636 bullet marks
Inside his cramped tank, the Soviet tanker was aiming his sight at the bullet-riddled German Leopard tank in the distance.
Because there was already experience in destroying such German tanks in battle, the fear of Leopard tanks was being eliminated in the minds of Soviet tank crews.
As long as you can get close to those Leopard tanks, at a close enough distance, or on the side, you can destroy this terrible tank that looks indestructible.
Inside the sight, on top of the Leopard tank, which had been magnified several times, several black craters were still steaming slightly.
The Soviet tanker pressed the aiming scale on the hull of the German tank and pressed the fire switch.
"Phew!" The latest T-34 fired a powerful shell that crashed into the front of the Leopard tank in the distance.
He saw that his shell had left a deep crater in the front armor of the enemy tank, but in the end, due to lack of strength, it was sent into the sky.
The shell had apparently left a permanent scar on the tank, a fatal scar that was heavier than the previous one.
"Reload! It's almost over! It's almost over! The Soviet artillery commander shouted excitedly, he was about to take out a terrible German tank.
Because of his limited field of vision, he couldn't see at all, and just to the side of his tank, a T-26 tank had just been hit by a shell and exploded into a cloud of flames.
The battlefield is so cruel that no one knows who will face death in the next second.
Wittmann's tank had to be hit by at least 10 shells at this time, and the knocks one after another made the Wittmann crew numb.
Loader Homan reloads armor-piercing bullets one by one, and then Karl? Wegener fired one shell after another at distant targets.
He destroyed at least 8 tanks, and because the opponent was in motion, at least 7 shells did not destroy the target.
In other words, Carl? Wegener had already fired more than a dozen shells, which was already a very high firing frequency in a battle.
Not only 45 mm caliber shells, but actually several anti-tank rifles, were firing at Weitmann's tank.
As for the larger caliber shells, they have already hit Weitmann's tank several times. In this case, Wittmann felt that he was really unlucky to be home today.
Of course, not the most unlucky - so far there have been no failures in the mechanism of action of his Leopard tank, and the tracks have not been interrupted by the other side.
Therefore, his tank can also be reversed with horsepower, which greatly delays the time for the Soviet army to approach him.
"What a bastard!" Weitmann slammed the steel plate on the side of the turret of the tank next to him with his hand and complained loudly.
This was the first time he participated in the battle on the Eastern Front, and as a result, the Leopard tank, which was invincible in Britain, was forced back by the Soviet tanks.
And he saw everything that happened on the battlefield today, and he did realize that the fighting environment here was much more sinister than the situation he faced in England.
Just as Wittmann was frustrated, a shell flew from the other end and pierced the T-34 tank that was approaching Wittmann's car.
Because the power of the shells was so great, the T-34 tank shook slightly before it slowly stopped.
Immediately afterward, another shell flew from the other side, piercing a T-26 tank and knocking the tank's turret far away.
Soon, the third Soviet tank was also beaten to scrap metal by shells from the flanks. Then came the fourth and fifth......
In the eye-piercing time, ten Soviet tanks were pierced by shells flying from the corner, and even the Soviet tankers who had no radio communication realized that something was wrong.
"1 company! Keep it going! Short stop and fire! On the radio, the clear voice of the commander of the 505 company of the 1st Tank Battalion sounded in the earphones of Karyus.
And next to the 1st Company, the tanks of the 2nd Company were also lined up, cutting in like a sickle towards the flank of the Soviet attack tanks.
Their position was so good that the attacking tanks of the Soviet army did not know for a moment whether to turn to meet them or to retreat immediately.
When they hesitated, the tanks of the 505th Tank Battalion, like a steel knife, were inserted into the formation of Soviet tanks.
Who would have thought that the Soviet armored forces, which had always overwhelmed the German army with the number of tanks and were mainly attacking, would have to face a large number of German tanks this time.
The point is that on the premise of almost no less quality, the German tanks turned out to be not inferior to their opponents in terms of quantity.
"They have more tanks than ours!" A Soviet soldier driving a T-26 tank watched in despair as a Leopard tank crashed into the wreckage of a T-26 tank and drove in their direction.
The Soviets put in about 80 tanks of various types in the vicinity, while the Germans actually put in as many as 60 or 70 tanks.
And the absolute superiority of the Leopard tank in performance turned this local battle into a massacre between tanks.
The Soviet army failed to besiege the Wittmann car, but the flank was broken through by German tanks, which suddenly became a turning point in the battle.
Just during the period when the Soviets were hesitating to retreat, a dozen German tanks opened fire on the flanks, destroying seven or eight Soviet tanks.
After losing a large number of tanks, the Soviet armored forces finally realized their situation and began to recede like a tide.
Wittmann lifted the hatch of his tank and watched the retreating Soviets through the gaps in his machine-gun shields.
Some members of the Soviet KV-1 tanks jumped out of cars and fled, and some T-26 tanks were exploding and burning.
The whole battlefield was in chaos, and the friendly troops of the 505th Tank Battalion were turning at this time, chasing down the Soviet troops who had retreated to the second line of defense.
The victory came so suddenly that Wittman had a sense of unreality. He looked at the destroyed Soviet tanks in front of him, and he didn't know what he was thinking.
And underneath him, the Leopard tank, which had just been issued to him, had become unrecognizable.
The entire tank was covered with bullet marks, as well as potholes where shells hit. It's like the surface of the moon, and it makes people's hairs stand on end when they look at it.
How dense are these bullet marks? It was so dense that even the camouflage painted on the Leopard tank was almost unrecognizable.