Chapter 1506: worthy opponent

  Chapter 1506 A Respectable Opponent

  Sameko asked puzzledly: "What kind of consequences?"

"The remaining enemies in the fortress were ordered by General Wilhelm, the commander of the German 11th Army, to lay down their weapons and surrender to us." Sokov explained to Sameko and also to Konev: "If we shoot Do you think they will surrender to us even if other Germans know about it? By then, we will have to make greater sacrifices and waste more time in order to destroy these stubborn enemies.”

"Comrade Sokov is right!" After listening to Sokov, Konev unexpectedly expressed support: "If the German soldiers who put down their arms and surrendered are shot, it will have a negative impact on our reputation. In the future, when encountering such a tough battle, it may not be an easy task to make the enemy surrender."

"But, Comrade Commander." Seeing that Konev expressed support for Sokov's statement, Sameko was in a hurry: "Can we just watch these latest executioners who committed crimes against our people get away with it? ?”

Konev laughed hehe, got up and walked to Sameko's side, raised his hand and patted him on the shoulder, and said with a smile: "General Sameko, since the enemy has put down their weapons, we will definitely not kill them." He. But when they arrived in the Siberian prisoner-of-war camps, whether they survived to the end of the war is beyond our control."

   Seeing that Konev's thoughts coincided with his own, Sokov smiled on his face. Konev's words were so clear that Sameko still thought for a while before he understood the truth. He had a surprised expression on his face and said excitedly: "I see, Comrade Commander. Wait for these prisoners of war After being sent to a prisoner-of-war camp in Siberia, of course someone would take care of them."

  He paused for a moment, and added: "The names of those German officers and soldiers who put down their crimes should be written down and given to the people in the prisoner-of-war camps, so that they can give these people 'special care'."

Seeing that Sameko finally understood what he meant, Konev said with a smile: "You are right, General Sameko. Not only can the comrades in charge of the prisoner-of-war camps be used to clean up these damned Germans; During the escort, if they make a small mistake, they can be severely punished without mercy."

Konev raised his hand to check the time, and said to Sokov: "Comrade Sokov, since your troops have basically controlled the fort and the railway junction, I will rush back to the Front Army Command as soon as possible, and give the other The troops have assigned new combat missions."

Sokov knew that his troops' capture of the Meriefa Fortress was only the first step for the troops to advance to the Dnieper River defense line. Next, it was the turn of the troops of the 7th Guards Army to attack Poltava. Together with Sameko himself, Konev was delivered to the gate of the headquarters.

"Comrade Sokov," Konev stretched out his hand to Sokov, and said with a smile, "Your troops have no combat missions for the time being, so you can rest in peace. Keep your spirits up and wait until a new combat mission is issued. Only then can you devote yourself to the new battle with full enthusiasm."

Konev was sent away, and as soon as Sokov returned to the headquarters, he told Sameko: "Chief of Staff, immediately call the artillery commander and say that the artillery of the 7th Guards Army will soon return to construction, let him Prepare ahead of time so you don’t get caught off guard.”

   "Okay, Comrade Commander." Sameko nodded and said, "I will call the Artillery Commander immediately."

   While Sameko was on the phone, Sokov sat down and began to think about William Stemmelman. He vaguely remembered that half a year later, that is, in January 1944, the 11th Army and a part of the 42nd Army of the German 8th Army, with a total of more than 60,000 people in six divisions, were captured by the Ukrainian First and Second Fronts. Surrounds the salient of Kanev on the Dnieper. The besieged troops included the elite Viking armored division and the Walloon Assault Brigade. For the convenience of command, these besieged troops were all incorporated into Stemmermann's German Army Group, led by William Stemmermann Artillery General unified command.

  Marshal Manstein, commander of the German Army Group South, mobilized heavy troops to rescue the Stemmermann Group in order to prevent the tragedy of Paulus from repeating itself. On February 10, under the command of Armored General Huber, the German army concentrated 100,000 armored soldiers from the 3rd Panzer Army and the 47th Panzer Army to carry out a arduous rescue operation, but they were stubbornly blocked by the four Soviet tank armies. , coupled with the fact that the ground became muddy due to warmer weather, hindered the attack of the armored forces.

The battle lasted until February 15th. Six days after the **** battle, the German troops who came to the rescue dealt a major blow to the Soviet army and opened a passage, but they also suffered heavy losses. The loss of more than half of the troops was not counted. The armored commanders above the platoon There were almost no casualties. They were less than ten kilometers away from the German army in the encirclement, but the last ten kilometers were elusive for the German army trying to break the siege, and it turned out to be a journey that they could not complete in their entire lives!

After receiving the report from the commander of the rescue force, Manstein had no choice but to send a telegram to William Stemmelmann, telling the other party: "The strength of the rescue force has been exhausted, and you can only rely on your own strength to proceed. Breakout!"

   After William Stemmelman received this telegram, he fell into despair. Because among the surviving officers and soldiers, there are more than 2,000 wounded. If they want to break out, they must discard these wounded. After a fierce ideological struggle, he decided to leave some medical staff to take care of the wounded, and surrender to them when the Soviet army rushed over, so as to save the lives of the wounded.

  The rest of the besieged troops will use the cover of night and snowstorm at 23:00 on February 16 to protrude from the encirclement of the Soviet army.

  Ten hours before the start of the breakout battle, the Soviet army sent representatives to persuade them to surrender, hoping that William Stemmelman would order the troops to lay down their weapons and surrender, but the Soviet army's proposal was rejected by him.

After Konev received a reply from the representative of persuading surrender, he said to everyone in the headquarters: "Comrades, we have already given the Germans a chance to surrender. Since they don't cherish this chance of survival, then we don't have to treat them again." Be polite. Give orders to all commanders: Kill every enemy you see."

   Both Konev and Vatutin expected that the Germans would carry out a breakout operation in the near future. In order to deal with the possible breakout operation launched by the Germans, they carefully set up five closed encirclement circles and three obstacles:

  The first layer of encirclement: all infantry units of the Ukrainian Second Front Army, about 200,000 commanders and fighters;

  Second layer of encirclement: all infantry units of the Ukrainian First Front Army, about 300,000 commanders and fighters;

  The third layer of encirclement: all artillery units of the Ukrainian First Front and the Ukrainian Second Front, about 200,000 artillery officers and fighters, and 2,000 artillery pieces;

  The fourth layer of encirclement: all tank units of the Ukrainian First Front and the Ukrainian Second Front, about 200,000 tank soldiers, and 1,000 tanks.

  Fifth encirclement: All cavalry units of the Ukrainian First Front and Ukrainian Second Front, about 100,000 cavalry commanders and fighters.

  The first obstacle: a natural barrier, the deep Gniloitiki River. As the weather began to warm up in February, there was only a thin layer of thin ice on the river. People and animals could not walk on it. They could only swim in the icy water. All the bridges and ships on the river had already been destroyed by Soviet engineers. Blow up or burn.

The second obstacle: on the other side of the only shallow water area of ​​​​the Gniloy Tiki River, the Soviet army set up two tanks and 20 heavy machine guns to kill those German officers and soldiers who slipped through the net with good water quality and prevent them from entering the five The garrison area of ​​the German armored forces who came to rescue the siege kilometers away.

The third obstacle: All fighter units of the two air armies of the Ukrainian First Front and the Ukrainian Second Front Army, about 500 fighters and bombers, are on duty 24 hours a day, closely monitoring the German movement on the ground, and once found The Germans are massed and ready to destroy them with powerful air-to-ground firepower.

  In order to successfully break out of the encirclement of the Soviet army and join up with the armored forces that came, General Stemmelmann drew up a careful breakout plan. He divided more than 50,000 German officers and soldiers into two echelons to implement the breakout.

  The first echelon consisted of the most elite SS Viking Division as the sharp knife breakout force, and the 72nd Infantry Division and the B Army Group carried out the auxiliary breakout. Their task was to quickly open a gap in the Soviet defense line.

  The second echelon is composed of the German 57th Infantry Division, the 88th Infantry Division and the 389th Infantry Division. They will quickly follow up and break through after the gap is opened.

   Finally, he was in charge of the cover force behind the break. General William personally selected a rear battalion of the most powerful Viking division of the SS. He personally commanded this battalion to cover the transfer of the main force.

After learning of William Stemmelman's breakout plan, Mustache ordered the Air Force to send a transport plane to send him out of the encirclement for his safety, but General William Stemmelman refused. His soldiers fought together to the last moment. He ordered the transport plane to carry the wounded and sick, and counted as many as could be sent.

  Thinking of this, Sokov thought of the early days of the Soviet-German War. Petrovsky, the commander of the 63rd Army, led his troops to launch a counterattack in Belarus, giving the Germans a head-on blow. However, due to the disparity in the strength of the enemy and our few troops, his troops soon fell into the siege of the German army.

  In order to protect an excellent commander like him, Zhukov and Marshal Timoshenko decided to promote him to the commander of the 21st Army after research, and sent planes to pick him up from the encirclement. But he believes that at this critical juncture, transferring the command to others will have a serious negative impact on the soldiers. In the end, only the seriously injured were taken away by the plane.

   "He is an opponent worthy of respect." Sokov murmured to himself, "It would be great if he could heed our advice and personally lead the troops to surrender to us."

   "Comrade Commander," Sameko, who had just finished the phone call, heard Sokov talking to himself when he came over, and asked curiously, "Just whoever you are talking about surrenders to us will be fine?"

Sameko's words jolted Sokov out of his contemplation. He looked up at his chief of staff and said: "Comrade Chief of Staff, from the fact that William Stemmelmann ordered the desperate troops of the fortress to surrender to us, let me I think he's an opponent who deserves our respect."

Regarding Sokov's statement, Sameko was silent for a long time, then nodded and said: "Comrade Commander, you are right. If there were a different German commander, he would definitely order the defenders in the fortress to fight to the end. One man, the last bullet, will never lay down his arms and surrender to us easily. If we want to capture the fortress, we must pay a heavier price."

"Comrade Chief of Staff, what if..." Sokov was afraid that Sameko would have any connection, so he quickly emphasized: "I'm talking about what if. If the troops commanded by William Stemmelman fell into our encirclement , if you want to eliminate them, you will have to pay a heavy price; but sending someone to persuade him to surrender can save both sides from paying unnecessary casualties, which one would you choose?"

   "Does this still need to be said?" Sameko replied without thinking: "It must be sent to persuade Paulus to surrender. Didn't we send people to persuade Paulus to surrender in the later period of Stalingrad?"

   "But did the Germans agree?"

   "No." Sameko shook his head and said with a wry smile, "How could a stubborn German general like Paulus surrender so easily."

"You are right, Comrade Chief of Staff." Sokov continued: "Don't look at William Stemmelman who cherishes the lives of his officers and soldiers, but he is also a stubborn German general. Even if he is in a desperate situation, In the face of our army's persuasion to surrender, he will never agree."

   "So what should we do?"

"Since the enemy does not surrender, then we will destroy them." After Sokov said this, he shifted the topic to Nedelin: "By the way, you called the artillery commander, what did he say? .”

   "General Negelin said that he is ready for the handover, and he will hand over the command as soon as the order arrives."

  Sokov gave a "hmm", and then said: "After General Nedelin handed over the troops to the friendly army, let him return to the headquarters immediately."

   "I'm afraid it won't work."

"why?"

   "General Nedelin said that since our army has captured the fortress, he wants to see the effect of the shelling in the fortress."

"No, this is absolutely not possible." Hearing this, Sokov raised his voice and said to Sameko: "Although we have already captured the fortress, who can guarantee that there are not a few German soldiers who want to fight to the end in those ruins? What? If they shoot at General Nedelin, the consequences will be very serious."

   "Comrade Commander, it's useless." Sameko said with a wry smile, "I tried to persuade him in the same way on the phone just now, but he was very stubborn, and I couldn't convince him at all."

   Sokov understood Sameko's statement very well. If Nedelin was not a stubborn person, he would have paid the price of his life for his stubbornness after a few years.

  Sokov thought for a while, and then said to Sameko: "Comrade Chief of Staff, can you contact Comrade Military Commissioner? I think he may come forward, and he may be able to convince General Nedelin."

"It's useless, Comrade Commander." Sameko said: "Although I haven't dealt with General Negelin for a long time, I found that he is a very principled person. Once it is something he looks for, Nobody can convince him."

   Hearing that Lunev was going out, but he couldn't convince Nedelin, Sokov was completely speechless. In any case, the other party will soon be the artillery commander of the Southwest Front Army, and before leaving his place, he must not let him make any mistakes.

  Thinking of this, Sokov said to Sameko: "Comrade Chief of Staff, then send more people to follow him, and we must ensure his safety. Understand?"

   "Understood, Comrade Commander." Sameko replied loudly.

  (end of this chapter)