Captain Vanya and the battalion commander stood on the side of the road together, quietly waiting for Sokov and the large army to arrive. Unexpectedly, not long after standing on the side of the road, a jeep drove out in the city.
Seeing this, Vanya muttered to the battalion commander, "Comrade Battalion Commander, look, it's so late, there are still people driving out of the city."
When the battalion commander saw that, no, a jeep was driving along the street towards his position. He quickly waved his head at the several soldiers standing behind him and said, "Come with me!"
After stopping the jeep, the battalion commander walked to the passenger seat and asked loudly at the person sitting in the car: "Which part of you are from? Where are you going so late?"
"I am Malining!" Unexpectedly, as soon as he finished speaking, a low voice came from the car: "I am here to welcome the friendly troops entering the city."
Although the people in the car said that they were Malining, the battalion commander did not believe it easily, so he still used a flashlight to illuminate the vehicle. When he found that the person sitting in the passenger seat was Malining, he quickly turned off the flashlight, stood at attention in place, and said in fear and fear: "Hello, Comrade Chief of Staff, I am the battalion commander of the garrison battalion, please forgive my recklessness!"
Considering that the other party was also performing his duties, Malining did not blame the other party, but instead asked with a kind look: "Comrade Major, what are you doing when you are standing on the side of the road so late?"
"That's right, Comrade Chief of Staff." The battalion commander thought that Malining did not know about Sokov's troops leading the troops into the city, so he quickly explained to him: "It's a lieutenant colonel from a friendly army who is going to lead the troops into the city. His subordinates want to greet him here. I was worried that it was dark and it was easy to misunderstand, so I waited with him here. Look, the commander was standing there."
"Lieutenant Colonel of a friendly army?" Malining was stunned when he heard the battalion commander say this, and then he thought that in the afternoon, a Sokov army had entered the city, so he asked tentatively: "Comrade Major, the commander who accompanied you to greet is the commander who brought the troops into the city in the afternoon, right?"
"Yes, Comrade Chief of Staff, you guessed it right." Seeing that Malining knew Vanya, the battalion commander nodded vigorously and replied, "It was the unit that brought the wounded into the city, one of the commanders was Captain Vanya standing there."
Malining pushed open the car door and walked out of the car, turned his head to the staff members who were still sitting in the car, and said, "Comrades, we're here, get out of the car." After that, he took big steps and walked towards Vanya in the distance without waiting for the staff members to come out of the car.
When Wanya saw the battalion commander who was going to stop the car, he was following the commander who came out of the car and walked towards his position. He guessed that the person coming must be a big man, and quickly walked up to him. He stopped two or three meters away from Malining, stood at the right place and straightened his body and reported: "Comrade Commander, I am Captain Wanya, the battalion commander of the 73rd Infantry Brigade, and I am waiting for my brigade commander to enter the city. Please give me instructions!"
"Hello, Captain Vanya. I am Malining, the Chief of Staff of the Front Army. I am very happy to know you." Malining stretched out his hand to the other party and said friendly: "I wonder when you started following your brigade commander?"
"Report to Comrade Chief of Staff!" Vanya replied respectfully: "As early as the Battle of Moscow, I was the brigade commander's subordinate, and I had participated in the mission of defending the Istria Reservoir with him."
Speaking of Istria Reservoir, Malinin remembered that Sokov was a company commander at that time. He was awarded the honorary title of "Istria Company". While shook hands with Vanya, he asked curiously: "Comrade Captain, I want to ask you, which company is now using the title of "Istria Company"?"
"Not yet." When he heard Malining's question, Vanya said a little embarrassedly: "Someone once asked the brigade commander such a question during a meeting, but the brigade commander said..." Speaking of this, he suddenly thought of such a thing. Perhaps Malining just asked casually, but in fact he didn't really want to know the answer, so he shut up.
Unexpectedly, seeing that he was only half of his words, Malining stopped saying, and hurriedly urged him: "Comrade Captain, why don't you say it? How did Lieutenant Colonel Sokov respond at the meeting?"
"He said," Seeing that Malining was not asking, but really wanted to know the answer, Vanya continued to say: "It is said that the honorary title of 'Istria Company' can be awarded to the company of the first battalion, but he was worried that the company formed later would not be granted any company for the time being. He planned to decide which company to award this honor based on the results achieved by each company."
"Sokov was very thoughtful." After hearing Wanya's words, Malining nodded and said, "In this way, the companies in your brigade will compete in battle, hoping that they can become the honorable unit."
The two chatted for a while and saw an army walking in from outside the city along the road. Malining raised his hand and slapped Vanya on the back and said, "Comrade Captain, it must be your brigade commander. Why don't you go up and greet him quickly?" Vanya quickly agreed and trotted to meet him.
A few minutes later, Vanya and a few people walked back and they came to Malining and stopped. Then, Malining heard Sokov's voice sound: "Hello, Comrade Chief of Staff, I am Sokov. I obey your orders, please give me instructions!"
"There's nothing to indicate." Malinin stepped forward, grabbed Sokov's hand, and said with a smile: "I'm here to welcome you."
Standing behind Sokov were Bere, Gurdiev, Sverin and others. When the three of them heard what Malinin said, they thought to themselves: This Lieutenant Colonel Sokov is not simple, even the Chief of Staff of the Front Army came out to greet him in person.
After Sokov and Malining shook hands, the three of them also came forward to report their own house and greeted each other. Although Malining also shook hands with the three of them and was polite when talking, it was easy for others to hear that he was polite and unfamiliar.
"Comrade Chief of Staff." Sokov looked at the troops standing on the road and asked Malining with some embarrassment: "How should these commanders and fighters of the 308th Division be placed?"
"Lieutenant Colonel Sokov, don't worry, leave this matter to me." After Malining said that, he turned around and called a staff officer who followed him, and ordered the other party: "There are many empty houses in the south of the city, and you are responsible for resettling the troops."
When Gurdiev saw that Malining asked the staff to find a residence for his subordinates, he quickly took the initiative to propose: "Comrade Chief of Staff, let me go with the political commissar and this staff member, so that you can avoid unnecessary chaos."
Malining considered that it was dark at this moment, a staff officer led hundreds or thousands of people to find a place to live in the city. If there was no effective cooperation, it would be easy to cause chaos. He originally planned to ask the battalion commander of the guard battalion to help, but when he heard Gurdiev volunteer, he went to the river to go and settle your subordinates, "Okay, Colonel Gurdiev, then you can go with the staff to settle your subordinates. After all this, go to the Front Command to meet the commander."
After Gurdiev and Svelin left, Malinin smiled and said to Sokov and Bere: "Two commanders, you must be tired after leaving all night. Why not go back to the Front Command with me first."
When Malining came, there were four people in the car. Now a staff officer took Gurdiev and the others to find a place to stay. There were two seats in the car, and Sokov and Beretre were just enough to sit down.
The jeep returned to the commander's office. After Wanya and Sokov and Bere got out of the car, they took the two of them and mentioned the matter of Jiaxianing: "... General Jiaxianing proposed that because his troops lost a built-in division, we hope that we can agree to incorporate Colonel Gurdiev's 308th Division into the combat sequence of his 24th Army."
The stay or departure of the 308th Division was always a knot for Sokov. At this moment, when Malining took the initiative to mention it, his heartbeat couldn't help but accelerate. He asked nervously: "Comrade Chief of Staff, can you tell me, have you agreed to his request?"
Malinin shook his head and stared at Sokov with a strange look and said, "Lieutenant Colonel Sokov, how is this possible? If the 308th Division was a unit of the Don Front, we would definitely agree to General Kaxin's request. But this unit now belongs to the 62nd Army of the Stalingrad Front. What right do we have to make changes without authorization?"
After hearing Malining's reply, Sokov's heart was hanging in his throat and returned to his stomach. He laughed dryly and said, "That's good, that's good. As long as you don't organize the 308th Division into the 24th Army, I will have an explanation to Commander Cui Kov when I go back."
The three of them walked into the headquarters. After Malining greeted the two of them to sit at the chief's meeting table, he ordered the orderly soldiers to pour two cups of hot tea and prepare some food for them. After all this, he also sat down and looked at Sokov and asked, "Lieutenant Colonel Sokov, I heard that you only suffered more than 30 casualties and seized the enemy's position. Tell me, how did you do this?"
Sokov understood in his heart that the reason why Malining asked this was because when they seized this position, they lost a whole division without any progress. They easily seized the position with only a few dozen casualties. The contrast between the two was too large, so Malining wanted to figure it out.
"Comrade Chief of Staff, this is the case," Sokov said calmly: "There are two reasons why we can take the enemy's positions so easily."
Malining took out a notebook, put it on the table and opened it. He put it in a position to prepare for the record and asked, "What are the reasons?"
"First is the terrain. The terrain on the south side of the hillside is gentle and the Germans have not built any fortifications, so we can put into tanks when attacking." Sokov said: "Secondly, we used the sneak attack tactic. Before the attack, we did not prepare for artillery fire. That is to say, before approaching the enemy's position, the enemy did not notice our actions..."
After recording what Sokov said, Malinin nodded and said with emotion: "Lieutenant Colonel Sokov, you can take the enemy's position so easily, mainly because of the proper tactics. To put it bluntly, if our front troops attack from the south, the casualties would definitely be much larger than you."
Just as Sokov was hesitating about how to answer Malining's words, he suddenly heard a surprise voice coming from the door: "Misha, it's really you, you have also retreated from the position."
Sokov looked in the voice and saw that the person standing at the door was Yakov. As soon as he stood up, Yakov rushed towards him quickly, then gave him a bear hug, patted him hard on his back with his hand, and said excitedly: "Thank God, you finally retreated safely. What am I worried about if you have anything to do?"
"Yakov, thank you for your concern." Sokov felt his nose sore about Yakov's concern. He tried hard to control his emotions and squeezed a smile on his face and said, "I have a great life. I can kill my bullets and bomb my cannonballs, but they have not been produced yet."
Sokov's words immediately caused a burst of laughter in the room. Amid the laughter, a tall middle-aged general walked quickly to Sokov. Immediately after Yakov, he gave Sokov a warm hug, and said with a smile: "Misha, you little guy, always give us unexpected surprises."
When Sokov was hugged, he was still muttering in his heart, "Who is this? It's too casual to just hug him." When he heard the other party's words, he immediately heard that the person who was hugging him was Lieutenant General Rokosovsky, the commander of the Don River Front Army.
After letting go of Sokov, Rokosovsky grabbed his hands, took a step back, looked him carefully, and said, "I have lost weight and darkness. But I look more mature."
After Sokov waited for Rokosovsky to let go of his hand, he quickly stood at the spot and saluted, "Comrade General, Lieutenant Colonel Sokov, the commander of the 73rd Infantry Brigade, reported to you, I obey your orders, please give instructions!"
"Okay, don't do this again." After Sokov reported to him according to the regulations, he raised his hand and pressed down, saying, "Sit down first, I have something to ask you."
After Sokov sat down again, he looked up at Rokosovsky and asked respectfully: "Comrade General, do you have any instructions?"
"The instructions are not worthy of." Rokosovsky sat down opposite Sokov, looked at him and asked, "I just wanted to ask you, do you think if our army used that position as the starting point of the attack, could it penetrate the German defense and join forces with the defenders in the city?"
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Chapter completed!