Chapter 378

When Captain Gusev and his officers began to form a new combat battalion, I went back to the division headquarters and wanted to know through boroda whether the troops just transferred had entered the designated position. As soon as I entered the door, I said aloud to boroda, "Comrade chief of staff, have the two battalions of the sholov regiment entered the designated positions?" Boroda, who had been sitting at the table, stood up and hesitated for a moment before replying: "report to Mr. commander, the commanders of two battalions of sholov regiment and tank company of Donskoy regiment, who called one after another five minutes ago and reported that the troops had entered the designated position and were digging fortifications. As for the troops of the other two regiments... "Before he finished, I rushed to say," are they also in the designated position, waiting for my next order? " He shook his head hard and said angrily, "I just called the other two regiments. The people who answered the phone said that the head of the regiment and the political commissar were not in. They went to the army to check the defense. They couldn't get in touch in a short time, so the troops couldn't be transferred for the time being." When I heard that some of my subordinates dared to disobey my orders, my fire came up, pointed to the phone and said to boroda, "chief of staff, please connect me right away, captain. Listen to me, I immediately stood at attention and said loudly," serve the Soviet motherland! " I called him to the table, pointed to the map and said to him, "Comrade captain, you see, in the north of the village, two battalions of Colonel sholov are building fortifications. You immediately take the first and second companies of the new combat battalion and guard battalion to the area, and build a second line of defense 500 meters behind their line of defense. Do you understand? " Instead of answering me immediately, Gusev looked at the map for a moment and then said to me, "Sir, I have a point of view that the forward positions of the second line of defense and the sholov regiment are only 500 meters away, which is too close. Once the battle starts, both positions are within the effective range of German artillery fire. In this way, perhaps when the German artillery stopped and the infantry launched an attack, our troops in the two positions had suffered heavy casualties and were unable to withstand the enemy's attack. "