Chapter 1189 The Southwest Front Army is losing ground
This is the last day of May. For Yang Mingzhi, he has stayed at the mine all day and personally participated in dealing with this mess. Especially this afternoon, Yevlov, Salinchkin and others all arrived again
, everyone held a meeting next to the mine again.
Moreover, Salinchkin also kept his promise. In the morning, urgently printed newspapers were posted on the newspaper columns of all the settlements. Here they described the enemy's bombing and the fighting heroes of the air defense battalion. One of the largest pages was reserved for
Yang Mingzhi. The article was written by Salinchkin himself, who exaggerated Yang Mingzhi’s achievements and the powerful power of the anti-aircraft machine gun he developed.
Even though in Yang Mingzhi's opinion, this flattery was too much, others were surprisingly unanimous in their opinion that such flattery was appropriate, and at least it would alleviate a lot of the panic among the military and civilians.
There are only three surgeons in the hospital, and Yang Guo is one. She underwent fifteen operations in a row, and the various foreign body fragments removed weighed one kilogram! Her spirit also simply collapsed, and the last operation was not completed. She
Finally fell down.
Raslyutin couldn't bear this result. She was the commander's wife and a pregnant woman. The child was too strong and could not overcome her temper, so she was allowed to perform a desperate operation. Now, the doctor became the patient, and now
She also had to drink a glass of sugar water and rest peacefully.
The German air raids obviously did not cause particularly serious losses to the guerrilla republic. They deeply stimulated the Soviet army here. At the temporary meeting held in the mine on that day, the battle against Loev was also brought up.
schedule.
"We must capture an enemy stronghold as revenge for their bombing of us."
"Capture Loev and seize the railway bridge!"
"Second this city, we set up a launch pad here to launch rockets at Lechica, which is under German control!"
The staff officers brought by Yevlov were furious when they saw the tragedy in the mine, and they were more willing to offer suggestions in front of the commander in order to be reused.
In Yang Mingzhi's opinion, many of their ideas are too slogan-like and have no substantive significance.
However, the attack on Loev is positioned as a military operation that must be carried out by the Guerrilla Republic in the first half of June! For this reason, the troops have reason to start combat preparations on the last day of May!
As for the hundreds of thousands of Soviet troops on the Kharkov battlefield 400 kilometers away, the battle continued until the end of May, and the balance of victory had already tipped to Germany!
What happened these days?!
The Soviet army launched a full-scale attack, eating up the 100,000 German defenders in Kharkov, and planned to defeat its main force, the Sixth Army. The sudden turn of the battle shocked all senior Soviet personnel, including Stalin. In order to avoid Kiev 1941
After the tragedy of 2004, Stalin allowed Timoshenko to retreat tactically.
In fact, Timoshenko hoped to withdraw further in order to preserve the absolute main force of the Southwest Front.
Stalin did not give permission. He ordered the defense line before the battle to stand firm. If the front line stabilized at the original state before May 19, then the Soviet Union would have no substantial losses. In the view of the Soviet top brass, even if many lives were lost, the troops defended the current situation.
In a country under our control, the blood of martyrs will not be shed in vain.
Can the defense line of the Barvinco River really be held?
The German army quickly used actions to deny Stalin's illusions. The German Kleist Armored Group took the lead in advancing eastward and encountered the Soviet 38th Army.
This Soviet army group is mainly infantry and lacks tanks. It is equipped with a large number of anti-tank guns and RPG weapons that can be used by individual soldiers. Timoshenko is confident that this unit can hold the defense line.
The war situation is really heartbreaking!
Perhaps it was because the morale of the German army was high, or because the Soviet soldiers were mainly new recruits and seriously lacked training. Even though the Soviet army had good anti-tank weapons, their defense line was first attacked by German air attacks, and then was welded with fence armor.
The No. 3 and No. 4 tanks broke through the defense line.
The defense line guarded by this group army was torn apart by the Germans.
At this point, the Soviet 6th Army and the 57th Army were completely surrounded, and the 9th Army was forced to retreat.
The Soviet 9th Army and the 38th Army were forced to retreat. Now it was no longer a question of whether they could hold the defense line on the Barvinko River. The Soviet Army even lost control of the Northern Donetsk River. The Germans built pontoon bridges on the river.
Tens of thousands of German troops have crossed the river and continue to pursue the retreating Soviet 9th Army.
At this point in the battle, most of the Soviet fighter planes participating in the battle were shot down, and several Soviet frontline airports were indiscriminately bombed by the Germans!
German fighter planes even bombed the airport in Severodonesk!
The current Severodonesk is actually where the headquarters of the Southwest Front is located, and Timoshenko himself is here. Originally, this place was considered the rear of the battle, but the war situation took a turn for the worse, and it actually became the front line!
Currently, there are as many as 100,000 Soviet civilians in this Soviet-controlled city! Most of them are women and the elderly, because men in the city between the ages of 18 and 50 have been urgently mobilized and recruited into the army. The Soviet army is preparing for this battle.
Most of the reserve forces were forcibly recruited in this way. The residents of Luhansk and Donetsk are almost all Russians. They only hate the Germans and despise the traitorous behavior of the Ukrainians.
The men took the initiative to join the army. At the last moment, Timoshenko also added nearly 100,000 so-called reserve troops. But these mobilized soldiers, they can only aim and shoot, and they have no understanding of complex technical and tactical coordination! They have a certain mentality.
Hot blood is not enough! Because the Soviet army was able to switch from offense to defense in this battle, in Timoshenko's view, the reason was the serious lack of training of the troops.
Except for a few elite troops, this is the case for all other troops!
Every day, even every hour, the war situation is getting worse!
By May 31, the retreating Soviet 6th Army had all crossed the Oskol River eastward, which was only fifty kilometers away from Severodonesk, the frontline hub city of the Southwest Front.
The Oskol River will join the Severodonesk River, and its impact plain forms a narrow lake with a width of four kilometers and a forest swamp area nearly 40 kilometers long. This is the natural barrier of Severodonesk.
Of course they can delay the German army attacking from the front, but they can't prevent the German army from attacking from the two wings at all!
Therefore, Stalin ordered the Soviet army to defend its original position, which failed on May 30. The German army occupied the important city of Izyum, causing the Soviet army's Barvinkovo salient to completely collapse.
The German army basically completed Operation Friedkus. Paulus saw that the war situation was of great benefit to the German army and took the opportunity to defeat the Soviet Southwest Front Army and the Southern Front Army. It depends on his one-shot move today!
If the Battle of Stalingrad in history is inevitable, then its start should begin when Paulus decides to pursue victory!
On the morning of May 31, the German army began to search for traces of the Soviet 9th Army and arrived at the Oskol River. The Soviet army had blown up all the bridges across the river, leaving the German army facing a wide river and the foot of the river.
Silt could only curse with disdain: "These Russians, you are a group of cowards. No difficulty can stop the German army's attack!"
Of course, the German army will not stubbornly insist on crossing the river. Its main force will bypass these areas with poor natural environment and plan to advance from the south. The target is Severodonesk, a city controlled by the Soviet army.
The Soviet army was fully aware of this vicious move of the enemy.
Timoshenko was surprised to find that a superior German force was bypassing the forest. Their goal was self-evident.
Timoshenko angrily called the hotline directly to Stalin's office and reported the even worse war situation angrily.
In fact, a massive amount of emergency telegrams from the front line have filled the desk of the Soviet leader. Bad news from the front line is coming one after another. It seems that there is no good news at all these days!
Stalin knew very well that someone was responsible for the outcome of the battle plan he had ordered to be implemented. Who was responsible? It was himself!
The soldiers on the front line were not useless, and the headquarters was not unwise. The Soviet army also defeated the German army in the first three days of the war. Kharkov was also easily accessible. I never expected that the German army actually had an extremely large force.
, many Soviet troops were once again trapped in a tight encirclement.
Therefore, in the face of Timoshenko's request to shrink the defense line again, Stalin made a difficult choice. The so-called retreat means being forced to give up part of the territory and holding on. Even if it costs huge sacrifices, it cannot be achieved. On the contrary, it will be due to lack of
The military force caused more serious losses.
He supported Timoshenko's request, but also put forward a condition: "Your retreat must be carried out slowly. If you think you can hold the front, you must try! You must also mobilize troops to rescue the besieged 9th Army.
.”
Timoshenko knew very well that the only front-line troops in his hands with acceptable strength were the 9th and 38th armies. The elite 21st and 28th armies had suffered frontal defeats, and they had made great sacrifices.
The cost was huge, and now they were struggling to defend, so how could they attack? Furthermore, the best of the best, the two tank armies that had been given high hopes, almost completely collapsed, and the survivors could only fight with infantry.
At least the leader supported the retreat, and even tacitly acknowledged that the Soviet army could abandon the city of Severodonesk.
Now Timoshenko knows that he is really unable to turn the tide, and the general can only sigh: "The headquarters must move back!"