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Whether firing from a station or firing on the move, there is no doubt that the M36 King Tiger main battle tank has greatly improved the combat effectiveness of the tank with the DX9 optical aiming drive. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info╔╗

Wang Chenhao got off the tank and patted it on the tank, feeling very satisfied.

At this moment, Zhang Zizhong, Minister of National Defense, rushed to Beiyuan to ask to see Wang Chenhao and brought bad news.

"Your Majesty, our M28 Gepard main battle tank has met an opponent!" Zhang Zizhong took out a copy of the latest briefing on the Battle of Stalingrad and handed it to Wang Chenhao.

A few months after the fierce battle of Stalingrad, the German Army's No. 4 and No. 5 main battle tanks suffered heavy losses, on the one hand, the Soviet Army took advantage of street fighting, with the help of the Chinese Empire to provide powerful anti-tank combat vehicles, anti-tank rockets and anti-tank sniper rifles and other advanced weapons to destroy a large number of German tanks, on the other hand, on the periphery of the Stalingrad battlefield, the Soviet Red Army's Central Equipment Group Army began a large-scale counteroffensive operation, they relied on the performance advantage of the M28A3 Gepard medium main battle tank, It had an absolute advantage over the No. 4 and No. 5 tanks equipped by the main German armored forces, and the German tanks suffered heavy losses in many tank battles between the two sides.

At the beginning, the Germans, with their absolute superiority in numbers, did not care about the loss of tanks. However, with the continuous enhancement of the combat effectiveness of the Soviet Red Army, the Soviet tanks took the lead in performance, and soon gradually equalized the German army in terms of combat experience, which made the German tank flow tactics no longer play a role, and the losses increased sharply, gradually affecting the German army's armored breakthrough ability.

The Soviets and Germans fought hard at Stalingrad until early November, and the German Army Group B was left with only 80 divisions and 3 brigades, about 1 million men, 10,290 artillery pieces, 1,675 tanks and 1,216 aircraft, but it still failed to capture Stalingrad. The dynamics of the two sides of the Battle of Moscow were repeated here.

On the Soviet side. Zhukov's strategy was to keep the Germans in the city, and then encircle the Germans in the city of Stalingrad by striking at the weakened outer flanks of the Germans.

On November 13, Stalin approved Zhukov and Vasilevsky's plan for a counteroffensive. And personally replaced this plan with Operation Uranus, which echoed the "Mars operation" against the German Army Group Center. The plan provided for the South-Western Front, under the command of Lieutenant General Vadudin, to carry out the main offensive from the bridgeheads in the area of Sheramofevich and Klitskaya on the west bank of the Don. Break through the defenses of the 3rd Army in Romania and penetrate directly into Karachi on the east bank of the Don River; The Stalingrad Front, commanded by Colonel-General Yeremenko, was tasked with assaulting from the south of Stalingrad to the northwest, breaking through the defenses of the 4th Army in Romania, meeting with the Southwestern Front at Karachi, and completing the encirclement of the German 6th Army Group; The Don Front, commanded by Lieutenant General Rokossovsky, was tasked with carrying out auxiliary assaults from the northwest to the southeast from Stalingrad to cover the main offensive of the Southwestern Front. The dates for the counteroffensive were set for November 19 for the South-Western Front and the Don Front, and November 20 for the Stalingrad Front.

November 19, 1942. The Soviet Red Army began to implement Operation Uranus. Vadutin's Southwestern Front and Rokossovsky's Don Front launched a counteroffensive in the snowfall, and the main attacking force under the command of Lieutenant General Vadudin included a whole 3 armies (1st Guards Army, 5th Tank Army and 21st Army). Altogether consisted of 18 infantry divisions. 8 tank brigades, 2 motorized brigades. It consisted of 6 cavalry divisions and 1 anti-tank brigade of the Chinese armed forces, supported by the 2nd and 17th wings of the Air Force of the Imperial Chinese Volunteers (known as the Air Group Army on the Soviet side).

The Romanian 3rd Army, which was responsible for the defense of the flanks of the German 6th Army Group, was absolutely inferior in numbers and lacked sophisticated equipment, and the positions of the 3rd Romanian Army were broken through by the Soviets within only one day of the battle. The situation on the battlefield of Stalingrad was suddenly opened, and the German army's ironclad tactics were declared bankrupt.

The Don Front carried out two auxiliary assaults, with the 65th Army attacking southeastward from the area east of Kretskaya, and the 24th Army attacking south from the Kacharinskaya area along the left bank of the Don to the direction of Verdach, cutting off the connection between the German army in the small bend of the Don and the German army at Stalingrad. ╔╗The 66th Army defended in situ in the area north of Stalingrad and was supported by the 16th Army of the Soviet Air Force.

On 20 November, Yeremenko's 51st, 57th, and 64th armies of the Stalingrad Front also switched to a counteroffensive in the south, breaking through the defenses of the 4th Romanian Army defending the area, and the Romanians, consisting mainly of cavalry, were quickly annihilated.

On the 22nd, the Southwestern Front began to cross the Don in batches. The next day, the Southwestern Front and the Stalingrad Front met at Rakachi, thus completing the counter-encirclement of Stalingrad.

By the 30th, the three Soviet fronts had encircled about 270,000 troops from the German 6th Army, including 5 corps and 22 divisions, Romanian and Italian troops, and some Croatian troops, in an area of 1,500 square kilometers in Stalingrad, and only about 50,000 troops of the 6th Army were separated from the encirclement.

When the German High Command received news of the Soviet counteroffensive, the Chief of the Army General Staff, General Zeitzler, urged Hitler to order Paulus to withdraw from Stalingrad. However, the commander of the Air Force, Field Marshal Goering, assured Hitler that he could guarantee the ability of the Air Force to supply the 6th Army by air through the "air bridge".

It turned out that although the Luftwaffe had the transport capacity to supply such a large number of troops, it was able to supply the encircled German army with a requirement of 700 tons per day, and it was indeed able to ensure the supply of the German Sixth Army. Hitler then supported Goering's plan, and he ordered Paulus to hold his ground, and the 6th Army must remain in Stalingrad, and ordered him to change the name of this army group to the "Stalin Bastion" Army Group in the future.

However, Goering's tragedy was that although his air force was able to control air supremacy over Stalingrad and cover the airdrops of supplies to the Germans, he ignored one of the most important problems, that is, the Air Force of the Imperial Chinese Volunteers had a strong night ground attack wing - the A-5 Attack Wing known as the Flesh Yaksha. ╔╗

The A-5 attack aircraft group of the Chinese Imperial Volunteers would carry out a fierce ultra-low-altitude attack on the encircled German army at night, and the powerful ground attack rockets caused the German supplies to explode and ignite a fire in an instant, causing heavy losses to the German supplies. The Soviet Red Army's large-scale deployment of anti-aircraft artillery, equipped with high-performance radio-proximity anti-aircraft shells, made the German airdrop plan quickly meaningless.

During this period, the Germans received only about 10% of their supplies, and the 6th Army gradually felt the threat of starvation. The other side. The Soviet army was constantly strengthening the encirclement of Stalingrad. And began the operation to reduce the encirclement.

On 21 November, Hitler ordered the expansion of Field Marshal Manstein's 11th Army into Army Group Don, with Field Marshal Manstein as its commander. and put Paulus's 6th Army, Hort's 4th Panzer Army, and Romania's 3rd and 4th Armies under his command. In his order, Hitler instructed: "The immediate task of Army Group Don is to halt the enemy's offensive and regain the lost positions. ”

Manstein thinks. The only chance of German success was for the 6th Army to break through from Stalingrad to the southwest, and the 4th Panzer Army of Hort to attack northeast from Kotelnikovo, south of Stalingrad, to flank Yeremenko's Stalingrad Front, and then rotate around to attack the right flank of the Soviet Southwestern Front. But on 30 November, in a public speech, Hitler said that he would never retreat from Stalingrad, and stressed again that the besieged forces must not surrender, and that Manstein must fight his way to Stalingrad.

At this time, the German high command in order to rescue the besieged Paulus Army. The German army's newly developed No. 6 main battle tank, the Tiger tank, was quickly deployed to the front line.

The M28A3 Cheetah medium main battle tank against the Chinese Empire, and the M36 King Tiger heavy main battle tank against the legendary Chinese Empire. The German Army developed the tank No. 6. i.e. Tiger tanks.

Due to the fact that the Tiger King main battle tank of the Chinese Empire had been kept secret, the Germans had no access to detailed information. ╔╗But the power of the M28A3 Gepard medium tank on the battlefield has made the German army suffer, and the German army has also obtained thousands of M28 tanks on the French battlefield, so it has been able to develop the German No. 6 tank in a targeted manner.

Since the target is not the mainstream tank in Europe, but the main battle tank such as the M28A3 and the T34 of the Chinese Empire, the design concept of the German Tiger tank is different from most of the German tanks in the early years. Previous designs emphasized a balance of mobility, protection, and firepower. Although the Germans were often inferior in firepower and protection to their opponents in the early days, these disadvantages were offset by tactical superiority. The design of the Tiger I tank presents a different design philosophy, focusing on firepower and armor at the expense of mobility. But in fact, the mobility of the Tiger I has only not improved, and it is the same as the previous No. 3, No. 4 and No. 5 (the Tiger uses a larger and more advanced engine and transmission system), that is, it still has the mobility of the German medium tank, although it is not as good as the M28A3 and T-34, but the Tiger is the most mobile heavy tank in the history of Europe and the United States.

Work on the Tiger heavy tank began as early as 1937, but at that time there was no specific production plan because there was no need for this in the European theater. What really stimulated the emergence of the Tiger was the appearance of the M28A3 main battle tank of the Chinese Empire, and the German army's use of 88mm anti-aircraft guns on the French battlefield showed great power in anti-tank applications, so the Germans converted the 88mm anti-aircraft guns into tank guns and installed them on the Tiger tank.

Although similar in design and appearance to tanks 4 and 5 (medium tanks), the Tiger I was more than twice as heavy as the V, with thicker armor, larger guns, and the inevitable large storage space for fuel and ammunition, larger engines, and a stronger transmission and suspension system.

The armor in front of the hull of the Tiger I tank is 110 mm thick, and the gun shield in front of the turret is 100~120, compared to the armor in front of the body of the No. IV tank of the same period is only 50 mm thick and the armor in front of the turret is only 40 mm thick, while the Tiger I tank also has 82 mm thick armor on the sides and back. ╔╗ This thickness can withstand most shells at normal engagement distances, especially anti-tank shells from the front, and the Tiger is designed to withstand large-caliber shells falling from long distances. Most of the armor of the Tiger I tank is vertically connected to other structures, and the occlusal connection form is adopted, so that it can obtain good structural performance. At the same time, welding (instead of riveting) was applied between the biting pieces of armor, the welds were of high quality, but the welded body and turret also significantly increased the weight of the Tiger. The Tiger I tank is too heavy for most bridges, so it is designed to wade four meters deep.

Due to the fact that the German army had earlier used diesel tanks, on the battlefield of Moscow was incapacitated by the cold winter. So the Germans learned their lesson. The petrol engine was changed back to the sixth tank, although this caused huge fuel costs for the German army, and it was not as efficient as other tanks with diesel engines. But at the moment the Germans had no other way to solve the problem of the cold winter.

The total weight of the German Tiger tank reached 55 tons, which is the same as the M36 King Tiger tank of the Chinese Empire, so the German Tiger tank was also included in the ranks of heavy main battle tanks. The German Tiger was armed with an 88 mm 56 times diameter tank gun. It is invincible to the 80 mm 70 times diameter tank gun mounted by the Chinese Tiger. Although the frontal armor of the German Tiger has reached 110 mm thick nickel-cadmium-chromium alloy rolled steel armor, its strength has reached the strength of the Chinese Empire's DKPG-433 type Chinese special steel, but it is still lagging behind the strength of the 100 mm DKPG-535 type Chinese special steel installed on the Chinese Tiger tank, which adopts a sloping armor layout, which is more than double the vertical armor strength of the German Tiger. In terms of mobility, the Chinese Empire's M36 King Tiger main battle tank reached a speed of up to 55 kilometers per hour, while the German No. 6 Tiger tank only had a speed of 45 kilometers per hour.

In terms of exterior design, the M36 King Tiger tank of the Chinese Empire has a low and flat design and exquisite workmanship. The target was small, while the German tank VI was designed to be tall and powerful, which made it easier to be hit by enemy anti-tank weapons on the battlefield.

And the most critical question is: The Chinese Empire had a monopoly on armored track technology. This gave the German Tiger a track life of less than 400 km, while the Chinese Empire's M36 tank had a track life of up to 1500 km. If a chase breaks out between the German tiger and the Chinese tiger. It is clear that the latter has an absolute advantage.

However, the German Tiger Tank (Type 1) was only an illusion against the Chinese Empire's M36 King Tiger main battle tank, and since its specific data was not known, the real opponent of the German Tiger tank was used against the M28A3 tank exported to the Soviet Union by the Chinese Empire.

Since the M28A3 Cheetah tank was a medium tank, it was no match for the German Tiger heavy tank in terms of firepower and armor protection, so the Germans quickly turned the situation around with the King Tiger tank.

On December 12, with a heavy heart, Field Marshal Manstein launched a counteroffensive operation codenamed "Winter Storm" with 750 Tiger heavy tanks.

The Germans, led by the 4th Panzer Army of Hort, fought fiercely with the Soviet 51st Army, and the Battle of Volosovo Tanks broke out between the two sides.

Four Soviet tank divisions armed with M28A3 main battle tanks met two German tank divisions armed with Tiger tanks, and fierce fighting broke out on the Volosovo Plain. The Soviets were unaware of the danger and were convinced that the M28A3 tanks were invincible, so they bravely charged forward and soon joined the German tank divisions.

The M28A3 Gepard tank was inferior to the No. 6 tank in terms of firepower and armor protection, and soon the Soviet tanks were hit by bullets and caught fire, causing heavy losses.

However, the Soviets still had no intention of retreating and continued to maintain the offensive, resulting in a short two-hour tank battle, in which 322 Soviet tanks were destroyed, while the German Tiger tanks only lost less than 42 units, and most of them were caused by the destruction of the tracks, and only a small number of tanks were destroyed by the M28A3 tanks at close range through the armor.

Soviet arrogance led to a crushing defeat in the tank battle, and the Germans broke through the 51st Army's defenses on the Aksai River on December 16 with Tiger tanks.

In this way, the Soviet army's strategic plan to counter-encircle the German army is seriously threatened, and it is very likely that the German army will be counter-encircled again, and if it cooperates with the German Sixth Army in the middle of the encirclement, the Soviet army will fall into a huge disaster.

Fortunately, the German army did not estimate the strong combat effectiveness of the Tiger tank, so there was no situation of internal and external cooperation, which made Stalin break out in a cold sweat and hurriedly convened an emergency meeting to discuss countermeasures.

Wang Chenhao took the briefing and read it carefully, couldn't help frowning, and asked, "What are the countermeasures?" ”

Zhang Zizhong replied: "The Soviet High Command asked the Imperial Government to urgently reinforce them with the most powerful M36 King Tiger heavy main battle tank in the Imperial Army, because the M28A3 or T34 tanks in the hands of the Soviet Army could not stop the impact of the German Tiger tanks!" ”

Wang Chenhao snorted coldly and said: "The Germans also dare to call themselves tigers, this is openly arguing with the empire's Tiger King tank!" ”

Wang Chenhao paused, and then asked, "Have you decided?" To send the M36 to the battlefield of the USSR? ”

Zhang Zizhong shook his head and said: "The M36 Tiger King main battle tank is the strongest tank in the empire in service, once it is sent to the Soviet battlefield, it is very disadvantageous to expose the strength of the imperial army prematurely." ”

Wang Chenhao nodded and said, "That's right!" So what are you going to do? ”

Zhang Zizhong replied: "The M36 tank imperial army itself has not yet completed all the deployment plans, let alone the Soviet army, and when it is transported to the Soviet battlefield, it is far from quenching the thirst of the near, so we have not yet come up with a coping strategy, and we decided to see the situation first!" ”

At this time, Chen Bing suddenly said: "Weichen has a way!" ”

Wang Chenhao immediately asked, "Hurry up!" ”

Chen Bing then said: "Your Majesty, the frontal armor of Germany's No. 6 tank is 110 mm, which is equivalent to the empire's 95 mm Chinese special steel, plus the opponent adopts a vertical armor arrangement, we only need to make a fuss about armor-piercing shells!" ”

Zhang Zizhong asked: "Tell me in detail!" ”

Chen Bing explained: "We have just successfully developed a deshelling armor-piercing projectile with a stable tail, which has an extremely strong penetrating ability and is enough to penetrate the armor of the German Tiger tank! ”

Wang Chenhao and Zhang Zizhong glanced at each other, and suddenly showed surprise.