Chapter 918: The Rear Is Attacked
"Where are those damned German armored units? Is our rear position still safe?" When he heard news of German armored units, Pavlov, commander-in-chief of the Western Front Army, hurriedly rose to his feet and asked with a trace of tension and unease.
Guderian might never have imagined that, in this risky plan to circle around the rear, the most worried party was not the German command, but their target this time—the commander-in-chief of the Russian Western Front Army, General Pavlov.
"While patrolling, the garrison at Baranovichi discovered a large number of armored-vehicle tracks west of Baranovichi. Judging from these tracks, the German armored units once came extremely close to Baranovichi, but ultimately chose to move west along the railway, toward the place where we are stationed," the messenger reported truthfully.
At first, Pavlov nodded. The German armored units had approached Baranovichi without launching an attack, confirming his guess that they simply lacked engineering capabilities and were only a diversion.
But when the messenger said that the armored units had already headed west, with the Western Front Army's headquarters as their destination, Pavlov froze again.
"What about the map? Bring me that damned map, quickly!" Pavlov ordered.
Upon hearing the general's command, his subordinates did not dare delay in the slightest. They hurriedly brought over every garrison map and map of the Polish region.
"West of Baranovichi..." Pavlov muttered to himself, but soon his face showed panic. He discovered that although the Białystok Triangle positions were extremely strong against a German attack from the west, the rear positions along the Grodno–Brest line were actually the weakest part of the triangle.
This was only natural. The rear consisted entirely of Russian territory, and Pavlov could never have deployed most of his troops to defend it.
But