Chapter Seven Breaking Through
Chernyy Yan, River Volga. Forward Headquarters, First Byelorussian Front
Early morning, just before the light of pre-dawn was a fine time, a great time. The darkness still almost absolute but just beginning to purple with the coming day. The sounds of the night had faded but those of the day had yet to be born. The result was a strange tranquility that rested the soul and revived the spirit. Soon, as the east began to lighten, the birds would start to sing their chorus to the dawn and the day would begin on a note of beauty.
Yes, thought Colonel-General Andrei Mikhailovich Taffkowski, a fine time. But this was better, the sky slashed apart by a howling gale of multi-colored tracers as eight divisions and six independent brigades of anti-aircraft guns started pouring fire into the German defenses across the Volga. The guns were mostly twin 37 millimeter guns with a number of the single-barrel 57 millimeters that had started to arrive and some 85s. Every round a tracer, ripping at the sky in a blinding array of light and the ground shaking and the ears shattering with the roaring scream as the massed guns raved at the enemy. The whole anti-aircraft firepower of two Fronts was firing flat trajectory across the river that was the spiritual heart of the Russian people.
Flat trajectory, that was the secret. The big guns, the 122s, 130s and 152s were silent. When they fired, their shells were tossed at the enemy, high in the air and, in doing so, they would endanger what was already happening. Also they wouldn't do the job that the anti-aircraft guns were doing now. The First and Second Ukrainians had learned that heavy artillery was almost ineffective against the German bunkers; they were too small to be hit except by blind chance. The hail of smaller-caliber fire from the anti-aircraft would help keep the bunkers suppressed but those guns had another role, one not obvious from the ground. From the air, though, it was different.
From above, the streams of tracer fire formed giant arrows pointing at the landing zones for the first wave of the assault crossing of the Volga. The Fifth Guards Airborne Division would be making its approach now. In the slowly lightening sky, Taffkowski saw the silent dark shapes winging overhead. Gliders. Paratroopers were all very well but try to do a night drop and they ended up too dispersed to do much against an organized defense. But gliders landed their troops in organized formations with their equipment and weapons. Using gliders in daylight was only slightly short of murder, they stood so little chance of survival, but at night, and supported by this mass of fire they could still get in. Oh, some would go down from German fire, others would be hit by the Russian barrage but most would get in. Fifth Guards Airborne here. Sixth Guards Airborne to the north at Verkniyh Baskunchak, Ninth Guards Airborne to the south at Nikolskoye.
The radar fire control on the anti-aircraft guns would be tracking the gliders in. At the last possible moment they would order the guns to cease fire so they could drop into their landing zones. That was when some guns didn't get the message or the crews elected to unload via the barrel and Russians would die from Russian fire. The chop when it came was sudden and brutal; after the vicious snarls of the guns, the silence was positively painful. Then, across the Volga, Taffkowski could hear the crackle of small-arms fire as the paratroopers started to engage the defenses.
Behind him, the sky was gray now as the sun edged nearer the horizon. Then, the leading edge peaked over the hills and the second assault wave started. A Regiment of Russian Marines had been brought down from Petrograd and they were crossing the river in their amphibious vehicles. Some of them were old lend-lease American DUKWs, others were GMTs, the Russian version of the DUKW obtained under MSDAP. Others were PT-76 amphibious tanks.
It would take them at least eight minutes to cross the river and, under normal circumstances, they would be wiped out by the German gunners. But, two things gave them a chance. The German defenses were under attack from the paratroopers and the German gunners were having to stare directly into the rising sun. It bought some chance but it was still going to be bad for the Marines in their thin-skinned vehicles. Even as Taffkowski watched, fountains rose around them, the drops of water sparkling and forming vivid rainbows in the dawn sunlight. In the midst of them, a GMT burst into flames and started to sink.
The Airborne and the Marines were buying time for the third wave, the assault crossing itself. At two selected areas of river bank a line of Kraz cross-country trucks backed up to waterline and stopped sharply. The pontoons slid from the back of the vehicles and splashed into the water, automatically unfolding as they did so. The locking catches slammed shut and the pioneers ran forward, boarding each pontoon, turning them around and bringing them into position. Sledgehammers swung, slamming the connecting clamps into place.
Taffkowski couldn't see it but he knew that fingers were already being lost and hands crushed in the desperate struggle to get the bridge ready. The Pioneers had been told the truth, that the Paratroopers were fighting steel and concrete fortifications with light infantry weapons and Marines were burning and drowning in the river to buy the time the Pioneers needed to get the bridges built. Every minute that was wasted meant more of their lives were lost.
36 sections of pontoon bridge had to be assembled to give the first 225-meter span that was already taking shape along the shore. Further down, a second unit was assembling their pontoons into a square powered raft. That would act as the first waypoint on the bridge over the Volga.
Eighteen minutes in, two minutes ahead of schedule. What was left of the Marine Regiment had long since made it to the other side now, leaving the river surface scarred with its wrecks. The first span of bridge was ready and the BMK bridging boats got to work. One end of the bridge was cast loose and the current took it, swinging it out into the river. The BMKs took control and brought it into position, vertically out from the bank. By the time it was in properly in position, the shoreside end was already secured and the shore access panels laid.
Out on the river, Taffkowski could see smoke rising from the diesels on the BMKs as they fought the current in order to hold the bridge steady. The big raft was already on its way out, its own engines and the BMKs trying to keep it aligned properly. They had it roughly into place but through his binoculars Taffkowski could see the Pioneers fighting to get the connecting bolts into place. Minutes were racking up and couldn't be recovered, if the defenses opposite overwhelmed the Paratroopers and Marines assaulting them, the Germans could concentrate their fire on the bridge and wipe it out. . Already the second span and second raft were being assembled on the river bank and the first raft had to be secured by then. Then, he heard the “Urrah” from the raft; the connecters were driven home at last.
Not before time, the second span was almost ready and the BMK bridging boats were racing back to collect it. They had to ferry it out from the shore then pivot it in mid-river. They had to get it out parallel to the shore, if they swung it so the river current struck the 225 meter length of the span rather than its 3.25 meter width too early, that current would carry it away. It was on its way now, he saw the BMKs fussing around, pushing it out while more prevented the current from taking it downstream. 36 minutes in, the second span was starting its pivot, its upstream end swinging down to match with the first raft while the downstream end was held steady. Then the BMKs pushed and the whole bridge shook as the span slammed into place. The Pioneers swarmed over it, hammering the connectors home.