Chapter 421 Caucasus (9)

Rokossovsky just listened to the matter of peace. It was not something that he should get involved in at his level. Zhukov told him that it was a very interesting move, which showed that in the eyes of the other party, he was "one of his own" - a person of Polish descent. It is more important to him than anything else. But he had some hesitations and difficulties regarding the requirements of the Stalingrad Blockade, because neither of the two tasks assigned to him by Zhukov could be completed easily:

First, let the 24th, 63rd, and 69th armies alternately cover the retreat, quickly retreat to Stalingrad, lure the Manstein Group to pursue it, and attract it to the outskirts of the city;

Second, use a relatively weak force to defend Stalingrad, and use urban street fighting and terrain advantages to fight the enemy for attrition - you can no longer fight with a battle loss ratio of 1:4 or 1:5. You need to display fearless heroism and play 1: 1. It must be at least a battle loss ratio of 1:2.

"Comrade Rokossovsky, I believe you can complete this arduous task. This ability has been demonstrated in the defense of Moscow. Now the party and the country need you to demonstrate this ability again." Zhukov said sincerely .

"The first requirement is difficult to fulfill." Rokossovsky said in embarrassment. "If I make up my mind now to let the 24th and 69th Army Groups stay in place and only let the 63rd Army Group retreat, the Army Group will be sure to be intact. But if the three armies retreat together, no one will be able to escape in the end.”

"I don't expect them to escape - this is the bait I threw to Manstein. I used three armies to lure him to Stalingrad. If you follow your method, you will only lose two armies at most, but the enemy They will not necessarily attack across the Don River - they are very timid now."

"Without three armies, I only have less than 200,000 troops..." he exclaimed.

"I will draw a group army from each of the Southwest Front Army and the Stalingrad Front Army to supplement it for you. In addition, the troops remaining in the city will also be under your command, so that we can quickly restore to 400,000 people."

"This alone won't work. 400,000 troops are not enough. Even if the city is defended, Manstein cannot be eliminated. The Germans may be close to 600,000."

"But it can consume the strength of the Germans. The enemy is expected to lose 40,000 to 50,000 troops when encircling and annihilating three armies in the first step. When attacking Stalingrad, you will have to cause at least 150,000 enemy casualties."

"Then Manstein still has at least 400,000 troops left, and I don't have any troops at all. This can't change the overall situation."

"Don't worry about this. I have prepared a huge reserve force." Zhukov walked to the map and told the whole plan. "I have secretly mobilized the Steppe Front Army and the Transbaikal Front Army. They will enter during the Battle of Stalingrad." The climax occurs when both the enemy and the enemy are exhausted.”

Rokossovsky soon understood Zhukov's intention: the German army used the Hot Cluster to contain the Bryansk Front and the Southwest Front, and used the Kleist Cluster to contain the Stalingrad Front and the Caucasus Front. Not only did Zhukov He has no intention of changing this situation. On the contrary, he will condone the suppression of the four fronts by the two wings of the German army, so that Manstein can press forward with confidence and boldness.

"Deploying a total of 6-7 group armies with strong combat effectiveness from the 4 front armies will not cause fundamental damage to their strength. On the contrary, it will make the suppression of the two wings more realistic. I will supply 2 of the group armies to you first, so that The Don Front will regain its strength as soon as possible and join the battle to defend Stalingrad. You must hold on in this city until at least the end of May."

Zhukov's strategy was very clear: he planned to use four fronts to contain Manstein's two wings, use the Don Front and the city of Stalingrad to lure Manstein into taking the bait, and let Rokossovsky assume the first position. Two months later, he would use the new Steppe Front and Transbaikal Front to surround Manstein, and launch a full-scale counterattack with the Don Front.

In terms of military strength, he used about 700,000 troops on the left to contain Holt, and on the right he used 700,000 to 750,000 troops to contain Kleist. In the middle, he first gave 200,000 to Manstein in exchange for 50,000 German casualties, and then Let Rokossovsky spend another 300,000 in the city defense battle and Manstein's 150,000 to 200,000, so that the German Army in China will only have 400,000 left (it has been considered that the German army will replenish 50,000 during the battle) . Then at this time, Zhukov once again invested 450,000 in the Steppe Front and 350,000 in the Transbaikal Front, and then added the campaign reserves of the four armies to the Don Front, restoring Rokossovsky's strength to about 400,000. The plan is to use 1.2 million to crush Manstein's 400,000, and strive to use 600,000 losses to kill the Germans' 250,000 to 300,000.

"After this, the time will enter summer, and Manstein's center army will have only 150,000-200,000 troops left and can only retreat. Once the German army retreats, we will have an advantage of about 600,000 troops in the center, regardless of pressure. Either to the left or to the right, you can win."

Rokossovsky secretly calculated that if he carried out this plan, he would have to undertake the heaviest and most arduous task: first, he would use the bait of three armies to lure Manstein into taking the bait; second, he would use 40 A weak force of 10,000 troops held Stalingrad and weakened the German army, buying time for the mobilization and deployment of the Steppe Front and the Transbaikal Front. Third, in the later stages of the campaign, it was necessary to coordinate with the two newly-joined fronts to launch a counterattack. If any one of the three links goes wrong, the overall campaign goal will be impossible to achieve.

Rokossovsky agreed with the intention of the overall plan and clearly understood the core of the tactics: using the urban defense system to hold back and consume the German army. The Red Army is currently not an opponent in field battles, but this is not necessarily the case in street fighting and close-range warfare. However, he believed that there was another key factor that had not been taken into consideration, so he said: "What if, I mean what if... Manstein eats my three armies and doesn't come to attack Stalingrad?"

"This is where I feel most unsure." Zhukov was also very honest. "Think about it, if you were in Manstein's position, what kind of temptation and stimulation would be needed to make you want to occupy this city.”

"It's hard, unless..."

"Unless what?"

"Let's give him half or even most of the city first, so that he can think that he can win here without paying a heavy price." Rokossovsky said with a bitter smile, "In this case, you can't take those two armies first To supply me, I can only defend it with 200,000 or less troops."

"This..." Zhukov hesitated, "It doesn't matter if you let him out. As long as the Germans can be eliminated, I can give him the entire city. But 200,000 troops have to face a 600,000-strong army. Can you hold on?" "

"I definitely can't hold on." Rokossovsky replied helplessly, "So you can't let the Germans seal the encirclement. You have to send people to send reinforcements to us - whenever I can't hold on anymore, you Just send me reinforcements from an army group to make the Germans think that they can kill us if they add more force."

"I will definitely try my best to support you, but who do you plan to let to cooperate with you in this arduous task? This must be someone you can highly trust. Your honor and life, and the success or failure of the entire campaign, all depend on this invisible front commander. ”

Rokossovsky said nothing.

At first, Zhukov thought that the other party was thinking deeply and asked again, but he did not hear a follow-up answer for a long time. When he looked away from the map, he found that Rokossovsky was only looking at him and did not leave for a long time - -The meaning is obvious. The only person the other party trusts and can entrust is yourself. Zhukov couldn't help but laugh: "Since you believe in me so much, I will happily accept this invitation."

"But what about the coordination of the overall battle situation?"

"Comrade Vasilevsky is asked to take charge of the overall situation." However, when he said this, Zhukov's brows couldn't help but jump: the entire campaign concept had not yet been agreed upon with Vasilevsky, who had different views. , it is still unknown whether Stalin can pass here. There are still many places to communicate, but the withdrawal of the first batch of baits-the three group armies can no longer be delayed.

He gritted his teeth and made up his mind: "You go ahead and arrange the retreat of the three armies. Don't worry about Moscow. I will communicate well."

"Can you give me 200 more tanks?"

"I can only give you 100 more vehicles."

When they shook hands and said goodbye, both of them looked solemn - their futures and futures were now completely linked.

As soon as Rokossovsky's dispatch order was issued, the three armies immediately retreated towards the Don River as quickly as possible. Manstein keenly captured this change and reported to the Hoffmannhui: "Look at this posture, Russia People really want us to fight Stalingrad."

Hoffman nodded: "Yes, they have been looking forward to us attacking this city. They were disappointed when we didn't attack there last year - because they knew we couldn't attack there. Not only would we not be able to attack, we would also suffer heavy losses."

Manstein looked at Hoffman and said seriously: "Führer, this joke is not funny at all."

"I'm not kidding. Seriously, we can't defeat the Russian megacities, Moscow, Leningrad, Stalingrad."

"This..." Manstein was speechless after being refuted, because what the head of state listed was all facts, so he finally had to say, "At least we won Kiev and Minsk..."

"But those are not Russians, they are Ukrainians, Belarusians... It seems that none of the real, purely Russian big cities have been captured."

"Okay..." Manstein sighed, "Where are these three armies?"

"Since the Russians gave us food, of course we can't be polite - the retreating enemy is much easier to fight than squatting in the fortifications." Hoffman waved his hand and said lightly, "Try to take a week to deal with them."