Chapter 319： Fall of Suceava

?Admiral Courtois, who set up his headquarters in Bacau, has been very anxious recently, and the cause of his anxiety is the telegram sent by Major General Antichi in the defense of Suceava. Major General Antić, whom he had high hopes for, sent a rescue telegram on the ninth day of Suceava's defensive defense.

On the telegram, Major General Antichi reported to Your Excellency the results of his battle. Within nine days of his defensive operation, the Suceava defenders paid 56,000 casualties to the attacking German army at the cost of 24,000 casualties. In this telegram full of reports on the results of his battle, Antić puts his own casualties in the most conspicuous position. It is obvious that he hopes that your admiral will notice the huge casualties of the Suceava defenders.

The experienced Admiral Courtois could not see Major General Antichi's intentions, but Antichi's desire to retreat would disrupt the Admiral's plan. And Major General Antich knew that the General’s intentions still sent this telegram. It was obvious that he was really unable to withstand it, but he was still smart enough to report the results of the telegram to propose a retreat plan, which made the General feel very difficult. Therefore, for the sake of stability, Admiral Courtois would like to listen to others' opinions, and Lieutenant General Andrew, who had just been transferred to him as his deputy, was obviously a suitable person.

"Antichy is going to be unable to stand up in Suceava, I want to ask your opinion."

In his office, the white-haired and somewhat exhausted Admiral asked Lieutenant General Anderson who was sitting across from him.

Seeing his tired general asking his own question, Lieutenant General Anderson was a little embarrassed. Because he arrived at Bacau just one day with the train of the Sixth Division, and only got a preliminary understanding of the basic situation. Admiral Courtois now asked himself his opinion on the situation of the battle, which made him answer, so...

After thinking about it again and again, Lieutenant General Anderson said his views. "Your Excellency, I think it is necessary to understand whether Major General Antichi can continue to fight defensively. If not, then we need to consider the issue of retreating there, as well as the issue of enemy pursuit."

Speaking of this, Lieutenant General Anderson had Marshal Markenson's figure in his mind, and he also had some serious considerations for this prestigious Marshal Anderson.

Anderson's words didn't give the admiral much hint, but the old admiral said with a smile. "Antich has sent me a telegram, saying that the German offensive has put a lot of pressure on him, obviously wanting reinforcements or allowing him to retreat. But the current battle in Suceava shows that we have newly formed troops. In the face of the German offensive, the casualties were heavy, and it was difficult to reinforce them."

The admiral said very tactfully. In fact, it is difficult to reinforce the past, but it is impossible to do so. According to intelligence, Suceava hides other troops besides the German siege. If reinforcements are added, the troops are likely to be defeated in the middle. You must know that your opponent is a master of mobile operations. What about retreat? This is also a difficult problem. Where to withdraw, whether or not to withdraw, and how to arrange the response troops are all questions. If there is no response force, it will be difficult for the Suceava garrison to escape the German pursuit. If they want to respond, the problem becomes the same as before.

This passive situation was caused by his underestimation of the combat effectiveness of the German army and the overestimation of the combat effectiveness of the mobilized divisions by him and Puleshan and others. This can be seen from his previous combat plan. At the beginning, in order to reduce losses, Admiral Courtois arranged a defender of 100,000 troops in Suceava, trying to make it a fortress city to resist the Germans.

But this city, equipped with his approved troops and commanders, now complained to him and hoped to be able to evacuate without even defending for ten days. How could this not let the general be frightened. According to his plan, the city may need to be guarded for a month, and then when the attacking Germans are exhausted, he leads the assembled army to force the enemy to evacuate and release the siege, or just fight them here.

The prerequisite for completing his plan is that Suceava's defenders are required to exhaust the enemy. But at present, it seems that let alone the enemy's exhaustion, it is fine if the defender does not collapse because of too much casualties. Don't think about it if the enemy is exhausted, so the general is a little helpless in the face of this situation.

Regarding this, Lieutenant General Anderson was thinking about it. "Then in this case, it is estimated that the only option is to evacuate."

"Evacuate?"

Hearing Anderson's words, Admiral Courtois said with a bitter smile. "It's not a problem to withdraw the defenders from Suceava, but Homan and Iasi, who are facing the next German attack, are still somewhat ill-prepared."

The Admiral's words made Lieutenant General Anderson asked inexplicably. "How is this going?"

Before, Anderson, as the deputy chief of staff, still had a reflection on the materials allocated. I remember that it seemed to be distributed in full. Is it because the transportation department has not delivered the materials?

Faced with Anderson's inquiry, Admiral Courtois gave the reason. The materials originally allocated have actually arrived, and your admiral himself made the re-allocation in it.

Because of Suceava's important position in the Admiral's plan, many military supplies and weapons that should be allocated to Homan and Iasi were secretly assigned to Suceava's defenders by the admiral. So when the defenders of Suceava couldn't stop the enemy's offensive, now your admiral found out that he had done a stupid thing.

After listening to Admiral Courtois's reasons, Anderson also had a headache. At this moment he suddenly felt that the admiral in front of him was old and his thinking was a little bit unable to keep up, but the idea just flashed through his mind. This issue involves too much, and it is not something he can talk about as a little lieutenant general. It is what he should do to care about the development of the war.

Lieutenant General Anderson spoke after thinking about the gains and losses. "Admiral, we can only let Major General Antichi evacuate with Suceava's defenders."

"why?"

Facing Admiral Courtois' inquiry, Anderson explained patiently. "According to the Suceava battle report you showed me, I found that the defenders had too many casualties. Now we can't mobilize the troops to rescue them, so we can only let them evacuate in order to prevent the collapse."

Hearing what Anderson said, Admiral Courtois spoke about his long-anxious problem. "In this case, the defenders cannot escape the enemy's pursuit."

As a defeated defender, there is no response unit and it is still in plain terrain. It is easy to be overtaken and annihilated by the enemy. This is basic common sense. Obviously Lieutenant General Anderson must have such common sense, and he must have his own consideration to make such a decision.

"The reason I am doing this is to make the Suceava garrison to withdraw to Iasi."

"Iasi?"

"Yes, it's Iasi." Anderson said his reason to the battle map. "It is now obvious that the Suceava defenders can only withdraw in two directions, west and south. To the west is the Carpathian Mountains and there are still unrepaired supply points. The retreat here basically allows the defenders to say goodbye to this battle. Take. Then it’s to evacuate south. There are two evacuation points, Homan and Iasi. Two of them are about the same distance. Among them, Homan is the closest to us and can get our support. And Iasi needs their own."

Anderson's words reminded Admiral Courtois, and he took over the words of the lieutenant general. "So Suceava’s defenders cannot evacuate to our side, because Mackensen’s goal is us. If you evacuate to us, you will be overtaken. It’s much better to evacuate to Iasi, because if you don’t have a line with them, the enemy will We have to divide our forces. In addition, Iasi is our center of defense against Russia, and there are not many fortifications at all. It is not easy to conquer, so evacuation to Iasi is the best result."

"Yes, Lord Admiral."

Facing Admiral Courtois to express his thoughts, Lieutenant General Anderson recognized it. "In fact, my idea is more to consider. The enemy attaches great importance to our Bacau unit. If they don’t pay attention, then they can only count on Major General Antichi’s command ability but we have to take a gamble. ."

The telegram permitting the evacuation was soon sent to Suceava, and the Suceava defenders who had been exhausted to defend the German offensive were relieved. The huge casualties have long left the defenders out of breath, and now they can finally evacuate.

So after ten days of fighting against Suceava, the defenders withdrew in the direction of Iasi under the leadership of Major General Antić. The German forces that captured Suceava immediately reported to Marshal Mackensen whether they were allowed to pursue the enemy's defeated army.

"There is no need to pursue. Through this period of battle, the enemy's mobilization division is not a big threat to us. As long as they dare to leave the tortoise shell, they can be swept away by us like fallen leaves."

Marshal Mackensen looked at the location of Bacau on the map and spoke. "On the contrary, the troops assembled here are the elite of the Romanians. Only by defeating them can the enemy's fighting will be defeated."

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