Volume 1: Empire's Last Rays Chapter 16: War Fires Rekindled
Each army has its own relatively fixed combat pattern, and the Soviet Army is no exception. After the bombing ended, the shells of the Soviet artillery came with a similar whistling sound, and the village and surrounding positions naturally became the area that was subjected to concentrated attacks. The buildings in the village, which were basically intact before the bombing, gradually turned into ruins under the intense bombardment and continuous shelling of the Soviet army. The German military flag that was originally flying on the flagpole also disappeared in the artillery fire. The village, along with a large area around it, was filled with the glow of explosions and thick smoke, and not a single person could be seen!
The bombardment lasted for nearly half an hour before it finally ended. Such a resolute artillery barrage, the Soviet command was obviously seeking revenge for their own T-34s and combat personnel being slaughtered. Following the Soviet army's attacking habits, as soon as the cannon fire stopped, the sound of officers' slogans rose from the surrounding positions around the village. With "Butcher" by his side, Lin En didn't need to worry about his role and position in the battle, while these withdrawn soldiers were considered external personnel for this defensive area. After waiting for a short while, a young lieutenant officer ran along the trench, wearing the insignia of the SS "Nordland" division on his uniform. Seeing Lin En and the four dirty guys, the lieutenant temporarily stopped in his tracks, identified "Butcher" as the highest-ranking officer, hastily and loudly gave a few orders, pointing with his right hand towards the woods outside the trench. "Butcher" nodded twice without showing any emotion, then calmly said another sentence, the lieutenant pointed left-handedly in the direction he had come from before hurrying away.
"Follow me!"
Because of the similar pronunciation to "follow me", Lin En barely understood another sentence. He hastily followed behind the "butcher" and walked north along the trench for a distance, then saw a turning point where an officer wearing a cloth military cap was distributing ammunition to passing soldiers. Depending on whether the soldier carried a rifle or submachine gun, he would take out bullets wrapped in cowhide paper from two different boxes, but not one package at a time, rather opening them and distributing some to each person. Behind him was another wooden box containing German signature long-handled hand grenades, with submachine gunners receiving two each and riflemen receiving either one or none at all.
It wasn't until Lynn walked closer that he noticed the quartermaster was standing on a wooden ammunition box, and his actual height might not even be over 1.6 meters.
A "butcher" walked up, and the quartermaster had only grabbed a handful of bullets to give him, but the "butcher" said something to him, and this short officer stared at him for three or four seconds before reluctantly grabbing three slightly larger and two smaller cowhide paper packages from two boxes beside him and "dumping" them into his cupped hands. Next, he took out four hand grenades from a box behind him, and the tall soldier with Lin En hurried up to stretch out his hand, still smiling on his face, before the quartermaster reluctantly handed over the hand grenades to him.
Although he didn't say anything to his face, when he turned around and left, the butcher's complexion looked very bad. Another companion who was waiting in place quickly picked out three slightly larger cowhide paper packages from his arms, and the "butcher" smoothly put the two remaining ones into his pocket, took a hand grenade from his companion and inserted it into his waistband, muttered a sentence, then walked forward with a cold face.
Two companions did not speak, they quietly divided the remaining three packets of ammunition and three hand grenades. This was Lin's first time touching a hand grenade, but in this situation he had no mind to play with it, and simply inserted it into his waistband. The whole packet of bullets felt heavy in his hands, actually Lin had seen such paper packages on the first day, each package should have fifty rifle or submachine gun bullets. At the front line, he hadn't even received more than thirty rounds at a time, nor did he know what "Butcher" said to that military supply officer-like guy. However, fifty rounds of ammunition didn't make Lin feel like he had become rich, after all, it was unknown when they would receive their next ammunition resupply.
Having obtained the ammunition, "Butcher" walked back with his head down, almost to the position where they had previously avoided bombing and shelling. He found a relatively narrow place in the trench, put his hands on the edge of the trench, and stepped on the walls of the trench one after another, borrowing force, and easily climbed up. The movement was not affected at all by the injury to his left hand. Lin En and the other two followed suit, each carrying a Mauser rifle and a "PPSh", but their movements were a bit more clumsy when climbing out of the trench.
Leaving the trenches, the four of them soon arrived at the edge of the small woods pointed out by the lieutenant. Five or six soldiers with steel helmets were using fresh branches to conceal their quadruple-mounted machine guns. The slope on the side of the woods facing the village was about the size of a badminton court, and the top of the slope was about two meters above the ground. Upon climbing to the top of the slope, it became apparent that the woods were actually smaller than imagined, with fewer than one hundred tall and short pine and fir trees combined, occupying only this small hill. Several shells from the Soviet artillery fire landed here, blasting several fir and pine trees at their roots. Due to the humid environment, the cannon fire did not ignite other trees, leaving behind charred craters that could barely serve as foxholes.
Looking around, within a three-kilometer radius of the village, there are many such small hills and groves (East Prussia is mainly hilly terrain). Facing the powerful modern weapons, these hills and woods have no geographical advantage. As long as the Soviets were willing to spend some time, they could completely use T-34 or heavy tanks to crush trees and climb to the top of the slope!
Under the leadership of "Butcher", Lin En and others each found a foxhole to guard, and they were not far apart from each other. Putting down their guns and backpacks, "Butcher" took out a shovel to reinforce his new position - he held the handle with his right hand, and his injured left hand was pressed against the blade of the shovel at the base of his palm, using his feet to apply force on the upper part of the shovel when digging. The strong and serious attitude drove the three "lazy eggs" who were originally going to make do with this. Knowing that "Butcher" had a stubborn personality, the three of them didn't go up to help him, but instead each exerted themselves to dig deeper into their foxholes and build a low wall on the east side. They didn't have time to complete this small project before the Soviet artillery shells came again, although the first few rounds were heading straight for the village's front line position, the four of them quickly hid their heads and bodies in the foxhole, only occasionally sticking out their eyes to observe the changes in the battlefield situation.
The subsequent artillery bombardment by the Soviet army seemed to be only for the purpose of distracting the defenders, with a much weaker intensity and density than before, but the shells were relatively concentrated, and the village and the front-line trenches were once again shrouded in the smoke of gunfire.
He gradually got used to the "thunder and lightning" scene on the battlefield, and also summarized the different sounds made by the flying shells at a distance. Lin En was able to face such artillery fire with more ease. The hill 3 kilometers ahead was where he almost lost his life, and it was also the only way to come to this village from the east. In addition to keeping an eye on that place, Lin En also took a look around the village. As he thought, the German defensive troops were not always fixed in a certain position. Anticipating the enemy's ground attack was about to start, several "bushes" came alive - two groups of German soldiers pushed anti-tank guns from the side and rear of the village along the edge of the forest towards the front, trying to get closer to the attacking position. One group moved forward from the back of the village until they were ambushed in the ruins. In addition, several artillery teams did not change their positions, but rather had soldiers hiding in trenches or forests return to their posts. Among them was the "tank opener", the famous German Pak 41/43 type 88mm cannon!
It was known that at least seven tanks and assault guns were deployed on this line, and seeing so many anti-tank guns, Lin felt a sense of security. He thought that the previous defensive firepower on the front line was also very strong, but it needed to defend a wide front of several tens of kilometers, and the terrain was relatively open, making the defensive situation even worse than this small village. Moreover, the battlefield mobility performance of tanks and assault guns had a very positive significance for the defense war, let alone two of them being German "Tiger" tanks?
Under the manipulation of experienced German artillerymen, the position adjustment of the three anti-tank guns was quickly in place. One of them was placed behind a quadruple machine gun, less than thirty meters away from Lynn. At this distance, Lynn could clearly see the gunners fixing the gun mount, adjusting the muzzle, and taking out long-pointed shells from square wooden ammunition boxes. In the late stage of World War II, the German army had many types of anti-tank guns, including self-developed ones, those captured from the Soviet army, and modified French cannons. However, they still had distinct differences in appearance. Based on his memory of pictures and the length of the gun barrel and shell size of this artillery piece in front of him, Lynn judged that it was a German-made 75mm anti-tank gun, and it was likely to be a late model - the reason was also very reliable: during this period, good weapons produced by Germany were mostly allocated to the SS for use.
The bombardment lasted for over ten minutes, with more than a thousand shells falling, and it seemed that many of them were rocket projectiles. Just as Lynn was not paying much attention, the Soviet artillery fire clearly "took care" of the front area of the German position, which is usually where minefields are laid. As the Soviet tanks appeared in sight, the cannon fire gradually subsided, matching perfectly, with a very tacit understanding.
This time, the Soviet tanks that first climbed up the hill were still the familiar T-34s to Lin. They formed a loose horizontal formation, with combat infantry in white cloaks following closely behind. Then some "new faces" appeared on the hill. Their shape was somewhat similar to the "rhinoceros beetle" in the insect world, with a huge body topped with an oversized head, and an oversized head protruding a long cannon barrel that looked extremely out of proportion, plus an oversized muzzle brake, making people feel like it would tip over forward when going downhill.
Seeing these guys who are obviously bigger than the T-34, Lin En couldn't help but take a cold breath: The IS-2 heavy tank named after Joseph Stalin, the commander-in-chief of the Soviet army, was the most powerful land ace in World War II! Some people regard it as the terminator of the German Tiger tank, and even call it "Tiger Hunter". Its 122mm tank gun can overpower the Tiger's 88mm cannon in terms of firepower. Its excellent defensive capabilities and superior mobility have given it an unstoppable "killer" position!
