At the wide desk, the commander of the Caucasian Front, the commander of the Red Army, Ivan Vladimirovic Choulenev, put down the intelligence file in his hand with a frown, rubbed his temples hard, and seriously thought about the current situation and the war. As one of the only five generals before the outbreak of the war, he had a deep qualification. During the civil war, as an outstanding general from a cavalry, he not only performed outstandingly on the battlefield, but also stood very politically firmly. He belonged to the Xie Miao Budunny system and was always regarded by Comrade Stalin as his own person and his confidant subordinate. He is one of the examples of political reliability, strong style and hard work. No matter how the wind of the Great Purge blows, it never blows on his head.

In addition, Qiulenev had another very good thing. Perhaps because of his cavalry general and his free personality, he was very compatible with many senior military officers. He had a good reputation, had a good temper, and was well-known for his character, even at a time when everyone was in danger, he was unwilling to do something to hurt the situation, and even protected a large number of subordinates within his ability. Based on this characteristic, Comrade Stalin valued him very much and promoted him to become the most important commander of the Moscow Military Region on the eve of the war.

Of course, Qiulenev's shortcomings are also obvious: he has always been in an unknown position. Although he is of high level and has a prominent position, his command ability seems to be a bit in line with the military rank. As a cavalry general, his overall command ideas and ideas are still in the period of civil war and cannot keep up with the evolution of mechanized war. In the eyes of many observers, he and Tukhachevsky are two completely opposite typical examples. Fortunately, he is not as confused and stick to the rules as Budjonny, and still learns the essence of armored warfare eagerly, so he stumbling into the threshold of modern warfare. However, even he himself admits that his command level is slightly inferior to Zhukov, Vasilevsky, or Vatutin, Konev, Rokosovsky and others.

Whether it is Stalin himself or the General Staff of the Red Army, he generally knows some facts and often mates him on the secondary battlefield, which is both a kind of care and a kind of protection. Facts have proved that he did a good job in the secondary battlefield, at least he has completed the tasks assigned to him seriously without making any mistakes. There are not many such senior generals in the Red Army.

Due to the special changes at the turn of summer and autumn, the Transcaucasian Front, North Caucasian Front and South Caucasian Front that should have appeared in history have not been established. Only the Caucasian Front has always been retained. As the supreme leader of the Caucasian Front, he has a total of 6 army armies, 2 flight armies, 3 independent armies, and a full capacity of more than 800,000 troops. The German Klester Cluster that confronted him probably has nearly 5

00,000 troops. During the war at the turn of summer and autumn, although the Caucasus was relatively flat in the direction of Rostov, which was relatively conducive to armored warfare and mobile warfare, Chrekrenev still firmly guarded the passes of the Caucasus Mountains, "threat" the German attempt to land on the Black Sea coast, and preserved most of the troops. This contribution is hard to say that compared with the excellent front commander, he is at least much stronger than the Voronezh Front.

Now he faces new problems: Stalin and the General Staff ordered him to draw reliable troops into Persia for combat and demanded vigilance against Turkish actions.

Originally, Qiulenev's pressure was not so great. Stalin initially only asked to draw 50,000 troops from the Caucasus Front, and he would draw 100,000 troops from Central Asia and then hand them over to a reliable general commander. However, under the repeated requests of the British, Moscow changed his decision and finally agreed to draw 100,000 troops from the Caucasus Front, and draw 50,000 troops from Central Asia. He changed from cooperation to dominance, which made him feel much more difficult and had a big problem.

On whether to consider replacing the commander of the Qiulenev Front, Zhukov and Huasilevsky were not consistent. Zhukov started from the war situation and hoped to transfer the more fierce and aggressive Konev to the direction of the Caucasus, and replaced Qiulev to the calm northwest front army, while Huasilevsky believed that such a change could not be made. First, Qiulev did a good job in this position and had nothing to pick on, and Konev has always caused trouble for the General Staff and Comrade Stalin; second, Qiulev's personality and temper can unite his subordinates and properly handle the nationalist sentiment in Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan and complex surrounding emotions such as Turkey and Persia. If Konev comes up with a bad temper, he might make these things a mess. Of course, the commander of the front army must understand military affairs, but it is not enough to just understand military affairs.

At this point, Voroshilov and Budoni held similar opinions, and even Molotov opposed Konev's attitude to serve is very unstable. What if his hot temper aroused the Turks? Moreover, the Caucasus is a stable front, and the Red Army does not intend to fight here. Unless it is really necessary to form a front army alone according to Comrade Stalin's idea to fight in Persia, it is better to focus on stability and caution.

Zhukov was convinced that he no longer held his point of view and instead asked Cholenev to form a reliable army to enter Persia.

Qiulenev quickly completed the task: given the complex national forces and relatively rugged terrain of Turkey and Persia, he specially chose the 45th Army to strengthen it. This army initially included the 138th Mountain Infantry Division, the 31st and 136th Infantry Division, the 1st Mountain Cavalry Division, and the 55th Fort Regional Division (reorganized into an artillery division after strengthening). He also transferred the 63rd Mountain Infantry Division, the 76th Infantry Division, the 6th Tank Division from the 47th Army, and the total strength reached 6 infantry divisions, 1 cavalry division, and 1 tank division.

The K-Teacher and an artillery division totaled 100,000 troops. However, there were only more than 100 tanks, and the more advanced T-34s were only more than 50. The rest were either T-60 or T-70, and there were even 4 T-26. To this end, when Qiulenev submitted a report to the General Staff, he specifically pointed out that although the T-60t-70t-26 was poor in armored warfare, fighting on rugged terrain like the Persian Plateau can fully utilize their flexibility and lightness, so he believed that it could basically meet the needs.

In addition to asking the General Staff to add 200 aircraft and a batch of shells to him, Qiulenev was very considerate of Moscow's difficulties and did not make any more demands. This moved everyone, including Zhukov, but no matter how moved it was, the requirements of the last 200 aircraft were not implemented. He only pieced together 70 aircraft to him, and gave him more than 20 T-60s to make up for it. Then he waved his pen and agreed that Lieutenant General Mezov would continue to serve as the commander of the strengthened army, and his number was still the 45th Army, which was also called the Persian Army.

In addition to personnel and organizational dispatch, Qiulenev seized the time to let the troops advance, while discussing combat policies with Lieutenant General Mezov and others. Finally, he determined that the goal of the Persian army was not to drive away and eliminate the Germans in Persia and Iraq, but to use a proper and solid line of defense to protect the northern Persia and the Transcaucasus, and give full play to the combat advantages of mountain infantry. The core focus was to protect the Baku oil field.

After all this was arranged, Qiulenev specially sent the Chief of Staff to report the situation, and reported to the General Staff's Office on combat goals and principles, general defense and focus. At the same time, he told Zhukov and others that he arranged an additional 50,000-70,000 reserve teams later. The entire plan was carefully and meticulous, and everything that should be considered was considered. No one in the base camp had much objection, and even Zhukov could not find anything wrong. He thought the goal of this plan was very calm and sober, which showed that the commander of the front army and the commander of the group army were carefully considered, not the product of the hot-headed and slapped the head.

Zhukov privately sighed to Huasilevsky: "After all, he was the commander selected by Comrade Stalin himself. He was respectful and considerate, and understood his superiors. It was much better than some commanders who were arbitrary and lost their temper at the leader if they were disagreeing."

Huasilevsky just smiled and didn't say much. Which leader doesn't like such subordinates?

In order to express his importance and comfort to the direction of the Caucasus, the base camp promised with confidence that once spring comes, heavy troops will be drawn from the Don River front to move south to strive for breakthrough progress in the Middle East battlefield.

The Red Army's attitude is reversed. In the past, we were looking forward to winter coming soon, but now we are looking forward to winter passing soon. The battles on the Don River front have been unsuccessful, and they cannot fight or retreat. The three fronts have clearly no achievements in advance, but they can only stick to the ground. Once the spring is in full swing, the land will be freezing, the Don River flows again, and the road is rugged and difficult to move. The German mechanized troops cannot be used to quickly and flexibly, which is very conducive to the adjustment of the Red Army's big step back. Now it is the time when the land is as hard as iron, which is very convenient for the activities of the German armored troops.

And the Russians were shocked to find that this winter was different from the previous one. Various German vehicles were not in use due to the cold, which was greatly unexpected. How could they know that in order to prevent this situation from happening again, German chemists have devoted a lot of energy to research lubricants and antifreeze formulas under extremely cold conditions since early 1942. Since September, the Eastern Front Military Control Office has continuously sent improved lubricants, antifreeze and other cold-proof materials to the front line. In addition, Germany has completely controlled the transportation channels of the Black Sea, and the logistics support of the Southern Army Group is the best. So Manstein is not afraid of the winter war now. (To be continued.)
Chapter completed!