Chapter 145 Victory Escape
Ukraine, Lochvita region.
A bush beside the river moved slightly, and a telescope poked out from a hidden place.
"Davari, the news is correct, there is really a pontoon here!" An excited voice came out from the grass.
"Keep your voice down, we don't know the reason for erecting the pontoon bridge yet, maybe it's the enemy's conspiracy." Another rougher voice took over.
"Whether it's a conspiracy or not, this is our chance to break out!"
"Davari, we are scouts, not commanders. Whether to break out from here is a matter for our superiors to consider."
“What to do next?”
"I will continue to lurk here. You go back and report to the comrade commander. Remember, you must report objectively and do not add your own subjective judgment."
You can probably judge two people from the conversation. The identity of the lurker - the leading reconnaissance soldier of the Soviet army.
Affiliated to the remnants of the 37th Group Army, they were ordered to find a crossing point along the river. At this time of year, the river was in flood season, and the rapid river was not suitable for swimming. The few small boats were unable to carry nearly 30,000 people. The troops completed crossing the river.
When they were desperate, they discovered that the Germans were building a pontoon bridge, and the progress was very fast.
At the beginning, the commander could not believe that the Germans would make such a low-level mistake. After repeated confirmations by the scouts, they finally believed that there was really a "way home" here.
There is about one division in the surrounding area, and about 600 people are stationed on the pontoon.
Opportunity!
Although there are risks, this is definitely an opportunity!
The senior commanders quickly reached a consensus and concentrated all firepower to capture the pontoon bridge in the shortest possible time, and then the entire 30,000 people carried out a forced crossing.
In order to achieve this goal, the Soviet army collected almost all weapons and ammunition and concentrated them on the troops responsible for attacking. The performance of the assault company responsible for launching the first attack determined the success or failure of the operation.
The German army was strategically located, and the offensive side to seize the pontoon bridge could not fully launch, so the Soviet army needed to use a small number of elites to complete this task.
The German machine gun position and the mortar position on one side may cause huge damage to the advancing infantry, and the most threatening thing is a big guy - an 88mm Krupp general-purpose anti-aircraft gun. Although this powerful and high-rate weapon was invented for air defense, once it is fired flatly, it is also a nightmare for all charging troops.
The Soviet army was already on the line. Two hundred carefully selected elite Soviet troops lurked near the pontoon, preparing to launch an attack at the risk of huge casualties.
At this moment, the sound of an engine suddenly came from the road.
A Horch 901 off-road vehicle drove to the pontoon alone without an escort. A man wearing the uniform of a senior German officer suddenly sat in the passenger seat.
The sudden change caught the soldiers off guard. A Soviet shooter hiding in the dark aimed his gun at the off-road vehicle, but he was stopped by his companions.
Their mission is to seize the pontoon bridge, not because of other things. The car quickly arrived at the bridge. The officer guarding the pontoon had a brief exchange with the people in the car, and immediately stood at attention and saluted each other, and then shouted to the surrounding soldiers to move the roadblocks and let them pass.
The Horch 901 off-road vehicle was preparing to drive onto the pontoon, but at this time, a communications soldier carrying a walkie-talkie ran over, shouting something and waving his hands.
Before the other soldiers could react, the people on the off-road vehicles suddenly dropped several black objects into the crowd. One of them rolled into the checkpoint with thick smoke, while the other one rolled into the checkpoint with thick smoke. One was accidentally thrown under the 88mm gun.
Boom! ! ! ! boom! ! ! ! ! boom! ! ! ! !
Serial explosions occurred at the German checkpoints. The unprepared defenders were instantly killed and injured. The 88mm Krupp gun was directly blown up in place.
Thick smoke rose into the sky.
The Horch 901 off-road vehicle roared in the smoke, smashed through the roadblock and rushed onto the pontoon!
The German troops behind were waking up from a dream. Someone raised a machine gun and fired at the rear of the car. Bullets hit the rear of the car and kept emitting sparks.
Chaos near the boardwalk! The sound of gunfire is endless!
The Soviet commando responsible for the attack was stunned.
What's going on?
The Germans beat themselves up?
Although he didn’t understand why, the commander knew that the opportunity had come.
Pop! Snap! Snap!
Several signal bombs rose into the sky, and the commander waved the gun in his hand, "For the Soviet Union! Davari! Charge with me!!"
Woohoo~~~~Boom! ! ! Boom! ! !
The concentrated mortar shells rained down on the pontoon defenders, and two hundred Soviet soldiers acting as death squads howled and launched a charge!
The sound of gunfire rang through the sky, and the pontoon defenders were a little dazed after being hit by the bomb. By the time they reacted, the Soviet death squads had already rushed to a position less than 100 meters away.
The two sides strangled each other, and the Soviet follow-up troops also began to charge. Blood mist rose from one side of the pontoon!
Fires and explosions dyed the sky red, but He Chi and the others ran away regardless. The driver stepped on the accelerator to the bottom.
——
On September 16, the command center of the German Second Armored Army in Kiev was attacked by a bomb, paralyzing its entire command system for nearly an hour.
During this period, huge chaos occurred in the German copper-cast iron encirclement, because the German troops received instructions that were completely in the opposite direction, causing the joints of the defense line to loosen.
The remnants of the surrounded Soviet 40th, 21st, 38th, and 6th Group armies found opportunities to break out of the encirclement in batches into small groups of less than a thousand men, and finally successfully evacuated more than 20,000 people.
In the Lochvita area, 30,000 people led by Kilponos, the commander-in-chief of the Southwest Front, unexpectedly captured a pontoon bridge just erected by the German army, and a group of people, including himself, A series of senior generals escaped, including Stalin's future successor.
What is strange is that neither the internal declassified intelligence of the German army nor the military history documents of the Second Armored Army mention that the then commander-in-chief Guderian issued an order to build a pontoon bridge here.
It was not until the end of World War II that Guderian revealed to the public in his memoirs why the German army let go of the remnants of about 50,000 Soviet troops in the Battle of Kiev despite having an absolute advantage.
“At some special moments, one person’s role is even equal to that of an armored division.” “If anyone knows where that guy is, please tell me. The two of us still had an unfinished game back then. discussion." This was what Guderian, then the special adviser to the West German Army, said.
Twenty years later, a Hollywood film company filmed the second part of the 007 series based on this memoir: "Codename 007: The Bridge". The filming party made a lot of money, but that was already That happened later.
(End of this chapter)