Chapter 807: Winning in Chaos

“Lower altitude! Turn on the jump indicator lights, have the men in the back prepare to jump!” a German pilot shouted to his co-pilot in the cockpit.

The co-pilot beside him immediately nodded and then reached up to flip a switch from the ‘off’ to the ‘on’ position. The plane was constantly bumping. Outside the bright cockpit glass, a dense mass of German planes could be seen, flying in formation in the sky.

This was one of the few times they had carried out an airborne mission in broad daylight, apart from training. Generally, to reduce paratrooper casualties, they had to fly at night most of the time. This time, their unprecedentedly bold daylight airdrop was, it could be said, somewhat surprising.

But from the very beginning, it had been very surprising. For example, in broad daylight, they had flown over the actual line of control between the German and Soviet armies, and had then not encountered any large-scale artillery fire, which was rather baffling.

“Prepare to jump!” Seeing that the indicator light had turned green, the German paratrooper battalion commander, Borol, who had been waiting for this moment in the plane’s cabin, shouted a reminder to his men. They were now the most skilled paratroopers in the world, with the richest airborne and ground combat experience in the world.

If they could assemble in the shortest possible time at night, then it was even less of a problem in such a bright daylight. The cabin door was pulled open by Borol’s hand, and a cold wind rushed in from outside. Everyone involuntarily squinted their eyes. The shouting of “equipment check complete” rose and fell.

“Alright! Gentlemen! No matter what happened last night, now, it’s our turn to go on stage!” Borol said, looking at his men without deliberately raising his voice. After speaking, he patted Donner’s shoulder and then hooked the static line of his own parachute onto the fixed anchor line inside the plane’s cabin.

“Damanhur!” As he jumped out of the cabin, Borol shouted the paratroopers’ slogan. That was the place of their greatest sorrow, and also the place where they had been tested by fire and had become the airborne devils. Now this place was their faith, the iron will they longed to inherit.

Then he saw the whole sky, saw the countless comrades who had leaped out of the planes just like him, hanging in the air from their parachutes. What excited him even more was that he saw a huge glider carrying a paratrooper fighting vehicle charging down in the distance. This spectacular sight was really hard to see in normal times.

Two escorting Fw-190D fighters dived at high speed, firing their cannons fiercely at a firing Soviet anti-aircraft gun. The dense shells sent up a cloud of white smoke from that anti-aircraft gun position. When the white smoke finally dissipated, that place had become a pile of scrap iron and scattered corpses.

What shocked Borol even more was that a new type of helicopter was circling everywhere on the battlefield. To say it was a new type might be an exaggeration, because at a glance it was an improved version of the Odin helicopter. But this plane was even more powerful than the Odin. It had rocket launch pods slung on both sides, two large-caliber cannons on its nose, and heavy machine guns on the sides. The whole plane was like a flying gunboat, pouring its carried ammunition all over the battlefield.

These planes were now dodging in all directions. It seemed they had already swept the entire area. Now the German paratroopers were airdropping, so they began to take evasive action for safety, but they still left a few planes circling over the woods.

It seemed that the suppression of the ground forces was mainly the work of these planes. To ensure that the paratroopers would not suffer excessive casualties during the airdrop, the German army had really gone all out this time. Not only had they used special forces, but they had also brought out a set of classic special forces assault tactics from a later era.

The German special forces, who had just been concealed on the ground, had used colored smoke grenades to indicate the attack targets. The Stuka II attack planes had first carried out a large-scale attack, and then helicopters had been used for pinpoint elimination. The entire process had cost the German army 14 Stuka II attack planes, and even 17 helicopters had been shot down, just to basically clear the Soviet anti-aircraft gun positions and troop concentrations near the German airdrop zone.

If it weren’t for the fact that the German special forces responsible for clearing the Soviet anti-aircraft gun positions had also taken out some large-caliber anti-aircraft gun positions the night before, today’s German air raid and attack operation would have paid an even heavier price.

To speed up the deployment of the airborne paratroopers, the German army had used a large number of gliders, including some large ones that could carry 30 soldiers. These gliders had been deployed on the battlefield before the paratroopers and had already established defensive positions on the ground. The paratrooper commander, General Student, hoped to make the battlefield even more chaotic, because he felt that his soldiers were better adapted to a chaotic combat state than the enemy. So he had used the same old trick, playing the same game he had played in the Netherlands and Belgium.

He had airdropped a large number of dummies with incendiary devices attached, dropping them on the periphery of the battlefield. These airdropped dummies had the same effect as in the past. They had created a great deal of confusion, causing the Soviets to overestimate the scale of the airdrop. The Soviets were once rife with rumors that the German army had already occupied Stalingrad and had set fire to almost half of the Caucasus.

The extremely chaotic scene also caused considerable trouble for the German army itself. Two paratroopers, due to the wind direction, had happened to crash into the propeller of a helicopter. The brutal scene had horrified all the paratroopers who had witnessed it. One plane had crashed as a result, and seven people had died. This accident had led the German army to issue a ban on the use of helicopters in the airdrop zone. Even Student had submitted a detailed explanation of the matter.

While the German side was in a state of chaos due to the multi-branch coordination, the Soviet army on the other side was also in a complete mess due to all sorts of man-made chaos. They didn’t know what the German army was doing. Due to the chaotic communication and mutual suspicion, they had not even received an accurate report on the scale of the German paratrooper airdrop.

Many of the barracks and rear reserve assembly areas had been destroyed by the special forces-guided attack planes and helicopters. The remaining few had been organized with great difficulty, only to collapse again under the assault of the German paratroopers. These “temporary workers” of the Soviet rear forces could, at best, delay the German paratroopers’ attack by sounding an alarm in normal times. To expect them to do anything in this situation was purely self-deception.

These second-line Soviet units had just begun to fight back when they found that they were surrounded by German paratroopers on all sides. The telephone lines had been cut, and the radio channels were filled with reports of German troops everywhere. The main force units were already attacking each other in a chaotic mess and had no ability to deal with the paratroopers in their rear. The German armored forces in front had already begun to assemble. Everyone knew what the situation would be next.

Who had betrayed them? This was a question all the frontline Soviet commanders wanted to know. But now they were shelling each other, and no one believed the other’s explanation. Some saw the artillery of the 166th Division shell the position of the 160th first, and then the artillery of the 160th began to return fire. Others heard that the 160th had sent men to attack the munitions supply base, causing a serious explosion there. Now there were all sorts of different versions of the story, and no one knew what the truth was.

The 160th Division had requested help from its friendly forces on the other flank, saying that the soldiers of the 166th had ambushed the munitions supply base. They wanted to take it back, but the other side had blown it up. Then their position had been attacked by the men of the 166th and had also been shelled. The friendly forces were skeptical but sent men to take a look and found that the 166th was indeed attacking the defensive positions of the 160th.

The 166th, on the other hand, had contacted the friendly units on its other flank and had reported the 160th’s blowing up of the ammunition depot and shelling of friendly forces. Then, they had also taken people to the scene to see for themselves and had gained the support of their friendly forces. And so, the scale of the civil war on the Soviet positions began to expand, expanding to a degree that the Germans could not even believe. Some areas had even used tanks, attacking their own friendly forces as fiercely as they would the German army.

Soon, Rokossovsky received two completely different reports from the frontline units. One said that the 166th had mutinied, and the other said that the 160th had defected. When Rokossovsky saw these two telegrams, he knew that his outer defense line was completely finished. In less than a second, this Soviet general had seen through the Germans’ plan. To put it bluntly, no one had mutinied or defected. It was all a trick by the Germans.

If nothing unexpected had happened, it was just that the Germans had used a small detachment to insert themselves between the two units, had first opened fire on one side, and then had fired on the other. And so the two units had begun to fight each other for no reason.

In fact, the situation was pretty much as he had expected, but the method the Germans had used was more complex and more imaginative. The main purpose of the Germans was to paralyze the Soviet anti-aircraft defense network, so a special detachment had attacked the main Soviet anti-aircraft gun position and had occupied it.

In the process of occupying it, they had discovered a concealed Soviet ammunition depot and had, without any hesitation, made a move on it. But in the process, they had been discovered by a rear guard patrol from the 160th Division, and a fierce battle had broken out between the two sides. The Germans had no choice but to blow up the ammunition depot, and this action had directly attracted the attention of the 166th Division not far away.

And so, another infiltration unit that was originally responsible for causing infighting among the Soviets had unintentionally connected the whole thing together. They were originally only responsible for creating an incident between the two Soviet units, but they had not expected to complete their mission so smoothly and to have escalated the incident to the exaggerated degree of the two armies fighting each other. As for the first round of 122mm howitzer shells that had landed on the Soviet positions, it was just a small trick of the Germans using captured weapons to frame each other in the chaos.

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