Chapter 238
On the banks of the Dobosna River, Krasnaya Beleg and Kotolichi will make way for the station.
Bean-sized raindrops fell on the calm river surface, creating ripples. The spring flood had obviously not passed yet, and the water level of the river was almost level with the riverbank. It seemed that if the next flood peak came, the dam near the station would not be able to withstand it.
However, apparently no one is paying attention to the water level issue now. After all, there are no residents of this generation. There are only Soviet Red Army troops and tens of thousands of German prisoners.
The POW camp used to hold prisoners was located under the riverbank on the south side of the station. Because there were too many prisoners and the time was rather rough, the entire camp did not have even a tent. Nearly 40,000 disarmed German prisoners sat in the open air in the water and mud, shivering with cold and their faces turning blue.
This prisoner-of-war camp was established three days ago. Some of the prisoners held here were captured in the Battle of Bobruisk Fortress, and some were captured in the Battle of the Berezina River. Trains are still continuously transporting prisoners from Minsk, and then they are thrown into this prisoner-of-war camp.
In the past three days, a large number of wounded soldiers died almost every day. Some of them died from serious injuries, some died from infection, and a considerable number died from hunger and cold.
The Soviet internal security forces were responsible for guarding these prisoners. They had no mercy on the Germans, especially the German prisoners of war. Outside the barbed wire, the watchtowers and sand fortifications equipped with machine guns could shoot all the prisoners who tried to cross the barbed wire. They did not even allow the prisoners to send out the bodies of the dead.
Out of desperation, these dirty German prisoners of war, who looked like beggars, could only move the bodies of the dead to the northwest corner of the camp, where a small mountain of corpses had already been piled up.
At this time, no Soviet person would sympathize with these German prisoners of war, not even those with the strongest sense of compassion. After all, even if we put aside the factors of national hatred and family feuds and only consider political influence and stance, no one would show mercy to these German prisoners of war. Otherwise, who could guarantee that the charges of being a spy or traitor would not fall on them?
Of course, not every captured German soldier was held in such a prisoner-of-war camp. Only ordinary soldiers and junior officers were held here, while senior officers and generals could still find a good place to stay. Some people could even get the same treatment as Soviet generals, with wine to drink, caviar to accompany their meals, and two orderly soldiers.
For example, Lieutenant General Miller, who was recently promoted to acting commander of the 12th Infantry Army, chose to surrender in the encirclement east of Minsk. Afterwards, he personally persuaded several German troops who were still resisting to surrender. In Yuri's previous life, this general was one of the few wartime generals who chose to stay in East Germany after the war. He also wrote a book called "I Finally Found My True Motherland" during the Soviet occupation of East Germany after the war.
On the riverbank on the side where the station would be stationed, Yuri stood with his back to the river, his eyes sweeping across the prisoner-of-war camp in the depression below the riverbank. Behind him, Arseni held an umbrella for him, and on both sides were commanders from various fronts.
However, the protagonist today is not Yuri, but Comrade Yuri Mikhailovich Shaposhnikov who came all the way from Moscow, and accompanying him is his favorite disciple, Vasilevsky.
Shaposhnikov's health has been very poor. In recent times, he has even been unable to preside over the daily work of the General Staff Military Academy. Everyone knows that this old man who is highly trusted by Stalin is probably not far from his death.
However, even so, when the news of the liberation of Minsk reached Moscow, the old man still insisted on coming to the front line despite his illness. He always believed that the disastrous defeat in the Battle of Minsk that year was directly related to him.
Today, many generals came to Red Bereg, not only from the Soviet army, but also from the German army. In addition to the commanders, chiefs of staff and military commissars of the four major fronts, the Soviet generals also included people from the Moscow General Staff and the Defense Committee. Although the first phase of the Belarusian campaign has just ended and the subsequent offensive is being launched, the results achieved by the Soviet army have already made Moscow and Stalin excited. The success of the Soviet army in this battle has far exceeded everyone's previous expectations.
The prisoners held here were only a part of the total. There were tens of thousands of German prisoners being transported from Mogilev, Minsk and Orsha. As for the number of officers above the rank of major general who were killed or captured, more than 30 were captured. To be frank, this was the most fruitful single battle achieved by the Soviet Army since the outbreak of the Soviet-German War - the Battle of Stalingrad could not be counted, after all, that battle lasted too long.
Looking at the prisoner-of-war camp from the river bank, the scene was quite spectacular. Tens of thousands of ragged German prisoners of war were sitting on the ground in the rain, wearing black German uniforms and with black faces covered in mud. At first glance, it looked like a large coal yard under the river bank.
Shaposhnikov stayed on the river bank coughing for nearly twenty minutes before he went to meet the captured German generals in the temporary warehouse built at the station.
The old man asked the captured German generals their names, ranks, and units one by one, and even shook hands with them one by one.
Coming out of the warehouse, Shaposhnikov, accompanied by Yuri and others, went to the temporary meeting room. Using the new battlefield situation map that had just been produced last night, he asked Yuri about the next battle plan.
In fact, two days ago in Minsk, Yuri had already submitted the latest combat plan to Moscow.
According to this combat plan, after ending the battle in the Minsk direction, the Soviet army did not rest at all and almost immediately engaged in a new battle.
The 1st Baltic Front will launch an attack towards Kaunas, which is the junction of the German Army Group Center and the Army Group North. With the collapse of the defense line of the Central Army Group, this junction has become the weak point of the German army. The capture of Kaunas will not only cut off the connection between the two German army groups, but also cut off the railway line from Daugavpils to Vilnius, thus isolating Vilnius.
The main offensive direction of the 3rd Belorussian Front was Vilnius. Once they captured Vilnius, they would directly threaten the German mainland.
The 2nd Belorussian Front's offensive direction was Grodno and Bialystok. According to intelligence, the German army was gathering troops in this area and building a new line of defense. This direction was very important to the Germans because once the Soviet army broke through the Grodno line of defense, East Prussia would be behind them.
As for the First Belorussian Front, Rokossovsky's task was heavier, because he would still fight on two wings, one was the attack on Brest, the other was the attack on Lublin. However, their ultimate offensive target was only one, that was the Polish capital, Warsaw!
"The current international situation is very delicate," Shaposhnikov showed Yuri a document brought from Moscow in a temporary meeting room. "We must speed up our advance into Poland. To be more precise, Comrade Stalin hopes to occupy Warsaw within two months."
Yuri took the document, took a look at it, and was shocked to find that it contained a photocopy of The Washington Post, with only a front-page headline that was published two days ago.
The headline of this newspaper exposed a secret agreement reached between the Soviet Union and Britain: as the British Prime Minister, Churchill was willing to recognize the legitimacy of the 1939 Soviet-Polish border. At the same time, he ceded Germany's two natural ice-free ports of Königsberg and Memel and part of the territory of East Prussia to the Soviet Union in exchange for the expansion of Poland's territory westward to the Oder River.
"This report has caused a very bad impact," Shaposhnikov said as he lit a cigarette. "The Polish government in exile, with Mikolajczyk as prime minister, has protested to the British and demanded that Poland's western border be pushed to the Oder River, but the Soviet-Polish border must still be divided according to the Riga Agreement. In addition, they do not recognize our occupation of East Prussia because it will hinder Poland's freedom of sea access."
Yuri was a little confused. He couldn't understand what the Poles were doing.
A country that was completely defeated by the Germans, and whose territory is now occupied by others, has already begun to dream of expanding its territory after the war. Not only does it want to expand its territory, it also wants to have a hand in the post-war division of power and take a piece of the cake. Are these Poles still asleep, or are they just sleeping soundly?
"Comrade Stalin's opinion is that Warsaw must be captured in the shortest possible time," Shaposhnikov continued, "and in the process, every possible effort must be made to support the Polish People's Army operating in Western Belarus and Poland and to strike at the power of the national army."
In today's Poland, there are two guerrillas, one is the Polish People's Army led by the Communist Party of Poland, and the other is the National Army loyal to the government in exile. In fact, for quite a long time in the past, the Polish National Army has been in conflict with the Soviet guerrillas. They even carried out large-scale activities in Belarus, attacked the Soviet guerrilla camps, and created uninhabited villages.
"This is a secret instruction from Comrade Stalin," Shaposhnikov said finally. "Special measures must be taken to implement it."
