17 kilometers southeast of Bialystok
June 2nd, 1942
It was amazing that it had started so quickly. One moment the trucks were trundling forward along a road; the next, air and ground alike were being rent by bullets and shells. Trucks shattered and men were tossed about like so many sacks of mail. Sergeants started shouting, their thunderous voices surpassing even the cacophony of being under intensive fire in volume, as they threw their men off trucks and kicked them toward any sort of cover that was in sight. The German ambushers were already under fire themselves from the divisional artillery in its entirety. The division had been assigned a corridor of attack that normally would have been given to only a brigade, the density of attackers was so great. Nikifor was part of the second brigade, the second echelon of the division. The first had passed without being harassed, but the Germans had chosen their moment. The second was being hammered already.
Nikifor found himself scrambling on all fours toward the German trenches before throwing himself sideways to hide behind a collapsed tree. Machine gun tracers and bullets tore up the ground where he had just been. He was breathing heavily, his grip on his rifle so hard that his knuckles were as white as the long dead. He looked around through air filled with smoke, rag-dolling body parts and clods of earth. Suvorin was crawling toward him; Bessonov was taking cover with Ilya Simbirsk in a ditch. Irinei Bobrov, Valeri Razumovskij and Timur Charpak were barely visible on the other side of the road, taking cover with Brezhnev. Suvorin finally reached him and propped himself up so he could peak above the log at the Germans. Ducking down again quickly, he spoke rapidly to Nikifor.
“Here’s the plan. Brezhnev is gathering a small fire group together. Bobrov, Razumovskij and Charpak will be part of it but he’ll get another squad involved as well. We’re to be the assault group. Me, you, Bessonov and Simbirsk. There’s another two squads going to attack as well. Ideally we’ll have at least one machine gun covering us, maybe two if we’re lucky. I’ve got smoke. Once we start running, we don’t stop until we’re in the trenches. Our objective is to clear them out, and capture the guns. The Germans must have a battery of 88s hidden away, or maybe a couple entrenched tanks. Got it?”
Nikifor nodded. Suvorin peaked over the log again and then tossed his smoke grenade. Heavy shooting from the Soviet fire team penetrating into the smoke as it built up. Finally, Suvorin judged the time right. He clapped Nikifor on the shoulder and they were off, darting into the smoke, followed by Bessonov and Simbirsk. The broken ground nearly tripped Nikifor up several times, especially once he could not see for all the smoke, but finally he fell into the German trench right next to Suvorin. The Germans seemed surprised to see the Soviets in amongst them already and were caught flatfooted. Nikifor and Suvorin were soon careering down the trench, alternating rushes to cover each other. Nikifor had somehow picked up a German machine pistol to complement Suvorin’s PPSh. They were near the end of a German communication trench when Nikifor looked beyond its end. He smacked Suvorin in the shoulder as he rushed forward to prevent him from going further and simply pointed.
There were tanks crowning the hill ahead of them, German tanks. There were many of them. They stood evenly spaced as if they were crenellations on a wall. Nikifor looked at Suvorin and saw his shocked expression reflected back at him in Suvorin’s face. Both turned to grim determination as they continued forward, refusing to let the German armor overawe them. They hit the end of the communications trench and, seeing no Germans nearby, hunkered down behind the protective earth to await the rest of the squad. It was not long in coming, Bessonov and Simbirsk appeared first at the head of a different communications trench. Bobrov and Charpak quickly trotted down the same trench Nikifor and Suvorin had taken with a German machine gun in tow. Razumovskij joined them, carrying liberal amounts of ammunition for every conceivable small arms weapon that was in use in the near vicinity.
Nikifor gratefully grabbed up clips of MP40 ammunition as Suvorin looked over the side of the trench again. The German tanks had not moved, so he began counting them out loud. As the numbers increased, he started interspersing the counts with swears. Finally, he ducked back down and looked grimly at everyone. “I counted fourteen tanks up on that hill. There’s probably more around. This is going to be bad. Do we have a radio? We need to call down a heavy fire on that hill, and smoke too. We need to get past them.” He looked around before amending his words. “Through them, rather. We need to get through them.”
Simbirsk raised his hand. “What hill is that? I’ll run back and find a radio operator. The battalion headquarter is positioned behind the road.”
Suvorin looked back at the hill and scratched behind his ear. “I’d say that’s probably hill 331. Check with headquarters first though. But tell them we need heavy artillery fire. Very heavy. And smoke between the trenches and the hill so we can approach.”
Simbirsk nodded and was off, running back down the trenches, skipping over the occasional twisted and bloody corpse. Suvorin gathered the rest of the squad around him and began laying out the plan of attack. “We’ve been through bad times, but this will be worse than anything before. We don’t know what’s on the other side of that hill so what we’re seeing here is probably just the beginning of an armored defense in depth. With luck it’ll only be an isolated squadron and the artillery will take care of it. If we’re not lucky…” Suvorin paused to take a deep breath before continuing his speech. “if we’re not lucky, then get ready to use your sticky bombs. Razumovskij, Bobrov. You two will carry German panzerschreks. I saw a couple back in the previous trench. Bobrov, give Talenskij your sticky bombs. I’ll take yours, Razumovskij.”
The two vanished down the communications trench as well, searching for the panzerschreks. Nikifor took advantage of the respite from Suvorin’s briefing to look around; the trench was filling up with Soviet soldiers. Obviously the assault on the hill would be an important, large-scale affair. Simbirsk, Bobrov and Razumovskij reappeared all at the same time. The latter two were lugging the big panzerschreks and as much of the necessary ammunition as possible. Simbirsk nodded to Suvorin. “Bombardment should begin in ten minutes, smoke in fifteen. This will be a two company assault with a third in reserve in case it’s necessary. Brezhnev will be overseeing the attack personally. He’s also the one who in the end determined which hill it was.”
Everyone looked at each other. Suvorin’s face tightened, but he said nothing. He left that to Bobrov, who audibly gulped. “We’re doomed, aren’t we?”
Bessonov replied only tangentially. “There will be no retreat.”
Brezhnev soon appeared, and peered at the still immobile German tanks through his binoculars. The trenches were filling up with soldiers, who were jostling each other for room. Soon the artillery was thundering to the rear, but to the horror of all the soldiers it was striking a different hill. Smoke similarly began building up in front of a different hill. Brezhnev’s face was stone, and then he blew the whistle. The soldiers looked at each other in shock, not believing what was happening. But then the sergeants were clambering out, shouting to their men to follow, Suvorin among them. Nikifor shot up and climbed up as well, followed by Bessonov and then everyone else. Someone shouted urrah, and it was picked up by others in an attempt to steady their suddenly shattered nerves. A ragged, desperate surge of men flooded out of the trenches, their shouts of war wobbly and betraying their fear just as well as it attempted to hide it.
Everyone was already panting with exertion even though they were only halfway along the fifty meter stretch to the foot of the hill. The German tanks finally began moving. Vehicles jerked forward as guns depressed to get the necessary angle of fire. That was when the holocaust began. High explosive shells ripped into the ground, tearing both it and the wave of humanity that was pressing forward. Nikifor was aware only of firing above him and dying behind him. He kept his eyes on Suvorin, just ahead of him. He saw Ilya Simbirsk out of the corner of his eye. Ilya ran into an explosion and emerged from the other side screaming and falling, his legs vanished. Men were falling everywhere but those not hit continued charging forward. Suvorin had reached the base of the hill and was beginning to climb its steep sides, and then Nikifor was beside him. Bobrov and Razumovskij were grappling the ground with difficulty, their panzerschreks defying easy clambering. The tank fire stopped, the angle was impossible for them.
Instead, German infantry appeared at the summit of the hill. Rifle fire crackled down and men fell backwards, tumbling into those unfortunates behind and below them. The Soviets kept advancing. Nikifor grappled for a grenade and, pulling the pin out, tossed it up the hill as high as he could. It landed near its crown and exploded, showering both the Germans and the Soviets with fragments. They seemed, fortunately, to have been deadlier to the Germans. Fire directly above Nikifor and Suvorin seemed to have halted at least momentarily. Somehow Nikifor had gotten ahead of Suvorin, and he was the first to reach the crest of the hill. He jumped up onto the top with two grenades primed and threw them both forward before collapsing. Both exploded amidst screams and then Nikifor was rushing forward.
More and more men reached the summit and the tide of men broke the line of German infantry. They shouted with worry and withdrew firing, but many fell to the shooting of angry Soviet soldiers. The tanks slowly began reversing, but not as quickly as men could run. Sticky bombs were placed on treads, in barrels and on anything that rotated or revolved. Nikifor had used only one sticky bomb, slapping it haphazardly onto a tank as he ran past. He wanted to reach the other side of the hill and look down on the Germans. Explosions behind him did not dissuade him from his goal and soon he saw a valley opening up before him. German infantrymen were tumbling down the steep slope of the hill into it, as much by fire as by their haste to retreat. Nikifor, however, did not look at the infantry.
He was looking at the tanks. There were dozens and scores of Germans tanks in the valley below and even more over the next hill. Suvorin joined him. Nikifor looked at him, he was clutching his shoulder. Blood was running between his fingers as he gasped for air. Nikifor did a double-take; Suvorin’s arm was shattered. Nikifor gasped with alarm as Suvorin collapsed, fainting from the pain and blood loss. Nikifor shouted for a medical orderly as he fell to his knees and attempted to pressure Suvorin’s shoulder in an attempt to stem the flow of blood out of his body.
