Australian Storm 1876 - Chapter 1100

Chapter 1100 Bare Fangs

7/9/18

The European battlefield reopened. On that day, thousands of Allied aircrafts formed large and small groups, flew across the border, and carried out strafing bombings on targets in Germany, which opened the prelude to the air war.

The Luftwaffe and anti-aircraft machine gun positions were forced to counterattack. On the thousands of kilometers long European front, fighter planes roared into the sky, chasing and fighting in twos and threes. From time to time, the downed fighter planes fell to the ground with black smoke, exploding a dazzling fireball.

Eastern Front Battlefield~West Ukraine Battlefield

Consecutive week

Ocean Empire Royal Air Force fighter planes rampaged, bombarded the exposed German artillery positions indiscriminately, and went deep into the rear to bomb the troop and material gathering points, destroyed armored vehicles, and dive-fired the marching troops. The performance was extremely rampant.

During the    period, the Luftwaffe organized a raid, and concentrated more than 200 German fighter jets to attack the large group of bombers that were being bombed, and shot down more than 60 “Farmer” bombers on the spot.

But the good times did not last long. These German fighter jets were entangled by the fighter jets of the Ocean Empire that followed, and they fought fiercely in the air. The fighter planes roared, and cranes danced in the sky.

The fighter jets of the Royal Air Force of the Ocean Empire came one after another like a swarm, and the situation was reversed in an instant.

One after another German fighter jets were shot down. The battlefield stretched from over Western Ukraine to Warsaw. Only 33 of the more than 200 German fighter jets that attacked returned to the airport, and many planes were covered in bullet scars.

Followed by the frenzied revenge of the Royal Air Force of the Ocean Empire, bombing the airports and main buildings around Warsaw, chasing the trains, bombing the German barracks and outposts, and bombing the sky.

July 17

Just when the 5th and 9th German armies on the northern front were weak in attack, the 2nd Army, which had been gaining momentum for a long time, launched a powerful counterattack across the board.

After more than 4 hours of coverage strikes by aerial bombardment and ground artillery fire, the Armored Commando Regiment made its debut.

The commando regiment was dominated by the armored dragoon division. On the frontal battlefield more than 30 kilometers wide, three armored regiments formed three goose-shaped attack arrows, supplemented by two divisions composed of half-track vehicles and armored trucks (134 Division) and 209 Division) mobile troops, a total of more than 70,000 people.

Assault Corps As soon as the armored assault corps debuted, the iron stream rolled over the four German infantry divisions of the German Ninth Army on the northeast side.

In cooperation with the offensive operations of the Commando Corps, the 5th Division of the 9th Corps under the 2nd Army Group with a total of more than 110,000 people, together with the Belarusian army of more than 60,000 people, also launched a comprehensive counter-offensive on the Northeast Front.

Fighting until 3pm

A large gap of more than 40 kilometers long was torn open in the northeast flank of the German Ninth Army. The army rolled in, the air fighters roared, and the fighting German soldiers fled everywhere.

On the battlefield with a radius of more than 170 square kilometers, there were battles everywhere, and gunpowder smoke was everywhere. Hundreds of tanks and iron armored chariots rampaged on the Great Plains of Western Ukraine, smashing the German army’s attempt to regroup, and then the mountains and plains pursued.

How can    human legs run over 4 wheels?

Many fleeing German troops wisely put down their weapons and surrendered after being surrounded by heavy troops, and no longer do mortal resistance. That kind of sacrifice is meaningless.

After defeating the frontal enemy, the    tank armored assault group swept horizontally along the rear of the German army, and was invincible along the way.

After defeating several German troops one after another, they slammed into the northwest and seized the center of the German rear material hub.

The main force of the Imperial Expeditionary Force moved in full force along the big gap of the breakthrough. The 300,000-strong army attacked extremely violently, and the flood spread like a flood, tearing the gap more than 40 kilometers long.

In the evening

The entire German northern defense line has collapsed, especially the Ninth Army has suffered heavy losses. During the battle, more than 40,000 people were killed and wounded, and more than 30,000 people were captured. They had to move closer to the 5th Army, trying to keep warm.

The fierce fighting continued all night. The main force of the 2nd Army, guided by artillery fire and aerial bombardment, moved forward steadily. In 24 hours, it had advanced 42 kilometers and entered the deep area behind the German army.

More than 200,000 elite Belarusian troops on the Northwest Front battlefield accompanied the assault, forming a heavy army group of more than 500,000, rolling forward, oppressing the space for the German army to move around.

arrived the afternoon of the second day

The bad news came that the Ocean Empire Armored Assault Corps had occupied the material transfer center 127 kilometers behind the German army, completely cut off the connection with the German army in Warsaw and Lithuania, and formed a large encirclement of more than 20,000 square kilometers.

It’s time

The German Eastern Front Command suddenly realized that the 2nd Army of the Ocean Empire wanted to swallow the German 5th and 9th Army in one fell swoop and annihilate the German Eastern Front Heavy Group of 630,000 people in one fell swoop. This is simply an April Fool’s joke?

Not only the British and the French dare not think so, but the Germans can never imagine that the 2nd Army of the Ocean Empire is so rampant that they want to make dumplings for the German army in one bite?

The battle of Western Ukraine has been fierce for two full weeks. The German army has lost about 140,000 people as a whole, of which more than 90,000 troops have been lost in a comprehensive counterattack in the past two days.

Even so, the German 5th and 9th armies still have more than 490,000 troops, and the 2nd Army of the Ocean Empire and the Belarusian Affiliated Army add up to less than 800,000. How can such a good appetite come from?

In the calculations of the German army, the Belarusian army was not counted at all.

In the past few years on the Eastern Front, the German army often used one division to deal with 5 or even 6 Tsarist Russian divisions and defeated them.

The face-to-face enemy is about 400,000 Belarusian vassal troops, and a few German divisions can be contained.

Calculated like this

The German army is almost 1:1 with the 2nd Army, which has a total of more than 380,000 people, and even has a partial strength advantage.

Admiral Schmidt von Manstein, commander-in-chief of the German Eastern Front and commander of the 5th Army, was really stimulated by Admiral Duan Qixiang’s audacity, and ordered the 9th Army to move closer and prepare to meet the opponent on the western Ukraine plain. Go hard.

The pride of the Germanic Junkers military aristocracy deeply rooted in his heart made Admiral Schmidt von Manstein make an extremely wrong decision.

Although the communication channel behind the German army was cut off, he was not worried.

With the existing material reserves on hand, the German army can persist in high-intensity battles for two weeks and guarantee food demand for a month.

And next to the German front is the Austro-Hungarian allied army, what to retreat?

Just do it directly, are the Germans still afraid of fighting?

Admiral Schmidt von Manstein knew the German army very well and believed that they were the best soldiers in the world, bar none.

The Great Plains of Ukraine are full of roads, and even if the war is unfavorable, they cannot retreat to Warsaw in the northwest, but they can retreat to the southwest, that is, the Caucasus.

In the heart of Admiral Schmidt von Manstein, blindly believing in the strong fighting power of the German army, he directly ignored the huge risk of retreating in the direction of the Caucasus.

How can the rugged trails in the Caucasus Mountains withstand the retreat of hundreds of thousands of troops?

When the time comes, you will compete with me, and thousands of troops will cross the single-plank bridge, will it not turn into a disaster?

After the initial chaos, with the support of the German Fifth Army, the more than 200,000 German 9th Army troops who fled crossed the hastily established new defense line, and finally breathed a sigh of relief.

Now that the door is closed

The 2nd Army of the Ocean Empire Expedition will not be in a hurry, gather the main force to form a semi-arc encirclement, rearrange the attack sequence, and prepare to prepare the Germans.

After the    Panzer Commando Regiment consolidated the defense, the 209th Division was left to defend against the German reinforcements from Warsaw, and then the Panzer Dragoon Division (302nd Division) joined the 134th Division. After a few days of rest and replenishment, they returned with a swift blow.

On the new defensive line established by the German 5th Army, the Ocean Empire Air Force once again displayed the stunt of indiscriminate bombing, supplemented by the covering artillery bombardment of the ground artillery. Immortals want to die and suffer heavy casualties.

Only 4 days

The 6 German divisions on the front line with more than 100,000 personnel were reduced by more than 35%. Then, before the German troops on the front line had time to replenish their defenses, they were violently attacked by the rolling iron flow of the armored dragoon divisions, and the defense line collapsed directly.

The imperial army swooped in and broke the counterattack of the German reserve forces. It rushed 38 kilometers in one day, completely wiped out 2 German divisions, and severely damaged 5 German divisions. It severely hit the Germans’ will to fight to the end.

The German army retreated more than 60 kilometers again to establish a new line of defense. Admiral Schmidt von Manstein was much more awake after being beaten. After counting the personnel, he felt a sense of shock and felt that something was wrong. Unfortunately, it has been late.

The new line of defense is coming down for a week

The casualties of the troops dominated by the German 5th Army were as high as 89,000, and more than 20,000 people were captured. The artillery was completely lost in the indiscriminate bombardment of the enemy, and there were less than 370 heavy machine guns left, and countless food and baggage were lost. tents, vehicles, and other military supplies.

Today’s German 5th Army and 9th Army together, there are only more than 380,000 troops that can fight, and there are still a large number of wounded and sick, it is simply a faltering giant.

A fully-staffed German division ranges from about 17,000 to 19,000 people. Up to now, most of the German divisions are not full, but it can be said responsibly that each German division is a tough one, and each one belongs to itself. of glory.

Since the outbreak of the Western Ukraine campaign, 4 German divisions have been wiped out and the establishment has been cancelled.

From the heart

Admiral Schmidt von Manstein was not convinced, unwilling, and unwilling to admit that the soldiers of the Ocean Empire army were better than the German army. Why?

Ocean Empire, the local tyrant army, the fighting style is simply too bullying.

After gaining air superiority, aerial bombardment and ground artillery fire repeatedly plowed the ground. More than 60% of the German casualties came from heavy artillery fire. Before seeing the enemy, the German frontline troops were crippled.

Then, the Ocean Empire rampaged with the advantages of the tank and armored forces, the artillery fire and heavy machine gun fire, the infantry followed the assault tactics, directly tore the German defense line, causing the remaining 20% ​​casualties.

The last 20% of the casualties came from the retreat stage. Under the assault of the armored forces and the cover-up of the army, the fleeing Germans strafed in the air, intercepted the bombardment with artillery fire, and retreated all the way through the ground strangulation. The losses were not small.

Moreover, the Ocean Empire Expeditionary Force made full use of the White Russian cannon fodder. When a large-scale frontal assault was carried out, these White Russian vassal troops were often the ones who rushed forward, which made people hate it.

It is really difficult for the Germans to kill a soldier of the Ocean Empire Expeditionary Force. They are either hiding behind an armored vehicle or hiding behind a Belarusian soldier. They are slippery like a loach and are very difficult to hit.

And the soldiers of the Ocean Empire were all equipped with steel helmets, and the overshooting that the Germans were good at was useless to them.

What is Beyond Shooting?

In the protracted trench warfare, the German army invented this very terrible method of warfare.

That is, under the guidance of front-line observers, using maps and continuously calculated observation data, command the German heavy machine gun positions in the trenches to shoot directly into the air.

This type of strike is similar to the throwing of ancient bows and arrows.

Before the Battle of the Somme

The German army used the method of overshooting to deal a heavy blow to the main British expeditionary force in charge of the attack, killing and wounding more than 60,000 people in one day, and achieving a more terrifying result than artillery bombing.

According to the memories of the surviving British soldiers at that time;

Even if you are lying down on your back or enter a bunker, the bullets from the heavy machine gun will still smash down your head and cover your face, easily passing through the surface tissue of the human body, killing and injuring soldiers…

In the German “Beyond Shooting Law” regulations, the muzzle of the high-speed Maxim heavy machine gun is raised by one foot, and the shooting method is used at a high elevation angle to project the enemy’s position at an angle of 30-45 degrees.

The ballistic of the   heavy machine gun bullets is a large parabola and can be shot up to 4000 meters away. The bullets that are as dense as locusts are actually smashed from the sky, and the raindrops kill the hidden advancing infantry from top to bottom.

Unfortunately, this method of warfare is useless against the soldiers of the Ocean Empire.

During the attack, the soldiers of the Ocean Empire mostly moved forward with tanks and armored vehicles and hid behind the front-line Belarusian soldiers.

The German heavy machine guns shot directly, with very few opportunities for oblique shots, and they were not good at overshooting. The heavy machine gun bullets that fell from top to bottom had lost their strong penetrating kinetic energy, and the downward force alone could not break the defense of the helmet.

If it hits the shoulders, at most the bones will be broken and tendons will be broken, which is not a fatal injury.

Once the German heavy machine gun positions are discovered, they will be taken care of immediately.

was either named by tank fire, or bombed by mortars, or planes strafed and bombed along the trenches, or suppressed by artillery fire, and there was no chance at all.

Therefore, Admiral Schmidt von Manstein hated the local tyrants of the Ocean Empire army, but there was no good solution.

Now it seems

After another major defeat, the 5th and 9th Armies were in danger.

The remaining weapons and ammunition can support a week of high-intensity battles, but after losing a large number of cargo materials, the food is insufficient, and there are only about 10 days’ worth of food left, which is a very dangerous signal.

as a last resort

Admiral Schmidt von Manstein adjusted the rear defensive line on the one hand, and took the method of continuing to shrink to maintain it. On the other hand, the Austro-Hungarian army was dispatched to fill the gap, and the other was to ask for help from the Berlin High Command.

Nothing else matters, as long as he can drive away these planes buzzing overhead all day, he will have the confidence to stick to it.

(end of this chapter)