Although it was not his idea to "sacrifice" the two battalions in front of the Germans on Mamayev Hill, the whole plan came from Shulka, and they can also be said to have indirectly "died" in Shulka's hands.
.
But how to say this question?
Shulka didn't know whether Khrushchev was right or wrong in doing so.
He is right. This is really unfair to the officers and soldiers of the two battalions stationed at Mamayev Heights. They were all kept in the dark and even fought with the enemy to the end... These two battalions are like Goli
As Kokov said, they were experienced veterans with a very tenacious fighting spirit. They stood firm on Mamayev Hill for three days despite a serious shortage of ammunition, and were finally wiped out in a surprise attack launched by the German army at night.
To say that he is wrong is indeed helpful to the entire plan, and it can even be said to be very helpful, because maybe because of this deception plan, the Germans believed that they would be able to capture Stalingrad in the near future, so they reinforced and supplied
and reserve troops would no longer be sent as a priority for the attack on Stalingrad, so the entire plan could be implemented smoothly.
Therefore, sometimes things on the battlefield are unclear and unclear. If you have to distinguish right from wrong, objectively speaking, national interests should prevail.
The German army was indeed fooled, which can be seen from the fact that the German army dispersed the reinforcements in batches to Army Group Center and Army Group North.
Paulus also protested to Hitler.
It is rare for an army commander to go beyond the army group commander to ask the head of state for instructions, but Paulus had this capital, because the Sixth Army under his command was already the mainstay of the Battle of Stalingrad.
"Your Majesty the Führer!" Paulus said: "We need reinforcements, ammunition, fuel, and everything else, but I know that they have been transferred to other places, including an armored division that was supposed to arrive this afternoon.
An artillery regiment!"
"My general!" Hitler replied: "Perhaps you already know the situation on the front line. The enemy launched a full-scale counterattack against our defense lines, and we had to send supplies and reinforcements to other directions...Obviously, the Russians did this in the hope that
Dispersing our army's reinforcements will delay the progress of our army's attack on Stalingrad. I will not give up here. I am organizing another batch of reinforcements. They will arrive at Stalingrad soon and be delivered to you! What you have to do
, just speed up the pace of progress! It will be ours soon!"
Paulus could only put down the phone helplessly. Although he knew that the "soon" mentioned by the head of state might be far away, he could do nothing.
If there is anything he can do, it is to transfer the two Italian divisions stationed on the Don River defense line to Stalingrad as reserves... Mamayev Hill has just been occupied by the Germans, and he needs more troops to hold it.
and expand the results.
This order made Dumilescu, commander of the Romanian 4th Army stationed south of Stalingrad, very dissatisfied.
The reason is that the defense lines of these two Italian divisions were handed over to the Romanian 4th Army for defense, and the Romanian 4th Army was originally lacking in strength.
"Our anti-tank equipment is seriously insufficient, general!" Dumilerescu complained to Paulus on the phone: "If the enemy's tank appears in front of us, even if there is only one, then we will have no choice but to wait and be killed!"
"
Dumilescu was not just threatening. The Romanian 4th Army only had a total of four 75MM anti-tank guns, but the defense line they stationed was 75 kilometers long. That is, one anti-tank gun was deployed on an average of two kilometers of defense line.
"Don't you still have an armored division?" Paulus asked.
"You mean the 1st Armored Division?" Dumilescu laughed: "We do have it, but we only have 4 tanks that are actually available!"
"Where are the other tanks?" Paulus asked.
"They had their cables chewed by voles!" Dumilerescu replied.
Paulus couldn't help laughing: "You are so funny, General! I think those field mice must have been sent by Stalin!"
Paulus thought that Dumilerescu was joking, or that he was complaining about the Romanian army and hoping to gain some resources.
But what Paulus didn't know was that Dumilescu was telling the truth. Quite a few of their tanks had indeed been chewed by voles and had their cables broken and could not be used.
The reason is that most of the tanks equipped by the Romanian 1st Armored Division are "No. 1" and "No. 2" tanks that were eliminated by the German army. There are also "5T" tanks, or light tanks captured from the Soviet army, faulty tanks, etc.
In terms of combat effectiveness, these tanks are still useful, because some of them are KV1 or even T4 captured by the German army from the Soviet army... KV1 tanks cannot cooperate with German tanks because of their slow speed and maintenance and reliability problems. T4
This is because some of the captured tanks were severely damaged, but because they could barely move, they were thrown to the Romanian army. At any rate, they could sometimes be used as forts.
The problem was that the German army was short of fuel, especially during the attack on Stalingrad.
As a result, almost all the fuel was supplied to the German armored forces and even the logistics forces (used for vehicle transportation and supplies) that were attacking Stagrad, but no gasoline was given to Romania.
This is somewhat ironic, because the gasoline was even shipped from Romania and produced by Romanians, but the Romanian armored forces were not allocated the fuel.
But this is normal, because the Romanian armored forces are stationed on the west bank of the Don River. They have almost no chance to participate in the war and certainly do not need to use tanks.
Dumilescu admitted it, and he was even happy about it.
Because when fuel is needed, it's time to go to the battlefield. For example, the German army is fighting the Russians on the front line.
In this regard, the Romanians still have an advantage, so there is nothing to complain about.
Because there was no fuel for a long time, the tanks could not move. On the other hand, the tank crews were worried about being bombed by the Soviet army... If they were bombed by the enemy without fuel, the tanks would not even be able to run.
Therefore, the tank crews of the Romanian 1st Armored Division built bunkers for the tanks and camouflaged them with straw.
What they didn't expect was that there were a lot of unthreaded rice on the straw, and the straw was an excellent breeding ground for voles... To be precise, the inside of the tank was the best breeding ground for voles. It was dry and comfortable there. If the straw and voles were combined,
Bringing the rice in to make a small nest is not a pleasant experience. When you have time, you can chew on the cables to grind your teeth.
As a result, out of hundreds of tanks of various types in the First Armored Division, within a few months only 4 tanks were left ready to be activated. (To be continued)