About fifty kilometers southeast of Rosohi, the village of Zuravka.

Captain Rabin, commander of the 1st Regiment, 1st Battalion, and 2nd Company of the 1st Infantry Division of the "Honorary Jew" Infantry Corps, got up early in the morning to inspect the position with two colleagues whom he had just met yesterday afternoon.

The village of Zuravka, where Captain Rabin and his men lived, and the city of Kandemirovka, about five kilometers to the south, guarded a traffic artery with four forks.

These four junctions lead to the village of Markivka to the south, the Don River to the east, and Rosohi to the north.

Yesterday for a whole day, all the motor vehicles of the 1st Infantry Division of the "Honorable Jews" transported the infantry here and in the rear, one after another.

The task of the 1st Infantry Division was to defend the east with this fork in the road as the center, and at the same time to send reconnaissance units to investigate the movements of enemy forces in the Boguchar-on-Don area to the east.

Yesterday morning, Captain Rabin and his men arrived in Zuravka on assault gun No. 3, and about half an hour later, an engineer platoon was ordered to join the 2nd Company and work with the soldiers of the 2nd Company to build fortifications in Zuravka.

In the afternoon, two more units joined Captain Rabin's ranks.

The first to arrive was the second company of the anti-aircraft artillery battalion under the 1st Infantry Division. Soldiers of the 2nd Anti-aircraft Artillery Company drove trucks and towed 12 PAK 40 anti-aircraft guns into the village of Zuravka.

This was followed by a unit from the Luftwaffe.

As soon as winter arrived last year, Marshal Goering, in his vanity, tried to imitate the template of the "Imperial Marshal" Panzer Division, recruited a group of redundant personnel from the huge and bloated air force ground forces, and formed ten air force field divisions to brush up on the Eastern Front.

After Chen Dao learned about it, he scolded Goering bitterly, this group of officers and soldiers who looked like T-34 tanks and KV series tanks formed an infantry division to go to the Eastern Front, which would only be brushed up by the Russians and ruin the reputation of the Luftwaffe, and it would not play any role.

It's just that Goering has already made a promise to the Supreme Command to send troops, but he can't take it back, so he has no choice but to get by.

He transferred 100,000 men from ground support units and antiaircraft artillery units to form 10 antiaircraft artillery divisions using obsolete antiaircraft guns, and went to the Eastern Front with the sign of an air force field division to fight with the army.

That's right, before the troops set out, Chen Daoqian instructed that these air force field divisions would never be allowed to fight alone, and that they could only be assigned to the army's troops and fight in coordination with them.

In 1943, because the front-line army brothers were quite satisfied with the performance of the air force field division, Chen Dao scavenged a batch of obsolete old anti-aircraft guns from the German Navy, transferred redundant personnel from the air force, and formed five air force field divisions to go to the Eastern Front.

Of the five newly formed Air Force Field Divisions, the 13th Air Field Division was incorporated into Chen Dao's unit and assigned to the Honorary Jewish Infantry Corps.

Each air force field division has three antiaircraft artillery regiments under its jurisdiction, each antiaircraft artillery regiment has three antiaircraft artillery battalions under its jurisdiction, and each antiaircraft artillery battalion has one light, medium, and heavy antiaircraft artillery company under its jurisdiction.

Captain Rabin was reinforced by 12 MG-C/30 20-mm L65 anti-aircraft guns from the 37th Anti-Aircraft Artillery Regiment and the 2nd Battalion of the 13th Air Force Field Division.

These 20-mm anti-aircraft guns were eliminated from the battleship "Bismarck", with a base with four wheels, and finally thrown to the 13th Air Force Field Division, which was dedicated to sweeping infantry and part-time fighting aircraft.

Captain Rabin, who was not the first person to meet the 13th Air Force Field Division, had heard of the unscrupulous behavior of the air force anti-aircraft artillery unit, and soon became involved with their company commander, Captain Muller.

At first, Captain Rabin thought that his troops would only stop in the village of Zuravka for a while and then continue their march.

Yesterday afternoon, he suddenly received an order from the battalion headquarters to comprehensively strengthen the defense of the village of Zuravka, and then the two units arrived one after another, so that Captain Rabin smelled the smell of gunpowder that was about to come in a big battle.

After aerial reconnaissance yesterday morning, the Panzer Division of the "Imperial Marshal" had detected that a large number of Soviet troops were moving south in the direction of the Don River to the east, entering the Boguchar area.

If the enemy were to attack west from the Boguchar area, this main road of communication where the "Honorable Jews" infantry division was stationed would inevitably be the first to be attacked. Occupying this, to the north you can outflank the Panzer Division of the "Imperial Marshal", and to the south you can threaten the airfield in the village of Markiivka.

Knowing the severity of the situation on the battlefield, Captain Rabin and his subordinates hurried to build fortifications and were busy until the second half of the night.

Before the day was completely light, he got up early and found Captain Muller, the commander of the anti-aircraft artillery company, and Captain Stein of the anti-aircraft artillery company, and inspected the village of Zuravka together.

Three men stood in the northeast corner of the village of Zuravka, on the west bank of a small river.

Holding a sketch of the battlefield in pencil in his hand, Captain Rabin pointed to the river on the map and said: "This river flows east of our line and can provide us with some cover and cause some trouble for the Russian tanks." I think the real pressure on us is coming from the north, and we should deploy more technical weapons to the north, especially the anti-aircraft artillery. ”

Captain Stein pointed to the open field north of the village, where the sappers were toiling to lay mines.

"We are not very afraid if the enemy's main forces come in this direction, even if the enemy uses a large number of tanks. After all, there are our allies in the northwest who are fighting together, and they can share some of the pressure for us. What worries me is that the enemy's artillery, whether it is anti-aircraft guns or anti-aircraft artillery, has a weak defensive capability, and how to avoid the enemy's initial artillery fire is our biggest problem. ”

Captain Rabin said: "It depends on the performance of the artillery behind us, if they can detect the enemy's artillery in advance and suppress them, we can relieve a lot of pressure." ”

"This village is crescent-shaped, with the sunken side facing north, and I think we should deploy more weapons and personnel in the northwest and northeast corners, and at the same time find a way to attract them to the middle, so that we can shoot sideways at the enemy who has rushed into the hollow area of the village." Captain Muller said.

Captain Stein nodded and said, "I agree with Captain Mueller. ”

"Well, I'll let the sappers put up more obstacles in the northeast corner, and if the Russians can't break through in the northeast corner, they should change direction, so that our chance comes." Captain Rabin said.

The deployment was finalized, and the troops were busy again.

Fast forward to ten o'clock in the morning, when Captain Rabin stood in the northeast corner of the village and saw dozens of black dots in the northeast sky chasing each other.

"I feel that the enemy is approaching, and our planes seem to be diving and strafing the ground." Captain Mueller did not know when he walked up to him.

Captain Rabin said, "Yes, at this pace, I think the Russians will arrive by the time we have lunch." ”

Captain Mueller did not answer, but squinted at the eastern sky.

"Mr. Captain, we have to get out of here, the first thing we have to deal with is not the Russian artillery, damn it, the Il-2 is coming, get out of here and find a place to hide." Captain Mueller turned around and ran.

Captain Rabin was also quick to react, and less than a minute after the two of them left the north-east corner of the village, five Il-2 attack planes lowered their altitude, two of which flew over the village of Zuravka and three over the woods northwest of the village.

With the rumbling sound of explosions, flames and smoke broke the calm of the ground and kicked off the battle.