Chapter 188: I’m Waiting For Tanks, What Are You Waiting For
As the calendar turned to October 25, 1915.
It had been 16 days since the 6th Army Group of Germania annihilated the big pocket of over 300,000 south of the Dnieper River.
It had been another 7 days since the troops briefly rested and then pushed north again to capture Dnepropetrovsk.
Sevastopol and Kerch in the south had been completely occupied and purged. Four divisions freed up on the Crimean Peninsula, along with some other rear troops, totaling about two corps, had also transferred from Crimea to the small rail hub of Melitopol north of the peninsula.
This force was directly commanded by an unnamed veteran lieutenant general from the 6th Army Group, with Bock and others serving as staff officers and mid-level backbone, preparing to make slight adjustments in Melitopol before continuing east along the railway toward Mariupol, 170 kilometers away to the east.
Meanwhile in the north, Rommel led Lelouch and Bock’s two armored divisions, concentrating almost all the army’s armored cars. After breaking through Dnepropetrovsk on the 18th, they rested only two days and began advancing east along the railway on the 20th, lunging toward the Donbas.
In just five short days, no enemy could block Rommel’s frontal assault, and he easily pushed forward over 100 kilometers, on the verge of reaching Donbas city.
Local reserve troops hastily pulled in to fill the line, along with Cossack cavalry, were all unable to stop the armored cars’ assault, managing at most to harass logistics with Cossack cavalry and destroy the railway behind Rommel.
But even so, the Cossack cavalry had to pay an extremely heavy price. After suffering a major setback last month, they no longer had the courage to confront armored cars head-on; they would flee at the sight of them, with morale very low.
If the situation continued developing in this trend, Lelouch believed Rommel would definitely reach Donbas city before the end of October, and slightly later, Bock might also reach Mariupol along the coastal railway.
At that point, if the two converged from north and south, they would inevitably complete that new eastern encirclement in early November. If they exerted some initiative, it might even be faster.
With the eastern battles already a foregone conclusion, Lelouch stopped worrying about military details and quickly turned his mind to those conspiracies and tricks.
He began pondering how to dig more pits in advance for the final great battle of Kyiv—not only to win, but to annihilate as many enemy troops as possible, not letting the enemy flee when they saw the situation turning against them. And to consume as much of the enemy’s manpower as possible before the decisive battle…
Fortunately, Lelouch had an inexhaustible supply of military strategy and war history in his mind; he quickly came up with some good ideas and then went to pitch them to Marshal Rupprecht.
……
October 25 at night, 6th Army Group Headquarters in Zaporozhye City.
Commander Marshal Rupprecht was staying up late drinking coffee and reading reports when his adjutant suddenly came over and softly reported: “Chief of Staff Lelouch requests an audience.”
Marshal Rupprecht was stunned: “Why is he suddenly so polite? Just come in directly! No more announcements in the future—bring him straight in. This won’t happen again!”
Seconds later, Brigadier General Lelouch appeared in the marshal’s office, unusually empty-handed.
Marshal Rupprecht knew him too well; for anyone else, seeing Lelouch arrive empty-handed wouldn’t seem strange.
But the marshal immediately sensed something unusual.
Normally, if Lelouch came late at night, it was definitely about military intelligence matters.
Yet reporting military intelligence without any reports or documents meant this intelligence didn’t need data or military details to support it, so… it was probably another scheme exploiting interpersonal relationships, psychological warfare, sowing discord, or the like…
Only when reporting these things did Lelouch himself not want to leave any paper evidence—just you know, I know, heaven knows, earth knows.
“Looks like the enemy is in for it again?” Marshal Rupprecht picked up his coffee and teased playfully.
Lelouch was caught off guard: “You can even see that?”
The marshal smiled smugly: “You’ve been with me for a whole year, scheming conspiracies every day. How could I not know you? Every time it’s late at night and empty-handed, it’s some shady ploy, and the enemy is about to bleed badly.”
Lelouch no longer held back and smoothly laid out his latest thoughts from the past few days:
“Here’s what I’m thinking: our original plan wasn’t to continue upstream along the Dnieper River toward Kyiv after capturing Zaporozhye and Dnepropetrovsk?
But because the previous phase went too fast, completing the task nearly half a month ahead of schedule, our tank troops haven’t caught up yet, equipment isn’t in place, so it wasn’t suitable to attack Kyiv immediately, hence we spent half a month turning east to hit the Donbas first.
But the problem is, we know we’re dithering to hit the Donbas first to wait for tanks, waiting for the muddy season to arrive with new off-road breakthrough equipment. But the enemy doesn’t know we’re waiting for tanks—they don’t even know tanks exist.”
Germanians slowing the offensive pace had reasons, but those reasons were too classified for the enemy to figure out even if they racked their brains.
I’m waiting for tanks—what are you waiting for?
Marshal Rupprecht followed this line of thinking and found the thought experiment becoming interesting.
“Yes, the enemy can’t understand our intentions, so… how do you think the enemy will speculate on this?” The duke couldn’t help but muse aloud.
“What the enemy thinks isn’t important; what’s important is, when the enemy can’t find an explanation, we can induce them and give them one.” Lelouch presented his core idea.
“Oh? Tell me more!” Marshal Rupprecht set down his coffee cup, lit a cigar, and his expression grew serious.
Lelouch: “We can completely pretend that we’re not continuing upstream from Dnepropetrovsk to attack Kyiv not because we don’t want to, but because we can’t.
We can release lots of news saying ‘the swamps on both banks of the Dnieper River are too numerous; after one autumn rain, it’s far muddier than other places, so all armored cars have been stuck in mud pits for days, unable to move.’
So we had no choice but to turn east to launch an offensive, because the Donbas region to the east is far from the Dnieper River lowland, relatively less muddy, and the enemy there is weak—perfect for expanding gains.
We can even allow some domestic newspapers to publish several photos of armored cars stuck in mud pits unable to move, or have news peddlers deliberately leak to foreign newspapers, letting enemy newspapers publish similar reports.
And the enemy, to boost morale, will definitely publish any such material they get. At that point, from the Tsar to the Lusha Army’s commander-in-chief, all will know the front-line situation and that our army lacks the strength to attack Kyiv.
This way, the enemy will feel even safer stockpiling heavy troops around Kyiv. We can even throw out more bait, like propaganda saying ‘our army, unable to use troops in the overly muddy Dnieper River great bend area, has drawn off large forces to the Eastern Front to expand gains,’
while in reality, key iron ore cities on the Dnieper River north bank leading to Zaporozhye—like Krivoy Rog, Sofiyivka, Nikopol—have very thin troop deployments.
At the same time, we pair it with more propaganda saying the enemy places great importance on constructing Krivoy Rog’s large iron ore mine, and in just half a month after occupation, they’ve fully repaired many facilities, soon to resume production and continuously supply iron ore to the rear war machine…
This way, don’t you think the Lusha Army might be lured into launching a counterattack inside the Dnieper River great bend on the Western Front? Won’t they want to temporarily retake the iron ore area for more thorough destruction, denying the enemy massive iron ore? If they think they can hold it, they might even want to keep the iron mine running for a few more months to feed their own war machine.
In short, our army can use every intelligence deception means to deliberately trick the enemy into believing ‘in the autumn rain muddy season, we lack the strength for any active offensive in the muddiest Dnieper River great bend area, and we firmly believe that in muddy conditions, the enemy is equally unable to counterattack, so we boldly draw off forces to the east to expand gains.’
If we lure the enemy to push deeper into the counterattack, then when we finally envelop with tanks, it’ll be much harder for the enemy to withdraw once they realize something’s wrong!”
Marshal Rupprecht listened very attentively, and he had to admit that if Lelouch’s ideas could be realized, the results would be excellent.
“But how to make the enemy take the bait? Will they believe it?” The marshal raised what he saw as the key difficulty.
Lelouch: “I think they will believe it, because belief in such things is never instant but a process. In war, no one fully believes their judgments about the enemy 100%, nor completely disbelieves.
So we just need to give them some sweet bait when they’re half-believing and probing. As soon as we show this trend, the Tsar will definitely pressure his subordinates to try a counterattack. If it succeeds, can they hold back?
And our cost might be delaying Krivoy Rog iron ore mine production by two months—weren’t you already planning its reconstruction?
We might let the enemy briefly reoccupy this iron mine for a month or so, and make our prior reconstruction groundwork slightly go to waste again. But I guarantee, after the enemy bites this necessary sacrificial bait, their cost will be ten times greater! Even more!
Moreover, to ensure the enemy falls for it, we can supplement with other stratagems. For example, didn’t we already release word that ‘after capturing Dnepropetrovsk, we didn’t continue upstream to Kyiv not because we didn’t want to, but because we couldn’t’? Digging deeper along this line, we can release extra rumors:
Just say ‘actually, at the time, our army was already straining to capture Dnepropetrovsk—it was the end of our bolt. Our army then thought Dnepropetrovsk was the rail hub to the eastern Donbas coal fields; even if not hitting Kyiv, to hit Donbas, we had to take Dnepropetrovsk at all costs, so our supply trains could turn east to support the Donbas fight.’
This way, we can subtly hint: luckily, the enemy 6th Army Group Commander General Evert, responsible for defending Dnepropetrovsk, lost his nerve at the critical moment. He feared our armored cars would cross Dnepropetrovsk to his rear for a deep envelopment and cutoff, so he abandoned the city and retreated in big strides.
If not for scaring off General Evert, with all our armored cars sunk in mud pits, we couldn’t have taken the choke point of Dnepropetrovsk at all, let alone advancing east to the Donbas coal mines later.
This way, when early winter approaches in the north and Lusha nationwide faces industrial shutdown from coal shortages and freezing urban residents, won’t the entire empire need a scapegoat to vent the public’s anger? Evert, who abandoned Dnepropetrovsk and deserted on the battlefield, is bound to face severe punishment!”
Hearing this, Marshal Rupprecht involuntarily drew in a cold breath. This was out to utterly destroy the enemy 6th Army Group commander, former Romanian Front Army commander!
Rupprecht himself was an army group commander, a respectable noble marshal. He didn’t really want the war to reach the point of hounding enemy high-ranking generals to death.
After all, he was part of that circle; his status imposed such limitations. He hoped the war would end with only rank-and-file soldiers dying, and noble dukes and marshals ending it decently.
Out of personal bias, Rupprecht couldn’t help asking: “But… from what I know, that General Evert isn’t some capable talent either. Whether he dies or not shouldn’t affect Lusha Empire’s combat effectiveness much. Do we have to target him? Letting him keep commanding, continuing his incompetence—isn’t that more beneficial to us?”
But Lelouch firmly shook his head: “Your Highness, you know only half the story. Evert indeed isn’t some famous general, but he’s not too bad either. After removing him, the Lushans are unlikely to pick a better one to replace him, so no worry about the enemy benefiting.
On the other hand, targeting Evert may not greatly affect enemy command ability, but it will definitely have major impact on the enemy army’s subsequent judgments and morale.
Once General Evert is severely punished, enemy generals will be gripped by fear in the short term, no longer daring to easily suggest retreat; if the Tsar orders counterattack, they’ll have to obey.
This way, when we attack Kyiv, the chance of the enemy fleeing drops greatly! As long as we can annihilate the enemy’s heavy troop group at Kyiv, the entire southern great plains area can then advance swiftly!
Moreover, in an army where a general has just been removed, what will the mid- and high-level officers of the troops that withdrew with him think? Will neighboring friendly units’ morale be affected?
These negative influences can slowly heal if given time. But we won’t give the enemy that time—we’ll strike the enemies toward Kyiv right after Evert is taken down by counter-espionage, at the peak of morale impact! Executing a general on the eve of battle is a great taboo!”
What Lelouch wanted was just the Tsar saddled with the “executing a general on the eve of battle” debuff; who was executed didn’t matter. As long as it wasn’t some utterly useless fool.
Even executing mediocrities like Cai Mao or Zhang Yun on the eve would still cause a brief but severe morale shock to the enemy army.
Seizing the moment of post-execution army morale shock to launch an offensive would yield great effects.
What’s more, Lelouch had other supporting backup plans ready, which could then be used in tandem, a two-pronged approach.
Duke Rupprecht actually felt a chill rise in his heart, but his intuition told him to adopt his chief of staff’s suggestion.
“I agree to implement this plan. Dispatch any resources you need… I hope you succeed.”
