Chapter 1142 Air blockade

   "Comrade Chief of Staff, take a look at this official letter." After reading the official letter, Sokov handed it to Witkov who was beside him, and said with a smile: "In this way, all our problems will be solved."

   Witkov took the official letter and looked at it, and couldn't help but smile: "Comrade Commander, I really didn't expect that the General Staff took such good care of us that it actually assigned two aviation divisions to our army."

  Sokov faced the four air force commanders and asked, "Where is your field airport?"

   "Grodivka," Colonel Nechepolenko glanced at the map on the table, and then pointed to a location directly east of the Red Army Village: "Our field airfield is here."

   "Well, it's less than ten kilometers away from the city." Sokov nodded after looking at the location of the field airport, and said, "When the infantry needs air support, you can dispatch it in time."

"Comrade Commander," Vitkov approached Sokov and asked him for instructions: "How do you plan to use our air force?" Troops, air strikes on the enemy's communication lines become a possibility.

   "Colonel comrades," Sokov heard what Vitkov meant, and asked, "Do you have reconnaissance planes in your division?"

   "It's needless to say," Nechepolenko quickly replied: "Not only any type of aircraft, but as long as it is at the level of an aviation division, it is equipped with reconnaissance aircraft."

"Since there is a reconnaissance plane, it will be easy." Sokov greeted the other three air force commanders, stood at the table, and said to them: "According to our reconnaissance, the enemy passes the bridge from the right bank of the Dnieper River every day." To transport supplies to the enemy on the left bank, the first task I give you is to send a reconnaissance plane to find out the enemy's transportation route."

  Colonel Neche Polenko is the commander of the bomber aviation division. Hearing what Sokov said, the first task he thought of was to dispatch enough bombers to carry out air strikes on the bridge over the Dnieper River. He interrupted and asked: "Comrade commander, are you planning to send our division to blow up the enemy's bridge?"

"Comrade Colonel, you guessed wrong." Sokov shook his head and explained to Nechepolenko: "The enemy knows very well that the bridge over the Dnieper River is a channel to ensure the supply of supplies to the frontline troops. This lifeline is kept at all costs. If we dispatch bombers to bomb, we will definitely be subject to intensive anti-aircraft fire, which will cause huge losses to the bomber formation. Even if we blow it up after paying a huge price, the enemy The ability can also be repaired quickly.”

  After hearing Sokov's words, Colonel Nechepolenko became confused: "Comrade Commander, why did you send our reconnaissance plane to conduct reconnaissance on the enemy's transportation line?"

Sokov picked up a red and blue pencil, drew a line from Pavlograd to the Skeleton Division's defense area, and said to Nechepolenko: "Comrade Colonel, my task for your division is to wait for the reconnaissance plane After finding out the situation of the enemy's transport team, immediately dispatch bombers to carry out the bombing, and must compress the supplies obtained by the Germans to a minimum."

"Use bombers to bomb the enemy's transportation lines." Necheporenko asked hesitantly: "Comrade commander, is this too wasteful? Instead of using bomber formations to deal with German trains or cars, it is better to go It would be more appropriate to bomb the German positions."

"Even if we send out bombers to bomb the enemy's positions." Seeing that Colonel Necheporenko did not understand his intentions, Sokov explained to him: "If the enemy's fortifications are blown up, they will attack them overnight." Quickly repair it. And if we go to bomb their transportation line, we don’t need too many planes each time, two or three are fine. Blowing up a truck, blowing up a wagon, the enemy’s supplies will be less One car or one wagon. If things go on like this, the enemy will experience a serious shortage of supplies, which will be very beneficial to our future offensive.”

After Sokov's explanation, Necheporenko finally understood what was going on, nodded vigorously, and replied affirmatively: "Understood, Comrade Commander. The enemy must have deployed powerful bombs near important facilities." Anti-aircraft firepower. But if transport vehicles were attacked, the Germans did not equip these vehicles with sufficient anti-aircraft firepower. Then we can basically complete the task of disrupting the enemy's communication lines with zero casualties."

   "Comrade Colonel, you are right." Sokov said with a smile: "We will use this method to destroy the German army's transportation lines, so that the frontline enemies will soon be short of food and medicine."

  That afternoon, the reconnaissance plane of the 202nd Division of the Bomber Air Force took off to conduct reconnaissance on the road between Pavlograd and the Skeleton Division's defense line to see if there was an enemy transport convoy.

The pilot of the reconnaissance plane was lucky. After flying twice in the air, he saw a convoy appearing on the ground. Except for the two armored vehicles that opened the way in front of him, and a broken armored vehicle, the rest were all the same. He hurriedly reported to the division headquarters through the radio: "Division headquarters, division headquarters, I found a German transport convoy in area 11."

  Neche Polenko quickly asked: "How many vehicles are there in the enemy's convoy?"

   "Except for the two armored vehicles that opened the road in front and the one that broke behind, there are about forty covered trucks." The pilot replied: "The entire convoy is about one kilometer long, and it is easy to identify targets in the air."

After finishing talking with the pilot of the reconnaissance plane, Colonel Neche Porenko immediately ordered his chief of staff: "Chief of staff, immediately send a formation of four planes to take off and rush to area 11 to carry out air strikes on the moving German transport convoy on the ground. .”

  Two minutes later, four bombers on standby took off and headed towards Area 11, preparing to attack the German transport convoy there.

  The German convoy on the ground has been on this road for a month or two, and has never been attacked by the Soviet army. Therefore, the auto soldiers believe that the Russians will not use aircraft to deal with them at all. Therefore, no one was surprised when they discovered the reconnaissance plane in the sky. They knew very well that even if the reconnaissance plane found them, they would not be able to attack them.

   What they didn't expect was that, on the muddy road, they had traveled less than two kilometers forward, and suddenly there was the roar of an aircraft engine in the air. Experienced soldiers immediately recognized that it was a Russian bomber and immediately issued an air raid siren.

  (end of this chapter)