Chapter 21 Plagiarism
Strategy requires layout, and tactics require adaptability. This is an eternal truth. However, in today's Soviet Union, whether it is high-level commanders or middle and low-level commanders, there is a serious shortage of those with strong military qualities or even those who meet the standards. The situation is most serious at the middle and low levels. Yuri has a very deep understanding of this.
Just like in the battle against Finland, most of the middle and low-level commanders were too dull and rigid in terms of tactics and techniques, only knew how to strictly follow the orders of the superior command department, and did not know how to make corresponding adjustments according to the actual situation on the battlefield. What's worse, they relied entirely on simple and crude means of attrition in command, and only knew how to ask soldiers to "charge, charge, charge", without considering the specific actual situation.
Of course, these are closely related to the current social and political environment in the Soviet Union, and we cannot simply blame a particular commander.
When Yuri turned his attention to the second display board, the two groups of students in the second group had already started the formal competition. The confrontation between the two sides was completely without any fancy or skill. The attacking red side did not make any attempts in the direction of attack, nor did they make any deceptive feints. They directly selected a direction and began to invest in the attack. In terms of the way of attack, they also adopted a very traditional way of fighting, with artillery fire preparation with effective firepower, and then the armored forces cooperated with the infantry to attack the enemy positions. The blue side was just passively defending, and it was completely playing a game of adding fuel and competing with the red army.
Such tactical command is neither technical nor entertaining. It can be said that it has no meaning regardless of which side wins or loses.
On the third display board, the two opposing sides were also fighting very boringly. When Yuri turned his attention to it, the Red Army was now planning to have the besieged troops fight a breakout battle by making a feint to the east and attacking the west. Logically speaking, this tactic cannot be said to be very clever, but it is still feasible to a certain extent. However, the problem is that the three students of the Red Army were not very resolute in implementing the tactical plan. Since it was decided to use the outer assault troops as a feint, the main attack direction of the inner besieged troops should be set in the opposite, or at least in a different direction. However, the Red Army was hesitant in command. They wanted to make this feint to the east and attack the west, but they could not command the besieged troops to make a full-scale assault in the opposite direction. The final result was that the battle was a mess, and a strange mixture of things emerged, which not only delayed the opportunity to fight, but also caused unnecessary losses.
Compared with the exercises conducted on the first three display boards, the two teams of students in the fourth group were in a worse situation. The tit-for-tat assault operations turned into an outright positional war. The two sides engaged in hand-to-hand combat in a narrow strip of land facing the mountain and backed by a river. When Yuri's attention turned, both sides of the exercise were ready to throw in their reserve troops.
This was not a battle, it was pure killing. Yuri was a little speechless. He originally lacked confidence in command, but after watching today's exercises, he suddenly found that his ability was obviously not the worst. At least his brain was not as rigid as a stone.
No wonder the Soviet army suffered such a surprising defeat in the early days of the Soviet-German War. Don’t say that the enemy was too numerous or that we were attacked unexpectedly, let alone the backward equipment. Those may be the reasons for the failure, but the existence of these reasons cannot cover up the reality of the poor quality of the commanders.
If we think about it carefully, during the entire Soviet-German War, the casualty rates on both sides were very different. Could this situation have nothing to do with the backward command quality of the commanders?
It can be seen that Yuri was not the only one who disagreed with the first round of exercises of the four groups. At least Belik, who was sitting next to him, also found it boring. He was not good at concealing his emotions, and the impatience on his face was very obvious.
The first round of four exercises took nearly an hour and a half. After all, during the exercise, the instructors acting as referees had to perform a series of calculations to determine the number of casualties on both sides. After finally waiting until the end, the commander-in-chief, Instructor Petrovsky, made a summary. The skinny colonel did not comment on the performance of either side, but simply announced the winner and loser. After that, the trainees rested for 20 minutes, and the four groups of trainees who were drawn for the second round of exercises came on stage to draw lots to decide which battlefield map the two sides would use.
This was Yuri's first time to participate in such a military exercise. Although he knew it was just paper talk, for some reason, he still felt a little nervous.
Yuri's group in the competition exercise were three students from another class. Yuri didn't know any of these three guys, but August had a wide range of contacts and gave Yuri and Belik a brief introduction of the other team's players.
The opponent in Yuri's group who was in charge of drawing lots was a burly captain. According to August, this man was from Petrozavodsk and his name was Vasily Alexandrovich Belowski.
Belowski drew battlefield map No. 3, which was the battle map for the Red Army to break out. Based on the principle of red and blue swapping, Yuri and his team, who had originally drawn blue 6, would command the Red Army to fight. According to the rules, they needed to command a battalion of the surrounded Red Army to break out of the Blue Army's encirclement, and at the same time, the troop losses could not exceed the limit.
This time Yuri was determined to learn, so he tried not to speak as much as possible and handed over the main command task to Belik. He and August mainly played the role of staff officers to find out the gaps and fill in the gaps.
Bielik was not modest and took the initiative to take on the responsibility. According to the rules of the exercise, the Red Army had two ways to win: one was to escape from the encirclement, and the other was to effectively kill the Blue Army's manpower in the battle, causing its casualty rate to exceed the limit.
Considering that the Red Army was in a passive position at the beginning, Bielik referred to the tactics used by the previous group of students and also decided to adopt a breakout method of making a feint to the east and attacking in the west. However, his main combat goal was not to lead the besieged Red Army to break out of the encirclement, but to choose another winning goal, that is, to destroy the enemy's living forces to the maximum extent in the breakout operation.
To be honest, Belik's combat thinking is also a way of winning by attrition. This way of fighting will appear very exciting and have a lot to watch, but it will also cause great casualties to one's own side.
Bielik's plan was to have the main support force of the Red Army's outer perimeter attack the 904 area controlled by the Blue Army, creating the illusion encirclement, so as to mobilize the Blue Army to send out its reserve troops for support. Once the Blue Army deployed its reserve troops, the Red Army in the encirclement would break out in the opposite direction, creating the illusion of a feint to the east and attacking in the west, giving the Blue Army the illusion that the offensive in the 904 area was a feint, forcing it to withdraw its troops to block the Red Army from breaking out.
In this way, the entire battle situation is divided into two parts. The encircled Red Army troops are likely to be eaten up, but they can pose a fatal threat to the Blue Army's reserve with their superior forces. At this point, the situation faced by the Blue Army will be passive. They can either choose to give up the attack on the encircled Red Army and rescue the reserve troops in trouble, or insist on eating up the encircled Red Army, and their own reserve troops will suffer heavy losses.
It can be seen from this battle plan that Bielik likes to take absolute initiative in commanding operations, and he may even use any means to achieve this goal.
Yuri did not agree with this battle plan, but he had to admit that Belik's battle plan was highly feasible.
"I have no objection," August was the first to express his opinion after listening to Bielik's entire battle plan. "This is a feasible plan, and I believe it will surprise the opponent to a great extent."
"I have no objection either," Yuri nodded. After all, Belik was the commander-in-chief. "But I think that if we want to mobilize the enemy's reserve forces and attack the 904 area, we must hit the enemy hard enough. Otherwise, the enemy may not be fooled."
"The details of the battlefield are up to you," Belik shrugged. He agreed with Yuri's statement, but how to fight the battle in area 904 would need to be decided by these two "staff officers".
"I think we can launch a night attack," Yuri said first when he saw August frowning and not wanting to speak. "After all, a night attack is more likely to cause the enemy to fall into chaos. Besides, 904 is a high ground and is better to defend than to attack."
"But night attacks will require deduction of tactical points. Have you thought this through?" August hesitated.
"Tactical points can be made up by strategic points," Yuri said without hesitation. He had already thought about this problem and had a solution.
As a tactic, night attacks were deducted a certain amount of points in the Soviet military exercise scoring, and this deduction would be reflected in the overall combat effectiveness. The reason for this is that during night attacks, it is difficult for soldiers to identify the direction of attack, which can easily cause confusion.
Don't mention searchlights, flares, etc. If flares can be used, it will not be a night attack. After all, this thing can not only provide lighting for your own side, but also provide lighting for the enemy.
"I've thought about it," Yuri took the pen from Belik and scribbled on the paper in front of him, saying, "We can use the campfire to point out the direction of attack for the soldiers."
"Bonfire?" August asked in surprise.
"Yes, the bonfire on our line," said Yuri.
How can the bonfires on one's own positions provide the direction of attack for one's own soldiers? This question is not difficult to answer, because in Yuri's memory of his previous life, the Soviet Red Army used this method very well in the Battle of Moscow during the Soviet-German War. But now, this clever method will become his invention.
