The decisive battle against the Third Reich

At half past six in the afternoon, Manstein decided to attack.

In fact, Manstein does not need to be in such a hurry... The Kerch Peninsula is located in the northern hemisphere, and the sunshine hours are particularly long in May and June. It usually takes around 7:30 to 8pm to get dark. (Note: The latitude of the Kerch Peninsula is similar to that of Beijing. For light conditions, please refer to Beijing’s dark time in May and June)

In other words, the German army actually still has time to make some preparations.

But Manstein has obviously lost his patience, or it can be said that Manstein has some lack of confidence.

"We can't guarantee that we can successfully break through the enemy's defense line with one attack!" Manstein said: "In addition, I still need to leave some time to attack Kerch City, so now is the time!"

Qinchuan could understand Manstein's mentality. He was responsible for the fate of the entire 11th Army, so he had to be careful.

What's more, the engineers have now modified six paving tanks and strung enough logs to pave five passages.

"Captain!" Manstein asked Qin Chuan: "In this case, you won't object to me letting the first infantry carry out the offensive mission, right?"

"Of course not, general!" Qin Chuan replied.

This is not only because Qin Chuan cannot refuse, but also because Qin Chuan has confidence in this battle... If he knows that he can win and can easily get loose, why not do it?

Of course, Manstein did not think so. What he thought was: If the paving tanks did not work, then the 1st Infantry Regiment might be able to win this battle with its amazing firepower and combat effectiveness. To put it simply, it is to provide a double insurance for this battle.

What Manstein did not expect was that the ease of this battle was almost beyond everyone's imagination, so much so that the 11th Army, especially its main 22nd Armored Division, criticized it... because they believed that the The First Infantry Regiment did not contribute much in the entire battle, but it was the First Infantry Regiment that finally reaped the fruits of victory.

These are all things for later.

The attack plan of the 1st Infantry Regiment is: the 1st Battalion will be the first to advance with the paving tanks, and advance to about 300 meters to cooperate with the tanks to suppress the Soviet firepower. Then the 2nd Battalion will follow closely and charge towards the Soviet defense line. The third battalion served as reinforcements for the invasion of Kerch City.

Also launching the attack at the same time as the 1st Infantry Regiment was the 28th Chasseur Division.

Of course, the 28th Chasseur Division was not the main offensive force. They only supported and delayed the Soviet army in other directions.

When he was ready, Manstein ordered into the walkie-talkie: "Fire!"

"Rumble" is a burst of intensive gunfire.

The bombing target was divided into two parts. One part bombed the Soviet defense lines, but most of them were mortars.

The main force was aimed at the Soviet artillery positions that had been detected previously, and this bombing was guided by aerial reconnaissance aircraft, so after a burst of artillery fire, the Soviet artillery was basically silenced.

After ten minutes of bombing, following Manstein's order, the troops launched an attack.

Suddenly gunshots broke out and artillery roared. The German soldiers of the 28th Chasseur Division pushed towards the Soviet defense line from all directions without tank cover.

Of course, they did not charge, but jumped towards the Soviet army in skirmish formation to attract the Soviet army's attention and firepower.

Then, the paving tanks in front of the 1st Infantry Regiment began to advance.

It was modified from the "No. 3" tank. The engine "rumbling" slowly moved forward. At the same time, strings of logs were uploaded on the conveyor belt and laid in front of the tank's tracks... This allowed the tank to move smoothly. Moving forward in the mud.

"Forward!" Colonel Slain ordered: "Follow the tanks!"

The soldiers of the 1st Infantry Regiment followed one by one with the MP43 in their hands.

Qin Chuan is of course one of them, but he is still holding a sniper rifle... For troops generally equipped with MP43, the sniper's task is even heavier. The reason is that long-distance targets are outside the range of the MP43, and they only Can be suppressed by machine guns and snipers.

However, there seemed to be no worries about this in this battle, because they all followed the tanks.

The Soviet army did not expect that the Germans would bring tanks up. The reason was of course the mud in front of the position.

Therefore, almost all the equipment in the Soviet defense line is aimed at infantry. If there is anything that can deal with tanks, it is the tanks placed in the defense line, but these tanks were either destroyed by German bombers or the remaining ones are light tanks. , unable to threaten the German Panzer III tank at all.

Lieutenant General Yefimovich, commander of the Soviet 46th Group Army, immediately called the headquarters: "Comrade Kozlov, German tanks are coming up, asking for reinforcements, asking for reinforcements!"

"German tanks?" Kozlov couldn't help but asked in confusion: "How can their tanks drive up?"

"They paved the road, they paved it with wood..."

"Comrade Yefimovich!" Mekhlis grabbed the phone from Kozlov impatiently and said: "The Germans are paving the way, won't you fire on their engineers? You won't counterattack them. Are you going to let the enemy pave the way in front of you?"

"No, Comrade Mehlis!" Lieutenant General Yefimovich wanted to explain but didn't know how. After a while, he had to say: "You should come here and see, they are paving the road with tanks!"

After hearing this, Mehlis and Kozlov couldn't help but look at each other. The two of them climbed up to the roof with doubts and raised their binoculars to look down. Sure enough, they saw several tanks advancing and paving the road.

Although the tanks were not moving very fast, they were paving the road wherever they went, and they were about to reach the Soviet trenches.

"What is that?" Mehlis asked in panic.

"I don't know!" Kozlov replied helplessly: "I only know that the Germans are going to break through our last line of defense!"

Three hundred meters away from the Soviet army, the first battalion was divided into two parts: one part continued to follow the tanks to pave the way forward, and the other part launched fire suppression on the Soviet troops in the gaps between the tanks.

The distance of three hundred meters has been carefully considered.

First of all, the MP43 in the hands of the Germans has a range of 350 meters, and the distance of 300 meters is completely within their range.

Secondly, Qinchuan knew that the Soviet army was equipped with a light mortar similar to the German 50MM mortar... The army of this era generally equipped light mortars so that it could play the same role as the Japanese grenade on the battlefield.

This Soviet light mortar has a caliber of 37MM and a range of 300 meters.

In other words, the German army's 300 meters away is exactly the farthest range of this mortar, so it can suppress the Soviet army with confidence.

At the same time, the 2nd Infantry Battalion followed up from behind under the cover of another group of tanks.