundred meters away.
In this way, even if the Germans jump over the wall in a hurry, the damage they can cause will be limited.
The soldiers had retreated to a safe area, but Samoylov, Mikhailov and others were still on the bridge, discussing how to deal with the Germans under the bridge: "Comrade Captain, what can you do to deal with the Germans hiding under the bridge?"
The enemy below?"
"This is not going to be easy, Comrade Lieutenant." Although Mikhailov has a higher military rank than Samoilov, he knows that the other party is the popular man in front of Sokov, so he speaks very politely: "The enemy is hiding under the bridge, we
As soon as the soldiers poke their heads out, they will shoot. Unfortunately, there is a river below, so even if we throw grenades down, we will not pose any threat to the enemy."
"Lieutenant Serelkov," Samoilov turned to Serelkov and asked: "Do you have any good ideas?"
"We can use ropes to help put the grenades down and use the fragments of the explosion to destroy the enemies hiding under the bridge."
"Is there an unknown amount of explosives under the bridge?" Mikhailev said worriedly after hearing this: "If you put a grenade down to blow up the enemy, will it detonate the explosives?"
"As long as you are careful, it shouldn't happen." Serelkov volunteered: "Comrade Captain, if you are worried, I am willing to personally lead someone to complete this task."
