Chapter 1693

Early the next morning, Zhukov flew to katukov's headquarters. He strode into the headquarters, and across the way, he reached out to katukov, and said with a smile, "general katukov, I congratulate you on your troops successfully crossing the Oder River and being the first to set foot on German territory."

He then shook hands with trekov, who was standing by, and said with the same smile, "Comrade trekov, I want to tell you some good news. At 8 o'clock last night, 224 salutes were fired 20 times in red square to celebrate your successful liberation of Poznan. "

When he came to berzalin, he still kept a smile on his face: "Comrade berzalin, your 5th shock group army was the first to rush into the city of ginitz, and also the first to occupy the German city. The great achievements you and your subordinates have made will go down in history forever! "

Finally, he came up to me, shook my hand briefly, and then walked towards the conference table. After him, marinin shook hands with me and asked in a low voice, "Rita, are you ready to attack?"

"No, comrade chief of staff." I also answered in a low voice: "I don't think we have the conditions to attack Berlin at present. I don't know if Marshal Zhukov will change his original intention when we meet later."

Malining looked at Zhukov, who was already seated, and said in a voice that only the two of us could hear: "Marshal Zhukov is a stubborn man. What he recognizes is that no one can change, not even the Supreme Commander himself."

"Comrade marinin, what are you still standing there doing?" Perhaps seeing malining chatting with me, Zhukov urged impatiently, "come and sit down, you two. We are going to have a meeting soon."

After we all sat down, Zhukov looked at malining and said, "Comrade chief of staff, read out the order given to us by the supreme command."

Malining nodded, stood up, picked up a folder in front of him, opened it, and read aloud: "the Supreme Command asked us to take positive actions to consolidate our victory in the last six days. When the follow-up troops catch up, they will add fuel, ammunition and other military materials to the two bases, and then immediately make a rapid impact, Take Berlin in two days from January 28 to 29. "

After listening to the order from the supreme command, several of them began to whisper, but my heart was thinking that history had deviated here because of my appearance. We arrived at the left bank of the Oder River half a month earlier. In the order to attack Berlin, the attack time was also advanced from February 15 to 16 to January 28 to 29, More than half a month in advance.

After hearing this, Zhukov glanced at all the commanders and said slowly, "you have heard me. According to the order of the supreme command, we will conquer Berlin in two weeks. Are you all ready to attack? "

"No, comrade marshal." I saw that the three commanders of the group army were silent. They quickly stood up and took the responsibility to themselves: "I think the time to attack Berlin is not mature, so I didn't let them prepare for the attack."

After hearing this, Zhukov did not immediately express his position. Instead, he turned his eyes to general sokolovsky who came with him. This general is now the deputy commander of the front army. Hearing Zhukov asking himself, he quickly replied, "marshal, I just talked with Comrade berzalin, and I know that his troops are fighting hard and excellent battles on the left bank of the Oder River, And the divisions have only half of their forces left, and they are constantly being attacked by the German air force. "

"What about our air force?" Zhukov, after waiting for sokolovsky to finish, turned his eyes to the air force commander General Lu Duncan who came to us last night, "general Lu Duncan, why does our air force let the enemy control the air in the battlefield?"

"Marshal," general Lu Duncan replied bitterly, "the enemy's plane took off from Berlin, and their runway was concrete, so they could not be restricted by the weather; No matter our field airport is far away from the front, the runway is also damaged by rain. Every time our fighter pilots take off, they have to risk their lives... "

After Lu Duncan's words, last night and the commander of the army's equipment unit, o'lear, who arrived here before, continued: "marshal, I have specially inspected the situation of each tank brigade and found that each brigade has only 40 tanks on average, and many brigades have only 15 to 20 tanks. The replenishment is very slow. The repair base is hundreds of kilometers away, so we can't repair the damaged tanks in time. "

Lieutenant general garazav, chief political commissar of the front army, also added: "marshal, after three weeks of fierce fighting, all our political workers have been advancing with the advance troops, encouraging the commanders and fighters to build immortal meritorious deeds in the battle, and the soldiers have shown great bravery. But at the same time, I want to tell you, marshal, our commanders and fighters are tired. They need to rest for a while before they can fight again. "

Seeing that all the people fell to the ground and thought that they did not have the conditions to continue to attack, Zhukov was silent. He leaned back in his chair and looked up at the ceiling, lost in thought. We all know that Zhukov was engaged in a fierce ideological struggle, so no one spoke. In such a big room, you can only hear people breathing.

After not knowing how long, Zhukov finally sat up straight again. Seeing his action, we all know that he has made the final decision, so we all hold our breath and stare at him, nervously waiting for his final answer. Zhukov looked at malining and said, "Comrade chief of staff, we will not attack Berlin for the time being. After three weeks of intense fighting and March, our troops have become exhausted. If we continue to push forward recklessly, we will repeat the mistakes of the German army under Moscow at the end of the year of 41. Maybe all our efforts will come to nothing“ Great, comrade marshal. " "I knew it, I knew you would make such a wise decision," he said“ Send a report to the supreme command. " Zhukov told malining to give a detailed report to the Supreme Commander himself on the reasons for our temporary suspension of attack and the current situation on the battlefield