Sheb, that was a recon vehicle, which has since been destroyed. It was a freebie, and we got lots of good information out of it. I didn't want to blow any prestige points on reinforcing it, though.
June 28th, 1941Our troops march victorious into Grodno. Taricus raids the liquor cabinets and throws a party for the grenadiers.
Our armored fist reaches the defenses of Volkovysk. Also, notice the huge thorn in our ass where the Red cavalry and infantry reinforced after being nearly obliterated, and now threaten to rampage through our undefended rear unless they are stopped! I send the 11th Wehrmacht and 37th Panzers to deal with this fiasco.
Lots going on outside of Brest. After their amphibious landing, the 10th Grenadiers and the cavalry engaged the heavy AA emplacements, completely destroying them (the cavalry in particular took heavy casualties). I'm learning what's so hard about fighting the Russians is that they materialize out of the grass like mushrooms overnight. SO JacenHan and his hardy grenadiers are going to have to knock out that phantom AA position (again). God speed.
Our trusty tactical bombers have been striking with devastating precision AND fending off Soviet fighters. It's time they got some recognition.
June 30th, 1941This charade with the rearguard pursuit is sapping essential manpower from the drive towards Volkovysk. I send our guerrilla detail back towards the front. We need all our Panzers to smash these Soviet T-60's asap. The 3rd Wehrmacht is stuck dealing with them for now, though they're fairly well-entrenched now and can hunker down among the trees. Unfortunately they're pretty much useless until that armor disperses, otherwise they'll get gnashed in the open.
The heavy artillery in Volkovysk is making progress costly in these fields west of the city. Fishbreath and his Russian conscripts are backed up by that entrenched artillery, otherwise they'd be grease between our Panzer treads by now. Those are 15cm guns, and we'll need to insert some foot troops to knock it out, that and the AA emplacements, too. Where are the FJ? The 13th Gebirsjager have an opportunity to sneak in the back door, and so are marching down from Grodno over the Nieman river.
That Flak is on the bridge because our two fighter wings NE of there needled a Soviet fighter wing down to 10% strength and I wanted to knock it out for
good and needed that coup de grace. That 37mm AA wasn't doing much anyway.
Significant casualties among the 10th Grenadiers attempting to destroy that AA emplacement. More troops will be coming over the river today and tomorrow to relieve them.
And hurrah! The 1st FJ has flown in from Warsaw and (not surprisingly) got shot up over Brest! They then got shelled once they landed. Half of the poor bastards are dead or missing. After they wait a turn to reinforce they should be in better shape than they are now. Though I think they'll be needed more in Volkovysk, so Monkeyhead, have your men march north through the woods.
Someone get the 22nd Panzers a brigade of bulldozers! Schnell!
Hitty40 - You're being assigned to the 13th Gebirsjager. These guys are great. They've seen action on every campaign since Poland. They're moving south to cross the river behind Volkovysk and hopefully wreak hell in the soft underbelly of the city's defenses.