Red Moscow

In less than five minutes, Vasya appeared at the entrance of the command department. After raising his hand to salute Sokov, he said breathlessly: "Comrade Commander, Lieutenant Vasya, the commander of the engineering company, is here on your order, please give instructions!"

"Comrade Lieutenant," Sokov walked up to Vasya and said to him, "How are you preparing for what I ordered you a few days ago?"

Hearing what Sokov said, Vasya immediately understood that what the other party was talking about was about the removal of landmines, and quickly straightened his body and replied: "Mr. The location of the distribution, and the roads they travel on a daily basis. At the latest, the night after tomorrow, I can send people to carry out the mission..."

Before Vasya finished speaking, Sokov interrupted him with a straight face: "Comrade Lieutenant, why did such a simple matter have to be delayed until the night after tomorrow?"

"Comrade Commander," Vasya blushed and explained after hearing Sokov's criticism of himself, "During the battle during this period of time, our engineer company has suffered a very serious reduction in personnel. Demining is layman, I need time to train them."

"Comrade Lieutenant, we don't have that much time." Sokov sighed and said, "You must have seen how our soldiers competed with the enemy for airdrops today. If you had completed the work of moving the mines last night, Then the enemy will definitely be trapped in their positions by landmines, instead of brazenly competing with us for supplies like now. Also, I am going back to Mamayev Hill tonight. Before leaving, I hope you can give me A quasi-letter."

Knowing that Sokov was going back to Mamayev Post, Vasya showed a shocked expression: "Comrade Commander, you are in such a hurry to go back, did something happen to Mamayev Post?"

"Nothing happened." Sokov naturally would not tell a subordinate about his training, he pretended to be nonchalant and said: "The superior thinks that I should stay in my post, so I just Must go back to Mamayev Kurgan."

Seeing that Sokov was about to return to Mamayev Post soon, Vasya was silent for a long time, and finally gritted his molars and said: "Comrade commander, after I go back, I will speed up the training of those recruits and try to go there tomorrow night." carry out this task."

"No!" Sokov shook his head and said firmly: "Tonight, you must carry out this task tonight."

"But most of my soldiers don't know how to clear mines." Hearing Sukov's order, Vasya said anxiously: "If they are sent to carry out missions rashly, and it is still at night with extremely poor visibility, it will be very difficult for them to clear mines." It is easy to cause unnecessary casualties."

"The new engineers don't know how to remove mines, will they always plant mines?" Seeing that Vasya has been struggling with the fact that the newly added engineers can't clear mines, Sokov said a little displeased: "You let those skilled engineers dig out the mines, Let the new engineers be buried in other places, wouldn't it be fine?"

"That's right, that's a good idea." Vasya couldn't help but shine at the method Sokov said. He clenched his right fist and slammed it on the palm of his left hand, and said excitedly: "In this way, I don't have to worry about the new recruits being unskilled in clearing mines and causing the mines to explode. Comrade Commander, I don't think there is any problem in carrying out the mission tonight."

…………

Before Sokov returned to the division headquarters, both Ivanov and Sidolin learned of his return to Mamayev Post. Ivanov also asked strangely: "Comrade Chief of Staff, why did the division commander come back suddenly? Is there any major operation in our army that requires him to come back here to command?"

When notifying the personnel to attend the military meeting, Chuikov considered that Sokov was at the barricade factory, so he did not call Mamayev Gang. Instead, he called Sokov when notifying Lyudnikov. Therefore, so far, the two division leaders, Ivanov and Sidolin, do not know the news that the Soviet army will launch a major counteroffensive in a few days.

When Sidolin heard Ivanov's question, he shook his head blankly and said, "Comrade deputy commander, you have been staying with me in the headquarters. Have we received orders from our superiors? Don't you know Is it?"

"That's strange." Ivanov frowned and repeated what he said just now: "If there is no important matter, why did the teacher come back suddenly?"

"Commanders, how are you!" Just as the two of them were frowning, Sokov's familiar voice came from the door, and they looked up towards the door, only to see Sokov striding towards the door. They walk.

After shaking hands with Ivanov and Sidolin who came up to us, Sokov sized them up and asked curiously, "What's the matter with you, you look very worried."

"Comrade Commander," Sidolin asked with a smile, "May I ask, why did you come back suddenly?"

"The reason is very simple." Sokov shrugged his shoulders and said rather helplessly: "During the day, the enemy broke through the defense line of the 138th Division. Seeing that the situation was critical, I took the guard platoon to block the gap. Comrade Commander knew that I was taking part in the battle again without authorization, so he drove me back to Mamayev Post."

After taking a sip from the tea mug on the table, Sokov looked at Sidolin and asked, "Comrade Chief of Staff, how is our army preparing? Can we launch a counterattack against the enemy?"

"What are you preparing for? Where are you going to launch a counterattack?" Unexpectedly, after hearing Sokov's question, Sidolin's face was full of doubts. He looked at Sokov and asked in wonder: "Comrade commander, you don't seem to have What tasks have you assigned to me?"

Sukov didn't expect Sidolin to answer himself like this, and he was still a little unhappy, secretly talking about such a big matter, you still have the leisure to joke with me, it's just too shameful.

Just when Sokov was about to get angry, Ivanov on the side interjected: "Yes, Comrade Commander, you have never assigned us any missions, how do we know how many troops to gather and where to attack the enemy?" What about counterattack?"

Both of them had the same rhetoric, which made Sokov realize that he had overlooked an important matter. During the meeting two days ago, he was in Chuikov’s headquarters, and he didn’t seem to see Ivanov or Sidolin. Didn't they get the notice of the meeting? No, for such a big matter, how could the people in the headquarters notify the meeting to be negligent?

"I want to ask you one thing." Sokov hesitated for a moment, but still asked the question in his heart: "The headquarters held a military meeting two days ago, why didn't you go?"

"Military meeting, what military meeting?" Both of them asked in a daze, "Why didn't anyone notify us?"

"It seems that the headquarters didn't do their job properly, and they even forgot about Ivanov and Sidolin." After muttering to himself, Sokov said to the two: "Two days ago, the commander The officers called a meeting of division commanders and announced the news that our army is about to counterattack." In order not to provoke the two of them, he did not mention that officers above the regiment level had to attend the meeting, but only vaguely said that division commanders member.

"The big counter-offensive is about to start?!" As soon as the two heard that the big counter-offensive was about to start, they immediately forgot to ask why they hadn't been notified, but asked anxiously: "Comrade commander, tell us quickly, when will our army implement the big counterattack."

"Everyone come to the map," Sokov walked to the wall, pointed to the map and said to the two, "According to the arrangement of the headquarters, General Vatutin's Southwest Front Army and Rokossovsky's Don River Front Army, A counter-offensive will be launched against the enemy in the Don valley on November 19..."

Ivanov waited for Sokov to finish introducing the offensive routes of the two fronts, and he couldn't wait to ask: "What about our Stalingrad Front, and when will we counterattack?"

"The counterattack of the Stalingrad Front will be one day later than the two fronts." Sokov said to the two: "The direction of the counterattack will be to the south of the city. And our 62nd Army will not participate in this counterattack."

The two people, who were gearing up, heard Sokov's last words, as if someone had poured a bucket of ice water over their heads three or nine days ago, and they immediately became terribly cold. After a while, Ivanov said unconvinced: "Why don't you let us participate in the counterattack? You know, in the past few months, the troops of our 62nd Army have been fighting the Germans face to face. Fighting. Now that we are finally looking forward to the counterattack, but we are not allowed to participate, what is going on?"

"Yes, Comrade Commander, what's going on here?" Sidolin also asked anxiously: "I finally hoped for a big counterattack, but we were not allowed to participate. I am worried that the commanders and fighters will feel dissatisfied when they find out. .”

"At the meeting, quite a few commanders raised the same question." Sokov said slowly: "Comrade Commander explained to us that the troops of the 62nd Army were seriously downsized after a long period of fighting. , Many division-level units that are still in the city have only one empty designation left. Let alone a counterattack, whether they can hold their positions is a problem."

As the chief of staff, Sidolin still has a certain degree of understanding of the situation in the city. Hearing what Sokov said, he seemed to understand something, so he tentatively asked: "Comrade commander, if I have not misunderstood, The superior wants us to continue to block and contain the enemy, so that the counterattack troops in other directions can encircle the attacking enemy?"

Seeing that Sidolin had guessed the intention of his superiors, Sokov nodded and gave him an affirmative answer: "Chief of Staff, you are right. At present, the task of our 62nd Army is to stick to the existing positions. Block and contain the enemy, so that our friendly forces can complete the encirclement of the enemy during the counterattack."

"The enemy has a lot of troops. There are hundreds of thousands of people." Ivanov said worriedly: "Even if we surround them, can we eat them?"

Regarding the number of German troops in the Stalingrad area, the Soviet High Command never had an accurate number, so that after Paulus's 300,000 troops were encircled, they thought there were only hundreds of thousands of enemies in the encirclement. The Supreme Command did not know the exact number of enemies, let alone the commanders below. Sokov did not bother with the numbers of the German army, but smiled and said to Ivanov: "Comrade deputy division commander, don't worry. So what if there are hundreds of thousands of Germans? You know, we are besieging them. In three aspects, there are at least a million people, and if ten people beat one of them, can't they still win?"

"It's justified to stick to the position in other areas." Sidolin said thoughtfully: "After all, those troops suffered heavy losses in the battle and have seriously lost their combat effectiveness. But our division is different. Not only are there thousands of troops The strength of the troops, but on the opposite side is the Romanian army with weak combat effectiveness. If they counterattack, they will definitely achieve good results."

"Chief of staff, your ideas coincide with the commander's." Sokov said: "The commander told me that he will arrange troops in the near future to take over our division's defense at the Barricade Factory and the Workers' New Village of the Red October Factory. , so that we can concentrate a part of our forces to launch a counterattack against the frontal enemy, in order to cooperate with the major counterattack of the main force."

"What, the superior is going to let us gather our troops to participate in the counterattack?" Knowing that those troops sent everywhere can be rebuilt, Sidolin couldn't help but be overjoyed: "As long as we gather the troops, with our current strength, we can get the most out of the Romanian army." It shouldn't be a big problem to seize all the positions here."

Ivanov, who used to be the commander of the Guards Division, considered the issue more comprehensively than Sidolin. He asked blankly: "Comrade commander, I would like to ask, with our existing ammunition and material reserves, can we Support a counterattack?"

"That's right, Comrade Commander, our ammunition and supplies have been consumed a lot recently." Sidolin waited for Ivanov to finish speaking, and immediately added: "I wonder when the superior will replenish it for us?"

"I see enough." Before Sokov could speak, Ivanov said first: "Now the river is frozen, and ships cannot come over; the ice on the river is too thin to support transport vehicles, I think I'm afraid For a long time, no new ammunition and supplies could be brought into the city."

"Information is not what you imagined." Sukov guessed that the two men might not know about the sailors of the district fleet using gunboats instead of icebreakers to break the ice, so he took the initiative to say: "In order to restore the supplies to the city, Regardless of sacrifices, the sailors and soldiers used gunboats instead of icebreakers to open a channel on the river so that some ships could transport urgently needed supplies into the city. Also, during the day today, the Front Army Headquarters, in order to increase the defense against the city They even ordered the air force's transport plane to take off in the heavy snow to the sky above the factory area to drop supplies for the defenders."

"Using gunboats to break the ice and airdrop in this kind of weather, I don't think it can solve any problems." Sidolin shook his head and said, "In such cold weather, even if the gunboats barely open a route, the river will soon freeze again. At that time, the efforts of the sailors and soldiers will be in vain. As for the airdrop, it will be even more worthless. The visibility in heavy snow is low, and the pilots cannot see the situation on the ground. Maybe most of the materials dropped will fall into the hands of the Germans. Li. I think other methods should be used to restore the transportation line on the river."

"Do you have a solution, Comrade Chief of Staff?" Sokov asked curiously.

"Yes," Sidolin nodded vigorously, and said in a positive tone, "I have a way to restore the transportation line on the river."