artillery arc

Chapter 433: Deception Plan
On the night of July 7, at 26, in Yeysk, the headquarters of the 2330st Ante Mobile Army.

"Report! Urgent message from the front headquarters."

Pavlov stood up and went to receive the telegram.

Wang Zhong and Popov continued to sit in front of the chessboard.

Popov: "Hurry up, I want to drink a bottle of vodka and take a nap before playing with you again."

"Don't make noise, I'm thinking." Wang Zhong picked up his queen and chose a square.

"That's not good," Popov shook his head. "If you put it here, I will move like this, you see? Then you can only choose between the Queen's Castle and the Castle."

Wang Zhong silently put the chess piece back to its original position and complained: "It's too hard to see the path clearly with the black and white chessboard."

Popov laughed loudly: "Yes, yes, how could our general be a bad chess player? Absolutely not! If this gets out, the Propaganda Department will have a headache."

He laughed a few times and suddenly remembered that Pavlov had been silent since he took the telegram, so he looked up quickly.

Wang Zhong was also moved by his action and turned to look at Pavlov.

The chief of staff held the telegram with a frown on his face.

Wang Zhong: "Another emergency telegram from our left wing?"

"It's more than an emergency." Pavlov shook his head. "The front headquarters can't contact the 91st Infantry Army and the 50th Infantry Army to which it belongs."

The 91st Infantry Army is the frontal defense force of the enemy's newly mobilized army. Now it can't even contact its superior 50th Army, which means that the army may have collapsed.

Fortunately, Ant's army was relatively small, so the collapse of 50 episodes had little impact. If Ant's army was as large as Proson's, the battle line would have been ruined.

Wang Zhong stood up.

Popov: "Hey? Why don't you leave? I haven't finished you off yet!"

Wang Zhong: "The military situation is urgent. Let me see what's going on."

After saying that, he ran away and came to the map table: "The 50st and 51th episodes are already in place. They should be able to hold off the enemy for a while. In addition, the infrastructure of the grassland can also delay the enemy's advance..."

At this time, a communications staff officer came over the telegraph: "Report, the commander of the front sent an urgent message."

As Pavlov reached out to take it, he said to Wang Zhong, "This is already the third letter. I guess it's to urge us to retreat across the river quickly. General Gorky is very anxious."

Wang Zhong turned his gaze to the southwest of the Nanant Prairie, a large area north of the Raoul Pass. There was also a large number of symbols and circles representing the Ante troops.

"The rear guard of the Borsk Front is still more than 100 kilometers away from the mountain pass," Wang Zhong shook his head. "Although a hundred kilometers can be reached in a short time by car, the rear guard has not yet shaken off the Prosen Army and has to stop from time to time to block the enemy. It should not reach the mountain pass too soon."

Pavlov: "If we retreat now, the enemy will not be able to recall the troops they have already deployed. It will take a lot of time to gather and redeploy the troops."

Popov added: "A lot of time, and a lot of staff officers' hair."

Pavlov actually agreed: "Yes, that's right. I feel it's okay to withdraw now."

Popov: "I'll sit on the fence first and see if 'Commander-in-Chief' has any better ideas."

Wang Zhong touched his chin and thought seriously.

Firstly, retreating now would be bad for the friendly forces in Borsk, because the enemy army group that was newly transferred to attack certainly does not have all its troops deployed now. If all the troops are put into the first wave of attack, the troops will only be crowded together and will not be able to perform at all.

With so many troops crowded together, they would surely suffer heavy losses if hit by enemy artillery fire.

Therefore, the enemy's attack echelons must come in waves.

Among the later waves of troops, there may be some that can be quickly transferred to Borsk.

If the First Mobile Army ran away at this time, the rear guard troops in Borsk might suffer heavy losses.

But if we don't run now, the enemy will hit us with a right hook. The fighting will and combat skills of the brother troops are not as good as those of the First Mobile Army, and we can't stop it.

In order to protect the Borsk Front, they lost the First Mobile Army, which was obviously not an option.

Wang Zhong was caught in the middle, struggling to find a way to have the best of both worlds.

Then he suddenly thought of a very famous action on Earth.

A bold idea took shape.

Vasily stared at Wang Zhong's face and said, "I know this expression! The general has an idea!"

Wang Zhong looked at Vasily: "Is my expression so obvious?"

Vasily shrugged: "If you don't believe me, ask the bishop and the chief of staff." Wang Zhong looked at the two of them and saw them nodding together. The reflection from their heads almost blinded Wang Zhong's eyes.

He waved his hands, "Stop nodding, your heads are reflecting! I do have an idea. I think we can execute a deception operation."

Pavlov: "We have made a lot of fake tanks. The Proson Air Force has gone crazy these past two days, bombing us. Even the bombing of Yarvik in the rear has stopped. What else can we do?"

Wang Zhong: "I plan to send a troop with a red flag to the front line for reconnaissance."

Pavlov was shocked: "No! You are not allowed to go!"

Wang Zhong hurriedly comforted the chief of staff: "Don't worry, I won't go! No, no! I mean, pretend to be me on the front line for reconnaissance, and get as close to the enemy's troops as possible. Because I used to do this often, and with the rigor of the Plossons, they must have discovered it.

"Didn't a paratrooper confess yesterday? He said that Proson had my file, which summarized my habits when I was in command, but he was not high enough to read the file.

"I bet there's something about liking to raise red flags and risking frontline reconnaissance."

Pavlov: "No, you almost ran into the face of the enemy tank on horseback. The Prosens must have recorded it."

(Indeed, there is one, and it was written by the man who missed the opportunity to kill General Rokossov.)
Popov: "I don't understand. What is this fake front-line inspection team doing? Pretending that you were killed?"

"No, no, no, of course they can't pretend that I was killed. Then the enemy will go to deal with the Borsk Front." Wang Zhong waved his hands repeatedly, "But the enemy will definitely try to kill 'me'. This reconnaissance team will definitely not be wiped out, but they can leave behind the bodies!"

That’s right. Wang Zhong’s tactic was based on a famous deception operation in Earth’s history during World War II. In this operation, the British intelligence agency forged the body of an officer who was killed in a plane crash, and placed carefully crafted documents that looked real on the officer’s body.

When San Dezi fished out the body, he immediately felt like he had found a treasure. The information on the body also perfectly matched the (fabricated) information provided by the legendary spy Garcia, so San Dezi was fooled and thought that the landing site was in Calais instead of Normandy.

Wang Zhong: "When this unit sets out, they will select a fresh corpse, put on an officer's uniform, and carry a document bag and a map bag containing our forged items..."

Pavlov suddenly realized: "That's our attack plan!"

Wang Zhong: "Yes! There are also documents about the delay of the offensive due to the continuous bombing, and the mobilization of new armies to block the enemy's right hook. This makes the Prosen people think that on the one hand, we are increasing troops on the left wing to resist the offensive, and on the other hand, we are also preparing to throw a right hook to defeat the enemy's Tenth Army!"

Popov was already laughing: "Okay, okay! This is good! Actually, we retreat secretly..."

Vasily: "No! We also need to prepare a secret feint plan, saying that we will pretend to retreat but actually attack!"

The other people looked at each other and then burst into laughter.

Wang Zhong finished laughing and patted Vasily on the shoulder: "Great! You really understand! Then you will be in charge of making all the things in the map package and the document package!"

Vasily's smile froze: "What? Me?"

Popov also came up and patted his other shoulder: "You are our camouflage expert! Think about it, since Loktov, you have been deceiving the enemy."

Vasily: "Are you sure I am deceiving the enemy? The cunning man is next to me!"

He pointed at Wang Zhong.

Wang Zhong: "I just came up with the idea, but it's you who implement it, musician."

Vasily sighed. "I knew it was bad news when you called me a musician. OK, I'll do it."

Pavlov: "How many staff officers do you want? How many clerks?"

Vasily thought for a moment and said, "Five staff officers to draw the map and five clerks to write the documents should be enough."

Wang Zhong nodded vigorously: "Well, very good, you are worthy of being our forgery expert. You have already figured out what to do. This is called professionalism!"

"Stop making a fuss and quickly organize a deception team. This team will face the enemy's attack directly. Besides the prepared corpses, everyone else must either escape from the enemy's attack unscathed or keep their mouths shut if captured. Both situations are not easy to achieve."

Wang Zhong: “Yes, indeed.”

Popov: "You have to choose the suicide squad. If you are injured but not dead, but can't keep up with the troops, you must be determined to pull the glorious bullet."

Wang Zhong: "Let's recruit volunteers according to the standards of the suicide squad. Bishop Dawasili, you will be in charge of this."

Popov nodded: "Okay!"

He stood up and was about to leave, but after two steps he turned back and said, “Wait a minute, you cleaned yourself off again?”

Wang Zhong: "I...I'm going to convince Bucephalus to be the actor! You see, my horse is here, and so am I. The person who plays me will probably be happy to ride my horse."

Vasily: "That's so great. You don't know. The stables are already saying that they are with Bucephalus. Even if the enemy bombards and blows up the stables, everyone is safe. Some people are even secretly selling horse hair!"

Wang Zhong's eyes widened. Just as he was about to comment on this matter, Pavlov shouted, "Vassily! We have gathered all the people for you. Let's get started!"

The words on Wang Zhong's lips suddenly changed: "Yes, let's start!"

(End of this chapter)