Chapter 946 Warrant

Although Captain Guchakov, who delivered the ultimatum to Paulus, failed to enter the German position because of the obstruction of the German soldiers, the ultimatum he left in front of the position was still handed over to Paulus by the German soldiers. s.

After reading Rokossovsky's ultimatum, Paulus was silent for a long time, and then asked Schmidt: "Chief of Staff, we are now facing a bad situation of insufficient fuel, insufficient ammunition, and insufficient food. There is no fuel and ammunition , our soldiers can continue to fight with the Russians; but if there is no food, they will starve to death. If there is no food, the Russians don't even have to attack, just use the siege method, and they can kill us all Starve to death."

"Your Excellency, Commander, you are right." Schmidt echoed: "Before Christmas, the rations of officers and soldiers were 100 grams of bread per person per day; but after Christmas, due to the shortage of food, the rations have been reduced. It has reached 50 grams. If it continues to develop, I estimate that after a period of time, even this last ration can only be distributed to troops directly engaged in combat.”

   "Chief of Staff," Paulus looked at Schmidt and asked with a strange expression: "How long do you think we can last in the encirclement of the Russians?"

"It's hard to say." Schmidt smiled wryly and shook his head, "We lost 80,000 people throughout December, and the army dropped to 250,000. If it weren't for Marshal Manstein and General Huot The Russian attack from the rear has drawn down a considerable number of their forces, and I estimate our losses will be greater."

"A loss of 80,000 a month, and the remaining 250,000 people can only last for three months." As soon as Paulus said this, he immediately denied it: "No, no, 80,000 people were annihilated. In December, the fighting power of our troops is still far higher than that of the Russians. At the same time, there are Marshal Manstein and General Huot who came to the rescue outside. Now they have been repelled by the Russians, and the fighting power of our troops , has also been greatly weakened due to the lack of ammunition and food. In other words, we can't last three months at all, and at best we can last until the end of February."

Schmidt judged from Paulus's tone of voice that his commander was not optimistic about the future of continuing the fight, so he tentatively asked: "Your Excellency, if we surrender to the Russians at this moment, at least two people can be saved." The lives of more than 100,000 soldiers. You should think about it carefully."

"Let me think about it again." Paulus glanced at the deadline stipulated above, sighed softly, and then told Schmidt: "Wait until the 9th, call a meeting of the commanders of all armies, and see What do they mean."

   On the morning of January 9, Paulus called several of his army commanders to his headquarters for a meeting. After circulating Rokossovsky's ultimatum to the army commanders, he asked: "Mr. Army commanders, what do you think?"

"Your Excellency Commander," Kurzbach, the commander of the 51st Army, stood up and said first, "If the Air Force can provide us with enough supplies and the necessary air cover, then we will stick to the Stalinger Army. Le area, it is still possible.

  However, the current situation is that the materials supplied to us every day are not enough for basic survival, let alone combat. In addition, in order to ensure the safety of the transport aircraft, the Air Force used a large number of fighter jets for escort, so that the sky above the Stalingrad area has been controlled by the Russian Air Force.

  Therefore, I strongly suggest that Your Excellency, Commander, agree to this ultimatum from the Russians and surrender to them. "

  If it was before, whoever dared to propose surrender to the Russians at such an important military meeting would definitely be unanimously condemned by other colleagues. But after Kurzbach finished expressing his opinion, the whole room was extremely quiet. Everyone was frowning and thinking hard. Should they obey the orders of Berlin and continue to fight the Russians? Or should we judge the situation, accept the advice of this ultimatum, and surrender to the Russians?

Seeing that no one was talking in the room, Schmidt became a little anxious. He stood up and said to everyone: "Mr. Generals, Your Excellency Commander called you here today, not for you to be in a daze, but for you to come up with ideas." Tell me, what do you think in your heart?"

"Let me say a few words." After Schmidt finished speaking, General Max Pfeffer, commander of the Seventh Infantry Army, stood up and said solemnly: "The weather today has reached minus thirty degrees, and Berlin What about the tens of thousands of sets of winter clothes provided to us? But at the Morozovsk and Tachinskaya stations, as well as some rear bases in small towns, these batches include fur coats, felt boots, cotton hats and earmuffs. The winter clothes have already fallen into the hands of the Russians. Therefore, most of our officers and soldiers will spend this unbearable Russian winter without winter clothes."

"I want to ask," Commander Pfeffer had just finished speaking, and Strekel, commander of the 11th Infantry Corps, also raised his own doubts: "I remember that before the counteroffensive of the Russian National People's Congress, most of our troops Equipped with winter clothes. But where are the military coats on the soldiers now?"

  When Schmidt heard Strekel raise this question, he secretly cried out that it was not good. He knew that the soldiers' military coats were all thrown into the fire and burned when they were ordered to retreat. And this order was issued by Paulus himself. Seeing the anger on Paulus's face, he quickly got up to smooth things over: "General Strekel, where the military coats on the soldiers went is not the point. What we are going to discuss now is how to treat the Russians. Human ultimatum?"

"Does it need to be said, in our current state, can we continue to fight the Russians?" Strekel said angrily, "I think it's better to surrender to the Russians. In this way, at least we can fight the Russians." Preserve the names of more than 200,000 people."

  After several days of repeated consideration, Paulus also realized that only surrendering to the Soviet army was the best way out. However, he didn't know the opinions of his subordinates, so he specially called this military meeting. Seeing several army commanders speaking at this moment, they all advocated surrendering to the Russians, and he chose the boulder in his heart as a fall to the ground. He stood up and said, "I'll ask this one last time. Those who oppose surrender to the Russians please raise your hands."

   But after he finished speaking, the army commanders just looked at him, but none of them raised their hands. Even if one or two people wanted to raise their hands, they changed their minds when they saw that their colleagues were sitting there securely.

"Well, since everyone has no objection," Paulus continued, seeing that everyone remained silent, "then I now officially announce that we accept the ultimatum of the Russians and send Kurzbach to meet with the Russians." The Russians negotiated..."

   Before he finished speaking, the phone on the table next to him rang suddenly, interrupting what he was saying. Schmidt walked over to pick up the microphone and listened for a while, then passed the microphone to Paulus: "Your Excellency, General Huber, the commander of the 14th Tank Corps, has arrived outside the headquarters. He said he has something important to do. Notify you immediately."

Paulus was keenly aware that when Schmidt mentioned Huber to himself, he used "report" instead of "report". He immediately realized the seriousness of the problem and quickly told Schmidt: "Chief of Staff , invite General Huber over here."

   Not long after, Hu Bei, accompanied by Schmidt, walked into the side from the outside. He gave Paulus a quick salute and dropped his hand again. After sweeping his eyes over the people attending the meeting in the room, he said to Paulus: "Your Excellency Commander, I came to see you today because I brought you a warrant from the head of state."

  Paulus, who was about to arrange for Kurzbach to negotiate with the Soviet army, was immediately frightened into a cold sweat when he heard that Huber had brought the warrant from the head of state. He hurriedly asked, "Where is the warrant?"

  Huber took an envelope from his briefcase and handed it to Paulus. Paulus unfolded it and saw that it was an order written by Hitler: "Paulus, I order you not to surrender. Every day your army group stands firm is a support for the entire front line. You can contain at least a few Russians." The strength of the group army."

  After reading the warrant, Paulus knew that Hitler had already guessed his intention to surrender, so there was such a warrant. He handed over the warrant to Schmidt and told the other party: "Chief of Staff, read the Führer's warrant for everyone."

  After Schmidt finished reading Hitler's warrant, the army commanders lost their voices collectively again. Kurzbach was the most disappointed. He thought that Paulus would send him to contact the Soviet army, but everything was disrupted by Hitler's order. The next thing to do is to continue to fight the Soviet army until the entire army is destroyed.

"Gentlemen and Gentlemen, the meeting is over here, everyone go back to their respective troops." Paulus said to his subordinates with difficulty: "Whether we accept the ultimatum from the Russians, they will definitely launch a fierce attack again, You have to prepare your troops for battle."

  (end of this chapter)