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Iosif GusakovskijCommander of the Guards Tank Brigade, Army General, Hero of the Soviet Union
Country:
 Belarus |
Content:
- Biography of Iosif Gusakovskiy
- And here comes Gusakovskiy's brigade to this line.
- "I'm listening, Comrade Guards Colonel," Karabanov said.
- Gusakovskiy understood: something irreparable had happened.
- Gusakovskiy's brigade was cut off.
Biography of Iosif Gusakovskiy
Iosif Iraklievich Gusakovskiy was a commander of a Guards Tank Brigade, an Army General, and a Hero of the Soviet Union. He was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union on September 23, 1944, for exemplary fulfillment of combat tasks and the displayed courage and heroism. On April 6, 1945, he was awarded a second Gold Star Medal for new feats of valor. Gusakovskiy was also honored with numerous orders and medals. He was of Belarusian nationality and became a member of the Communist Party in 1931.
In 1928, I. I. Gusakovskiy volunteered to join the Soviet Army. He initially served in the cavalry and was later sent to a tank school. Before the war, he held various command and staff positions. During the Great Patriotic War, he participated in battles on the Western, Voronezh, 1st Ukrainian, 1st and 2nd Belarusian Fronts. He commanded a tank brigade and served as a chief of staff of a regiment and a brigade. From September 1943, he commanded the 112th and later the 44th Guards Tank Brigades. After the war, he commanded a division and an army, and served as the commander of the Baltic Military District and the Chief of the Main Personnel Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of the USSR. In 1948, he graduated from the General Staff Academy.
Currently, Army General I. I. Gusakovskiy continues to serve in the ranks of the Soviet Army, holding a responsible position in the Ministry of Defense of the USSR. He was elected a deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in 1962 and 1966.
Biography:
It so happened that a tank officer entered into battle with the fascist invaders on foot. This happened in July of 1941 near Elnya. Captain Gusakovskiy fought in the infantry for three months. He wore his tank officer's cap, which faded and became lighter, but Gusakovskiy could not part with it. Only on October 3, the captain finally got into a tank. His battalion fought on one of the outskirts of Moscow. Gusakovskiy fought against the Germans, using ambush tactics and launching sudden short attacks. Sometimes it was necessary to bury the tanks in the ground and fight to the death.
But even in those unbearably difficult days, he dreamed of more: of maneuvering, of a daring breakthrough into the enemy's rear. And how the soul of the tank officer came alive when in the December offensive, during the defeat of the Germans near Moscow, he had the opportunity to fully use the power of armored vehicles: fire, movement, maneuver! For 90 kilometers through impassable terrain, through dense forest trails, paving the way for the brigade, Gusakovskiy's tanks moved. It seemed that nothing could stop them! On the third day, the commander of the brigade called him.
"You can't catch up with him!" he said, looking at the thin figure of the captain with a weather-beaten face. ...On the Kursk Bulge, the commander of the tank brigade, Leonov, was killed in battle near Obeyan. Gusakovskiy was appointed to command the brigade. In one of the battles, he was wounded in the leg, but he remained in the ranks. The time was hot - the army was advancing. The new brigade commander had so many worries, so many new questions arose every day, every hour, so many battles had to be fought by the brigade that Gusakovskiy had no time to think about his injury.
The qualities that were inherent in his character, such as restraint, could initially be mistaken for dryness. He did not belong to those who liked to pat a young officer on the shoulder and address him as "you," trying to ingratiate himself. Reserved in expressing his feelings, he was actually a kind-hearted and sensitive person. With each battle, Gusakovskiy's military skills grew. Once, in a blizzard, tanks made a 150-kilometer maneuver. But they were unable to immediately capture the city. The situation became more complicated. It was pointless to break through the defense from the east, as planned. What to do then? For the first time, Gusakovskiy's brigade acted independently from the corps.
And at that moment, when it seemed that the enemy had managed to stabilize the situation and just in this crisis hour of the battle, Gusakovskiy made a maneuver that stunned the enemy. Overnight, he turned one of his battalions southeast. And when at dawn the battalion struck in a new direction and managed to divert the enemy's forces, the other two battalions stormed the city.
This skillful maneuver was a kind of preparation for a more ambitious operation in the spring of 1944. Our troops were advancing from Goryny to the Dniester. They crossed the old defense lines, striving to quickly reach the borders of the Motherland.
On the headquarters map, the arrows indicated the path through the Bug. Gusakovskiy's brigade took its positions. The plan was for the tanks to enter the gateway of the breakthrough made by the infantry and penetrate deep into the enemy's territory. However, the resistance of the enemy was so strong that it was impossible to break through the infantry's front immediately. The tankers successfully operated on the flank. The battalion commanded by Ivanov was particularly outstanding.
"Ivanov!" Gusakovskiy called the combat officer over the radio. "Listen, Ivanov, quickly take the height '126.9'," he directed the tank strike. And in a different voice, he said with care: "Take care of the people!"
Gusakovskiy moved his command post closer to Ivanov's battalion. He needed to see everything in order to manage the battle: the captain, the height captured by the tankers, the road cut off by them, and the Bug River they broke through.
The roar of artillery resembled distant thunder. Darkness thickened. The rising wind swayed the tops of the trees, and a German scout hummed in the sky. Somewhere very close, footsteps could be heard on the roads leading to the forest.
On July 17, the brigade forced the Western Bug. It was a bold breakthrough and a powerful flanking strike of the entire army.
Soviet troops, following the orders of the Supreme High Command, reached the Vistula. On January 12, 1945, Colonel Gusakovskiy was summoned to the army command post by a radiogram. He received an order to break through for a deep strike in the rear of the fascist troops.
At night, the tanks of the advanced units crossed the Vistula and concentrated in the forest near Warsaw. The forest with its dense, furry spruces resembled a huge garage: every tree had combat machines parked under it.
By two o'clock in the afternoon, the brigade, accompanied by self-propelled guns, a division of Guards mortars, a motorized infantry battalion, sappers, and communication equipment, broke through the breakthrough prepared by the infantry and artillery. The brigade entered, as tankers say, a "clean breakthrough." And this was already a good sign: the striking power of the advance detachment was preserved, with a high moral and combat coefficient.
The strike was swift. When the tankers reached the Pilica River, it turned out that there was no bridge, and the ice was thin. But there was no time to hesitate. Gusakovskiy made the decision to explode the ice and let the combat vehicles ford through.
And so they did. The infantry, taking the western bank, pushed back the enemy. And the tanks, sliding down the gentle slope, entered the black, smoking water, pushing the ice floes that rubbed against the steel sides of the machines. Cold water seeped through the viewing slots, causing the drivers' hands to go numb. Once they reached the opposite bank, the combat vehicles immediately joined the battle.
But Gusakovskiy soberly assessed the situation. The initial successes of the offensive could cloud one's judgement: everything is now easy, everything doesn't matter. There was a danger that by breaking into Ravva-Mazovetskaya, they would get stuck there, lose time and strength. "What if we bypass it and, reaching the main highway, cut off the enemy's retreat routes?"
Gusakovskiy posed this task to the commander of the tank battalion, Karabanov, instructing him: "Not always head-on! Sometimes you can attack from the flank... Understood?"
The tanks made a leap of 123 kilometers. Gusakovskiy was concerned about the lack of communication with the corps. It was possible that the brigades that followed him got bogged down in the battle near Rava-Mazovetskaya. And then the communication officer, Major Bardishin, alone in a tank at night, set off back. It was a dangerous path: there were German strongholds between the advance detachment and the main forces. But he found the headquarters of Colonel Babajanyan and, at dawn, everyone moved along the path of the 44th brigade, which was pulling along all the tanks, infantry, and self-propelled guns.
With each passing day, the contours of the offensive became clearer. Everyone was striving for the Oder!
There are critical moments in battle when you need to make a bold and quick decision that later, in a calm atmosphere, seems so risky that it is difficult to say whether you would repeat it or not. In such moments, all command qualities are tested: sharpness of thought, strength of character, determination, and the ability to take risks. Gusakovskiy faced such a moment on the day the brigade reached the Mezeritsky bulwark of defense, or as it was called, the gateway to the "Oder quadrilateral."
On the day when the reconnaissance tanks approached this line and in the twilight light of the winter morning, the tankers saw the "dragon's teeth" - black concrete pillars embedded in the ground - none of them could even imagine the danger that lay behind these fortifications. Much later, our military engineers, inspecting the "Oder quadrilateral," saw casemates with steel flanges, tunnels, plants with unique equipment, electrical and pumping stations - a large and complex underground operation, created and fine-tuned with German precision. This fortified area was located on the Berlin direction. Its powerful visible and invisible defensive structures were enclosed in a wide square, intercepted by rivers, heights, hills, and forests. Everything was mined, encased in concrete and steel. The construction of the "Oder quadrilateral" by the German General Staff began immediately after the disaster in the Stalingrad area.
And here comes Gusakovskiy's brigade to this line.
The first option for the strike was to go to the Mezeritsky bulwark through country roads, describing its own arc - it had its advantages. The brigade would avoid encounters with the enemy. However, by reaching the main highway, it risked exposing itself. This option matured in Gusakovskiy's mind at night when the brigade made a leap towards Vilnau. Encouraged by the success of the night march, Gusakovskiy reviewed the plan. Although the first option had its advantages, it meant losing time. And time is the most valuable factor in war. And as soon as Gusakovskiy spoke aloud, as if testing his thoughts, the chief of staff, Lieutenant Colonel Vorobyov, understood: he needed to postpone giving the order to act according to the first option.
The new plan - to go along the main highway - carried a greater danger, but it opened up opportunities for a sudden strike. "And a chance is a great thing," Gusakovskiy said, firmly convinced that by making a forced march, they would be able to reach the Mezeritsky bulwark of defense before nightfall.
Why did he decide to go through a powerful line of enemy defense with just one brigade? Utter recklessness, boldness for the sake of boldness, let alone a show of bravery, were deeply alien to this officer. Gusakovskiy felt the enemy. Sometimes these were just hints, some strokes, scraps of information, but even based on them, he reconstructed a picture of the behavior and mood of the fascists.
To solve the task, Gusakovskiy needed a ram - a strong, well-assembled ram to break through the fortifications on the move and clear the passage for the brigade in a narrow front of the breakthrough. He put Karabanov's battalion in the vanguard, closely followed by the battalions of Boritko and Pinsky. The fire of all the tanks and self-propelled guns had to clear the passages on the narrow front of the breakthrough.
Gusakovskiy caught up with Karabanov on the road. He wanted to see his combat officer one more time, to say something very important to the officer who would go ahead.
"Listen, Alesha," Gusakovskiy said, looking into Karabanov's face, full of strength and youth, "here's what..."
Karabanov was surprised and embarrassed: for the first time, the colonel called him by name. The intonations in Gusakovskiy's voice were so unusual that the battalion commander looked closely at the colonel. He only caught the gleam in his eyes.
"I'm listening, Comrade Guards Colonel," Karabanov said.
"Does the radio work well?" Gusakovskiy asked."Well."
"How is the morale of the people?"
"Good."
"Have you rested?"
"For three hours."
"Is the task clear?"
"Clear."
Gusakovskiy quickly and curiously glanced at the major from the side. Giving him a slight push forward, saying goodbye, he quickly said, "Take care of yourself..."
Karabanov took a few steps and turned around. Gusakovskiy turned as well.
"Remember," he shouted through his folded hands, "communication, communication, communication!"
At 7 pm, the vanguard tanks approached the boundaries of the fortifications. The short winter day was coming to an end, and the thick evening shadows fell on the road.
If Colonel Gusakovskiy, whose tanks had advanced far ahead, had waited for the main forces to catch up, if he had decided to postpone the battle until morning or at least for an hour, he would have undoubtedly lost the lucky opportunity that presented itself in sudden fire on the enemy.
The guns of Karabanov opened strong fire. The colored tracers of German machine gun bursts ominously illuminated the outskirts of the "Oder quadrilateral."
The first radiogram received from Karabanov read: "On the bridge, dragon's teeth. Approaches are covered with rails driven into concrete pits, the enemy is firing." Gusakovskiy replied: "Move the dragon's teeth, dismantle the rails. Do not allow the bridge to explode."
The tanks' gunfire covered the work of the sappers. Karabanov's tanks, while firing, broke through to the bridge and seized it. The battalion commander fired the first rocket. In the twilight, the rocket soared and, as if hitting low-hanging clouds, scattered blue sparks. It was a signal: the battalion turned 180 degrees and opened fire from the rear on the German pillboxes. Boritko and Pinsky's tanks rushed into the passage made by Karabanov's machines. That's how they broke through the German fire - with short bursts forward.
In the midst of the battle, a short radiogram came from Karabanov's battalion. The brigade's radio operator, looking at the colonel, felt that he was unable to say what was transmitted on the radio.
Gusakovskiy understood: something irreparable had happened.
"Karabanov..." he said quietly."He's dead..." the radioman answered quietly.
The combat officer was buried in a pine grove. The brigade commander took a handful of frozen soil and threw it into the open grave. And immediately, abruptly turning around, he walked, without paying attention to the road, on the loose snow, whispering, "Alesha, Alesha..." It seemed to him that a part of his soul had left with this brave officer.
But as heavy as the bitterness of loss was, one had to think about the living, about the brigade as a whole, about contacting the corps, about how much fuel remained in the vehicles, how many ammunition supplies were available, and give people time to rest until dawn... It was necessary to visit the wounded, to do a thousand big and small things related to the life of the brigade.
Gusakovskiy received a radiogram from the brigade that followed him. "Where have you passed?" a worried neighbor inquired. "Specify the area. In the place you indicated, there are dragon's teeth and double-beam girders." Based on the short and alarming radiogram, Gusakovskiy understood that in the hours that passed after his breakthrough through the "Oder quadrilateral," the situation there had fundamentally changed. Officer Khrapsov went to the east and, upon returning, reported, "The passage is closed, the Germans have concentrated forces from other areas and are firing heavily at the tanks breaking through."
