Chapter 652 Death Bombing
The fact is exactly as Malashenko had guessed earlier. The German army, which was in an offensive deployment state, was temporarily disrupted by the Soviet surprise attack and counterattack in the early stage, but soon recovered. The subsequent main force deployed according to the previous offensive state went down like a flood, and attacked all the Soviet counterattack forces on the front line.
The German Air Force has been in action since the first Soviet artillery shell landed on the position and exploded.
The German Air Force, which was originally busy in the early morning to break through the last Soviet defense line in the suburbs of Stalingrad today, just caught up with the emergency situation of the front-line troops encountering the Soviet counterattack. This led to the embarrassing situation that Malashenko encountered an air strike within two minutes of driving the tank onto the German position, but for the German Air Force, it was just a simple matter of changing the target of attack.
Similarly, Zhukov, who served as the commander-in-chief of this counterattack, naturally anticipated that the Germans would inevitably use air superiority to launch a resolute counterattack, so he began to prepare early.
Stalingrad, located in the high latitudes of the northern hemisphere, gets up very early in the summer. At four o'clock in the morning, the sun is already high above the horizon, shining on the earth, the Soviet pilots and their shining war eagles, and the busy ground crew who are ready to go at the airport.
The Soviet fighter aviation, which arrived at the battlefield a little later than the German Air Force, did predict the situation correctly. The main counterattack directions marked with red circles on the map were full of dense German planes bombing.
Lieutenant Alekhin led his team to support the battle for air supremacy over the Malashenko theater, which was just a local microcosm.
The three army formations of the 24th, 1st Guards, and 66th that participated in the counterattack were all bombed by the German Air Force with the greatest intensity.
As Paulus requested, all the planes that could drop bombs were sent to the battlefield. The German Air Force's Fourth Air Force under Baron Richthofen dispatched thousands of aircraft to support the front-line ground battles in just one and a half hours.
They took off with bombs and dropped bombs immediately after landing on the battlefield. After dropping bombs, they immediately returned to the airport to replenish ammunition and fuel. During the short interval when the ground crew refueled and loaded the plane, they got off the plane to take a breath, drink some water and go to the toilet, and then immediately boarded the plane again to continue the same mission as before.
The German bomber pilots who had been working non-stop for a whole morning were almost exhausted to the ground. After three consecutive attacks, some of them fell to the ground with weak legs and needed the help of ground crew to stand up.
The desperate bombing of the German pilots did achieve impressive results.
The three Soviet army groups participating in the counterattack were all curbed in their respective offensive directions.
After bombing the Soviet ground forces in motion into pieces, the German Air Force, which had abundant manpower, immediately turned the nose of the plane and aimed at the Soviet artillery positions.
A few hours ago, Malashenko cursed fiercely and threatened to personally report to Comrade Lao Zhu the cowardly artillery regiment commander who planned to flee in advance, but judging from the subsequent developments, Malashenko will obviously never have this opportunity again.
The artillery regiment commander who was planning to escape as soon as possible before starting the artillery preparation was given special attention by the German Air Force. A formation of 12 Heinkel 111 bombers dropped all the black bombs loaded horizontally on the Soviet artillery who had not yet withdrawn from the position.
The powerful explosion of the bomb caused a chain reaction that detonated the artillery ammunition piled up next to the gun position and behind the position. The artillery regiment commander, who had just boarded the truck and had not yet shouted the order for the driver to drive immediately, was directly smashed through the front cab by a 250-kilogram bomb.
The low-drag bomb with strong gravitational acceleration had already killed the artillery commander who was cursed as a coward by Malashenko before it exploded.
The Soviet fighter aviation, which was still weaker than the German 4th Air Force, paid a painful and heroic price, but still could not stop the largest and most powerful strategic air force in the German Air Force. Zhukov tried his best to avoid being ridden on by the German Air Force and shitting on his head, but it finally happened mercilessly.
The battle that lasted until 12:30 noon finally ended with the German army's first ceasefire. The slowly retreating German army stopped less than two kilometers away from the Soviet army to eat lunch and replenish their physical strength. Malashenko, who was in the occupied starting position that was almost bombed into the moon surface by the German Air Force, was in a different situation.
Malashenko, who stretched his head out of the turret to observe the situation regardless of danger during the battle, had his tank cap gone, revealing a messy head.
Malashenko still doesn't know when and why his tank cap was lost.
Maybe it was blown away by the explosion of the bomb dropped by the German Air Force? Or maybe he accidentally bumped into something and knocked it off?
Malashenko didn't know the real reason, and he didn't want to think about it carefully.
With a half-burned cigarette between his fingers, Malashenko only knew that this morning's battle was probably the most intense battle he had fought since this year, not since he crossed over last year.
The only annoying thing was that the honorary title of the most intense battle did not belong to him, but was used to describe the group of Germans on the opposite side.
It was the first time that Malashenko had seen bombs falling like dumplings.
In just one morning, Malashenko estimated that there were at least 160 or 170 German planes flying over his head. In particular, there was a Stuka painted with the "Spade 17". Malashenko clearly remembered that this conspicuous German dive bomber flew back and forth over his head at least three times. Its arrogance was unmatched in the German Air Force this morning.
Reaching out to brush his messy, dusty hair that looked like a chicken coop, Malashenko, who felt like his head was about to explode, raised his head slightly with a cigarette butt in his mouth and looked ahead and around.
All he could see was a scorched earth scene. The wreckage of the German tanks and the Soviet tanks were burning at the same time, less than a meter away.
The wreckage of Soviet and German fighter planes that fell from the sky twisted and deformed in the flames, releasing billowing black smoke. The air under the scorching sun at noon was filled with a faint smell of burnt human flesh.