"I agree to launch a tentative attack on the Tula front line. The commander of the 6th Armored Division is General Kirchner, and is known as the Kirchner Armored Cluster." Hoffman paused, "but reinforcements to the 9th Army are essential. Give two air wings, plus the 2nd Armored Division, and the rest of the 3rd Armored Army remain unmoved. In addition, attacking Moscow is not this year, at least not the target of this battle. We can scare Stalin, but don't trick our own people into it."

Everyone laughed when they said this.

The 2nd Armored Division was the only reserve armored division held by the General Staff. Zeitzler was reluctant to let it go, but since the head of state had ordered, he could only implement it.

Model asked, "My head of state, do you need me to go back to Smolensk to take charge of command?"

"Let Scherna go, you must trust your subordinates fully, just as I trust you." Hoffman explained while gilding himself on his face, "Your mission is to take Borisso Grebsk as soon as possible and eat the right wing of the Central Front. I always feel scared when I defend Karachi - who knows whether the Italians will suddenly collapse?"

Model smiled and nodded. Although the head of state rejected his grand plan, this trust and respect made him particularly touched.

Hoffman never expected that Bagramiyan felt the same as he did: the Italians in Karachi were too difficult to fight, and they could fight in a bad way. Is this still an Italian?

"Who spread false news that the Italians were fighting without fighting? Who boasted in front of me that they could take the position with a charge?" He was furious at the front line command center. "After fighting for 4 days, you only advanced 1,800 meters. If you continue to fight at this speed, let alone this week, you will not be able to break through the Italians' defense line this month."

The following group of army commanders, the commander of the army, was silent and did not dare to breathe.

Bagramiyan stood in front of the commander of the 9th Mechanized Army and sneered: "Comrade Ivanov, you promised me that you can take Highway 7 in 24 hours. Now three 24 hours have passed, and Highway 7 is still in the hands of Italians. What are you going to do?"

"Enemy...the enemy...the air force is too strong, and anti-tank firepower is emerging one after another...our tanks have suffered a lot!"

"Bastard, why don't you push it up with infantry? Is it because you have too many people or the enemy's anti-tank guns?" Baglamyan shouted, "Come... pull this coward who has shaken compromise and shaken... and shoot it immediately!"

The blue haters of the Ministry of Internal Affairs rushed forward and took the poor Ivanov away without saying a word. He realized that the commander was not joking, but was going to take action seriously. He quickly called out, but before he could shout a few words, there was a "bang" outside. The commander, who had just been transferred from the Far East and had not yet seen the cruelty of the Eastern Front, was sent to waste his life in a daze.

Bagramiyan was still angry: "You all listen, Karachi is the target we must win. If you can't complete the mission, Comrade Stalin wants to shoot me, I will shoot you!"

"Comrade Primakov!"

"have!"

"Now, if you change your 4th Guard Mechanized Army to attack, how long does it take to complete the mission?"

"I... can I make a small request?"

"explain."

"Please give me a rocket launcher battalion, I promise 2..." Primakov wanted to say that he had won it in 24 hours, but seeing that Baglamyan's eyes had turned blood red, he quickly changed his words, "Take the position in 20 hours!"

"It's too long. I'll give you two rocket launcher battalions. You have to win it within 12 hours. The time will start to be calculated from the arrival of the rocket launcher battalion."

Primakov gritted his teeth, responded quickly, "Yes!" and then turned around and left.

Highway 7 is the only way to Karachi. The Italian Ram Armored Division deployed a large number of anti-tank guns here using the terrain, woods, and shrubs. In addition to heavy machine guns, most of them were 50mm anti-tank guns replaced by the German army, and some were Russian-made 762mm anti-tank guns. Compared to the era when 37mm anti-tank guns could only be used to fill the facade, the equipment has been greatly improved. The Russian tanks seemed to have become unstoppable. The T-34 armor was often shot with 50mm anti-tank guns, and they were often shot and holes.

In addition to these semi-fixed firepower positions, the division also put two battalions of tank troops into mobile defense. Whenever the defense line is shaking, tanks or assault guns will appear in time for reinforcements. In addition, the Luftwaffe provided strong air cover. Whenever the Red Army tried to launch a intensive charge with artillery fire and infantry, the he-218 dive bombers and ju-87g ground attack aircraft would always arrive at the request of the infantry and use firepower to regain the Red Army officers and soldiers below.

Just as it was night on June 3, Primakov commanded his troops to sneak into the starting position, and the Italians encountered the most violent attack since the beginning of the Karachi defensive war.

After receiving the positions and rocket artillery battalions in the afternoon, Primakov did not rush forward to attack, but carefully studied the lessons of Ivanov's failure and found that he still used the tricks of dealing with Japan when attacking, covering it with artillery first and then attacking with tanks. This trick was of course overwhelming to deal with the Japanese Kwantung Army, which lacked heavy equipment at the beginning, but it could not be used well on the Eastern Front: the German army firmly had the air superiority, and the daytime attack could not achieve suddenness and concealment, nor could it get rid of the pursuit of air firepower, and the artillery fire support in the rear could not be too dense. Once it was dense, German bombers would come to attack.

At that time, Bagramiyan reported to the General Staff that the Air Force 2nd Army could be transferred to support the Northern Line on June 1. Unexpectedly, on the afternoon of June 3, the army not only could not be able to transfer, but also lost nearly half of the aircraft. In addition, the base camp and even Stalin himself continuously sent him telegrams to promote the attack, one more letter was tougher and one more letter was severer. Bagramiyan felt that he was being slapped.

After Primakov studied the situation of the position and heard the cry of several division commanders under Ivanov, he made up his mind and simply put the attack time at night. Everyone was worried about him. Commander Bagramiyan only gave 12 hours, and once the attack was at night, there would be less than 8 hours left. However, the former believed that if the attack was smooth, 1-2 hours would work. If one round could not be rushed, then let alone 12 hours, it would be not enough to double the amount.

"Ula!Ula!"

Groups of Red Army soldiers followed the t-34 at the forefront and launched a tide-like attack. Although Primakov's troops were given the title of guard, their quality was actually worse than that of Ivanov's troops transferred from the Far East. They could not fight such advanced infantry tactics as advanced attacks, infiltration operations, and roundabout encirclement. The most specialty was probably the human sea tactics, allowing the infantry to rush with the tanks.

Not long after they entered the preset position, the Italian heavy machine guns and mortars on the left and right wings began to fire violently, and the soldiers hurriedly fell down, slowly rushing forward while trying to suppress the firepower on both sides. The tanks continued to move forward regardless of everything, because once they stopped, they would become living targets, and used shells to sweep the surrounding fire points, trying to open a road for the team. There were many tanks and corpses left on both sides of the road, which were left by friendly forces in front when they attacked, and there were all kinds of ways to die, and most of the tanks were destroyed by anti-tank guns or mines.

The two sides fought fiercely, and the Red Army infantry battalions were put into positions one by one, and three regiments had been continuously raised. Apart from adding a lot of casualties, it seemed that the progress was not much. More than 30 tanks were killed alone.

But Primakov seemed to be unaware of it, and still commanded the troops to attack continuously, as if he wanted to use his life to build a passage.

About 5 minutes later, he picked up the phone and asked the military artillery director: "Have the enemy's firepower points been exposed? Have you remembered it?"

"I've written it down!"

He waved his hand fiercely and shouted at the microphone: "Let's fire!"

After a command, the two advanced invisibly and had touched the rocket artillery battalion not far from the front line and suddenly opened fire violently, aiming at the firepower point exposed by the Italians just now. Regardless of whether there were soldiers or tanks nearby, they carried out large-scale indiscriminate attacks. Continuous whistles made people's scalp numb. Balls of fire formed on both sides of the entire Highway 7, and the flames were red for a long time. Then, in the astonishment of all the surviving soldiers, the second attack echelon, together with the assault of the three battalions of assault infantry, roared and drove the most dangerous section at the fastest speed, regardless of whether there were any Red Army corpses under the road where the tanks ran over.

In order to take the position and not be shot, Primakov was almost crazy.

The officers and soldiers of the Gongyang Division did not expect the enemy to take a fire-burning attack. Many firepower points were destroyed in this rapid rocket rain before they could be transferred, and their defense firepower was greatly reduced.

The heavy artillery fire in the deep area was only then remembered to respond to the Soviet artillery fire and intercept the enemy's second echelon, but it was obviously too late. There were batches of tanks and infantry on Highway 7 and followed the rocket launcher's landing point. The moving targets were too small to distinguish. In the end, the revenge bombardment could only be poured into the Soviet rocket launcher battalion, which had not yet been completely transferred.

The tank troops of the Ram Division tried to play the role of firefighters again and rushed towards the Red Army tanks desperately. The leading tanks launched an attack with the Red Army tanks. Although the current defense level of the T-34s continued to decline, the offensive firepower was still the same as before. In addition, both sides were in close combat and melee, the Red Army, which received more infantry support, was obviously more favorable. In the following 20 minutes of tank fire exchange, the Ram Division destroyed nearly 50 Red Army tanks with more than 30 tanks, but in the end they could not stand up and retreated from their positions.

At 11 o'clock on June 3, the Red Army completely occupied the front line of Highway 7, and the subsequent troops continued to advance and began to siege Karachi.

...
Chapter completed!