USSR 1941

  Chapter 3 Firepower Preparation

   "Private!" The instructor objected: "I must remind you that we repelled the enemy at this distance just now..."

   "That was just a tentative attack by the enemy, Comrade Artur!" The major interrupted the instructor: "They are short of troops!"

  Since the major said so, the instructor dared not say anything more.

   "What's your name, Private?" The major turned his gaze to Shulka.

   "Uh, Shulka, Comrade Major!"

   "So, Shulka!" asked the major, "At what distance do you think we should fight the enemy?"

   "500 meters!" Shulka replied without thinking: "This is the longest range of the enemy's 50MM mortars, and their mortars and submachine guns can't work!"

  The major thought for a while, then nodded and said: "You are right, Shulka, I will consider this suggestion!"

   As he spoke, the major patted Shulka on the shoulder and left.

  The instructor glared at Shulka, as if he wanted to find some other excuse to punish Shulka, but he hesitated for a while and finally gave up.

  After the instructor left, the bearded man breathed a sigh of relief and said, "Do you know how lucky you are?"

   "What?" Shulka didn't understand what could be called lucky.

   "Delivering ammunition..." the bearded man said, "You will be the target of German planes immediately!"

  So Shulka understood that this is not the most dangerous place.

   After being stunned for a while, Shulka asked the bearded man in a low voice: "That major, who is he?"

  The reason why he asked in a low voice was because Shulka was worried that the major might be a very familiar person, and it would be strange to ask like this.

Fortunately, there was no abnormality on the face of the bearded man. He squatted on the ground and rolled tobacco with old newspapers, and replied casually: "The commander of the 44th regiment, Comrade Gavrilov, is the one who organized the troops to fight! "

  Hearing the name, Shulka's head exploded with a "boom".

  Shuerka has heard of this name in modern times, a legendary figure... When the other Soviet troops were defeated in the early days of the Soviet-German War, he led the remnants to hold on to the Brest Fortress for a month.

   "Is this the Brest Fortress?" Shulka asked again.

   At this time, the bearded man looked at Shulka in surprise.

   "I say, Comrade Shulka!" said the bearded man, "You won't even forget who I am!"

   Shulka did not know who the bearded man was.

But this is easy to explain, for example, the brain was injured by a shell, so Shulka soon knew that the bearded man was named Okunev, a fellow of Shulka, and they joined the army to receive training and became honorable an infantryman.

   As for Shulka himself...he can learn from the Red Army card.

  Shuerka took out the Soviet soldier's card from his jacket pocket. It was a booklet made of kraft paper, with a red five-pointed star printed on the first page.

  According to Okunev, a soldier will receive such a Soviet soldier certificate after completing basic training, and must carry it with him at all times.

   Open it casually, the first page is information such as name.

   Designation: 1st Infantry Battalion, 131st Regiment

  Military rank: Private

  …

  The strange thing is that the place where the photo should be posted is blank.

  Later, Shulka realized that this was actually quite normal... The management of the Soviet Army was chaotic, and many people had no conditions to take pictures during the war, and until the end of the war, there was still no guarantee that such documents would have photos.

  Shuerka stared at the soldier's card in a daze. He knew it was like a modern ID card, but it was hard to imagine that the ID card of this era would be so crude. It's no wonder that German spies could easily sneak into the Soviet army.

   What surprised Shulka even more was that he would exist in this capacity in the future, without any choice.

   Suddenly someone shouted: "Aircraft, air defense siren!"

  The ear-piercing air defense sirens sounded over the trenches soon, but before anyone else could react, the German "Stuka" bombers descended from above with their characteristic howls.

   There was another violent tremor, and then the German artillery fire joined the bombing ranks, and shock waves and heat waves rushed towards Shulka's position one after another.

   But Shulka's trench is not very dangerous.

As I said before, the German attack just now was fire reconnaissance, so they focused their bombing on a four-story building behind the trench... The Soviet army deployed many firepower points there, and even set up a few windows Mark used heavy machine guns and sandbags to transform it into a bunker, which obviously caused a lot of trouble for the German army.

   As a result, aerial bombs fell from the sky and slammed into the building, and there were many "bombs" that would not explode.

Later, Shulka realized that those were not bombs, but oil drums full of gasoline... At this time, the Luftwaffe did not have special incendiary bombs. In order to better blow up or burn buildings, they often threw them at the target. Take out the petrol cans and set them on fire with gunfire or bombs.

This approach is very effective, because a group of bright red flames burst out from the artillery fire, and the surrounding area of ​​​​the building was quickly plunged into a sea of ​​​​fire and thick smoke. The fire further ignited the combustible materials in the room and even detonated the ammunition stored by the Soviet army spread.

As a result, a hellish scene unfolded in front of Shulka: Soviet soldiers were ignited by flames everywhere upstairs and downstairs. They shouted hysterically, some ran, some jumped, and some Simply waving his arms full of flames and jumping off the stairs.

  They hoped to end their suffering in this way, but only some of them could achieve their goal...the floor was too low, and more people fell into a fiercer sea of ​​fire after jumping off the building.

  Some people seem to want to rush out of the sea of ​​fire, but this is obviously a waste of time. The flames are like demons entangled and tore them around, until they are dragged into endless pain and a bottomless abyss.

At this time, a "Stuka" swooped down with a sharp howling sound, and it accurately dropped an aerial bomb on the side of the building... The bomb passed through the wall from the second floor of the building and hit the ground hard. On the load-bearing beams on the first floor, Shulka could even see the splashing cement all around.

  With a loud "boom", flames erupted from the entire floor, wood chips, glass, and even the entire wooden door were blasted outwards.

  The building persisted for a while in the flames and thick smoke, like an old man who lost his crutches, trembling and shaking, and finally collapsed from bottom to top into a pile of ruins.

   "Get ready to fight!" The order came from the soldiers' mouths.

   Only then did Shulka realize that this bombing was actually what is often called "fire preparation."

  (end of this chapter)