Chapter 180: A tough battle

The weather is fine, and the field airport is full of busy ground crews, clearing water, leveling the ground, and machinery and equipment preparing for construction are also being pulled out for inspection... The airport in Siberia must be repaired with cement. This is

The consensus of the entire Air Force is that otherwise, if it rains or snows, we will not be able to take off for several days.

The ground troops also came out of various tents. It was getting moldy in the damn weather these days. The engineers were busy preparing the roads, the infantry helped wipe the equipment, and the tank crews were busy inspecting the tanks. On the surface, everything seemed normal.

In fact, everyone knew in their hearts that a war was inevitable, and the target was naturally Novosibirsk, thirty kilometers away.

Chuikov is the last person who wants to see the weather improve, but nature will not change due to personal will. The sun after the continuous rain is very comfortable on the body, but Chuikov does not feel much warmth in his heart.

The Chinese are about to attack Novosibirsk. Two heavily armed groups have formed a pincer, and a battle is inevitable. As the key gateway to the entire Siberia, Novosibirsk must not simply give up. The Chinese people's energy must be exhausted here. For winter

Lay the foundation for a counterattack.

War is not only a contest of combat power, but also a contest of wills, and a contest of wisdom among commanders. Since the war began, Chuikov felt that he had done a good job, but the Chinese were not impatient at all. Although they were constantly delayed, they still

Push forward steadily.

During this period, Chuikov, who had received some reinforcements one after another, still had no idea of ​​a decisive battle in Novosibirsk. His mechanized troops continued to retreat. Forty infantry divisions held fast to the defense line about 30 kilometers deep in Novosibirsk. The remaining troops set up defenses in turn.

, the main force is waiting for winter in Omsk. What Chuikov hopes to see most is for the Chinese [***] squadron to march straight in after occupying Novosibirsk. Only in this way can his continuous resistance tactics have the greatest effect. It depends on the Chinese being fooled.

Don't be fooled anymore.

Novosibirsk has a complete defense system. This is thanks to the fortifications left behind when the Chinese supported Kolchak. After Chuikov took office as the commander of the Siberian Front, he repeatedly strengthened the defense of Novosibirsk. Although only a few

As for the infantry, Chuikov is still very confident that he can hold on for more than a month.

In any case, this battle must be fought, otherwise the fighting spirit of the entire front army will be exhausted in the continuous retreat. Without fighting this battle, let alone Moscow, even within the front army, it will be difficult for him to convince the subordinates.

General. The tenacious Soviet will let Chinese imperialism know what iron blood is!

Twenty-four hours after the weather cleared, that is, in the early morning of October 28, a dense roar rang out over the calm Siberia. Soviet fighter planes appeared over Novosibirsk for the first time. More than a hundred I-15 and I-16

, bravely stepped forward to meet the formation of Chinese fighter jets.

The Central Asian campaign had proved that the Soviet fighter aircraft were seriously lagging behind. This led to the air force in the Siberian theater having a clear attitude, which was to go for the bombers. However, the Soviet fighter jets were soon disappointed. The Chinese Air Force bombers, at least in the Eighth

At an altitude of more than 1,000 meters. At an altitude of almost 6,000 meters, the Soviet fighter group was attacked by a dive attack by Mustang fighters. Because the air force expanded too quickly, most fighter pilots did not fly Mustang fighters too much.

Based on my experience, the trainer aircraft I learned in school were all Eagle IIIs, so the tactics in actual combat were very simple, just one move: dive, attack, pull up, dive again, and attack again.

This move is very effective when facing the Soviet I-15 and I-16. The Mustang fighter can easily bite the tail of the Soviet fighter plane and use six 12.7 mm machine gun bullets to reach a target of the Soviet fighter plane.

A ball of fire.

The entire air battle lasted for more than two hours. In the encounter between the well-prepared Soviet fighter formation and the equally well-prepared Chinese fighter formation, the Soviet fighter planes were severely damaged again. 88 aircraft were shot down, while the Chinese side only had 3

Two Mustangs were damaged, and two of them insisted on flying back to the airport. One lost control of the plane on the way back and the pilot was forced to parachute.

The weather on this day was very good and cloudless. The soldiers of both armies who were watching the battle on the ground had a great time. In contrast, the moods of the two sides were very different.

After it was over, I hid in the air-raid shelter. It was a great pleasure to watch, and the cheers and cheers kept coming one after another.

After clearing the Soviet fighter planes, the high-altitude B-17s lowered their altitude and began to drop bombs against the anti-aircraft artillery at about three thousand meters. The Mustang fighters separated part of the way to look for the ground anti-aircraft artillery and dive and strafed. A group of thirty

A dive bomber appeared last and dropped its bombs accurately on the Soviet anti-aircraft artillery position.

The air force was performing for the whole day, and the battle over Novosibirsk was just one of the scenes. More of it was a battle deep behind enemy lines. About 500 Mustang fighter jets and 200 dive bombers attacked the Soviet army 300 times deep.

Kilometers or so of all military airports were discovered.

At the end of the day, Chuikov's originally good mood suffered a heavy blow. The Siberian Front had more than 1,500 air force fighters, including 1,000 fighter jets. However, after a day of aerial decisive battle, the Soviet army lost more than 1,500 fighter jets.

The astonishing number was 380. This did not include the 55 bombers destroyed on the ground. In just one day, one-third of the air power was lost, which made Chuikov feel better.

The answer from the Air Force is very clear. The performance gap between fighter planes is too big. Whether it is the flexibility of climbing, turning, or the ability to withstand dive speeds, Soviet fighters simply cannot compare with new Chinese fighters. In the end, it boils down to a very cruel sentence:

Our planes are like targets! The enemy's planes are like shooting targets!

Because of this sentence, Chuikov ordered a strict ban on fighter planes taking off for air combat, and asked all airports to do concealment work. Chuikov decided to use the remaining fighter planes for ground attacks. It seemed that the hope of fighting for air supremacy was dead, and the next battle would be very difficult.

It was difficult, but Chuikov had no choice. He had to fight a decent defensive battle in Novosibirsk to buy time for the defense line behind him.

Chuikov painstakingly managed Novosibirsk as a fortress, which the two armies participating in the attack did not realize. Subjectively, the top brass of the front army were very optimistic about taking Novosibirsk in a short time, believing that the trend of the Soviet army's repeated retreats would not change.

On October 29, after the peripheral battle started, everything was not as expected. A large amount of evidence from aerial reconnaissance showed that the Soviet army had a heavy troop group stationed in Novosibirsk.

This news made the entire Chinese Far East Front rejoice! Finally, a big one was caught! The General Staff requested to capture Novosibirsk before November 5th. This was based on the premise that the Soviet army was unwilling to use its main force to resist. Now suddenly

Upon discovering this situation, the whole army became excited.

The first to start the battle was naturally Liu Mianyue's LM Army Group, which had a total strength of more than 500,000 and was equipped with a thousand 100-caliber or above cannons. At the beginning of the battle, they prepared for two hours with ferocious artillery fire.

Immediately, five infantry divisions were deployed as attack troops to search for weak points in the Soviet defense line along the ten-kilometer-long defense line. Once discovered, elite commandos were immediately deployed. This was a tough battle and was destined to be a battle with huge casualties.

fighting.

The Soviet army, which had repeatedly retreated and was holding its breath, showed high fighting spirit and a firm spirit of not giving up an inch of ground in the peripheral offensive and defensive battles. On the first day, the two armies invested 150,000 heavy troops to storm the Soviet defense line.

The Soviet army was extremely tenacious, and the [***] squadron attacking one side also had the belief that it would die. This battle became anxious as soon as it started.

On the first day of the battle, during the daytime, under the cover of fierce firepower, the [***] team advanced the front line for about 1.5 kilometers. One of them even advanced to two kilometers, and was later ordered to retreat.

The fronts were leveled. That night, the Soviet army launched a counterattack. Although the night battle was also an important item of the Chinese [***] team, more than ten small positions were recaptured by the Soviet army. Overall, the Soviet army, as the defensive side, occupied

Due to the favorable geographical location, China has equipment advantages, especially absolute air superiority. This has been fully verified in the daytime battle. Fighters are constantly circling over the battlefield. Once called from the ground, planes will swoop down at any time to kill the Soviet firepower.

Because of the loss of air superiority, the Soviet artillery did not have room to fully exert itself. In order to avoid air strikes, the Soviet artillery had to suppress it for a short time and then move its position. Despite this, the Soviet artillery was still under attack on the first day of the battle.

The Soviet army suffered huge losses, and the Chinese side also suffered more than 10,000 casualties. The Soviet casualties were around 30,000. This was not due to the Soviet army’s lack of combat effectiveness, but the result of the equipment gap. The basic equipment was still the Mosin-Nagant Soviet army.

, in front of Chinese soldiers who are fully equipped with semi-automatic rifles, the firepower density is far from enough.

The difficulty of the battle exceeded the imagination of the commanders on both sides of the war. What Chuikov did not expect was the disparity in casualties caused by the equipment gap between the two armies. The Chinese did not expect that the Soviet army was so tenacious, especially after carefully preparing as many as five lines of attack.

The anti-tank trenches restricted the movement of mechanized troops. After the peripheral battle began, tanks could only appear as cover for infantry, and it was difficult to concentrate on using tanks for assault again.

Of course, tanks can also be used to bypass Novosibirsk, but this tactic is difficult to implement in the poor road environment in Siberia. Fang Jianxiong, who is far away in Yanjing, actually did not expect to fight such a battle in Novosibirsk. It can be said that

Chuikov once again exceeded China's expectations. But from Fang Jianxiong's perspective, the advantages of fighting this battle outweigh the disadvantages.

Chuikov also had some helplessness, because Novosibirsk had a ready-made defense system foundation. Without using it before retreating, it would be difficult to find a suitable battlefield. Of course, the Soviet army could also withdraw across the Ob River, but referring to the last Siberian battle
Chapter completed!