There is only one update today due to things, so I will make up for the third update tomorrow! There are a lot of things going on at the beginning of school recently, sorry!
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December 25th was Christmas 1941.
Guderian's headquarters was located nine miles south of Tula, which could almost be said to be the front line.
Guderian sat on a chair in despair, was silent for a while, then took out a pen and paper and wrote a letter to his wife: "Cold and poor living conditions, insufficient winter clothes, serious losses of personnel and materials, meager fuel
Supplies, all this made our military operations a torture, and the heavy responsibility made me more and more frustrated. Although many words of encouragement were said by all parties, no one could take over the burden on my shoulders!"
After writing the letter and sealing it, Guderian handed the letter to the adjutant and asked him to hand it over to the evacuated wounded to take back.
Then, he took off his military cap from the wall, put it on his head, and ordered: "Retreat!"
"What?" The adjutant couldn't help being stunned when he heard this: "But the head of state ordered..."
"I said!" Guderian interrupted the adjutant: "Retreat!"
"Yes, General!" The adjutant stood up and conveyed the order.
Guderian looked towards Moscow and said to himself: "The attack on Moscow failed, we suffered a defeat!"
Then, without looking back, he jumped on the barrel truck and retreated to the rear with the guards.
As a responsible commander, Guderian did not care about the orders of the head of state, what he cared about was the lives of the soldiers... If it was possible to win, he would fight with the soldiers on the front line and persist until the last moment, but he knew
It is impossible to win at this point.
In other words, the head of state's decision was wrong, and Guderian would not let his soldiers pay the price with their lives in order to obey the head of state.
However, Hitler got the news that night, and Guderian was immediately dismissed from his post.
Also dismissed from his post for the same reason was the commander of the 4th Armored Group, Hoppner. There was even General Sponak, who won the Knight's Cross, and was sentenced to death.
If Hitler still had a glimmer of hope in capturing Moscow before, then he should clearly realize at this time that this battle cannot be fought... All units and even the commanders who have been directing the battle on the front line are retreating
, which is enough to show that the German army has no intention of fighting.
But Hitler's order remained unchanged: "Don't take a step back!"
Although the German army could no longer take a step forward at this time, even if they were waiting on the defense line, Hitler would have his soldiers wait there... Maybe the enemy would collapse under this pressure first, who knows?
But the reality was certainly not what Hitler thought.
While Hitler was replacing a large number of frontline generals in an attempt to stabilize the morale of the army, the Soviet army was actively preparing for a counterattack.
Zhukov made a phone call to the headquarters of the 1st Guards Tank Brigade.
"How are you preparing?" Zhukov asked.
"We still need a few days!" Katukov replied: "The number of rocket launchers is not enough, and the ammunition is not enough!"
"What's lacking can be made up for later!" Zhukov said: "Unless you plan to miss the time for counterattack!"
"Of course not, Comrade Zhukov!" Katukov replied.
Counterattack is an exciting thing, and Katukov certainly does not want to miss this opportunity.
In fact, even if Katukov is willing to give up, Zhukov will not let him do so.
Because the significance of counterattack is very important, although the German army lost the offensive strength, it does not mean that they have lost their combat effectiveness.
Therefore, if the Soviet army's hard-organized counterattack is blocked or even repelled by the German army, it will definitely be a heavy blow to the morale of the Soviet soldiers and civilians... After careful preparation, the Soviet army cannot even defeat the lingering enemy. Does that mean that
When the enemy calms down, will it be time for the Soviet army to be defeated?
Therefore, the counterattack must only succeed but not fail. It must at least push the enemy back a certain distance so that Moscow has room to defend itself.
Under this premise, the 1st Guards Tank Brigade is of course indispensable.
Therefore, the 1st Guards Tank Brigade immediately packed up and took the train to Moscow.
The soldiers have experience with this... They are probably the only unit that was taken to Stalingrad twice for training during the Moscow Defense War and then immediately sent to the battlefield.
This time it took longer, more than thirty hours on the road.
This is because there are trains bound for Moscow everywhere along the way, transporting people, supplies and equipment, and one after another is overcrowded.
During this period, Shulka and others even saw a train derailed and overturned on the side of the road due to an accident.
The accident scene was a mess, with many injured people and supplies scattered everywhere.
If it were normal times, we should first choose to evacuate these injured people from the accident scene to the hospital for treatment.
But this cannot be done during wartime, because it will delay the forward delivery of materials and troops.
As a result, the injured people set up tents and camped in the ice and snow. The engineers who arrived just repaired the railway and reopened it to traffic, and then trains passed by the accident site one after another.
For those wounded who camped in the wilderness at temperatures exceeding minus 30 degrees Celsius... Shulka didn't know what their outcome would be.
Sometimes Shulka wonders, what would happen if such an accident happened to a train of the 1st Guards Tank Brigade?
After much deliberation, Shulka believed that the outcome might still be the same: the soldiers who could still fight might be taken away, leaving the wounded behind first.
This is indeed cruel, but it is a helpless choice.
What's more, those soldiers who were taken away may not be a good thing. The destination they rushed to was a battlefield filled with bullets.
The next afternoon, the train arrived in Moscow.
However, the soldiers did not get permission to get off the train, and of course they did not unload their equipment. The train waited quietly in a temporary parking tent.
The so-called temporary parking canopy is a section of railway branch that allows trains to park here without affecting the passing of other trains. A large canvas is propped on the top... This is obviously to avoid being discovered and bombed by enemy aircraft.
Since there will be more and more snow, such parking tents must be "cleaned" by someone every once in a while.
The "cleaning" method is very simple, that is, a few teenagers take a bamboo pole and poke it at the top to make the snow slide off the top.
Although they were still childish and their faces were red from the cold, what was surprising was that they had a pistol on their waist... This is war, and even children cannot escape its clutches.
"Are our rocket launchers enough?" the instructor asked worriedly, "We only have three hundred rocket launchers!"
"If they do supplement us later!" Shulka withdrew his gaze: "Then it shouldn't be a problem, because... we can concentrate these three hundred on the front line!"