Iron Cross Fire

Two days later, Senval did not disappoint Kuster's trust in him and completed the task well.

Kuster then organized the various organizations and finally got the following results:

4 Austrian battalions, 3 Hungarian battalions, 1 Croatian battalion, 1 Italian battalion and 1 mixed battalion, 2 cavalry companies and 12 old bronze howitzers.

Soon, not long after Kuster adjusted his troops, he received a telegram from Borojevich. The content of the telegram was also very clear, requiring them to go to the junction of the Third and Second Armies, which is 20 kilometers south of Lviv and on the south bank of the Dniester River.

This is exactly in line with Kuster's plan, and here, the river is a horizontal line dividing the two banks, which makes the tactics very simple.

As he expected, there was still a bridgehead left on the north bank of the Dniester, forming a salient point on the front line. This was originally the responsibility of the 49th Division, but now that they are here, it will be handed over to the 27th Division.

Kuster simply ordered three battalions to form the "Bulge Infantry Regiment" to defend there, and let Gerstoli serve as the regiment commander.

Kuster looked at the map and the intelligence in his hand again, and he learned:

His left wing was under the charge of the 49th Division, which had a total of 9 battalions, and his right wing was under the charge of the 17th Division, which had 14 battalions.

And his opposite bank, that is, the Russians, had a total of 4 divisions, from west to east, namely the 22nd (12th Battalion), 24th (4th Battalion), 32nd (7th Battalion), and 12th Infantry Division (17th Battalion).

With such a huge disparity in strength, it seemed impossible for them to win. But Kuster kept a close eye on the intelligence in his hand. The Russian 22nd and 24th Divisions responsible for attacking the bridgehead had very few troops deployed at their junction, but Kuster did not intend to break through from here.

He looked at the 24th Division on the map. This division was very weak, but it was responsible for attacking most of the Austrian 27th Division. Poor them, they might have been hurt by the rotten communication, and they didn't know that a division of Austria-Hungary had been added.

The Russian 32nd Division on the right of the Russian 24th Division also had insufficient manpower. Their role was to cooperate with the Russian 12th Division to attack the Austrian 17th Division. Of course, they did not know that they still had some manpower to attack the Austrian 27th Division.

At the easternmost end of the battlefield, the river was very narrow, so it became the most intense battle between the two sides.

At the westernmost end of the battlefield, the Austrian 49th Division attracted most of the attention of the Russian 22nd Division. Kuster thought there was no possibility of a breakthrough here, so he simply ignored it.

For the sake of simplicity, Kuster named the four Russian divisions on the north bank from west to east: R1 (22), R2 (24), R3 (32), R4 (12).

Similarly, the three Austrian divisions on the south bank were called: A1 (49), A2 (27), A3 (17).

In this way, the order was relatively easy to understand.

After analyzing the situation, Kuster immediately deployed his troops. In addition to the three battalions on the north bank, he had seven battalions.

Kuster deployed 4 battalions as the main force on the south bank of the R2 Division, ready to cooperate with the salient on the north bank to attack at any time. 3 battalions were deployed on the south bank of the R3 Division to share the pressure of the A3 Division. There were also 2 companies left by his side to protect the division headquarters and be ready to be deployed in the battle line at any time.

After the initial strategic deployment was completed, Kuster rushed to the main force on the front line and tried to further understand the strategic deployment of the Russian army.

The German intelligence department gave Kuster a big surprise. They accurately told Kuster the deployment of the 4 divisions on the battlefield.

The R1 Division had 9 battalions deployed on the north bank to confront the A1 Division, and 3 battalions attacked the bridgehead.

The R2 Division had 2 battalions to cooperate with R1 to attack the bridgehead, and the other two battalions would face the attack of the A2 main force.

R3 had 4 battalions that would encounter 3 battalions of the A2 Division, and the remaining 3 battalions and the R4 Division, a total of 21 battalions, would attack the A3 Division together.

The A3 Division had only 14 battalions, and it was absolutely impossible to defend the river with such a huge difference in numbers. Especially the river here is very narrow, which makes it not too difficult to launch a forced crossing.

Therefore, if Kuster wants to make a difference here, he must fight quickly, otherwise his flank friendly forces will collapse.

Kuster quickly called the A1 division commander and told him the plan, hoping that he could support his actions.

The A1 division commander was very straightforward. He quickly handed over two battalions as reserves to Kuster's command.

Then, Kuster communicated with the A3 division commander again, also revealed the plan to him, and hoped that he could attract enough Russian troops.

The A3 division was silent at first, but then agreed to Kuster's request. At the end of the conversation, he hoped that Kuster could end the battle quickly.

After obtaining the consent of the two divisions next to him, Kuster called Borojevic again. He did not tell him the specific plan, but just hoped that he could provide some reconnaissance planes for the sake of the three division commanders.

Borojevic said that he could only give him two planes and asked Kuster to control the soldiers and not let them kill the pilots.

After a series of successful negotiations, Custer went to the front to inspect the terrain. He was ready to establish a general policy for the next action.

But even if Custer walked all over the south bank, he still didn't know the terrain of the north bank, so he ordered the soldiers in the bridgehead salient to explore the surrounding terrain as much as possible.

Next, Custer needed to make some adjustments to the deployment of his main force. But before making any adjustments, in order to be able to implement the troops, a point of view must be established:

First of all, we should know that the attackers in this range are the A2 Division, not the R2 Division. The R2 Division has only two battalions that can be deployed here, while the A2 Division has four battalions that can be deployed. Therefore, Kuster firmly believes that they are the real attackers.

Secondly, we should know that the attack of this era is extremely dependent on artillery. In many cases, the troops cannot move forward after advancing a certain distance. This is largely because the mobility of large-caliber artillery is extremely poor, and it takes a lot of time to build positions. Therefore, Kuster believes that the artillery must be deployed as far forward as possible.

Finally, we should know that the intelligence of the four Russian divisions here has been infiltrated. They know the information of the Russians at any time, but the Russians need to use human lives in exchange for information. The R2 Division did not know that there were several times more enemy troops stationed here, and in order to obey orders, they had to attack the Kuster Division. Such an attack will inevitably cost the entire R2 Division, so Kuster agrees with the view of defending first and attacking later in the troops.

Through Kuster's remarks, officers and soldiers were deeply impressed. The subsequent adjustment work was also very smooth.

Kuster hid the machine gun position 20 meters on the south bank, and at this distance, he could open fire and kill the enemy without waiting for the enemy to start crossing.

The artillery position was 200 meters south of the machine gun position, which was a bit close. If the enemy observed the artillery, Kuster might suffer a heavy blow.

But Kuster had made good guarantees. There were means of mobility everywhere in the artillery position, and Kuster gave the artillery a death order: people can die, but keep the artillery for me.

The four infantry battalions were all placed 50 meters south of the artillery position, which made it easier for them to quickly engage in battle in times of crisis. In normal times, this made it easier for them to safely and quickly collect all the resources for crossing the river.

After Kuster adjusted the organization, they quietly waited for the Russians to arrive and were ready to annihilate them at any time.

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