There are too many changing factors in war, and any insignificant change may affect the overall situation.
For example, take Army Group North, because the commander of the 56th Panzer Corps, which was the forward, was not the historical Erich von Manstein, but von Wojtander Tate.
Although the two commanders are both members of the Feng family, they have completely different command styles.
Historically, when Manstein was commanding operations in the 56th Armored Corps, he penetrated 80 kilometers deep into the Soviet Union in the first few days. Later, he went 100 kilometers deep alone. Far away from friendly forces, he penetrated into the heart of the Soviet Union and launched a fierce attack.
At that time, Manstein gave an instruction to the officers and soldiers of the 56th Army: "If we cannot reach Dinaburg within four days, it will be difficult to capture the bridge over the Dvina River."
For this reason, the 56th Armored Corps under the command of Manstein advanced all the way. After occupying Dinaburg, it did not follow Loeb's order to defend the ferry and wait for reinforcements, and continued to carry out in-depth assaults alone.
The situation was different for Commander Vaughan d'Arc Tate. Due to too much waiting for the Finnish army to achieve the first phase of combat objectives and share the casualties and losses of the German army, he had already spent many days leading the German army into Dinaborg.
Then, Tate chose the "safety strategy" given to him by Loeb, which was to wait for the 41st Armored Corps at the Jacobstown ferry to arrive and join forces.
This is the biggest difference between the two commanders.
Historically, Manstein was known for his "calculated adventures." Manstein's strategic talent and environment created his genius-like and sensitive strategic sense, and no one in the German army could surpass him strategically.
The name Joan of Arc Tate may be far less famous in comparison.
His combat style is also very simple, which is to fight steadily. When the German army has the advantage, he can fight very beautifully and achieve perfect command without leakage. However, he is not adapted to the quick battle mode at all, and prefers to go step by step step by step.
Eat away the obstacles.
According to Manstein's concept, when an armored corps appears in a deep position of the Soviet army, it will inevitably cause great chaos to the Soviet army. Of course, the Soviet army will also do its best to mobilize troops from all over the country and give priority to driving this unit back.
Across the river.
At this time, the faster the 56th Armored Corps continues its in-depth assault, the harder it will be for the Soviet army to have the opportunity to forward superior forces to fight against this army in time.
It goes without saying that the deeper a single armored corps goes alone, the greater the risks it takes. It is precisely because of this that Vaughan d'Arc Tate is unwilling to continue to carry out assaults alone and chooses to obey Marshal Loeb's standby
Order.
But on the other hand, it is what is called "calculated risk taking".
In itself, the 56th Armored Corps can be considered to have penetrated deep into the heart of the Soviet Army. The safety of a fast armored corps deep behind enemy lines should mainly rely on its own movement. Once it stagnates, it will soon be attacked by the enemy.
The army reserve forces were surrounded on all sides.
Therefore, Manstein's risky tactics are actually feasible to a certain extent.
However, this time, Vaughan-de-Tate, who commanded the 56th Armored Corps, had ordered the entire army to garrison Fort Dinard, temporarily expand the landing site at Fort Dinard, and hold on to the ferry to wait for reinforcements to arrive.
The disadvantage of this is that the 56th Army has no chance to gain greater results. But the advantages are also obvious. Vaughan-de-Tate used Fort Dinner as a stronghold and used the fortifications left by the Soviet army in the defensive battle to eliminate a large number of
Soviet counterattack troops.
Soviet General Froshilov, who had already been severely depleted in the previous days and had no time to replenish the complete troops, hastily transferred them to counterattack the German 56th Armored Corps that broke into the rear of the Soviet 11th Army.
The combat effectiveness of these Soviet troops was not high, coupled with the serious lack of organizational structure, and the German army had complete fortifications left by the Soviets themselves. The entire Soviet counterattack and recapture operation could almost be said to be a complete failure.
Vaughan d'Arc Tait did not adopt Manstein's "calculated risk" theoretical tactics, but while insisting on attrition of the enemy, he moved closer to another tactical theory - the concentrated use of the armored group's forces to exert overall effectiveness.
Vaughan d'Arc Tate finally waited until the entire Fourth Armored Army came closer. In fact, he only waited at Fort Dinner for three and a half days.
In this way, the 4th Armored Group Army gradually approached the biggest obstacle in the north - the "Stalin Defense Line".
This is a fortification zone in the Soviet border area, with uneven distribution of strength and weakness. It runs along the old Soviet border line, from the south bank of Lake Pepsi in the west of Presko to Sebiezh, a small border fortress of the past Soviet Union.
In some places, the Stalin Defense Line is just a simple tunnel, while in other areas it is a huge military defense engineering group. Overall, the Stalin Defense Line consists of 23 huge fortification areas, including more than 4,000 permanently prepared
Firepower point.
Fortunately, the Soviet Supreme Command did not correctly position itself as a defender, but overconfidently regarded itself as an attacker.
It was precisely because Stalin overly believed that a two-sided attack by the Soviet Union and Britain would defeat Germany, which led to the extremely slow progress of the construction of late-stage fortifications and even stagnation. By the time the German army launched a full-scale counterattack into the Soviet Union, the fortifications of many fortresses in Stalin's defense line
It has not yet been completed, and many places where heavy firepower weapons should be placed are still empty. Some troops guarding the fortress do not have heavy weapons, the air defense troops have no anti-aircraft guns, the artillery troops have no cannons, and the defense line garrison can only use light weapons to fight the Germans.
Moreover, during the initial construction period of the "Stalin Defense Line", the idea of armored forces had not yet been carried forward, and Soviet armored forces experts were still a loser like Pavlov. The Soviet Supreme Command did not know how powerful German tanks would be in the future.
Large, there are only a small number of 37mm rebound guns on the defense line, and the very few 76mm guns that exist are temporarily removed from the turrets of old tanks. The number is not enough to deal with the armored clusters of German tanks, and the artillery support troops are also
rare.
Now, the 41st Armored Corps continued to advance along the road towards Ostrov on the orders of the Armored Group Headquarters, while the 56th Armored Corps of Vozhendtet turned east and headed towards Sebyezh-Opochka.
Enter.
Vaughan-de-Tate's intention was that after the 56th Army broke through Stalin's defense line, it could encircle a powerful Soviet tank group with the 41st Army that might be located near Presko.
And even if there is no such estimated Soviet army group, even if there is not a beautiful encirclement and annihilation battle like Army Group Center and Army Group South, just breaking through Stalin's defense line is still a major victory!
