However, the situation of the war was actually somewhat beyond the control of the German army.
This is mainly because the German army is seriously underprepared...The attack the German army is preparing is to assemble the 6th Army, the 17th Army and the 1st Armored Army.
However, of the three armies, only the 6th Army is stationed in Kharkov, and the other two armies are intensively gathering and preparing.
However, the Soviet army launched an all-out attack with two front armies and the Kiev garrison, which caused the German army to respond hastily.
The result of the first battle gave Paulus a headache.
"General!" the adjutant reported: "The enemy's left wing has advanced thirty kilometers and the right wing has advanced fifty kilometers. On the other hand, the Kiev defenders are also attacking our right wing with all their strength and have advanced thirty kilometers!"
Paulus frowned.
Obviously, the Kiev defenders hoped to join forces with the Soviet right wing and cut off the connection between the 6th Army and Manstein's 11th Army.
The two armies are attacking in tandem. One army is advancing fifty kilometers per day and the other is advancing thirty kilometers per day. However, the distance from Kiev to Kharkov is only 520 kilometers. At this speed, it only takes six or seven days.
.
At that time, the 6th Army will have to retreat north to escape the encirclement...and this will leave Manstein's 11th Army alone and trapped in several sieges.
As a result, the German army's gains in the south will completely collapse.
"General!" the adjutant reported with a telegram: "The 1st Armored Group will take at least a week to assemble!"
"A week?" Paulus said: "It seems we can't count on them!"
The First Armored Group participated in the Battle of Moscow, and its strength was greatly reduced. Not to mention that it was still resting and recuperating in Bryansk, 600 kilometers away from Kharkov. At this time, it was not easy to transport them up by train urgently.
After a pause, Paulus asked: "How is the enemy's situation?"
"We have received very little information!" the adjutant replied: "Based on preliminary estimates from the air force reconnaissance results, they have three times more infantry, twice as many artillery, and 5.5 times more tanks than us, and a considerable number of them are
T34!”
Paulus raised his head in surprise: "There are 5.5 times more tanks than us?"
"Yes, General!" the adjutant replied.
Without saying a word, Paulus immediately ordered: "Send a telegram to the Führer, we need air force support!"
"yes!"
Therefore, the 10th Air Force, which originally provided air cover for Manstein, immediately entered the Battle of Kharkov.
But this is far from enough.
The reason is that the Soviet Union has short days and long nights in winter, so the time for aircraft to be effective is not long. As soon as it gets dark, Soviet tanks and infantry will launch a crazy attack on the German army.
Objectively speaking, if the fight continues like this, the Soviet army may indeed succeed.
But Paulus was still superior after all.
After being silent for a while, he pointed at the map and ordered: "Here, Zmilyov, assemble an armored corps!"
"But General!" the adjutant replied: "We don't have an armored corps!"
"You're right, Colonel Fischer!" said Paulus, "but the Russians don't know this!"
As a result, Zmilyov had an additional armored corps. From time to time, a group of German tanks drove out and circled there, and then there were "tanks" camouflaged with white canvas. They seemed to be waiting for the Soviet army to continue.
Move forward and give the enemy a hard blow from its flank.
The Soviet commander, Marshal Timoshenko, was fooled. He ordered the Soviet army to fight steadily, not requiring speed but gathering sufficient strength.
This was obviously based on the German decision to assemble an armored corps on the flank, because it had enough strength to not be easily repelled by the German counterattack, which made the Soviet attack twice as slow.
Therefore, the German army took advantage of the time gained to gather troops.
In just five days...the German 1st Panzer Army suddenly launched a counterattack under the cover of the air force before it was fully prepared.
The 1st Armored Group Army did not block the front of the Soviet army or attack the Soviet army's flanks. Instead, it attacked the Soviet army's hinterland. It advanced 80 kilometers in one day and cut off the Soviet army's logistics supply lines.
In an instant, the entire battlefield situation took a 180-degree turn, and the Soviet army, which had torn apart the German defense line, was in danger of being surrounded.
On the other side, Shulka is leading his troops to build an underground warehouse.
To be precise, it's not "building", but perfecting.
Because these underground warehouses have always existed, and some are even spacious basement factories.
The problem is that there are too many sundries and machines in these warehouses and factories. At the same time, there are too few and too small entrances and exits, making it very inconvenient to store materials.
Shurka's approach is to dig a slope downwards outside these underground warehouses, and then build a tunnel several meters wide and high directly to the underground warehouse.
In this way, cars can drive directly into the warehouse to transport piles of scrap metal, sundries, and scrap machines, and then transport piles of supplies in.
Some basements are not high enough, that is, cars cannot get in... This problem can be easily solved. As long as a tunnel is dug one meter down in the warehouse, cars can easily enter and exit the warehouse along this tunnel.
This approach is obviously more efficient. Otherwise, if we only use human transportation, we will not be able to store much materials in a short time, so Shurka's foresight will lose value.
"Shulka, Shulka..." While Shulka and the soldiers were busy, Kalashnikov ran over and said out of breath: "The Germans counterattacked, they surrounded us
troops!"
"How many troops are surrounded?" Shulka asked.
"All of the 6th Army and the 57th Army, plus parts of the 9th and 38th Army!" Kalashnikov replied.
A Soviet army group usually had three armies, and some even had more, so the number of troops to be surrounded could easily be hundreds of thousands.
This sudden change also shocked Moscow, especially Stalin.
Because this attack was launched by Stalin despite the opposition of others. Even not long ago, Stalin was proudly demonstrating to the generals who opposed the attack at the meeting.
"You think that we should not launch this attack!" Stalin said: "You thought that the German army had the strength to stop our attack, but the victory on the front line proved that this was not the case. Kharkov was already surrounded by us, and the Germans seemed to have no choice but to surrender.
This choice!”
However, he can only be handsome for three seconds.
Stalin's words were still in his ears, but intelligence suddenly came from the front line that a large number of German armored units had penetrated deep into the hinterland to surround the Soviet army.