The Third Reich in Desperation

However, no one knew that the palms of the Hero of the Soviet Union were already clenched with sweat!

When he received the news of the all-out counterattack from the north and the south by the Allied Forces, Kilponos knew that he had been forced into a road where he could only move forward and not retreat!

Moreover, Stalin's mandatory order to continue the offensive cut off Kirponos' last retreat.

Since the troops of more than 40 Romanian divisions were dispatched, Kirponos has been struggling for 7 days in order to force out the German main force hidden by Manstein, Model, and Paulus!During this period, he even dispatched a total of six infantry divisions and launched eight almost desperate counterattacks.But the final result was a battle damage rate of nearly 40.00%!The number of troops under his command that can still maintain combat effectiveness has dropped from 34 divisions to 26!

Originally, this was nothing to Kirponos.In war, people will die, and there will be sacrifices.

Everything must be aimed at victory.As long as victory can be achieved, no matter how cold-blooded things are, a qualified commander must do it without hesitation!

This is also the fact that his predecessor, General Zhukov, repeatedly emphasized to these officers and soldiers when he was in the Kiev Military Region, the predecessor of the Southwest Front Army.

If the generals of the German army did hide the main force of Germany behind Romania's low combat effectiveness but a large number of offensive troops, they waited for their main force.Then, Kirponos will continue to implement the same tactics without hesitation, and also leave behind the elite Russian troops under his own hands, and let the Ukrainians fight the Romanians desperately.Even at the cost of sacrifice three times higher than the opponent's.It is bound to grind and consume Romania's underpowered army into powder!

But the current situation is that the Ukrainian army, which has already been dissatisfied with the heavy losses of the German southern provinces with refueling tactics, has become very noisy and restless.The Ukrainian officers who occupied the grounds were raging, and the Ukrainian officers in the headquarters were cold-faced, and the sarcasm at the corners of their mouths was undisguised.In the communications and telegrams between the Ukrainian troops, there are even more words.

From that moment on, Kirponos knew that he had no choice.

According to Stalin's order and his original idea, it is obviously impossible to continue to use Ukrainian troops to use oppressive tactics against the Allied forces.

At the beginning, those Ukrainian commanders on the front line still counted on waiting for the retreat order, so they could muster up the courage to resist the Allied forces that suddenly turned from defense to offensive.

However, after the long-awaited retreat order did not come, but after Stalin's idiot order to continue the attack, the Ukrainian Soviet troops on the front line no longer had the strength to hold on.

Due to the disagreement between General Pavlov and General Zhukov, the Southwest Front Army and the Southern Front Army have not received standard supplies for a long time.

A large number of weapons and ammunition supplies were detained by Pavlov in the rear, but after a symbolic discount, [-]% of the rear transportation volume was slightly returned to the frontline troops.

In this way, although they have an excellent logistics and transportation network aided by the Germans, the two southern front armies, including the Southwest Front Army, generally run out of pre-stored ammunition and have a serious shortage of ammunition to carry with them.

There is really no better way to use such a force than to retreat.In other words, even if retreat is not allowed, as long as the supplies that should be transported can be replenished!

Now, many Ukrainian military officers have blatantly spread complaints and negativity in the army.

No wonder it is so, from their point of view, not giving weapons and not letting them retreat, this is the standard usage of cannon fodder.In particular, in order to cope with the main force of the German army that may appear at any time, Kirponos put the Russian troops in his hands behind to avoid the battle, which caused a strong imbalance in the Ukrainian troops.

Not to mention that ordinary soldiers couldn't understand Kirponos' actions, even most Ukrainian generals concluded that Kirponos only cared about the few troops with the title of guards in his hand, and didn't care about their life or death.

Indeed, in Stalin's eyes, consuming Ukrainians and local forces in Ukraine was also a means of strengthening the rule of the Soviet government.But that's not what Kirponos was aiming for in doing.

After all, the combat effectiveness of Russian troops is indeed higher than that of Ukrainian troops.Of course, there are also reasons why Russian troops are better equipped.

In other words, Kirponos is really thinking from the perspective of a commander, and he is treating these Russian troops as elites at the bottom of the box.

It's a pity that his Ukrainian subordinates think from their own circumstances, and there is really no way to think like this...

Text 698 SS Pride

Continuing to hold down the few guards in their hands is definitely not what these Ukrainian generals want to see.They fought with themselves, and they didn't die here in vain.But if he obeyed the unanimous request of the frontline officers and approved the retreat, not only would he be unable to explain to Stalin, but it would be a shameful failure for the entire "Thunderstorm" plan, and he himself could not accept it.

Now, counting the Southern Front Army fighting side by side with the Southwest Front Army, the strength of the enemy and our two sides is roughly one to one.It is not because the German army has Romanian allies that it has an advantage in military strength.

Such a ratio of troops is enough to ensure that the Ukrainian troops can at least eliminate the Romanian army with oppressive tactics!

Even so, Kirponos still suppressed this tactic in his heart, and did not immediately order an attack.It wasn't until he got the northern front, after the German army and the Finnish army joined forces, had completely recovered the three Baltic countries, and shifted his focus to advance to the hinterland of the Soviet Union in an all-round way, he made the decision to fight on the southern front!

The attacking arrows composed of Ukrainian troops have been rushed to the face of the Romanian army's attack position under the urging step by step, and have been engaged in a war of attrition between attack and attack.

This time, when news of the presence of German troops finally came back from the front, Kirponos grabbed the phone.

"Command all guards! Forward!"

……

"Ula!"

The Ukrainian troops of the Southwest Front Army have achieved a record that is very worthy of their pride.When they were short of ammunition and extremely short of supplies, they fought vividly with the three Romanian armies commanded by the Romanian leader Antonescu.

A very interesting phenomenon is that both sides know that the defense will be much easier, and both know that the opponent will definitely attack.

However, neither side chose to defend, and both chose to be the difficult offensive side.

On the side of the Allies, Romania borne the consumption and losses.

On the Soviet side, this is Ukraine making sacrifices for the overall situation.

However, after the Ukrainian troops fired a few shots and rushed out of the attack position, they quickly searched for bunkers nearby, forming a confrontation with the Romanian troops.

"Ivan! Damn it, what are you doing, rushing forward to seek death?!"

"What, the political commissar is behind to supervise the battle? Why didn't he come up by himself, listen to me, and almost retreated with everyone, it was too sudden."

"Those parasites robbed us of food, let us Ukraine fight for them hungry, and in the end did not give us weapons, let us die with bare hands!"

"........."

These Ukrainian troops who stopped were not discussing any offensive tactics, but just changed places to abuse the high-level commanders in the rear after being driven out of the attack position by the political commissar.

"Hey, if it weren't for these bastards in the rear, threatening us with our family members, who wouldn't want to rebel early? Now I heard that Zhukov and Pavlov had a conflict, but they didn't send us the logistics supplies. Let us Get caught in the middle and suffer." A lieutenant colonel leaned behind a small house that had been abandoned for a long time, and sighed.

Now a Ukrainian army here is barely stationed in an uninhabited town that was abandoned due to the war.

Behind them is the political commissar who supervised the battle, and the town is ahead, and the Romanian enemy troops.

So, they simply stationed in this uninhabited town, waited for a while, and after adding battles, they withdrew to the attacking position.

"Hmph! When we were delivering supplies, we were detained, but when the war mission came, we never forgot us." The Ukrainian division commander who took the lead cursed along with the officers under him at this time.

Because he is a Ukrainian, even if he is a division commander, he can't escape the fate of cannon fodder and was rushed to the front line together.

"General, it's not an option to go on like this!" The lieutenant colonel staff officer who sighed before, saw the division commander speak, and quickly answered.

"Yeah, if things go on like this, we'll have to be forced to die on the front line. When we're all dead, those bastards in the rear can occupy our homes and enslave our families more recklessly." Another lieutenant colonel joined in. This high-level meeting.

"It's just that we have nothing to do." Seeing that everyone talked about this without shyness, a colonel who had long been full of complaints even chatted with him: "Even if we surrender to the other side, those bastards can still treat us. Family members. In this way, our lives are saved, but the lives of family members cannot be saved."

Over the years, Ukrainians have been persecuted a lot.The Soviet Union used various methods to suppress Ukrainians in the future.Those who catch strong men and drive them into the army as cannon fodder are not bad, at least they have enough to eat.But many of their compatriots entered the concentration camps and were sent to Siberia, and countless people died of starvation!

If it weren't for Germany to set up a union, under the supervision of the Soviet government, a large number of Ukrainian workers were recruited to build railway and road networks, and then the Germans gave these Ukrainians a full meal.If this is not the case, there will be hundreds of thousands more Ukrainian ghosts who starved to death!

"Teacher, what can you do? As long as you speak, we will listen to you!"

Several Soviet officers, at this time, regard their own Ukrainian division commander as a life-saving straw, looking forward to a direction.

"A way, what can I do?" The teacher who was expected by everyone just smiled wryly, covered his forehead and said in a deep voice: "I can't find a bright way out, but, I heard, it seems Many people in the domestic railway and road departments have been accepting bribes from the Germans, and they have also saved many Ukrainian workers."

Speaking of this, the teacher raised his head and continued with gloomy eyes: "I heard from a friend that Germany sent a businessman named Schindler to recruit Ukrainians to work as workers in the Railway Union. During the war, but these German businessmen and technicians, as long as they declared their willingness to continue building roads for the Soviets, they were all retained."