At this time, most of the German troops pursued the operational principle of "offense is the best defense", that is, they were better at attacking than defending, and even showed some disdain for absolute defense.

To be precise, they are more advocating "dynamic defense", that is, deploying mechanized troops in the second line, and the enemy will attack in whichever direction they break through to plug this loophole.

Admiral Kleist made similar preparations.

In order to prevent the Soviet troops from breaking through, Admiral Kleist left an armored regiment outside Kiev.

This armored regiment is the 11th armored regiment of the 3rd Motorized Army, and it has two tank battalions with a total of 93 tanks, which are deployed to the west and south of Kyiv.

This makes sense, because north of Kiev is the German 17th Army, and the bridge over the Dnieper has been blown up by the Soviets themselves, and further north is the German Army Center, which means that it is basically impossible to break through from this direction.

The west is also unlikely, as that is the hinterland of the German troops.

The reason why the German commander Eberhard divided his troops into two and deployed one of them to the west was that once the Soviets broke through, the tank battalion in the west would be able to flank the enemy with the tank battalion deployed in the south.

To Colonel Eberhard's surprise, the Soviet army's breakthrough direction was to the west.

"West? Why Southwest? Colonel Abbehard couldn't help but be stunned when he received the information, but he still ordered as soon as possible: "Order the first battalion to prepare for battle, and the second battalion will immediately reinforce the first battalion!" ”

"Yes, Colonel!"

But before the signal corps could convey the order, the battle had already begun.

Admiral Kirponos had information about the German armored forces, so the Soviet encirclement began with the annihilation of the 11th Panzer Regiment.

This made Admiral Kirponos a little nervous, because in the previous battles the Soviet and German tank units had faced each other, and there was a large difference in the number of tanks between the two sides...... Budyonny led a mechanized corps in the hope of breaking through the defenses of one of the German armored regiments.

If purely in terms of the number of tanks, a mechanized corps of the Soviet army has nearly 1,000 tanks, while an armored regiment of the German army only has about 100 tanks.

But this is not the case.

Because the German tank regiment is not just a tank regiment, they also have aircraft, artillery, infantry, and they cooperate with each other like a fish in water.

And the attack of the mechanized units of the Soviet army was a shout and then a swarm of swarms.

The Germans did not choose to defend the Soviets head-on...... This is what the Soviet army wanted.

The Germans retreated under the cover of air force, artillery and infantry.

There are only two words to say "retreat", but on the battlefield it is not so simple: shells are pouring into the Soviet tank group, Stuka bombardment fighters are swooping down from the top of their heads with a whistling sound, and the huge tank group of the Soviet army is beaten to the point that it is helpless, and there are signs of chaos.

Budyonny ordered the troops to accelerate their advance.

This order may be correct, because as long as it is tangled with the enemy's tanks, the superiority of the enemy's artillery fire and air power cannot be reflected.

But...... Waiting for the Soviet tanks in front were patches of mines.

That is, the Soviet mechanized corps had already suffered heavy losses before the German tanks were seen.

After the Soviet tanks were bombed, ran through minefields, and had a frustrating mechanical failure, they finally saw the German tanks.

It's just that the German tanks were not on the front, but on the flanks.

In order to avoid being surrounded by the Germans, the Soviets could only divide two units to fight separately, but the Germans continued to fight guerrilla warfare with the Soviet tanks with the high mobility of their tanks

The German tanks communicated well with each other, and could be very flexible to sometimes divide their forces and sometimes concentrate, while bombing and bombing the pursuing Soviet tanks with Stuka bombing, they formed a local superiority in forces to encircle and annihilate the scattered Soviet tanks.

On the other hand, the Soviet tanks did not have a unified command due to the lack of communication, and they all went around like headless flies.

As a result, more than 1,000 tanks fought against more than 100 German tanks, and not only failed to win, but lost nearly half of the tanks.

Now, also against an armored regiment of the Germans, the Soviet army has only one mechanized corps that is not fully organized, and the whole army has only more than 500 tanks.

Admiral Kirponos again had to start with tank battles.

The reason is simple, if the Germans do not annihilate this armored regiment left near Kiev, they will most likely become a nightmare for the Soviet 9th Army with its high mobility.

According to previous experience, although these 500 tanks still have a numerical advantage, they are not enough for the German army.

Therefore, from the moment the battle began, Admiral Kirponos was always in front of the radio with fear.

The sound of gunfire on the front line was already ringing in, mixed with the sound of tank tracks, flames, and smoke...... Once again, a tank battle between the Soviet Union and Germany began.

Shulka and the others had jumped out of the car and followed behind the tank.

On the one hand, this is because tanks need infantry cover and coordination, and on the other hand, the battlefield is full of shells, and then moving forward in a car at this time is undoubtedly a target for the enemy.

"Forward!" The battalion commander, Captain Venyakov, brandished a pistol and shouted at the fighters: "Follow the tank, pay attention to use the tank to hide yourself!" ”

This is the result of the training of the 9th Army during this time...... This was not the case in the previous battles of the Soviet army, where infantry was infantry and tanks were tanks, and perhaps the only effective coordination between infantry and tanks was to use tracer bullets to indicate the target and direction of the attack for the tanks.

Now it's completely different:

The starter waved the signal flag at the back, and all the tanks knew what to do...... The message, of course, was passed into the tank by a soldier lying on the back armor of the tank over the phone.

The Soviet soldiers also nicknamed the followers "Followers".

It's a nickname, because their job is to stay on their stomachs or follow the tank so that they can't fall for a moment.

No way...... Most of the Soviet soldiers were uneducated and rough people, so their nicknames were usually unpleasant, just like Shulka's nickname was "Escape Hero".

Followers make it much easier to coordinate between tanks and infantry, as they can tell the tank crew a few things intuitively from the outside:

"You're driving too fast, wait for them (infantry)!"

"Oh my God, you're going to collide with the tank next to you, right to right!"

……

But of course, there were also followers who would command blindly, and after the war, Shulka heard a tank crew member complain, and one of the followers called out on the phone: "Hey! There's a plane in front of you, why don't you guys knock it down?! ”