Li Xiaofeng was indeed a little troubled. He was definitely happy to push Ubolevic to the position of Chief of Staff, but at the same time, Li Xiaofeng was unwilling to give up the position of Minister of the General Equipment Department. It was not that he wanted to take all the benefits by himself, but at present, the General Equipment Department is very important. For example, if the missile plan and nuclear bomb plan mentioned earlier were not strongly insisted by the General Equipment Department and kgb, even Ustinov would not be able to handle it.

Not only these two plans, but also the equipment and what weapons should be developed within the army, there are many messy suggestions between different military branches. For example, the navy's old stubborn likes battleships and not aircraft carriers, such as the Air Force's six-engine giant intercontinental bomber, and the Army wants to build a super heavy tank to play with.

In short, there are a lot of inexplicable ideas, but as mentioned earlier, the Soviet Union's resources were limited. If all the valuable resources were wasted on these brain-opening projects, it would be really a big deal. At least Li Xiaofeng could not allow these shabby projects to grab resources. Therefore, it is very important to control the total equipment;; + department.

If Tukhachevsky stepped down and Ubolevic was transferred to the General Staff, who would take over the General Equipment Department? Anyway, Li Xiaofeng has no good candidates for the time being. Either transfer Triandafilov back or he could only promote Shaposhnikov. However, the former is a pure tactic and strategist, and he is definitely not as easy as Ubolevic in handling the complex interest relations in administration, especially the military. After all, the latter has worked in this department for more than ten years and everything is clear.

As for Shaposhnikov, it is not impossible to transfer him back, but who can be allowed to accept the commander of the Kiev Military Region? Moreover, Shaposhnikov is not a purely own person after all. He is old and not in very good health. Letting him become the chief of the general equipment can only be a transition. In the long run, he still has to find a more suitable candidate.

But this more suitable candidate does not exist for the time being. If in a few years, when Rokosovsky and his group grew up, Li Xiaofeng would not have to worry about this problem. Now, no matter whether he is helping to get into this position, he will be in trouble later.

After thinking about it, Li Xiaofeng made a decision, which was to drag it down. Anyway, the power of the General Staff had been restricted, so it would not be so easy for Tukhachevsky to commit suicide, so it would not be unacceptable to let him continue to do it.

Moreover, considering that Trotsky was not so easy to let go of the General Staff, if he agreed to Tukhachevsky's resignation, he would have to exchange certain interests. In the long run, this would definitely make Li Xiaofeng suffer a loss, so it would be better to just let it go. At most, in 1945, Trotsky had to step down, and Tukhachevsky got out of office, and even Tukhachevsky couldn't keep it. At that time, it was the right way to take over the General Staff naturally.

Based on this idea, Trotsky didn't say anything. Li Xiaofeng was naturally too lazy to extricate himself. Tukhachevsky did perform poorly in the War of Prevention, but he was the first Soviet marshal after all. After all, he made contributions to the country during the domestic revolutionary war. It seemed inhumane to drive him away, so Li Xiaofeng would not be foolishly a villain.

Trotsky did not expect that a certain immortal was so patient and could withstand the temptation of the General Staff. Now it was his turn to sit on the wax. To be honest, Tukhachevsky did not step down, and he was actually passive. He was originally going to enjoy his achievements, but who thought that Li Xiaofeng would not be fooled, what should he do?

For a time, neither Trotsky nor Li Xiaofeng said anything, but instead, Tukhachevsky, who was shaky at the beginning, temporarily stabilized his position. Of course, Tukhachevsky did not know that the reason why he could continue to be the Chief of Staff was not that the Politburo and the Military Commission chose to continue to trust him, but that it was a forced compromise and delay in the internal struggle for power and interests. To put it bluntly, the time has not come.

Tukhachevsky didn't know this. He thought he had overcome the difficulties, so his dead heart began to restless again. He felt that he should seize this opportunity and show a good performance to stabilize his position.

Therefore, the Minsk counterattack that he had been planning for a long time was put on the table again, and our Chief of Staff was ready to launch a wave of offensives in late August and early September to drive the Germans out of Belarus!

"This guy is really ignorant, so he can't calm down a little!"

This news naturally made Li Xiaofeng very unhappy. Not only was he not interested in the so-called Minsk counterattack from the beginning, but more importantly, is this suitable for such a counterattack?

The Battle of Kursk had just ended. Although it was a big victory, the Red Army suffered a lot of losses. After more than four months of consumption, the Red Army urgently needed rest and supplements. How could they have the ability to invest in new counterattacks?

If such a counterattack is necessary, there is only one way to do it, and the east wall must be demolished and repaired. The last time Tukhachevsky did this directly led to the deterioration of the war in Ukraine. Let's do it again. This is to be prepared to ruin the situation that I finally got back!

Of course, Li Xiaofeng firmly opposed the so-called Minsk counterattack. His reasons were very good: insufficient troops, grassroots commanders and fighters were very tired and needed rest, and the main force of the German army was still very strong.

So did Tukhachevsky listen? If he could listen, it would not be Tukhachevsky. Fortunately, the General Staff at that time was no longer the General Staff at that time, and the Chief of Staff had to follow the baton of the Military Commission, so the plan to launch the Minsk counterattack was immediately rejected, but he did not completely deny his suggestion. Instead, the battle was changed to mid-to-late September, and the Red Army would wait for two months to rest and supplement.

It seemed that everyone was happy, but in fact, neither Li Xiaofeng nor Tukhachevsky were satisfied with this result. One thought that soldiers were very fast, and the other thought that the idea of ​​Minsk's counterattack was garbage. Can you be happy?

"It's right to be unhappy," Trotsky said calmly, "If everything follows Comrade Andre's advice, what else do we need to do?"

Let me put it this way, in fact, the one who deliberately couldn't get along with Li Xiaofeng this time was Trotsky. To put it bluntly, Lao Tuo still wanted to break the silence and forced a certain immortal to take the initiative to cooperate with him to rush Tukhachevsky to step down. Otherwise, he would constantly use Tukhachevsky to cause trouble for a certain immortal, which would make Li Xiaofeng so annoyed.

Is this tactic effective? It’s hard to say, because although Li Xiaofeng can tolerate it for the time being, this does not mean that he can tolerate it all the time, at least it is impossible to endure it until the moment when Lao Teng stepped down in 1945.

In the following period, direct or indirect conflicts broke out between Li Xiaofeng and Tukhachevsky over many military issues, and the anger between the two sides became increasingly greater. For example, on the issue of tank guns, the two sides had a very unhappy quarrel.

According to the impression of most comrades, the performance of Soviet tank guns and anti-tank guns was lower than the world's advanced level during the same period. For example, the Soviet Union's 76.2mm tank gun was actually only a little stronger than the United States' 75mm m3 tank gun, and the 85mm tank gun was not as good as the German 75mm KWK40 and the US's 3-inch tank gun (m7). As for the 100mm of the D-10 series, it is also not as good as the German 88mm kwk43, and it is only stronger than the KWK36.

Is this true? In fact, this question is very complicated, and it is necessary to comment on whether a tank gun is easy to use. It must be based on national strength and battlefield environment. Even just talking about cannons is nonsense. No matter how good the tank gun is, it is just a cannon. What's the use of just having cannons without advanced ammunition?

For example, before 1941, were the Red Army's tank guns really much worse than the same level as the world? To be honest, it is not necessarily true that when tanks of other countries of the same era were still playing with machine guns and 37mm guns, the Soviet Union used 45mm tank guns. In terms of the performance of this 45-barrel, it was basically no problem to destroy other tanks of the same era.

But was the Soviet Union satisfied at that time? It was not satisfied. On the contrary, the Soviet armored soldiers and artillery felt that they were insufficient firepower (it was purely to scare themselves), and with the launch of the new generation of tanks, more powerful anti-tank guns were put on the agenda. For example, the Grabin Design Bureau undertakes the development of 57mm and 107mm anti-tank guns.

The 57mm anti-tank gun among them was the later Zis-2 (Factory 92 won the honorary title of "Stalin Factory" and its full name is zavnistalina, so the artillery developed by the factory is called Zis type).

When the zis-2 was put into service in 1940, it can be said to be one of the most advanced anti-tank guns in the world. This gun fires a 3.14 kg B-271 armor-piercing projectile that can reach an initial velocity of 1,000 meters per second, and can penetrate 90 mm thick vertical armor at a distance of 1,000 meters, and still has a 75 mm armor-piercing power at a distance of 1,500 meters.

Also please note that the zis-2 type was not the 57mm gun with the longest tube developed by the Grabin Design Bureau at that time. Another type of zis-1kv 57mm gun that was developed in November 1940 was 86 times the caliber. When using the br-271, the initial velocity reached 1150 meters/sec, but the lifespan was too short. According to Grabin himself, "After shooting 40 rounds, the initial velocity and accuracy were significantly reduced. After 50 rounds, the shells did not rotate and began to turn somersaults (the rifle was bald!)". Although Grabin's statement was a bit exaggerated, it was an indisputable fact that the zis-1kv had too short lifespan, and later the zis-4 was also troubled similarly.

It can be seen that before 1943, the power of the zis-2 was sufficiently used. Even if the improved No. 4 tank encountered the zis-2, it would only be beaten. However, the very powerful zis-2 had one problem, that is, production was too troublesome and cost too high. The production capacity was very limited. Please note that the zis-2 was born a bit "too late". Since 1940, the Soviet Union had already begun to prepare for war. At that time, the Red Army generally believed that the power and potential of the 45mm artillery was limited, and better anti-tank guns must be developed to replace them.

In order to complete this task as soon as possible, the Grabin Design Bureau creatively solved this problem, combining the f22 cannon barrel with the zis-2 gun mount, and accumulated a zis-3. This was the main anti-tank weapon of the Red Army artillery later. As for the zis-2, it continued to be improved and developed, and mass-produced after the process was mature.

Of course, it is well known that the Patriotic War broke out in 1941, and the mass production of zis-2 was replaced by the urgent needs of the frontline. For the Red Army, the zis-2, which had higher production costs and more complex production technology, was really unaffordable. We could only use zis-3 to get it first.

Because of the war, the Zis-2, which should have been the main tank gun of the Red Army, could only retreat behind the scenes and cried silently. So only a small number of artillery and armored soldiers obtained this weapon (the artillery is zis-2, while the armored soldiers are t-34-57, and their improved version of the Zis-4 tank gun, which later developed into zis-4m).

Let me put it this way, this zis-2 and its improved version of 57mm tank and anti-tank gun are actually more powerful than the D-5t85mm tank gun that was widely equipped with the T-34 later (when the zis-2 uses br-271p and br-271n, the armor-piercing power reaches 105mm/90 degrees and 140mm/90 degrees respectively at 1000 meters, and the 500 meters distance is even more powerful, while the br-271n still has 125mm armor-piercing power at 1500 meters distance!)

There may be no intuitive image to say that, just to put it bluntly, when zis-2 and zis-4 use br-271n bombs (apcr), they can penetrate the tiger's armor at a distance of 1,200 meters. The armor-piercing power is quite considerable.

Of course, it has to be said that the "artifact" of ACPR bomb was too high-end for the Soviet Union. Not all tanks and anti-tank guns could be equipped, and they were generally only distributed to the best gunners. Of course, this was a common phenomenon in other countries back then. After all, tungsten resources were limited, and the production of tungsten carbide bullet cores was also quite troublesome.

Take the US imperial examination, which is not short of money. After landing in Normandy in 1944, it was distributed to three-inch and millimeter tank guns (please note that it was not the later Abrams tanks! It was widely used in M4 tanks and M10 tank destroyers) and how many T4 high-speed armor-piercing bombs (that is, ACPR bombs, or HVAP bombs) were used? It was just two thousand rounds!

When the Ardennes counterattack ended in 1945, the American tanks and tank destroyers, who were abused by the German armored troops, applied for T4 crazily and immediately replaced the M4 with the 76.2mm m1a1 tank gun. As of March, the US imperialists had only given out how many T4 4 ? Only 18,000 rounds to the front line!

Is there a lot of 18,000 rounds? In fact, calculating the number of 76.2 mm tank guns on the Western Front by the US, you will know how many units can get. According to the Americans' own later records, before 1945, each unit could only get one T4 armor-piercing bomb per month. By February 1945, only each unit received five T4 armor-piercing bombs at one time. Even the 6th Army, which was fighting in Alsace in France, did not receive one T4 before January 1945.

The key reason why it is so tragic is that tungsten is not enough, even a rich man like the US cannot be used openly. Moreover, t4 is not as perfect as imagined. In fact, on the battlefield, the effect of t4 is much worse than in the experiment. At a normal combat distance of 800 to 100 yards (731 to 914 meters), it is impossible to penetrate the Black Panther's improved front armor, and can only penetrate its side.

Let’s look back at this zis-2. In the original plan, it was the tank and anti-tank gun that the Soviet Union should have widely equipped, but due to war, its priority suddenly dropped. Historically, after the Soviet Union encountered tigers and leopards after 1943, it felt that the firepower of the zis-3 was not enough, so it wanted to redevelop zis-2. Of course, we also know that the zis-2 still did not usher in spring. In terms of tank gun competition, this time it was the later D-5 series.

Although the D-5 is not as good as zis-2 from the perspective of armor-piercing power, the production process and production cost of d-5 are much lower than that of zis-2 (its body tubes and 52-k anti-aircraft guns are basically the same), so the extremely developed zis-4 and zis-4m were once again abandoned by armored soldiers (but artillery weapons are still widely equipped).

Now, when the German Black Panther first landed on the battlefield, the sensitive Red Army armored soldiers immediately felt that they were insufficient in firepower and believed that it was necessary to replace tanks and anti-tank troops with better artillery. On this issue, Tukhachevsky admired the Zis-2 series, while Li Xiaofeng believed that the D-5 series was enough.

Good guy, this is an irreconcilable contradiction. Tukhachevsky insisted on resuming the production of zis-2, but Li Xiaofeng firmly disagrees. So why does Li Xiaofeng disagree? The reason has actually been mentioned before, that is, the production of zis-2 is troublesome and has a low lifespan.

First of all, this is an ultra-long cannon with a caliber of 71 times. As we all know, the longer the barrel of the artillery, the more troublesome it is, and what is even more serious is that the armor-piercing shells used in zis-2 require relatively high manufacturing technology. In order to exert its excellent performance, it must be equipped with better armor-piercing shells. Now the Soviet armor-piercing shell production process is actually not up to date (in 1941, even the quality of the 45mm tank gun and anti-tank gun armor-piercing shells was extremely poor). Even Ustinov repeatedly focused on production and strengthening the process, it only temporarily solved the problem of armor-piercing shells of the 76.2mm gun.

Is this appropriate for the br-271 series, which is more difficult to get on the horse at this time? Moreover, the main task of tank guns is not only anti-tanks, but also requires cooperation with infantry combat. The ability to destroy fortifications is also very important. In this regard, Zis-2 is naturally not good at it, and its high-explosive grenade is too low.

The problem is that Li Xiaofeng talked to Tukhachevsky about reason, but the latter couldn't listen at all. He always insisted that anti-armor was the first priority. It is necessary to prevent the threat of more advanced tanks from the German army in advance... (To be continued.)

ps: Bow to thank jj, deep sea snail, 893, lazy readers, lazy readers, hzangdd and comrade Juventus!

324 Tank Gun Battle (1:
Chapter completed!