Winter Storm Read online

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  Knispel clenched his fist when he got the hit, seeing the Russian crew bailing out. The lion had taken the bait, catching that mouse by the tail just as it leapt for the safety of its next hiding place. The other four tanks in his platoon had fanned out, and now they were advancing on the tree line in a chevron formation, with Knispel’s tank on the angle in the lead. He saw movement, and shouted out an order.

  “Platoon halt! Targets ahead!”

  Three T-34s appeared so suddenly that he immediately knew the ground must fall off to a lower elevation just beyond that notch. If they could have stayed just below that rise, firing hull down they would have been in a much better position, but his earlier inspection of the captured T-34 told him they had to show themselves. The gun on that tank could simply not depress more than a few degrees. Kleber fired first, scoring a glancing blow on the leftmost tank, and Knispel fired second, taking it flush on the upper frontal plate.

  “Another kill Sergeant!” His driver whistled.

  “No, we’ll give that one to Kleber. He hit that tank first.” He was already rotating to sight on the middle tank, which was still charging, the range diminishing to 300 meters. They want to see if they can beat my armor at point blank range, he thought. But I won’t let them get the chance. He put one round on the turret, punching through and surely killing that tank commander. The platoon quickly smashed the third T-34, and that looked to be the end of the engagement, until a hot round came right for Kleber’s tank, leaping out of the shadows of those trees.

  The hands struck twelve on Lavrinenko’s clock. Kleber had drifted right through his gun sights, and the range was an easy 300 meters. He had a perfect side shot, and he took it, his loader pumping in a second round so he could fire yet again a few seconds later. Sometimes a lion, sometimes a fox, thought Lavrinenko.

  He got his hits, then ordered his men to quickly bail out. He would never know if he could claim that tank as a kill, but it hardly mattered. All he could think of was getting back to friendly lines, back in another tank, and getting to Katukov with information he had learned in this sharp little duel. Yes, the Germans had a new tank, but that was not all. They had someone inside it that could read his mind.

  The battle of Malakhovo had just ended. The Russian attack was broken, the armor of the 3rd Tank Corps shattered, and the Russians were falling back. Sergeant Kurt Knispel had racked up an amazing nine kills, and was also gracious enough to give two more that he might have claimed to his platoon mate Kleber. As for those last two shots taken by Lavrinenko, he would have been shocked to learn that neither penetrated the 100mm side armor on the Lion. No man there knew it at that moment, but Germany had a war winner in the VK-55, and it was only the first of their new tank designs. The road Guderian had labored to control was finally his. Now all he had to do was find the fuel he needed to keep his panzers on that road, for every day would bring one final reserve corps the Russians still had on their side ever closer, and it was commanded by General Winter…

  Part VII

  Black Snow

  “Second Panzer Army is forging ahead, slowly but surely. Guderian had someone call up in the afternoon that his troops are on their last legs. It is true, they did have to fight hard, and a very long way, and still they come through victoriously, pushing back the enemy everywhere. So we may hope that they may be able to fight on, even against the repeatedly reinforced enemy, (new Siberian divisions), until a favorable closing line is reached. Hoepner is still clawing his way towards Moscow, so close, and yet each mile is an agony. Just west of the Kremlin, there is an ominously quiet spot where the enemy now, all of the sudden, has intensified his reconnaissance effort across the frozen river. It is not impossible that, after being beaten back elsewhere, he is now trying his luck there under cover of the fogs.”

  —War Diary of General Franz Halder

  Chapter 19

  The road to Serpukhov had been a whirlwind advance. With the Heavy Brigade breaking through, all the Soviet 3rd Tank Corps could do was move aside to the east and try and maintain pressure on the German flank. This forced Guderian to post kampfgruppes built around the Panzergrenadiers in Langermann’s 4th Panzer Division. The four battalions of Westhoven and Dorn were strengthened by the Division Panzerjager companies, flak batteries, and backed up by most of the artillery. KG Eberbach operated just east of the road, keeping a wary eye on anything that might be building up at Yasnogorsk, a railhead the Russians had been using to move in reinforcements.

  “Where are they getting all these fresh units?” he said on the radio to Guderian. “Don’t we have most of their army in the Kirov Pocket?”

  “Yes,” said Guderian, “but that is our problem as much as theirs. “This time they haven’t collapsed like other cauldrons. They’re fighting, and we had to commit 24 infantry divisions just to keep them in the bag. That’s why infantry is scarce as hen’s teeth.”

  “They’re fighting for the city named for their leader,” Eberbach suggested. “And now for Moscow. Yet every time we smash a division, two more appear to take its place!”

  To keep moving north, Guderian had to call on one of those hard to find infantry divisions, the 31st, fighting further west with 35th Korps. He wanted to move it into the positions north of Tula and relieve Langermann’s force. He also gave up his plan for a double envelopment of the city, which then freed up the 17th Panzer Division, and Loeper’s 10th Motorized. These units could then swing around the western side of Tula and relieve Funck’s 7th Panzer Division in the northern segments of the city, where it had been entangled with the Siberian Guards in costly house to house fighting.

  “Infantry,” Guderian said aloud as he looked at his map. “Two more good infantry divisions is all I need, but where to find them? At the very least, this realignment of forces should free up 7th Panzer again, and eventually I will get Langermann off flank duty as well. I will move the 7th right behind Westernhagen’s 101st. We drive on Serpukhov tonight!”

  On the 19th of September, Gruner’s Recon Battalion from Model’s 3rd Panzer pushed up the road, finding it completely empty. The Germans had cut clean through the massed armor that had fought so desperately at Malakhovo, and now 7th Panzer was coming up behind them to organize the advance. The Generals met on the muddy road north of Malakhovo, Guderian in the center of the group with his map.

  “Where did they get that tank corps?”said Model.

  “From the same bag with all these rifle divisions,” said Guderian. “But it seems we have solved the problem of this T-34.”

  “That we have,” said Westerhagen, a tall, proud man in a dark SS style uniform.”My Big Cats went right through them!”

  “Yet we still have a long way to go, and I’m afraid we will not have the support from 12th Panzer I was hoping for from the west. It pushed into Maloyarslavets as planned, but now they have pulled it out to send north to help Hoepner.”

  “But he has only twenty kilometers to go,” Funck protested. “We needed that division!”

  “Certainly, but I have freed up your troops by other means, Herr General, and I’ll want them on the road, right behind Westernhagen’s tanks. The 101st will be the tip of the spear, and you will follow. Get as far north as you can, and quickly. This rain is going to complicate matters considerably. The more ground we take now, the better.”

  “We’ll get to Serpukhov,” said Model. “But then what? That place will surely be well defended.”

  “The Russian frontier was well defended three months ago,” said Guderian, “but here we are. My only real concern at the moment is our mobility. How is the fuel holding up?” He looked at Westernhagen first.

  “My 2nd Battalion is at 60 percent, 3rd Battalion is a little worse off at 40%, but 1st Battalion is in good shape. They just refueled and I will move them to the front of the line.”

  The other Generals reported the condition of their respective divisions, and Guderian laid out the plan. “Langermann, your 4th Panzer is to mop up that enemy armor and
cover Yasnogorsk. I would love to take it, but I do not want to dilute our advance just now, or get you into another protracted city fight. Stay loose, and be ready to move north as soon as I can get Loeper’s 10th Motorized up there. Model, You get the left flank, but keep Munzel moving north with Westernhagen. The Oka will bend south in your sector, and I want you to push out patrols there and sniff out any good crossing sites you can find. General Funck, it looks like you and Westernhagen will get the job of taking Serpukhov. I’ll get you all the bridging battalions I can find.”

  “And after I take it?” Funck echoed Model’s earlier question.

  “Then we will have dinner there and discuss the situation.” Guderian smiled, wanting to keep up a brave face, though he inwardly knew that it would be very difficult after that. Those last hundred kilometers would be the most grueling of the campaign.

  Their marching orders in hand, the Generals returned to their divisions, with Model’s eyes aglow as he studied his map. “Gruner was the first to reach the bridge at Serpukhov,” he said to a staffer. “And I want to be the first to put men and tanks over the Oka. I will cross here.” He fingered a town named Protvino, where the Oka flowing west from Serpukhov then turned sharply south, meandering down towards Alexin.

  “Where is Gruner?” asked Model, needing his recon troops.

  “He was leading the advance up the main road sir. I think he’s still operating with the 101st.”

  “Very well, then it will be up to KG Munzel. I’m off to find some bridging engineers!”

  And he did exactly that, finding the bridging company of Langermann’s 4th Panzer Division coming up the main road at a town called Yakolevo.

  “Leutnant! I need your company. Turn left off the main road right there. A company of motorcycle infantry will lead you to the river.”

  “But sir,” the Lieutenant protested briefly. “You realize our division will be on the right flank when it gets here.”

  “It can’t be helped,” said Model. “The heavy brigade has taken my bridging company, and your division is well to the south. I need you to move west at once. Follow those men.”

  On the night of the 20th, the bridging company found all of KG Munzel’s tanks hidden at the edge of a light wood near the river, and the Lieutenant reported.

  “Where is Oberst Munzel? I am to report my bridging company is at his disposal.”

  “He’s already in Protvino!” said a Sergeant. “He crossed just after midnight on a light raft with a few men from his headquarters platoon. Word is the place is completely empty, but you had better get down to that river bank. He will be expecting you!”

  When the bridging troops arrived at the edge of the dark, swollen river, they found the rest of Pape’s Motorcycle recon battalion there, and a the I/394 Battalion of Panzergrenadiers. The engineers went to work immediately, laboring through the night to get the pontoons floated and bridging panels assembled. By dawn their work was complete, and the tanks of KG Munzel would cross the morning of the 21st, the first German troops over the Oka, just as Model had wanted. Elated, the General radioed Guderian with the good news.

  “Herr General? I’m standing on the north bank of the Oka at Protvino, and with three battalions of Munzel’s panzers crossing behind me!”

  “By God Model! How did you manage that?”

  “Where there’s a will….”

  “Very well,” said Guderian, breathing a sigh of relief. “Westernhagen is going to try and take the main road bridge into Serpukhov this morning. Scout west and see what you find, but put together a kampfgruppe and send them into Serpukhov from that flank. With any luck we can take the place by tomorrow night!”

  When Westernhagen’s Big Cats reached the bridge at Serpukhov, they mounted an immediate attack from march, thinking to storm the position. What they found waiting, just as Model had warned, were the men of the 2nd Red Banner Army, freshly arrived from the east. It was more a corps sized formation than an army, with only two rifle divisions, the 3rd and 12th, and several regiments of infantry on motorcycles, with a few battalions of light armored cars and artillery. Arriving at Serpukhov on the 20th, they barely had time to detrain and rush to man the defensive fortifications all along the river. Without enough troops to cover the river line all the way to Protvino, at least the two vital bridges would be well defended. But the eager troops, just come from the training camps and off that long train ride, did not know what was about to hit them.

  Westernhagen lined up his heavy tanks, and began blasting away at the enemy pill boxes and improved fortifications. The engineers rushed forward, ready with bridging pontoons deploying to both sides of the road. The bridge was still intact, but the Germans assumed it would be blown the minute they put tanks on it, and planned accordingly. With no organic artillery, he would rely on the guns of his panzers to support any infantry he could find to make the cross river assault. The 101st Panzergrenadier Battalion, Gruner’s Recon Battalion from the 5th Panzer, and I/3 Panzergrenadier Battalion from that same division made up the kampfgruppe, with three heavy panzer battalions waiting to pounce right behind them.

  The infantry clawed out a bridgehead, the tanks blasting at the enemy machinegun and mortar positions from across the river. The Russians tried answering with their 45mm AT guns, but were dismayed to see the rounds just bouncing harmlessly off the heavy frontal armor plate on the Lions. By noon, III Battalion had all 36 of his heavy tanks across the main road bridge, which the Russians had foolishly failed to destroy.

  *

  News that the Germans were over the Oka and fighting in Serpukhov jolted Zhukov at his headquarters in Moscow. He had been scraping up every reserve battalion he could find, even stripping machinegun battalions from the innermost ring of fortifications around the city. 7th Guards Rifles had been counterattacking towards Naro-Fominsk, and he called off the attack, yanking that unit back to get it on trains and up to Moscow. One look at the map summed up his dilemma. The troops he needed were on the long front line extending south. There, the 43rd Army was still holding on to Maloyaroslavets, and Yevremov’s 33rd Army was holding the line all the way down to Kaluga, where Zakharin’s 49th held that city, his lines reaching down to the lower Oka where 5th Army took over at Alexin. All those troops could be put to much better use elsewhere, and he decided to get them moving at once.

  “Guderian’s drive on Serpukhov has compromised that entire segment of our line,” he said to a staff officer. “Order Zakharin and Yevremov to begin an immediate withdrawal to the northern Oka river line. After that we pull out Kurochkin’s 43rd. Otherwise all those troops will be trapped if the Germans turn west.”

  He knew the Germans were not going to do that. They had already pulled the 12th Panzer Division out of the fight for Maloyaroslavets and sent it north to Hoepner. Now it was hitting the southern fringes of Rokossovsky’s battered 16th Army, which was still grudgingly holding back the tide of steel pushing towards Moscow. His reserves in the city were so thin now that any breakthrough could see those fast moving German panzer divisions rushing up on the inner defense ring.

  What he needed now was infantry closer in to Moscow, which he knew was the final objective of both Hoepner’s and Guderian’s effort. They want this city badly, he thought, but they won’t set one foot on these streets. The men who will stop them are in those armies, and I still have the Siberians out east… soon… but not yet. When they get here, then we hit them.

  “Get those orders out immediately,” he said, then turned, his boots hard on the stone tiled courtyard as he went.

  The night of the 20th, even as Model was pushing KG Munzel over the Oka, the whole front was to move from a condition of relative stability to frenetic motion. It was no small matter to move several armies thirty or forty kilometers to the rear. Zhukov knew many of those rifle divisions would have little transport, and that it would be days or even weeks before he had safely reshaped his defenses.

  Yet the Germans were stretching, he knew. He could sense that they were also tr
ying to do everything possible to keep the advance going. He would have another surprise for Guderian in short order, the 10th Army coming in on the trains from Ryazan. Those troops, five fresh rifle divisions and a cavalry division, would be thrown at that long flank stretching from the Oka at Serpukhov all the way back to Tula. The Germans had some god awful new tanks now, and it was neutralizing the temporary advantage his armored brigades had been enjoying with their T-34s. So it would come back to the stolid rifle divisions in the end, and more kept coming from the east, particularly the Siberians, who were now the godsend of this entire defensive operation.

  Time for a good spoiling attack with that 10th Army, thought Zhukov. Rokossovsky has been bawling and crying for anything I can send him, and some of his units even tried pulling off the line to fight in the suburbs of Moscow, but I put an end to that, at gunpoint, which is one thing those ruffians understand. Now I will remind Guderian just how far he is from Orel. We hit the flank of that road to Serpukhov tomorrow morning.

  Chapter 20

  Moscow had not yet seen its first snow of the winter, but the cold was slowly setting in, the rains sometimes turning to sleet, and windows frosting over at night. On the 22nd of September, the Big Cats of Guderian’s 101st Heavy Panzer Brigade growled into the heart of Serpukhov. The same news that had so shaken General Zhukov also fled to the capitol, bat like, on the dark cold winds of the night.

  Sergei Kirov was awake when it came, well after midnight when Berzin tramped in, his hard face red with the cold, hat in hand. The news of the fall of Serpukhov was the least of his worries. That was still a hundred kilometers from the city.

  “The Germans have broken through out west,” he said. “We’ can’t stop them.”