Chapter 939: Wasteland War

In the ruins, the role of the tank was infinitely diminished. These steel behemoths that galloped across the plains became clumsy, lumbering giants in a city of towering buildings and piled rubble, easily destroyed at the turn of a street corner.

But even so, the tank still had its own inherent role to play in the city. Whether in defending a street or launching an assault, having tank support versus not having it were two completely different outcomes. So, even knowing that tanks would be at a disadvantage in urban street fighting, sending them in to participate in the offense and defense could still yield good results.

Do not underestimate any weapon of killing, nor overestimate any. They are just weapons. No matter where they are used, whether in a suitable place or an unsuitable one, they can kill. The only difference is which weapon is more convenient for killing in that environment, and the rest are just a little less convenient.

So, never believe that the submarine is the nemesis of the aircraft carrier, because the vengeful souls of the commanders of the hundreds of submarines sunk by escort carriers attest to the fact that the carrier is also the killer of the submarine. And never be certain that the tank is not suitable for street fighting, because even if there are a thousand ways to destroy a tank in urban warfare, it has at least one way to kill the person who wants to destroy it.

To be superstitious about weapon performance is just the one-sided talk of a group of military enthusiasts in peacetime. What the battlefield is really like, only God and those who have personally experienced war will know. There is no need for prayer, no need for cowardice or madness, because no matter what, you could lose your life in the next second.

You have to fight on with a pistol in your hand, you have to fight on with a dagger in your hand. Apart from surrendering and becoming a prisoner, to fight on is the only choice—whether you are holding a pitiful revolver or driving a main battle tank with an intelligent computer.

The swaggering American Apache helicopter was ultimately shot down by a group of farmers carrying RPG rocket launchers and AK-47s. And the enemy faced by the soldiers with broadswords, long spears, rifles, and grenades was an unmanned attack drone supported by a satellite data link. No one ever decreed that you could only win a war if your weapons were stronger than your opponent’s, because there is only one rule of war—there are no rules!

It is unknown who first became accustomed to crushing their opponents with weapons: when the opponent only had broadswords and long spears, you had to have muskets and front-loading cannons; when the opponent used muskets, you had to have bolt-action rifles and submachine guns; when the opponents finally got their hands on rifles and machine guns, they found that tanks and armored cars were rolling towards them.

So? When the weapons and equipment are the same, will people in their subconscious already not go to war? Or is it that everyone cannot bear to see tens of thousands of people die and dare not face the price that victory requires? No matter what people think today, it is a pity that in the ruins of Stalingrad in 1939, the soldiers of both sides had no such strange thoughts in their minds.

The Soviet infantry, hiding in their trenches from the scorching fire, had no time to complain about why the Germans’ weapons were so advanced. The German soldiers, working the bolts of their rifles and chambering their bullets, had no time to think about why the Soviets were so tenacious. They just repeated their most efficient actions to most efficiently finish off their enemies—that was all.

When a German soldier’s head was shattered by a bullet, and the blood splattered on his comrade’s face and clothes, God did not spare him just because he was wearing a tactical vest and carrying an MP-44 assault rifle. When a Soviet infantryman emptied the magazine of his rifle at a tank and was finally turned into a sieve by the tank’s hull machine gun, God did not let him go just because he only had a bayonet left in his hand.

The tracks of the Panther flamethrower tank slowly rolled over one corpse after another, some German, some Soviet. A Mosin-Nagant rifle with a fixed bayonet was still stuck in the body of a Ukrainian soldier who had just lost his position. The empty eyes of the young Ukrainian who had just been stabbed to death by two Soviet soldiers still stared stubbornly ahead.

A German grenadier jumped into this trench as the Panther advanced. He saw the two soldiers who had killed each other with their bayonets, and also saw the young Ukrainian who had bled out. He walked to the young man’s side with his G43 semi-automatic rifle and, with a black-gloved hand, closed his eyes.

From the beginning of the battle until the sound of gunfire on the battlefield had gradually died down, the Soviets had not regained an inch of their lost territory. However, on the positions that both sides had controlled a few hours before the battle, there were now thick piles of soldiers’ bodies. These bodies were piled up layer upon layer on the ruins, looking like small hills made of corpses.

“Collect as much ammunition as you can from the bodies!” a company commander with a Mauser 98k rifle on his back shouted as he passed this trench, reminding his men. He had to inspect this position he was in charge of to get a more intuitive understanding of the nearby terrain. The streets here could no longer be called streets, and the buildings here had long since disappeared… The map in his hand had become a useless decoration. Many things could not be arranged in advance. The grassroots commanders could only arrange the corresponding tactics on the spot.

He looked at the German machine gun nest that had originally been suppressed by the Soviet machine guns, then pointed to another, more concealed and rearward position, and set up the first German fire support point. “Set up a machine gun nest there! Be concealed, and don’t open fire easily.”

While this company commander was pointing and giving directions here, a whistling sound suddenly came from the sky. Everyone held their helmets and ducked into the trenches. This subconscious reaction was already deeply ingrained in everyone’s bones, so these movements were completed very naturally, with even a hint of flair.

Then, on the Soviet Red Army positions in the distance, one shell after another began to fall. The buildings shook in the flames and smoke of the explosions, and the earth trembled with the one after another of explosions. The end of the world was surely nothing more than this. After all, the position of the German shelling was only a few hundred meters from their own frontline soldiers.

Some of the dust and flying rubble from the explosions were even carried over to the German positions by the shockwave. Everyone held their breath and squinted their eyes, waiting for this grand artillery feast to pass. As the German troops continued to advance, this large-scale shelling became more and more dense and more and more accurate. In contrast, the Soviet artillery fire became more and more like a feeble moan.

The Soviet artillery positions on the other side of the Volga had long since been ravaged by countless German air raids, leaving them with no spirit. After all, under this sky, an existence that dared to challenge the great army of German pilots had not yet appeared, and the German Air Force’s ground attack methods were also very diverse.

And the Soviet defenders, having lost the artillery groups on the other side of the Volga, had ultimately lost their advantage in the repeated artillery duels. With the arrival of the German large-caliber artillery, the German artillery near Stalingrad had already formed a firepower advantage over the Soviet army. And this accumulated advantage had now become an overwhelming force, gradually swaying the outcome of the street fighting in Stalingrad.

BOOM! A shell happened to land on the corner of a half-collapsed building. The huge explosive force deprived this already crumbling building of its last bit of supporting structure. As the floors of the second and third stories crashed down, the outer wall also began to collapse outwards, finally burying the assembling Soviet troops below.

Further in the distance, near the bank of the Volga, were the wrecks of scrapped Soviet tanks, their parts long since scavenged to repair tanks in better condition. These wrecks had attracted a lot of the German Air Force’s ammunition and had finally rusted and corroded into a ghostly equipment graveyard on the riverbank.

A shell landed here, sending the sand on the riverbank flying dozens of stories high. Many of the civilians who were fetching water on the beach were hit by the scattered shrapnel of this shell. The rest instinctively lay prone on the ground, waiting for this dense shelling to pass.

Küchler might have been really anxious, so this time the German shelling from all four sides lasted for a full five minutes. The city, which had just returned to quiet, once again billowed with缕縷 (wisps) of thick smoke. But for the entire Stalingrad, there were not many places left to smoke…

“Those bastards in the artillery, did they take the wrong medicine?” The German company commander, slapping the dust from his body, stood up from the trench. He cursed the friendly forces who had launched a sudden artillery strike, while at the same time picking up the binoculars on his chest and looking at the positions opposite him.

The thick smoke there had not yet dissipated. The shell might have hit an abandoned truck, so that this truck, which had already been burned to its frame, was now burning again. The tall buildings on the Soviet positions were a little fewer, which made it more convenient for the German army to observe and reconnoiter before an attack.

“If I were a Soviet, I might have surrendered by now,” the company commander muttered to himself, lowering his binoculars. “To have their own city beaten into this state, if they continue to fight, there will really be nothing left.”

Crack! Before he could finish his words, he was hit in the neck by a bullet from the other side. Everyone around him instinctively flinched, and then a hysterical shout became this German company commander’s last memory: “Sniper! Enemy sniper! The Lieutenant (company commander) has been hit!”

The sound of retaliatory fire began to ring out. The battle still needed to go on…

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