A hummingbird helicopter roared over the Dnieper and Dubrovno and flew straight over the town of Stonis, where it circled in circles.

The helicopter's unusual behavior quickly attracted the attention of the German troops in the town, and Major Piper stood on the side of the street and asked the orderly next to him to fire a white flare into the sky.

The flare flew into the sky, and the helicopter turned around and flew in the direction where the flare was flying, before hovering about fifty metres above Major Piper.

Throwing down a canning box, the helicopter turned around and left.

The orderly picked up the canned food box that had fallen on the ground, took out the white paper inside, and handed it to Major Piper.

Major Piper hurriedly glanced at the contents of the blank paper, and then hurried into the battalion headquarters.

"Send a report to the regiment headquarters immediately, we received an order from the division headquarters to act according to the original plan, but we need artillery cooperation throughout the process." Major Piper gives orders to the signal men.

About fifteen minutes later, Major Piper received a reply.

After reading the call, Major Piper was relieved, with the support of artillery, he was a little more sure of completing the task, and now it depends on when the Russians attack.

Running around the town of Stanis, Major Piper commanded his company commanders to strengthen their positions, and a look of unbearability flashed on Major Piper's young face as he watched the soldiers sweat and work hard under the scorching sun.

In the orders sent by the division headquarters, they must be meticulous in their combat operations, and the more realistic they are, the better.

When he led his subordinates into Stennis Town, the famous "Brother-in-law" personally instructed him to use some extraordinary means to confuse the enemy.

For the ultimate victory. It is bound that more comrades-in-arms who get along day and night will pay the price of their lives. Maybe you'll die in battle.

Come to think of it. Reassured, Major Piper summoned his company commanders to explain the main points of the next phase of the battle, emphasizing that if he encountered an unforeseen situation in the next battle, his successor should firmly complete the tasks assigned by his superiors.

About two hours after the first ceasefire, the prelude to the great battle began again.

The first to step into the battlefield were still the "gods of war", and the overwhelming artillery fire once again covered the German positions. The town of Stennis became a key area of concern for Soviet artillery.

The Soviet artillery carefully ploughed every inch of the town of Stennis with a few close men, and Major Piper still hid in the basement of the church with a few close men, silently listening to the "artillery march" outside.

"The Soviets were not willing to reduce all the buildings in the town to rubble, and they had to turn them into ashes to meet their violent needs." A herald teased.

Major Piper scoffed, then shrugged his shoulders.

"Their artillery will not be arrogant for long, I bet ten marks, at most two days, we can see the Russian artillery at bayonet distance, and then kill them."

Major Piper and his men hid in the basement, unaware that the two air forces had already "put together bayonets" in the sky over Stennis Town.

Groups of fighters of the Soviet Air Force flew over the battlefield. PE-2 bombers and Il-2 attack aircraft withstood artillery fire from the ground and launched wave after wave of air attacks on German positions and tanks exposed on the battlefield.

Fighters followed the bombers in groups. Protecting them from Luftwaffe Messerschmitt fighters, and at the same time shouldering the heavy responsibility of intercepting German reconnaissance planes and protecting artillery positions from detection.

Under overwhelming artillery fire, the Soviet infantry groups almost poured out of their nests, rushing to the German defense line all over the mountains, and the German semicircular defense line with the city of Dubrovno as the center was attacked on all fronts.

After hearing the shelling outside the basement stop, Major Piper was the first to burst out of the basement, and had just opened the basement door, but he took a few steps back in pain, jumping to his feet and panting wildly.

In front of the door of the basement was a staircase that led diagonally up to the ground, and the roof of the church was destroyed by artillery fire, and some of the broken bricks and stones that fell down the stairs to the basement door, where they were blocked by the wooden door and piled up to the door, and Major Piper pulled the door open, and was hit by the bricks that rolled into it, hitting the instep of his right foot.

Enduring the stinging pain of the cone coming from the instep of his right foot, Major Piper limped out of the basement and ran to the east of town.

Hiding at the observation point he had avoided before, and seeing the battle outside the town, Major Piper gasped.

The wilderness outside the town was densely packed with tanks and infantry, swooping down on the town of Stannis like an ant colony.

Glancing outside the town, Major Piper saw that there were more than 100 Soviet tanks, led by the bulky KV tank, followed by the small and nimble BT series tanks.

How many tanks did the Soviets really have? They had just suffered a defeat, and in the blink of an eye, they were able to send so many tanks, and Major Piper's brow was furrowed.

Major Piper would have been even more shocked if he had known the terrible figure of a Soviet mechanized corps of 36,000 men and 1,031 tanks.

Tank Destroyer No. 4 remained hidden in the messy rubble field, using its low body and aggressive artillery to hunt down incoming Soviet tanks.

In the crisp and pleasant sound of shelling, in front of Stennis Town, there were more and more Soviet tanks on the battlefield, but they still could not stop the pace of the Soviet army's advance.

Regardless of casualties and fear, countless tanks and infantry pressed on the town of Stennis.

When there was a difficulty, looking for artillerymen, Major Piper immediately made a decision.

Under the call of the radio, the sound of shells breaking through the air soon came from the sky behind Major Piper, instantly smashing the offensive wave of the Soviet infantry group.

Major Piper shouted to the herald beside him, "Order Tank Destroyer No. 4 to break off, cover the infantry retreat, and fire two more red flares." ”

His order was immediately carried out, two red flares flew into the sky, and the Germans on both flanks of Stennis saw the agreed signal and began to organize a retreat synchronously.

Taking advantage of the gap outside the town where the Soviet troops were suppressed by artillery, the German infantry outside the town jumped out of the foxhole, carried their guns and cats, and turned around and rushed into the town

To the west of the town, a group of SDKFZ251 armored vehicles rushed into the infantry ranks east of the town, turning their backs on the infantry.

The infantrymen rushed to the armored vehicles, opened the doors and jumped into the cabins, leaving one for each armored vehicle that was filled.

Major Piper was relieved to see the timely arrival of the armored vehicles sent by the regimental headquarters.

His battalion was originally on trucks, and its survivability on the battlefield was very low, so in order to allow the troops to withdraw from the line of fire as quickly as possible, the regimental headquarters specially seconded a batch of armored vehicles from the division headquarters to cooperate with them.

"Retreat, retreat, retreat, retreat," the town was filled with the shouts of officers, and the soldiers of the Paipu battalion rushed from all directions, jumping nimbly onto armored vehicles.

There were fewer and fewer soldiers in the town, and the wounded were taken away, and after much hesitation, Major Piper finally relented and said, "Inform the No. 4 tank destroyer that it can withdraw from the battle and abandon all the damaged vehicles." ”

Jumping into the last armored car with his men, Major Piper saw Tank Destroyer No. 4 exit the battle one by one.

Three tanks were wounded by Soviet artillery fire in previous battles, and the incapacitated tank destroyer No. 4 was abandoned.

Major Piper's armored car, caught in a convoy of tank destroyers No. 4, rushed along the road to the city of Dubrovno, in the rear.

"Enemy planes, he's coming at us." A mournful voice shouted.

When Piper looked back, he saw a fighter jet chasing the convoy on the road, rapidly approaching less than fifty meters above the ground.

Unable to run, Major Piper rushed to the rear of the car, and the MG42 machine gun above the hatch at the rear of the car was pressed against his shoulder, and fired wildly at the Il-2.

However, the dense bullets could not stop the approach of Il-2, let alone the strafing of the machine guns.

Two shells landed almost above Major Piper's head and entered the cabin, and a scream rang out behind Major Piper.

In the explosion, there was a sharp pain in Major Piper's back, and before he could react, his body flew out of the cabin and fell to the grass on the side of the road.

The armored car was hit by two cannon shells, and the driver was seriously injured and drove off the road, overturned on the side of the road, and the surviving Major Piper in the cabin was thrown out of the car.

A Tank Destroyer No. 4 came to an abrupt stop on the side of the road, and the crew jumped out of the cabin, hurriedly mounted Major Piper and two other survivors onto Tank Destroyer No. 4, and drove away.

About fifteen minutes later, his smug laughter rang out from Major General Krivoshin's command.

"Quick, report the battle to General Yeremenko, we have broken through the outlying positions of the German army and are marching towards the city of Dubrovno, the German army in the central direction is retreating, let him send us some reinforcements, especially infantry, we will launch a siege battle next."

Major General Krivoshin's battle report was quickly sent to Gorky, and Lieutenant General Yeremenko was overjoyed to receive it.

Looking at the curve of the semicircle near the city of Dubrovno on the map, he took out his pencil and drew a dotted line at the top of the semicircle.

"The central attack was successful, and the enemy's defense line was smashed in the center, we, um, we"

Yeremenko was about to make an impassioned victory speech, when he suddenly felt that the semicircular position of the German army on the map that had been knocked into pieces seemed to be somewhat familiar, as if he had seen it somewhere.

After thinking about it for two minutes, Yeremenko couldn't remember the origin of this formation, but vaguely remembered that it seemed to have been seen in a tactical class.

Seeing him scratching his ears and cheeks and sitting restlessly, the staff officers around Yeremenko not only asked the reason.

"Have you ever seen the formation of the German defensive line after it was knocked out?" Yeremenko asked.

The staff officers gathered around the map, and they all showed thoughtful expressions.

Seeing the confused expressions on the faces of the staff officers, Yeremenko spewed a long rough breath from his nostrils depressedly.

These guys, at such a critical moment, are unreliable. (To be continued.) )