Chapter 1005 The Moment of Fate Has Arrived

While Marshal Zhukov was busy digging traps for the German armored forces, Marshal Konev, a Soviet general who was almost as famous as him in history, also showed his determination to sacrifice his life for the cause of GCism. He stayed in Tervivo, only 18 kilometers away from Volokolamsk, day and night, urging the three armies that had been fighting for many days to deploy defenses. Fortunately, the defensive positions were ready. As early as last winter, hundreds of thousands of Soviet people with Moscow household registration braved the severe cold and worked hard for two months on the land from Tervivo to Klin to build three defense zones. They were all defense zones that included a large number of anti-tank trenches and anti-tank firepower strongholds!

In less than 48 hours, Konev deployed hundreds of thousands of troops to the Tervivo defense zone, the most advanced of the three defense zones. Most of these troops belonged to the First Red Banner Army mobilized from the Far East, and the rest were mostly drawn from the First and Second Guards Armies, and some were reinforcements that had just arrived from the Far East. In order to defend Moscow, Stalin had done his best and was frantically searching for troops everywhere!

As a famous Red Army general, Konev was not in vain. He knew very well that while he was desperately organizing defense, the Germans would not be idle and must be mobilizing elite troops.

So once the war is reignited, it will inevitably be several times more intense!

The E-50A tank, which had not appeared before, would most likely reveal its true face.

In order to find out the true strength of the German army and see the E-50A tank, Marshal Konev went to the front-line position to observe the situation in person despite the obstruction of his staff. In any case, he had to help Zhukov find out the opponent's trump card in time before the tank decisive battle that determined the fate of GCism began.

This Soviet marshal is now ready to fulfill his oath: to sacrifice himself for GCism!

In a wet and muddy observation bunker very close to the front, Marshal Konev was observing the battlefield where the smoke had not yet dissipated through the artillery telescope. However, he soon felt a little disappointed, because the tanks that appeared in the eyepiece were still the tanks he was very familiar with - the Tiger tank and the Grizzly assault gun!

Compared with the previous combination of the No. 4 tank and the Grizzly assault gun, it was indeed upgraded, but the E-50 that he wanted to see the most did not show up. Now the Soviet Red Army only knows that the enemy has such a new type of heavy tank.

But they know nothing about its performance, and of course they don’t know whether the JS-2 tank’s 122mm cannon can penetrate its front?

For this question, no one in the Red Army dared to guarantee it. Because the theoretical value of the right-angle penetration depth of the JS-2 122mm cannon at 1500 meters is 185mm homogeneous steel plate. In actual combat, this standard is definitely not met.

The Soviet Union's 122mm armor-piercing shells were also not very ideal, and it was good enough if they could penetrate 200mm. However, the Germans now have a simple and effective way to deal with armor-piercing shells, which is to add skirts on both sides of the tank and weld an iron fence on the front. Although it cannot block armor-piercing shells 100%, the defense effect against armor-piercing shells is still very ideal.

So hundreds of A-1 cannons (the main gun of JS-2) were pushed to the front line and stuffed into the bunkers where the ZIS-3 76mm cannons were originally placed. They were ready to give the German E-50A a hard blow, but the target did not appear.

Konev turned around and asked, "At what distance is the A-19 cannon going to fire?"

General Beloborodov, commander of the First Red Banner Army, replied, "If the enemy's E-50 tank is found, the A-19 cannon will fire at a distance of 1,000 meters. If the E-50 tank is not found, half of the A-19 cannons will be hidden first, and the rest will fire at a distance of 1,500 meters."

Konev nodded and said nothing more - he himself is an expert in the use of artillery, and has used artillery to fight many wonderful defensive battles in the battlefields of Eastern Ukraine and Crimea.

Of course, it is also known that once the 7-caliber cannon is pushed into the front line to fight against the German tank cluster, it is basically "Farewell, Motherland" - this is the catchphrase of the Soviet artillery in this battle, meaning that there is no return!

Basically, the ZIS-3 and A-19 cannons and gun groups that are on the front line (referring to fighting with enemy tanks) are disposable. 20%-30% of them will be destroyed by German artillery or bombing before the first shell is fired, and most of the remaining cannons will only have a "lifespan" of dozens of rounds. The ZIS-3 or A-19 that can survive for more than 24 hours in the fierce battle line are either placed in reinforced concrete bunkers or have great luck.

In addition to poor survivability, the cannons placed on the front line have an insurmountable weakness - the defense line is long, and no one knows where the enemy's tank cluster will appear? Therefore, the cannons can only be deployed in a dispersed manner, and in places where they are really needed to exert their firepower, the number of cannons must be much less than the enemy's tanks.

The defense line of the 1st Red Flag Army in Turvivo is more than 30 kilometers long, and the main breakthrough area of ​​the Germans is at most a few kilometers wide. In other words, only a small number of A-19 cannons will really come in handy. And relying on them, it is impossible to resist the German steel torrent.

The role of these A-19 cannons is just to test the depth of the E-50 tanks.

"Boom boom boom..."

When the thunderous sound of artillery sounded, Major General Marx, the commander of the 1st Armored Division of the German Army, was immediately startled. His Tiger tanks and Grizzlies (which were transferred from the 4th Armored Grenadier Division and assigned to the 1st Armored Division) were still 1,500 meters away from the Soviet front line.

And the sound of artillery did not sound like the sound of ZIS-2 and ZIS-3, but the 122mm cannon was firing!

He quickly raised his telescope and looked forward, only to see that a large armored vehicle, not sure whether it was a "Tiger" or a "Grizzly", had been set on fire. The remaining Tiger tanks and Grizzlies reacted quickly, and stopped advancing after the first round of Soviet artillery fire, preparing to fire back.

But the Soviet 122mm gun fired the second round first! On the battlefield, another Grizzlies assault gun was destroyed on the spot.

However, the good luck of the Soviet artillery ended there. When the cannons on the position fired for the third time and destroyed two Tiger tanks, an experienced German tank commander had already discovered the muzzle flame.

The turrets of more than a dozen Tiger tanks turned, and then the coaxial machine guns fired, followed by the roar of the cannons. The civil artillery bunkers were blown into the sky, and the two A-1 cannons and their gun crews were all blown into the air. There were also four A-19 cannons that continued to fight and continue to fire. Perhaps because of panic, they did not hit any targets this time, but instead attracted more 88mm armor-piercing shells, which were all blown into the sky after several rounds of artillery battles.

Seeing this scene, Konev just sighed slightly. It seems that Germany does not need to send out the E-50 at all, and the defense line of the Red Flag 1st Army will be broken.

"Comrade Commander, it's dangerous here, you should move first." Admiral Beloborodov said loudly to Konev at this time, "Leave this to our Red Banner 1st Army, it's no problem to hold off the Germans for 2-3 days."

Konev nodded and said to Beloborodov: "Tell the comrades that although Russia is big, we have no way to retreat, because Moscow is behind us!"

This slogan, first shouted by the officers and soldiers of the 8th Guards Infantry Division, has now spread to the three fronts near Moscow, and all the Red Army soldiers understand its meaning.

Their Soviet motherland has now reached the most dangerous moment!

...

When Beloborodov made a promise to Konev, General Hermann Hoth, commander of the German 4th Panzer Army, also came to Volokolamsk to supervise the battle.

Now is also the most critical moment for the German Third Reich!

Although the General Staff and the Central Army Group Command had roughly guessed the Soviet army's plan, they still resolutely invested the biggest bet.

As the commander of the army group on the front line, he certainly couldn't be vague, so at the military mobilization meeting last night, General Hoth also gave the troops a rare death order: within three days, the 48th Armored Army must attack near Link and cut off the Red October Railway Line, and at the same time be prepared for a decisive battle with the Soviet tank cluster that has an advantage in numbers!

The Soviet tank cluster must be defeated at all costs!

The fate of the German Third Reich, the European continent, and even the entire world will be determined by this tank battle.

At this moment, the German Wehrmacht General Staff far away in Berlin was also extremely tense. Imperial Marshal Hessmann and Imperial Marshal Schleicher, the Minister of Defense who had retired from active service, both put their beds in the General Staff from the evening of the 26th. They were the first to grasp any changes on the front line.

In fact, Marshal Guderian, who was commanding the overall situation on the Eastern Front, was in the first operations room at this moment, thinking hard about a situation map of the Moscow front. Chief of the General Staff Hessmann walked in quietly. Guderian heard the noise at the door and turned his head. Seeing Hessmann, who looked tired and had dark circles under his eyes, Guderian knew that his immediate superior must be under great pressure now. He probably couldn't sleep for even a minute last night.

"Imperial Marshal," Guderian smiled and frowned, "the moment of fate has come!"