Chris, if you'd quit being distracted by the girl, you might have better luck!!!
Bestesn ALL!!!
David
So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
Moderator: Commissar D, the Evil
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Commissar D, the Evil
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
Jaeger, thank you very, very much for your kind reply. If I can ever help in any technical literature you are interested in, please drop me a PM. I've never read Hassel, sad to say--it was always my intent and greatest wish to become a true writer of history. But, when I compared my own attempts at historical writing to someone who was really good, like my friend Prit Buttar, I realized that my only real talent, if any, was in fiction. In fact, if you ever check the past Forum Hero Tales, you will find that I prefer satire to straight fiction. Anyway, as Odysseus says in the movie TROY: "We all play with the gifts the Gods give us."
Chris, if you'd quit being distracted by the girl, you might have better luck!!!
Bestesn ALL!!!
David
Chris, if you'd quit being distracted by the girl, you might have better luck!!!
Bestesn ALL!!!
David
Death is lighter than a Feather, Duty is heavier than a Mountain....
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Commissar D, the Evil
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
INTERLUDE, PART 1
Luftwaffe Colonel Ernst Braun was a colorless and utterly bland officer, with few flying hours in his pocket and even fewer combat flying hours in his career. But, in these last few heartbeats of Bad Frostberg, even he provided a few surprises, despite Rosselsprung’s relegation of him as being utterly unimportant to the fate of the apparently doomed city or any of its' combat enterprises.
First, he organized a repair group of orderlies and clerks. Together, they re-planted the long range radio antennas, hanging one on the roof of a nearby building and another on the statue of Friedrich der Grosse erected in the center square of the town. To accomplish that particular feat, he and his party had to walk over the carpet of civilian corpses in the town square, climb the concrete plinth the statue sat upon, and scale up the horse and across the uniform of the long-dead king before hanging the antenna wire on to its upraised sword.
Then he had his radio operator send off a lengthy coded message. Unbeknown to anyone at headquarters, Braun had long ago realized that the normal chain of command in the Luftwaffe was useless for the city's needs. So this message actually went to a personal friend of his. The brief reply came back in minutes.
Braun reasoned that there were only four factors that kept the Luftwaffe from intervening in the fight for Bad Frostberg; no fuel, few planes, even fewer qualified pilots and 24 hour a day attention by the Allies to its airfields. Prussia was one of the only spots on earth where a pilot had to fight the Red Air Force in the day and endure American and English bomber raids throughout the night. So, he could only hope that the bonds of a long, personal friendship could provide some small solution to Bad Frostberg’s (and therefore, his) dilemma.
The answer to his message encouraged him so much so that his next act was to ask Gruber for the keys to the Ia's personal schwimmwagen. Gruber was occupied enough by other matters that he didn’t question the request and only asked if he needed a driver. Braun said “no” and quickly disappeared, although not before asking his own Luftwaffe radio operator to join him.
“So where are we going?” The man asked on the stairs up to the surface, although he had already guessed their destination from the nature of the coded message and its reply.
“North!” Braun answered with unaccustomed enthusiasm.
After his shock from actually hearing the word said aloud subsided, the radio operator replied with a healthy grin, “Well good then. I thought we were doomed to die down there with the others.”
“Better to die while seeing the blueness of the sky,” Braun answered him poetically and with a sly smile.
The two drove off in the tiny borrowed Volkswagen, making their own path through the rubble until they reached the North road.
At a certain point on it, they were confronted by the Russian interdiction fire. It was no longer the wall of explosions it was earlier in the day--even the Reds didn’t have that much ammunition to waste. Rather it was its own swirling and twisting demon, whose claws gored the earth in a seemingly random and unpredictable pattern. Both men drew in deep breaths and Braun, who was driving the car, floored the gas pedal and prayed for the best.
It was the Commander of Schlachtfliegerstaffel 8, Heinz Martin, who received the decoded message. He answered quickly and confidently, as the only thing he didn’t lack at this stage of the war was confidence. For the last month, three separate Allied air forces had tried to pound his Staffel down into submission and his own fuel supplies were irregular enough to give him a heart attack, but he was sure of both his men and machines.
After taking heavy losses, the Staffel had been dispersed. Their planes were hidden under trees and netting. Their runway was a barren strip of snow-covered highway and their headquarters was a seemingly rustic wooden farm-house.
But his men, upon which everything hung, were in high spirits and only awaiting his orders to strike. So he quickly approached them, once he had received the request from his old friend Braun, to see if anything whether a single one of them lacked the heart to risk his life on orders.
“Bad Frostberg?” Wirblewind questioned, “I thought that was a write-off.”
“Not exactly,” Heinz Martin said, “It’s still a Fortress, which is why I imagine the garrison is trying to break out.”
"Then let's go and kill some Russian tanks, unless anyone has another winter sport in mind, like skiing or maybe bobsledding..." Wirblewind said disdainfully.
David W. was a known daredevil, a fact made obvious by his nickname "Wirblewind", and he nourished that particular reputation at every opportunity. His wing-man, Robert Kohler was, on the other hand, regarded by everyone as a sober and cautious pilot—in as much as anyone who rode an underpowered Hs-129 into battle in 1945 could be regarded as being either “cautious” or “sober”. Still, Kohler’s opinion added weight to that of Wirblewind.
“Well, if they’re fighting the Russkies in earnest, I guess we should be there too.” Kohler said plainly.
Oswald, who flew a Storch was slightly skeptical. Looking at the map, he commented quickly, “Well, I don’t like this weather front approaching over here.”
Wirblewind scoffed at him, “That won’t hit until late tomorrow, at best—why are we discussing this instead of getting into the air?”
Heinz Martin fairly laughed at his eagerness. “Okay then, get your mounts ready. Oswald, in my quarters at once!”
Outside afterwards, David W. gave his shark-mouth painted "mule" a swift kick in the road wheel. "And you'd better friggin' fly right this time, you piece of junk!" He swore at the machine with its' terminally defiant engines.
Luftwaffe Colonel Ernst Braun was a colorless and utterly bland officer, with few flying hours in his pocket and even fewer combat flying hours in his career. But, in these last few heartbeats of Bad Frostberg, even he provided a few surprises, despite Rosselsprung’s relegation of him as being utterly unimportant to the fate of the apparently doomed city or any of its' combat enterprises.
First, he organized a repair group of orderlies and clerks. Together, they re-planted the long range radio antennas, hanging one on the roof of a nearby building and another on the statue of Friedrich der Grosse erected in the center square of the town. To accomplish that particular feat, he and his party had to walk over the carpet of civilian corpses in the town square, climb the concrete plinth the statue sat upon, and scale up the horse and across the uniform of the long-dead king before hanging the antenna wire on to its upraised sword.
Then he had his radio operator send off a lengthy coded message. Unbeknown to anyone at headquarters, Braun had long ago realized that the normal chain of command in the Luftwaffe was useless for the city's needs. So this message actually went to a personal friend of his. The brief reply came back in minutes.
Braun reasoned that there were only four factors that kept the Luftwaffe from intervening in the fight for Bad Frostberg; no fuel, few planes, even fewer qualified pilots and 24 hour a day attention by the Allies to its airfields. Prussia was one of the only spots on earth where a pilot had to fight the Red Air Force in the day and endure American and English bomber raids throughout the night. So, he could only hope that the bonds of a long, personal friendship could provide some small solution to Bad Frostberg’s (and therefore, his) dilemma.
The answer to his message encouraged him so much so that his next act was to ask Gruber for the keys to the Ia's personal schwimmwagen. Gruber was occupied enough by other matters that he didn’t question the request and only asked if he needed a driver. Braun said “no” and quickly disappeared, although not before asking his own Luftwaffe radio operator to join him.
“So where are we going?” The man asked on the stairs up to the surface, although he had already guessed their destination from the nature of the coded message and its reply.
“North!” Braun answered with unaccustomed enthusiasm.
After his shock from actually hearing the word said aloud subsided, the radio operator replied with a healthy grin, “Well good then. I thought we were doomed to die down there with the others.”
“Better to die while seeing the blueness of the sky,” Braun answered him poetically and with a sly smile.
The two drove off in the tiny borrowed Volkswagen, making their own path through the rubble until they reached the North road.
At a certain point on it, they were confronted by the Russian interdiction fire. It was no longer the wall of explosions it was earlier in the day--even the Reds didn’t have that much ammunition to waste. Rather it was its own swirling and twisting demon, whose claws gored the earth in a seemingly random and unpredictable pattern. Both men drew in deep breaths and Braun, who was driving the car, floored the gas pedal and prayed for the best.
It was the Commander of Schlachtfliegerstaffel 8, Heinz Martin, who received the decoded message. He answered quickly and confidently, as the only thing he didn’t lack at this stage of the war was confidence. For the last month, three separate Allied air forces had tried to pound his Staffel down into submission and his own fuel supplies were irregular enough to give him a heart attack, but he was sure of both his men and machines.
After taking heavy losses, the Staffel had been dispersed. Their planes were hidden under trees and netting. Their runway was a barren strip of snow-covered highway and their headquarters was a seemingly rustic wooden farm-house.
But his men, upon which everything hung, were in high spirits and only awaiting his orders to strike. So he quickly approached them, once he had received the request from his old friend Braun, to see if anything whether a single one of them lacked the heart to risk his life on orders.
“Bad Frostberg?” Wirblewind questioned, “I thought that was a write-off.”
“Not exactly,” Heinz Martin said, “It’s still a Fortress, which is why I imagine the garrison is trying to break out.”
"Then let's go and kill some Russian tanks, unless anyone has another winter sport in mind, like skiing or maybe bobsledding..." Wirblewind said disdainfully.
David W. was a known daredevil, a fact made obvious by his nickname "Wirblewind", and he nourished that particular reputation at every opportunity. His wing-man, Robert Kohler was, on the other hand, regarded by everyone as a sober and cautious pilot—in as much as anyone who rode an underpowered Hs-129 into battle in 1945 could be regarded as being either “cautious” or “sober”. Still, Kohler’s opinion added weight to that of Wirblewind.
“Well, if they’re fighting the Russkies in earnest, I guess we should be there too.” Kohler said plainly.
Oswald, who flew a Storch was slightly skeptical. Looking at the map, he commented quickly, “Well, I don’t like this weather front approaching over here.”
Wirblewind scoffed at him, “That won’t hit until late tomorrow, at best—why are we discussing this instead of getting into the air?”
Heinz Martin fairly laughed at his eagerness. “Okay then, get your mounts ready. Oswald, in my quarters at once!”
Outside afterwards, David W. gave his shark-mouth painted "mule" a swift kick in the road wheel. "And you'd better friggin' fly right this time, you piece of junk!" He swore at the machine with its' terminally defiant engines.
Death is lighter than a Feather, Duty is heavier than a Mountain....
Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
lolOutside afterwards, David W. gave his shark-mouth painted "mule" a swift kick in the road wheel. "And you'd better friggin' fly right this time, you piece of junk!" He swore at the machine with its' terminally defiant engines.
Thanks. Dave.
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Commissar D, the Evil
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
INTERLUDE2
The fight for the ridge forced Von Bellow to pause and regroup his tired forces. He had to pull in his left wing, he hadn’t the manpower to maintain it and he had to move closer to the road. He also had to give his men time to rest and eat. So he ordered his company commanders and the commander of the panzers to meet him on the road for a conference.
It was then that he noted the German artillery fire support had ended. On the other hand, the reports he received indicated that his assault group on the Eastern side of the road had done even better than the contingent he lead on the Western side.
The Russians, as he had foreseen, were no where near as strong on the Eastern side of the road. They had hastily pulled back under the attack, so that grouping of his suffered minimal losses, advanced just as far as he had, and was relatively fresh.
Accepting the risks of gathering the leadership of the Kampfgruppe in one place and at the same time, Von Bellow met with his commanders by the side of the road, in the shadow of Jan-Hendricks Jagdpanther. A feldwebel held a map board against the sloping side of the Jagdpanther and Von Kessel pointed at it.
We’re here, roughly half way through the Red’s position. Von Bellow said. We have to change our tactics and concentrate our efforts on supporting the panzer schwerepunkt. We’ll advance in an arrow formation, straight up the road with our flanks in echelon. We need to maintain a 1,000 meter perimeter on both sides of the road. Anti-tank guns must be immediately suppressed by tank guns—we have to rely on speed and momentum to fight our way through.”
As this sank in, he moved to another subject. “Any word on the refugees?”
“Nothing’s getting up that road.” The Leutnant commanding the small rearguard replied. “The Russians are pounding it with artillery, even a panzer couldn’t make it up to us—if there are any panzers left in the town.”
“So we can’t go back and can’t stay here,” Von Bellow stated the obvious, “Therefore we must advance.”
"Straight up the road?" Phylo shook his head.
“No choice, if we continue on fighting through the forest, eventually the Kampfgruppe will splinter and be destroyed bit by bit.” Von Bellow replied.
“What’s to keep the Reds from regrouping and attacking us from the rear?” Phylo posed a question obvious to all from the map.
“Not a damned thing.” Von Bellow motioned for the feldwebel to put the map board down. “That’s just another reason why we have to keep moving. We’ve gone too far to stop now Gentlemen.”
At that point, a minor miracle interrupted the conference as a lone schwimmwagen recklessly sped up the road and slid to a stop in front of them. A white faced Colonel Braun jumped out of the car.
“Well I’ll be damned, the Luftwaffe has made its appearance!” Von Bellow laughed, but not without a hint of admiration. He shook Braun’s hand and patted him on the back. “What in god’s name are you doing here?”
“It was a bit stuffy at headquarters; I and my radio operator went out for a little ride." Braun was supremely relieved to have arrived safely and hid his bravery in understatement. "Besides, you’re going to need a ground observer"-- he glanced back at the schwimmwagen, which was riddled from end to end by shrapnel-- "if my luck holds.”
Phylo interrupted to give a quick report on the state of the armor. Again they had been lucky. Aside from the lone Panther, every other AFV was operational and even the thin-skinned half-tracks had survived.
After that Von Bellow gave his company commanders their orders and the officers quickly dispersed.
Even Phylo had to admit that, under the circumstances, Von Bellow’s plan for concentrating his forces and driving straight up the road was the only option left to the Kampfgruppe, however dangerous it might be.
On the Russian side, the Commissar was issuing orders of his own over the radio to Captain Vadim Sidorov. As usual, he got straight to the point without any verbal foreplay.
“You’re fighting a reinforced German regiment with no support and you have an entire Guards Tank Brigade at your disposal!” The Commissar roared loudly enough into the radio that Sidorov, on the other end, removed his headset and listened to him with only one ear. “It’s noon, you’ve been fighting them for six hours and they’ve still not been eliminated!” The Commissar spoke so quickly that it was impossible for Sidorov to give the usual excuses. “Obviously you need encouragement and direction, so I give you exactly two hours to finish this matter.” The Commissar stopped his tirade for a moment to catch his breath, then began again. “Understand Captain that you outnumber them at least four to one in infantry and probably ten to one in armored vehicles. If you don’t annihilate them in two hours, I will personally see to it that you are brought up on charges of cowardice in the face of the enemy. So you’d better start fighting like a member of the Party.”
With that the Commissar hung up and turned to Colonel Sonovich and their “guests”.
Valery was familiar enough with the Commissar’s style of command that the radio conversation was more or less what he expected. Their guests, Colonel Artem Tarasov and Colonel Grusinov were less familiar with him and his performance made the desired impression.
Colonel Tarasov commanded the Third Guards Tank Brigade, which had remained uncommitted throughout the battle. Colonel Grusinov commanded a regiment of Cossacks, newly attached to the Corps.
Tarasov looked like Moscow’s propaganda image of the brave Slavic warrior. He was a good six feet tall, blond, blue-eyed and fresh-faced in an immaculate uniform. He reminded the Commissar, curiously enough, of a captured S.S. recruiting poster. Tarasov saluted quickly and gave him a pleasant smile. The Commissar smiled back and returned the salute.
Grusinov on the other hand was a thickly bearded, thickly built and wearing what seemed to be a mix of uniforms and a mass of gold medals on his chest. Personally, the Commissar hated Cossacks, as he regarded them as a bunch of drunken, undisciplined murderers at best and had fought Cossacks in the service of Germany on more than one occasion.
However, custom and courtesy dictated that after the exchange of salutes, the two men embraced in a brutal bear hug.
Then the Commissar led them over to the map table.
Valery joined them with an announcement. “Sir, Frontal Aviation is reporting that it discovered a German train full of heavy artillery and eliminated it. It was on the tracks on the Western edge of the town.”
The Commissar noted the implied criticism from Valery but ignored it.
“These are your tasks Gentlemen." The Commissar said. "At 0100, Colonel Tarasov will lead his brigade through the rail yards on the Western end of the town. You shouldn’t encounter anything more than residual resistance.” He put a finger on the map. "Then you are to head directly North at full speed. You are to stop for nothing and not even put out flank guards until after you have passed through the rear areas in the West of Sidorov’s Brigade. Under no circumstances are you to come to his aid.
Instead, you are to bypass him and advance North. The Germans hold a salient to the West of Danzig and their backs are to the Baltic. Your destination is the Baltic!!!!!”
Tarasov smiled, it was a campaign that could make his reputation. The type of operation, so broad in scope and possible effect, that every armor officer looks forward to and most never receive the opportunity to lead.
The Commissar was well satisfied by his reaction and turned to Grusinov. “Your part in this Comrade is different but just as important. You will be joined by an armored reconnaissance company before you advance. But here,” He pointed to a line leading off to the west, “in these forests are thousands of German civilians and a very small contingent of troops trying to run away from the city. They are headed towards the town of Neuburgh, a town that neither Front Command nor I have any plans to capture. I want this column stopped and destroyed. I want your men to seal this Western escape route off, but more than that, I want these escaping Germans rounded up or eliminated.”
The deadliness, the sheer murderous quality in his voice, impressed Grusinov, almost as much as the prospect of plundering German civilians without a fight. He grunted approvingly and grinned broadly as he accepted the orders.
After the two had left, it was time for the Commissar and Colonel Sonofovich to finally have that confrontation that had been brewing between them since the start of the campaign.
The old bonds of friendship between them were such that only Valery could have this particular conversation with the Commissar.
“So your plan all along was to be the first to reach the Baltic. And this when a full Corps attack might have taken the town over a week ago?”
“Might have and probably would have.” The Commissar corrected him. “But it would have ruined the Corps' offensive power and we wouldn’t have been able to restore it. I knew that any reinforcements would be denied us the moment I received the order to invest and lay siege to the town. Someone powerful at Front Command wanted us to fight ourselves out here and then would have kept us here by not giving us replacements for our losses.”
“You can’t know that for certain.” Valery answered quickly. “We should have launched a full scale assault at the earliest opportunity.”
“We did assault the town—and we lost. The town couldn’t be taken from the March--we tried that and failed. That told me that the town would devour our fighting power if we committed the entire Corps. And who uses a Tank Corps for this type of job anyway? Tactically and strategically, we should have been allowed to bypass it and leave it to the infantry, and it would have withered away behind our lines.”
There was enough truth in that to make Valery reconsider even the most seemingly paranoid aspects of the Commissar’s viewpoint.
Sensing that his faithful Colonel was re-thinking his position, Davidov sat down and looked at the map again. “This way, we have an untouched Brigade to restore our fortunes and enable us to advance. And no one at Command can question it, as the town will certainly fall by tomorrow.”
The fight for the ridge forced Von Bellow to pause and regroup his tired forces. He had to pull in his left wing, he hadn’t the manpower to maintain it and he had to move closer to the road. He also had to give his men time to rest and eat. So he ordered his company commanders and the commander of the panzers to meet him on the road for a conference.
It was then that he noted the German artillery fire support had ended. On the other hand, the reports he received indicated that his assault group on the Eastern side of the road had done even better than the contingent he lead on the Western side.
The Russians, as he had foreseen, were no where near as strong on the Eastern side of the road. They had hastily pulled back under the attack, so that grouping of his suffered minimal losses, advanced just as far as he had, and was relatively fresh.
Accepting the risks of gathering the leadership of the Kampfgruppe in one place and at the same time, Von Bellow met with his commanders by the side of the road, in the shadow of Jan-Hendricks Jagdpanther. A feldwebel held a map board against the sloping side of the Jagdpanther and Von Kessel pointed at it.
We’re here, roughly half way through the Red’s position. Von Bellow said. We have to change our tactics and concentrate our efforts on supporting the panzer schwerepunkt. We’ll advance in an arrow formation, straight up the road with our flanks in echelon. We need to maintain a 1,000 meter perimeter on both sides of the road. Anti-tank guns must be immediately suppressed by tank guns—we have to rely on speed and momentum to fight our way through.”
As this sank in, he moved to another subject. “Any word on the refugees?”
“Nothing’s getting up that road.” The Leutnant commanding the small rearguard replied. “The Russians are pounding it with artillery, even a panzer couldn’t make it up to us—if there are any panzers left in the town.”
“So we can’t go back and can’t stay here,” Von Bellow stated the obvious, “Therefore we must advance.”
"Straight up the road?" Phylo shook his head.
“No choice, if we continue on fighting through the forest, eventually the Kampfgruppe will splinter and be destroyed bit by bit.” Von Bellow replied.
“What’s to keep the Reds from regrouping and attacking us from the rear?” Phylo posed a question obvious to all from the map.
“Not a damned thing.” Von Bellow motioned for the feldwebel to put the map board down. “That’s just another reason why we have to keep moving. We’ve gone too far to stop now Gentlemen.”
At that point, a minor miracle interrupted the conference as a lone schwimmwagen recklessly sped up the road and slid to a stop in front of them. A white faced Colonel Braun jumped out of the car.
“Well I’ll be damned, the Luftwaffe has made its appearance!” Von Bellow laughed, but not without a hint of admiration. He shook Braun’s hand and patted him on the back. “What in god’s name are you doing here?”
“It was a bit stuffy at headquarters; I and my radio operator went out for a little ride." Braun was supremely relieved to have arrived safely and hid his bravery in understatement. "Besides, you’re going to need a ground observer"-- he glanced back at the schwimmwagen, which was riddled from end to end by shrapnel-- "if my luck holds.”
Phylo interrupted to give a quick report on the state of the armor. Again they had been lucky. Aside from the lone Panther, every other AFV was operational and even the thin-skinned half-tracks had survived.
After that Von Bellow gave his company commanders their orders and the officers quickly dispersed.
Even Phylo had to admit that, under the circumstances, Von Bellow’s plan for concentrating his forces and driving straight up the road was the only option left to the Kampfgruppe, however dangerous it might be.
On the Russian side, the Commissar was issuing orders of his own over the radio to Captain Vadim Sidorov. As usual, he got straight to the point without any verbal foreplay.
“You’re fighting a reinforced German regiment with no support and you have an entire Guards Tank Brigade at your disposal!” The Commissar roared loudly enough into the radio that Sidorov, on the other end, removed his headset and listened to him with only one ear. “It’s noon, you’ve been fighting them for six hours and they’ve still not been eliminated!” The Commissar spoke so quickly that it was impossible for Sidorov to give the usual excuses. “Obviously you need encouragement and direction, so I give you exactly two hours to finish this matter.” The Commissar stopped his tirade for a moment to catch his breath, then began again. “Understand Captain that you outnumber them at least four to one in infantry and probably ten to one in armored vehicles. If you don’t annihilate them in two hours, I will personally see to it that you are brought up on charges of cowardice in the face of the enemy. So you’d better start fighting like a member of the Party.”
With that the Commissar hung up and turned to Colonel Sonovich and their “guests”.
Valery was familiar enough with the Commissar’s style of command that the radio conversation was more or less what he expected. Their guests, Colonel Artem Tarasov and Colonel Grusinov were less familiar with him and his performance made the desired impression.
Colonel Tarasov commanded the Third Guards Tank Brigade, which had remained uncommitted throughout the battle. Colonel Grusinov commanded a regiment of Cossacks, newly attached to the Corps.
Tarasov looked like Moscow’s propaganda image of the brave Slavic warrior. He was a good six feet tall, blond, blue-eyed and fresh-faced in an immaculate uniform. He reminded the Commissar, curiously enough, of a captured S.S. recruiting poster. Tarasov saluted quickly and gave him a pleasant smile. The Commissar smiled back and returned the salute.
Grusinov on the other hand was a thickly bearded, thickly built and wearing what seemed to be a mix of uniforms and a mass of gold medals on his chest. Personally, the Commissar hated Cossacks, as he regarded them as a bunch of drunken, undisciplined murderers at best and had fought Cossacks in the service of Germany on more than one occasion.
However, custom and courtesy dictated that after the exchange of salutes, the two men embraced in a brutal bear hug.
Then the Commissar led them over to the map table.
Valery joined them with an announcement. “Sir, Frontal Aviation is reporting that it discovered a German train full of heavy artillery and eliminated it. It was on the tracks on the Western edge of the town.”
The Commissar noted the implied criticism from Valery but ignored it.
“These are your tasks Gentlemen." The Commissar said. "At 0100, Colonel Tarasov will lead his brigade through the rail yards on the Western end of the town. You shouldn’t encounter anything more than residual resistance.” He put a finger on the map. "Then you are to head directly North at full speed. You are to stop for nothing and not even put out flank guards until after you have passed through the rear areas in the West of Sidorov’s Brigade. Under no circumstances are you to come to his aid.
Instead, you are to bypass him and advance North. The Germans hold a salient to the West of Danzig and their backs are to the Baltic. Your destination is the Baltic!!!!!”
Tarasov smiled, it was a campaign that could make his reputation. The type of operation, so broad in scope and possible effect, that every armor officer looks forward to and most never receive the opportunity to lead.
The Commissar was well satisfied by his reaction and turned to Grusinov. “Your part in this Comrade is different but just as important. You will be joined by an armored reconnaissance company before you advance. But here,” He pointed to a line leading off to the west, “in these forests are thousands of German civilians and a very small contingent of troops trying to run away from the city. They are headed towards the town of Neuburgh, a town that neither Front Command nor I have any plans to capture. I want this column stopped and destroyed. I want your men to seal this Western escape route off, but more than that, I want these escaping Germans rounded up or eliminated.”
The deadliness, the sheer murderous quality in his voice, impressed Grusinov, almost as much as the prospect of plundering German civilians without a fight. He grunted approvingly and grinned broadly as he accepted the orders.
After the two had left, it was time for the Commissar and Colonel Sonofovich to finally have that confrontation that had been brewing between them since the start of the campaign.
The old bonds of friendship between them were such that only Valery could have this particular conversation with the Commissar.
“So your plan all along was to be the first to reach the Baltic. And this when a full Corps attack might have taken the town over a week ago?”
“Might have and probably would have.” The Commissar corrected him. “But it would have ruined the Corps' offensive power and we wouldn’t have been able to restore it. I knew that any reinforcements would be denied us the moment I received the order to invest and lay siege to the town. Someone powerful at Front Command wanted us to fight ourselves out here and then would have kept us here by not giving us replacements for our losses.”
“You can’t know that for certain.” Valery answered quickly. “We should have launched a full scale assault at the earliest opportunity.”
“We did assault the town—and we lost. The town couldn’t be taken from the March--we tried that and failed. That told me that the town would devour our fighting power if we committed the entire Corps. And who uses a Tank Corps for this type of job anyway? Tactically and strategically, we should have been allowed to bypass it and leave it to the infantry, and it would have withered away behind our lines.”
There was enough truth in that to make Valery reconsider even the most seemingly paranoid aspects of the Commissar’s viewpoint.
Sensing that his faithful Colonel was re-thinking his position, Davidov sat down and looked at the map again. “This way, we have an untouched Brigade to restore our fortunes and enable us to advance. And no one at Command can question it, as the town will certainly fall by tomorrow.”
Death is lighter than a Feather, Duty is heavier than a Mountain....
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Me-109 Jagdfleiger
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
Great as always D.!
Surprisingly Jahn and the rest of the hero's are still alive for now but i can sence the impending doom..
![:[]](./images/smilies/icon_study.gif "Study")
Jonathan
Surprisingly Jahn and the rest of the hero's are still alive for now but i can sence the impending doom..
JonathanCheers Jonathan,
Only the spirit of attack borne in a brave heart will bring success to any fighter aircraft, no matter how highly developed it may be.
— General Adolf Galland, Luftwaffe.
Only the spirit of attack borne in a brave heart will bring success to any fighter aircraft, no matter how highly developed it may be.
— General Adolf Galland, Luftwaffe.
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Commissar D, the Evil
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
Well Jahn, the stage is set for this drama to end. I expect that things will happen relatively quickly as everyone is now in place.
So, sit back and enjoy, although some parts may be sad.
Bestens,
David
So, sit back and enjoy, although some parts may be sad.
Bestens,
David
Death is lighter than a Feather, Duty is heavier than a Mountain....
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Commissar D, the Evil
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
SOUTHERN SECTOR
Von Kessel’s line guarding the Southern section of the city was manned to thinly to form a continuous line. The best he could manage was a checkerboard of individual fire points, each situated to offer interlocking fields of fire and mutual support.
It was on this fragile and fragmented defense that the hammer blow of the Russian assault fell. They came forward in groups of platoon strength, either lead by or supported by two or three tanks. And, rather than plunge immediately through the gaps in the German defense, they took the time to assail and reduce each strong point in its turn.
Men began to desert their posts, well before these posts were struck by the Russians. Those of them that fell into the hands of the few remaining feldpolitzei were brought back to the lines and even as the Russians were attacking, German firing squads were busy in the rear making “examples” of a few of the "worst" deserters. Of course, the designation of being the "worst" was determined on the spot and depended heavily on the mood of the feldpolitzei who captured them.
Oddly, all things considered, most of the men clung determinately to their positions.
“Zing!”
The round knocked W.F.’s helmet off. Instinctively, he rolled to his left, ending up on his back, staring at the ceiling with his rifle clutched to his chest.
“You okay?” Jahn whispered urgently.
“That was damned close.” W.F. replied. There was still a buzzing in his ears from the hit. He rolled again, rolling over to Jahn and exhaled deeply.
Jahn had the look of a frightened soldier on his face. “What if we have to surrender?” he blurted.
“Surrender? Never surrender to the Russians kid, it’s the only rule of war you never break.” W.F. crawled over to him and sat next o him, his back against the wall.
Jahn drew his knees up to his chest and sneaked a peak outside. “They’re closer. There are so many of them.”
“Look kid,” W.F. said, running his fingers through his hair to reassure himself that he wasn’t bleeding. “I once saw a road in Russia, part of which was made out of ice. I couldn’t understand it at first, then I saw the bodies of our men under the ice. They had been stripped naked and water poured over them to build the road.”
Jahn looked terrified and was trembling slightly, but he listened.
“I don’t think they do that now--we were winning then--so now its probably just a long march to Siberia as slave labor building roads out there in the snow with picks and shovels. Either way, you don’t want to end up as part of a road somewhere in Russia, do you?"
Jahn clutched his rifle and swallowed hard. “No—hell no! We've got to fight these bast**ds!”
“Good lad.” W.F. shook his head to clear away the buzzing. “Now gather up your kit and lets find some better cover.”
Von Kessel radioed headquarters, pleading for reinforcements. Gruber answered and promised, somewhat emptily, to send what he could find. Finished with the conversation, Von Kessel and his radioman set out into the ruins so that he could get a better idea of how his troops were holding out.
The head of the Russian tank column burst out of the forest, crossed the train tracks and continued North. All of this happened in clear view of the screaming patients in the hospital. There was no firing because there were no troops to fire. The Russian tanks, followed by the motorized infantry didn’t even bother to approach the hospital, they just motored on, across the railroad tracks and straight through a line of civilians hoping to escape into the forest. Those civilians who weren’t quick enough on their feet were simply crushed under the broad tracks of the tanks.
Doktor Krollspell watched on in horror. He turned to Ursula. “The Russians are here, I think you had better prepare yourself."
Moshe, who had stripped off his civilian clothes and was wearing his striped prisoners’ uniform clutched at her arm. “You’d be better off with me, Miss”, he said.
Moshe and Doktor Krollspell locked eyes on one another, while Ursula looked desperately back and forth at each of them, trying to decide what to do.
“I was once a history professor”, Moshe said. “I’m just a Jew convict now to you, but we both know what the Reds will do to you when they capture you and to her, if she’s with you.”
The Doktor nodded. He leaned down and kissed Ursula on the cheek. “Go with him and may God protect you both….”
Von Kessel’s line guarding the Southern section of the city was manned to thinly to form a continuous line. The best he could manage was a checkerboard of individual fire points, each situated to offer interlocking fields of fire and mutual support.
It was on this fragile and fragmented defense that the hammer blow of the Russian assault fell. They came forward in groups of platoon strength, either lead by or supported by two or three tanks. And, rather than plunge immediately through the gaps in the German defense, they took the time to assail and reduce each strong point in its turn.
Men began to desert their posts, well before these posts were struck by the Russians. Those of them that fell into the hands of the few remaining feldpolitzei were brought back to the lines and even as the Russians were attacking, German firing squads were busy in the rear making “examples” of a few of the "worst" deserters. Of course, the designation of being the "worst" was determined on the spot and depended heavily on the mood of the feldpolitzei who captured them.
Oddly, all things considered, most of the men clung determinately to their positions.
“Zing!”
The round knocked W.F.’s helmet off. Instinctively, he rolled to his left, ending up on his back, staring at the ceiling with his rifle clutched to his chest.
“You okay?” Jahn whispered urgently.
“That was damned close.” W.F. replied. There was still a buzzing in his ears from the hit. He rolled again, rolling over to Jahn and exhaled deeply.
Jahn had the look of a frightened soldier on his face. “What if we have to surrender?” he blurted.
“Surrender? Never surrender to the Russians kid, it’s the only rule of war you never break.” W.F. crawled over to him and sat next o him, his back against the wall.
Jahn drew his knees up to his chest and sneaked a peak outside. “They’re closer. There are so many of them.”
“Look kid,” W.F. said, running his fingers through his hair to reassure himself that he wasn’t bleeding. “I once saw a road in Russia, part of which was made out of ice. I couldn’t understand it at first, then I saw the bodies of our men under the ice. They had been stripped naked and water poured over them to build the road.”
Jahn looked terrified and was trembling slightly, but he listened.
“I don’t think they do that now--we were winning then--so now its probably just a long march to Siberia as slave labor building roads out there in the snow with picks and shovels. Either way, you don’t want to end up as part of a road somewhere in Russia, do you?"
Jahn clutched his rifle and swallowed hard. “No—hell no! We've got to fight these bast**ds!”
“Good lad.” W.F. shook his head to clear away the buzzing. “Now gather up your kit and lets find some better cover.”
Von Kessel radioed headquarters, pleading for reinforcements. Gruber answered and promised, somewhat emptily, to send what he could find. Finished with the conversation, Von Kessel and his radioman set out into the ruins so that he could get a better idea of how his troops were holding out.
The head of the Russian tank column burst out of the forest, crossed the train tracks and continued North. All of this happened in clear view of the screaming patients in the hospital. There was no firing because there were no troops to fire. The Russian tanks, followed by the motorized infantry didn’t even bother to approach the hospital, they just motored on, across the railroad tracks and straight through a line of civilians hoping to escape into the forest. Those civilians who weren’t quick enough on their feet were simply crushed under the broad tracks of the tanks.
Doktor Krollspell watched on in horror. He turned to Ursula. “The Russians are here, I think you had better prepare yourself."
Moshe, who had stripped off his civilian clothes and was wearing his striped prisoners’ uniform clutched at her arm. “You’d be better off with me, Miss”, he said.
Moshe and Doktor Krollspell locked eyes on one another, while Ursula looked desperately back and forth at each of them, trying to decide what to do.
“I was once a history professor”, Moshe said. “I’m just a Jew convict now to you, but we both know what the Reds will do to you when they capture you and to her, if she’s with you.”
The Doktor nodded. He leaned down and kissed Ursula on the cheek. “Go with him and may God protect you both….”
Death is lighter than a Feather, Duty is heavier than a Mountain....
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Luftman129
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
Ach du lieber! I guess it'd have been a better idea to leave her at home, lolCommissar D, the Evil wrote:Jaeger, thank you very, very much for your kind reply. If I can ever help in any technical literature you are interested in, please drop me a PM. I've never read Hassel, sad to say--it was always my intent and greatest wish to become a true writer of history. But, when I compared my own attempts at historical writing to someone who was really good, like my friend Prit Buttar, I realized that my only real talent, if any, was in fiction. In fact, if you ever check the past Forum Hero Tales, you will find that I prefer satire to straight fiction. Anyway, as Odysseus says in the movie TROY: "We all play with the gifts the Gods give us."
Chris, if you'd quit being distracted by the girl, you might have better luck!!!
Bestesn ALL!!!
David
Thanks,
Chris
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Commissar D, the Evil
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
The Forest
Leutnant Jaeger “set up shop” once he emerged from the rear of the Russian defense perimeter. A long line of people trudged past him, keeping to the trail marked by the column. These were mostly all people from the defunct “Gruppe A” overtaking and mixing in with the weak stragglers from the original refugee column.
Arajs had pulled himself up in the over-crowded half-track and found himself behind the rear MG which was mounted on a pivoting arm. This suited him quite comfortably and certainly beat lying on the floor. He would have appreciated it more if it had a gun shield, like the forward, MG, but it at least afforded him the chance to defend himself.
Leutnant Jaeger had only one appreciable bit of fun in the rearguard and that was the opportunity to waylay fleeing feldpolitzei and impress them into the rearguard. Even his men appreciated the irony of that move and brooked no argument from the “chain dogs”. Any protest by them was quickly resolved with a rifle butt.
Otherwise, things seemed to grow grimmer by the moment. They had seen the strafing Shturmoviks earlier and heard the explosions from the Ribbentrop’s train. When its heavy guns didn’t resume firing, they rightly assumed that it had been destroyed.
As disturbing as this was, even more upsetting was the sudden sound of gunshots echoing in the forest behind them. What it meant was anyone’s guess, though the safe odds were on the rear of the refugee trail being ambushed by the Russians. The sounds drifted closer, single and multiple rifle shots. But louder than that were the screams. The screams from behind them seemed immensely out of proportion to the relatively small number of gunshots.
The mystery resolved itself when a single survivor stumbled into their position, his head bleeding from where half his scalp was missing, sheared off by a sword cut. “Cossacks!” the man screamed and ran on into the forest.
“Cossacks!” The words were repeated up and down the trail. Leutnant Jaeger’s men formed up for an all around defense, without him having to give the orders.
Jaeger looked at his watch again and when the appropriate hour came, they mounted back up and withdrew further, the wretched chain dogs and Hansen with his Latvians following nervously on foot. From experience, Hansen knew the Latvian attitude towards Cossacks was akin to a normal man’s reaction to a rabid dog. Either avoid it or, better yet, shoot it.
But the forest was no place for a running fight, Hansen thought. Too many opportunities to get lost or surrounded.
As the thought occurred to Hansen, far up ahead Rath was reaching the same conclusion for different reasons, since he was as yet quite unaware that they were being stalked. What worried Hauptmann Rath were the difficulties the civilians were suffering in negotiating the forest. It impeded them, slowed them down and broke up the column every time an obstacle like a fallen tree was encountered. More than that, Rath wasn’t going to allow this retreat to degenerate into blind flight, with the soldiers leaving the struggling column of refugees behind.
Assured by Tom and Ulrich that there was no sign of the Russians ahead, he stopped the column’s spearpoint to redistribute the troops. And he decided that, if they took a route just skirting the edge of the forest, they could make better time, even if it made them more vulnerable to air attack, which was his major worry.
He stopped the two Hetzers and ordered them to patrol the length of the column once they left the forest and were in open ground. One would patrol the inner side of the column, closest to the forest, the other would patrol the outside. The Hetzers' commanders pointed out that they only had fuel for about 130 km. of operation, but didn’t really object to the plan.
Keeping one half-track for point duty, he ordered the other three to space themselves out on the inner edge of the column. Again no one objected seriously.
But the infantry in the spearhead were another matter. Speaking to the company commanders, he proposed that one company stay in the spearhead, one would wait for the rearguard to catch up and the other would be placed in what he calculated to be the middle of the civilians.
The officer in charge of the “stay behind” company objected strenuously. Rath relieved him on the spot, had him disarmed in front of his men and with a personal kick in the arse, sent him off to fend for himself. He would have had the man shot if it had been necessary to make his point and did promise to shoot him if he ever encountered him again. After that, any objections to his orders were very muted indeed.
As for Tom and Ulrich, Ulrich volunteered to act as sort of a courier by racing up and down the column to sort out any immediate problems or report them to Rath. Tom would continue to lead the evacuation.
It was a fine plan. Rath had thought it out well, even while he was on the move. Its only flaw was Grusinov’s regiment of Cossacks and the Red Army armored reconnaissance unit that would soon make an appearance.
When the order to travel on the edge of the forest in open ground reached Leutnant Jaeger, he welcomed it, as he knew that Cossacks could be counted on to avoid armed troops and fall upon the unprotected civilians strung out on the forest paths. Ulrich brought the order himself and then sped off to get the column on to the new route. This would have been impossible had their original route not been so near to the forest edge. As it was, it was simply a matter of ordering the civilians to move to their right a few hundred meters and follow the forest's edge. Although he had word from Jaeger about the Cossack "infestation"--as Jaeger put it--so far they hadn't molested anyone beyond the rear guard's position.
Further back, in the depths of the old Russian perimeter, the situation was vastly different...
Leutnant Jaeger “set up shop” once he emerged from the rear of the Russian defense perimeter. A long line of people trudged past him, keeping to the trail marked by the column. These were mostly all people from the defunct “Gruppe A” overtaking and mixing in with the weak stragglers from the original refugee column.
Arajs had pulled himself up in the over-crowded half-track and found himself behind the rear MG which was mounted on a pivoting arm. This suited him quite comfortably and certainly beat lying on the floor. He would have appreciated it more if it had a gun shield, like the forward, MG, but it at least afforded him the chance to defend himself.
Leutnant Jaeger had only one appreciable bit of fun in the rearguard and that was the opportunity to waylay fleeing feldpolitzei and impress them into the rearguard. Even his men appreciated the irony of that move and brooked no argument from the “chain dogs”. Any protest by them was quickly resolved with a rifle butt.
Otherwise, things seemed to grow grimmer by the moment. They had seen the strafing Shturmoviks earlier and heard the explosions from the Ribbentrop’s train. When its heavy guns didn’t resume firing, they rightly assumed that it had been destroyed.
As disturbing as this was, even more upsetting was the sudden sound of gunshots echoing in the forest behind them. What it meant was anyone’s guess, though the safe odds were on the rear of the refugee trail being ambushed by the Russians. The sounds drifted closer, single and multiple rifle shots. But louder than that were the screams. The screams from behind them seemed immensely out of proportion to the relatively small number of gunshots.
The mystery resolved itself when a single survivor stumbled into their position, his head bleeding from where half his scalp was missing, sheared off by a sword cut. “Cossacks!” the man screamed and ran on into the forest.
“Cossacks!” The words were repeated up and down the trail. Leutnant Jaeger’s men formed up for an all around defense, without him having to give the orders.
Jaeger looked at his watch again and when the appropriate hour came, they mounted back up and withdrew further, the wretched chain dogs and Hansen with his Latvians following nervously on foot. From experience, Hansen knew the Latvian attitude towards Cossacks was akin to a normal man’s reaction to a rabid dog. Either avoid it or, better yet, shoot it.
But the forest was no place for a running fight, Hansen thought. Too many opportunities to get lost or surrounded.
As the thought occurred to Hansen, far up ahead Rath was reaching the same conclusion for different reasons, since he was as yet quite unaware that they were being stalked. What worried Hauptmann Rath were the difficulties the civilians were suffering in negotiating the forest. It impeded them, slowed them down and broke up the column every time an obstacle like a fallen tree was encountered. More than that, Rath wasn’t going to allow this retreat to degenerate into blind flight, with the soldiers leaving the struggling column of refugees behind.
Assured by Tom and Ulrich that there was no sign of the Russians ahead, he stopped the column’s spearpoint to redistribute the troops. And he decided that, if they took a route just skirting the edge of the forest, they could make better time, even if it made them more vulnerable to air attack, which was his major worry.
He stopped the two Hetzers and ordered them to patrol the length of the column once they left the forest and were in open ground. One would patrol the inner side of the column, closest to the forest, the other would patrol the outside. The Hetzers' commanders pointed out that they only had fuel for about 130 km. of operation, but didn’t really object to the plan.
Keeping one half-track for point duty, he ordered the other three to space themselves out on the inner edge of the column. Again no one objected seriously.
But the infantry in the spearhead were another matter. Speaking to the company commanders, he proposed that one company stay in the spearhead, one would wait for the rearguard to catch up and the other would be placed in what he calculated to be the middle of the civilians.
The officer in charge of the “stay behind” company objected strenuously. Rath relieved him on the spot, had him disarmed in front of his men and with a personal kick in the arse, sent him off to fend for himself. He would have had the man shot if it had been necessary to make his point and did promise to shoot him if he ever encountered him again. After that, any objections to his orders were very muted indeed.
As for Tom and Ulrich, Ulrich volunteered to act as sort of a courier by racing up and down the column to sort out any immediate problems or report them to Rath. Tom would continue to lead the evacuation.
It was a fine plan. Rath had thought it out well, even while he was on the move. Its only flaw was Grusinov’s regiment of Cossacks and the Red Army armored reconnaissance unit that would soon make an appearance.
When the order to travel on the edge of the forest in open ground reached Leutnant Jaeger, he welcomed it, as he knew that Cossacks could be counted on to avoid armed troops and fall upon the unprotected civilians strung out on the forest paths. Ulrich brought the order himself and then sped off to get the column on to the new route. This would have been impossible had their original route not been so near to the forest edge. As it was, it was simply a matter of ordering the civilians to move to their right a few hundred meters and follow the forest's edge. Although he had word from Jaeger about the Cossack "infestation"--as Jaeger put it--so far they hadn't molested anyone beyond the rear guard's position.
Further back, in the depths of the old Russian perimeter, the situation was vastly different...
Death is lighter than a Feather, Duty is heavier than a Mountain....
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Commissar D, the Evil
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
COSSACKS
Grusinov’s regiment was entirely mounted and it burst into the forest as a howling mass of cheering men and snorting ponies. They fell upon the fleeing German civilians with great gusto, cutting them down by the hundreds with their sabers. They slaughtered entire families with their swords, only using their rifles and submachine guns when they stumbled upon armed soldiers who were capable of fighting back. That explained the screaming Jaeger and his men heard that overwhelmed the sound of the few gunshots.
Of course, the Cossacks’ desire to loot the bodies of their victims slowed them a bit. But, as mounted men, they knew that no one on foot in the forest had the slightest chance of outrunning them. So they eagerly took the opportunity to plunder the dead, and then moved on, working their way from the tail of the refugee column towards Leutnant Jeager’s rear guard.
How many people died in the forest has never been calculated. Their bodies were never counted, much less buried. But where Grusinov’s men went, no one survived unless they were very, very lucky.
Killing by hand worked the Cossacks up into a frenzy of murder. The Commissar’s orders to round the refugees up, if it had ever been seriously considered by Grusinov, certainly didn’t survive actual contact with their intended victims. They only sobered up from the blood orgy once they found that the Germans had left the forest and even their rearguard was hanging outside its edges.
Grusinov immediately split his men into two forces, one to remain in the forest and “tag along” to scout for openings in the German column to attack, the other to circle out into open country and look for likely places to attack from that perspective.
In looking for openings, they weren’t to be disappointed. Rath’s column now stretched nearly two kilometers in length. Scattered throughout it and guarding it were less than four hundred soldiers in units, a few armed walking wounded scattered in with the civilians, and nine armored vehicles, two of which were at the head of the column and unable to intervene.
So the Cossacks would find a weak spot, rush in, slaughter everyone in sight and disperse the rest, then reform and pick another spot to hit. The Soviet armored reconnaissance company attached to them didn’t, at first, move fast enough to even catch up with them as they ranged around, ahead and behind the refugees.
It was an event complete with scenes out of the Napoleonic campaign in the early 1800s in Russia. The Cossacks would charge and a few wounded, freezing grenadiers would hold hem off until either they were overrun or the Cossacks decided that the prize wasn't worth the effort.
But Rath and his men were determined. At first this determination focused solely on escape. When that hope seemed remoter, they re-focused on protecting the column itself. Even if it meant, as it invariably did, splitting themselves into smaller groups interspersed with the civilians.
A single MG-34 or a small group of men armed with automatic weapons often meant the difference between life and death for hundreds.
Hauptman Rath in his half-track joined in the fighting when it became apparent that the horsemen were able to strike any part of the column at will. And he found that even the sight of German armor racing towards a threatened section of the column could save it from butchery. As he and the other old hands knew, the main weakness of the Cossacks was their reluctance to fight anyone who could fight back.
Still, the situation was verging on the desperate from the German viewpoint. And Hauptmann Rath knew he had to come up with something before the column either bled to death or simply disintegrated.
Grusinov’s regiment was entirely mounted and it burst into the forest as a howling mass of cheering men and snorting ponies. They fell upon the fleeing German civilians with great gusto, cutting them down by the hundreds with their sabers. They slaughtered entire families with their swords, only using their rifles and submachine guns when they stumbled upon armed soldiers who were capable of fighting back. That explained the screaming Jaeger and his men heard that overwhelmed the sound of the few gunshots.
Of course, the Cossacks’ desire to loot the bodies of their victims slowed them a bit. But, as mounted men, they knew that no one on foot in the forest had the slightest chance of outrunning them. So they eagerly took the opportunity to plunder the dead, and then moved on, working their way from the tail of the refugee column towards Leutnant Jeager’s rear guard.
How many people died in the forest has never been calculated. Their bodies were never counted, much less buried. But where Grusinov’s men went, no one survived unless they were very, very lucky.
Killing by hand worked the Cossacks up into a frenzy of murder. The Commissar’s orders to round the refugees up, if it had ever been seriously considered by Grusinov, certainly didn’t survive actual contact with their intended victims. They only sobered up from the blood orgy once they found that the Germans had left the forest and even their rearguard was hanging outside its edges.
Grusinov immediately split his men into two forces, one to remain in the forest and “tag along” to scout for openings in the German column to attack, the other to circle out into open country and look for likely places to attack from that perspective.
In looking for openings, they weren’t to be disappointed. Rath’s column now stretched nearly two kilometers in length. Scattered throughout it and guarding it were less than four hundred soldiers in units, a few armed walking wounded scattered in with the civilians, and nine armored vehicles, two of which were at the head of the column and unable to intervene.
So the Cossacks would find a weak spot, rush in, slaughter everyone in sight and disperse the rest, then reform and pick another spot to hit. The Soviet armored reconnaissance company attached to them didn’t, at first, move fast enough to even catch up with them as they ranged around, ahead and behind the refugees.
It was an event complete with scenes out of the Napoleonic campaign in the early 1800s in Russia. The Cossacks would charge and a few wounded, freezing grenadiers would hold hem off until either they were overrun or the Cossacks decided that the prize wasn't worth the effort.
But Rath and his men were determined. At first this determination focused solely on escape. When that hope seemed remoter, they re-focused on protecting the column itself. Even if it meant, as it invariably did, splitting themselves into smaller groups interspersed with the civilians.
A single MG-34 or a small group of men armed with automatic weapons often meant the difference between life and death for hundreds.
Hauptman Rath in his half-track joined in the fighting when it became apparent that the horsemen were able to strike any part of the column at will. And he found that even the sight of German armor racing towards a threatened section of the column could save it from butchery. As he and the other old hands knew, the main weakness of the Cossacks was their reluctance to fight anyone who could fight back.
Still, the situation was verging on the desperate from the German viewpoint. And Hauptmann Rath knew he had to come up with something before the column either bled to death or simply disintegrated.
Death is lighter than a Feather, Duty is heavier than a Mountain....
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Tom Houlihan
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
Now I understand why Mr. Chekhov always had so much venom in his voice when he called someone a "Cossack!"
I had an attachment, but I think someone better tell me what the maximum size is.
I had an attachment, but I think someone better tell me what the maximum size is.
Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
Nice!
Jaeger
‘There are no desperate situations, there are only desperate people.’ - Heinz Guderian
‘There are no desperate situations, there are only desperate people.’ - Heinz Guderian
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Commissar D, the Evil
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
Ah, I was looking forward to the attachment.......
I'm taking a break today, but don't worry folks, the story continues!
Best,
David
I'm taking a break today, but don't worry folks, the story continues!
Best,
David
Death is lighter than a Feather, Duty is heavier than a Mountain....
-
Commissar D, the Evil
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
Death and Sparse Glory on the North Road
Now everything depended on the few Panzers and half-tracks.
Konigstrasse left Krugers’ Tiger II on point, with the two surviving Panthers behind it. Guarding their flanks were the two Hetzers, one on either side of the road and the five half-tracks followed behind the Panthers. Von Bellow, Bruan and their three radio operators commandeered one of the half-tracks as a mobile command post. And Jan-Hendrik’s Jagdpanther brought up the rear of the tiny Gruppe, to provide overwatch fire with its big 88mm canon. Von Bellow gave Oberleutnant Lasch and his platoon the dubious honor of screening the road forward of the Tiger. He trusted Lasch after their encounter on the ridge. For his part, Lasch accepted the dangerous assignment in good humor, realizing that his commander only gave it to him as a matter of his faith in Lasch’s abilities.
As the infantry got into place and Lasch’s men spread out on the road, the panzertruppen spent the last few minutes performing maintenance and redistributing their ammunition loads. Jan-Hendrik had to part with a few high explosive shells to re-stock Kruger’s Tiger II. The Panthers evened out their supplies, as Phylo had expended more shells in the earlier fighting. But just as importantly, tracks had to be adjusted, suspension elements greased and engines checked. The crews were all veterans and knew their mounts quite well, including the problems peculiar to any single one of them.
Von Bellow gave the order to continue the advance, once Lasch’s troopers were 500 meters up the road.
It wasn’t a “straight shot”, the road curved and twisted around the terrain and each curve, each corner might hold its own dangers, so Lasch’s men moved at first at a cautious pace, which brought down Von Bellow’s immediate wrath as he had stressed the need for speed and momentum.
They hadn’t gone far before Lasch ran into trouble.
At first it was just a couple of machine gun nests and a few overly stubborn infantry. Knowing they couldn’t afford to get pinned down, Lasch’s men deployed quickly and knocked the mgs out with panzerfaust fire. But a few hundred meters later, while still trading sporadic fire with the Russian infantry in the woods, they were shelled by a line of 76.2 mm anti-tank canon that stretched across the road. The Russians had set them up wheel to wheel, not bothering, in their rush to camouflage or dig them in. This took a certain amount of nerve that might have impressed Lasch had he not been so busy keeping his men moving under their fire.
Kruger’s Tiger rattled up in support. Its great gun quickly knocked out two of the guns--they were spaced so closely together that one high explosive shell decimated both of their crew. But in return, three shells struck the glacis of the Tiger. The 63 ton tank shook from bow to stern under the multiple impacts. Phylo’s gunner fired past the Tiger, taking out another gun. And he was sincerely pleased to se the Tiger continue to advance.
None of the three shells penetrated the Tigers massive frontal armor, but the three hits wounded each member of the crew, as the armor inside the tank spalled off from the impact and sent flying splinters through the fighting compartment. Kruger called out to each of his crew members on the intercom to report their status. He himself was bleeding from a minor leg wound, but he was stationed further back in the turret of all of them. His gunner, Axel, reported a few cuts, and that the loader, Paul, had been knocked off his feet. Helmut the radio operator/bow machine gunner took the full brunt of the hits and was wounded in the chest, but said he was okay. Willi, the good-natured and excellent driver had a few minor splinter wounds in his torso, but also said the he was alright. Paul got up angrily, his forehead bleeding from colliding with the gun breech and cursing, shoved another shell into the gun. So they were all bleeding, but all still able to fight.
Willi gunned the engine and the Tiger roared towards the line of guns, an action which alone made the Russian gunners abandon their pieces. The Tiger contemptuously crushed another two guns under its tracks as Helmut’s bow MG chased after the fleeing Russians.
Lasch’s men were thus free to advance further, but he had two dead. Judging that the infantry wasn’t moving rapidly enough, Von Bellow ordered two half-tracks and their panzergrenadiers to take the lead. These two vehicles roared past both Kruger’s Tiger and Lasch’s troops, their machine guns raking either side of the road ahead. Lasch was ordered to keep his men close to the tanks, in anticipation of any close in infantry assault on them.
With the half-tracks in the lead, the German advance quickened.
The Soviet anti-tank gun line across the road wasn’t an accident. Sidorov knew what Von Bellow knew; that the success of the German attack depended solely on the continued operations of the few panzers. Even as he reined in his tank and infantry battalions and prepared for a great counter-attack, he ordered his men in the line of the German advance to kill the panzers regardless of the cost.
As far as General Rosselsprung and Colonel Gruber were concerned, events were spiraling towards their sad but inevitable conclusion.
They had lost contact with Von Ribbentrop’s armored train and reports were coming in that it had been destroyed by Russian fighter-bombers.
Hauptmann Rath’s “Gruppe B” was also out of radio contact. Monitoring he radio net of the armored vehicles attached to it only told them that he was enduring heavy attacks.
Von Bellow was still in sporadic radio contact, but for all the support they could offer him, his kampfgruppe might as well have been landing on the moon.
Russian tanks had been spotted crossing the rail yards and rushing North.
Finally, both Von Kessel and Untersturmfuhrer Witling separately radioed in requests to withdraw. Witlings request was tinged with by a palpable reluctance; his men were well dug in, but didn’t have the personnel to man the entire position, moreover, Soviet advances in the South were threatening their flank. So he had to request the withdrawal knowing that it would add to the physical hardships of his men.
On the other hand, Von Kessel’s “line” was in imminent danger of collapse. To save anything at all, he needed to pull back immediately.
General Rosselsprung gave them both permission retreat, hoping only that the pressure on Von Kessel wouldn’t turn the retreat into a more of a catastrophe than what it was.
Meanwhile, Division and Berlin continued to send inane encouragements and impossible orders:
“Use your reserves to counterattack strongly to the South!”
“Your Panzers should be formed into a mobile attack Group to supplement your reserves.”
And this gem from Berlin:
“All Germany stands in awe of the beacon of heroism shining from Bad Frostberg! Never Give Up! Never Surrender!”
He gathered the papers into a neat pile. “Burn this sh*te Gruber. It’s the same nonsense they sent to Paulus—in fact they probably just scratched out “Stalingrad” and penciled in “Bad Frostberg”.
Rosselsprung paused, then snorted bitterly, “Form Letters for a Festung!!!"
“Paulus believed them and didn’t try to get his people out.” Gruber answered soothingly.
Soon, Rosselsprung realized, the time would come when he would have to order his radios destroyed to prevent their capture and fight the final fight in his headquarters. The only appealing part of that thought was the idea of finally being free of messages from higher commands.
Still, even as despair worked its insidious way through the radio operators and orderlies in the bunker, Rosselsprung remained calm. So did Gruber. Gruber in fact defiantly broke open a long hidden bottle of champagne, the pop from its cork bringing startled stares from the remaining men. He passed the bottle around to the radio operators and the orderlies who, having nothing else to do at the moment, stuck close to the radio room.
Sensing Rosselsprung’s eye on him, Gruber turned and said, “No worries Sir, I have one last bottle.”
Rosselsprung forced a grin. He sat at the table staring at the maps, a useless exercise but a welcome distraction. He strictly refused to allow himself to think about what might have or could have been done.
As quickly as he could, Von Kessel pulled out as many of his men as he could reach, setting up a new line a few blocks South of Rosselsprung’s Headquarters. Zwitling’s contingent turned up as well and together they formed a roughly “U”--shaped perimeter guarding the approaches to Headquarters from the South, West and East. As soon as the dwindling groups of survivors appeared from the South, they were pressed into the line, which consisted of nothing more than ruined houses and apartment buildings. The rest of the city had to be abandoned by the defense, even the hospital.
Zwitling’s troops brought with them what was probably one of the last still-functioning field kitchens—it was one of those touches that had made his men feel relatively comfortable over the last weeks—so the Speiss and his helpers dished out hot food to anyone who turned up with a mess tin or an extra container for his kameraden. For once, food was not an issue, as the rations hoarded for the now dispersed civilian populace could be eaten. Ammunition wasn’t as plentiful, but there was enough, thanks to Gruber’s carefully calculated distribution, for more days of combat than anyone expected to live through.
At this stage, desertions were rare as even those men who had hid out earlier emerged to grab some hot food and, as the Russian grip tightened on the position, there no longer seemed much sense to many of them in hiding out any longer.
But, whatever desperate preparations were made, the fact was that the Russians had managed to split Von Kessels line off at its Western most end. Those troops were dying hard, even as the majority of survivors settled in for the final fight.
W.F. and Jahn, marooned as they were in the nearly surrounded Western perimeter, had no intention of dying. At W.F.’s suggestion, once the Reds had pushed them out of their last viable fighting position, they crept and crawled towards the west, towards the rail yards and the hospital.
After making good progress, the lead armored half-track of Von Bellow’s kampfgruppe rounded a bend in the road at speed, only to encounter a lone T-34 lurking in the trees by the side of the road. It’s first shell struck the engine compartment and knocked it on its side. The few wounded survivors tried to limp or drag themselves away as the tank sent another high explosive round into the hulk. The following half-track veered of the road and into a ditch, its troops spilling into the woods on the other side of the road and opening up an ineffective small arms fire.
“Bit by bit, piece by piece” Axel commented as he pressed the trigger on his 88mm and the T-34 flamed. It burned for a few moments before exploding with a roar. The Tiger advanced beyond the two stricken half-tracks and halted to fire a couple of high explosive rounds into likely ambush positions.
Phylo’s Panther pulled up ahead of the half-track in the ditch and, despite a sprinkling of Russian rifle fire, he and his loader were able to attach a tow cable to it and pull it out of the ditch. As the men remounted, Phylo ran over to Kruger’s tank. Kruger was sitting in the open turret hatch, ignoring the few Russian shots.
“I knew this was too good to last.” He said. “I guess that means we’re back on point?”
Phylo shrugged hopelessly, looking back at the shaken Grenadiers, none of who were too eager to get back into the half-track and after that looking at the burning bodies of the crew of the first half-track.
“I’ll take point,” Phylo said firmly. “Doesn’t really matter anyway, they’re going to get us all one by one, sooner or later.” Which was exactly the point Axel had mumbled about.
Von Bellow pulled up in his half-track and briefly surveyed the destruction. Before he could say anything, Phylo’s Panther started off and began moving down the road. Von Bellow waved for the other half-tracks to follow it and began cursing when they didn’t move out quickly enough to satisfy him.
“Move! Move! Move!”Von Bellow stood in the center of the road, screaming at them and waving the armored vehicles on. Kruger buttoned up again, waited a minute and gave the order to advance.
The other vehicles followed but maintained a respectful distance. No one wanted to bunch up and fall en masse into the expected Soviet killing zone lying somewhere unseen ahead. Finally the marching infantry passed Von Bellow, strung out on either side of the highway, their kameraden deeper in the woods and sweeping the flanks.
By temperament, Phylo wasn’t the type to crawl ahead cautiously; he reached the next stretch of relatively straight road and ordered his driver to go all out. The Panther responded admirably and raced to the spot Phylo had picked out up ahead to stop and reconnoiter from. They arrived there so quickly that they caught the next Russian roadblock, 1,200 meters ahead, still in the process of setting up. Lucky in a way, as there were half a dozen tanks still on the road and a couple of anti-tank guns still unlimbering as dozens of Russian infantry marched towards the still-forming block.
Werner, Phylo’s gunner, rained destruction on them, aiming at the tanks first. But one Panther wasn’t going to fight its way through this block. Not this time. Phylo ordered Werner to forget the tanks and take out the guns, before they could be hidden.
The surviving T-34s, perhaps feeling ignored, fired back at the Panther. At 1,200 meters, with his bow armor facing them, Phylo felt relatively safe from their shells, unless they hit his vulnerable tracks. But his relief was much greater when Kruger pulled up and added his 88 to the duel.
Three black spots appeared in the sky. Intent on the gunfight, neither Phylo nor Kruger saw them. But Von Bellow and Braun, in their open-topped APC a few hundred meters behind the tanks, saw them almost immediately. Von Bellow started to order his men into the woods, but Braun stopped him, recognizing the silhouettes even at that distance. He got on the radio and made swift contact with the incoming German airplanes.
Oswald’s Storch was the first over the battlefield, flying low and slow as he attempted to form a picture of the terrain and positions. After receiving Braun’s instructions on his radio, which were quite clear, he vectored the Jabos in at the Russian blocking position.
Wirblewind was already cursing his white-painted mount before he entered the fight. As usual, the left engine was acting up. It was one of those curious pieces of machinery that seemed to run okay when examined by the mechanics, but always proved to be temperamental when it came to a mission--like a tooth that stopped aching when one reached the dentist's office. The HS-129 was powered by two of the 700 hp, Gnome-Rhone 14M radials: Wirblewind would have happily to personally shot the Frenchmen who built this one.
Like their Ilyushin counterparts, the HS-129s didn’t dive down on their targets at high angles--like a Stuka—at their targets, rather they approached in a shallow descent, first dropping bombs and then returning to wreak havoc with their 30mm canon. A shell from the 30 mm gun each carried was devastating if it hit the top or flank of a T-34. So Wirblewind and his wing mate, Robert Kohler, were able to inflict quite a bit of damage on any Russian tank unlucky enough to be spotted.
Braun directed them with masterful precision.
Not waiting for the smoke to clear and at considerable risk to themselves, Phylo’s Panther, Kruger’s Tiger and the other Panther plunged towards and broke through the roadblock as the Reds were reeling from this completely unexpected attack. So despised was the Luftwaffe at this stage that the Russians hadn’t even thought of setting up adequate anti-air defenses.
At he end of his second pass, his left engine began to smoke, not from any perceivable battle damage, but just out of spite, Wirblewind thought. He notified his wingman and the Storch of his problem. Kohler hooted at him derisively over the radio, but as even he could see the smoke, didn’t press the issue beyond the obligatory standard insults.
Wirblewind drifted off to the Southwest, nursing the engine. In theory and practice, an HS-129 could fly on one engine, but no experienced pilot who ever flew her welcomed the experience or climbed out of the cockpit on return without being bathed in sweat.
Meanwhile, the German tanks were mopping up the former Russian positions and the column began to move again.
An odd thing happened at this point. While the Germans on the ground celebrated the minor victory, the little Storch dropped lower and circled the road. Before anyone could figure out what the pilot was up to, the plane dropped even lower and finally landed on the snow covered road amongst the advancing S.S. foot-soldiers.
Von Bellow’s armored personnel carrier drove back to it and the pilot flung his door open and stepped to the ground, to the general disbelief of the soldiers filing past him.
Braun recognized him and, getting down from the half-track, ran over to greet him. Von Bellow followed out of curiosity and the pilot pulled out a map for their benefit. Speaking quickly, he gave them the bad news.
“There is a Russian armored formation assembling to your rear, here on the map”, Oswald said. “And two more, one here and one here, on your left flank ahead.” There’s also an entire Tank Brigade pushing North about five kilometers West of you. The Tank Brigade doesn’t seem to be aimed in your direction, but the three smaller formations are obviously going to hit you. We can manage maybe one more sortie today, but the boss says that’s all we can give you.”
Von Bellow scratched his head and, bringing out his own map, made the appropriate notations on it. Then he looked at Oswald hard. “Surely you didn’t land just to give us this information?”
Oswald shook his head. “No, my boss, Commandant Martin asked me to give Colonel Braun a lift home.”
Von Bellow cast a sidelong look at Colonel Braun, whose own surprise was plainly evident.
“I can’t leave,” Colonel Braun sputtered. “I can’t leave now.”
Oswald’s face hardened and he lowered his voice so that only the two of them could hear what he whispered. “Commandant Martin told me to tell you that, if you stay, you are committing suicide.”
Colonel Braun visibly squared his shoulders. “I didn’t come here to get rescued. Take my radio operator instead, I don’t need him. I may be committing suicide, but at least no one will ever question my dedication to Germany—or my family’s for that matter!”
“Yes Sir.” Oswald saluted. Braun called his radio operator to him and ordered him into the small plane, then patted the metal of the door with seeming affection as it closed. With nothing else to discuss, Oswald quickly took off for the return flight.
As the Storch lifted into the air, Von Bellow stood closer to Braun, whose eyes followed the airplane wistfully as it flew safely away. Kohler’s HS-129 was still pummeling the Russians, but at a distance far enough off away that its prey couldn’t be seen from the road.
“Not the smartest decision for an airman”, Von Bellow offered.
“No, he should never have attempted to land here”, Braun answered dryly, “ the road’s much too narrow.”
It took a second for Von Bellow to catch the joke and when he did, he burst into laughter and slapped Braun on the back.
Now everything depended on the few Panzers and half-tracks.
Konigstrasse left Krugers’ Tiger II on point, with the two surviving Panthers behind it. Guarding their flanks were the two Hetzers, one on either side of the road and the five half-tracks followed behind the Panthers. Von Bellow, Bruan and their three radio operators commandeered one of the half-tracks as a mobile command post. And Jan-Hendrik’s Jagdpanther brought up the rear of the tiny Gruppe, to provide overwatch fire with its big 88mm canon. Von Bellow gave Oberleutnant Lasch and his platoon the dubious honor of screening the road forward of the Tiger. He trusted Lasch after their encounter on the ridge. For his part, Lasch accepted the dangerous assignment in good humor, realizing that his commander only gave it to him as a matter of his faith in Lasch’s abilities.
As the infantry got into place and Lasch’s men spread out on the road, the panzertruppen spent the last few minutes performing maintenance and redistributing their ammunition loads. Jan-Hendrik had to part with a few high explosive shells to re-stock Kruger’s Tiger II. The Panthers evened out their supplies, as Phylo had expended more shells in the earlier fighting. But just as importantly, tracks had to be adjusted, suspension elements greased and engines checked. The crews were all veterans and knew their mounts quite well, including the problems peculiar to any single one of them.
Von Bellow gave the order to continue the advance, once Lasch’s troopers were 500 meters up the road.
It wasn’t a “straight shot”, the road curved and twisted around the terrain and each curve, each corner might hold its own dangers, so Lasch’s men moved at first at a cautious pace, which brought down Von Bellow’s immediate wrath as he had stressed the need for speed and momentum.
They hadn’t gone far before Lasch ran into trouble.
At first it was just a couple of machine gun nests and a few overly stubborn infantry. Knowing they couldn’t afford to get pinned down, Lasch’s men deployed quickly and knocked the mgs out with panzerfaust fire. But a few hundred meters later, while still trading sporadic fire with the Russian infantry in the woods, they were shelled by a line of 76.2 mm anti-tank canon that stretched across the road. The Russians had set them up wheel to wheel, not bothering, in their rush to camouflage or dig them in. This took a certain amount of nerve that might have impressed Lasch had he not been so busy keeping his men moving under their fire.
Kruger’s Tiger rattled up in support. Its great gun quickly knocked out two of the guns--they were spaced so closely together that one high explosive shell decimated both of their crew. But in return, three shells struck the glacis of the Tiger. The 63 ton tank shook from bow to stern under the multiple impacts. Phylo’s gunner fired past the Tiger, taking out another gun. And he was sincerely pleased to se the Tiger continue to advance.
None of the three shells penetrated the Tigers massive frontal armor, but the three hits wounded each member of the crew, as the armor inside the tank spalled off from the impact and sent flying splinters through the fighting compartment. Kruger called out to each of his crew members on the intercom to report their status. He himself was bleeding from a minor leg wound, but he was stationed further back in the turret of all of them. His gunner, Axel, reported a few cuts, and that the loader, Paul, had been knocked off his feet. Helmut the radio operator/bow machine gunner took the full brunt of the hits and was wounded in the chest, but said he was okay. Willi, the good-natured and excellent driver had a few minor splinter wounds in his torso, but also said the he was alright. Paul got up angrily, his forehead bleeding from colliding with the gun breech and cursing, shoved another shell into the gun. So they were all bleeding, but all still able to fight.
Willi gunned the engine and the Tiger roared towards the line of guns, an action which alone made the Russian gunners abandon their pieces. The Tiger contemptuously crushed another two guns under its tracks as Helmut’s bow MG chased after the fleeing Russians.
Lasch’s men were thus free to advance further, but he had two dead. Judging that the infantry wasn’t moving rapidly enough, Von Bellow ordered two half-tracks and their panzergrenadiers to take the lead. These two vehicles roared past both Kruger’s Tiger and Lasch’s troops, their machine guns raking either side of the road ahead. Lasch was ordered to keep his men close to the tanks, in anticipation of any close in infantry assault on them.
With the half-tracks in the lead, the German advance quickened.
The Soviet anti-tank gun line across the road wasn’t an accident. Sidorov knew what Von Bellow knew; that the success of the German attack depended solely on the continued operations of the few panzers. Even as he reined in his tank and infantry battalions and prepared for a great counter-attack, he ordered his men in the line of the German advance to kill the panzers regardless of the cost.
As far as General Rosselsprung and Colonel Gruber were concerned, events were spiraling towards their sad but inevitable conclusion.
They had lost contact with Von Ribbentrop’s armored train and reports were coming in that it had been destroyed by Russian fighter-bombers.
Hauptmann Rath’s “Gruppe B” was also out of radio contact. Monitoring he radio net of the armored vehicles attached to it only told them that he was enduring heavy attacks.
Von Bellow was still in sporadic radio contact, but for all the support they could offer him, his kampfgruppe might as well have been landing on the moon.
Russian tanks had been spotted crossing the rail yards and rushing North.
Finally, both Von Kessel and Untersturmfuhrer Witling separately radioed in requests to withdraw. Witlings request was tinged with by a palpable reluctance; his men were well dug in, but didn’t have the personnel to man the entire position, moreover, Soviet advances in the South were threatening their flank. So he had to request the withdrawal knowing that it would add to the physical hardships of his men.
On the other hand, Von Kessel’s “line” was in imminent danger of collapse. To save anything at all, he needed to pull back immediately.
General Rosselsprung gave them both permission retreat, hoping only that the pressure on Von Kessel wouldn’t turn the retreat into a more of a catastrophe than what it was.
Meanwhile, Division and Berlin continued to send inane encouragements and impossible orders:
“Use your reserves to counterattack strongly to the South!”
“Your Panzers should be formed into a mobile attack Group to supplement your reserves.”
And this gem from Berlin:
“All Germany stands in awe of the beacon of heroism shining from Bad Frostberg! Never Give Up! Never Surrender!”
He gathered the papers into a neat pile. “Burn this sh*te Gruber. It’s the same nonsense they sent to Paulus—in fact they probably just scratched out “Stalingrad” and penciled in “Bad Frostberg”.
Rosselsprung paused, then snorted bitterly, “Form Letters for a Festung!!!"
“Paulus believed them and didn’t try to get his people out.” Gruber answered soothingly.
Soon, Rosselsprung realized, the time would come when he would have to order his radios destroyed to prevent their capture and fight the final fight in his headquarters. The only appealing part of that thought was the idea of finally being free of messages from higher commands.
Still, even as despair worked its insidious way through the radio operators and orderlies in the bunker, Rosselsprung remained calm. So did Gruber. Gruber in fact defiantly broke open a long hidden bottle of champagne, the pop from its cork bringing startled stares from the remaining men. He passed the bottle around to the radio operators and the orderlies who, having nothing else to do at the moment, stuck close to the radio room.
Sensing Rosselsprung’s eye on him, Gruber turned and said, “No worries Sir, I have one last bottle.”
Rosselsprung forced a grin. He sat at the table staring at the maps, a useless exercise but a welcome distraction. He strictly refused to allow himself to think about what might have or could have been done.
As quickly as he could, Von Kessel pulled out as many of his men as he could reach, setting up a new line a few blocks South of Rosselsprung’s Headquarters. Zwitling’s contingent turned up as well and together they formed a roughly “U”--shaped perimeter guarding the approaches to Headquarters from the South, West and East. As soon as the dwindling groups of survivors appeared from the South, they were pressed into the line, which consisted of nothing more than ruined houses and apartment buildings. The rest of the city had to be abandoned by the defense, even the hospital.
Zwitling’s troops brought with them what was probably one of the last still-functioning field kitchens—it was one of those touches that had made his men feel relatively comfortable over the last weeks—so the Speiss and his helpers dished out hot food to anyone who turned up with a mess tin or an extra container for his kameraden. For once, food was not an issue, as the rations hoarded for the now dispersed civilian populace could be eaten. Ammunition wasn’t as plentiful, but there was enough, thanks to Gruber’s carefully calculated distribution, for more days of combat than anyone expected to live through.
At this stage, desertions were rare as even those men who had hid out earlier emerged to grab some hot food and, as the Russian grip tightened on the position, there no longer seemed much sense to many of them in hiding out any longer.
But, whatever desperate preparations were made, the fact was that the Russians had managed to split Von Kessels line off at its Western most end. Those troops were dying hard, even as the majority of survivors settled in for the final fight.
W.F. and Jahn, marooned as they were in the nearly surrounded Western perimeter, had no intention of dying. At W.F.’s suggestion, once the Reds had pushed them out of their last viable fighting position, they crept and crawled towards the west, towards the rail yards and the hospital.
After making good progress, the lead armored half-track of Von Bellow’s kampfgruppe rounded a bend in the road at speed, only to encounter a lone T-34 lurking in the trees by the side of the road. It’s first shell struck the engine compartment and knocked it on its side. The few wounded survivors tried to limp or drag themselves away as the tank sent another high explosive round into the hulk. The following half-track veered of the road and into a ditch, its troops spilling into the woods on the other side of the road and opening up an ineffective small arms fire.
“Bit by bit, piece by piece” Axel commented as he pressed the trigger on his 88mm and the T-34 flamed. It burned for a few moments before exploding with a roar. The Tiger advanced beyond the two stricken half-tracks and halted to fire a couple of high explosive rounds into likely ambush positions.
Phylo’s Panther pulled up ahead of the half-track in the ditch and, despite a sprinkling of Russian rifle fire, he and his loader were able to attach a tow cable to it and pull it out of the ditch. As the men remounted, Phylo ran over to Kruger’s tank. Kruger was sitting in the open turret hatch, ignoring the few Russian shots.
“I knew this was too good to last.” He said. “I guess that means we’re back on point?”
Phylo shrugged hopelessly, looking back at the shaken Grenadiers, none of who were too eager to get back into the half-track and after that looking at the burning bodies of the crew of the first half-track.
“I’ll take point,” Phylo said firmly. “Doesn’t really matter anyway, they’re going to get us all one by one, sooner or later.” Which was exactly the point Axel had mumbled about.
Von Bellow pulled up in his half-track and briefly surveyed the destruction. Before he could say anything, Phylo’s Panther started off and began moving down the road. Von Bellow waved for the other half-tracks to follow it and began cursing when they didn’t move out quickly enough to satisfy him.
“Move! Move! Move!”Von Bellow stood in the center of the road, screaming at them and waving the armored vehicles on. Kruger buttoned up again, waited a minute and gave the order to advance.
The other vehicles followed but maintained a respectful distance. No one wanted to bunch up and fall en masse into the expected Soviet killing zone lying somewhere unseen ahead. Finally the marching infantry passed Von Bellow, strung out on either side of the highway, their kameraden deeper in the woods and sweeping the flanks.
By temperament, Phylo wasn’t the type to crawl ahead cautiously; he reached the next stretch of relatively straight road and ordered his driver to go all out. The Panther responded admirably and raced to the spot Phylo had picked out up ahead to stop and reconnoiter from. They arrived there so quickly that they caught the next Russian roadblock, 1,200 meters ahead, still in the process of setting up. Lucky in a way, as there were half a dozen tanks still on the road and a couple of anti-tank guns still unlimbering as dozens of Russian infantry marched towards the still-forming block.
Werner, Phylo’s gunner, rained destruction on them, aiming at the tanks first. But one Panther wasn’t going to fight its way through this block. Not this time. Phylo ordered Werner to forget the tanks and take out the guns, before they could be hidden.
The surviving T-34s, perhaps feeling ignored, fired back at the Panther. At 1,200 meters, with his bow armor facing them, Phylo felt relatively safe from their shells, unless they hit his vulnerable tracks. But his relief was much greater when Kruger pulled up and added his 88 to the duel.
Three black spots appeared in the sky. Intent on the gunfight, neither Phylo nor Kruger saw them. But Von Bellow and Braun, in their open-topped APC a few hundred meters behind the tanks, saw them almost immediately. Von Bellow started to order his men into the woods, but Braun stopped him, recognizing the silhouettes even at that distance. He got on the radio and made swift contact with the incoming German airplanes.
Oswald’s Storch was the first over the battlefield, flying low and slow as he attempted to form a picture of the terrain and positions. After receiving Braun’s instructions on his radio, which were quite clear, he vectored the Jabos in at the Russian blocking position.
Wirblewind was already cursing his white-painted mount before he entered the fight. As usual, the left engine was acting up. It was one of those curious pieces of machinery that seemed to run okay when examined by the mechanics, but always proved to be temperamental when it came to a mission--like a tooth that stopped aching when one reached the dentist's office. The HS-129 was powered by two of the 700 hp, Gnome-Rhone 14M radials: Wirblewind would have happily to personally shot the Frenchmen who built this one.
Like their Ilyushin counterparts, the HS-129s didn’t dive down on their targets at high angles--like a Stuka—at their targets, rather they approached in a shallow descent, first dropping bombs and then returning to wreak havoc with their 30mm canon. A shell from the 30 mm gun each carried was devastating if it hit the top or flank of a T-34. So Wirblewind and his wing mate, Robert Kohler, were able to inflict quite a bit of damage on any Russian tank unlucky enough to be spotted.
Braun directed them with masterful precision.
Not waiting for the smoke to clear and at considerable risk to themselves, Phylo’s Panther, Kruger’s Tiger and the other Panther plunged towards and broke through the roadblock as the Reds were reeling from this completely unexpected attack. So despised was the Luftwaffe at this stage that the Russians hadn’t even thought of setting up adequate anti-air defenses.
At he end of his second pass, his left engine began to smoke, not from any perceivable battle damage, but just out of spite, Wirblewind thought. He notified his wingman and the Storch of his problem. Kohler hooted at him derisively over the radio, but as even he could see the smoke, didn’t press the issue beyond the obligatory standard insults.
Wirblewind drifted off to the Southwest, nursing the engine. In theory and practice, an HS-129 could fly on one engine, but no experienced pilot who ever flew her welcomed the experience or climbed out of the cockpit on return without being bathed in sweat.
Meanwhile, the German tanks were mopping up the former Russian positions and the column began to move again.
An odd thing happened at this point. While the Germans on the ground celebrated the minor victory, the little Storch dropped lower and circled the road. Before anyone could figure out what the pilot was up to, the plane dropped even lower and finally landed on the snow covered road amongst the advancing S.S. foot-soldiers.
Von Bellow’s armored personnel carrier drove back to it and the pilot flung his door open and stepped to the ground, to the general disbelief of the soldiers filing past him.
Braun recognized him and, getting down from the half-track, ran over to greet him. Von Bellow followed out of curiosity and the pilot pulled out a map for their benefit. Speaking quickly, he gave them the bad news.
“There is a Russian armored formation assembling to your rear, here on the map”, Oswald said. “And two more, one here and one here, on your left flank ahead.” There’s also an entire Tank Brigade pushing North about five kilometers West of you. The Tank Brigade doesn’t seem to be aimed in your direction, but the three smaller formations are obviously going to hit you. We can manage maybe one more sortie today, but the boss says that’s all we can give you.”
Von Bellow scratched his head and, bringing out his own map, made the appropriate notations on it. Then he looked at Oswald hard. “Surely you didn’t land just to give us this information?”
Oswald shook his head. “No, my boss, Commandant Martin asked me to give Colonel Braun a lift home.”
Von Bellow cast a sidelong look at Colonel Braun, whose own surprise was plainly evident.
“I can’t leave,” Colonel Braun sputtered. “I can’t leave now.”
Oswald’s face hardened and he lowered his voice so that only the two of them could hear what he whispered. “Commandant Martin told me to tell you that, if you stay, you are committing suicide.”
Colonel Braun visibly squared his shoulders. “I didn’t come here to get rescued. Take my radio operator instead, I don’t need him. I may be committing suicide, but at least no one will ever question my dedication to Germany—or my family’s for that matter!”
“Yes Sir.” Oswald saluted. Braun called his radio operator to him and ordered him into the small plane, then patted the metal of the door with seeming affection as it closed. With nothing else to discuss, Oswald quickly took off for the return flight.
As the Storch lifted into the air, Von Bellow stood closer to Braun, whose eyes followed the airplane wistfully as it flew safely away. Kohler’s HS-129 was still pummeling the Russians, but at a distance far enough off away that its prey couldn’t be seen from the road.
“Not the smartest decision for an airman”, Von Bellow offered.
“No, he should never have attempted to land here”, Braun answered dryly, “ the road’s much too narrow.”
It took a second for Von Bellow to catch the joke and when he did, he burst into laughter and slapped Braun on the back.
Death is lighter than a Feather, Duty is heavier than a Mountain....
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Me-109 Jagdfleiger
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Re: So....My Tank Corps in Prussia...
Amazing as always D. ! Way better than any novel i have ever read, keep up the great work
Jahn
Jahn
Cheers Jonathan,
Only the spirit of attack borne in a brave heart will bring success to any fighter aircraft, no matter how highly developed it may be.
— General Adolf Galland, Luftwaffe.
Only the spirit of attack borne in a brave heart will bring success to any fighter aircraft, no matter how highly developed it may be.
— General Adolf Galland, Luftwaffe.