The Bloody Triangle

by Victor Kamenir

  Radekhov-Brody direction. The enemy, deploying their . . . moto-mechanized group of forces in the area of Berestechko and the forward units in Dubno, Verba, Radzivilov, was attempting to widen the breakthrough in the direction of Brody-Tarnopol, but encountering fierce resistance of out units, was not successful.56

  Another intelligence report, issued twelve hours later, recognized that German infantry divisions were being deployed in a defensive posture on the flanks of their mobile mechanized group.

  Therefore, Kirponos was concentrating the XXVII Rifle Corps along the Zdolbunov-Kremenets line. Farther south, another rifle division, the 199th, belonging to the XLIX Rifle Corps, reinforced by three partially mobilized antitank brigades and the XXIV Mechanized Corps, was forming the second line of defense.

  By the end of the day, the three Soviet armies holding the Lvov pocket, the Sixth, Twelfth, and Twenty-Sixth, remained mainly in their old positions. Only the Sixth, having to deal with a gapingly exposed right flank, gave up any territory of note to the Germans.

  CHAPTER 11

  Continue Mission, June 28

  South-Western Front, Colonel General Kirponos Commanding

  THE MORNING OF JUNE 28 found General Purkayev and Colonel Bagramyan scrambling for information about Potapov’s Fifth Army. Still out of communication with the Fifth Army, Colonel Bagramyan sent his deputy, Lt. Col. N. D. Zakhvatayev, to Potapov in order to get the most up-to-date information and evaluate the situation.

  While the Sixth and Twenty-Sixth armies were still holding their own in Lvov pocket, a new player entered the scene against the Twelfth Army. Shortly before midnight, Hungarian troops crossed the Soviet border and were slowly moving forward under cover of intensive artillery barrages.

  The situation at Ostrog was still unclear, and Kirponos positioned some of his reserves facing north approximately forty miles south of Ostrog. These reserves consisted of the XXIV Mechanized Corps, the 199th Rifle Division, three more-or-less mobilized antitank artillery brigades, and the 14th Cavalry Division. They were to intercept the possible German swing south from Ostrog. As usual, Purkayev disagreed with Kirponos, believing that the Germans would press on to Kiev as fast as possible. However, he was overruled by Kirponos, inadvertently reinforced in his belief by Zhukov, who acknowledged the possibility of German enveloping maneuver south of Ostrog.

  The XXIV Mechanized Corps was the weakest and the least combat-capable mechanized corps available to commander of the South-Western Front. Approximately three quarters of its enlisted personnel were brand-new recruits, large portion of whom have not yet completed their basic training. At the start of the war, the XXIV Mechanized Corps had roughly 220 tanks, all of which were the older models. Over forty of them, or almost 20 percent, were the old two-turreted T-26s.

  This corps, having virtually no wheeled transport, had been moving up on foot since June 24 towards Kremenets, a distance of almost seventy miles from their garrisons around Proskurov. The later stages of its road march was conducted under heavy pressure from German aviation.

  While XXIV Mechanized Corps was still a day away, its commander, Maj. Gen. V. I. Chistyakov, an old friend of Bagramyan’s, stopped by to chat with his friend. Chistyakov was less than enthusiastic about his corps’ combat worthiness: “Our corps is far from what I would like to see. We just began its formation. We have not yet received new tanks, there aren’t any trucks. . . . Therefore, my friend, if you hear that we don’t fight the best, don’t judge us too harshly. You need to know that we’ll do all that we can.”1

  Towards the end of the day, staff of the South-Western Front received news of Ryabyshev’s VIII Mechanized Corps reaching the immediate vicinity of Dubno. Rejuvenated by these encouraging news, Kirponos ordered counterattacks to continue on June 29. Not knowing the true situation of the IX and XIX Mechanized Corps, he sent them instructions to push again towards Dubno to link up with the VIII and XV Mechanized Corps advancing from the southwest. The two southern mechanized corps were to be supported by the XXXVI and XXXVII Rifle Corps as well as the 14th Cavalry Division belonging to the V Cavalry Corps. Task Force Lukin was to plug up the eastern direction.

  Overall, the situation around Rovno was still sketchy. The IX and XIX Mechanized Corps, after suffering severe casualties during the two previous days, were not in any condition to renew the offensive. The good news from the VIII Mechanized Corps quickly soured once Kirponos’ staff found out that Popel’s group was bottled up near Dubno.

  Bagramyan later wrote that it seemed that the Soviet High Command in Moscow began doubting South-Western Front’s ability to halt the German panzer thrust:

  Apparently Stavka no longer counted on us to destroy the main thrust of Army Group South and fight through to the border. This was witnessed by a telegram demanding to inform commanders of 87th and 124th Rifle divisions, which were supposed to be still fighting surrounded near the border, of an order: “Abandon equipment after burying it; and with light weapons fight through the woods towards Kovel.”2

  Looking at the orders for the two surrounded divisions, the Stavka did not hope that they could rejoin the Fifth Army. It was trying to save any survivors by directing them north to Kovel, away from main fighting. Of course, neither Stavka nor Kirponos’ staff knew that 124th Rifle Division no longer existed and that the handful of survivors from the 87th Rifle Division was already heading east. Miraculously, approximately one thousand men from this division were able to rejoin the Fifth Army in July.

  At the same time as the Soviet High Command was attempting to direct the survivors of the two surrounded division to Kovel, the Soviet XV Rifle Corps was falling back from it in good order. This corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. I. I. Fedyuninskiy, managed to disengage from the forward German units and was crossing to the eastern bank of Stokhod River. His 45th and 62nd Rifle Divisions, while suffering heavy casualties during the past several days, still remained combat capable. The 16th Rifle Regiment, the only unit from the surrounded 87th Rifle Division to break out, constituted the corps reserve.3

  Once behind Stokhod River, the XV Rifle Corps had a chance to catch its breath, while Fedyuninskiy and his staff had an opportunity to review the events of the past week and sum up the lessons learned. In his memoirs, Fedyuninskiy was critical of the overall Soviet performance:

  Enemy aviation and commando groups put communication centers and lines out of action. There weren’t enough radios in [various] headquarters; and, besides, we were not accustomed to using them. Mobile means of communications suffered severe casualties and, in a fluid, rapidly changing environment, turned out to be of little use. All of this led to orders and directives reaching the [addressees] late or not at all. This was the cause of the piecemeal nature of our counteroffensive, disruption in cooperation between branches of service.

  Particularly poorly carried out was cooperation between infantry and tanks. This was especially apparent on June 24th, when we undertook a counterattack in the Lyuboml area. Commander of the 41st Tank Division, Colonel Popov, displayed indecisiveness. He was mainly “worried” about preserving equipment and not about the most effective ways to utilize it in the developing situation.

  We poorly conducted reconnaissance of the enemy, especially at night.

  Communication with neighbors was often lacking, especially when often nobody would even try to establish it. The enemy, taking advantage of this, would infiltrate into our rear and attack units’ headquarters.

  Despite enemy air superiority, camouflage measures during road marches were poorly carried out. Often troops, vehicles, artillery pieces, field kitchens would converge on narrow roads. The fascist aircraft conducted quite painful strikes on such bottlenecks.

  It is necessary to also note that [our forces] initially did not sufficiently appreciate significance of engineering work. There were instances when soldiers did not dig foxholes due to low expectations of individual commanders, often due to lack of entrenching tools. Situation with entrenching tools was so bad that in some units so
ldiers used helmets instead of shovels.4

  Throughout all of June 28 there was only one radiogram from the Fifth Army. Even this one message that got through did not carry any useful information, just a routine notification of changing location of its headquarters.

  Bad news continued raining down. Two senior officers from 12th Tank Division, Regimental Commissar V. V. Vilkov and Col. E. D. Nesterov, reported that a significant part of Lieutenant General Ryabyshev’s VIII Mechanized Corps was fighting surrounded just south of Dubno. While these two men were making their report:

  Vashugin walked in during the conversation. We noticed how he turned pale, but nobody attached any significance to it. We thought: the man simply feels bad for the setback, for which he was partially responsible [emphasis added]. Nobody could have guessed what kind of blow this represented to him. Not waiting for the end of the conversation, Vashugin left.5

  Despite the obvious inability of his Front to continue the offensive, Kirponos nonetheless ordered to proceed. Hopes now were pinned on Potapov’s Fifth Army, plus the XXXVI Rifle Corps and Task Force Lukin, with whatever aviation assets could be scraped up. Below are the excerpts from order disseminated on June 28, 1941:

  —The 5th Army, minus XXXVI Rifle Corps, capitalizing upon success of the VIII Mechanized Corps, go onto offensive and reach with its left flank the Styr River, securing river crossings near Lutsk.

  —The XXXVI Rifle Corps at 1200 hrs on 06/28/41 go onto offensive with immediate objective, capitalizing upon success of the VIII Mechanized Corps, reach the line of Mlynov-Bakuyma-Kozin.

  —The V Cavalry Corps (headquarters and the 14th Cavalry Division), going onto offensive at 1200 hours, by the end of the day reach the area of Teslukhov-Khotyn-Kozin.

  —The XXXVII Rifle Corps (141st and 139th Rifle divisions) advance at 0800 hours and by the end of 06/28/41 reach the line of Boldury-Stanislavchik-Polonichna.

  —The XV Mechanized Corps to continue with already-defined mission. By the end of the day to be in vicinity of Berestechko. To be ready to repel possible enemy mechanized attacks from north and northwest and support the VIII Mechanized Corps in destroying enemy groups of forces which broke through beyond Ikva River.6

  Simultaneous with the above-mentioned formations, the VIII Mechanized Corps was diverted from its push on the city and sent east: “The VIII Mechanized Corps, after securing the line of Ikva River behind it, attack the enemy moto-mechanized units operating east of Ikva River in the direction of Ostrog. After destroying the enemy, rally by the end of the day in the areas of Zdolbunov, Mizoch, Ozhenin.”7

  However, all the planning was conducted in the most generous outline, often not even being aware of location of formations that were to participate in the offensive. Their situation report released around 0800 hours on June 28 reflected the dearth of concrete information: “Situation of the Fifth Army is being clarified.” “There is no information about situation of VIII and XV Mechanized Corps.”8

  After Kirponos, Purkayev, and Bagramyan arrived at this decision, Kirponos delegated Bagramyan to inform Vashugin and Khrushchev about it. In doing so, Bagramyan found out shocking news:

  After picking up the working copy of a map and my notes, I went to see N. S. Khrushchev. He was unusually sad. [He] listened to my report and without hesitation approved the planned efforts. Finding out that I was going to see Vashugin next, Nikita Sergeyeevich [Khrushchev] bitterly said: “Don’t go. No need to report to him any longer. For [Vashugin] the war is over.” Vashugin shot himself. He was an honest, uncompromising, energetic human being, but too excitable and easily hurt. The burden of disaster broke him.9

  It was probably not too difficult for Bagramyan, writing his memoirs years later, cushioned by passing years, to give a less scolding description of Vashugin. In reality, it was quite possible that the staff officers at Kirponos’ headquarters suddenly were able to breathe easier without Vashugin’s menacing presence. Vashugin quite clearly realized that he was directly responsible for putting Ryabyshev’s VIII Mechanized Corps out of action and trapping a large portion of it with Popel near Dubno. He did one decent thing and shot himself.

  Around 2200 hours, first Bagramyan and then Kirponos were called to the telegraph machine on direct line to Moscow. The upper echelon continuously demanded news:

  One after another requests for information . . . . We could feel that Stavka was worried about the situation of our Front. . . . For several minutes the telegraph was clicking off the questions: “What is going on at Dubno, Lutsk, Rovno? How far did enemy tanks penetrate those regions? Where is Potapov? Where is his 15th Rifle Corps? What are results of the counteroffensive by 8th and 15th Mechanized Corps?”10 There wasn’t much that Bagramyan or Zhukov could report about Potapov’s 5th Army: “Since 2400 hours on 06/27/41 command group and headquarters of [5th] Army lost communications with [their] units, subjected to strong enemy mechanized attacks. 15th Rifle Corps—situation not clarified; 27th Rifle Corps—situation not clarified; 22nd Mechanized Corps—situation not clarified.”11

  Fortunately, the pullback of the three Soviet armies defending the Lvov salient and Hungarian border was proceeding in relatively orderly manner. In conclusion, Kirponos reported: “Overall, the South-Western Front feels itself to be sufficiently capable to continue further struggle. The enemy mechanized group of forces operating in the area of Ostrog presents the biggest threat to the South-Western Front. The unclear situation on the right flank deepens the overall unfavorable position of the Front’s right wing.”12

  Zhukov continued pressing Kirponos about not letting up his offensive, once advising him to “use all of Lukin’s mechanized forces” in the counterattack against the German forces. Kirponos had to explain to Zhukov that both tank divisions of Lukin’s V Mechanized Corps already departed for the Western Front. The only tank force available to Lukin was a tank regiment belonging to the 109th Motorized Rifle Division.13 However, Kirponos himself did not know that this tank “regiment” was in reality about a score of light tanks, mainly belonging to Lukin’s reconnaissance battalion.

  After midnight of June 28–29, Bagramyan’s deputy, Lieutenant Colonel Zakhvatayev, returned from his information-gathering trip to Potapov’s Fifth Army. It was a dangerous and arduous endeavor. Between Kirponos’ headquarters in Tarnopol and Potapov’s headquarters northeast of Rovno, a great number of Soviet and German units were fighting in close quarters, often intermixed. On the return leg of his trip, Zakhvatayev’s plane was damaged by flak and forced to land. Luckily, Zakhvatayev was uninjured and, commandeering a truck, returned to Tarnopol, making a wide loop east through Shepetovka.14

  The news delivered by Zakhvatayev wasn’t encouraging. The XV Rifle and remains of the XXII Mechanized Corps abandoned Kovel and were moving east across Stokhod River. The XXXI Rifle and IX Mechanized Corps plus the 135th Rifle Division from the XXVII Rifle Corps were defending approaches to Rovno, while the XIX Mechanized Corps was already pushed back to the very suburbs of Rovno.15

  Kirponos and his senior officers did not know that Zakhvatayev’s report was already outdated. By this time fighting mostly died down on June 28, the Soviet forces abandoned Rovno and fell back almost fifteen miles to the east bank of Goryn River. This river became a rough temporary demarcation line between Soviet and German forces.

  Potapov’s Fifth Army was still pulling into the river bend north of Rovno along the Stokhod River. The XXII and IX Mechanized and XXXI Rifle Corps, along with the 1st Antitank Artillery Brigade, held the river line down to the Rovno-Novograd-Volynskiy highway. The XIX Mechanized and XXXVI Rifle Corps extended south almost to Ostrog. From there, full of gaping holes were the lines of The VIII and XV Mechanized and XXXVII Rifle Corps to Brody.

  However, with the XXXI, XXXVI, and XXXVII Rifle Corps coming up on line, the area between Goryn River east to the Stalin line was stripped of Soviet reserves. In the case that Germans broke through at Ostrog and raced on to the plum prize of Kiev, the Nineveeth Army under Gen. I. S. Konev was ordered n
orth into the Kiev Fortified District.

  Mechanized Corps, Maj. Gen. K. K. Rokossovskiy Commanding

  After abandoning its attack on Dubno the previous day, Major General Rokossovskiy’s IX Mechanized Corps was stubbornly defending the Lutsk-Rovno highway in the area of Klevan against the determined efforts by German 14th Panzer and 25th Motorized Infantry Divisions. The terrain in this location favored defense:

  In those wooded, swampy areas the Germans moved only along major roads. After using Novikov’s division to cover our lines on Lutsk-Rovno highway, we shifted the 20th Tank Division, including its artillery regiment armed with new 85mm cannons, here from the left flank. . . . Canons were emplaced in roadside ditches, on hillocks along the highway, and some—directly on the road in order to be able to conduct direct fire.16

  Not only was Rokossovskiy able to set up effective antitank defenses, General Novikov’s 35th Tank Division and the 41st Tank Division even conducted local counterattacks, resulting in capturing some vital high ground.

  Moving off before midnight, by early morning of June 28, the 41st Tank Division gained some ground, capturing a small village called Petushki. This division, numbering around 150 tanks, ran into hail of enemy fire. The village was taken at a heavy price:

  The battlefield resembled hell. The smoke of burning tanks, ours and German, was stifling; flakes of ash floated through the air. Screeching, thuds, howling, shots [smothering] the voiced commands, tankers’ faces turned black. People jumped out from burning and knocked out tanks and fell, cut down by rifle and machine-gun fire, fragments of shells and mortars.17

  All efforts of the 41st Tank Division were in vain. Daylight brought increased German pressure, and the Soviet division was forced to give up the bloody ground. Germans immediately noticed the pullback and went after the 41st Tank Division with a vengeance. Division’s pitiful air defenses, represented by one battery and four antiaircraft machine guns, were quickly bombed out of existence.