81_81266 When Guderian stood on a high hill and watched his troops advance on the vast plains of Ukraine, he learned why the Führer did not agree with the strategic plan of the Wehrmacht General Staff to attack the Soviet Union.

Hundreds of tanks once seemed to Guderian to be a spectacle, with cars and armoured vehicles, command vehicles and other logistical vehicles, and his 1st Panzer Division was a behemoth when it was in France.

But now, between heaven and earth, these vehicles wind their way along the road, and compared to the magnificence of nature, they are as small as earthworms. An army of tens of thousands of people was scattered across this plain, and he could no longer find it in an instant, originally he thought that his troops could control many areas, but now it seems that his troops were still scattered only to control some of the most basic defensive areas.

In the beginning, Guderian was moving his troops in battalions, but later because the battle line was too long and the terrain was too large, he began to be forced to fight with companies as the basic unit, and later there was even only one platoon or squad of troops attacking, which was a very distressing thing for a group army commander.

The 9th Mechanized Infantry Corps had caught up with Guderian, and the 3rd SS Panzer Division and the 9th Motorized Infantry Division had also handed over the defensive line to the German infantry behind them, catching up with the pace of the 1st Panzer Division's attack, which gave Guderian more troops at his disposal, but after these troops were sent to various attack points, they still found that they were still too small for this land.

The battle was very strange, the German offensive force was actually not large, only about 200,000 men were engaged in the first counterattack, and then these troops were reinforced to 450,000, but this offensive force was not huge compared to the Soviet troops they had to deal with.

In another huge encirclement of 300,000 German troops, the Soviets had about 600,000 troops. However, due to the lack of heavy weapons and air support, these armies were unable to break through the originally loose defensive line formed by the German army.

Everywhere on the battlefield, 1,000 Soviet Red Army soldiers could be seen raising their hands and surrendering to 100 German soldiers. Everywhere you can see, more than 20 German soldiers with guns attacking thousands of Soviet Red Army.

A field photographer captured the German attack on the village: two German machine gunners set up their machine gun position behind a fence at the entrance of the village, and then this machine gun position began to pour ammunition, and a dozen German soldiers outflanked and stormed the village, and about ten minutes later, they drove out of the village about 300 panicked Soviet Red Army soldiers, who looked hungry for a long time, raised their hands in fear and begged the Germans to give them something to eat.

As the supreme chief of staff of the German army on the Eastern Front, Manstein drew up an operation plan called "Shine" under the instruction of Accardo, which allowed the German army after Operation Requiem to advance as quickly as possible, occupy Ukraine and Belarus before the Soviet Red Army reacted, and completely annihilate all the field armies of the Soviet Army on the Eastern Front.

Now this "shine" is enough to shine, the German army on the 8th day after the start of the battle surrounded most of the Soviet mobile forces, and now excluding the Soviet troops on the Northern Front led by Timoshenko, it is still relatively complete, and the Soviet Red Army in the rest of the region has fallen into the disaster of total collapse.

A German reconnaissance detachment appeared on the edge of a small town on the morning of that day, two Germans on motorcycles stopped themselves in a wheat field not far away, and a four-wheeled armored reconnaissance vehicle was more daring, it crossed the wheat field, stopped at the side of the town's street, and the two German grenadiers sitting in the car jumped out of the armored car, bent against the wall and advanced to the first intersection after they entered the town.

Several Ukrainian women with scarves wrapped around their heads saw the Germans intruding into their town with baskets on their shoulders, and said something to the Germans in a hurried tone, and the two German grenadiers could not understand these people, so they could only lean against the wall and watch the chattering foreign women warily.

Soon the roar of the motorbike engine caught the attention of the locals, and a German motorcycle with a "sidecar" drove into the town, and a German soldier on a motorcycle shouted to the two German grenadiers who arrived first: "There don't seem to be Soviet soldiers around here." ”

"What are they talking about?" said a German soldier nervously with a gun, as he asked his companion.

"My Russian is not very good either. The German soldier with glasses on his motorcycle spread his hands helplessly: "I just heard them talking about the Russians, leave, eat." ”

"Are they going to invite us to dinner?" said one of the German soldiers, cracking open and laughing, uttering the most improbable guess: "I think if they were inviting us to dinner, I would give all the cigarettes to the platoon commander." ”

"I'm afraid your cigarettes won't be saved. A thin man in bib pants pushed aside a few Ukrainian women, came to the German soldiers, and stretched out his hand to shake hands with the German soldiers: "Hello, my name is Polytikovsky, I am a secondary school teacher here, I speak German. ”

"Hello, what the hell are these girls talking about?" asked the German veteran, who was led by a rifle on his back, pointing at the Ukrainian women.

They said thank you for coming here and delivering them from the devil. They are willing to cook dinner for you, and they say that there are no more Soviet soldiers here, and they will leave this morning. The middle school teacher, whose name was Who, replied.

"......" thought that he had just said that he would give cigarettes because of his humble mouth, and the young German soldier was very speechless.

"That...... ......The German veteran felt very embarrassed that he did not remember the other party's name, and continued to ask embarrassedly: "Are you sure there are no more Soviet soldiers here?"

"Yes, sir, the Russians are not welcome here, so you can rest assured. What Howski nodded: "The direction they left was due east, and they walked in a hurry. ”

"You two, go to the east to stand on guard, and if you find a situation, fire a warning shot immediately. The veteran nodded and began to arrange the task: "The armored vehicle is on standby south of the town. The rest of the people continued to search, expanding the search area to about 5 kilometers, and let's get moving. ”

The two soldiers who did not get off the motorcycle nodded, started the motorcycle and left the intersection, and the two soldiers began to move against the wall in the intended direction. On the street they saw 122-mm anti-aircraft guns blown up by the Soviets themselves, as well as several abandoned military cars.

Soon the vanguard of the German army arrived at the town abandoned by the Soviets, two Leopard tanks passed through the city, followed by about 500 heavily armed grenadiers, cars and armored vehicles parked in the town for a while, and huge flags were covered by the sappers one after another.

Subsequently, the soldiers began to set up radio antennas on the roof of the mayor's office in the middle of the town, and the grenadiers searched the houses where the citizens lived and stopped disturbing the people. Immediately after some open-top cars were driven into the town, as soon as the German official in a straight military uniform appeared, the local Ukrainian girls suddenly became more favorable.

As time passed, more and more German officers arrived, and the rank became larger and larger, until General Liszt stepped out of the car, and the locals learned that this place had been used as a temporary front-line headquarters by the German Army Group E.

Politikovsky and two good-looking Ukrainian girls were chosen to be the representatives of the locals and were cordially met by General Liszt. Several people chatted enthusiastically about the local customs, and Politikovsky also pointed to a beautiful Ukrainian girl to introduce the local clothing characteristics and customs.

When Liszt assured them that the Germans would only collect a tenth of this year's crop as a tax, the screams of the Ukrainian girls could be heard far away from their mouths. Then the town boiled over, because the Germans promised to return the Ukrainian captives to the locals, and as long as the prisoners worked in Poland's "construction brigade" for a year, they would be able to return safely to their hometowns. People sang and danced to celebrate the arrival of the German army, and the identity of the "German occupation army" began to sublimate to the exalted "German liberators" from this moment.

A dozen men who had taken refuge in the wheat fields were persuaded by Polytikovsky to return to the town, but the Germans did not bother them, and even a young man in a Soviet military uniform was ordered by Liszt to be pardoned. So the Germans once again jumped from "liberators" to "people sent by God to liberate Ukraine."

Everywhere there were voices of thanks to the Germans for driving out the "Soviet demons", and the heroic Ukrainians even offered to provide the Germans with 100 clean rooms, saying nothing to let the officers of the army group sleep in tents around the town.

It was the first Ukrainian town to welcome the Germans, and of course it was taken seriously by all sides, and Marshal Brauchitsch was once again shocked by the foresight of Führer Accardo, who had predicted that the German offensive would be welcomed by the local Ukrainian people when he drew up his plan.

Subsequently, in the name of the Army General Staff Headquarters, the German army issued temporary legal regulations for the occupying forces, prohibiting the German army from disturbing the lives of the locals. Troops at all levels must strictly enforce this regulation and exercise gentlemanly restraint towards friendly local Ukrainian residents. In fact, the partisans that the Germans feared did not show up for resistance and hatred, on the contrary, more Ukrainians did not have any special feelings for the arrival of the Germans, and they numbly watched the German convoy drive in front of them, without cheering or hate