Armageddon - Max Hastings [86]
On the ground, the Russians excelled at night fighting and patrolling. Every German soldier who moved from the Eastern Front to the west remarked upon the dramatic change he experienced, that he could move freely during the hours of darkness, when the Americans, especially, were content to leave the front in peace. The Russians harassed the enemy relentlessly. Night patrols sometimes slit the throats of German sentries and left the mutilated bodies to provide food for thought among their surviving comrades. Lieutenant Pavel Nikiforov, a Soviet reconnaissance officer, derived pride and pleasure from his hours watching the German lines through his periscope, observing the enemy eating, sleeping, washing, defecating. “I always felt that I knew the Germans better than most men, because I had spent so much time so close to them.” The Germans respected Russian exploitation of well-camouflaged massed anti-tank guns in defence. Lacking any counterpart for the hand-held bazooka, PIAT or faust, Soviet infantry would drag anti-tank guns into attacks immediately behind their spearheads.
The Russians’ command of artillery was superb, though it relied for effect upon weight rather than accuracy of fire. Their principal weapons, including the T-34 and Stalin tanks, together with their 1944–45 aircraft, were as good as or better than anything the Western allies possessed. They had developed one weapon unique to themselves, the Katyusha, which the Germans greatly feared. A battery of the rockets deployed on trucks could deliver in seconds a barrage of 192 projectiles, each weighing 120 pounds, which carpeted a front 400 yards wide, to a depth of 300 yards. Katyushas could be effective up to four miles, but they were dangerous to the firer as well as to the enemy, especially if he was careless with fusing. The rockets were not remotely as accurate as the German Nebelwerfer multiple mortar. Katyushas not infrequently savaged their own infantry if a launch rail became bent or a stabilizing fin fell off. Lieutenant Alexandr Vostrukhin took the precaution of crawling under his tank whenever outgoing rockets were flying overhead, “just in case.” But their moral effect on the enemy was devastating. Just as British and American airmen would chalk rude messages on their bombs, so Russian crews scrawled on their rockets: “This is for my mother and sister.” When Lieutenant Valentin Krulik first saw massed Katyushas in action, he was awed by “this incredible wall of fire, which the batteries kept up for most of the day.” The batteries were seldom employed casually. They were almost always used to support a big attack or a desperate defence.
Yet, if the Red Army at last possessed hitting power and command skills as great as those of any combatant, its infantry and armoured assaults relied upon the sacrifice of lives rather than upon tactical ingenuity or even common prudence. To this day, Russian casualty figures are a source of perverse pride to many veterans. “Of course the Red Army was reckless with the lives of our men,” said Vladimir Gormin of 3rd Ukrainian Front. “Nobody knew how many died, and who cared, anyway? It was typical that there was always some grand operation on the great revolutionary holidays—1 May, 7 November, 23 February. Men died, simply so that a few generals could collect another medal.” By contrast with the Western armies, the Soviets adopted a cavalier attitude to the threat of encirclement. “The Shock Armies pushed on regardless of what was happening on their flanks,” said a Russian officer. “They got cut off by the Germans, sometimes for weeks, sometimes running out of fuel, food, ammunition. But they were expected