ABSTRACT
On the night of 11–12 January 1945 the ten armies of the 1st Ukrainian Front made ready to deal the first blow of the Soviet offensive on the Vistula. It was physically impossible to observe silence in the Sandomierz bridgehead because the tanks, assault guns and towed artillery pieces were moving into position by the thousand, but loudspeakers blared music into the night, overcoming the growl of the diesel motors. Marshal Konev placed his observation post in a small house near the edge of a wood. One of the windows faced west and should have given him a fine view over the nearby German main line, but now the fog, low clouds and blizzards reduced the visibility at times to literally zero. Air support would not be at hand, though the artillery would be firing against pre-registered targets, and the bad weather gave the infantry and tanks an extra element of surprise.
