Chapter 178: The Encirclement

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The Poles were completely bewildered. To this day, they still didn’t know what kind of enemy they were facing. They had fought with great composure on the eastern front, and some of their forces had even pushed into Soviet territory. But against the Germans on the western front, they seemed to have completely lost their rhythm.

Take, for example, the 6th Division of the Polish Kraków Army Group, which was currently facing the German 3rd SS Panzer Division. The order they had received was to assemble their troops and attack into German territory. But as the division commander, Garokov, was gathering his forces, his first line of defense collapsed.

Faced with German tanks and armored cars, the Polish defenders, who had just come out of their fortifications to prepare for an attack, were clearly helpless. They quickly gave up resistance and were captured or chased in droves. By the time the 6th Division’s commander, Garokov, finally learned that his first defensive line had been breached, the SS’s Panther tanks were already breaking into his second.

Garokov decided to gather his troops and set up a third defensive line around his divisional headquarters. He even called up the cavalry from the divisional reserve, hoping to organize an effective defense to stop the frenzied German attack.

“Whose idiotic order was this? Ten hours ago, I received an order for my troops to attack the German border, but the Germans attacked right in the middle of our assembly!” Garokov raged in his command post. “Are the generals above us German spies?”

“Call the Army Group command! Ask them what the hell is going on! How can the German army advance several dozen kilometers in just a few hours?” he shouted at his adjutant. “Tell the Army Group command to revise the orders! And tell the cavalry to charge early! Otherwise, we’re going to be inexplicably crushed!”

“Report, Division Commander! There’s a problem with the telephone! We can’t contact Army Group headquarters!” an officer reported helplessly, holding the phone. “The German soldiers may have cut the telephone lines!”

“Send someone to check, quickly! Have the cavalry check the communication lines! Immediately have the soldiers set up the surrounding defenses! Since German troops were able to cut the telephone lines, that proves they’re not far from here!” Garokov immediately commanded.

“Boom!” “Rat-tat-tat-tat!” Outside the command post, someone suddenly began to open fire fiercely.

“What’s going on? Have the Germans already reached here?” Garokov asked in shock. “Go and see at once. Why did they suddenly open fire?”

“Yes, sir!” The adjutant hurriedly saluted and ran out of the room to investigate what had happened. He hadn’t been gone long before the sound of guns and cannons grew louder and louder.

Suddenly, a huge and violent explosion rang out next to the building where the command post was located. In an instant, flying shrapnel shattered the glass, passed through the bodies of two officers who were looking out the window, and struck the surrounding walls. This was followed by blood and dust that filled every corner.

The shockwave knocked everyone in the room to the ground. Plaster and lime fell from the shaking ceiling. A whole section of the ceiling nearest the window had already collapsed, lying at an angle where the window used to be. And the outer wall where the window had been was now gone.

“Cough, cough! Cough!” Garokov was thrown to the ground by the shockwave but was luckily not seriously injured. A radio operator, his face covered in white dust, pulled him up from the ground. He was still coughing as he squinted and looked around his command post.

The door to his command post was blocked by rubble from the staircase, but fortunately, he could now walk directly out onto the street from where the window had been. The two officers by the window were now two corpses, one of them half-covered by the collapsed floorboards. A radio operator lay slumped over a table, his face covered in blood, clearly beyond saving.

Garokov and the sole surviving radio operator from the command post ducked and crawled out of the room, which was in constant danger of collapsing. They fell into the huge bomb crater outside the window and then panted as they climbed up. The sound of explosions continued to come from all around. As soon as he poked his head out of the crater, he saw his troops in a complete mess, running around like a flock of sheep being herded by the explosions.

Suddenly, a hand reached out and gave him a pull. Garokov finally climbed out of the deep crater. He didn’t have time to think. He ran, hunched over, to the base of a wall. Only then did he have time to look back and see who had pulled him out.

As he turned his head, his adjutant was just pulling the radio operator out of the crater. The two of them, one after the other, ran toward him. They didn’t collapse onto the ground until they were right in front of him.

“Report! An enemy bomber formation was just spotted. They are bombing us now!” the adjutant said, gasping for breath.

Garokov really wanted to kick him. Of course I know it’s a bombing! And I knew it a long time before your report! But he looked at his adjutant and, because he had come back to save them, ultimately gave up on scolding him.

“My God! Where are our planes?” Garokov looked up at the German bomber formation circling like vultures and asked helplessly. “The enemy is at our doorstep. Why won’t they take off and fight?”

“Sir! Our anti-aircraft fire is too weak. We have no way to drive these planes away. It looks like they will only leave after they have dropped all their bombs,” the adjutant said, pulling a steel helmet from a nearby corpse and putting it on his head. “We should retreat from the town! It should be safer outside.”

With a sigh, Garokov looked at the Polish soldiers who were running for cover, their heads in their hands. He knew the situation was beyond his control. Those soldiers could only be gathered slowly after the bombing was over. He just nodded to his adjutant and, with the only radio operator who was still obeying orders, ran hunched over toward the edge of the small town.

They soon found a guard company that was still relatively intact, but the poor company commander could only find thirty of his men. With these soldiers, Garokov finally regained a little confidence. He began to send out soldiers to contact the now-disorganized 1st Regiment headquarters.

By the time he found his 1st Regiment commander, an hour had passed. The German planes had already flown far away, but his troops were still in a complete mess. His 2nd Regiment had been routed by the main German force, and a portion of the 1st Regiment was now missing. Garokov couldn’t even be sure how many of his six battalions were left.

“First, send the cavalry to repair the telephone lines! Find any usable telephones nearby! I need to contact the Army Group command and report the situation I am facing!” Garokov said to his 1st Regiment commander and his adjutant. “Second, I need you to take everyone you can still find and set up a defensive line near this small town! Secure the two intact locomotive engines in the warehouse over there.”

“Have the sappers check along the railway tracks at once! See if the nearby tracks have been damaged by German bombing!” he ordered his adjutant. “If you can’t find the sapper company, then send twenty infantrymen! If you encounter Germans, retreat back here! Send out cavalry to scout all the surrounding areas! I want the exact movements of the Germans!”

“Tanks! The Germans are attacking!” a soldier shouted in panic from not far away, pointing in the direction of the border. Before he could finish, a bullet shattered his head. The surrounding area was thrown into a panic, and several more soldiers were hit by bullets and fell to the ground.

The soldiers who had just gathered scattered once again, giving Garokov the urge to smash something. “Have the men push the anti-tank guns up! Are they just waiting to be slaughtered by running around like idiots?”

Several Polish soldiers, while retreating, raised their rifles and returned fire. As one was working the bolt after firing a shot, he was hit by a burst of machine-gun fire, rolled over, and lay groaning on the ground. A moment later, he was silent.

Garokov grabbed his adjutant and commanded loudly, “I don’t care where you find it! Get me some explosives! Hand grenades will do! Go to the garage and blow up those two locomotives!”

As he spoke, he pulled over the 1st Regiment commander. “Find some men to hold off the German tanks! I only need you to hold for fifteen minutes!”

The 1st Regiment commander nodded, but his heart was filled with bitterness. In this situation, you couldn’t even ask me to hold for two minutes, let alone fifteen. He looked at the chaotic troops, gritted his teeth, and rushed out, shouting to every Polish soldier he passed, “Counter-attack! The cannons are coming soon! Open fire!”

I hope there’s still time to destroy the locomotives, he thought. This division of mine is finished. Whether the Army Group command behind us can get accurate information will depend on luck. Never mind those high-ranking officers in the rear; even he, the frontline commander, still hadn’t figured out what was going on.

He wouldn’t need to know, because just around the corner of a building from him, a beautiful tank with the number 113 painted on its turret was firing fiercely, turning all the Polish soldiers who appeared on the street into sieves.

Just as the scene descended into utter chaos, gunfire erupted from behind him again. It was clear that another German unit had flanked and encircled the rear of the small town. Like the last straw, it completely broke the psychological defenses of the Polish defenders. For a moment, the sound of soldiers begging for mercy even drowned out the sound of machine-gun fire.

Garokov watched everything happening before him in shock. Hundreds of soldiers raised their hands, surrendering to a single German paratrooper holding a strange submachine gun with a curved magazine. And on the other side, a dozen cannons lay piled in a corner, untouched, paralyzed. From beginning to end, no one had thought to use these weapons to fight back against the aggressors.

At this moment, he finally vaguely guessed the strength of the German forces. It was probably only a dozen or so men in total—and, of course, a few deadly tanks. This force had formed an encirclement and had annihilated the better part of his infantry regiment.