"Why are you here?" Returning to the headquarters and walking into his office, Manturov saw a familiar, beautiful figure. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 info

"Comrade Military Commissar, don't you know? I'm now the deputy head of the Political Department of the Southwestern Front, why can't I be here? ”

Manturov pretended to be serious and said: "Comrade Voroshilova, why haven't I received any notices about it? As the military commissar of the front army, it is impossible for me not to know about any personnel arrangements! ”

Katia was wearing a brigade-level political commissar uniform, smiling mischievously, deliberately teasing the man in front of her who was wearing a general's uniform. "If you knew, then I wouldn't be able to stand here and talk to you."

"Comrade Voroshilova, this is the battlefield! It's a place full of killing! You are a woman who has been in Moscow well, why should you come here? ”

Katya sneered and said, "Comrade Military Commissar, do you think I am staying well in Moscow?" ”

"Of course, at least there is no killing, no gunfire will be heard, no artillery will be heard, and no stuka dive bombers will be heard! There, your life is not threatened in the slightest, and you can continue to live a carefree life, isn't that good? ”

"Do you know what I dreamed about last night? I dreamed that you were hit by an air raid and ......" Katia's eyes welled up with a few tears. From those beautiful, black pearl-like eyes, you can see that she cares about her lover.

"Then, when you wake up, go to Voroshilov and ask him to arrange a job for you in the Southwestern Front, right?" Manturov's expression still did not change at all, "Now, our army has gained air supremacy, I have not seen German planes in the past few days, and I don't have to worry about air raids at all." ”

"Okay," Katia wiped away her tears, "since you're so safe, then I have nothing to worry about, I'll go back to Moscow now, are you satisfied?" ”

As the saying goes, "tears are a woman's weapon", looking at those beautiful eyes full of tears, Manturov's heart was captured in an instant. He reached out and held Katia tightly in his arms.

"Honey, please don't go." Manturov stroked Katya's beautiful back, carefully smelled the fragrance emanating from his wife's body, and regained the feeling he had when he met in Siberia three years ago.

"I love you!"

"My dear," Manturov kissed Katya on the cheek, "you used to be a school flower, then a group flower, a party flower, and now a military flower." ”

"Of course, I'm the prettiest everywhere I go." Katia is quite confident in her beauty, and she has almost never met anyone who looks more beautiful than herself.

"Report!" At this moment, a majestic voice came from outside the door. Standing outside the door was the Chief of Staff of the Southwestern Front, Lieutenant General Pulkaev.

Manturov quickly let go of his hand, pretending to be indifferent, and said: "Comrade Pulkaev, please come in." ”

Pulkaev took a document and walked up to Manturov, "Comrade Military Commissar, this is what you proposed, the battle plan for the 3rd and 48th Panzer Corps of the German Army, codenamed 'Operation Suvorov', please sign it." ”

Manturov walked to the table, picked up the pen, and without even looking at it, signed his name. "Comrade Pulkaev, how are the preparations going now?"

Pulkaev briefly, described the current state of preparations. "Now the various units are replenishing supplies and repairing weapons. The fighters are racing for time to train and prepare for battle. ”

"How much more supplies do we need? Can you refill it tomorrow morning? ”

"Please rest assured, tomorrow morning, the 5th, 8th, 9th, and 19th Mechanized Corps, as well as the 87th, 124th, and 140th Infantry Divisions, will be able to get enough supplies and go into battle at any time."

At this time, Manturov remembered the lack of ammunition in the early days of the Southwestern Front, "Now, we have to seize the time and try to get more supplies for the various units."

Otherwise, if the battle is too long and the ammunition supply cannot keep up, the consequences will be unimaginable. ”

"I've thought about that, too," Pulkaev said, "and now we've used all the trucks to deliver supplies to the troops participating in the operation."

In addition, the Air Force has provided several transport planes to transport large quantities of military supplies directly from the Donbass and the Kharkiv industrial region to the front-line airfields. ”

Manturov thought for a moment and said: "Can you think about it, requisition some civilian trucks?" I heard that the Ninth Mechanized Corps, commanded by Rokossovsky, also recently forcibly requisitioned 200 civilian trucks from Shepetivka. ”

"At present, there is no need for this, after all, each of our mechanized corps has more than a thousand trucks responsible for transportation, which is still enough."

"That's good. By the way, are you worried that we will not have enough troops to launch an offensive against the Germans? ”

"I have also consulted this with General Kirponos. If the enemy units advancing along the Vladimir-Volynsky-Kristonabor front, that is, the entire German Army Group South, were to be encircled and annihilated, at least 60 divisions were needed.

But what we had to deal with this time was nothing more than 6 German divisions, with only 9 to 100,000 men, and a total of less than 600 tanks. And we will send 4 mechanized corps, plus 2 infantry divisions, a total of 170,000 people, more than 2,500 tanks, absolutely able to destroy them! ”

Manturov sighed and said, "Yes, if we follow the order of the Supreme Command No. 3, I'm afraid we will need 60 divisions to be enough."

But now, with only more than 30 divisions, we are simply not able to accomplish the objectives specified by Order No. 3. It is impossible to destroy the invading enemy forces in a short time, and we can only divide them and destroy them in stages, unless we bring in the 12th and 26th armies, as well as the 16th army in reserve, and then we will have 60 divisions. ”

Before proposing this battle plan, Manturov's first consideration was the number of troops at hand.

Historically, the Battle of Brody was only a failure, not because of the lack of troops of the Southwestern Front, but because the objectives of Order No. 3 were not realistic. Not only did they encircle and annihilate all the troops that had entered the country, that is, the 700,000 troops of the entire Army Group South, but they also had to enter German territory on June 24 and capture the strategic town of Lublin.

Such an unrealistic goal would have been impossible to achieve under the circumstances of the time. Therefore, as soon as Order No. 3 was issued, the staff officers of the entire Southwestern Front opposed the implementation of this order, and even the representative of the Supreme High Command, General Zhukov, was persuaded by Manturov to withdraw Order No. 3 from the Supreme High Command.

Prior to this, in order to ensure that the Southwestern Front could carry out the tasks of the Supreme Command, the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU decided to send General Zhukov to the Southwestern Front as a representative of the Supreme Command, with full authority to command the counter-assault mission. Soviet Deputy Prime Minister Manturov was also sent to the Southwestern Front as military commissar to supervise the troops, hoping that he would ensure that orders would be carried out.

However, instead of acting as his regulator and ensuring the implementation of Order No. 3 by the Southwestern Front, Manturov also took the lead in proposing another battle plan. The reason why he did this was actually to avoid the recurrence of the historical tragedy, to avoid unnecessary losses suffered by the Southwestern Front, and at the same time to win the favor of the commanders and staff officers of the Southwestern Front.

"Comrade Manturov," Pulkaev said from his heart, "yesterday, when you came here, I thought you had been sent by the Central Committee to supervise our execution of Order No. 3.

But this morning, from the moment you came up with this plan of operations, trying to persuade the Supreme Command to withdraw Order No. 3, I changed my mind about you. ”

"Comrade Chief of Staff, I am not here to supervise you and carry out those unrealistic tasks. I have come here to give constructive suggestions to all of you and to prevent the war from deteriorating. (To be continued.) )