Chapter 592 Pavement Tank

The tank paving vehicle was actually invented by the Americans. They used it during the Normandy landings... The Normandy beach was very soft and could not bear the weight of the tanks. In order to allow the tanks to land smoothly and provide firepower and cover for the infantry, the Americans invented this paving tank that can pave the road while advancing.

Its structure is very simple. It is to add something like a conveyor belt on the top and front of the tank, and continuously transmit the paving materials strung together with steel wires from the rear to the front and then compact them with tracks. In the blink of an eye, a passage can be paved for the tank.

The only difference is... the paving tanks made by the Americans are more advanced, and the paving materials they use are steel plates.

Obviously, it is too difficult for the German army to find steel plates and string them together with iron wires at this time. On the one hand, there is no material and on the other hand, there is no need. The defense line built by the German army is only more than 700 meters away from the Soviet army. The road in between is indeed muddy, but it is much better than the soft beach.

In fact, these roads are not unable to withstand the pressure of tanks, but because the mud is easy to slip. Once a tank falls into a pit, it will not be able to bear the force and will sink deeper and deeper. This is fundamentally different from the beach, so it is enough to pave the road with logs.

In modern times, Chinese and Soviet tanks generally carry a log at the rear for self-rescue when the tank falls into the mud. (Note: This log is called "self-rescue wood")

And logs and steel cables are very easy to obtain in the Kerch Peninsula... Kerch Port is an ancient port city in Crimea, and there are two large shipyards distributed in the north and south outside the city. (Note: Ukraine is an important shipbuilding industrial base of the Soviet Union)

The reason why there are shipyards in the north and south is that the Kerch Peninsula and the Taman Peninsula divide the sea into the Azov Sea and the Black Sea, and this setting is so that they can build ships for the Azov Sea and the Black Sea respectively.

In these shipyards, there are logs of uniform thickness and hard material everywhere, and of course there are a lot of steel cables left... This is the effect of blitzkrieg. When the Soviet Union retreated, there was no time to move anything, and even the shipbuilding machines were intact.

Next, it was the engineers' time to show their skills. They first used the machine to make a small hole in the two ends and the middle of the round logs, and then passed the iron cable through the small hole and then wrapped it around the logs several times to make it more secure.

After stringing them one by one, they were piled on the car with the rear compartment removed for use.

Compared with these tasks, the modification of paving the road is simpler. It is to set up an external conveyor belt on the top of the tank, and remove the motor directly from the side three-wheeler. The modification of three tanks was completed in more than an hour.

However, the results of the test drive were very disappointing.

The reason is that the conveying of logs is not coordinated with the forward speed of the tank...

If the conveying speed is too slow, the tank will drive in the mud for a long time without getting logs to pave the road, which may cause the paving tank to get stuck in the mud and all the previous work will be wasted.

If the conveying speed is too fast, the logs will pile up in front of the tanks and become obstacles.

"Try again!" Major Edmund, the commander of the engineering battalion, ordered: "The tanks maintain a speed of 22 kilometers per hour!"

"Yes, Major!" The soldiers responded.

This time the progress was very smooth. The logs were laid in rows in front of the tanks, and then the tracks rolled them on the ground, and cheers came from the shipyard.

"General!" Major Edmund reported to Manstein who was watching nearby: "This method is obviously feasible, but there are still some difficulties, such as the coordination between tanks and log-carrying cars. I suggest that they conduct some necessary training first. In addition, I think it is necessary to equip tank crews and cars with communication equipment!"

Manstein nodded and said: "Whatever it is, do whatever you think is necessary. All I need is for it to be useful on the battlefield!"

"Yes, General!"

While the shipyard was busy, the German soldiers on the front line were not idle. They kept firing a row of shells at the Soviet defense line, and from time to time launched a tentative attack on the Soviet defense line.

Of course, this attack was no longer to break through the enemy's defense line, but for harassment and fire reconnaissance.

The purpose of harassment is to increase the psychological pressure of the Soviet army and consume their physical strength... This is especially useful for recruits. Recruits are always very excited at the beginning of the battle, and they put all their energy into the battle regardless of everything, but this state of chicken blood with a tense body obviously cannot last long, and they will soon feel exhausted.

Most of the Soviet troops were new soldiers, so this tactic was just right for them. Sometimes, a few Soviet soldiers could not stand the pressure and jumped out of the trenches to charge the German trenches... This charge was purely a psychological breakdown.

Fire reconnaissance was mainly to find the location of tanks in the enemy's trenches.

Soviet tanks were still quite intimidating to the Germans, because in addition to the KV tanks, the Soviets also had the T34, which had excellent performance.

If it were any other time, the German armored soldiers would not be afraid of the T34, because they had found a way to deal with the T34... Taking advantage of the weakness of the Soviet army's backward communication equipment and the inability of tanks to coordinate, they concentrated their forces to defeat them one by one. Among them, the Soviet command tank was destroyed first. When the command tank was destroyed, the Soviet tanks would be in chaos and fight on their own. (Note: The Soviet command tank has two antennas, one for sending and one for receiving. Ordinary tanks have only one receiving antenna, which means they can only passively receive commands.)

But the situation now is somewhat different.

The German army is going to fight a paving war, that is, the tanks are paving the road while advancing. This will have a disadvantage, that is, the forward trajectory can be easily estimated by the enemy, so the enemy can block it with tanks or artillery fire.

In order to avoid the trouble caused by this as much as possible, the German army needs to find the location of the Soviet tanks as much as possible, and then let the air force blow them up one by one.

The Germans were very successful in this regard. After a few hours, only a dozen of the fifty Soviet tanks were left under the German offensive. Only one T34 tank that posed a threat to the Germans remained, and the rest were insignificant light tanks.

On the other hand, German reconnaissance aircraft discovered the location of the Soviet artillery positions.

Manstein did not immediately attack the artillery positions because he believed that if he bombed them now, the enemy would probably recover and reorganize in a few hours.

However, if he waited until the offensive to launch a sudden attack...