Knowing that Sokov was going to inspect the north side of the fortress, Samoilov, who was in charge of security, did not dare to neglect and set up a warning circle around Sokov and Lunev. All the soldiers were alert and observed.
of the surrounding environment.
When Sokov came to the river where the female soldiers died, more than half an hour had passed. Seeing that there were many commanders and fighters surrounding the river, Samoilov called two soldiers and prepared for them to evacuate.
The crowd, but Sokov stopped them: "Comrade Lieutenant, don't be nervous, the enemy's snipers have been eliminated, and it should be safe at this moment."
Among the onlookers, someone shouted: "Comrade Commander and Comrade Military Commissar are here!"
Following the shouting, everyone's eyes turned to the direction Sokov came from. Soon, the crowd left a passage, and the division commander Khokhlov and the political commissar Shepilov walked out of the passage.
.
Since a sniper incident had just occurred, the two men came to Sokov and Lunev. They did not raise their hands in salute, but straightened their bodies and reported: "Comrade Commander, Comrade Military Commissar, Commander of the 182nd Infantry Division."
(Political Commissar) Colonel Khokhlov (Shepilov) reports to you that the troops have just completed the task of annihilating German snipers, please give instructions!"
"There is nothing to instruct." Sokov felt a little unhappy when he saw so many commanders and soldiers gathered by the river: "Where are the bodies of the four female soldiers?"
"Just by the river." Khoklov replied: "Please come with me."
Khokhlov led Sokov and Lunev through the crowd and came to the river.
Sokov saw four bodies lying on the grass by the river, all covered with white cloths. He walked forward quickly, bent down and was about to remove the white cloth covering the bodies, but Lunie rushed after him.
The husband stopped him: "Comrade Commander, please wait a moment."
When he heard Luniev calling him, Sokov turned his head and looked at Luniev in surprise, not knowing what the other person was going to say to him.
"Comrade Commander," Lunev whispered to Sokov: "There are too many people around. Let them disperse first, and then you can check the bodies of the female soldiers."
After Lunev reminded him, Sokov felt it was very reasonable, so he stood up and said to Khokhlov: "Comrade Major, there are too many people around, you should evacuate immediately."
"Okay, Comrade Commander." Khokhlov agreed and called a staff officer to evacuate the crowd so that Sokov could view the bodies of the female soldiers.
Taking advantage of the time to disperse the crowd, Sokov asked Khokhlov in confusion: "Comrade Colonel, are these female soldiers from the division's communications battalion?"
"Yes, they are all from the Division Communications Battalion."
"Then can you tell me why they came to the river to bathe?"
"This is because there is no special bathhouse for women in the division. They can't find a place to take a bath, so they have to come to the river." Khokhlov pointed to the other side of the river with his hand: "Look, there is a forest on the other side of the river.
There are also grass and shrubs on our side, which provides a certain degree of privacy, so they choose to take a bath here."
After Lunev waited for Khokhlov to finish speaking, he turned to look at the ruins of the fortress dozens of meters away, shook his head with a wry smile, and said solemnly: "Colonel Khokhlov, that is, if they can find a bath
place, they would not choose to come to the river, and they would not lose their lives in vain like now."
"Yes, Comrade Military Commissar." Shepilov waited for Lunev to finish and then quickly added: "We will learn from this lesson and strive to prepare a bathhouse for female soldiers as soon as possible."
The staff quickly evacuated the onlookers, leaving only the guard platoon led by Samoilov, but they all had their backs to Sokov and others, standing on guard more than ten meters away.
Sokov once again came to the bodies of the female soldiers and squatted down, gently uncovered the white cloth covering their bodies, and found that they were all wearing only white underwear, and the bullet points were all on their foreheads or temples. The soldiers gathered their bodies
, wiped all the blood on their faces, making them look like they were sleeping soundly.
When Sokov covered the white cloth, he moved very gently, as if he was worried about surprising the sleeping female soldiers. As soon as he stood up straight, he accidentally saw a mass of black flesh and blood beside the bushes not far away.
The flesh and blood has lost its hands, and it is no longer possible to identify where the minced meat is and where the cloth is.
"Colonel Khokhlov," Sokov pouted at the mass of flesh and blood and asked with disgust, "What is that thing? Why does it look so disgusting?"
"Comrade Commander, what you saw," As soon as Sokov finished speaking, Shepilov stepped forward and reported: "It is the German sniper."
"What, a German sniper?" Sokov looked at the disgusting mass of flesh and blood and asked in surprise: "How did he become like this?"
"When the 1st Battalion of the 546th Regiment was searching for him, five more soldiers fell under his gunfire." Khoklov gritted his teeth and said: "Because the location where he was hiding is very dangerous, if we launch a force attack,
There was bound to be a heavier price to pay. Therefore, Captain Zheliya, commander of the second company of the first battalion, called in an anti-tank team and used rocket launchers to destroy the sniper's hiding place."
When Runev heard what Khokhlov said, he asked in surprise: "Did he be blown up like this by a rocket launcher?"
"After being attacked by a rocket launcher, his hands were blown off and he even lost one of his eyes." Khoklov then explained: "When Zheliya ordered people to arrest him, the soldiers thought of the sacrifice.
The female soldier and her comrades could no longer control the anger in their hearts and stabbed them randomly with bayonets, which turned them into what they are now."
After listening to the explanation, Sokov finally understood what was going on: "So that's it."
"What do we do with his body?"
"Just leave it here." Sokov thought of the most common bird in Russia, which is the crow. If you leave the sniper's mangled body here, I believe it won't take long before it will be eaten by crows flying from all directions.
Must be clean: "Leave it to the Russian crows."
After saying this, Sokov stared at the bodies of the four young female soldiers covered under white cloth and told Shepilov: "Comrade Political Commissar, please find four coffins and bury these female soldiers properly.
Bar."
"Don't worry, Comrade Commander." Shepilov patted his chest and said, "I will immediately arrange manpower to bury them."
"And you, Colonel Khokhlov." Sokov turned to face Khokhlov and said, "I am going to give you a special order now."
"Special order?" Khoklov quickly straightened his body and replied: "Comrade Commander, please give the order. I will not let you down."
"I'll give you an hour." Sokov stretched out a finger and said to Khokhlov: "Within one hour, build a new bathhouse for the female soldiers so that all female soldiers in the division can bathe.
Take a hot bath."
"One hour?" After hearing Sokov's special order, Khokhlov couldn't help showing a troubled expression on his face: "Comrade Commander, this time is too short."
Sokov remembered that in "The Dawns Here Are Quiet", Warrant Officer Vaskov only spent a few hours building a bathroom for female soldiers to take a bath. Now the 182nd Division has thousands of people, and
There were many houses in the fortress suitable for conversion into bathhouses, so Khokhlov was only given one hour to do so.
"What, Comrade Colonel, are you unable to complete this task?" Seeing Khokhlov's delay in speaking, Sokov showed an unhappy expression on his face: "If you really cannot complete it, you can just say it, I will
Just arrange additional manpower.”
"No, there is no need to arrange other people." Hearing Sokov said that he was going to arrange other people, Khokhlov quickly waved his hands desperately and said with great emotion: "Comrade Commander, please don't worry, I will definitely do it."
Complete the construction of the female soldiers' bathhouse within the specified time."
Seeing that Khokhlov agreed reluctantly, Sokov stopped talking nonsense and just said to him: "Comrade Colonel, I will call you in an hour. I hope to hear a satisfactory answer then."
After Sokov left, Khokhlov stamped his feet anxiously and said repeatedly to Shepilov: "Comrade political commissar, isn't the commander making things difficult for me? Is it so easy to build a bathhouse? Don't say that.
I'm afraid it won't be completed in an hour, or even in a day."
"Comrade division commander, don't be anxious." Seeing that Khokhlov was a little confused because of such a trivial matter, Shepilov quickly comforted him and said: "There are many bathhouses in the area controlled by the division now? As long as we
Wouldn't it solve the problem by choosing one of them as a bathhouse exclusively for female soldiers?"
The words woke up the dreamer. Shepilov's words made Khokhlov's eyes light up. He slapped his thigh hard and said excitedly: "Yes, why didn't I think of this? As long as a certain men's bathhouse is given over to
By using female soldiers, wouldn’t it have completed the special mission assigned to us by the commander?”
"Comrade division commander, let's work separately." Shepilov said to Khokhlov: "You are responsible for arranging the bathhouse for female soldiers, while I will stay and be responsible for installing the sacrificed female soldiers."
When Shepilov mentioned the sacrificed female soldiers, Khokhlov's expression darkened again. He nodded and said to Shepilov: "I asked Captain Zhelia's second company to assist you.
Complete this mission."
"Comrade Division Commander," Shepilov was worried that Khokhlov might think the matter was easy and leave it to others to handle, and reminded him specifically: "Don't forget one thing. Comrade Commander's wife Asya was once
Worked in our field hospital, and was even unfortunately captured by the Germans. Although the commander quickly launched an attack and rescued his wife, I think he was still angry with you in his heart, otherwise he would have been killed in Kursk
In the later stages of the battle, why were we only allowed to serve as reserves and not assigned combat missions?"
"At that time, we added thousands of new recruits without any combat experience. I think the commander may have felt that our combat effectiveness was diluted, so he did not assign us combat missions..." When Khokhlov said this, he suddenly felt a wave of excitement all over his body.
Shocked, he then wanted to understand what was going on and asked Shepilov with a panicked look: "Comrade Political Commissar, you mean that the commander has a problem with our division because his wife was captured, so he didn't arrange anything for us."
Important combat mission?"
"Other than that, I can't think of any other more convincing reason." Perhaps seeing that Khokhlov wanted to refute, he added: "If it is because the large number of supplements has not undergone military training, there has been no combat.
experienced recruits, thus causing the unit's combat effectiveness to be diluted.
This reason sounds somewhat reasonable, but if you think about it carefully, except for a few veterans who have recovered and been discharged from the hospital, the new recruits in other group armies are all new recruits who have not been trained and have no combat experience. But those troops
They can all jump into the battlefield as soon as they complete the replenishment, so why can’t we?”
After listening to Shepilov's detailed analysis, Khokhlov felt that it was very reasonable. He quickly said: "Comrade Political Commissar, then I will rush back to arrange the bathhouse matters now. I will leave the matters here to you. I will let
Captain Zheliya’s troops will come as soon as possible to assist you.”
On his way back to the headquarters, Sokov did not know that Khokhlov and Shepilov were talking about him. From today's tragedy, he realized that many tasks within the army were not carried out well.
Seeing that he was almost arriving at the headquarters, he slowed down and said to Lunev beside him: "Comrade Military Commissar, I think it is our negligence that we do not have a special bathhouse for female soldiers. We should come up with a plan as soon as possible to solve this problem.
, to prevent similar tragedies from happening again.”
"Comrade Commander, what you said is very reasonable." Lunev agreed with Sokov's statement: "As our army grows, the number of female soldiers is increasing. In the past, there were only female health workers and female soldiers.
There are now more female scouts, female anti-aircraft gunners and female tank crews in the communications corps. If special bathhouses are not prepared for them, they will have no choice but to choose rivers and lakes as bathing places. In this way, tragedies like today will happen again.
The probability is very high, I think that when we return to the headquarters, we will immediately issue a special order to the commanders of each division and each brigade, asking them to find ways to solve the problem of female soldiers' bathhouses."
The two of them walked into the headquarters unknowingly while chatting.
Samyko, who was left behind at the headquarters, was almost going crazy with anxiety at this moment. He kept worrying about the safety of Sokov and Lunev. At this moment, when he saw the two men walking in from the outside with beards and tail, he hurriedly greeted them with concern.
He asked: "Comrade Commander, Comrade Military Commissioner, are you all okay?"
"What can happen to us?!" Sokov answered casually and then asked: "Did anything happen in Klemenkoug during the time we left?"
"No, Comrade Commander." Sameko replied truthfully: "So far, everything is peaceful there and nothing has happened."
Seeing that there was no fighting at the front, Sokov told Samyko what he and Lunev had seen and heard, and finally said with emotion: "Comrade Chief of Staff, if the 182nd Division has a special bathhouse for female soldiers, these four
The female soldier would not have gone to the river to take a bath, and would not have died in vain at the gunpoint of a German sniper. On the way back," Sokov turned to look at Runev sitting beside him, "I
After discussing with the Military Commissioner, it is up to you to issue orders to the divisions, brigades, and regiment-level units of the group army, asking commanders at all levels to prepare bathhouses for female soldiers as soon as possible to avoid similar tragedies from happening again."