Chapter 147 Regaining Trust
Yuri's words were actually a direct rebuttal to Khrushchev's words. Given Khrushchev's personality, if someone spoke to him like that, he would definitely be obviously displeased, even if he would not fly into a rage . But strangely, when Yuri finished speaking, the committee member not only did not get angry, but instead nodded with a smile, approving Yuri's rebuttal. At the same time, he said, "This is the starting point for your Kursk battle plan, right? Very good, that's good."
Yuri was stunned. He did not know that Rokossovsky had recommended this battle plan to Stalin, nor did he know that in the past period of time, facing the increasingly passive situation in Kharkov, Rokossovsky had called Stalin four times and stubbornly recommended this battle plan.
Of course, Yuri also didn't know that as the situation in Kharkov deteriorated, Stalin's attitude was also changing. When he calmed down, the leader suddenly realized that the trend of the war was moving forward step by step according to Yuri's original proposal. Kharkov was indeed undefendable. The German offensive in this direction was very fierce. After paying a heavy price, the Voronezh Front was forced to evacuate the city two days ago.
Since the Germans did not have an absolute advantage in this direction, the Soviets were able to withdraw and regroup in the Oboyan area to consolidate their defenses. Due to logistical problems, the Germans were weak and could not pose a greater threat to the Soviets' new defenses.
In the Southwestern Front's theater of operations, the main forces of the Ninth Army were mostly annihilated, and the Ninth Tank Army suffered heavy losses. The tanks of the army's subordinate units lost up to 60%, and almost lost their combat effectiveness. The 69th Army also lost more than half of its troops and was forced to abandon Belgorod. However, in Volchansk, the 69th Army, supported by the 17th Army, successfully repelled the German offensive and finally stabilized the defense line.
At the beginning, Yuri had proposed to Stalin to withdraw troops from Kharkov, abandon most of the territory liberated in the Kharkov offensive, build a defense line from Volchansk to Bogodukhov, and gather heavy troops in the Oboyan area. At that time, Stalin rejected Yuri's proposal, but now looking back, the German offensive still stayed on the Volchansk-Bogodukhov line, but the difference is that the Soviet army suffered much greater losses than if it had retreated voluntarily.
This reality made Stalin realize that although Yuri was young and had never served in the General Staff before, he was qualified and fully capable of being the Chief of Operations. In this position, he was at least much better than Antonov.
A leader naturally has a leader's mind. After intuitively recognizing Yuri's ability, Stalin would never continue to negate Yuri's role because of the previous unpleasantness. In addition to Rokossovsky's previous recommendation, Stalin decided to give the task of defensive planning of the Kursk salient to Yuri. At the same time, if the direction of the situation is consistent with Yuri's previous inference, Stalin is also prepared to give the planning of the Battle of Kursk to Yuri.
The leader recognized Yuri's ability, but would never apologize to him for the previous unpleasantness. Therefore, Stalin needed to show his trust in Yuri in another way, which was to appoint Yuri as the "Supreme Command Headquarters Representative" to go to the Kursk salient to coordinate and arrange the defense line deployment of the Central Front and the Voronezh Front.
The representative of the Supreme Command Headquarters is a status rather than a position. People with this status are basically high-level military commanders. They act in the name of the headquarters, and the headquarters grants them full authority to solve practical problems in important combat areas on the spot.
In the past, most of the people who had been awarded this status were military leaders with a certain status in the General Staff. Now, Yuri has obtained this status at the age of less than 30 years old, which directly shows that Stalin has given him a high trust - less than 30 years old, less than 30 years old, this is very important, important things only need to be said twice.
Khrushchev knew the news in advance, so he was very proud. After all, he recommended Yuri. Whether it was in the minds of ordinary military generals or the main political leaders of the Soviet Union, even Stalin, they all had this recognition. Since the outbreak of the Soviet-German War, Khrushchev had been jumping up and down for so long. With Yuri, he finally drove a nail into the army, and it was a very important nail. How could he not be proud of such a gain?
Because of this, Khrushchev now likes Yuri even more. Even if Yuri talks back to him a little, he doesn't care. In his opinion, it's nothing.
After standing in the corridor with a few people for a while, footsteps were heard, and then Zhukov appeared outside the door of Office No. 1.
"Comrade Yuri, Comrade Stalin invites you in," Zhukov said after looking around the door for a moment, finally looking at Yuri with a calm expression.
Yuri saluted him expressionlessly, then turned around and walked towards the office door.
"It is hard to pinpoint a specific person as to who is responsible for the situation in Kharkov, Comrade Yuri Arkhipovich," Zhukov said in a low voice as the two men passed each other, "so some issues should not be pursued too much."
In this speech, Zhukov used a more formal address, rather than the address of a superior to a subordinate. Yuri understood his meaning immediately, so he paused and nodded vigorously.
Seeing him nod, not only Zhukov, but also Vasilevsky, Vatutin and Golikov, all breathed a sigh of relief.
Unlike the last time, there was no smoke in Stalin's office this time. Stalin himself was standing in front of the huge small conference table on the left side of the office, quietly looking at a map on the table.
"Comrade Yuri Arkhipovich," Stalin raised his head and glanced at Yuri with a gentle smile on his face when he heard the footsteps. "The headquarters has decided to arrange for you to go to the Kursk salient as a representative of the headquarters to take a look and arrange the defense there. What do you think?"
These words were blunt and in keeping with Stalin’s style, and in fact, they were an implicit sign that he had recognized his mistake on the Kharkov issue and was agreeing with Yuri.
"Comrade Stalin, I think that relying solely on the strength of the Voronezh Front and the Central Front is not enough to guarantee the safety of the Kursk salient," Yuri walked to the side of the conference table and said, "We also need a large reserve force to prepare for future battles, especially future counterattacks."
Stalin nodded and turned his eyes to the map. He knew very well that the "future counterattack" Yuri mentioned must be referring to the Kursk Battle Plan that Rokossovsky had recommended several times in a row. In the past, he did not agree with this plan. After all, the battlefield was changing rapidly and no one could guarantee what would happen next.
But now, the battlefield situation has shown how accurate Yuri's prediction was. After the attack in Kharkov and the German counterattack, the Soviet salient in the direction of Kursk has been formed, and the two salients embedded on both sides of Kursk have also been formed. Militarily speaking, the salient is the focus of the war between the two opposing sides, because the formation of the salient itself is a double-edged sword: the party inside the salient can use the salient to launch a surprise attack into the enemy's depth, and the party outside the salient can also eat up the enemy's salient through the offensive on both wings. Looking at the major battles since the outbreak of the Soviet-German War, the fierce battles between the two sides were basically carried out around the salient - the Battle of Kiev, the Battle of Minsk, the Battle of Moscow, and so on.
In other words, with the formation of the Kursk salient, the outbreak of this major battle was no longer decided by any party. It would definitely break out unless one party chose to retreat. But the question is, who can choose to retreat? Can the German army retreat? Obviously not, because once they choose to retreat, their entire southern battlefield will immediately collapse, and the Soviet army will advance into eastern Ukraine, thus preparing for the next step of recovering the entire Ukraine. So, can the Soviet army choose to retreat? The answer is obviously no. Not to mention the military factors, the political factors alone do not allow the Soviet army to make such a choice.
The Battle of Kursk is inevitable. What is about to unfold between the Soviet and German sides will be a life-and-death battle. Yuri's judgment is completely correct, which makes Stalin very appreciative.
"Comrade Georgy suggested that we mobilize the Steppe Military District as a reserve. What do you think?" Stalin asked.
"Although the Grassland Military Region now has four combined armies stationed, the number of tanks is still too small, with less than 712 tanks," Yuri said without hesitation, "As a reserve force, their strength needs to be further strengthened. In addition, the number of anti-tank weapons also needs to be increased, otherwise it will be difficult to support this large-scale war."
"The headquarters plans to mobilize the whole country. We have more tractor drivers who can be put into training in the short term. As for tanks, we can transfer them and should be able to replenish them." Stalin crossed his arms and said thoughtfully, "I will assign appropriate people to do this work. The work you need to be responsible for, Comrade , is mainly the defense construction of the Kursk salient. In addition, the headquarters is dissatisfied with the current command system of the Voronezh Front and the Southwestern Front. It is necessary to make adjustments to some commanders."
