Chapter 922: Obituary

As Akado walked out of the hospital room, a wave of sadness washed over him. One by one, the people he knew were leaving him: the old man “Poison,” whose memory was now fading; Stresemann, whose fate he had changed, only for him to die in a plane crash; Hitler, who, though his enemy, was a towering figure in his memory; and General von Seeckt, once his superior, who had ultimately died in a foreign land. And now, another kind old man was gone—August…

They were all gone, all had left him. Akado felt more and more like a lonely dancer on the stage of the world war, performing the life’s passion of those who had already departed. He didn’t know if, when his own time came to leave the stage, there would be anyone left to continue the performance for him.

As Akado mourned for those who had left, the Führer seemed to have forgotten the many, many people he didn’t even know, whom he had never even met, who had been thrown by him into the cruelest of battlefields, to become one cold corpse after another. When these men died, there was no Führer sitting by their side, no family holding their hands.

In fact, at a time like this, to be able to die peacefully in a hospital bed was a different kind of happiness. Because for many, what accompanied their death was a pile of bodies, or the cold, hard earth. To not have to search for your own arm or intestines at the moment of death was a blessing from God.

So, while Akado mourned for the people he knew, countless German grenadiers were facing the enemy’s bullets. The tracks of Soviet tanks rolled over the earth, churning up the mud. The air was filled with the whistle of flying bullets and the roar of exploding shells.

A shell flew in from the distance and destroyed a Soviet KV-1 tank that was crossing a trench. The massive explosion threw all the German soldiers in the nearby trenches to the ground. Everyone’s eardrums were ringing from the deafening blast.

Before their hearing had even recovered, while the ringing in their ears was still going on, some Soviet soldiers had already jumped into the trenches. They held their Mosin-Nagant rifles with fixed bayonets and, with their mouths wide open, charged at the disoriented German soldiers.

A German grenadier, before he could even get up from the ground, lay on his back and began to spray with his MP-44 assault rifle, turning the Soviet soldiers who had jumped into the trench beside him into sieves. Behind him, another Soviet soldier vaulted into the trench and was also hit by a shot from a German not far away.

More Soviets swarmed in. A German soldier pulled the pin on a hand grenade and threw it towards a distant part of the trench that was already full of Soviets. With a loud boom, sand and earth were thrown high into the air, and the ringing in everyone’s ears continued. They still couldn’t hear what their comrades around them were shouting.

This grenadier struggled to his feet from the bottom of the trench, then ejected the magazine from his assault rifle, pulled a new one from his tactical vest, and skillfully slammed it into the rifle with a click. He then worked the action, chambering a round, and the weapon was ready to fire.

He raised his rifle, leaned against the wall of the trench, and then, suddenly standing up, he pulled the trigger at the enemy’s direction. His muzzle flashed, and spent casings flew from the ejection port one after another, landing on the ground in front of him and by his worn-out boots.

The bullets flew from his muzzle, cutting down the Soviet Red Army soldiers who were already so close, one after another. Some of the Soviets were hit in the knee, some in the stomach, and they fell in a jumble. Because he had no time to aim, this burst of fire had only created a field of wounded.

Without the slightest hesitation, the German grenadier ducked back into the trench, took one of the two hand grenades hanging from his chest, and pulled the pin. Then, without even looking, he threw the grenade out of his trench and covered his ears.

BOOM! Another explosion. Dust flew everywhere again. Because he had covered his ears, the ringing that had been there just now finally subsided a little. He heard the shouts of his comrades in the trench, and the howls and screams of the Soviets not far away.

“Hans! I need reinforcements!” In the distance, on the chaotic German position, someone was shouting for his comrade. But the only answer to his shout was, “Damn it! Which Hans are you looking for!”

There were simply too many Hanses here. There was the wounded Hans, the dead Hans, and the Hans who was firing fiercely at the enemy. If there was any name on this battlefield more common than this damn one, it would be “Ivan” in the Soviet army opposite them.

With the destruction of the Soviet KV-1 tank not far from them, a German Panther tank slowly emerged from the side of the roadbed in the distance. The defensive system that the Germans had set up nearby had been stabilized by the arrival of the armored units, and the Soviet offensive was being contained.

Many of the Soviet soldiers who had already charged into the trenches were still fighting the Germans repeatedly for their positions. Some German soldiers were killed by the superior Soviet forces in their foxholes and trenches. The Soviet light machine guns began to roar in the German trenches, and the soldiers of both sides exchanged fierce fire at close range.

Time passed, bit by bit. As the second German tank appeared on the position, the Soviets knew that this attack was probably not going to succeed. Because their tanks were being destroyed one after another, the battlefield was littered with the wrecks of Soviet tanks.

Although the Soviet Red Army was desperately trying to catch up with the German army in the three major performance indicators for tanks, and had indeed produced the relatively advanced T-34 and Stalin tanks, these tanks were still a minority and could only be equipped by the most elite armored units. Therefore, most of the Soviet armored units were still using the outdated, modified KV-1 and T-26 tanks, which also became an important basis for the Germans to judge the elite level of the Soviet army.

Guderian’s unit was the most elite armored force of the German army. Apart from some armored units that had been temporarily assigned to him, he had about 1,000 tanks of various models in his hands. Now, because of the northern offensive, a good number of independent tank destroyer battalions and some of the surrounding panzer divisions had been temporarily assigned to him, allowing him to command a large-scale armored battle with 1,700 tanks.

With so many armored units, this German force was not suitable for defensive operations in terms of its composition. Guderian had no intention of cowering behind a defensive position and passively resisting the Soviet Red Army’s offensive. He had a plan to speed up the transition between offense and defense on the entire battlefield, to have everyone attack each other in a war of movement.

Like two boxers who only knew how to attack, they had both abandoned their defenses and were constantly attacking, wanting to be the first to knock out their opponent. So the entire battlefield was filled with the collisions of the two sides’ forces. Everyone just built simple defensive positions and then waited to be broken through by their opponent or to break through their opponent’s simple defensive positions.

But because they were at a certain numerical disadvantage, the German army had gradually become passive in the exchange of blows. In most cases, they had committed their armored units to defense and had rarely carried out an armored counter-attack. This was also a rhythm that Guderian was intentionally changing. He knew the Soviet army would inevitably choose to attack, so he had begun to delay with a defense that would result in fewer casualties.

Those who did not know the combat record of the German armored forces in defensive operations in another timeline would not know how terrifying the German armored forces were in a defensive battle. The commanders of these elite armored units knew when and where they should appear on the battlefield and often achieved an exaggerated combat record of a dozen to zero against the Soviet army.

With the participation of the German Panther tanks, the remaining Soviet tank units began to fall back. Under the cover of smoke, the follow-up Soviet infantry also began to retreat. The Soviet troops on the German positions collapsed because of this retreat. They had fought to the death only to see their own comrades retreat, and in the end, they were annihilated by the Germans on their positions.

The German grenadier kicked the leg of the Soviet soldier lying at his feet, letting the other’s foot sway with the rhythm of his kick. He then removed the magazine from his weapon and inserted a new one. But this time he did not immediately work the action but leaned against the wall of the trench with his rifle.

“Collect the magazines under your feet! Find as many useful supplies as you can,” the platoon leader and the company commander shouted at the end of the battle. This was a necessary task for the German army, a kind of work similar to cleaning up the battlefield. Doing so could save a lot of supplies and prevent the rear from having to waste precious raw materials on consumables.

Compared to the truly wealthy America, although the German army was completely victorious in combat effectiveness, in some details, they had to adhere to a style of thrift. After all, there were many things that Germany was not as good at as the United States at this stage, so these details were even more distinctive and more important.

“This is not the enemy’s main force. I think their main force should be on the flank,” a staff officer in a mechanized division headquarters near the front said to his superior, the division commander, pointing to the front of their own army’s defense. “News just came back. The Soviet offensive only had KV-1s and a small number of T-34s, so we have to remind our comrades on the flank.”

“Yes! On this matter, just do as you see fit. Send a telegram to the neighboring units and tell them that our side has already repulsed the enemy’s attack,” this division commander said, staring at the map with his hands behind his back. Then, for some unknown reason, he suddenly spoke to the chief of staff who was about to leave the command vehicle. “News just came from the homeland’s radio. It says that the former Imperial Chancellor, August, passed away yesterday.”

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