The decisive battle against the Third Reich

Then the news spread quickly. An eyewitness told a Soviet sentry. The Soviet sentry would report the matter to his superiors with some doubts, and then report it to the commander of the 62nd Army, Lopatin. Will be there.

Lieutenant General Lopatin was surprised when he heard this information, but he could not be sure whether it was an isolated incident or a big conspiracy. He immediately asked his staff: "Where is Captain Droyev?"

Captain Droev was the Soviet officer sent by Lopatin to greet the "reinforcements".

"I don't know, Comrade Lopatin!" the staff officer replied.

The communication situation of the Soviets determines that their reaction speed is relatively slow. For example, if Captain Droyev had a walkie-talkie and kept in contact with the command at all times, the problem would have been discovered by now.

But Captain Droev was not equipped with a walkie-talkie, so no one knew whether he could not be contacted or whether he was killed by some spies as described in the intelligence.

Then, Lopatin looked at the map and ordered: "Call the checkpoints along the way to stop the support troops and order them to stand by for inspection!"

"Yes, Comrade Lopatin!" the staff officer responded.

Lopatin's decision was obviously wrong because he thought that this might be done by a small number of Germans disguised as Soviet soldiers... This is not unusual for the Soviet army. The German Brandenburg troops They often sneak in and steal information like this, even in Stalingrad.

Because of this wrong judgment, Lopatin thought that he only needed to stop the troops and conduct a search. What he didn't expect was that this time was different from usual. This time it was not a small force that sneaked in, and its purpose was not to collect intelligence, but to conduct a special operations-like assault.

It should be said that Lopatin missed an opportunity.

If he could accurately judge this point, and then quietly mobilize his troops to set up an ambush in front of the "reinforcements", then the 1st Infantry Regiment would probably be left with nothing to eat.

It's a pity that Lopatin does not have such wisdom.

Fortunately, Lopatin did not have such wisdom, otherwise the 1st Infantry Regiment would have been the first piece of meat minced by the Stalingrad meat grinder, and it would have been minced to the point where no residue was left.

The person who received the call was the Soviet second lieutenant who stood up and answered the call. Soon he saw the tanks of the "reinforcements" described on the phone "rumbling" up.

The second lieutenant put down the phone and stepped forward, raising his hand to stop the team.

"Hey, you are not allowed to pass here!" said the second lieutenant: "Your superiors ordered you to stand by and wait for inspection!"

"What happened?"

"I don't know!" the second lieutenant replied: "Anyway, just stay here!"

Qin Chuan knew that something might have been revealed. Although he didn't know where the mistake was, he couldn't hide it anymore, so he made a quick decision and ordered: "Hit!"

Gunshots rang out soon, and the second lieutenant was beaten into pieces before he understood what was going on. Several Soviet soldiers at the checkpoint hurriedly raised their guns, but a row of smoking grenades had already been thrown at them. At their feet... with a roar, more than ten Soviet soldiers were blown into the sky.

There were also a few clever ones who turned over and hid behind the sandbags to avoid the explosion of grenades, but this was of no use, because the next second the tank "rumbled" and drove up to kill the sandbags and the Soviet soldiers hiding behind them. They were crushed together.

"Go along this street!" Qin Chuan ordered: "All the way to the Volga River, on the right is the 'Red Barricade' artillery factory, and on the left is the tractor factory!"

"Yes, Major!" the German soldier responded while taking out a white towel and tying a white towel on his left arm... This was to avoid being unable to identify ourselves and the enemy in the dark.

At the same time, they also established a set of code words. One party asked "Long live Stalin" and the other party answered: "Red barricades." This will not make the Soviet army suspicious but can effectively distinguish between ourselves and the enemy. Because if the other party is the Soviet Union, of course they will answer "Long live Stalin" instead of other answers.

According to the plan, the troops were divided into battalions and divided into three parts to advance. Each part was covered by three to four tanks.

This is done so that the troops can be deployed to launch a more effective attack, so that a certain street will not be blocked by the enemy's fire and it will be impossible to move forward.

It turned out that this worry was not unnecessary, because in the subsequent battle, several tanks drove out from the tractor factory and blocked a street... These tanks were just produced from the tractor factory, and even the people who drove them were It's a factory worker.

It can also be seen from this that the consciousness of the Soviet working class is still very high. Usually they should flee at this time, but they will take the initiative to drive tanks to fight.

But this had no effect, because the German tanks came around from another street not long after, and there was a heavy bombardment on their sides...

The tanks driven by Soviet workers lacked professional skills, and they were unable to distinguish between ourselves and the enemy. After all, both sides used T34 tanks.

But this was not a problem for the Germans, because they tied a piece of red cloth on the tank's barrel, body and antenna in eye-catching locations.

In addition, the tanks driven by Soviet workers did not have infantry coordination, so they were beaten into a pile of scrap metal in a few hits.

When the news reached Lopatin, he was shocked. Only then did he realize that it was not just a small group but an entire army that had sneaked in.

Then Lopatin quickly understood the purpose of this unit sneaking in...the factory.

"Quick, send reinforcements to the factory area immediately!" Lopatin ordered: "At the same time, order checkpoints along the way to block these hateful Germans at all costs!"

"Yes, Comrade Lopatin!" The staff immediately became busy, issuing orders and adjusting troops.

But it was too late to do this.

Stalingrad was short of troops, and the result of the lack of troops was that the main force could only be distributed on the periphery.

This was of course no problem originally. The outer perimeter was defended by troops, while the city was built by civilians, who even armed themselves.

Then, when the Germans attacked, the peripheral troops could defend layer by layer and retreat step by step along the fortifications built by the people.

But now these German troops have reached the interior as soon as they came up, and they have penetrated more than two kilometers into the hinterland... (Note: Stalingrad is roughly a rectangle, 40 kilometers long and 5 kilometers wide)

As a result, Lopatin didn't even have the troops to send reinforcements to the factory in time. In the end, Lopatin could only send his entire security company up.