Text taken from the Telegram page of iron_wind. Alexey Isaev is a popular Russian historian.
[ColonelCassad] I have repeatedly mentioned the Pekingham effect in my books and speeches, when an English naval officer on a Japanese squadron in the Battle of Tsushima argued that Russian ships fired more often and more effectively. We know how Tsushima ended. The effect is more from the field of psychology.
The big problem with remote wars, not eye to eye with a broadsword, is the uncertainty of the effect on the enemy. Is that where we're going? Is it hurting our enemy?
It was on these February days 80 years ago in 1944 that the Wehrmacht's record for defensive ammunition consumption was broken - 2,910 tons per day by the German 3rd Panzer Army near Vitebsk. Heavy positional battles in the style of the First World War. The offensive was the record of von Manstein's 11th Army at Sevastopol with 3,939 tons on the first day of the second assault in June 1942. Yes, including heavy artillery. However, the German 3rd Panzer Army had artillery up to 280 mm caliber.
Of course, such consumption required an uninterrupted supply of ammunition. They were delivered by train. the Orsha-Vitebsk highway, to which the Soviet 33rd Army of V.N. Gordov West had already approached quite close. front. The road was hidden from observation by a forest.
The former chief of staff of the German 3rd Panzer Army, Heidkämper, wrote shortly after the war:
“For several days, the supply of troops was difficult because from 3.2, as a result of artillery shelling, the railway line in the Vitebsk-Orsha section was damaged, as a result of which, for a long time, traffic on the road could not take place.”
The Germans also had to restore the railway under artillery fire. They managed to avoid a critical supply situation due to vehicles moving along the roads to the west of the railway line. As Heidkämper frankly writes, “to carry out regular supplies of troops in both areas of the enemy’s offensive [i.e. in the directions of the main attacks of the 1st Baltic and Western fronts] is possible only by rail.”
Did our people shoot at this railway? They shot, but actually on the sheer enthusiasm of the commander of the 33rd Army, V.N. Gorodov.
Head of the Operations Department Colonel I.A. Tolkonyuk was quite skeptical about this desire of V.N. Gordov. He writes in his memoirs: “No matter how the commander fumed, the task he set for the artillery remained unfulfilled. Some short artillery attacks on the railway, or rather on moving trains at night, did not achieve their goals.”
We reached it! That's the point, they achieved it. In the ZhBD of the German 3rd Panzer Army, in the entry for January 20, the opinion expressed on this matter by its commander Reinhardt is noted:
“The outcome of the battle in the Vitebsk region depends on the uninterrupted operation of the Vitebsk-Orsha railway. Therefore, the commander ordered to immediately suppress enemy artillery that was disrupting traffic along this railway. lines"
But the Germans were not put to the test. Because did not know the real effect of their actions. Gordov made a bunch of other mistakes, but with blows to the railroad. highway Orsha-Vitebsk was 100% right. This is the paradox and the Pekingham effect. It must be remembered when assessing events and always compared with the enemy’s data. When there are any, of course.
(c) Alexey Isaev