"It's nonsense!" Seeing all this, Rokossovsky could not help but curse indignantly, and then turned around and said to us: "All the commanders come with me, and we must let the fighters go back to the trenches." ”

The division's command post was set up at the edge of the forest, and about 30 meters out of the forest was the second line of defense built by the 107th Division. A few of us immediately dispersed as soon as we went out, trying to stop the retreat of the troops. I saw the chief of staff of the division standing next to the second line of trenches, brandishing his pistol and shouting loudly to stop the retreat of the fighters. I stood there and thought about it for a while, and felt that if I stayed with the chief of staff of the division, the results would be more obvious, and most of the soldiers who escaped were his subordinates.

Seeing many soldiers running past him without paying attention, the chief of staff of the division couldn't help but be anxious, and scolded angrily: "Go back, go back to the trenches!" You cowards! ”

Most of the warriors heard his roar and stopped and turned and jumped into the trenches, but many of them still ran past him without hesitation. These people completely enraged him, and without even firing a warning shot into the air, they directly pulled the trigger at the deserters. Every time a gunshot is fired, someone falls to the ground.

When he fired, he kept cursing and swearing: "You cowards, you dare to continue to run away when you see me." Hell you all! "Seeing him shoot, I was stunned at first, but then I understood that he was enforcing battlefield discipline against the escapees.

I stood beside him, wondering if I should persuade him to stop in moderation, and to make an example of him, and not to kill too many people, so as not to provoke a mutiny. I looked at him, thinking in a daze, when half of the lieutenant colonel's head burst open, and red-white viscous liquid splattered everywhere. I couldn't dodge it, because the liquid spilled all over my face. I watched in astonishment as the chief of staff of the division in front of me bent his knees, fell to his knees with a thud, and then fell backwards and fell out of the coffin.

The unexpected change frightened me to the core, and I immediately fell to the ground quickly, buried my face in the snowdrift with my head in my hands, and secretly prayed in my heart: "There is a debtor who is wronged, the chief of staff of the division shot you just now, it has nothing to do with me, don't shoot at me." ”

After a few moments, I felt no movement around me, and then I cautiously raised my head. The soldiers who had been running non-stop just now were all standing in place, and the young soldier standing in front of the body of the lieutenant colonel, holding a smoking submachine gun in his hand, it seemed that the chief of staff of the division had been killed by him.

I got up from the ground, snatched the submachine gun from his hand, and shouted at the soldiers who were in a daze around me: "Go back to the trenches, don't let the German devils rush over." He shouted back and pushed the soldier who had fired the shot towards the edge of the trench. The warriors stood still and hesitated, then turned around and jumped into the trench, placing their weapons on the edge of the trench.

I squatted on the trench and looked closely at the trench in the distance, and found that it had been completely occupied by the Germans, and although their tanks and armored vehicles did not cross the trenches guarded by infantry, they were lined up on the edge of the trenches, aiming their guns and vehicle-mounted machine guns at this side. Perhaps they are gathering strength and are planning to launch a new wave of attacks.

I looked back and saw that there were cavalry at the edge of the forest, with the vanguard in line, and a large number of cavalry pouring out of the forest. Rokossovsky was talking to the commander of the cavalry squadron leader. It dawned on me that the reason why the soldiers stopped just now was not because they were stunned to see their division chief of staff killed, but because they saw the cavalry stopped at the edge of the forest blocking their way.

A few hours ago, my submachine gun, which I had never left with me, was buried in a collapsed church, and I was very unsure of wearing only a pistol with very limited range and power on such a war-torn battlefield, so I did not return the submachine gun to the young soldier, but bent over to the command post with the gun in my hand.

As I approached the cavalry ranks, I heard only the last words that Rokossovsky said to the cavalry commander: "...... We have no way back, you immediately organize troops to counterattack and take back the position! ”

"Yes!" The commander on the horse replied loudly: "Rest assured, comrade commander, that I will immediately lead the troops in a charge, and I will definitely drive the Hitler bandits out of our positions." ”

"Go ahead, I'll be waiting for your good news at the command post." After Rokossovsky finished speaking, he took General Zakharov and several staff officers back to the command post.

I stopped where I was, looked at the cavalry that had really assembled in front of me, and then looked back at the heavily defended German positions on the opposite side, and I couldn't help but worry about the impending attack.

I looked at the cavalry commander wearing the rank of major in front of me, hesitated for a long time, but still mustered up the courage to say to him: "Comrade Major, the German army now occupies a favorable terrain, and at the same time there are tanks and armored vehicles, if we do not have enough artillery cover, we will pay a heavy price for rashly launching an attack!" ”

The major on the horse smiled bitterly and said, "There is always one death!" Then he turned his horse's head and ran to the ranks of the cavalry, shouting orders at his men.

Hearing him say this, I was speechless, and could only stand silently in place, watching him go over to dispatch troops.

In a few moments, when the troops had been assembled, I heard him speak to his men from afar: "Brothers! Although Russia is big, we have no way back, because behind us is Moscow...... "Hearing this, I couldn't help but smile bitterly, and I said in my heart that Crochkov had only been saying this for a few hours, and I didn't expect him to already know the truth. But after thinking about it, it is estimated that this was told to him by the commander just now, and he just used it to boost morale.

The cavalry major drew his saber and raised it above his head: "We swear: with our blood and lives, we will defend our great capital!" ”

"We take an oath!" Thousands of cavalrymen drew their sabers one after another, followed the example of a major, and raised them above their heads.

The major turned his horse's head, pointed his saber forward, and said in a loud voice: "Hitler's bandits who have invaded our territory are ahead. Teach them hard with the sword in your hands, brothers. Then he swung his knife down and roared, "Forward!" ”

"Ula ~~~!!" The cavalry team erupted in earth-shattering shouts and began to move forward.

The corners of my mouth twitched, and I wanted to step forward to stop the major, saying that this is not the era of cold weapons, and I need to maintain a formation to exert enough combat effectiveness. To attack a well-armed and well-established German army, if the cavalry were to charge in such a thick, dense formation, it would be almost like suicide. However, as soon as I took a step forward, I suddenly remembered what the major had just said, "A man must die", and the oath of the cavalrymen who were willing to defend the capital with their blood and lives, and knew that they were all fighting with the determination to die, and even if I tried to persuade them, it would not have any effect, but would be annoying. So I stopped in time, and stood there with awe as I watched the cavalry charging in front of me, a row of fifty horses, a team of four, a total of five, and the horses slowly marched forward with small steps under the control of the cavalry.

I returned to the command post and saw Rokossovsky standing in front of the observation hole, watching the charging cavalry with his viewing glass. General Zakharov, who was also standing next to him with a telescope, suddenly shouted excitedly: "Look, comrade commander, the cavalry is starting to pick up speed, and in a minute they will rush forward and drive them away from our positions like rabbits." I glanced disapprovingly at the smug general, and picked up the telescope that had just been placed on the observation hole.

I saw that the cavalry, having crossed the trenches, began to accelerate gradually. The horses ran faster and faster, but the queue was still quite neat. Compared to the infantry charge, the cavalry charge is more majestic. My main attention, however, was on the major, who charged to the far left of the group, leaning forward, holding the reins in his left hand and pointing diagonally with his saber raised in his right hand.

There was only less than a hundred meters left from the German trenches, and the speed of the cavalry charge was also raised to the limit. The rest of the distance can be rushed through in only ten or twenty seconds. At this moment, the opposite side suddenly rang out like a burst of gunfire, and the German machine guns, submachine guns, rifles, and the vehicle-mounted machine guns on the armored vehicles opened fire together, and the dense fire swept towards the charging cavalry ranks like a storm.

As soon as the gunshot rang out, my chest tightened, my heart beat faster, my breathing became rapid, and my hands holding the binoculars shook uncontrollably.

I saw through the binoculars that the galloping horses, when they had been hit by bullets, either rose to their feet in pain, or they bent forward and fell to their knees, and threw the horsemen on their backs out of the way. The fighters who fell to the ground were either trampled to death by the horses that rushed up from behind, or were hit by the dense fire of the Germans. For a time, the neighing of the war horses and the miserable howls of the soldiers came and went.

I saw the Major charge on his horse, and suddenly his whole body shook violently, and his right arm, which was held high in the air, fell back, his five fingers were released, and his saber fell to the ground with a clatter. Then the body shook twice, and fell directly from the horse's back to the sky, because one foot was still hanging on the stirrup, so the body was dragged by the horse on the ground and continued to run forward.

The horses running in front fell directly to the ground, and the horses behind tripped over the front, and the charging team was suddenly in chaos. Although the Soviet cavalry fell one by one in the continuous fire of the German army, the people in front fell, and the people behind were not frightened or dodged, but continued to rush forward one after another.

Faced with heavy casualties among the cavalry, I sadly removed my binoculars from front of me, turned my head to look at Rokossovsky standing aside, and found that he was looking at the battle going on in front of him through the observation glasses expressionlessly, and he did not even blink an eyelid at the suicidal charge of the cavalry troops. Seeing all this, I can't help but feel a little chilled, for a commander in a high position like him, the responsibility is just to hold the defensive line, and thousands of people are just a bunch of cold numbers for him.

Raising the binoculars again, I saw in my eyes that after the Germans stopped firing, all the cavalry that charged forward fell to the ground. Among the piles of corpses, several bloodied warriors struggled to crawl out, brandished their sabers in their hands, and stumbled towards the German positions.

"Boom, boom!" Several tank shells landed in their middle with unmistakable accuracy, and the flying shrapnel pierced their bodies in an instant, ending their incomparably tragic and most rear-end charge.