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"I'm going to kill him, I'm going to kill him! This bastard, he should go to East Kazakhstan, to Semiy! And not what Balkhash. I know he must have been timid. Yes, this scum of the Frunze Military Academy! Damn, reinforcements, how long will it be before the reinforcements from the Urals die? In the underground office of the Karaganda Coal Mining Company, Kulik clutched the march route report sent by the 16th Army, and cursed in fragments.

On the large map hanging in front of him, there were already many bad signs. First of all, Semiy, under the siege of four army groups, the defense line has not yet been broken, and the troops inside are fighting more and more, which shows that the enemy has begun to reinforce through the mountains and aircraft at any cost. At the Ayaguz River, a whole division was bombarded by three 305-mm and two 280-mm fortified heavy guns this afternoon because of its rash advance! The two armies fought for a month, and they didn't even rub off the cement of the fortress. Already in the Akdouka direction, one heavy armored division of the enemy, as well as seven to eight infantry divisions and at least thirty 210-mm heavy guns, have appeared. The situation had deteriorated on the northern front, as was the Mount Aitau on the southern front, where the Wehrmacht had increased from two to three, and recaptured Kopa yesterday, only 20 kilometres from Ottar, who had lost tens of thousands of casualties, and for the first time committed at least 300 tanks in the mountains.

Tashkent, which was farther away, also fought for a month, but without even seeing the Khujand fortress at Andijan's throat, more than 5,000 people were killed by the shelling of six 305-mm fortresses. Dushanbe's troops were even worse, the mountainous terrain could only be guerrilla warfare, and the operational theory of the large army group was a joke over there. Even Herat, Afghanistan, is losing ground in Afghanistan, Badgis province is lost, the Murghab River defense line has been lost, and the enemy is advancing towards Mali. If Mali is lost. The 200,000 Afghan garrison had to retreat to Mashhad, Iran.

What makes Kulik even more troublesome is that the human resources of this opponent are obviously stronger than imagined! Intelligence showed that just a week after Yang Qiu's speech, three million young people asked to join the army, and the daily wagons sent to the northwest increased from 6,500 knots to 12,000 knots. Driven by huge human resources, perhaps a night's sleep on the opposite side will add tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of soldiers.

Therefore, the strategic reserve has become the only means for him to quickly resolve the war, but this is the only one who actually ignored the East Kazakh battlefield and turned around and went to Akchatau and Balkhash!

"What's there?! He's cowardly! It is a crime against the people and the country! It is the Semiyi that needs to be strengthened now. Not Balkhash. Someone should be sent to arrest him immediately! Such problems must be dealt with seriously. The hot-tempered Kulik's voice grew louder and louder, just like his nickname, so explosive that all the officers in the room were afraid to speak.

OK. A burst of telephone ringing finally broke the sinking, and the chief of staff, Morodinov, picked up the phone, listened to two sentences, and handed it to Kulik: "Comrade commander, it's the phone of Commander-in-Chief Apanashchenko." ”

Apanashchenko? A contemptuous sneer tugged at the corner of Kulik's mouth. He didn't like this man very much in his heart, everyone was a general, and as a result, because he was stationed in the East all the year round, he was appointed commander-in-chief of the entire Eastern Front. "Isn't it just Marshal Budyonny's protection?" Kulik was still muttering to himself when he picked up the phone, because everyone knows. Apanashchenko was Budyonny's man, and this operation was the first to be suggested by Budyonny.

Apanashchenko's call represented the dissatisfaction of the High Command with the situation of the war, and Kulik, although he did not like him, understood how irritated Stalin was at the moment. No doubt. He and the entire Kazakh Front have already sat in the crater, and if he fails, he will be the second Konev to be shot!

"Come, send a telegram to the head of the Political Department of the 16th Army, Sharif. Let him immediately dismiss Lukin and lead the troops. ”

"Commander. Comrade Commander! Telegram, it was the telegram of Commander Havrov. When Kulik was determined to dismiss Lukin from his post, the correspondent rushed in and shouted: "Enemy, enemy! Airborne landing was carried out in the Kima hills, 40 km north of Balkhash, about a thousand aircraft! ”

"What!"

Kulik was startled, and after reading the telegram, he was even more furious: "Ridiculous, really ridiculous!" Isn't Haverov, an old drunkard, blind?! Actually let so many enemies be airborne behind their backs. Is his 37th Army going to be a collective treason! Telegraphed back to him that his three infantry divisions were not here for a vacation! ”

First Lukin, then Havrov, Kulik's curses that even the Chief of Staff Morodinov could not hold back, reminded: "Comrade commander, now is not the time to hold accountable. Although there are only 20,000 infantry, it will still pose a serious threat to the troops. I propose to suspend the investigation of Comrade Lukin for the time being, and to let him go to Balkhash immediately after the destruction of the enemy. ”

Kulik's face was gloomy, and instead of answering immediately, he asked rhetorically: "Did you find any reports from tanks and artillery?" ”

"No, it's all light infantry."

"Light infantry, 20,000 light infantry." Kulik got up and paced back and forth. The threat of 20,000 light infantry is not small, but Balkhash to East Kazakhstan and Mount Aitau are more than 200 kilometers, and it is undoubtedly a fool's dream to outflank the back road with 20,000 light infantry, so he thought about it before deciding: "Order!" Lukin was dismissed from his post as lieutenant general of the first-class group army and demoted to major general for meritorious service. Nietseikov was dismissed from the post of political commissar, and Comrade Sharif, director of the Political Department, concurrently served as the political commissar of the group army, and jointly led the 16th Army to encircle and suppress this enemy. Order Havrov to immediately dispatch troops to cooperate with the encirclement and suppression, and must not let them lean towards the north and south ends of Lake Balkhash! It was ordered to remove Belov from the post of general of the 1st Army, Vlasov took over as commander of the army, and the 4th Mechanized Army was merged into the 24th Army. Order the 15th Army, the 24th Army, and the 35th Army to immediately continue the offensive towards Semey, and tell them that when they exhaust the last drop of gasoline, they must also take Semey! Then a telegram was sent to Commander-in-Chief Apanashchenko, asking Commander-in-Chief Zhukov's 2nd Army to cooperate in the offensive against Semiy. Order the rest of the troops to defend in place and not to retreat half a step back before the next snowfall! In the end, let Lieutenant General Ye Liming's cavalry all go to act as a transport team, and the supplies must be sent as soon as possible. ”

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"Hurry, hurry! You stupid pig! ”

"Trucks, turn all the trucks over."

In the small town of Balkhash, Kulokin, under the reprimand of the officers, climbed into a BT5 tank that had been activated. Since many of the antiaircraft guns of the air defense battalion were blown up by strafing, the artillery without artillery was drawn out to participate in the encirclement and suppression of the enemy's airborne troops. Beside him, there were also more than forty BT7 and T26 tanks. Because the road was bumpy and dirt, Kulogin immediately learned to tie himself with a belt as soon as he got into the car.

"Let's go, let's go."

Soon after Kulokin climbed into the tank, more than 50 trucks and hundreds of horse-drawn wagons began to hit the road, following the tank all the way north to support Kima. Haverov was very satisfied with his efficiency, and secretly wondered if he would be able to transfer out of this place that he hated after eating the airborne troops, but he had no idea that a huge "fleet" was quietly approaching.

"How far is it?"

On a landing craft converted into a command boat, the commander of the 1st Armored Division, Leshi, was full of anxiety. He was Liu Mingzhao's classmate and a member of the German Nine that year. The nine-member group is now the backbone of the National Defense Force, Long Yun is the commander of the Fifth Army, Liu Mingzhao is the head of the Operations Department in the General Staff, and I heard that he will soon be the commander of the Third Army, Meng Lang is the commander of the 103rd Division, Zhang Wei is a military staff officer under Commander Qiu Bin in Nanyang, Xiao Jinyun has become the director of the Military Intelligence Bureau, and Dongfang Chen and Liao Changfeng have done an impressive job in the Marine Corps. With his ability, it has already reached the time to become a commander, but Commander-in-Chief Qin Zhangshu and Commander Chu Nan both hope that he can stay for an extra year, so he is still the commander of the armored division.

The 1st Panzer Division and the 1st Army to which it is located can be said to be one of the most elite units of the entire Wehrmacht, so he is also under a lot of pressure after being selected as the crossing arrow, after all, the General Staff and the whole army are watching him.

In order to complete the crossing, the navy also fully cooperated, and also transferred many officers with landing experience from the 22nd fleet. The commander of the command boat was the first to rush to the Iranian beach. Seeing that Le Shi was in a hurry, he glanced at the speedometer and smiled comfortingly: "Commander, rest assured, the big lake is no bigger than the sea, and the wind and waves are small, so our speed is faster than expected, and we will definitely be able to reach it in half an hour at most." In the dead of night, I guess I should hear the sound of a motor on the other side of the river after another five kilometers. ”

"Rest assured, the Air Force will cover." As he spoke, there was a buzzing sound overhead. Everyone looked up, and there were about 30 H-5s chasing after them from behind. A few minutes later, the sky in the distance burned red. The noise of the motor was obscured by rumbling explosions and flames, but this shelter could only last for a short time, and as long as it was close to ten kilometers, it was impossible not to be detected.

Before seeing this wave of bombers return, three more groups of snake fighter-attack planes and bombers rushed north, and in just ten minutes, such a large formation attacked, which made Leshi frown, didn't he say that there were only two waves of bombing before landing? Why so many planes? And it's still night, isn't the command afraid of accidents? Could it be that something is wrong with the airborne division?

Le Shi was thinking about it, but the captain next to him suddenly shouted: "Watch out for the cannonballs!" ”

In the darkness, red dots glittered among the mountains ten kilometers away. In the blink of an eye, columns of water had already risen in the formation. There is no doubt that the garrison in Balkhash had heard the motor and spotted the landing craft formation.

"Full speed! Full! ”

"Contact the support plane, turn on the searchlight in ten minutes to guide the landing field!"

At the captain's shout, the landing craft formation began to accelerate, and the diesel motor and the aviation propeller behind it simultaneously made a sharp hiss, pushing the tank landing craft to rush towards the harbor at a speed of 23 knots. At the same time, the hard-hulled assault boats in the formation began to accelerate, and these small boats cut through the water at a high speed of 40 knots