"What now? Why hasn't the commander's call back come yet? Karpov, who was at the spearhead of the offensive of the whole army, reinforced by three divisions and one tank brigade, walked around the corps headquarters in distress, the 27th Army was the unit facing the German defensive positions head-on, and there was no one of the few units that was not affected by the intersperse, but he did not live in a vacuum, and the dense exchange of fire in the rear and the chaos in the radio system inevitably interfered with his determination. Although Chistyakov had clearly asked him to launch the offensive as planned before tonight, it would be irresponsible to the party, the people, and the troops that he could not simply ignore and rigidly carry out orders after a major change in the situation.

"It would be better to advise Comrade Commander to postpone or cancel the offensive...... "Masnov said with a frown, "but now it is all the more important to find out the true purpose of the Germans - whether they were infiltrating in small formations or attacking in large forces, whether they intended to leave with a touch or whether they had a deeper strategic purpose...... Rushing to attack doesn't do us much good. ”

While he was thinking about it, the silence was broken by a telegram sent by the staff officer: "The commander of the group army sent a telegram that in view of the current chaos in the rear, the time for launching the offensive has been advanced from 5:45 to 5:00, and the original plan remains unchanged, striving to use the offensive to disrupt the enemy's deployment. ”

Karpov looked at his watch, it was already 4:45, and the sound of gunfire in the distance had been ringing out in all directions, and he shook his head and gave the order: "Prepare to attack!" ”

"Don't fight for it again?" Masnov asked eagerly.

"It's useless, I know the commander better than you. He had made up his mind, and in the absence of a situation in which it was difficult to judge the severity of the situation, he would rather strike out than wait passively and conservatively for the situation to become clear. That's not his style. Karpov sighed, "He's done it right many times in the past, and hopefully he's still right this time." ”

Masnov thought for a moment and said slowly: "Even so, we must leave enough reserves and armored forces, and in case the rear needs rescue, the troops can adjust their direction in time." ”

Karpov nodded. Tell the staff officers: "Fine-tune the offensive plan and follow Comrade Buchin's advice." ”

At 5 o'clock, the attacking units of the Red Army, which were not affected, launched artillery preparations on time. Artillery of various calibers poured ammunition on the German positions in front, and the German troops, who were initially tasked with interspersing the task, were greatly surprised, thinking that their movements had been strongly intercepted by the enemy, and when they found that all the fire was being fired in the direction of the front. Not a single unit stopped and watched. All of them are stuffy and carry out their own interspersed strategies.

Looking at the heavy artillery fire projected by the Red Army towards the defensive positions, Manstein and Heinrich in the rear command suddenly laughed together, "These fools! ”

In front of the 27th Army were 3 German infantry divisions defending with a good system of fortifications, and behind them was the No. 2 defensive line, Army Group South also held the reserves of 6 infantry divisions, and the bulky 150mm howitzers of each infantry division did not go to the front line to undertake the task of interspersing because of the inconvenience of movement, so this defensive force could not be gnawed by Karpov alone. The Red Army at this moment is like a huge North American bison. Faced with the situation of being dismembered by a knife, he didn't think about how to escape. Instead, he tried to use the horns of the ox to push through the stone wall in front of him - how unwise!

"Do you want to let them in?" Manstein suddenly turned his head and asked Heinrich, "It will be more beneficial for our attack." ”

The latter thought for a moment and rejected the tempting suggestion: "Forget it, be on the safe side." ”

"Well, heavy artillery is preparing for suppression and counter-artillery fire."

According to the offensive routine of the Red Army, the attack was usually launched after 45-60 minutes of artillery preparation, but because there were too many expectations for the offensive of the 27th Army, this round of artillery preparation lasted for 75 minutes before it ended, and then the infantry followed the large-scale attack behind the barrage and tanks.

The east showed the whiteness of the fish's belly, the sky was gradually brightening, although the fierce attack on the front was launched as planned, but Chistyakov could not tell the bitterness in his heart, the front was a landslide, and his main force in the rear was disturbed by the Germans. In the middle of the Red Army's artillery preparations, the anti-tank positions that the 21st Army had managed to assemble at dawn were dealt a devastating blow: they had planned to try to stop the torrent of armor of the Guards Banner Brigade, but the Germans quickly retreated after paying the price of two tanks being destroyed. Before the anti-tank units of the Red Army were happy, the Guard Flag Team quickly pushed the latest equipment they carried, a full 16 self-propelled rocket artillery vehicles, these rocket launchers, nicknamed the "Himmler Organ", were newly developed at the request of Hoffman to deal with the Katyusha (Stalin Organ), mounted on the SdKfz 251/1 half-track armored vehicle, which is a regimental fire support unit, with a maximum range of more than 6000 meters, equipped with ammunition in a modular way, It can launch 24 rockets in 7 seconds at a time. Under the overwhelming coverage of nearly 400 rounds of 150mm rockets, this hard-fought position was shrouded in a sea of fire and almost completely destroyed, and the self-propelled rocket artillery vehicles after pouring ammunition did not stay in place and were stupidly beaten, and continued to follow the torrent of armor while reloading.

At 8:15 a.m., the most important turning point in the battle of Hequbu came: due to the news that the Daode Army was attacking on a large scale, the front line was fiercely exchanged fire, and the 21st Army was in urgent need of reinforcements, the units of the 24th Group Army that were crossing the river accelerated the pace of their advance, and heavy equipment such as tanks and artillery became the priority units to cross the river. However, the infantrymen who were on standby on the shore suddenly spotted the warship in the distance from the downstream upstream, and when they saw clearly that it was the Romanian flag flying on it, everyone was surprised, but unfortunately, it was too late.

The commander of the formation, Colonel Bernard, was very satisfied with his efforts, and the fleet hurried to the designated place, and now the pontoon bridge was in sight, and the only order was - fire! The entire formation opened fire together, and a total of 12 127mm naval guns on 3 destroyers and 10 240mm guns on 4 shallow water gunboats quickly began to fire, and massive fire rushed towards the pontoon. The Red Army officers and men on the pontoon bridge had understood that the big thing was not good, and the front was desperately rushing forward, and the rear was desperately retreating, but it was too late, and the fierce artillery fire continued to explode in the middle of the river, and the two pontoon bridges in front were blown up in an instant, and the Red Army soldiers, artillery, tanks and other heavy equipment who were crossing the river instantly fell into the icy and biting Don River, and for them, the war was completely over.

The Red Army on the shore woke up like a dream and copied all kinds of weapons to counterattack, but whether it was mortars, machine guns or rifles, it was difficult to shake the steel fleet on the river, these warships were inconspicuous little followers on the Black Sea, but in the Don River they were behemoths that crushed everything, all resistance and counterattack were torn to pieces by the naval artillery group, the river was quickly stained red by the blood of the Red Army soldiers, and the banks became a Shura hell.

After the "offensive ......" suppressed and destroyed all the resistance forces, a satisfied Bernard continued to command the fleet to advance and prepare to destroy the three pontoon bridges further upstream.

In the Kremlin, Comrade Stalin was reviewing various documents and reports, and suddenly Zhukov and Vasilevsky went to his office and reported in an anxious tone, "Comrade Kalanin, commander of the 24th Army, has sent the latest report. ”

"Oh?" Stalin's attention was still focused on the papers, and he didn't pay attention to the faces and tones of his two subordinates, raised his head and asked with a smile on his face, "Has his army crossed the river so soon?" ”

"No, I can't cross the river for a while."

"What?" Stalin paused for a moment, he could see that the two of them looked wrong, and when he read the telegram clearly, he angrily threw the message paper on the ground and roared, "Where did the Germans get the warship?" What are our Air Forces doing? ”

"The Luftwaffe is relatively strong, our Air Force has been covering the Caucasus direction, plus for some time German aircraft have turned a blind eye to the pontoons, and the front-line generals have relaxed their vigilance." Vasilevsky explained, "Yesterday was a snowy night, and visibility on the Don was not very good, so this is how the warship probably got in." ”

"What about the report of the 21 Army? What about their offense? ”

"This ......," Zhukov and Vasilevsky said cautiously, as if they looked at each other, "they were under a massive attack by the enemy. ”

"Didn't Comrade Chistyakov say that the offensive should be launched on time?" Stalin said coldly, "What is the result? ”

"It's not ideal, their situation is not good, the Germans penetrated into the rear, now the command system is out of order, Comrade Chistyakov is trying to adjust."

"Is that what it means to be surrounded?"

"It can't be called surrounded, but the order and command of the army group command is obviously out of order."

"What's the Failure Method?" Stalin asked, "Can he attack?" Or rather, can he resist the enemy's attack? ”

Zhukov sighed: "The formation of the troops is still there, but the defense line has been broken by the Germans, and now it needs to be sorted out and adjusted." ”

Stalin looked at him, then at Vasilevsky, and asked dissatisfied: "What do you think?" ”

"The 21st and 24th armies flanked the Germans and regained control of the pontoon bridge as soon as possible."

"Isn't it destroyed? What to recapture? Stalin was furious, "How do you feel that overnight our commanders have become incapable of fighting." ”

The two nodded, this was also where they were confused, no one could figure out what was going on in the river meander.

"Let the 24th Army cooperate with the 21st Army to clear out the German troops that have infiltrated it, and let the 24th Army find another place to erect a pontoon bridge and quickly cross the river." Stalin thought for a moment, "As for the warships and gunboats on the river, let our bombers and artillery destroy them." ”

"Yes!"

Comrade Stalin's will cannot be disobeyed. (To be continued.) )