Chapter 776: "Why... why..."

“Marshal! The steamboat has been arranged. Two gunboats are escorting it, so it’s foolproof. We’ll cross the sea at low speed tonight; the German air force can’t possibly stop us. As long as we reach the other side, we’ll be safe,” one of Voroshilov’s trusted aides reported in his office, detailing the preparations for their retreat.

He had every reason to be anxious. As a confidant of Voroshilov, he was allowed to flee with him. It could be said that the escape route Voroshilov had been arranging for so long was also his own. So, as soon as they had arrived in Kerch, he had, on the Marshal’s orders, commandeered several ships at the pier, just waiting for a time like this.

The current situation was relatively good for Voroshilov. After all, the German army had concentrated almost all of its heavy artillery for the attack on Sevastopol. The large-caliber railway guns were also on the western side, and it would take time to transport them to the east. So, although the Soviet positions were being squeezed very hard, there was no immediate danger of collapse.

“Come and help. Throw all these documents into the brazier. We can’t take any of this with us, so we’ll just have to leave it here,” Voroshilov said. Of course, he knew what could be taken and what couldn’t. For example, the official orders he and Khrushchev had issued, leading their troops south to flee into the Crimean Peninsula, were incriminating evidence that had to be destroyed.

Of course, there were also various other orders, arrest warrants, and execution orders that the two of them had signed to suppress the army and eliminate commanders who did not obey their orders. It was best to destroy these orders as soon as possible. After all, such matters were not something to be proud of, and destroying them would benefit the living.

The aide did not hesitate. He walked directly to Voroshilov’s side, picked up the documents on the desk, and threw them into the brazier, one by one. Because there were so many papers, the flames in the brazier immediately shot up very high. The dancing flames reflected on the two men’s contorted faces, creating a strange atmosphere in the office.

One after another, the documents recording their crimes were thrown into the brazier, eventually turning into charred remains, piling up on the other charred carbon inside. Neither of them spoke, just mechanically tossed the documents in their hands, watching them burn with their own eyes.

“Comrade Marshal! Comrade Marshal! The German radio is broadcasting a message,” an officer rushed into the office without knocking. He was momentarily stunned by the scene before him. Under normal circumstances, a unit would only burn its records after it had reached a dead end. So the scene before him made him feel uneasy and afraid.

“What is it? Speak! There are too many documents. We are just doing some necessary processing to avoid being unable to burn them in time if something happens in the future,” Marshal Voroshilov said slowly. As he spoke, he continued to toss the documents in his hand into the brazier.

“Ah! It’s like this, Comrade Marshal. The German radio has announced that Comrade Khrushchev, who was in charge of the command work in the Sevastopol fortress, has been killed by them. His remains were found today…” the officer replied in a low voice, his head bowed.

“…” Hearing this news, Voroshilov’s hands froze. He had never expected that his old friend, who had walked alongside him all this way, would really die in battle at Sevastopol. They had disposed of Yezhov together, and they had also commanded the disastrous defeat in Poland together. Although the two of them had many different ideas, they had always been partners. Now that Khrushchev was gone, Voroshilov felt a sense of sadness, like a rabbit grieving for a dead fox.

“Give the order. Organize a local counter-attack. Have the marines take the lead. Assemble… assemble 5,000 men. Retake some of the positions. Consider it… a send-off for Comrade Khrushchev,” Voroshilov finally said with some sorrow, giving a combat order. To avenge Khrushchev, he thought to himself.

The next evening, Voroshilov, having taken a nap in the afternoon, impatiently climbed out of his bed. Three cars were already waiting outside the headquarters. A few guards and the Marshal’s confidants had already prepared all the excuses. The Marshal was going to make a temporary inspection of the port’s defenses and would return to headquarters for dinner.

The group, carrying several briefcases of documents, hurriedly got into the three cars waiting at the door. Then, under the watchful eyes of all the soldiers around the headquarters, they drove towards the pier. Many soldiers were squatting on both sides of the streets of Kerch. These poor grunts, shivering in the cold and clutching their rifles, watched as their superior officer drove away in a car.

The battle had been raging for a day, and there were still wounded soldiers on the streets. The counter-attack to avenge Khrushchev had already cost the lives of 2,000 Soviet soldiers on the positions. But without an order to stop, the frontline commanders could only grit their teeth and continue to discuss how to launch another attack on the German army.

At dinnertime, a frontline officer pushed open the door to Marshal Voroshilov’s office. There was a strong smell of something burning inside. Apart from a well-used brazier and the theater map hanging on the wall, this place was no different from an ordinary civilian house.

“Comrade Marshal? Comrade Marshal? Do you know where the Comrade Marshal has gone?” This commander from the front had come to plead with Voroshilov to cancel the offensive plan, so he was asking the soldiers at the headquarters everywhere, trying to find the missing Marshal.

“Comrade Division Commander! About an hour ago, Comrade Marshal Voroshilov and a few of his guards said they were going to the pier. They haven’t come back yet,” an officer from the dispatch office said, telling everything he knew. “They said they would be back for dinner, but they must have been delayed by something.”

A strange sense of panic welled up in the division commander’s heart. He quickly ran back to the car parked at the door, jumped in, and ordered the driver to head straight for the pier. But he was still a step too late. At the pier, he saw several soldiers who had been shot and killed on the ground, and several dock guards who were cursing.

“What on earth happened?” the division commander asked with a frown to a soldier who was cursing there.

The soldier glanced at him, sized up the division commander’s attire and rank, and then said with hatred, “Those bastard officials, they said they were going to inspect the ship, and then they tried to escape with it. We didn’t ask for anything excessive, just to escape with them and continue to work for these gentlemen. But these bastards just ordered their men to open fire, killing so many people.”

Even a fool would know that Voroshilov had run away, betraying the tens of thousands of defenders on the Kerch front. This division commander looked at the turbulent sea, not knowing what to feel in his heart. In the end, he turned around helplessly and walked towards his car. After all, the offensive could be stopped, because the person who had given the order was now on a boat, running away.

Yes, he had run away, abandoning the generals and soldiers who had fled to the Crimean Peninsula with him, and had just scurried away by himself. If it weren’t for trust, who would have run into such a dead end? But some people, for the sake of their own lives, are so resolute when they leave.

The sky gradually darkened. On a pitch-black beach, Marshal Voroshilov, supported by his confidant, landed on the shores of the Caucasus with a few guards. For him, that dragon’s den and tiger’s lair of Kerch was now on the other side of the sea. He was now truly and completely safe.

There was some light opposite them, made by the swaying of flashlights. This indicated that the people who were supposed to meet Voroshilov’s party had arrived. And so, the guards beside Voroshilov also began to respond to the other party with their flashlights. Not long after, these soldiers of the Soviet internal troops, carrying submachine guns, came before Voroshilov, whose shoes were soaked and who was shivering from the cold.

“Comrade Marshal Voroshilov?” The leading officer extended his hand, took Voroshilov’s officer’s ID, and compared it carefully. Then, without returning it to Voroshilov, he stuffed it directly into his own greatcoat pocket.

The somewhat bedraggled group was surrounded by the internal troops who had come to meet them and began to walk deeper into the beach. Voroshilov, who had been through countless storms, looked at the internal affairs officer who had come to meet him and asked, “Comrade, where is Comrade Zhukov’s liaison officer? Why hasn’t he come?”

“He is just ahead, waiting for us to go over,” the officer said with a smile, his expression completely unnatural.

“Who are you? Have Zhukov’s man come and see me! I’m not going anywhere…” Before Voroshilov could finish, the several guards behind him, sensing that something was wrong, began to reach for the pistols at their waists, but the other side’s submachine guns had already opened fire.

Rat-tat! Rat-tat-tat! Bullets flew everywhere, and Voroshilov’s guards immediately fell in pools of blood. Before the old marshal could even react, his body was riddled with a dozen or so holes. His unlucky confidant, abandoning his marshal, tried to run back, but was also turned into a sieve by a volley of bullets.

Lying on the ground, Voroshilov did not close his eyes. He struggled to ask the officer with his mouth full of blood foam, his voice slurred, “Why… why…”

“Comrade Stalin does not allow any form of betrayal. That is why you are being dealt with,” the officer answered sympathetically. “Marshal Zhukov proposed that you live out your life in anonymity, but the great leader, Comrade Stalin, still feels that for a person like you, it is better to be dealt with as soon as possible, to save everyone the trouble.”

Voroshilov was finally gone, lying on the beach with empty eyes. On February 21st, the Kerch garrison surrendered to the German army. The Battle of Crimea ended with a German victory.

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