USSR 1941

  Chapter 17 Missions

   Soon Shulka discovered that the problems he faced were far more than these.

  Dinner is still mashed potatoes, and the amount is less than noon. In addition, each person is given a biscuit, which is only a small piece with the width of three fingers. If the mouth is bigger, there is only one bite.

   "Is there more food?" Shulka couldn't help asking, "We are all hungry!"

  During the war before, it may be because of the effect of adrenal hormones that I didn’t feel hungry at all. Now when the battlefield quiets down and the muscles in my body relax, I immediately feel hungry and panic on my chest.

  At this time, Shulka certainly didn't care about whether the food would suit his appetite. He even believed that he could eat a bucket...if the cooking soldier was willing to give him a bucket.

   "I think so too, comrade!" The cook replied, "If you can give me more potatoes, I can give you more food!"

  The soldiers couldn't help laughing with a "coax", and someone responded: "There is no food, let's have some vodka!"

   "You can go there and look for it..." The cooking soldier shook his head towards the ruins and broken bricks and tiles at the rear, and replied: "If you are lucky, you can dig some food out of it!

   "Forget it!" The soldiers replied resentfully: "The only things you can find there are corpses and rats!"

  The situation is like this. The Soviet army, which was unprepared for this war, stored all the materials in warehouses. These warehouses were bombed or burned by German bombers at the beginning of the war.

  In addition to food, ammunition and water are also lacking.

  The latter sounds a little strange. The Brest Fortress was built at the confluence of two rivers, and each sub-fortress was surrounded by artificially excavated rivers, so there was actually a shortage of water.

   But this is actually quite normal. If the water pipe was blown off during the bombing, there would be no water available, and the area near the river was occupied by the German army...so the Soviet army could only wait for the river to fetch water in the dark with helmets and buckets.

  It was okay at the beginning, the German army hadn't discovered the problem of the Soviet army's water shortage, and at the same time thought that the fortress could be quickly taken down in a short period of time, so no targeted blockade was implemented.

  Two days later, due to the informant of the captured Soviet soldiers, the German army quickly deployed machine guns and artillery fire by the river, which caused the Soviet army to pay the price of life for every sip of water, almost in exchange for blood.

  At this time, with a short whistle, the platoon leader Pukarev shouted from more than ten meters away: "Second platoon gather!"

  The entire platoon of more than thirty soldiers jumped up from the ground and adjusted their formation.

   "Our mission!" Pukarev raised his head towards the side of the trench, where there was a pile of buckets.

"Just go to the river to get some water!" Pukarev ordered: "The wounded and the Maxim machine guns are waiting for water, be careful not to let the Germans find out, otherwise they will fill you with bullets or grenades Iron bucket!"

   "Yes, Comrade Platoon Leader!" The soldiers replied.

   After disbanding, everyone received an iron bucket from the deputy platoon leader... In fact, plastic buckets should be used for this task.

  But firstly, the Soviet Union was completely unprepared, and secondly, the Soviet Union’s heavy industry was developed while its light industry was very backward, so iron barrels were used more often.

   This made Shulka feel very embarrassed, because as long as he moved, the iron bucket in his hand would make a "clang clang" sound, which was obviously telling the Germans his location.

  Before departure, the platoon leader called several squad leaders together for a short meeting.

   "There are likely to be Germans near or on the opposite side of the river, so we should move separately!" Pukarev said: "The first team goes to this location, on the right side of the dormitory, the second team goes to the cafeteria, and the third team goes to the direction of the church!"

  Pukarev’s decision is of course correct. Crowding in one place to fetch water is just asking for trouble.

  The problem is...

   "But comrade platoon leader, where is the dormitory?" Shulka asked.

  Pukarev stared blankly at Shulka, and the other two monitors couldn't help laughing.

"God, Shulka!" Pukarev said, "Your head will not be blown up by the German shells, the dormitory... the place where we slept, although it is now a pile of ruins, but neither will you As for not knowing its location!"

   "Oh, yes, I know where it is!" Shulka lied, and the place where he usually sleeps should not be ignorant.

   "Let's go!" Pukarev ordered.

"yes!"

  Several squad leaders responded, and led their subordinates to advance along the traffic trench towards the target, but Shulka was stopped after only a few steps.

   "Where are you going, Shulka?" Pukarev asked angrily.

   "Get water, Comrade Platoon Leader!" Shulka replied.

   "But the dormitory is here!" Pukarev raised his head towards the traffic trench in the other direction, his face full of helplessness.

   "Oh, yes! Over here!" Shulka hurriedly led his subordinates to change directions.

Pukarev looked at the back of Shulka and his group leaving, and couldn't help but shook his head: "It's unbelievable, he is the one who blows up the enemy tank... Now it seems that he didn't throw the incendiary bomb on us. Lucky!"

In fact, Shulka asked Okunev to lead the way to find the dormitory. Okunev is used to this. He even believed that Shulka had a slight concussion during the battle or something that could not be seen on the surface. injury.

  After rushing to the dormitory, Shulka found that the situation was not good, because there were two searchlights on the other side of the river shining back and forth here, and there were faint conversations of some German soldiers.

   "There are Germans!" Matvey said: "This doesn't look like a suitable water point!"

   "We should change to another place!" Okunev agreed: "It's too dangerous here!"

  So several soldiers turned their attention to Shulka, but Shulka didn't seem to be listening to their discussion at all.

   "Comrade squad leader, comrade squad leader?" Okunev secretly nudged Shulka with his elbow.

   "What?" Shulka then brought his attention back.

   "We are discussing whether to change the place to get water!" Okunev said: "What do you think?"

   "Oh, yes, of course a different place!" Shulka replied.

   "Then..." Matvey said: "We should go down the river bank and look for loopholes in the German blockade!"

"I agree!"

"I agree!"

  …

  As I said before, Matvey is a veteran, and he has a considerable status in the army.

   "Comrade monitor!" Matvey asked, "Where's your order?"

   "Does any of you know where the Jurav shelter is?" Shulka asked.

   "Of course!" Matvey replied.

   "We should go there!" Shulka said.

   "Go there?" Matvey asked suspiciously: "But it's an abandoned air-raid shelter, and it's in the middle of the fortress, there won't be any water there!"

   "No, there is water!" Shulka replied.

  (end of this chapter)