The tank full of infantry stayed on the first line of defense for more than ten minutes and continued to sail towards the German second line of defense. Sokov kept observing the tanks advancing forward with a telescope. As the tanks got closer to the enemy's position, he felt his heart beating very hard, and his body was trembling involuntarily as if it was too cold to bear it.
Ivanov, who was standing aside, noticed Sokov's abnormality, quickly touched him with his arm and asked with concern: "Comrade Commander, why are you trembling? Isn't it a little too cold?"
"No, comrade of the deputy division commander." Sokov shook his head and said with a wry smile: "I'm a little too nervous when I see our troops about to rush into the enemy's position."
"Col. Sokov." Golikov turned his head and smiled at Sokov, and said on his own: "Don't worry, judging from the current situation, our troops may be able to occupy the enemy's position in a few minutes."
Seeing that the tank had passed halfway, there was no movement on the second line of defense that was being bombarded in the distance. It seemed that all the German soldiers were suppressed by artillery fire in the cover or in the anti-aircraft shelter. Seeing this, even Sidolin, who had always been steady, breathed a sigh of relief and echoed Golikov: "Comrade Deputy Commander of the Front Army is right. The Germans have been suppressed by our artillery fire and cannot move. I believe our soldiers can easily seize the second line of defense."
However, when everyone thought that the counterattack troops could easily capture the second German line of defense, something unexpected happened. When more than 200 meters away from the German position, Sokov suddenly saw several soldiers rolling down from the moving tanks and were quickly swept into the tank tracks behind.
"Hell, what's going on?" Not only Sokov saw this, but even Golikov also saw it. He shouted in surprise: "Why did those soldiers roll down from the tank?"
When Ivanov heard what Golikov said, he put down his telescope and said hesitantly: "Comrade, the deputy commander of the Front Army, it may be that the tank was too bumpy during its driving, which pushed the soldiers down."
"This is impossible!" Golikov said loudly: "Although there are bullet craters on the road ahead of the tank, I see that the driver carefully bypassing these places and cannot push the soldiers down. It must be for another reason. Maybe it was hit by flying shrapnel and rolled off the tank."
"Comrade Deputy Commander of the Front Army, this is impossible." Ivanov immediately refuted Golikov's statement: "Our tanks are at least two hundred meters away from the shelling area. No matter how far the shrapnel fly, it is impossible to fly two hundred meters away. It must be another reason."
When Golikov and Ivanov were discussing why soldiers rolled down from the tank, several more soldiers rolled down. Sokov, who had been observing the battlefield situation, found that next to the tank's route, several steel helmets emerged from a traffic trench and soon disappeared.
When Sokov saw the few helmets that had flashed away, he immediately understood the reason why the soldiers fell from the tank. He quickly put down his telescope and pointed ahead at Golikov, Ivanov and others and said, "Look quickly, there seem to be Germans in the traffic trench next to the tank's route."
"What, the Germans in the traffic trench?" Golikov quickly raised his telescope and looked at the battlefield again, saying, "Is this impossible? The enemy is suppressed in the trench by our artillery fire. How could he hide in the traffic trench and open fire on our army?"
As soon as he finished speaking, he saw a German soldier standing up from the traffic trench and dropping a grenade at the moving tank. Before the grenade exploded, the soldier retracted back into the traffic trench. He dropped the grenade and landed behind a tank and exploded. The shrapnel drove two unlucky soldiers off the tank.
"Yes, Colonel Sokov is right." Seeing the truth of the matter with his own eyes, Golikov immediately took back his words: "There are really German soldiers hiding in the traffic trench and sneaking into our offensive forces."
Although Golikov had already said this, Ivanov still found it difficult to accept it. He asked in confusion: "Hey, how could the Germans hide in the traffic trench?"
"It's very simple." Sokov said, biting his back teeth, "The Germans must have found that our army had successfully occupied the first line of defense while the artillery was bombarded. In order to regain the lost positions from our army, they braved our artillery fire and entered the traffic trench and tentatively penetrated into the positions we occupied."
"Chief of Staff," Sokov turned and shouted at Cidolin, who was standing next to the telephone: "Immediately call several regiment commanders and say that the enemy is trying to regain the positions occupied by our army through the traffic trench. Order them to send troops immediately to eliminate the enemies entering the traffic trench."
"Comrade Commander," Cidolin asked tentatively when he heard Sokov's order, "Do you need to notify the tank brigade to stop and clear the enemy and move forward?"
"No." Sokov shook his head and said with a wry smile: "The two tank battalions that we just belonged to, except for the command vehicles, probably no other vehicles have radio stations. Even if there is an order, they cannot be conveyed. Let them."
Just as Sidolin picked up the phone and was about to give orders to the three infantry regiments, Sokov suddenly remembered that the first battalion of tanks commanded by Bereth were all modified tanks, and there should be no problem in communication. There were also several self-propelled artillery that could use artillery fire to support friendly forces on the left wing. He added: "Chief of Staff, call Colonel Bereth and ask his battalion to use artillery fire to support the troops on the left wing to cover them to occupy the enemy's positions."
Tanks carrying infantry were about to approach the German second line of defense, the left-bank artillery stopped the artillery. The German officers and soldiers hiding in the shelter and anti-artery holes dragged anti-tank guns and machine guns into the position without waiting for the smoke to dissipate, and opened fire fiercely at the approaching counterattack forces.
The German artillery had high technical and tactical skills. He was not panicked at all when facing Soviet tanks dozens of meters away. After setting up anti-tank guns, he fired without hesitation. One moving tank after another was destroyed dozens of meters or even more than ten meters away from the German position, and stopped in place and burned wildly.
Some of the infantry carried on the car jumped out of the car in time and hid in nearby bullet craters. However, the slow-responding soldiers turned into firemen after the tank was destroyed and rolled down from the tank. They screamed and jumped and jumped down, suddenly jumped, and stood up, running around like headless flies until they were hit by the enemy's machine guns and fell to the ground and stopped moving.