Two days later, a pre-war military conference was held in Rokossovsky's temporary headquarters.

The snow around the buildings has long been cleared, and every five meters on both sides of the street, there are two fighters with submachine guns. There are also roadblocks and sandbag fortifications at the intersection, and the vehicles of the commanders who come to the meeting can only drive to the street intersection and stop.

A major from the headquarters, standing next to the sandbag fortifications, saw a commander getting out of the car, and went up to ask the other party's name, rank, and unit to confirm whether the other party was on the list of people attending the meeting. Those who are on the list will naturally be let go; If you don't have a name, no matter how high your military rank is, you will still be stopped.

Fedyuninsky often came to the headquarters of the Front, and the officers inside were very familiar with him, but when he got out of the car, the major questioned him on official business, checked the roster in his hand, and confirmed that he was a member of the meeting, and only then let him and his subordinates go.

The commander of the Eighth Infantry Army, Lieutenant General Pern, had come to the headquarters of the Front with Fedyuninsky not a small number of times, and it was the first time he had seen such a close examination. He said to Fedyuninsky with some displeasure: "Comrade commander, what the hell is going on, the officers on duty know us very well, and they still have to carry out such a close inspection, are they afraid that we are spies of the Germans?" ”

Fedyuninsky turned his head to look at his subordinates, and replied with a serious expression: "General Pern, such a strict examination proves that today's military meeting is very important. The major had done the right thing, he was doing his duty. ”

Hearing Fedyuninsky say this, Pern could only obediently shut his mouth and follow him, walking along the street of three steps, one post, five steps and one sentry, towards the headquarters.

Coming to the corridor of the headquarters, Fedyuninsky saw that quite a few people had already arrived first. Except for a few colonel-level officers, the rest of the commanders had twinkling stars on their shoulders. A lieutenant officer stood in front of a small room and kept repeating the phrase: "Comrade commanders, please store your tunic here......"

Fedyuninsky and Pern took off their military overcoats and handed them to the lieutenant. The lieutenant handed the two men's overcoats to a young female soldier in the room. After the female soldier took the military coat, she took out two sets of number plates from the drawer, one of which was hung on the military coat, and the other was handed to Fedyuninsky as proof.

Having stored his military coat, Fedyuninsky searched the crowd for familiar faces. Soon he saw General Grissin, hurriedly walked over, shook hands with the other party, and after a few words of greeting, asked, "General Grischen, do you know what will be discussed in today's meeting?" ”

"I don't know." Grischen shook his head and said, "But I guess I'm ready to attack the Germans." While people were talking in low voices, the entire corridor was filled with a buzzing roar that Grischen had to raise his voice in order for Fedyuninsky to hear what he was saying.

After about half an hour, the conference rooms at the end of the corridor opened, and the chief of staff, Bogolyubov, came out of it. As he appeared, the chatting commanders in the hallway fell silent, looking at him to hear what he would say next.

"Comrade commanders," said Bogolyubov, seeing that the crowd was almost coming, announced in a loud voice: "the meeting is about to begin, please all come in." ”

As soon as his words fell, the commanders standing in the corridor rushed to the door. Only those colonel-level officers were still standing in place, and they planned to let people with higher ranks than themselves go in, and then they would follow in.

After entering the conference room, Fedyuninsky walked straight to the long conference table and took a seat on the left side of the table, while Grissa sat next to him. Then, several other army commanders also sat down at the conference table. And those commanders at the army and division levels sat in chairs in the back row.

After everyone was well, the closed door on the other side of the conference room opened, and Rokossovsky, together with Deputy Commander Trubnnikov and Military Commissar Subotin, walked out of it. Rokossovsky sat down at the head of the table, and his two deputies sat on his left and right.

Rokossovsky looked up at Bogolyubov, who was standing aside, and asked: "Comrade Chief of Staff, are all the people here?" ”

The seats in the conference room were arranged by Bogolyubov himself. He set up as many chairs as there were people in the meeting. Hearing Rokossovsky's question at this moment, he hurriedly glanced around the room, saw that the entire conference room was full, and hurriedly replied: "It's all here, Comrade Marshal." ”

After hearing this, Rokossovsky nodded, stood up, and said to the commanders present: "Hello, comrades commanders, you have been summoned here today for the purpose of assigning combat missions to the various group armies. Next, let the Chief of Staff, Comrade Bogolyubov, assign tasks to everyone. ”

After waiting for Rokossovsky to finish speaking, Bogolyubov turned to face the commanders present and said in a loud voice: "Comrade commanders, we have waged more than three years of arduous and remarkable struggle with the Germans, and after countless sacrifices, we have finally driven them out of our borders. Now, the last time has come for us to pay their blood debts! ”

As soon as Bogolyubov's words fell, thunderous applause rang out in the venue, and even individual commanders chanted "Ula!" Ulla!! For a while, the atmosphere in the venue was unusually warm.

Bogolyubov had been prepared for the reaction of the commanders for a long time, so he did not interrupt the cheers, but stood quietly in place. It was not until the room was quiet again that he continued: "Comrade commanders, the order given to us by the headquarters of the Supreme High Command is to carry out the East Prussian campaign on the 14th of this month. The units participating in the campaign were: our Second Belorussian Front, General Chernyakhovsky's Third Belorussian Front, General Baglamyan's First Baltic Front, and the Red Banner Baltic Fleet......

The East Prussian campaign was of great military-political significance, and after the capture of East Prussia by our troops, it would destroy the eastern outposts of fascist Germany and liberate parts of northern Poland. By losing East Prussia, Germany would have lost an important national economic zone. …… After the capture of East Prussia, the conditions for the ships of the Red Banner Baltic Fleet to be stationed will be improved, and it will be possible to transfer combat forces to the southwestern part of the Baltic Sea and disrupt the German lines of communication at sea......"