Chapter 660 Heavy Thunderstorm Forty-Eight
Northwest of Warsaw, Womianki.
This place is located on the west bank of the Vistula River, across the river from Legionovo. It is the farthest place from the smoke and sound of gunfire on the entire Warsaw battlefield.
Captain Gustav Schwarzenegger felt like he was in another world from the front line in Warsaw, where he could die at any time, to the peaceful and peaceful Warmianki. He is now standing in the commander's seat of the No. 4 H-tank, looking at the lush wheat fields and villages and towns along the roadside, as if he has returned to the countryside of his hometown Austria in peacetime.
"When the war is over, I will go back to my hometown, buy a farm, and live a pastoral life for a few years. This is the best..." Captain Schwarzenegger seemed a little tired of the constant fighting on the battlefield and thought about it. A few years of quiet pastoral life.
"Captain, are we abandoning Warsaw?"
Gunner Oger's German with a Norwegian accent interrupted Captain Schwarzenegger's thoughts and brought him back to the cruel reality - it is not easy to go home and farm, because the war with the Soviet Red Army is unprecedentedly fierce and peaceful. cruel.
In more than a month of fighting, Captain Schwarzenegger's company has had 15 No. 4 H tanks destroyed and injured, and the personnel losses (sacrifice and serious injuries) reached 52 people. This is Captain Schwarzenegger's first The heaviest casualties seen since the war broke out!
And the infantry losses he saw were even more severe. Every minute of fighting in downtown Warsaw seemed to be accompanied by death. The city of Warsaw has become a flesh and blood mill. Every street, every building, and every ruin has to go through repeated battles to determine its temporary ownership. Every inch of land occupied by the Soviet Red Army was soaked in blood, the blood of the Soviets or the Germans!
However, after experiencing such huge losses, the strength of the Warsaw garrison did not weaken. Because Warsaw was not an isolated city, there were a large number of German troops stationed along the Vistula and Butzula rivers behind it. They protected Warsaw's back roads and ensured that reinforcements could continuously arrive in Warsaw.
Therefore, the losses of frontline troops can be quickly replenished, and the company led by Captain Schwarzenegger is now fully equipped. Years of battlefield experience told him that it was impossible for such a tank company with sufficient personnel and equipment to leave the front line.
"No, we will not give up Warsaw!" Captain Schwarzenegger said very firmly, "We are going to fight somewhere else. This time we may take the initiative to attack, and we will launch an attack soon!"
His judgment was completely justified, because after the 5th SS Tank Battalion was transferred from Warsaw, the defenders in Warsaw could only rely on the No. 3 assault gun to counterattack the Soviet B-4 assault group. Because the combat capability of the No. 3 assault gun is not as good as that of the No. 4 H tank, and once the No. 3 assault gun is on the front line, it cannot also serve as a self-propelled artillery to support frontline infantry operations.
Therefore, in the next few days, the defense pressure on Warsaw City will be very high. If the armored cluster does not fight back as soon as possible, Warsaw will be unable to withstand it.
…
Major General Rotmistrov, commander of the 7th Tank Army of the Soviet Red Army, walked quickly into his military headquarters. When he saw the military political commissar Oktyabryski, he smiled and said to him: "Comrade political commissar, on the Narew River The bridge is ready and we’re about to set off tonight!”
Nowadays, the mobilization of mechanized units of the Soviet Red Army is generally carried out at night, because after more than a month of competition, the Soviet Red Air Force finally realized that it could not defeat the German Air Force at all.
The Yak-1, which is famous for its maneuverability and flexibility, is naturally as stupid as a pig when it encounters the Fokker Zero. The MiG-3, which is famous for its high-altitude performance, cannot show any prestige when it encounters the He-219 and Fw-190B/C. At the mid-to-high altitude level, there is no Soviet aircraft that can compete with the Fw-190A-4.
From June 1 to the present, the exchange ratio in air combat has remained at the level of one German aircraft for 6-7 Soviet aircraft. And because the Poles were relatively accepting of the Germans between the Soviet Union and Germany, the rescue rate of German pilots who parachuted over Poland was much greater than that of Soviet pilots who parachuted - in a few areas that were already firmly controlled by the Polish Bolshevik Party , parachuting German pilots were difficult to rescue, but there was not a Bolshevik Party committee leading the masses to capture Nazi pilots below most of the combat airspace.
Therefore, the exchange ratio of pilots between Germany and the Soviet Union was as high as about 1:10. If the Germans lost one pilot, the Soviet side would lose 10 pilots! Although the Soviet Union has far more civilian pilots than Germany (more fuel means more pilots), it cannot afford such consumption. Moreover, civilian pilots cannot fly fighter aircraft into the air without a certain period of training.
Therefore, starting from mid-July, the Polish sky was gradually controlled by the German Air Force. The Soviet Red Air Force could only concentrate its efforts to ensure the security of key areas, such as the Warsaw battlefield and main logistics lines. The advance and mobilization of mechanized troops was placed at night as much as possible.
"Departure tonight? Going to Legionovo?" Oktyabryski asked. Although he is a high-ranking military and political commissar, his access to military secrets is limited. For example, he did not know in advance the plan for a roundabout decisive battle formulated by the front army headquarters.
In fact, even the army commander Zhimachenko only got the text of the battle plan from the front chief of staff Major General Rimoskik before attending the combat meeting in Minsk last night. And the commander of the 7th Tank Army, Rotmistrov, only learned the attack direction of the 7th Tank Army at the army combat meeting an hour ago.
He told Oktyabriski: "It's not to Legionovo, but to Serotsk, from where we cross the Renav River and catch the Nazis off guard."
"What? Cross the Renav River?" Oktyabriski was surprised, "Are we going to make a big detour behind the enemy? But the German planes will come to bomb us."
"This time there will be American planes to cover us," Rotmistrov said with a smile, "It's American internationalist fighters flying P-51 planes. They have actually arrived in Minsk a long time ago. It's just that they haven't been dispatched so much during this period, but this time they will show their skills. There will be an English-speaking air force liaison officer arriving this afternoon."
At Stalin's request, more than 20 American fighter squadrons have been deployed to the Soviet Union. These fighter squadrons are equipped with P-51 series fighters, most of which are high-altitude models, and some are low-altitude models. However, these American aircraft cannot be used openly, otherwise they will soon be consumed by the large number of German fighters, so they can only be used in the most critical places.
…
"I am Captain Gustav Schwarzenegger, the commander of the 2nd Company of the 5th SS Tank Battalion, and I have been ordered to lead my troops to report to you."
Just as the 7th Tank Army of the Soviet Red Army set out on its journey at night, Captain Schwarzenegger also met his temporary commander, Major Beck, at a hidden campsite of the armored part in Womyanki.
"Welcome you and your comrades, I am Franz Beck, a major in the Wehrmacht Army Reserve, and I have been ordered to serve as the commander of the Beck Heavy Armored Regiment."
Unlike most of the school-level officers of the Wehrmacht Armored Forces, Major Franz Beck is a "reserve major", which means he is not a professional officer. In fact, he is a dentist, and a doctor of dentistry, and has not attended a military school. In the last World War, he was awarded the rank of technical sergeant (artillery) and the second-class Iron Cross. Later, he joined the army again in 1937 and served in the 6th Armored Division. He served as battalion adjutant, anti-tank platoon leader, tank company commander, tank regiment chief of staff and tank battalion commander. He was an armored force commander with rich combat experience. Therefore, he was brought to Warsaw by General Reinhardt and appointed as the commander of a temporary heavy armored regiment.
The so-called heavy armored regiment is actually a temporary synthetic regimental battle group. It consists of a heavy armored battalion equipped with Panther tanks (the 504th Battalion or the 505th Battalion), 2 tank companies equipped with No. 4 H tanks (drawn from the 5th SS Tank Battalion), 1 self-propelled armored artillery battalion or 1 assault gun battalion (drawn from the 5th SS Division), 1 armored grenadiers battalion (Finnish Battalion or the 1st Battalion of the Walloon Brigade) and 1 armored engineer battalion.
There are two regiments, namely the "Beck Heavy Armored Regiment" and the "Rudel Heavy Armored Regiment", and Captain Schwarzenegger's tank company was incorporated into the Beck Heavy Armored Regiment.
According to the plan formulated by General Reinhardt and Major General Hube, starting from July 20, that is, tomorrow, in the "Legionovo Short Assault Operation", three heavy armored battalions equipped with Tiger tanks will be responsible for taking the lead, and with the cooperation of armored grenadiers, they will attack the Soviet front, benefiting from the powerful power of 132 Tiger tanks, giving the Soviet front a crushing blow.
The "Beck Heavy Armored Regiment" and the "Rudel Heavy Armored Regiment" are responsible for breaking through the gaps made by the Tiger tanks and attacking along the line of Radzymin-Wowomin-Sureowic. Strive to break through the back of the Soviet army attacking Warsaw in the shortest time, not to surround the dozen Soviet army groups under the city of Warsaw, a dozen army groups with more than one million people, Model does not have such a big appetite.
His idea was just a short offensive to deal a heavy blow to the Soviet Army's northern cluster and force them to abandon the attack on Legionovo. This would allow the Soviet Army's main attack direction to return to Warsaw, the meat grinder, and at the same time attract more Soviet reserve troops to the Warsaw front, creating favorable conditions for the assault on the northern line.