Chapter 38 9.new victories ahead

On the evening of December 13, General Kryuchongkin reported briefly by radio that the besieged German army was stepping up its onslaught against the 3rd and 32nd Cavalry Divisions.We knew the excellent fighting qualities of the Kryuchonkin cavalry, so we believed they would hold out despite knowing that they would be dealing with an enemy corps. The cavalry was to act as an anvil, while Rusyanov's Guards Division was a hammer, constantly hammering the besieged fascists. The Guards liberated settlement after settlement west of Izmarkovo.They seized 150 pieces of artillery and a large amount of other military material in the village of Sloboda.

The fascist army was blocked in the triangle area of ​​Izmarkovo, Rossoshnoye and Uspenskoye, desperately resisting the guards in the east of me, and fled westward frantically. At noon on December 14, Major E. A. Matthew Ke returned from the Cavalry Corps.He was beyond excited. "This is what happened, Comrade General! The fascists relentlessly attacked our cavalry south of Rossoshnoe. General Kryuchynkin had to withdraw his divisions to the more favorable upper Lyubovsha, the Bino, Shcherbach line. The cavalry is in a bad position: out of fuel, ammunition is almost out, and it's hard to get up because enemy troops are running around... the only way is by air.”

General Kostenko listened to him in silence. "You can't move much by air," he said, turning to me. "However, the drowning man grabs at the straw. You go and talk to Faraleyev and say that I ask for immediate help, both by airlift and a surprise attack on the fascists storming the cavalry. Tell Shamshin , let him quickly transfer his motorized infantry brigade to support the cavalry. We give all the guard mortars to Kryuchonkin. The 14th cavalry division should move closer to the main force. Tell Kryuchonkin by radio: at all costs The price is to prevent the enemy from fleeing west. If he let the fascists escape, it would be his shame!

..." An hour later, I called and found the Air Force Commander of the Southwest Front.I told General Farareev about the difficult situation of the cavalry divisions, and told him that Kostenko had asked him to launch an aviation assault to support the cavalry.And use the transport plane to send ammunition to the cavalry, otherwise, in the morning, there will only be three shells left for each cannon of the cavalry.Faraleyev did not immediately answer. "You wait. I'll calculate what I have right away, and report our capabilities to the Marshal. But there is little hope: the weather forecast by the weatherman is bad, and besides, I have very few transport planes. As for the assault on the enemy's ground troops, I will If possible, I'll organize it."

When Faraleyev went to report to the commander-in-chief, General Bogin came to the telephone.After greeting him, he said: "The Marshal ordered fifty trucks to be sent to you at ten o'clock this morning. They will be loaded with fuel and ammunition in Yelets. You can use them to aid the cavalry army. The besieged group must be wiped out as soon as possible, and new combat orders will be carried out. , we have sent you this order today." I asked what the new battle orders were, and Borgin replied: "Today you will understand. In short, the order for a new offensive."

Soon Faraleyev went to the telephone again.He said the Marshal had ordered him to use all his cargo planes to deliver ammunition to the Cavalry Corps, and if the weather was right to fly, he intended to send at least six DU-2s.He also wanted to parachute some supplies from combat aircraft.But is the weather suitable for flying? ... When Kostenko learned of the results of my conversation with Faraleyev, he became depressed. "In this case, Kryuchongkin's cavalry basically have to rely on their own sharp sabers." The old cavalryman was miserable because he could not help the cavalry.He doesn't even have anyone to vent his anger on: we don't have our own logistics minister, and we don't have our own logistics organization.

By the end of the day, radio communication with the headquarters of the cavalry corps was organized, and each telegram from Kryuchonkin became more disturbing. "The enemy is attempting to break out to the west and is turning around the two wings of our army." An hour later, the telegram was sent: "The 32nd and 14th Cavalry Divisions have been cut off from the army headquarters, and the 32nd Cavalry Division headquarters have been cut off from the army headquarters. The connections of the regiments are now located in the deployment area of ​​the 3rd Cavalry Division...The army headquarters maintains radio contact with Kovalev's 32nd Division, but there is no communication with Shmuylo's 14th Division at all...Although the command has The cavalry units are still resolutely smashing the enemy's attempt to break out of the encirclement."

General Kostenko took advantage of the opportunity to establish radio communication with the 34th Motorized Rifle Brigade and ordered the brigade commander Shamshin to rush to the cavalry army.But the brigade commander's reply was astonishingly short: "The vehicle can't drive without gas." At 8 o'clock in the morning on December 15, General Kryuchonkin sent a new telegram: "Our army is exhausted. Twenty percent of the horses are out of combat. We haven't fed them oats for the sixth day and night." After a long silence Kostenko said thoughtfully: "How useful it would be for us now to have small convoys of cars full of ammunition, fuel, and fodder! Although the Hitlerites are roaming about, they can still drive on the roads under the cover of armored cars and infantry detachments .”

"Who knew it would turn out exactly like this?" I said. "Command is to foresee and lead the war to the desired track." Kostenko said angrily. From the headquarters of the Southwest Front came an officer with new battle orders.Our group has been given a new mission as the northern wing of the Front Army.The order stated: "In order to completely smash the enemy and move forward from Tula to the Orel Transversal Road①, the 61st②, 3rd, and 13th Army Groups and the Kostenko Group have been transferred to the general offensive since the morning of December 18. The task is to completely smash the 6th Army The 34th and 35th armies, before the end of December 26th, entered the front lines of Plavsk, Cherny, Novosili, and Korpuna with their main force, and the Kostenko group entered the Mtsensk area. The next task is to enter the To Belev, Bovkhov, Orel, Pornery line."

-------- ① A road parallel to the front. ② After the Moscow counteroffensive began, the 61st Army was transferred to the Southwest Front Army. Our group should start the offensive first on December 16, carrying out the main assault in the general direction of Mtzensk. Judging from this order, we understand that the commander-in-chief no longer suspects that the campaign to crush the Yelets Group is drawing to a close, and that he has looked further west.He sought to support the well-developed counter-offensive of the Western Front near Moscow with the new advance of the Southwestern Front's northern flank.In a word, we must start preparing for a new offensive before we have eliminated the besieged enemy army groups.But the besieged enemy troops continued to draw attention to them.

The cavalry divisions, displaying astonishing steadfastness against the onslaught of the fascist troops breaking out to the west, continued to complain of a shortage of ammunition and fuel.The supplies that the planes that took off were like a drop in the ocean regardless of the bad weather.However, the leaders of the German army knew well that our cavalry was in a difficult situation, and kept throwing their troops into new shocks.In order to break out of the siege, the enemy has used all kinds of tricks.For example, south of the village of Davydovo, fascist infantry drove a group of women and children ahead of them.Our army had no choice but to let this column pass, because peaceful residents might suffer from counter-shooting.But the Fascists did not go very far.The cavalry charged at them suddenly on horseback, and slashed and killed them with sabers. In order to cheer up their desperate soldiers, German planes dropped leaflets over the encircled area, which read: "Hold on. Rescue is in progress." After I learned the contents of this leaflet, I asked Colonel Kaminsky to verify by aerial reconnaissance what forces were there and where they came to rescue the besieged enemy.But reinforcements never arrived. So the Hitlerites, trapped in their pockets, decided to try one last time.They reassembled an assault group, led by General Kochenhausen, commander of the 134th Infantry Division, and broke out from the Rossoshnoye State Farm in the direction of Krivets.Although our cavalry had to cherish every bullet, they did not move an inch, and carried out a swift counterattack to disperse the enemy.General Kochenhausen was killed.The besieged enemy army was in a mess.They ran from one village to another, like big mice in a mousetrap... Knowing that the last hope of an organized breakout was lost, the fascist high command issued leaflets calling on its besieged soldiers to escape individually.But escape was impossible. On December 15, the besieged troops were divided into several isolated groups, all of which were subsequently wiped out. On the morning of December 16, after listening to the liaison officer's report and my brief situation report, Kostenko resolutely rolled up the encircled area map on the table and said: "It can be considered that the enemy's Yelets group is finished. Bring me new maps. Tell Rusyanov and Kryuchonkin: Let them reserve some troops to pursue the enemy group fleeing along the road, and move westward with the main force. Afterwards, the direction of attack will be according to the latest order of the commander-in-chief..." This is the end of the Yelets offensive.After the 13th Army and General Kostenko quickly marched to the front lines of Lyubovsha, Ponizovka, Dutoye, and Livny, they are now preparing for a new battle in the direction of Orel. Only ten days have passed since the coordinated attack of the right-wing armies of the Southwest Front and the left-wing armies of the Western Front, and what a drastic change the situation has taken!The Fascists had not had time to recover from their defeats near Rostov and Tikhvin before they suffered a rout near Moscow.Under the ever-increasing assault of the Soviet army, the Hitlerites quickly retreated westward on the entire wide front from Kalinin to Livne.One of the most powerful groups of the enemy, the Guderian Tank Army, was finally smashed at the junction of the Western Front and the Southwest Front. As a result of the rapid assault near Yelets, the right-wing army of the Southwest Front liberated 8,000 square kilometers of Soviet land, including more than 400 residential areas including Yelets and Yefremov, and seized a large number of spoils of war.Twelve thousand people were killed and wounded by the fascists.All this forced Hitler's High Command to deploy heavy reserves to restore the damaged front west of Yefremov and Yelets, although these reserves were urgently needed near Moscow. General Halder, Chief of the General Staff of Hitler's Army, wrote in his diary at that time: The situation in the area of ​​​​the German Second Army is already critical, "The chief of the army from Tula to Kursk has been ruined." And this was just the beginning of the winter offensive in the western strategic direction of 1941-1942.The Soviet army has faced the new task of smashing the basic strength of the fascist army.The right-wing army of the Southwest Front should still cooperate with the Kalinin Front and the Western Front to complete these tasks. I went to the headquarters of the 5th Cavalry Corps to coordinate the subsequent action plan.It was an unforgettable sight: the entire road was filled with abandoned German cars, carts, artillery and tanks.Piles of rifles, machine guns, mortars and ammunition were littered everywhere.Corpses in green army overcoats lay covered with a thin layer of snow.There was a look of fear on the face of the deceased.Did these Germans understand in their last moments what kind of abyss the fascist leaders had pushed them into?Countless swarms of crows had circled over the corpse of the poor conqueror.I couldn't help thinking: this is the fate that awaits everyone who sets foot on our soil as a murderer and a plunderer.The Hitlerites were convinced of this on the way from Rostov to Taganrog, in the frozen Tikhvin swamps, in the snow-covered fields near Moscow, in the great battle in which we had the honor to participate. The victory near Moscow was the decisive military-political event of the first year of the Great Patriotic War.This victory has extremely great significance for the subsequent course of the war.Hitler's blitzkrieg plan has been buried for the last time, and the myth of the invincibility of Hitler's army has been bankrupted.For the first time, the people of the world believed that the aggressors could be contained. Soldiers of the Southwest Front were rightly proud of being honored to directly participate in the Great Moscow Battle. We greet the new year 1942 with the conviction that the fate of the fascist German invaders has been sealed. My story of how the Great Patriotic War began is coming to an end.I am not trying to whitewash the incident.The truth, no matter how painful, is always more precious than the sweetest lie. I tried to use the example of the army in the southwest to illustrate how difficult the battle path of the Soviet army was in the first months of the war.The Soviet army did not immediately master combat skills, and the Soviet commanders, especially the senior commanders, did not immediately possess the maturity of a commander. It was this maturity that later helped them fully demonstrate the Soviet military education and Soviet military academics. Indisputable superiority. The Soviet Supreme Command relied on the heroism of the army and the enthusiasm of the people of the whole country to pass a series of defensive engagements and counter-assaults.Make Hitler's "blitzkrieg" plan impossible to realize.While forcing the fascist high command to consume the strategic reserve, the leaders of the Soviet army formed their own strategic reserve in the rear, bravely making preparations to defeat the powerful armies of the aggressors.We have seen at the end of the book how successfully the first attempts of the Soviet Army's major offensive campaigns were carried out, which laid the groundwork for the defeat of the fascist invaders. Historical experience proves that the road to victory is difficult, and only those inspired by the spirit of patriotism and lofty purpose can complete the road to victory with honor.The officers and soldiers of our army have a deep understanding of the lofty purpose they are fighting for, so under the wise leadership of the Communist Party, they can stand firm in the struggle of the outnumbered, and then win the victory. How far I have conveyed the harshness of combat life in the first months of the war is for the reader to judge for himself, but I have tried to paint a true picture. Readers are confronted not only by famous Soviet military chiefs, but also by hundreds of lesser-known heroes of the early wars.The fighting path of some of them was interrupted at the beginning of the war, but most of them withstood all the cruel tests of the war and celebrated the great victory over the fascist invaders. I introduced the heroes of our army who had just been baptized in battle and were taking their first lessons in the harsh battle school.I wish I could also tell about the war years in which they fought hard and victoriously.