On November 11, 1942, the Germans launched the last major offensive of the Battle of Stalingrad. Because the enemy's offensive was too fierce, the Soviet 62nd Army was scattered into three sections and lost contact with each other. In the chaos and severe attrition, the unit fell into despair, and one of the regimental commanders broke down and planned to take advantage of the chaos to escape. At this moment, a tank emerged from nowhere, and the soldier standing on it sensed that something was wrong with the regimental commander and immediately jumped down and punched the other side.
The regimental commander was already full of anger, and when he saw that he had inexplicably let an ordinary soldier without an official or a title be beaten, he immediately became mad and started to fight with the other side. The two twisted and rolled on the ground, fighting in the dark, and finally the regimental commander was knocked unconscious on the spot. He did not know that he was fighting with Lieutenant General Trikov, commander of the 62nd Army in soldier uniforms, who got up from the ground, calmly patted the soil on his body, and then lit a cigarette. After a while, he threw the remaining pack of cigarettes to the soldier next to him and said in a flat tone, "When your regimental commander wakes up, you will give him the tobacco and let him prepare for the next battle." ”
In the countries of World War II, several German officers valued honor the most, and even the most difficult battles did not affect them in the slightest, wearing straight officer uniforms and wearing medals to the front line to direct the battle. Especially in an era when new classes such as snipers were beginning to exert their power, the well-dressed German officers on the battlefield were like living targets, and they did not care. On the contrary, they called the practice of "disguised" as a lower-level officer and soldier in order to survive as an act of cowardice. In contrast, most Soviet officers from grassy backgrounds didn't care what they wore when they were in battle, especially someone like Trikov who grinned a lot.
Trikov was a "rough man" who had to drop out of school to work at the age of 12 because of poverty. When he served in the Baltic Fleet, he accepted a large number of proletarian progressive ideas, and although he was greatly infected, he still frankly stated that these declarations sounded very profound, but he did not understand the reasoning at all, only that the Tsarist Government was not saved, and only this new force could change everything. After the October Revolution, Trikov switched to the Russian Red Army and was selected to enter the Moscow Military Instructor Training Course to receive basic military education. In July 1918, coinciding with Lenin's inspection of the training class, Trikov saw his dream idol up close, and his sincerity to the revolutionary cause in his heart became closer.
For the first half of his career, Trikov basically spent time in the Far East, and he also had a long career in China. After the outbreak of the Soviet-German war, Trikov was urgently recalled to Moscow, and perhaps the top level had a higher appointment for such a hand-trained and capable general, trikov's attitude was very resolute, and he went to the front line. It can be seen from this that he has always regarded himself as a soldier defending his family and the country, and naturally does not care what clothes he wears in front of grass-roots officers and soldiers.
However, Trikov's troops were mixed up in Stalingrad badly enough.
Initially, he took the Soviet 64th Army to block the German army from the front, but the enemy was gaining momentum, and the promised reinforcements did not arrive as scheduled, and he had to retreat strategically to the Don River with his officers and men. In July 1942, as the Germans' strategic intentions for the march into Stalingrad became clear, Trikov was ordered to lead a team to obstruct it. As a result, the 64th Army gave everything it could to lay one defensive line after another against the enemy, and immediately after one defense was destroyed, it immediately built the next defense, completely exchanging life for battle losses. Of course, this style of play was very helpless, and the effect was quite limited, and Trikov's headquarters was almost killed in a German air raid.
In September 1942, the Battle of Stalingrad broke out, the German superior forces launched an unprecedented offensive, and Lieutenant General Lopatin, who was responsible for guarding the city, saw that his 62nd Army was incomplete and the enemy army was full of momentum, and thought that the battle was over, so he told the leaders that he was powerless. However, in the eyes of the top brass, the city is not only an important town of the Soviet Union, but also of extremely high strategic value, and it is named after the leader, which must not fall. Lopatin's level is not bad, but the command needs a more capable candidate. Asked if he could defend Stalingrad, Trikov said: "I will either hold the city or die here."
Trikov knew that the 62nd Army was in no way capable of confronting the elite Germans, and the first thing he did was to break up the troops and deploy them in all corners of the city, doing everything possible to delay the enemy's pace and even force the enemy into a street battle. However, this method of warfare also has drawbacks, and it will make the Soviet army in adversity more dispersed. It may be useful to make up for it: the former bustling city has been reduced to rubble, the ears are full of enemy gunfire, but there are only a few comrades around; the battle is arduous and can not see the head at a glance, there is no friendly army behind it, only a short promise from the top "about to launch a counterattack", and people who are not determined enough can not survive such a dilemma, so the scene at the beginning of the article appears.
As we all know, the military discipline of the Soviet army in World War II was extremely strict, not to mention the situation where the regimental commander openly fled, even if defeated and taken prisoner, the officers and men of the Soviet army had the possibility of becoming "traitors". If you want to be a deserter, you actually fight with the commander of the group army in public, and such a crime is afraid that you will be shot ten times. Unexpectedly, the grinning Trikov chose to solve the problem in a man's way: after being beaten, he lit a cigarette, and then like a person who was fine, he never mentioned this matter again. It is said that the regimental commander later fought heroically as if he were a different person, until he died on the battlefield.
From the data, before the Soviet counterattack, Trikov's 62nd Army had actually been completely dispersed by the Germans, and the large troops were either too far away or lost contact with the command, and there were only 239 people left around him. The Soviets fought and retreated, and soon retreated to the Volga. To make matters worse, the Germans were pressing forward, and at their most dangerous point they were only a few kilometers from Trikov's headquarters. However, Trikov repeatedly refused the orders of the high command to recall him, and he stood on the volga river with his subordinate officers and soldiers announcing that there was no way to retreat now, and that soldiers who wanted to escape would never be held accountable even if they were well off. However, Trikov said he would definitely stay in the city and would not take a step back. The officers and men were greatly infected, and they fought desperately, and soon they waited for the large troops that came to fight back.