Chapter 21 Flesh and blood defense line

As soon as the news of the Soviet army's invincible reputation on the land battlefield, many people thought that this would be a fearless struggle like a moth to a flame. Some people took the miracle of the Rhine Valley as a precedent and subjectively determined that the flames of Stuttgart were igniting a raging fire that could end the Great Soviet era. In any case, the attention and support of the whole world made the Soviet senior leaders feel pressured. After the initial counterattack of the garrison surrounding Stuttgart was defeated, they quickly transferred the 11th mechanized corps, which served as the general reserve team from the front line of Lake Constance, and made this outstanding unit directly drive to the city of Stuttgart by force.

The first ray of morning light shone through colorful glass in the hall of Stuttgart Cathedral, forming an optical effect that looked like a fairyland. Here, many Germans who participated in the uprising were praying devoutly with their hands folded together. Faith can be said to be the biggest element supporting human behavior beyond matter, and its power can often determine the willpower and tenacity of a group. The strong performance of the Soviet army was largely due to their firm belief in the **. The armed SS, which believed in the will of the head of state, also had amazing performance on the battlefield. In contrast, the toughness of the Western Allied forces on the battlefield was far less than that of the previous two.

At the moment when the strong enemy was approaching, Lynn also came to this church, not to seek faith comfort, but to use the atmosphere here to relieve the nervous nerves that have been highly tense for days. It has been two days and three nights since the Stuttgart Uprising kicked off. During these sixty hours, the uprisingers in the city and supporters outside the city have cleared the Soviet garrison in Stuttgart and enriched the uprising power with the enemy's weapons and ammunition. Under the call of the banner of fighting against foreign enemies and regaining freedom, more than 100,000 Stuttgart residents have joined the ranks of the uprisingers. In 1945, they lowered the banner without fighting; in 1948, they opened the door to the surging Soviet army; this time, they decided to defend their dignity and power, even at the cost of their lives.

Among the civilians, many people did not have the ability to participate directly in the battle. All they could do was help the rebels dig up fortifications, build barricades, send ammunition to the front line during the battle, and withdraw wounded personnel from the rear. All kinds of solid buildings in the city and surrounding areas were used to minimize the attack power of Soviet artillery and tanks, but to resist the Soviet army's destructive three-dimensional attack, the defense line itself is far from enough.

The explosion sounded from a distance. The grand, solid and baptized religious buildings inevitably trembled slightly with the ground, and wisps of dust fell from the ceiling and walls, giving people the illusion that the end of the world was approaching. The prayers who looked like sculptures returned to the state they should have, and they stood up and left one after another. Some had defeated the pessimism and cowardice of human nature with faith, and thus seemed full of confidence. Some were not optimistic about the future, but

Still walking to the battlefield resolutely, some people still looked dim and were confused and pessimistic about their future. In the process of exploring the meaning of life, Lin Neng also experienced these completely different mentalities. Now he is more like a piece of steel that has been tempered, becoming more and more tough in the furnace. He didn't stay in the church for a long time, and he felt that his previous chaotic thinking was straightened out because of fatigue, and the thick fog that filled the road ahead was dissipating, and the other end of the road was not far ahead...

As the 11th Mechanized Corps of the Soviet Army entered the attack, the Stuttgart offensive and defensive war, which had been suspended for about ten hours in the middle, continued to take place. Since the bridges on the Rhine River had been blown up by the rebels, it was extremely difficult to attack the urban area from the west. From the beginning, the Soviet army concentrated its forces to seek breakthroughs on the other three sides of the urban area. For the rebels, the defense on the entire line would disperse their very limited main combat troops, so Lynn adopted a strategy to use a large number of "militia" who received assault training to defend the peripheral positions, and the Free Corps and the resisters with better combat effectiveness supported the entire battlefield in a mobile manner.

In previous battles, the Soviet army made breakthrough attempts in the east, south and north directions of Stuttgart city. This time, the Soviet troops, with armored clusters as the vanguard, chose the relatively flat south of the city. On this side, the insurrections built a complete line of defense. They had 5 anti-tank guns, 11 field guns, 23 mortars, 50 machine guns and more than 1,500 rifles, and submachine guns. They also used the captured three Soviet T-34 tanks with damaged power as fixed firepower points. Experience in urban defense warfare such as Leningrad proved that in order to withstand the strong impact of the field army, soldiers must use each weapon, including their own flesh and blood.

The Modson Chemical Factory located in the southern part of Stuttgart is one of the important fulcrums of the uprising and the decline of the German chemical industry in recent years. During the prosperity, it had multiple assembly lines and thousands of workers. The chemical products they manufactured were exported in large quantities, which exchanged valuable foreign exchange for the Third Reich. In the late World War II, the blockade and bombing of the Allied forces made the Modson Chemical Factory difficult to even produce normal production. The factory had to break the equipment and workers into pieces and transfer it to surrounding villages and towns for "underground production". Some equipment also avoided the misfortune of being plundered by the Allied forces and handed over to the Soviets, and retained an important material foundation for the re-initiation of the factory. By the end of 1946, the Modson Chemical Factory, like many factories in Germany, began to produce military products for the Allied countries.

The prosperity of the past briefly reappeared, but the victory of the Soviet army completely destroyed this illusion. Their ruthless expropriation turned the Stuttgart factory into an empty shell with only walls and buildings. Since the Modsen Chemical Factory was adjacent to the main roads entering the city and the railway line passing through the city, the solid buildings might also be used by the resisters. The Soviet occupation forces planned to demolish the entire factory, but they soon discovered that a small amount of ** was helpless for the factory building where the chemicals exploded during the design, so they transformed it into a warning outpost and a military material hoarding point. On the night of the uprising, an underground resistance armed force composed of workers successfully eliminated the Soviet garrison here with his familiarity with the terrain structure of the factory. The seized combat materials would play a huge role in the battles later.

For a target that seemed very solid, the Soviet aviation army unambiguously bombed continuously. The bombs dropped by bombers and thrust aircraft collapsed most of the walls. Except for two warehouses with particularly strong structures, the rest of the factories collapsed to varying degrees. Before the battle with the face to face began, the guards had already suffered great losses, and the Soviet commander's first attack in this area involved an armored regiment and twice the number of mechanized infantry. For civilians who had never experienced a regular battlefield, the screams of rocket launchers and self-propelled artillery alone were enough to make them terrified. The rolling dust raised by the tank vehicles during the rapid advancement brought strong impact and shocking visually. Coupled with the Soviet fighter jets that kept circling and firing above their heads, the combat situation made people feel that the insurrectionists had been defeated before the battle, and there was no suspense in the collapse of the front.

When the tank cluster rushed to only a few dozen meters away from the factory wall, the defenders had not shown serious resistance. The Soviet mechanized infantry, who were riding in combat vehicles, always followed the attack queue. Some vehicles had slowed down. After the soldiers got off the car, they quickly unfolded, preparing to clean up the remaining enemies after the tank controlled the factory. Seeing the smooth evolution of the battle, the Soviet battlefield commander might have been brewing the wording to report to his superiors. When Aner ran over the collapsed factory wall, the remaining warehouses and factories suddenly flew out.

Several moor bottles fell on the tank and exploded. The t-34, which was the first to be hit, turned into a ball of fire in a blink of an eye. The soldiers fighting on the tank suddenly became firemen, and the other t-34s that crossed the wall also encountered the same blow. Unlike being hit by anti-tank ammunition, these tanks were not immediately paralyzed, and they could still move and fire, but in a short while, they lost power one after another. The tank crew could not withstand the smoke and fire and escaped from the tank compartment, becoming the targets for close-range shooting of defenders.

The losses of a few tanks could not stop the Soviet army from capturing this stronghold. The subsequent tanks did not slow down at all. They crossed the fence and entered the factory area unstoppably, and fired violently at the building window with artillery and machine guns. The infantrymen who fought on the tanks also got off the car early and relied on the wreckage of the fence to launch a confrontation with the defenders in the factory area. When the tanks entering the factory continued to move forward to the warehouse, more molten bottles, anti-tank grenades, and cylindrical explosives were attached to the warehouse.

Near trenches and individual pits flew out, and the violent explosion was no less than the reputation of the Soviet army's firepower preparations. The simple smoke emitters were also ignited at this time. A large amount of gray and white smoke quickly enveloped the factory area. Soviet tanks and infantry immediately lost their shooting targets, while the uprisingers hiding in various corners increased their firepower output with their familiarity with the terrain. The dense gunshots and explosions from the smoke area psychologically interfered with the rhythm of the attack of the Soviet officers and soldiers.

The smoke continued to spread at the Modson Chemical Plant. In other parts of the defense line, the insurrectionists also used similar means to delay the Soviet attack and gain as much time as possible for the arrival of their mobile troops. Lynn's regular troops were limited in strength and their equipment was not ideal. What is really worth relying on was the soldiers' experience and steel will. They rushed to the front line with anti-tank rocket launchers and anti-tank guns seized from the Soviet army. There were even two intact t3485 seized from the Soviet garrison in Stuttgart. However, in addition to overcoming the obstacles of space distance and road conditions, their rapid maneuvers must also be very careful about Soviet fighters that could dive down and drop bombs at any time.
Chapter completed!