Chapter Ninety-One: The Road to Rivalry is Narrow

And Andrei picked up the phone in confusion, and it was Zhukov's voice on the other end of the phone, Andrei quickly stood up and reported in a loud tone: "Report to Comrade Deputy Commander-in-Chief, Colonel Andrei of the Ministry of Internal Affairs is waiting for your instructions." The pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info" and Zhukov's affirmative voice came from the other end of the phone: "Andrei heard that this special group of fighters is now very good under you, not only has there been no instability, but now the training in Mamayev Gang is also in a good way!" As soon as he heard Zhukov's praise, Andrei hurriedly said: "Thank you, Comrade Deputy Commander, for your praise, I will definitely work hard to make new contributions." ”

Zhukov continued: "Some time ago, according to your tactical advice, the base camp let the troops in the front line constantly send small units to harass the enemy army, so that they were too busy to take care of themselves and were unable to start a new attack. A few days earlier, however, the forces of Hort's 4th Tank Army had concentrated an assault force from the south through Dutovo to carry out its main assault. At the moment, their troops are already wedged five kilometers into the junction of the 62nd Army and the 57th Army in the rear. This greatly increased the danger of the Hort Army breaking through to Stalingrad and the Volga from the south.

In order to cope with the contingency situation, the commander of your Front, General Yeremenko, was forced to transfer troops from the lines of the 62nd Army and the 4th Tank Army to reinforce the dangerous zone south of Stalingrad defended by the 57th Army. These forces effectively stopped the offensive of the Hult Army, but this maneuver was detected by Paulus, who intensified the offensive and broke through the defensive line of the 62nd Army from several positions.

Since now the 62nd Army was already under the flank of the enemy's Gothic 4th Tank Army and Paulus's 6th Army, and the 57th Army also suffered heavy losses. In order to avoid the fate of the annihilation of the troops after being encircled, it has been decided after the study of the base camp that I have let the troops of the 62nd Army begin to retreat in the direction of Stalingrad tonight. And the task of your division is to serve as the rear guard of the whole army and cover the main force of the group army to complete this retreat mission. ”

"Comrade Deputy Commander-in-Chief," after listening to Zhukov's words, Andrei knew how difficult the task of his troops would be, with the existing equipment and training level of the new division, even if it was all gone, it might not be able to block the Hodt Tank Army, so I would like to take advantage of this opportunity to ask Zhukov to put forward some conditions: "Our division lacks heavy weapons, especially not enough anti-tank weapons, it is very difficult to block the enemy's armored forces, and we don't even have rifles, and the soldiers have no combat experience yet." ”

"Andrey, you don't have to worry about this." Zhukov said: "I know that this task will be extremely difficult for your division. Therefore, tonight, when the troops of your division are transferred to the defense area of the former 2O8th Division, they can receive an artillery battalion and a tank detachment with fifteen tanks, and at the same time I will have logistics provide you with a batch of light weapons. I hope that this equipment can help you, and you don't need to go, just transfer three regiments, and I will not interfere with how to act, how to fight you yourself. ”

Hearing this, Andrei knew that he had to go, but leaving the strong fortifications of Mamayev Hill to fight a field battle with Hoth's Panzer Army in the field This is not a joke, this battle can only be fought by chance, Hult is also his old enemy, and he is also an old enemy of the Soviet Army, Andrei gritted his teeth and remembered Hoth's information: In the Barbarossa plan that began on June 22, 1941, the 3rd Panzer Army and Guderian's 2nd Panzer Army in the battle sequence of Army Group Center attacked long-distance with thunderous momentum, The Soviets simply did not have time to make any preparations for the enemy, and fled in despair. In the Minsk-Kiev encirclement, the clever tactical coordination and annihilation tactics won the army the honor and the largest encirclement battle in human history, and the prestige of the two most famous German armored units on the Eastern Front, the Hoth Panzer Army and the Gudri Panzer Army, was established. Hort was also awarded the 25th Knight of the Order of Merit with oak leaves.

Later, in Smolinsk in the summer and autumn of the same year, Hort was also one of the important formulators of tactical strategy during the Vikima encirclement operation, and on October 19 he became commander of the 17th Army. During the winter crisis of the German army in 41-42, the clever defensive tactics implemented in Ukraine dealt a devastating blow to the blind Soviet army, which played a key role in preventing the collapse of Army Group South on all fronts. In the German summer offensive that began on May 17, 1942, the 1st Panzer Army under the command of 1st General Kleist fought tenaciously to encircle and annihilate the elite forces of the Soviet army under the command of Marshal Semiyan Kostnovich Timoshenkoso, becoming the greatest contributor to the success of the attack on Stalingrad. On June 1, 1942, Hult became commander of the 4th Panzer Army.

Hoth, who let his old army be wiped out at the beginning, and let himself hide in the forest and almost starved to death, grandma's, Lao Tzu has to make you look good this time. Then Andrei immediately notified the commanders of the various units to come to the meeting, and ordered the three squads of Unit A to immediately go to the front line to get information!

At the same time, Andrei was also thinking about how to deal with the German Panzer Army at the moment, and he recalled the information he saw on the Internet at the beginning: in the early stage, it was an armored group, and later it was upgraded to an armored army, and the predecessor of the 4th armored group was the 16th Army, which was formed in Berlin in 37. In February 41, it was expanded into the 4th Panzer Group in France, and the first commander was the former commander of the 16th Army, Hopner. Operation Barbarossa began as part of Army Group North, consisting of the 41st Panzer Corps (Commander Reinhardt, 1st, 6th, 26th, and 269th Infantry Divisions) and the 56th Panzer Corps (Commander Manstein, 8th Panzer Division, 3rd Motorized Division, and 290th Infantry Division). 20 days after the start of the war, the 4th Panzer Group had advanced 430 miles and was less than 80 miles from Leningrad. However, due to the insufficient number of infantry and the slow follow-up, it was not possible to encircle and annihilate the main forces of the Northwestern Front. At the same time, the 4th Panzer Group was stuck in the forested swamps of the Baltic Sea coast and could advance only a little more than 1 mile a day on average. In September 41, the 4th Panzer Group was transferred to Army Group Center to participate in Operation Typhoon, and on October 7, together with the 3rd Group, surrounded the Soviet troops of 5 armies west of Vyazma, and more than 650,000 Soviet troops became prisoners of war.

On January 1, 42, it was upgraded to the 4th Panzer Army, and seven days later Hoppner was removed from his post due to the defeat at the Battle of Moscow. During the summer offensive of '42, the 4th Panzer Army was subordinate to Army Group B (Army Group South) under the commander Hort, who served until November '43.

In the Battle of Stalingrad, the 4th Panzer Army officially entered the battle on August 1, initially with surprisingly weak forces, consisting only of the 48th Panzer Corps (Commander Kempf) and the 4th Army, with a total of only one 24th Panzer Division, 1 motorized division and 2 infantry division. However, it still broke through the Soviet defense line on the Don River, drove the Soviet troops out of Karachi, and routed about 12 Soviet divisions and 5 armored brigades in this area, and advanced into the Abganerovo area. The Soviets were forced to transfer the forces of the five armies of the Stalingrad Front to form a new Southeastern Front, and launched a counter-assault from the 9th to the 10th, and the 4th Panzer Army was forced to go on the defensive.

It can be said that in this field battle, the current Soviet army is not an opponent at all, how can half of its light infantry division deal with this Fourth Panzer Army?