At the beginning of 1942, Desan was busy.

First, their Army Group North had to take the enemy's ports in the far north, thus completely cutting off the enemy's access to international aid from the outside world.

Since the beginning of Operation Barbarossa, seven large convoys of material transport have sailed more than 2,000 kilometers from the northern part of the British to the Murmansk area via the Arctic Ocean.

This sea route is constantly transfusing blood to the old Maozi.

According to the statistics of the front-line troops, in just a few months, the enemy received at least seven hundred and fifty tanks, eight hundred combat aircraft and one hundred thousand tons of other equipment.

These weapons seriously hampered the pace of the offensive of Army Group North.

Secondly, LN Grad should also be occupied as soon as possible.

After encircling for so long, it could not be done, and the blow to the morale of troops at all levels was not small, and the enemy even had the intention of getting stronger and stronger. If you can't solve this nail household, what kind of conquest will you talk about.

Finally, there is the problem of Crimea, where medium bombers can bomb the oil fields around Romania directly.

For Desan, oil is their lifeblood. It was not easy to have an oil-producing area, and the mustache naturally did not let the beard threaten his economic lifeline.

Of course, the most important thing is the Central Theater.

Although the enemy is very tenacious, it has exploded in the war with amazing combat effectiveness and mobilization ability. But the logistical problems of the house have been solved, and it only takes one auspicious day to continue the general offensive.

The battle strength is 1.8 million against 1.25 million, and the advantage is mine!

······

Tula, an infantry division of the 50th Army.

"Division commander, the newly replenished fighters have arrived at the front. Comrade Political Commissar is mobilizing the recruits and is expected to return to the division headquarters in half an hour. ”

"Our biggest problem now is the lack of anti-tank weapons and anti-aircraft guns. At present, there is a serious shortage of antiaircraft artillery battalions and anti-tank battalions directly under the division, and the combat effectiveness is less than half of that of the peak period. “

"Even if we can build a large number of anti-tank trenches and temporary fire points on the defensive line in time, it will be difficult to withstand the joint attack of the enemy's Second Panzer Army and aviation."

As soon as these words came out, Makarov immediately turned into a bitter melon face, and even the joy of the arrival of reinforcements disappeared without a trace.

That's right, the commander of the infantry division is an old horse who has a very good relationship with the Yellow River. Everyone who sees his service file will call him a lucky man.

He was ambushed by the Japanese while on an intercontinental transport mission, and he survived.

Fighting with the Finns, and even being besieged by Simon Heyer, he still did not die.

In the Battle of Smolensk, his own troops suffered heavy losses from Germany, and in this battle alone, 400,000 people were captured.

But he stubbornly led a group of recruits to successfully break through, and even participated in a bold ambush battle in the area of Mtzensk.

It is precisely because of the above experience that Makarov was able to become an infantry division commander in this special period.

Of course, the old horse is also unlucky.

After all, the day before De San began Operation Barbarossa, he completed the retirement ceremony in the presence of family and friends.

If it weren't for the enemy's overwhelming efforts, perhaps Makarov would have driven a tractor he had bought in advance and become a farmer in his hometown with his back to the land.

A moment later, Lao Ma was in the makeshift command post and began to observe the situation on the position with a telescope.

The outermost battle had been going on all night, and the fighters had suffered a major blow, both physically and psychologically.

As far as the eye can see, the trenches ploughed by artillery fire and aerial bombs are devastated, and wounded soldiers are hiding in almost destroyed fortifications waiting for treatment.

"Our positions can only withstand one more enemy attack at most."

"Let's go, come out for a walk with me. The political commissar is not on the front line, and the two of us have to carry the banner of mobilization. ”

After speaking, Makarov, supported by his third deputy division commander, staggered out of the command post with a Mosin Nagan on a lean.

In the last period of their lives, they still remembered the responsibilities of soldiers.

Having entered the position, the old horse stopped a warrior who was about to salute him. Looking at the slightly immature faces in the trenches, his heart seemed to be crushed.

"Davaris, you've worked hard!"

"In such a short period of time, people not only dug trenches, but even built breastworks, which is a remarkable thing. Our deeds may not be recorded in the history books of later generations, but the common people of Tula will not forget! ”

"I'm proud of you!"

Although the trenches on the positions were not dug deeply, the height of some positions was not even a meter. But now the entire division is almost entirely wounded, and it is already the limit for everyone to be able to do this way.

As a division commander who personally trained the recruits, Lao Ma knew that the soldiers had done their best.

When he heard the word breastwork, the warrior who had been about to salute suddenly collapsed, and tears mixed with blood flowed down uncontrollably.

This situation immediately aroused Makarov's suspicions. When he looked closely, he realized that what looked like a tree branch in the breastwall was actually a white, stiff arm.

This act of defiling the body of the sergeant caused anger to rise quickly.

"Who told you to build bunkers out of the corpses of warriors! Didn't I send someone to send the comrades to the cities in the rear? What the hell is going on? ”

After being reprimanded by the division commander, the young soldier cried even harder, he pointed to the chest wall in front of him and said bitterly:

"This is my brother, this is my instructor, this is the hygienist who has saved everyone countless times! We have long made a pact that even if we become corpses, we will continue to guard the surviving people, and we will stay on the battlefield and fight together. ”

At the same time, the helpless and haggard voice of the commissar sounded from the rear.

"I gave the order, the battle line collapsed too quickly last night, and there is another farmland nearby, and there is really no material available."

"Let's go, come with me to a meeting at Command. The 4th Tank Brigade is here, and the commander of the other side wants to discuss the next tactics with us. ”

Hearing this, the old horse straightened his steel helmet and saluted the chest wall in front of him before leaving silently.

On the way to the command post, the two also met a fighter holding explosives. According to the other side, he was ready to look for an opportunity to get under the chassis of the enemy's tank.

The cold wind whistled up the snow and fog and made a terrible whistling sound. The old horse suddenly stopped, looked at the position behind him and said:

"Comrade Commissar, if I fall before you, please put me in the breastwork. For a soldier, it is indeed a good place to be. ”

"Okay, but we won't be too far apart. And in our tradition, I'm probably ahead of you. ”

······

After the two arrived at the headquarters, the colonel and brigade commander of the 4th Tank Brigade had been waiting for a long time. He looked at Makarov's arrangement and said with great heartache:

"You infantry are so far ahead! What's the difference with looking for death! ”

Faced with the doubts of the friendly troops, Lao Ma shook his head helplessly, he pointed to the military map on the table and said:

"In the vanguard of the enemy, the 3rd Panzer Division of the 2nd Panzer Army. Guderian: What firepower do you still know? We have to go first to get a chance for the 4th Tank Brigade. ”

"Only by leading it into the trap we have laid can there be a slight possibility of holding the line."

"The enemy is outnumbered, and there is no chance to destroy the enemy at all. It's just a sequence, there's nothing to fight about. Trenches and mass graves, you have to choose one. ”

The task of Makarov and the 4th Tank Brigade was to hold the railroad in the rear.

Once the position is lost, their army group will be completely devoid of supplies and reinforcements, and the enemy will open the passage from Tula to Coldwind City.

Judging from the current situation, the fall of any transportation hub may become the last straw that breaks the camel's back.

This is also the reason why the 50th Group Army, where Lao Ma belongs, will not retreat in the same place.

Half an hour later, the three of them discussed the battle plan together. In fact, the specific steps are very simple, that is, rely on the infantry to lure the enemy deep and drag the decisive battle site to the area set up by your side in advance.

Not long after the colonel commander of the 4th Tank Brigade left, the enemy's attacking forces began a new offensive in the early morning. The unreasonable artillery fire covered the defensive line arranged by the old horse in an instant.

"Boom! Rumble! Rumble! ”

At present, the military thinking of the German three is not complicated, and both the SS and the Wehrmacht firmly believe that only an offensive, especially a surprise attack, can achieve victory in battle.

As Gu Bushuai's subordinates, the 3rd Armored Division has brought its superior firepower and mobile encirclement to the extreme.

At the very beginning of the offensive, their vanguard ensured the initiative with their powerful firepower and rapid maneuvering.

Due to the inadequacy of bunkers and fortifications, the vast majority of fighters on the positions could not resist the shelling phase at all. Coupled with the occasional trumpet of Jericho, the first line of defense became precarious in the blink of an eye.

"Division! This is the Frontier Observation Post! ”

"The enemy's armored units are approaching at high speed, and there are only five kilometers left from the line of defense! As far as I could see, there were 47 tanks No. 3 and 11 tanks No. 4! ”

"Please immediately assemble all surviving allies in the area at the position of the first line of defense and prepare to engage the enemy."

In a sense, Guderian's second outfit can really be regarded as his own son.

Before Operation Barbarossa began, when other armies were still using 35T, 38T, and No. 2 tanks, his Panzer Division was already full of 105 No. 3 tanks.

Different from the original timeline, after being beaten by the T-34 and KV series, Desan accelerated the renewal plan of the active equipment, so that the Changsan and Changsi began to be installed in winter.

The second set is the first batch of troops to replace tanks.

Only half an hour passed, and the 3rd Panzer Division broke through the first line of defense. The infantry in the rear quickly followed, trying to consolidate the position in the shortest possible time.

Blessings are incomparable, and disasters are not singular.

While the enemy's tanks continued to advance, Makarov received a call from an artillery position.

"Divisional commander! The enemy's aviation is already approaching! It was only a matter of time before the position was discovered. We decided to open fire immediately to help take the pressure off the infantry on the frontal battlefield. ”

"Davaris! Good luck! Kill the enemy for me! ”

"Fire!"

With the order of the artillery commander, the howitzers and field guns on standby in the rear staged their final swan song.

More than a dozen barreled cannons of various types and calibers were fired in unison, and the not too dense shells smashed fiercely on the path of the enemy's charge.

But the enemy's reaction was not slow, and countermeasures followed.

Unlike the Maozi, who relied on observation posts to determine the parameters of the shelling.

At this time, De San firmly held air supremacy, and the presence of reconnaissance planes, artillery school firing planes, and Stuka allowed them to carry out counterattacks in the shortest possible time.

The artillery position, which was originally hidden, was exposed at a glance from a high altitude.

Although it is cruel, this is a battlefield of life and death, and the side that loses air supremacy is so powerless.

The artillerymen also understood this, so they were ready to sacrifice before the attack. From the very beginning, they planned to use themselves as bait to gain a chance for the anti-aircraft artillery battalion to counterattack.

The ferocious firepower of the German three was far beyond Makarov's imagination, and the two infantry regiments held out for only three hours before evaporating from the defensive line.

Of course, the warriors' fearless fighting style also caused a lot of losses to the Germans.

Those scrapped tanks and armored vehicles are the best proof of this.

Seeing that the enemy's 3rd Panzer Division had entered the decisive battle, the colonel commander of the 4th Tank Brigade shouted around:

"Comrades! The friendly forces successfully completed the objective and led the enemy to the predetermined decisive battle area. Now, it's time for our brigade to go! ”

"As the only armored force in the entire Tula region! Although we are not as numerous as the Germans, even if we die, we must pull the enemy's tanks with me! Do you understand? ”

"Stay in formation! Charge! ”

Unlike some grassflower-level troops, this is not the first time that the 4th Tank Brigade has fought against the armored division under the 2nd Tank Group, and it has even had such a good record before.

These T-34s, who suddenly came out, under the cover of the last infantry regiment, immediately put the vanguard of the rampaging 3rd Panzer Division into a bitter battle.

The early model of the T-34 was superior to the earlier No. 3 and No. 4 in terms of single vehicle performance, that is, it was completely inferior in terms of radio command.

But if you fight against the long three and the long four, it's a different scene.

Theoretically, the two warring sides could destroy each other in terms of firepower.

What's more, the performance of the tank is not the only factor that affects the victory or defeat, and the tactical thinking and system are also crucial.

Surrounded by many elite vehicle groups in Germany, the casualties of the 4th Tank Brigade were not optimistic. If there are no other reinforcements, it is only a matter of time before they are completely annihilated.

Seeing that the friendly forces were showing their decline, Makarov suddenly couldn't bear it. He got up from the ammunition box with his rifle and said to the messenger on standby:

"Inform the guard battalion! Get ready for battle! Come with me into battle and kill the enemy! ”

A second before going to the battlefield, Lao Ma suddenly thought of his friend who was far away in the Republic of China. The Slavic man smiled wryly and said to himself in a voice that only he could hear:

"Huang, it looks like I'm going to miss my appointment. Lake Baikal and mountain towns, we will go together in the next life. ”

But at this moment, the correspondent who had just gone out suddenly ran back. Looking at the division commander who was ready to die, he pointed in the direction of Cold Wind City and said excitedly:

"Reinforcements! Our reinforcements! ”

"There are fighters! And hundreds of tanks that have never been seen before! Teachers! We are saved! ”

As soon as these words came out, Lao Ma rushed out of the headquarters at the first time, picked up the telescope in his hand and began to check the form in the air.

I saw that at a low altitude of about 1,000 meters, there were more than 300 fighters hunting down Desan's dive bombers, and for a while, there was a feeling that there were more wolves and less meat.

In the past, the Bf109, which could be beaten according to its own Yi 16, was also forced into a desperate situation by another kind of fighter.

Through the field of vision provided by the telescope, Lao Ma also saw the red star identification mark on the fuselage. However, it is a little different from its own insignia, because those red stars also have golden wings on both sides.

"Hurricanes? And Spitfire! Where did these fighters come from? Why is it on the battlefield of Tula? Aren't they in the North Caucasus Military District? ”

Since the end of 1941, the old Maozi have received nearly 500 hurricanes.

However, many of those fighters were second-hand goods with little maintenance, and some even wore desert camouflage.

As for the aid that was sent by the British through the Lend-Lease Act, the pilots in the north were making do with it with a good attitude. After all, even if the performance of the Hurricane is not as good as the BF109, it is still better than the Yi-16 that is like its own.

After observing for a few minutes, the old horse once again discovered the blind spot of the matter.

The air force supported from the direction of Cold Wind City is not only exaggerated in number, but even the performance of a single aircraft seems to have improved significantly.

After taking out the disgusting Stuka, they actually launched an attack on the enemy's ground forces with cannons and rockets, and even with great efficiency.

It seems that those hurricanes are better than the original goods with the British.

At this moment, a bold and crazy idea welled up from the bottom of his heart. Could it be that these fighters are from the distant Republic of China!

Soon, the old horse's conjecture was verified. Because an infantry squad armed with a French rifle and submachine gun came to the command post with a hygienist, and the packaging of the medicine in the hands of the military doctor was full of square Chinese characters.

"Comrade commander, we will take over the next battle."

"There is an order in the rear, you need to return to Cold Wind City immediately to meet the Chief of the General Staff! Someone will explain the specific situation to you later, and then talk about the problem on the way! (End of chapter)