artillery arc

Chapter 627: Sunset on the Second Day

The second day of the offensive, Kosalia First Front Headquarters, 2120 hours.

Pavlov looked at the setting sun outside the window and said, "There is only a little bit of sunlight left. The enemy should stop counterattacking."

Popov let out a long sigh: "Although I know that the enemy's armored forces are strong, this is too strong, isn't it?"

Wang Zhong's expression was not good: "Look at it in a positive way. Our armored soldiers sacrificed themselves to slow down the enemy's counterattack."

At this time, the preliminary results of the various units facing the enemy had been sent to the headquarters. Basically, except for the Guards Heavy Breakthrough Tank Regiment equipped with Rokosov I heavy tanks, the exchange ratio between other units and the Prosons was about 3 to 1.

The good news is that the exchanges between ordinary tank units equipped with T34W and the enemy are not as ugly as before. There will no longer be such a bad thing that a long-barreled Type 34 platoon of the enemy destroys an entire brigade of Ts without any losses.

The bad news is that the exchange ratio between the veterans of the Guards Tank Brigade driving the T34W and the Proshen armored troops is not much better.

The reason for this, in addition to reasons related to the quality of the troops such as aiming accuracy and search speed, there is another very important reason, that is, the armored units generally reported that the newly issued armor-piercing shells could not penetrate the frontal armor of the enemy's late Type 4.

Vasily: "The new armor-piercing projectile can stably penetrate the 80mm frontal armor of the enemy tank when tested in the rear, and can even penetrate 100mm armor at a closer distance. I think these testers should be shot. They must have cheated."

Wang Zhong: "It's not necessarily fake. It's possible that our armor steel is not as good as Proson's armor steel."

In fact, because a large number of professional and technical personnel were lost in the process of industrial migration, the quality of armored steel produced by Ante dropped sharply in the second year of the war. There were even reports on the front line that the PAK38 had directly penetrated the T34 gun shield.

This is exactly the same as the situation on Earth.

Now that the war has entered its third year, the talent and technology in the rear should have recovered to a certain extent, but the quality of armor steel certainly cannot be compared with that of Proson.

Pavlov: "Look at it in a positive light. This time at least three of our tanks can be exchanged for one. If we take the results of the heavy tanks into account, the ratio can even be close to two to one. If we continue to exchange like this, the day of one to one will come sooner or later."

In fact, on Earth, until the very end, the Russians were unable to achieve a one-on-one match with the Sandezi armored forces, and were even outclassed by the Sandezi armored ace.

Because too many of the Russians' best armored soldiers died on Earth, by the end of the war, the average driving time of the troops was not much longer than at the beginning of the war.

Although the Russians also had a large number of legendary aces, the average level of their troops was too low.

But this time and space is different. At least now many aces who drive heavy tanks can be preserved.

When the Ante version of T54 is put into mass production, some aces trained in heavy tanks can be transferred to the T54 troops, and the old and the new can be brought together to form some medium tank ace troops.

While Wang Zhong was thinking, a signalman entered the room and said loudly, "The report of the 8th Guards Tank Army has arrived."

Pavlov: "Theirs are the only ones missing! Let me see how much they lost."

The 51th Guards Tank Army inherited the mantle of the original 51st Tank Army, but only in name. In fact, there were too few survivors from the st Tank Army, so this tank army was a brand new unit.

Pavlov opened the envelope, read the report for a while, and immediately smiled: "The Eighth Guards Army did not encounter the enemy's armored counterattack. They successfully broke through the positions of the enemy's 167th Infantry Division and are advancing in depth. Kirinenko's Cavalry Army is also with them."

Wang Zhong breathed a sigh of relief: "It seems that there is no need to expand the battle damage table today."

He looked at the damage figures on the blackboard.

That was the estimated losses reported by the armored units today. The real losses would not be known until nightfall, when the statisticians of each unit carefully counted them. On the first day of the enemy's counterattack, the estimated losses were as high as 500 vehicles. At least four brigades lost more than half of their vehicles, and other brigades that encountered Plosson's troops also suffered heavy losses.

But the good news was that this time most of the brigades pushed back the Plossoms’ counterattack and finally took control of the battlefield.

This means that a considerable portion of the 500 vehicles lost can be repaired.

Popov stood next to Wang Zhong and looked at the numbers on the blackboard together. He sighed and said, "If we lose a few more days, our armored forces will be completely wiped out."

Wang Zhong said confidently: "The enemy will be exhausted first."

----

"We won't be able to hold on like this!" Marshal Goron slammed the table. "How come we lost 300 tanks on the first day of the counterattack?"

Chief of Staff: "Most of this is the result of the enemy's new heavy tanks, my Marshal."

As soon as he finished speaking, the commander of the Third Armored Army added: "Marshal, although we suffered heavy losses, the various units claimed to have destroyed more enemy tanks. The 200th Armored Division, which has relatively new equipment, even reported destroying enemy tanks!"

The commander of the Second Armored Corps of the Asgard Knights was not to be outdone: "Our Ampura Division lost ten tanks, and the report shows that 220 were destroyed!"

The marshal sighed, "That's enough. We all know how much water there is in claiming to have destroyed this thing! Apart from anything else, since we destroyed so many ANT tanks, we should be controlling the battlefield. Why are we retreating in most places?"

The commander of the Third Armored Army said: "The enemy is too numerous, and their tactics and skills have obviously improved greatly compared to before. We can't drive them away like before."

The commander of the Second Armored Army of Asgard also agreed, "Yes, and the enemy's new heavy tanks are too powerful. They repelled our troops and continued to pursue us, threatening the logistics supply lines of the armored army. That's why we retreated."

The commander of the Third Armored Corps took the conversation back: "The enemy's new heavy tanks are more mobile than we expected. We can't escape at all. Many of the pursued armored battalions have suffered heavy losses.

"Our troops were able to stabilize their position and force the enemy back only after they retreated to within the firing range of the Elephant tank destroyers."

Marshal Goron: "Thank God, a new piece of equipment finally plays a little role."

Chief of Staff: "It's a pity that the failure rate of these tank destroyers is too high. They can't keep up with the mobility of the armored forces."

Marshal Goron: "What about our new weapons? What about those Panzer 5 and 6 tanks? Where are they? Isn't the Ampra Division equipped with a battalion of Panzer 5 tanks and a battalion of Panzer 6 tanks?"

The Asgard Knights' Ampura Armored Division belongs to the Knights' Second Armored Corps, so the commander of the Second Armored Corps replied: "The Type 30 tanks are performing well and are on their way to the battle area. It is expected that Type tanks will be put into battle tomorrow.

"As for the Panzer V... this battalion only had 40 tanks that could move, and during the maneuver it drove into a minefield."

Marshal Goron was shocked: "The enemy laid the minefield so quickly?"

"No, it was deployed by our infantry division." The army commander looked embarrassed. "The tracks of the remaining Type 5 tanks were all blown off and they can't move forward."

Marshal Goron cursed: "Fuck it!"

(End of this chapter)