The driver did not dare to neglect, and quickly started the tank and drove in the direction of the Soviet pursuit.
According to the driver's guess, the Russians would soon find out that something was wrong with their tank, and immediately mobilize anti-tank weapons to destroy themselves. But when he cautiously drove the tank into the pursuing Soviet team, the other party did not notice anything strange about him. There were even people shouting in front of the tank and gesturing to him to slow down the tank. Point, don't disrupt the infantry's attack queue.
"You have all seen it." Huber, the commander of the tank, said with a sneer: "Under the cover of night, the Russians did not discover our true identity at all and thought it was their own tank. Now it is in front of us. There are two choices, and I give you the right to choose."
Hearing what Huber said, everyone except the driver focused their eyes on him, wanting to hear what he wanted to say.
Seeing that everyone was silent and just staring at him, Huber expressed what he was thinking: "The first option is that we maintain the current speed, mix among the Russians, and retreat to the designated position; the second option is Choose, we fulfill our military duties and attack the Russians, but the result of doing so may be that our entire army is annihilated in a short period of time. It is up to you to choose where to go!"
After Huber finished speaking, he looked at everyone and asked: "Tell me your choice, whether to run away among the Russians like a coward, or to die fighting like a warrior."
"Mr. Captain," as soon as Huber finished speaking, the gunner expressed his position: "I will listen to you in everything. I will do whatever you say."
Seeing that the gunner was willing to advance and retreat with her, Huber nodded and asked the loader, "What about you?"
"Since you and the gunner are willing to fight bravely against the Russians, how can I, as your assistant, lag behind." The loader said without hesitation: "I am willing to fulfill my military duties, even if I lose my life. No matter what."
"Very good, very good." Huber said "very good" twice, then looked at the radio operator and machine gunner and asked: "Tell me, what is your choice?"
"I, I..." the radio operator stuttered for a while, and finally made up his mind decisively: "I am willing to fight and die like a brave man."
"Very good." Huber was very satisfied with everyone's reply. He asked the driver who was driving the tank: "You are the only one left, driver. Tell us, what is your choice?"
"Since we are a crew, we are a whole." The driver said without looking back: "Of course I want to die like a warrior like you."
"Now that everyone's opinions have been unified, let's attack the Russians."
"Mr. Captain, there are Russians everywhere outside." The gunner reminded Huber: "Where should we attack?"
"Look where is the Russian command center, let's attack there." Huber said: "As long as the Russian command center is defeated, their troops will fall into chaos because of the loss of unified command. In this way , our troops have a higher chance of escaping."
After a while of observation, the pilot pointed to a command cabin two to three hundred meters away and said to Huber: "Mr. Captain, look quickly. There is a command cabin on the roadside ahead, and there are people standing guard outside. Soldiers, this should be the Russian headquarters, let’s attack there.”
Huber visually measured the distance and felt that with the strength of his crew, he could completely destroy the command cabin, so he decisively issued an order: "Get to your positions, start loading, and prepare to destroy the Russian command cabin ahead."
The first artillery shell was fired, but because it was too dark, Huber had a slight deviation when aiming. As a result, the shell did not hit the target, but landed more than 20 meters away from the command cabin and exploded.
When the tank fired like this, it immediately exposed its target. Huber soon heard the Russians outside shouting, seeming to say that a German tank was found here, and immediately mobilized anti-tank guns to destroy it. But Huber could not care about this. Now that his target has been exposed, all he can do is to make a quick decision and destroy the Russian command cabin as soon as possible, thus making this unit leaderless because of the loss of unified command. And fell into chaos.
When the second shot came out of the chamber, everyone in the car felt the car body shake violently. As a rule of thumb, it was a hit with an anti-tank weapon. Fortunately, he was lucky. Only the vehicle body was hit by bullets, but the shells did not effectively penetrate the tank's armor.
Huber asked loudly: "Is anyone injured?"
"No, Mr. Captain." The other members of the crew replied in unison.
Huber used a periscope to observe the cabin in front and found that the second shell had missed again. Although many Russian soldiers were knocked down, the command cabin was still intact. The other party seemed to have discovered that the target of the German attack was his cabin, and quickly started to leave the place. Seeing that the Russian command cabin was about to escape, Huber became anxious. He shouted to the loader: "Load quickly, don't let the Russians escape."
However, before the third round was ejected, their tank was hit by an anti-tank weapon again, the turret was blown off, and all the crew members were knocked unconscious.
After an unknown amount of time, Huber woke up and found that the turret was gone. She and the other members of the crew seemed to be sitting in an open car, surrounded by nothing. Seeing that the Russians did not notice her, Huber quickly saw the injuries of the crew members.
After some inspections, he suddenly felt more at ease. Every member of the crew was still alive, but they were knocked unconscious by the shelling they had just suffered. He shook the members awake one by one, hoping to give the Russians another thunderous blow while he was being ignored by the Russians.
But when everyone woke up, they discovered a serious problem. The turret was blown away, which meant that the tank's main gun and machine gun were gone. Today, each member of a tank crew has only one pistol equipped with two magazines.
"Mr. Captain," the pilot, whose forehead was still bleeding, asked Huber nervously, "What should we do next?"
"Can the tank keep moving?"
The driver replied in a panic: "I'm not sure about this. We have to restart it to know whether the tank can continue to be used."
"Brothers," Huber said to everyone: "Now we are surrounded by Russians, and the tank has also suffered heavy damage. The only thing we are proud of is that the five members of the crew are still alive, which means With that, we can continue our offensive against the Russians."
But this time even the gunner was a little discouraged. He said with a grimace: "Mr. Captain, now we only have five pistols and ten magazines left. Do you think we can still make waves among the Russians with our strength?" ?"
Seeing that the crew members became so downcast because of a small setback, Huber couldn't help but feel a little angry: "What's wrong with you? Could it be that a small setback destroyed your confidence?"
"Mr. Captain, what we are facing now is not just a small setback." The driver said with a wry smile: "Even the turret was blown away by the Russian artillery fire. What strength do we have to continue fighting the Russians? ?”
"Then what are you going to do?" Huber asked through gritted teeth, "Are you planning to surrender to the Russians?"
"It's not enough to surrender." The driver shook his head and said: "If we still want to continue attacking the Russians under the current circumstances, doesn't it mean that we will die in vain?"
"Yes, yes, Mr. Captain." The loader also added: "I think it is impossible to continue fighting, but if you don't want to be a prisoner of the Russians, I have a good way."
"What a good idea." The loader pointed to the outside of the tank and said: "Look at how many Russian corpses are around the tank. I think we can take off their clothes, put on their clothes, and sneak out quietly. "
Although the radio operator felt that it was immoral to take clothes off the dead, he considered that if he wanted to survive, he would have to use Russian military uniforms to escape from this damn death zone. He was worried that Huber would not agree and would insist on letting people like him hold up their pistols to fight the Russian soldiers who were armed to the teeth, so he carefully persuaded: "Mr. Captain, I think the loader is right. If you want to go smoothly, To escape from the encirclement of the Russians, we can only take off the clothes from the dead Russians. We can use their clothes to dress up as Russians and follow these Russians to move forward. Maybe we can successfully return to our army. The rear."
Huber is not a one-minded person. The main reason why he ordered the gunner to fire just now is because the No. 4 tank is relatively late. The Soviet army, which lacks anti-tank weapons, has nothing to do with its own tanks. But what he didn't expect was that his tank fired three times. Not only did it miss the target, but the opponent also used anti-tank weapons to knock off the turret. At this moment, asking his crew members to hold a few pistols and fight against the Russians equipped with rifles, submachine guns and machine guns outside was tantamount to asking everyone to die. He would not do such a stupid thing.
"Okay." He nodded and agreed with his subordinates: "When everyone goes out, in addition to taking off the Russians' clothes, we also need to collect their weapons. With enough powerful weapons, even if we are discovered by the Russians , and also have enough strength to stand out from their encirclement."
Fortunately, the Soviet army had moved forward at this moment, and no one discovered that all the crew members in the tank with the turret removed were still alive, and they even climbed out of the tank and picked off the dead Soviet soldiers. Take off your clothes, collect usable equipment, prepare to put on makeup, and continue to mix with the Soviet army, moving in the direction of their retreat.
A few minutes later, the crew members all changed into Soviet military uniforms, carried Popov submachine guns, picked up Mosin Nagant rifles, and stood next to the tank waiting for Huber's next order.
Just when Huber was about to give the order, the driver suddenly said: "Mr. Captain, I just took a look and found that the tank's engine is still in good condition. In other words, we can use the tank to continue marching. Now, we are walking, It’s better to move forward in the tank, please give us the order.”
Huber originally wanted to order the tank to be abandoned, but when he heard the driver say that the tank could still drive, he suddenly had a new idea. He waved to everyone and ordered: "Everyone get back on the tank, and we will continue on our way in the tank."
Just like that, the five tank soldiers got back into the tank and continued on their way in the tank without the turret. Except for the driver, everyone looked around with guns drawn and alertly, ready to shoot without hesitation if they found an enemy approaching.
A dozen health workers who were treating the wounded stood up when they heard the roar of a tank engine not far away. It was clear that what was coming was a German tank without a turret. There were five people in Soviet uniforms sitting in the tank. They thought it was their own people, so they waved to them desperately to signal the tank not to come, because there were still people lying on the ground. There are many wounded people, and if they are accidentally run over, their lives will be endangered.
But the next moment, there was a man in the tank shooting at them with a submachine gun. Several of the health workers who were caught off guard were immediately knocked down. The rest quickly fell down on the spot, cursing in their hearts that these tank soldiers were blind and actually shot at their own people. .
Although the health workers thought that the tank soldiers had made a mistake and shot at their own people, many of the wounded lying on the ground had some understanding. They quickly shouted loudly: "They are Germans, they are Germans in disguise." "Yes." After shouting, he struggled to sit up, picked up the Bobosha submachine gun placed aside, and shot at the oncoming tank.
Unfortunately, all the bullets he fired hit the tracks of the tank, causing countless sparks but not causing any damage to the enemies in the vehicle. When Huber saw a wounded man sitting on the ground, he actually fired at his own tank. He couldn't help but blood rushed to his head. He raised the rifle in his hand, aimed at the opponent and fired a shot, directly knocking down the wounded man.
A wounded man not far away saw that his comrade's shooting did not pose any threat to the German tank, but instead sacrificed his life in vain. He quickly picked up a grenade, pulled the string and threw it towards the tank.
There was a loud "boom", and when the smoke cleared, the wounded saw that the German tank was still driving forward, with a figure hanging on the vehicle, who seemed to have been killed. As for the other German soldiers, except for the driver, the rest were shooting wildly, seemingly preparing to eliminate all moving objects around them.
But their luck soon came to an end. A T-34 tank drove out from nearby, slowly turned its turret, and aimed at the moving German tank. With a loud noise, the T-34's body shook violently, a flame more than one meter long erupted from the muzzle, and a shell escaped from the barrel and flew directly towards the German tank not far away.
The shell accurately hit the German tank. The next moment, the tank began to burst into flames. The remaining four people in the vehicle were covered in fire, but none of them jumped out of the vehicle. The driver continued to drive the tank forward, and the other three Germans kept firing in all directions. A few minutes later, the tank stopped first, and then the shooting stopped. The people in the vehicle would rather be engulfed in flames than jump out of the vehicle to escape.
