After waiting for a long time, Zhukov's voice came out of the earpiece, he seemed to be in a pretty good mood, and his tone was full of relaxation and comfort: "Hello, Lida! Judging by today's battle report, you have fought quite well, and if there are no surprises, you should arrive at the city of Kharkov tomorrow. ”

"Yes, Comrade Marshal." Although Zhukov and I were familiar with each other, every time I talked to him due to the difference in identity, it seemed a little restrained: "Our 299th division occupied a wooden bridge over the Ude River and built a bridgehead on the south bank. ”

I thought that when I said this, Zhukov would compliment me more or less. Who knew that he asked angrily, "Why don't you pass this captured bridge and throw more troops to the south bank?" There was a hint of reproach in his tone.

"The wooden bridge was too narrow to pass through heavy weapons such as tanks and artillery, and after crossing the bridge, the infantry was blocked by the dense fire of the Germans, and it was impossible to continue to advance." In order to give him a more detailed picture of the situation at the front, I added: "In order to prevent the Germans from destroying the bridge, I have ordered General Sivakov, who is in command at the front, to send the 84th Division to reinforce the 299th Division, and at the same time give them an order to hold the bridge at all costs." ”

"Lida, I order you to launch an attack on the south bank immediately, move quickly, and quickly tear a few holes in their defense line while the enemy is not ready." Zhukov pointed out to me on the phone: "As long as you gain a firm foothold in the depth of your defenses, as soon as the tanks cross the river tomorrow, you will be able to quickly eat the German troops west of Kharkov." In that case. You will be able to take the initiative on the battlefield. ”

"Understood. Comrade Marshal. I heard the implication of Zhukov's words, and he hoped that we would quickly sweep away the German troops on the periphery west of Kharkov with all our might, and hurriedly replied: "I will immediately deploy my troops and launch an attack on the enemy's lines." ”

"Well, let's do it now." After Zhukov said this, he did not immediately hang up the phone, but added: "The high-density and uninterrupted bombardment of the large cluster you proposed." Today we have achieved good results, but the Air Force has limited ammunition, and this tactic can only be used once or twice once in a while, and if it is used often, we simply cannot afford to consume it. ”

Immediately after the end of the call with Zhukov, I said to Chistyakov and Managarov, who were sitting next to me: "Comrade generals, Marshal Zhukov ordered us to immediately launch an attack on the enemy positions on the southern bank,"

"Which division are you going to use?" After listening to this, Chistyakov frowned and asked: "At present, the only ones that can be put into battle are the 51st, 52nd and 375th Guards Infantry Divisions. ”

I glanced at Managarov. The heart said that it would be nice if he volunteered to give me another teacher. Seeing that he didn't react at all, I knew that I was taking it for granted. After all, he has already taken the initiative to send four divisions, and he will definitely not hand over the remaining troops in his hands to me until the 48th Infantry Corps arrives.

I thought about it for a moment, and then said to Chistyakov: "This battle may not end before dark, so bring General Nekrasov's 52nd Guards Division, they are good at night fighting, just let them play to their strengths." ”

After the assignment, I hurried with a few guards to the forward command of Sivakov, where I was going to personally direct the offensive operation.

When I arrived at Sivakov's command post on the hillside, a surprised expression appeared on his face: "Comrade commander, how did you get here?" ”

Why do you all say this every time you see me, can't you change something fresh? After muttering to myself twice, I coughed lightly, and then said to Sivakov: "Comrade commander, I have just received an order from my superiors to immediately attack the enemy on the southern bank. ”

My words surprised him again, and he asked in surprise: "If you attack the south bank, won't the remaining strongholds on the north bank be cleared?" ”

"The German strongholds on the north bank should be handed over to the 90th Guards Division and the 116th Infantry Division, and the task of seizing positions on the south bank will be completed by the 299th and 84th Divisions." Seeing Sivakov's unhappy look, I added: "In addition, I have brought General Nekrasov's 52nd Guards Division for night battles with the Germans." ”

Unexpectedly, after hearing this, not only did he not have the slightest joy on his face, but he also frowned. In response to his reaction, I was puzzled and asked: "Comrade Army Commander, what are you frowning about, do you think that I have brought too few troops?" ”

"You misunderstood, Comrade Commander. It's not that I dislike that there are too few troops, on the contrary, there are a bit too many troops. Sivakov explained to me: "At the moment our troops holding the bridgehead on the south bank are only one battalion of the 299th Division. When the Germans saw that we had only so many troops, they had the illusion that they could drive our troops away with just two charges, and they had not used artillery fire to destroy the bridge. If they find out that we have gathered three divisions on the north bank of the river and are ready to attack them, they will probably destroy the wooden bridge with artillery fire, so that we will not be able to cross the river. ”

The situation that Sivakov said was unexpected. I then asked, "Where is your observation post, can you see the wooden bridge?" ”

"You can see it." Sivakov replied in the affirmative.

"Take me to the observation post immediately." In order to find out the distribution of friend and foe, I gave him the order and turned and walked out the door.

Sivakov took me to the observation post on the top of the hill, pointed to the river in the distance and said to me: "Comrade commander, there it is. You can clearly see the distribution of our positions with a telescope. ”、

I held up my binoculars and looked in the direction of his finger, and in the distance on the river, there was a wooden bridge that only two people could pass side by side. On both sections of the bridge, there were defensive positions of our troops. Since the main force of our army is on the north bank of the Oud River, I focused on the south bank.

I saw that at the southern end of the wooden bridge, there was a circular trench about 200 meters long, and our commanders and fighters were hidden in this trench. And the camera pushes another seven or eight hundred meters to the south. It was the position of the German army. Except for a couple of trenches connected by traffic trenches. There are also a number of civil and engineering fire points, as well as makeshift sandbag fortifications, and the windows of several buildings behind are also stuffed with sandbags, which is obviously also a German fire point.

I stopped the camera on the open area between the two armies, and found that there were quite a few corpses lying here and there, both German and our own. I don't have to ask at all. You can guess that these corpses were left behind when the two sides attacked each other.

After seeing the situation on the battlefield clearly, I gave an order to Sivakov: "Comrade commander, let the troops be broken into pieces, cross the wooden bridge in platoons, and enter the opponent's fortifications. In addition, General Bere sent two tanks to stop at the river and suppress the fire on the opposite position to cover the infantry charge. ”

After ten minutes or so, the tanks sent by Bere arrived, just two. I looked at the two tanks listening to the river. Suddenly he was angry, and said in his heart, I asked you to send two tanks. I didn't expect you to really send only two tanks, and none of them were sent. Although they were all new tanks, they were too few in number to overwhelm the Germans in terms of firepower.

The Germans quickly sensed our move and immediately concentrated several tanks and fired in the direction of the wooden bridge. The cannonballs landed in the river and exploded, stirring up columns of water that soared into the sky, and the falling water sprayed the soldiers on the bridge like chickens in soup.

"Comrade Commander, almost a regiment of troops has been assembled across the river, can you start the attack?" Sivakov was afraid that I would not realize the seriousness of the problem, and he deliberately emphasized, "If the Germans smashed artillery fire on our positions, such a dense formation, a single shell could cause dozens of casualties." ”

Seeing that they were ready, I simply ordered, "Then attack!" Remember, be sure to fight harder and try to tear a few holes in the German line. ”

As the order was given, the tanks, which were parked by the river, opened fire on the German positions on the opposite side. The sound of artillery was an order, but after the first round of fire from our tanks, the thousands of soldiers gathered at the bridgehead shouted and rushed out from their hiding places.

In the face of our charge, there was silence at first on the German positions, but when our commanders and fighters entered the range of two hundred meters, they finally opened fire. Mortars began to bombard, and dozens of machine guns in the trenches began to fire wildly. The rain of bullets and the bursting shrapnel weaved into an impermeable web of fire in front of the commanders and fighters of our army.

For most of the commanders and fighters who have experienced a hundred battles, such an intensity of firepower is really not taken into account. They continued to advance under the dense artillery fire and bullet rain, using everything they could use, including craters and dead bodies, as cover, and in the continuous explosions, they quickly distinguished the sound of the shells passing by, judged the distance of the explosion point, looked at the gap after the shell exploded, and quickly fired their guns, or crawled from one crater to another.

The soldiers braved the rain of bullets to crawl and roll forward amid the constant whistles of the commander. In the dense rain of bullets, the charging queue burst out from time to time with a blood mist. Whizzling bullets and flying shrapnel pierced their bodies, tore their flesh apart, made their flesh shake under the rain of bullets, and then the corpses were like broken bags thrown out, overturned by the impact of bullets.

Although people fell every minute, the living soldiers still shouted slogans and charged forward. They continued to push forward with corpses covering the offensive road, and grenades from both the attackers and defenders rained down, kicking up walls of smoke one after another, and the shrapnel that burst out was intertwined with each other to kill and injure soldiers on both sides. The brave warriors, with their shining bayonets, screamed and swooped forward with their bloodshot eyes.

The German soldiers, who had already been demoralized because of successive defeats, were now panicked and timid when they saw the soldiers screaming and killing like fierce gods, and many soldiers threw their guns and fled backwards one after another. And the warriors chased after them, stabbing them down with bloody bayonets, leaving nothing alive in their passes.

Seeing that the forward positions of the German army were broken through by our troops one after another, the openings were getting bigger and bigger, and more and more fighters poured in, I breathed a sigh of relief in my heart, and then ordered Sivakov: "Comrade commander, call Bere and Povsky and ask them to transfer some tanks and artillery over." We are going to strike while the iron is hot today and beat the German defenses in this position to shreds. ”

Before Bere's tanks and Povsky's artillery arrived, the situation on the battlefield had changed unexpectedly. In order to prevent our troops from breaking through their positions, the Germans actually concentrated their artillery fire and fired indiscriminately at the breakthrough we had just made.

In just a few minutes, the breakthrough was like an erupting crater, tightly wrapped in rising black smoke, and the black smoke exploded one after another, wave after wave, explosions everywhere, and fire everywhere. The whole land was plowed over and over again, and the craters were everywhere the artillery fire passed, and the troops of the two armies, which were still frantically scuffling, disappeared without a trace in an instant.

When the shelling was over, dozens of people stumbled out from the positions where the smoke had not yet cleared, and although they were in rags, they could be seen to be our commanders and fighters. Most of them had no weapons in their hands and were still wounded, and they supported each other and walked with difficulty towards the bridgehead.

I saw that there was still about a company of troops in the trenches, so I grabbed Sivakov by the shoulders, pulled him to the lookout, pointed at the fighters who were still in the position, and gave him a loud order: "Comrade commander, immediately call the commander of the 299th Division and ask him to send all the soldiers in the trenches and bring back all the wounded." ”

"Cavalry!" Suddenly, a staff officer next to us shouted.

"Cavalry, what cavalry?" In my impression, on the Soviet-German battlefield, I have only seen Soviet cavalry, and I have heard of German cavalry for the first time two days ago, and I have never seen it before. Hearing the shouts of the staff officers, I quickly raised my binoculars again and looked towards the battlefield where the smoke was still rising.

I saw more than a hundred cavalrymen lined up in a neat formation, raised their sabers high above their heads, pointed diagonally forward, and rushed towards the wounded who were running with difficulty. When the wounded saw the cavalry rushing up behind them, they immediately panicked and wanted to shoot to intercept it, but they had no weapons in their hands; Run, where can the two legs of a man outrun the four legs of a horse? At the moment when they hesitated, the enemy's cavalry had already crashed straight into their ranks, and the cavalrymen who were lying on horseback, their sabers stretched outward, flashed with cold light, and the blades instantly slashed across the chests and heads of the warriors, and the half of the body with flying fell straight to the ground. Even if the reaction was quicker, the rifle was raised, but under the impact of this high speed, it was split into two pieces by the person with the gun. Where the cavalry passed, in just an instant, dozens of soldiers who were lucky enough to escape from the dense German artillery fire all fell to the ground. (To be continued.) )