Chapter 868: Tourism

“If we were here on vacation, we wouldn’t be working so hard!” As the German company commander complained, a veteran German grenadier was holding his MP-44 assault rifle, viciously emptying a magazine at the opposite block. Muzzle flash erupted, the recoil making the barrel jump uncontrollably.

Across the street, a cloud of white dust erupted around a window. The German grenadier’s bullets had flown into the window, and a Soviet rifleman inside was hit and fell, draped over the window sill, his arm still swaying.

The veteran immediately pulled back from the window, went around a rubble-strewn table, and retreated into the corridor outside the room. The enemy had clearly spotted his position, and a fierce attack struck the window he had just exposed. For a moment, broken glass and wood splinters flew everywhere, but the room was already empty.

“Don’t just stand there like an idiot! Follow me, out the back! They might throw a grenade in!” the German shouted, running for the stairs while reminding his comrades. A few young Ukrainian men followed behind him, scrambling down the stairs.

It wasn’t that they were slow. Just half an hour ago, several people they knew had been hit by a precise 75mm shell from the Soviets while firing from the same spot. The bloody reality of that event was still echoing in everyone’s mind.

In these ruins, no one could rely on luck to survive to the end. So everyone had to learn from the unknown lessons of the past to live a little longer. For the Soviet and German soldiers who were constantly struggling in these ruins, the cruel and bloody days had only just begun.

At the corner of the street, a German self-propelled quad anti-aircraft gun was advancing slowly. Around it was a dense crowd of German soldiers. They had been ordered to attack this city block and, under the cover of this self-propelled quad 20mm cannon, to annihilate the nearby Soviet effective strength.

As the column advanced, this German armored vehicle finally appeared at the end of the street. A dense hail of Soviet bullets struck the bulletproof steel plates on the German anti-aircraft vehicle, kicking up a shower of sparks. But these bullets did not penetrate the German armor, only leaving a pitted surface.

“Straight ahead! Aim!” the commander of the anti-aircraft vehicle shouted to his men, pointing straight ahead. The soldiers on the vehicle were adjusting the position of the cannon with all the speed they could muster. The four dark muzzles were pointed at the enemy. Everything seemed to be ready.

“Fire!” At the German commander’s command, the slaughter began. A dense rain of 20mm cannon shells swept towards the Soviet positions. In an instant, the bricks and tiles were shattered into pieces, and the thick brick walls were riddled with a dense pattern of holes. The Soviet soldiers behind these walls were hit and fell one after another, their miserable screams insignificant under the roar of the cannon.

“Forward!” The German troops following behind this anti-aircraft vehicle saw the shocking scene before them and gave the order to attack. Beside him, one after another, the German soldiers charged past the anti-aircraft vehicle and ran towards the enemy’s direction. These soldiers, crouching low to keep their bodies as low as possible, holding their rifles, moved quickly through the city’s rubble.

Although they had powerful covering fire behind them, even though their numbers were very large, they still followed the combat rules that their German instructors had repeatedly emphasized, standardizing their tactical movements. They crossed the street, entered the still-smoking Soviet positions, and shot and killed the still-struggling wounded Soviet soldiers inside one by one.

Many of these men were Soviet citizens who had been persecuted during Stalin’s rule. The Great Purge had broken their families, so they hated Stalingrad, the city named after Stalin, to the bone. They were willing to help the German army fight, to avenge their relatives who had died in Siberia.

So these men attacked frantically. Under the urging of their German commanders, they frantically slaughtered the pitiful Soviet soldiers. The battle raged on, from dawn to dusk in one go. In 48 hours, the Germans had paid a price of nearly 9,000 men and had finally cut off Stalingrad’s last outer position from the outside of the encirclement. On March 30th, Stalingrad was finally and truly surrounded, becoming an isolated city.

“They’re not here on vacation! So we must defend our every position! Give the invaders a head-on blow!” In the Soviet command post, a corps commander roared at his several division commanders. These outer Soviet units had lost almost half their strength in the past two days. Now their defense line was in tatters and was in danger of collapsing at any moment.

Rokossovsky’s reinforcements had just arrived nearby. These divisions, which had lost a large number of their infantry to the Germans, had now been ordered to retreat to a designated area to await reorganization and replenishment. But compared to the German opponents they had just been replaced by, they had already lost more troops and weapons.

“But Comrade Corps Commander, our soldiers have suffered too many losses. They have been widely using snipers in their attacks and have also been using armored vehicles to support their offensive nearby. The pressure on us is too great,” a division commander said, wiping the sweat from his head as he explained.

His words resonated with everyone. After all, the German offensive was not something these infantry units could stop. Faced with the combined attack of German bombers and artillery, most of the Soviet positions had become extremely vulnerable. Coupled with the Germans’ attack regardless of losses, a portion of the Stalingrad urban positions had already fallen into German hands.

While the soldiers at the front were saying these things, in the general headquarters, Rokossovsky was also listening to his aide report on these problems. “The Germans are not as bad at urban combat as we had imagined. They are good at using the ruins, and they are frequently rotating the designations of their attacking units. These units are summarizing their combat experience in actual combat and are becoming more and more difficult to deal with.”

And another matter also made Rokossovsky a little uneasy. The German army had already broken into the city of Stalingrad from the southwest. Although they had only captured two city blocks, this had really touched a raw nerve with the Soviet high command. They had expected the outer positions to be able to hold off the German army for a long time, but they had not expected that the Germans would basically clear the outskirts of Stalingrad in just two days.

The German army, with temporarily very abundant supplies, had carried out several rounds of frantic bombing on Stalingrad. A large number of the Soviet army’s heavy weapons had been destroyed. Rokossovsky had no choice but to transfer troops from the east bank of the Volga to participate in the city’s defense. This “piecemeal” tactic was a complete war of attrition.

But the transport capacity of the ships on the Volga was limited, and the German planes were constantly interdicting the Soviet ships’ transport. Under these circumstances, he could only transport one regiment across the river at a time and then throw that regiment into the battlefield. Time was always of the essence, so he did his best to choose the lulls in the German attack to replenish the front lines with these scattered units.

“The total number of enemy killed reported by our army is 11,700,” the aide said to his superior after looking down at a set of data. “Should we send this to Moscow separately? This is probably the most enemy we have annihilated in a single battle in the continuous fighting.”

Hearing this suggestion, Rokossovsky fell silent. He himself was not very clear on just how many enemies his troops had annihilated, but as far as he knew, only about 7,000 had been officially verified. Of course, the Soviet army’s own losses were not the 6,000 that had been publicly announced, but a full 18,500.

Because the German army had used a large number of new recruits, the Soviet army had been able to basically achieve a two-for-one exchange ratio. This exchange ratio could be said to be the highest record on the entire German-Soviet front. Previously, the German army had even, in some local battles, achieved a terrifying loss ratio of 1 to 32.

“Report this situation to Moscow truthfully! Otherwise, Comrade Stalin will think we have no pressure at all here!” Rokossovsky finally gave up the idea of taking credit. In this situation, to report difficulties and get support was the most important thing. Anything else was just looking for trouble.

“Yes! Comrade Commander,” the aide nodded and then left with the documents in his hand. In this underground shelter, one did not have to worry about the almost endless shelling of the German large-caliber artillery, but it could truly be said to be a place without sun or sky. They could only rely on dim electric lights for illumination all day long.

Every shell that landed nearby would make the lights here tremble. In the flickering environment, it was easy for a person to become irritable. Only in the evening would Rokossovsky go out for a walk to see this now-unrecognizable transportation hub on the Volga.

This place had been prosperous for hundreds of years. In the past, it had rarely been ravaged by war. The people here had lived and worked in peace and contentment, until 1939, this very year. Two days ago, this city had begun to be shelled by the enemy. Although the air raids were devastating, they had not completely turned this city into ruins. But the shelling was more accurate than the air raids and also more targeted. And so, from that moment on, this place began to head towards destruction.

“Will I be destroyed along with this city?” Rokossovsky asked himself this question, then gave a cold laugh, rejecting his own sentimentality. “I will not give in easily! No matter who the opponent is, I will hold on until the last moment! Adjutant! Give the order! Order the four divisions of the reserve to launch a counter-attack and retake our lost positions! I want to make the Germans understand one fact: the Battle of Stalingrad has only just begun!”

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