Chapter 363: Artillery Fire

"This proves you are right, Comrade Shulka!" Katukov said to Shulka: "The capture of Rzhev will obviously be of great help to our rescue of the besieged troops!"

This is one of the reasons why Rzhev will become a battleground for military strategists. As long as you swing the artillery up... the targets within ten kilometers will only be discovered and destroyed.

The problem is that Rzhev is in the hands of the German army at this time, and there is also a railway connection. They can use the railway to transport artillery, shells or other supplies.

Therefore, Soviet tanks may be bombed as long as they enter the range of ten kilometers, let alone attack the hard ground of Rzhev.

"It seems that we can only attack at night!" Lieutenant Colonel Gavrilov said.

Attacking at night can avoid the advantage of enemy artillery fire as much as possible, and the German army may have air supremacy.

But this does not seem to be a good way, because tanks also have no night combat capability, and tanks are targets at night for the German anti-tank guns condescending and hidden in the snow.

"Can our artillery suppress the German artillery?" Katukov turned his gaze to Colonel Yegorovich.

Colonel Yegorovich shook his head and replied: "No, Comrade Katukov! The enemy is condescending and hiding in artillery bunkers, while our artillery is exposed in the open snow with nothing to cover. So, although our artillery fire The range is farther than the enemy, but they are always suppressed by them!"

"What about 'Katyusha'?" Zakhakovic asked.

"Katyusha" may be an artifact to suppress enemy artillery, because it can fire a large number of shells in a short time and evacuate.

but……

"We have bombed several times with 'Katyusha'!" Colonel Yegorovich replied: "But we are not sure whether we have blown up something, we only know that the enemy's artillery is still ringing, and our artillery bombardment is accurate. destroy!"

Needless to say, the bombing effect of "Katyusha" is not very good.

"Katyusha" is actually more suitable for bombing densely arranged targets, such as groups of infantry, tanks, etc. If the German army deploys artillery in a scattered manner, "Katyusha" may not be able to do anything, unless the Soviet army has too much ammunition. Blow up an enemy artillery with dozens of rockets.

Not to mention the air force. At this time, the Rzhev area has become the main defense target of the German army, and the German air force has concentrated here to compete with the Soviet army for air supremacy.

The command fell silent.

After a while,

Lieutenant Colonel Zhakavic said: "Perhaps, we should go back to the original plan, which is to tear apart the enemy's line of defense and rescue the besieged troops. What I mean is that occupying Rzhev is no worse than this." Simple!"

"But attacking Rzhev is feasible for our tanks, Comrade Zakhakovic!" Lieutenant Colonel Gavrilov stood firmly on Shulka's side.

"But it doesn't seem feasible now!" Zakhakovic replied: "The enemy's artillery fire blocked a range of ten kilometers around, and it would take us an hour to drive the tank to Rzhev...that is, the enemy can use it in one hour. The time to hit our tanks as targets, their artillery observers use high-powered binoculars to observe us from a high place, and then tell our position to the artillery, and the artillery knocks down our tanks one by one! We are the targets , a target without the ability to fight back, Comrade Gavrilov!"

"It's useless to say that, isn't it?" Colonel Yegorovich said, "We should fight a battle and try to attack the enemy with tanks, instead of staying here and worrying about this and that, maybe the enemy doesn't As scary as we imagined!"

What Colonel Yegorovich said is a bit reckless, but it seems to be correct. After all, war is like this. It will not stop and wait for you just because you don't think of a suitable attack method... The 9 besieged divisions are running out of supplies The next is struggling to support.

More importantly, Colonel Yegorovich's suggestion was in line with the appetite of Soviet officers, and Katukov also hoped to see Rzhev's defense situation.

So an attack was quickly organized.

It was launched after dark... Katukov, in his heart, would not have wanted to expose his tanks to enemy fire and aircraft during the day.

The daytime in the Soviet Union is very short, only a little over seven hours before and after, so this is just a matter of waiting a little longer.

Attacking was the 2nd Tank Battalion and the 2nd Infantry Battalion, plus two infantry battalions commanded by Colonel Yegorovich.

The tank battalion was divided into three parts based on the company. One part covered an infantry battalion to attack Rzhev's left flank, one part attacked the right flank, and the remaining part was used as a reserve team ready to support at any time.

Katukov called Shulka, and the two sneaked to the front line under the cover of the guards and hid in the snow to observe the troops' attack with binoculars.

"Look there!" Katukov pointed in one direction and said, "Maybe your idea is correct, we should attack Rzhev, but this is not an easy place to attack, it may be beyond our ability !"

Looking in the direction indicated by Katukov, Shulka saw a cliff tens of meters high in front of him, which formed a natural barrier for Rzhev. Moving his sight to the side, he saw a cliff more than two meters high. High steep walls, and then all the way uphill.

Shulka originally thought that this steep wall was an anti-tank trench dug by the German army. Later, he realized that it was actually a river. Humid, it becomes very hard after being frozen, and even artillery fire cannot destroy this natural "anti-tank trench".

This allowed Soviet tanks to attack along two main roads, which must be the main direction of the German defense.

At this moment, the battle started with a few flares rising.

The German artillery fire was not violent, usually only three or five rapid-fire shots, and occasionally a few more shots were fired when the target was a tank.

When Shulka saw such artillery fire, he felt a little nervous.

Because this also means that these artillery fires are grouped and targeted... If it is to block the fire without moving, it is to shoot with the head buried in the pre-adjusted target, and the artillery fire is row by row.

Most of the Soviet artillery who lacked communication equipment and coordination capabilities had this style of play.

The Germans sometimes did this, but not now.

In other words, the German artillery stationed in Rzhev is a group of experienced veterans. They can perfectly cooperate with artillery observers and artillery to achieve "point where to hit" artillery defense.