Shulka led his troops to guard the throat of the street, which was a few buildings slightly down from the corner.
The buildings at this location will naturally "disappoint" the enemy, that is, it is always the vanguard that rushes up, while the follow-up troops are on the other side of the corner and cannot even see the situation ahead.
On the other hand, if a tank comes out of a corner, it will be within the range of the rocket launcher immediately.
In order to get a better view and prevent other buildings from blocking the rocket launcher's firing range, Shulka also ordered two buildings to be blasted, and then piled a few sandbags on the rooftop and in front of the windows to build good bunkers.
alright.
Then, two more tanks were hidden a few hundred meters away at the other end of the street and a telephone line was connected, and a defense was deployed.
These two tanks are mostly "Matilda".
Shulka had to admit that although "Matilda" has many shortcomings, it is still very useful sometimes.
Therefore, there is a saying that is right, there is no useless equipment, if it is useless it is just because it is not used in the right place.
For example, "Matilda", its thick armor is very useful at this time.
German artillery fire could not penetrate it... Of course, the "Matilda" tank gun could not penetrate the opponent either.
But that's not a problem.
Because the mission of "Matilda" is to deal with enemy infantry and attract attention, as for the German tanks, it is left to the bazooka.
Everything is ready and waiting for the German army to attack.
The first to come up were the German infantry.
They were the vanguard of the German army... Since there were too many buildings on the street, one building after another, no one could tell which building contained the enemy, nor did they know the location of the enemy's defense line, so some infantry was needed to test.
These German infantrymen were very careful and professional. They held rifles and used everything available on the road, such as open doors, collapsed walls with only half of them left, statues and other available objects to cover each other and move forward.
Step into.
Behind it was the sound of a tank's motor, and by the sound Shurka knew it was the "No. 3" tank.
"Let the infantry go over!" Shulka ordered: "Let the tanks deal with them!"
"Yes!" the communications soldier responded in a low voice and used the phone to convey the order.
After receiving the news, the two "Matilda" tanks slowly drove out of the hiding building, one on the left and the other on the right... It seemed unwise to expose the location of the tanks as soon as the fight started, but this was exactly what Shure was doing.
Card hope.
At this time, whether it was the Soviet or German army, their attention was always on the tanks.
Because it is the most dangerous and threatening equipment.
Sure enough, the German infantry's attention was immediately attracted by the tanks, so they hid themselves while urgently summoning the tanks in the rear.
What drove up was indeed a "Type III" tank. It hugged the building at the corner and even smashed into pieces the protruding corners of the building.
This action proves the strength of the German tank crew...it is to prevent their side armor from being exposed to the enemy's gun muzzle.
The side armor of the Panzer III tank is only 32mm, and there is basically no inclination, so even if the opponent only has a small 40mm caliber cannon, the German tank crews do not dare to be careless.
Then there was only a "boom" sound, and the "No. 3" tank took the lead in firing.
At this time, Shurka was a little strange. The Germans were well prepared. They should know that the "Panzer III" tank could not penetrate the frontal armor of the "Matilda". Isn't it a waste of effort to open fire in such a hurry?
Shulka soon understood, because in the field of view of Shulka's telescope, the German army seemed to be busy with something after seeing the tanks.
"It's an anti-tank gun!" Shulka said: "The Germans have anti-tank guns hidden behind the tanks!"
This approach is very smart. The tanks are used in the front to attract the attention of the Soviet army, while the anti-tank guns are deployed in the rear. Then, as soon as the tanks get out of the way... the anti-tank guns can fire at the Soviet tanks.
"But their anti-tank guns can't penetrate our tanks either!" the instructor said.
"No!" Shulka said: "If they can arrange it like this, it means that this anti-tank gun can penetrate the 'Matilda'!"
After a pause, Shulka ordered again: "Pass the order on, the Germans are probably equipped with anti-tank guns that can penetrate the Matilda! Let the tanks be careful!"
Shurka guessed correctly, the German anti-tank gun is the pak40.
This anti-tank gun was developed after signing a contract in 39, but because the German army's current pak38 anti-tank gun is still sufficient, the pak40 project has been carried out unhurriedly.
It wasn't until the Soviet-German war broke out that the German army suddenly discovered that the tanks standing in front of them were tanks like the T34 and KV1, so they urgently increased the priority of the Pak40.
Its first prototype gun was sent to the battlefield for testing in November. Due to logistical transportation problems, it had only been equipped with a small amount of equipment until this time.
The Pak40 anti-tank gun has a caliber of 75mm and can penetrate 116mm of vertical armor at a distance of 1,000 meters.
The "Matilda" tank is only 90mm thick even if it is equipped with additional armor.
Therefore, the Pak40 anti-tank gun can undoubtedly penetrate the "Matilda" head-on.
Of course, if it can penetrate the "Matilda", it also means that it can penetrate heavy tanks such as T34 and KV1.
This is one of the reasons why Lucas, commander of the 6th Armored Division, dared to fight against the 1st Guards Tank Brigade... He had learned about the battle between the 7th Armored Division and the Soviet army, and knew about the relationship between "No. 3" and "Matil"
Even at close range, they cannot penetrate each other.
If this is the case, that is to say, when the German army still relies on the "Plank 3" tank and the Pak38 anti-tank gun, it is basically impossible to fight the enemy at a long distance... If they cannot penetrate each other, they will only
The fighting got closer and closer and eventually turned into "hand-to-hand combat", otherwise the German army would not be able to advance at all.
Fortunately, the 6th Armored Division is equipped with 9 pak40 anti-tank guns.
(Note: 9 Pak40 anti-tank guns form an anti-tank gun battery. Each gun is equipped with 5 artillerymen, plus tractor drivers, spare gun crews and logistics personnel, the whole company has more than 100 people)
Lucas believed that anti-tank guns could destroy enemy tanks.
The problem is that the total combat weight of the Pak40 anti-tank gun is 1,425 kilograms. It needs to be towed by a vehicle for deployment. This will only become a target for enemy tanks on the battlefield, especially in offensive battles.
So Lucas came up with this idea:
First launch the attack with the Panzer III tank, and secretly deploy the Pak40 under the cover of the Panzer III tank. Then the tank only needs to step aside... and the Pak40 can fire at the target.
"We can fire and destroy the tank!" the instructor said: "If the tank cannot move, the anti-tank guns behind it will not be able to work!"
"No!" Shulka said: "We are going to shoot anti-tank guns!"