Chapter 120: The Call of Stalingrad
Yuri had never invested too much emotion in treating Olga. He still had more of a possessive feeling towards this woman. However, even so, after sending Olga away from the hospital, Yuri's mood inevitably became depressed. After all, the two had been together for so long, and even if there was no love between them, they had developed feelings for each other. When he thought that their fate ended here, it was unlikely for him to face it with a calm mood.
The drizzle outside the window was still falling. Yuri stood in front of the window, watching Olga and Demel leaving the hospital yard with umbrellas. He felt a sense of depression accumulating in his heart, which took a long time to dissipate.
Anyone who moves forward has to face many choices, and each choice means persistence in a certain pursuit and painful sacrifice. This process sounds plain, but in fact it is full of pain and helplessness.
Now, Yuri has made a choice for his future. He has a goal to pursue persistently, so naturally he has to make some sacrifices. The connection with Olga is just the beginning.
This drizzle in Moscow didn't seem to be stopping any time soon. It kept falling until 3 o'clock in the afternoon. The rain didn't get heavier, it was just sparse, but the sky seemed to be getting darker.
After lunch, Yuri took a nap. At 3 o'clock, the doctor who came to check him woke him up. After a careful examination, the doctor told him that he was in good health and would recover quickly. Perhaps in about half a month, he would be able to recover and be discharged from the hospital.
This review was not included in the hospital's plan, so Yuri understood that there must be some new arrangements made by the Supreme Command or the General Staff. The bigwigs above needed to understand his recovery status in order to make subsequent decisions.
Although Yuri did not want to return to the army at this complicated time of the war, he hoped to wait for half a month to a month, and then return to the army after the situation in Stalingrad became clear. But at this time, he could not continue to stay in the hospital. At least, he needed to express his stance.
Therefore, after the review, Yuri submitted an application for discharge directly to the hospital, clearly stating that since his injuries were no longer serious, he hoped that the hospital would approve his discharge and return to the army.
The hospital did not respond to his application that day - this was normal because the Moscow State Hospital was only responsible for providing him with treatment but had no power to decide whether he should stay or go.
The next morning, Yuri's ward welcomed another guest. However, unlike the previous times, this time the guest was not his acquaintance, let alone his friend or classmate, but the highest person in charge of the General Political Department, Director of the Political Department Comrade Alexander Sergeyevich Sherbakov.
Comrade Sherbakov, who is just in his early forties, is full of energy and passion for the political construction of the Soviet national army. Since he succeeded Comrade Mehlis as Director of the General Political Department a month ago, he has been trying to make some breakthroughs based on his predecessor's work, preferably to come up with something refreshing.
At this time, bad news came from the southern front. After the Battle of Kharkov, the Soviet army on the southern front seemed to have been broken. Facing a series of offensives by the Germans, news of defeat came from all fronts. Voronezh, the Don River, the Volga River, the North Caucasus, every direction seemed to be collapsing. The Soviet defense lines collapsed one after another. The German army was unstoppable and had already spread the war to Stalingrad and the North Caucasus. More than half of Voronezh was also lost.
Comrade Stalin and the Supreme Command led were extremely dissatisfied with this and asked the General Staff and the General Political Department to come up with a plan to stop the Soviet army's defeat on all fronts in the south.
Although Comrade Sherbakov was a little stubborn and did not have much creative talent, he also had his own advantages, that is, he was good at memory and often learned from others. When Comrade Stalin proposed at the working meeting of the General Political Department to give full play to the role of political commissars in the army and stop the army from retreating, Comrade Sherbakov suddenly had an idea and remembered the method Yuri had used in the 34th Brigade: set up a special anti-retreat squad to stop the soldiers from retreating with hard means.
Of course, due to his cautious nature, Comrade Sherbakov did not immediately respond to this proposal. He hoped to find Yuri and understand the effect that the anti-retreat team could achieve. In other words, he hoped to first understand whether this thing actually worked, and if so, how it worked specifically.
In Yuri's ward, Sherbakov had a deep talk with Yuri, who was recovering from his injuries. Yuri agreed with the General Political Department's plan to set up an anti-retreat team.
Recently, according to the news from various sources, Yuri also learned about a series of problems that the troops were facing, and among these problems, there were two main serious ones: First, after the early winter counter-offensive and the subsequent summer offensive that proved to be a failure, the Soviet front-line troops with rich combat experience suffered heavy losses, and most of the newly added troops were composed of new recruits. These troops composed of new recruits lack combat experience. Before they were sent to the front line, they often only experienced 2-3 weeks of combat training, and did not receive corresponding discipline training. For troops like this, if the battle is going well, they can fight to the death with morale support, but once the battle is unfavorable, they can easily be defeated by a fierce offensive of the German army.
Second, the victory of the Moscow counterattack campaign made Zhukov famous, and at the same time, the strategies and tactics he respected were also highly respected. Now, almost every commander can talk about the idea of the great depth strategy. The atmosphere is like the Soviet army does not need to fight, but only needs to retreat blindly, and can use the advantage of great depth to wear down the German army. To what extent is this idea harmful? In Voronezh, a battalion-level commander arbitrarily ordered his troops to withdraw from the battle without the consent of any higher command department. When he was sent to the front-line military court , the commander actually said plausibly that he was saving his troops in order to launch a counterattack against the exhausted German army on a deeper line of defense.
In fact, in addition to these two reasons, Yuri believes that there is another reason that is causing the current passive situation of the Soviet army, that is, after entering late June, the Supreme Command has changed the subordinate relationship of the various troops on the southern front too frequently. The left wing of the Bryansk Front was reorganized into the Voronezh Front, the Southern Front was reorganized into the Southeastern Front, the Southwestern Front was transformed into the Stalingrad Front, and then the Stalingrad Front was transformed into the Don Front, and the Southeastern Front was transformed into the Stalingrad Front... An army group may belong to this front today, and be transferred to that front tomorrow, and it may be transferred to another front the day after tomorrow.
Frequent transitions like this have made many commanders exhausted. They are busy all day long getting familiar with the new leadership organization, but they do not have more time to get familiar with and master their own troops. As a result, when they are involved in battle, many commanders cannot effectively command their troops.
This frequent change in the command of troops seemed to indicate that the Supreme Command was busy deploying troops. In fact, it also showed that the top Soviet leaders lacked foresight about the movements of the German army. With relatively limited forces, they had to be led by the German offensive.
Of course, Yuri would never express such ideas in front of Sherbakov, so he only emphasized the first two points. With these two points as support, it became necessary to issue corresponding anti-retreat orders and set up a special retreat team.
During the conversation with Sherbakov, Yuri also roughly moved the content of the so-called Order 227 that he had seen in his previous life. According to the content of this order, he suggested that this anti-retreat action, especially the formation of an anti-retreat squad, should take into account the troops at all levels of the front-line operations. From the front-line headquarters, the front headquarters, the army headquarters, to the army, division, brigade, regiment, battalion, and all levels of grassroots combat units should have corresponding anti-retreat measures.
Of course, the punishment measures taken against soldiers who retreat without authorization cannot be a one-size-fits-all approach. They cannot be taken out and shot without any reason. Instead, they should be divided according to the severity of the problem. For those whose problems are not very serious, education should be the main approach, while for those who have lost their weapons, punishment should be the main approach. Only those who truly flee because of cowardice and have a bad impact on the battle should be shot.
Comrade Sherbakov listened carefully throughout the conversation and even took notes at certain critical points.
Discussing the counter-retreat plan with Sherbakov was not Yuri's meddling in other people's affairs, but rather a display of his talents. He hoped that through this conversation, he could tell some people that he not only had the talent to command troops, but also the ability to do political work.
First there was an application for discharge from the hospital, and then there was a deep conversation with Sherbakov. These two events together obviously accelerated Yuri's return to the army.
On August 8, the weather in Moscow was very good, with the sun shining brightly and the sky cloudless. The radio was reporting the successful landing of the US Navy on the Japanese-occupied Guadalcanal Islands. Yuri, who was smoking in his bedroom, received a certificate of recovery from the hospital. At the same time, he also received the latest appointment notice from the General Staff.
The notice was issued by Comrade Zhukov himself. It contained two parts: the first part was the good news. Yuri had been promoted to major general by decision of the Supreme Command, but the promotion ceremony had been postponed because there was no time to hold it. The second part was the appointment. The General Staff required him to rush to Stalingrad before the 14th to take over the post of deputy commander of the 62nd Army. Among the people working with him were Comrade Vasily Ivanovich Chuikov, who had just been transferred from the 64th Army and was the commander of the 62nd Army, and Comrade Nikolai Ivanovich Krylov, who was the chief of staff of the army.
