Winter Storm (15 page)

“Roko
is over there. He’ll stop them.”

“Rokossovsky?
I heard he was given a new army!”

“He was
given an old army,” said Lavrinenko with a grin. “The 16th. They just put new
men into it, that’s all. And don’t worry… We’re only a hundred and twenty
klicks from Moscow here. If they need us, we can get there very quickly. All
the more reason to keep a full belly on fuel, plenty of ammo on hand, and to
fix that damn squeaky wheel! Where’s Yuri?”

The
forces arrayed on the middle defense line of the capital
were indeed the men of the newly reconstituted 16th Army under General
Konstantin Rokossovsky, Roko, the ‘Rock of the East.” He, too, was an old
Cavalry officer, having commanded the 7th Samara Cavalry in the upper Volga
district against Volkov’s forces, leading a Brigade commander by the name of
Georgie Zhukov at that time, whom he described as a disciplined and demanding
man, while also being stubborn, painfully proud, and ‘broadly inexperienced as
a military leader.’

The two
men began a long rivalry there in Samara, both serving in the eastern campaigns
against the Orenburg Federation, where each gained valuable combat experience
that was now serving them very well. Rokossovsky avoided the persecution and
torture he would have had to endure during Stalin’s purges, and was instead
handpicked by Sergei Kirov, who moved him quickly through his historical
commands in the 5th Cavalry Corps, and then the 9th Mechanized Corps at the
outbreak of Operation Barbarossa. There he had been a rock in the stream,
holding up both 13th and 14th Panzer division with his implacable defense, and
then counterattacking the 25th Motorized Division left behind to guard that
axis while the Germans took another road.

Now he
served under the man he had once dismissed as being broadly inexperienced, and the
16th Army, which had been recently destroyed at Smolensk, was raised from its
own ashes to mount the last line of defense by a regular Soviet army on the
western approaches of Moscow. To flesh out the new units, men from penal
battalions were swept up from all over the front rear areas, and hastily organized
into new rifle divisions.

In the
real history, Stalin had also placed the Rock in command of that same army,
seeing a man who had survived the brutality of his own Great Purge as the
perfect candidate to lead the tough felons recruited from the penal system. He
had once commented that one no longer had to wonder what Rokossovsky might have
under his fingernails, for the NKVD had pulled most of them out when he was detained
in the Gulags, accused of treason. He also had steel teeth, for the NKVD had
knocked his own out of his head in those same hard days.

But none
of that had ever happened. Rokossovsky still had his fingernails, and no steel
in his mouth in this telling of events. The question remained as to whether he
still had the steel that made up his backbone in that older history. Soon that
would be put to the test. He gladly accepted his new command, again a motley
collection of misfits, ruffians, mavericks and mad men from the far east, with
a sprinkling of new Siberian volunteers to finish it all off.

On the
morning of the 14th of September, the tired 6th Panzer Division made its first
inroads, throwing three battalions at a single fortified complex held by
Russian special forces, and eventually bulling their way in. But the 6th was
low on supply, and needing time to rest, with little real offensive punch left
after its long drive along that bitterly contested road. They would soon be
relieved by a fresh division, the 2nd Panzer, Heinz Guderian’s old unit, where
he first drilled his armored doctrines in 1938. It was now coming up the road
that had been fought for, and cleared, by the blood and fire of the 6th.

And this
new German unit was now about to meet the Rock.

*

The
men of the 810th Machinegun Battalion leapt off the train
at Odinsovo, right where Rokossovsky had established his headquarters for 16th
Army, just 20 kilometers southwest of the Kremlin. The Germans had attacked the
middle defense line of the city the previous day, relying on the fresher 2nd
Panzer Division for the main effort. In reprisal, strong reserves in the 2nd
Guards Cavalry Corps had come down from the north to try and break through behind
them, and cut the road that stretched west to Mozhaysk. It had taken Hoepner’s
Korps two weeks of hard fighting to push up that road, a distance of a little
over 50 kilometers. And now they were breaking through.

The
surly, grizzled fighters of the 16th Army threw everything they had at the
enemy, using sheer malice when they had no more grenades, or the ammunition ran
dry on their inadequate 45mm AT guns. They knew they were the last hard rock in
the stream before the river of enemy troops might reach Moscow, but Hoepner was
a hammer, and he kept pounding them, day and night.

Rokossovsky
could see that his men were at the limits of their strength to resist. It was
only the fact that Hoepner had no infantry to secure his flanks that the danger
was not greater. Of the four German Panzer Divisions making this attack, the
1st Panzer was strung out well to the rear facing down elements of the 22nd
Army to the north, the 6th Panzer Division was worn out, and now trying to hold
back the 2nd Guards Cavalry, 11th Panzer was finally clearing op the last
pockets of resistance south of the road, where remnants of the 16th Rifle Corps
had retreated all the way from Mozhaysk.

That
left only 2nd Panzer, which struck the line of the Soviet defensive positions
like an arrow, its steel head being its well established panzer regiment, which
had 24 Lions in the spearhead of the attack. They punched through, the German
infantry crouching behind them, and then more following in half tracks and
armored cars. The Rock was stubborn, rallying his troops while he got on the phone
to Moscow and appealed to his old subordinate, and now superior officer,
Georgie Zhukov.

“The
Germans have a new tank! He declared, his voice surprisingly high and shrill,
even though he was a big, barrel-chested man. Zhukov had heard the same
plaintive calls from the commander of the 3rd Tank Corps, though he had not yet
seen the beasts that were now prowling the battlefields out there. “I’m up
against several panzer divisions,” said Rokossovsky. “Send me anything you can
find!”

“I will
get you help,” said Zhukov. “But under no circumstances may you withdraw. You
must hold that road, hold your position at all costs.”

Some
hours later the Major commanding the 810th Machinegun Battalion tramped into
Rokossovsky’s headquarters and saluted. He had just been pulled off the inner
defense ring, well north of the city, a sector that was not being threatened,
and his men had come through the sullen night to join the fight.

“Good,”
said Rokossovsky. “How many are you?”

“Twenty-seven
squads, sir, but eighteen of those have heavy machineguns.”

“Twenty-seven
squads? What else is there?”

“It’s
just me and my men sir,” said the Major. “Unless there’s another train behind
us.”

There
was no other train. The 810th Machinegun Battalion was all that Zhukov could
find to send that day. He had People’s Militias on the inner defensive ring,
and several other battalions like the 810th. But there were no more Armies to
commit to the fight, no more Rifle Corps, no divisions in reserve, and no more
tank brigades. The 2nd Siberian Shock Army was still a thousand miles to the
east, hastily assembling as it scrounged to outfit its units with any weapons
they could find. The 10th Army was closer, but it was coming through Ryazan to
try and stop Guderian, and would not arrive until the following day.

Zhukov
had already sent the last of the 4th Para Brigade the previous day, and they
were fighting south of the main road. Then he had stripped the flak batteries
from the airfields around the city, and sent them into the buzz saw of the
fight. The only trained, professional troops that remained in the capital were
the three battalions of the Kremlin Guard, Sergei Kirov’s personal bodyguards, and
Beria’s internal security troops. He could not touch those. All he could send
was that hapless Major and his single battalion of machine gunners. If the line
was going to hold, and the city was going to be saved, it was up to
Rokossovsky. Implacable as he was, the General could nonetheless see the grim
reality of his situation.

If I
leave my bandits and brigands where they are now, he thought, the Germans will
get through with those damn tanks, and then the city will be defended by
nothing more than the old men and boys in the Militias, while my men cling to
these bunkers and fox holes.

At
least my troops can still fight, and Moscow is a very big place. I’ve been
ordered to hold this damn road, contest every bunker, and every meter of
ground, but I would much rather be fighting in the built up areas closer to the
city. It would be house to house there, not so comfortable for the people who
live in them, but much better for my infantry. Here we deploy on a single hard
line. There we could defend in much greater depth. In such a case we will force
the Germans to clear every building, every cellar and attic. As it stands, once
they get through…

He
decided there and then to appeal the order he had received from Zhukov, but to
whom could he make such an appeal? Marshal Boris Shaposhnikov was still Chief
of the General Staff. Technically that staff served the interests of the Army
as a whole, which Zhukov now commanded, but he made his appeal in any case.

“You
want the Germans in the city tomorrow night? Who will fight them there, the
Babushkas? Let me get my men back to more favorable positions on the outskirts
of the city. If we stay here, the Germans will move through and that will be
that.”

“Very
well, General, you may withdraw to the inner defense ring, but what makes you
think you can hold there if you cannot stop the enemy where he stands now?”

“Because
Doctorov’s Cavalry are to the north. If I fall back the Germans will have to
cover that entire northern flank if they follow me, and that will seriously
dilute their striking power.”

Rokossovsky
had found a way out of the trap he now believed he was in, and he immediately
gave orders for a planned withdrawal that night. But somehow word reached
Zhukov, who was furious when he learned that his subordinate had tried to go
over his head. He telephoned Rokossovsky, hot with anger, and rescinded that
order, telling him he was to stand where he was.

No
amount of reasoning would move Zhukov, and Rokossovsky hung up the phone, angry
and resentful of the man who thought he knew better, when he was nowhere near
the field of battle! He folded his arms, thinking, brooding, and knowing what
he had to do. Yes, it might end up costing him his head, or at the very least
the fingernails and teeth that he still had because Josef Stalin had not lived
to take them from him. But he knew that there were some positions that should
not be held, some roads that should not be defended, and some orders that
simply could not be obeyed.

That
night, he personally went out and rounded up his Division and Brigade
Commanders, telling them exactly what they were to do.

*

Off
to the south and east, Model reported that he had beaten
off the counterattack of the 156th NKVD Regiment, and now had most of Leninskiy
under his thumb. “I’ve punched right through at Leninskiy,” said Model on the
radio. “Yet the question remains—where do we go from there?”

Guderian
had studied his map carefully, looking for a way forward, but not finding one.
“There is a secondary road running up to Alexin from that town—two good bridges
there.”

“Yes, I
can probably get to the Oka in a few days, weather permitting, but where with
that take me? I would have to push another 30 kilometers north along that river
to reach our real objective, Serpukhov. There’s a secondary road along that
west bank, but we don’t even know if it can be used until I reconnoiter it.”

“I’ve
done that by air,” said Guderian. “It’s a small road, just as you say, and the ground
near the river gets a lot of drainage. I’m afraid we will be up to our knees in
mud if you take that road. Better leave that to the infantry on your left.
Instead, I want you to move east to help me take and clear the main road to
Serpukhov.”

“Isn’t
that what they’ll expect us to do?”

“This
time we’ll have to oblige them. It looks like a whole new Russian tank corps
has materialized in front of us. That was what they pulled off the trains to
the north. But if we can beat them I doubt they’ll have anything left. I want
to hit them hard, then break through for Serpukhov.”

“Very
well, Herr General, so we still dance.”

Model
wasted no time, ordering KG Munzel and his tanks back across the river and
along the good road that linked Leninskiy with the main road to Tula. It would
pass through a smaller town called Salkhovo, and there they ran into the Soviet
21st Tank Brigade, engaging them in a sharp duel that was won easily, given the
fact that Munzel had all three Panzer battalions at hand, with a hundred medium
tanks, though they were all Panzer III variants. But that was more than enough,
even though there were 32 T-34s in that brigade. The Germans knocked out 18 of
these, and that broke the brigade, sending its disorganized remnants scattering
in all directions.

The
Soviets retreated west towards Alexin, but maintained a lot of pressure so that
Model was forced to follow them with most of his Panzergrenadiers to screen
that flank. This meant he would now form the strong right shield to the west of
the main road, with Langermann’s 4th Panzer Division screening the eastern
approach. The Germans were slowly prying open that corridor north to Serpukhov.
The only question now was what they could scrape together to send up that road.