Chapter 995 Victory Is in Sight?

From April 16 to 20, the fighting between the two sides in the Kalinin region was still going on fiercely. On the battlefield in the eastern part of the region, in the Upper Volochok-Udomlya area, the heavy armored forces and mechanized infantry and motorized infantry of both sides fought fiercely on the muddy land full of lakes and swamps.

The European coalition forces were in a defensive posture in this area. Relying on the fortifications built last fall and winter, they invested a large number of mechanized infantry (armored grenadiers) and motorized infantry, and carried out resolute defensive operations with the support of Fw-190 fighters and HS-129 attack aircraft to resist the increasingly fierce attacks of the Soviet army, and made a posture to attack the Soviet army's flanking forces in the May Day Town-Vadair area.

The Soviet army was desperate for a decisive battle. It deployed four Guards Tank Armies (1st, 2nd, 5th, and 6th) and a large number of infantry on the front battlefield of less than 80 kilometers, and launched continuous strong attacks on the nights of the 16th, 17th, 18th, and 19th. It tried to take advantage of the difficulty of German aircraft to take out at night, and used powerful JS-2 tanks and T-34/85 tanks as spearheads to pierce the defense of the coalition forces and completely crush or expel the Paulus Group of the coalition forces.

However, after accumulating thousands of JS-2 tanks, T-34/85 tanks and more than 150,000 infantrymen to attack in turns, the Soviet army's attack on Volochok and Udomlya still suffered setbacks. Not only did it fail to break through the coalition defense, but it also paid a heavy price of more than 500 tanks destroyed (including more than 200 completely destroyed) and more than 30,000 casualties and missing persons.

By the daytime of April 20, the front lines of the two armies in Verkhovna Volochok and Udomlya had hardly changed from those on the 16th.

The most intense fighting between the two sides took place in the forested and swampy areas in the western part of Kalinin Oblast (west of the Red October Railway).

While the Soviet heavy troops were blocked in Verkhovna Volochok and Udomlya, General Chuikov's command of the flanking group was once again strengthened. While Chuikov was able to organize a large army to besiege Andreiapol, he also sent an assault group with the 18th Red Army as the main force to attack from Kuvshinovo along the Firovo-Ozerki-Vadel line. Firovo and Ozerki are both towns west of the Red October Railway. If the 18th Red Army can occupy them, it can open up contact with the 7th Guards Tank Army besieging Vadel, so that the gains and losses of Andreiapol will be insignificant.

Starting from the 17th, the 18th Army of the Red Army began to attack northward frantically. It hoped to capture the two key points of Firovo and Ozerki before the road became dry. The Soviet offensive was relatively smooth at the beginning. The main force of the 18th Army, the 16th Mechanized Army, repelled a Polish infantry brigade guarding Firovo on the night of the 18th and recaptured the city.

However, on the second night, the 16th Mechanized Army, which continued to advance, encountered the German army near Ozerki near Bologoye. The Soviet convoy, which was arranged in a 20-30 km long snake formation on the **** highway, was illuminated by the sudden flares, and then was ambushed by the No. 4 H tanks and "Olga's Hammer" ambushed in the nearby woods. In just over ten minutes, two or three hundred vehicles of various types were turned into burning fireballs.

Subsequently, the two sides launched a fierce melee along the muddy road. Both sides deployed hundreds of self-propelled artillery and more light artillery that could be deployed quickly (including mortars, infantry guns, mountain guns, and the ZIS-3 cannons that were everywhere in the Soviet army) to shoot at each other. The infantry of both sides also charged and counter-charged each other along the road. In the edge of the forest and the road, every inch of land became a "key point", and hundreds or thousands of shells from both sides often fell. The two sides changed hands several times before deciding who would win!

Because it was a close battle at night, the casualties were very tragic from the beginning. The German army was obviously planning to annihilate the Soviet 16th Mechanized Army, but the Soviet army played the tenacity and ferocity of GC fighters. Immediately after the surprise attack, they launched a counterattack, and also fought their best close combat and night battles - in the past two years, especially in 1943 when the German army had most of the air superiority, the Soviet army had been relying on night battles to deal with the German army. Close combat has always been the Russians' specialty. Even the infantry of the Tsarist Russia was famous in Europe for close combat with bayonets.

So although the German army succeeded in ambushing on the night of the 19th, it obviously underestimated the Soviet army's determination and night and close combat skills. After a hard battle, the Soviet 16th Mechanized Army was not defeated, and finally had to retreat around 2 a.m. the next day, leaving behind a field of corpses and damaged equipment, and giving the victory to the Soviet army.

However, the victorious Red Army suffered even more heavy losses. More than half of the 16th Mechanized Army was killed or wounded. On the 30-kilometer-long road and on both sides of the road, there were destroyed Soviet vehicles and dense corpses.

The entire 16th Mechanized Army was almost completely crippled, and the attack on Ozerki had to be postponed.

Meanwhile, the race for Andrea Boll is also raging. Because starting from the 12th, weather conditions allowed German aircraft to take off to support operations. Therefore, the Soviet army's battle for Andrea Pol can only be carried out at night, and night is conducive to German paratroopers to use their anti-tank firepower and individual firepower - the German paratroopers are not only equipped with many cannons with a range of up to 300 meters "Doll" rocket launcher, and the FG42 paratrooper rifle is standard. Therefore, the individual firepower and individual anti-tank firepower far exceed that of the Soviet infantry.

Moreover, paratroopers have always been an elite unit of the German army and are not comparable to ordinary infantry of the Soviet army. So Andreapol fought until April 20, and was still firmly in the hands of the German 2nd Parachute Division.

…

"What's going on? You can't even defeat a little Andrea Bol! What does the 8th Guards Tank Army do? A tank army can't take down ten thousand German paratroopers!"

During the day on the 20th, Marshal Zhukov, who was sitting in the underground command center of the General Staff Headquarters, suddenly felt a little irritable and lost his temper at Pepekov, who was reporting Andrei Bol's battle situation to him.

"Comrade Chief of the General Staff," Pepekov looked at his immediate superior with some strangeness, "The counterattack on the northern front is going quite smoothly now, although Andrea Bol cannot win. But in Fivolo - We are fighting relatively smoothly on the Ozerki front line, and it is expected that we can capture Ozerki within a few days. This way, the troops in the Wadale-Wuyi Town area can receive sufficient support, and victory is still expected. "

Of course, the "anticipated victory" Pepekov mentioned did not refer to the annihilation of the Paulus Cluster. This is not the historical period of the Battle of Stalingrad. It is completely impossible for the Soviet army to wipe out as many as five or six million people with tanks. / Paulus cluster with thousands of assault guns - although Stalin had illusions about this, Pepekov, the chief of staff Zhukov relied on, would not be so stupid.

What Pepekov considered victory was actually forcing the Paulus cluster to break out to the north. As long as the Paulus cluster retreats to Okulovka, north of May Day Town, the cluster will be 380 kilometers away from Moscow and will basically not pose a threat.

"But what about the Western Front?" Zhukov looked back at Pepekov, "Where do you think the armored divisions that the Germans transferred from the Northern Front went?"

"It's the center," Pepekov replied, "that is, the western front."

There is no doubt about this, because since the beginning of the Soviet-German War, the German army has always followed the principle of "concentrating superior forces." Their superior forces are always gathered on one battlefield.

The battlefield where the German army now concentrates its superior forces is undoubtedly Moscow!

Therefore, the Soviet General Staff could guess the outline of the combat plan in the drawer of Hessman's desk with their eyes closed - first encircle Moscow, and then the Volga-Urals region or the Caucasus region.

Moscow has not yet been surrounded, so the elite German armored groups will not leave. The reason why they were transferred from the northern front must be because it is more advantageous to fight from west to east. The terrain north of Moscow is indeed not as conducive to mechanized attack as west and south of Moscow. Anyone with military knowledge will know this.

"There are no major problems on the Western Front," Pepekov said. "Marshal Konev's reserve front has taken over the position. He has adopted a large-depth defense strategy to ensure that the German army cannot form a breakthrough in the short term. If the German army wants to We also have enough troops to intercept them by going south, and it is still muddy season, and the roads are not conducive to the Germans. Their offensive will probably start in May, and we still have time."

Now that they had guessed the possible deployment of the German army (in fact, there were just a few moves here and there), the Soviet army naturally also made targeted arrangements.

"So victory on the northern front can still be expected," Pepekov said. "What we should do now is to invest more troops and storm Volochok, Udomlya and... Report!"

Before he finished speaking, he was interrupted by a report. A staff officer hurriedly arrived in front of Pepekov and Zhukov like a gust of wind.

The staff report said: "Report from the Reserve Front Army Headquarters, the Rzhev-Sychokav-Vyazma front line stationed by the 1st Guards Army is suffering from heavy artillery and bombing by the German army! Marshal Konev believes that the German army is The offensive in the above-mentioned areas has begun, and he suggested ending the counterattack on the northern front and fully defending Moscow.”