Chapter 136 Guderian's Failure

From the perspective of Guderian, the director of the German armored forces, Hitler's request was undoubtedly extremely excessive and almost impossible. It could even be said that it was equivalent to asking Guderian to personally create a miracle that seemed impossible.

Not only did his request not get met, but Hitler also imposed unreasonable demands and orders on him with a little bit of petty profit. Guderian felt that Hitler's actions were likely to cause an irreparable disaster, so he immediately decided to continue to argue with Hitler.

"My Führer, the Russian tanks are far beyond our preconceived limits in terms of quality and quantity. Those new T34 medium tanks and KV series heavy tanks are far beyond all our equipment of the same type. Although I am unwilling to admit it, it is an indisputable fact that those Russian tanks are better than our German ones."

"It is still a long way to go before the new tanks that can surpass the Russian tanks are finalized and put into production. Our armored forces can only continue to add new tanks to the front line so that the total number of our tanks can match that of the Russians! Otherwise, the double disadvantages in quality and quantity cannot be compensated by the courage of German soldiers!"

Hitler thought that his summary speech had played a decisive role, but he did not expect Guderian's reaction to be so intense that he even stood up and argued with him.

Feeling more and more that his face was a little bit embarrassed in front of so many subordinates, Hitler, whose tone gradually began to be mixed with the smell of gunpowder, simply began to seriously argue with Guderian.

"Guderian, I have something to tell you first! Before I set out to hold this meeting, I had already met Dr. Ferdinand Porsche in Berlin in private."

"Dr. Porsche promised me personally that the new tank he designed is several times stronger than the Russian tractors. Henschel's design has been submitted for bidding review. We now have double insurance! From a long-term perspective, our armored forces are undoubtedly more advantageous!"

Hitler, who was spitting, was a little too excited at the moment. His special liking for tanks made the high-handed and racist German leader unable to tolerate the slightest boast of the superiority of the Soviet armored forces.

"Besides, Guderian, if I knew that the number of Russian tanks was really the same as what you said in your book, I believe I would not have started this war!"

The book that Hitler referred to was actually a book on armored forces written and published by Guderian in 1937 - "Attention! Tanks! 》

In this book, Guderian, who has his own unique and rigorous views on armored forces, pointed out the strength of the Soviet armored forces and believed that the Soviet tanks pursued large-scale production during wartime and even reduced some quality design ideas, which was very suitable for the needs of large-scale wars that might break out in the future.

Guderian, who conducted a long and in-depth investigation of the Soviet armored forces, pointed out in the book that the number of tanks owned by the Soviet armored forces in 1937 may have reached 10,000.

Guderian's argument caused a great sensation and earthquake-like effect among the German high-ranking officials at the time. A number of senior German army generals, including Beck, the then Chief of the German Army General Staff, raised serious doubts about Guderian's argument, and even almost caused Guderian's book "Attention! Tanks!" to fail to be published and distributed in Germany.

Judging from the size and industrial capacity of Germany's own armored forces in 1937, it is incredible that the Soviet armored forces, which had just started to develop in tank design with the help of early German tank designers during the Soviet-German honeymoon in 1930, could achieve the miracle of "students surpassing their masters" in such a short period of a few years.

In fact, whether it is the scale of Soviet tanks encountered by the German front-line troops after the launch of Operation Barbarossa, or the declassified data on the specific number of armored forces of the Soviet and German armies during World War II in later generations.

In 1937, the total number of combat tanks of various types owned by the Soviet army was about 70,000, which greatly exceeded Guderian's conservative and vague estimate of about 10,000, and was geometrically far superior to the size of the German armored forces at the same time.

But even when the Soviet-German War officially started, Guderian's seemingly absurd argument was confirmed by the Soviet army's seemingly increasing and inexhaustible steel torrent.

Whether it was Hitler himself, or the political and military advisory group around him, or even some of the senior German generals in the German General Staff who surrounded Hitler and gave him advice.

He selectively ignored the massive number of tanks in the hands of the Soviet army, which far exceeded his own estimates, with the "ostrich policy".

The reason for this was that the German high-level officials and even Hitler's advisory group were arrogant and believed that the strength of the Soviet army was actually vulnerable to the powerful German blitzkrieg offensive. Even with such a large number of tanks, it could only delay the death of the Bolshevik regime slightly. In short, it was insignificant and a waste of effort.

On the other hand, a considerable number of German military and political high-level figures had the problem of currying favor with the powerful and actively catering to Hitler's subjective wishes.

When Hitler, who was surrounded by these nice words all day long, heard too many of these "auspicious words", it was self-evident what kind of result the increasingly arrogant and arrogant German leader would have when he first heard Guderian's counter-advocate.

Knowing that the comparison of the number of enemy and our tanks on the front line was not optimistic, Hitler once again chose to ignore Guderian's frank advice.

Guderian, who fulfilled his due responsibilities, ultimately failed to persuade Hitler to believe in himself and change his existing views. The catastrophic consequences of these senior leaders' selective ignoring and escaping of the "ostrich policy" will be paid for by the German soldiers fighting bloody battles on the front line in the future.

This front-line combat meeting ended in a quarrel between Hitler and Guderian over the issue of armored forces, and ended unhappily.

Hitler, who thought Guderian was exaggerating, returned home with a grudge, while Guderian, who lamented that he was powerless to change the status quo, was thinking alone about the next combat action.

"In any case, even if the operational plan of the General Staff Headquarters is changed, the preparations for the 2nd Panzer Group to launch an attack in the direction of Moscow must be completed as soon as possible."