Pre-war meetings are the basic exercises of the army - generally speaking, the company commander participating in the war will gather the non-commissioned officers and officers in the company to convey the battle plan, and then the non-commissioned officers and officers attending the meeting will convey it to the soldiers.

Tomorrow is the battle for the attack on Norville, and it is natural that Company E will hold a meeting to convey a specific battle plan.

"This is where our company will attack tomorrow," Spears circled on the map the area where Company E needed to attack: "It's eight hundred meters from the village of Kaublu to here, fortunately it's not a damn wide field, we can follow the road on both sides of the road, and we need to use everything we can cover as much as possible, houses, slopes, trees, rocks, etc., are all the bunkers we need." ”

This was Spears' first assault operation since he took charge of E Company, and considering the negligence in the daytime operation, Spears involuntarily repeated the same old instructions to the 2nd and 3rd platoons:

If we encounter a house where the Germans are entrenched, grenades and rifles need to be well coordinated, the supporting fire of machine guns must be in place, and the mortar team must always pay attention to the situation in front and support the attack group at the front, so as not to let the tactical stronghold of the Germans become a bayonet in our throat......

He talked a lot at length, and there was a kind of mother who took the trouble to arrange and admonish his son when he went out for the first time, although it was very verbose, but for these paratroopers, it was actually a very warm feeling.

Finally, he mentioned the distribution of forces: "For tomorrow's attack, the 1st Platoon will not participate in the battle, assisting the medics in treating the wounded, and the 2nd Platoon will be on the left and the 3rd Platoon on the right, and will approach Noville on both sides of the road from Fois-Noville. ”

No one was surprised that the platoon did not participate in the battle, in fact, the only thing that the platoon could take out now was two or three kittens, which was not as strong as the strength of the company.

Spears said a lot, and finally felt embarrassed, after all, this is E Company, an excellent company in the 101st Division, these old words, the more I think about it, the more ridiculous it becomes, so he pretended to close his notebook and said: "That's it, you go back and tell the soldiers what you should say, if nothing else......"

"Sir, I have a request!" Compton interrupted Spears, Spears looked at him with some surprise, Compton was afraid of being preempted by Lieutenant Peacock on the side, and hurriedly said:

"Since the first platoon is responsible for assisting the paramedics in treating the wounded, I don't think they need Jacob to command, can Jacob follow the second platoon tomorrow?"

Peacock on the side regretted it, why didn't he think of this?

Spears frowned, and then looked at Zheng Yingqi in embarrassment, but he didn't expect Zheng Yingqi to nod happily and simply said, "Yes." ”

Compton was overjoyed, and Spears fell silent and said in an inexplicable tone, "You're like a treasure." ”

Treasure?

Zheng Yingqi was puzzled, but everyone else laughed heartily, only Peacock was secretly annoyed that he was slow to react, why didn't he think of snatching Jacob over?

……

Compton has infinite respect for Zheng Yingqi - if it weren't for Zheng Yingqi giving up the opportunity to be promoted to officer when he was in Normandy, he felt that the current commander of E Company must be Zheng Yingqi, of course, this is not to look down on Spears, but Compton's confidence in Zheng Yingqi!

"Tomorrow is going to play Noville, do you have anything to pay attention to? Our Treasure Boy. Compton asked, finally quipping.

Zheng Yingqi didn't understand this stalk, and he didn't care, he lowered his head and thought about it for a while and said, "I have an idea......

"What thoughts? Say it! I knew the Treasure Boy wasn't going to let us down! "Compton was overjoyed.

Zheng Yingqi squatted on the ground, simply drew a map on the ground, and pointed to a location and said: "In this position, there are several destroyed Sherman tanks, which were destroyed by the Germans when the Sobury detachment retreated, and because of the war, the Germans have not cleaned up there." ”

"Left side of the road?"

"Yes, about three hundred meters from the edge of the town of Noville, less than 100 meters from the middle of our offensive line."

"You mean......" Compton's eyes lit up: "We control here, we can suppress the entire flank fire of the offensive line, and we can more effectively deal with our approach to Nowell!" ”

"Yes, but you have to touch it at night," Zheng Yingqi said, "You'll have to smoke some unlucky eggs that have been frozen." ”

The biggest problem there is to be in the company of many corpses, to lie with those who have been frozen in the cold for a month - a death-like challenge for ordinary people, but for paratroopers who have gone through half a year of war from D-Day to now, it is not a problem.

Compton laughed, looked at Zheng Yingqi with "bad intentions", and said, "I think you are the most suitable target to be the commander of these unlucky guys, right?" ”

Zheng Yingqi shrugged, expected, expected, otherwise how could he use the phrase "unlucky egg who is frozen"?

"Thank you." After the joke, Compton sincerely thanked Zheng Yingqi, and Zheng Yingqi accepted the thank you with a smile.

Compton immediately turned around and went to Spears and told the boss of E Company about Zheng Yingqi's plan, for this plan, Spears also felt that his eyes lit up, and he approved it without hesitation - from ancient times to the present, commanders under various pit subordinates have emerged one after another, but the most pit is still at the top, and commanders who come to power for various reasons but do not have the corresponding literacy will pit piles of subordinates, but at the grassroots level, there is no such thing.

After all, the vast majority of grassroots officers have come up step by step, they all have the corresponding literacy, and they can see the advantages and disadvantages - some people may be jealous of their subordinates' outstanding talents, but they will definitely not waste a good plan in vain because of jealousy.

Of course, because of jealousy, the matter of deliberately killing his subordinates will not be discussed, at least Spears is not such a person.

With Spears' approval, Compton immediately dispatched two machine-gun teams and four riflemen from the platoon to be led by Zheng Yingqi.

"I think we're going to be on fire!"

After confirming that Jacob would lead them, the eight paratroopers were so happy that they felt as if they had bought a life insurance policy again—much better than the garbage insurance that the War Department had given them.

But after learning about the mission, the company of eight people collapsed, and oh my God, there is a war tomorrow, and we want to sleep quietly in the house......

"Don't want to?" Looking at the eight unlucky ones with broken faces, the number one unlucky guy asked.

The eight paratroopers shook their heads in unison, and said no, even if 100,000 are unhappy at this time, then they have to be happy, and it is definitely not wrong to brush up more favorites on Jacob!

"Alright, let's go—bring blankets and quilts, and we'll have to live on them for the rest of the day."

The blankets in Zheng Yingqi's mouth are the kind that the army distributes, and as for the quilts, they are all ownerless things in Kaublu - anyway, the owner doesn't know where it is, what can they do with it?

In the darkness of the night, a squad of nine men burrowed into the darkness in the cold and groped towards their battlefield under the leadership of the unlucky man number one.

As soon as the team left, Winters's figure appeared not far away - he was actually there, but he was really embarrassed to face Zheng Yingqi who was called by the old scalper, so he could only silently send them to suffer.

"Actually, we could have attacked at night." Compton naturally said to Winters that in the entire 2nd Battalion, at this time, only the old men of Company E had a privilege, after all, they were the descendants of Winters, and they had spent a very long time together.

"Although there are flares, the accidental injury rate is still too high."

"We have a lot of experience in night battles!"

"But allies can't." Winters spread his hands helplessly.

"Well, who told us to put up pig teammates." Compton vented - after a month of various battles, the 506th Regiment and even the 101st Division can still be sent to the battlefield, completely because there are too many pig teammates.

"I think, Jacob thinks so too." Winters replied, and Compton shut up instantly, they thought that the other troops were like a group of pig teammates, so Jacob, would he also think that they were a group of pig teammates? So he himself has to work more for those who can?

[That's a real problem......]

……

If every minute and every second is regarded as a critical moment in the war, then there will be a lot less gaps in the war that can be drilled - but the reality is that no one's nerves can be tense all the time, and the more the war is present, the officers have to find a way to make the soldiers relax as much as possible and not exert too much pressure.

Therefore, Zheng Yingqi once again successfully exploited the loophole, and under the noses of the Germans, brought eight people to their mouths.

"I think if the Germans found us, they would be happy to open their mouths and eat us in one bite." Hale, who had slipped into the wrecked tank, said like a crow's mouth.

"So we have to be very careful not to be discovered by the Germans and swallow us in one gulp." Zheng Yingqi carefully moved a corpse as he replied, with a warning to shut up the lively Halton.

Why the hell want to be swallowed by the Germans, we're here to the Germans!

Hale muttered in his heart, and his eyes involuntarily fell on the corpse beside him, out of respect for the remains of friendly soldiers, when they entered here, they lightly lifted the body to the side, but the space in the Sherman tank was so large, the so-called side was still in front of them, although he was used to seeing dead bodies, but in this black hole environment, he still couldn't help but look at the corpse that was faintly visible under a ray of moonlight.

Even though he had been dead for a month, the corpse's face could still be seen in the night in the bitter cold - his young face, like himself, was covered with stiffness and hoarfrost, and the vaguely distorted distortion must have been a sharp pain before he died, Hale thought to himself, he must have been in pain before he died.

Death......

At that moment, Hale thought of death—or he had thought of it a long time ago, but the dead night, the stiff corpse, made the distance between him and death shrink infinitely.

"Am I going to die?"

With this question, Hale slowly pondered.

The faint blue slowly dispelled the darkness, and the world slowly turned gray, and as visibility increased at a visible rate, the sound of gunfire broke the silence of the night, which also meant ......

The battle is on!

"Come out! Set up machine gun positions! Zheng Yingqi's shout made the paratroopers hiding in Sherman feel like they had returned to the world, their stiff bodies crawled out of the narrow entrance with difficulty, and they quickly set up their positions, using the destroyed tanks as cover, and began to cover.

The Germans kept an eye on the paratroopers, and as soon as the paratroopers began to assemble, the Germans pounced on their positions, and when the paratroopers entered their firing range, the silence of the dawn was broken by the sound of German gunfire - but in the blink of an eye, countless bullets pounced on their flanks.

The Germans were stunned.

"Where's the bullet!"

"Bastard! Where did the gun fire? ”

"Why are bullets coming from the side?" 16 reading

The German soldiers cursed, when shooting, they needed to concentrate on the front, and who wanted to expose their side to the muzzle in this situation?

"There it is!"

"Son of a bitch, why are those remains there?"

While the Germans were scolding, they had to separate the fire to suppress, the fire from the side was too fierce, two machine guns, four semi-automatic rifles, such firepower was not easy to suppress, and the attacking paratroopers, at this time, burst out of all their potential, pressed up as fast as possible, pressed again, and continued to press!

"This is the most enjoyable rush I've had since the war!"

A shuttle machine gun bullet forced a paratrooper to hide behind the rock, but he did not habitually scold his mother, but shouted excitedly, and his comrades-in-arms not far away also loudly echoed the words of his comrades-in-arms, and after half a year of fighting, there was no charge like this!

Despite the excitement of the paratroopers, Compton, as the platoon commander, could not let up, and he kept roaring: "Spread out! Pull out the line! Don't get together! Submachine gun! Suppress! Suppress! ”

The 2nd platoon advanced very quickly, quickly left the 3rd platoon behind, after quickly advancing more than 200 meters, Compton gathered two machine gun groups, occupied an anti-slope, and began to support the attack of the third platoon, and the third platoon that got the strategy also broke out, and quickly advanced, directly surrounding the Germans in several strongholds, and then after a grenade package, replenished the guns, collected the prisoners, and continued to advance.

If you look at this battle from God's point of view, the German army is like an oval-shaped silkworm chrysalis around the outer defense line of the entire town of Norville, but this silkworm chrysalis is now directly pierced by a chopstick A huge gap - this chopstick is E Company.

The Germans did not want their outer defense line to be easily broken through like this, so they forcibly drew two platoons from their already modest forces to try to block the advancing American troops, and the point of fire of the tank remains became the most important target, and they gathered about a platoon of infantry to attack the remains of the tanks under the cover of mortars.

"Machine guns continue to suppress the Germans on the offensive line! Riflemen, change positions and stop the Germans! At this time, Zheng Yingqi never transferred the fire of the machine gun to defend this fire response point, but mainly used riflemen to stop the Germans.

The remains of these tanks provided them with the most brutal and effective defense, and the German attack did not take here, and just when the Germans gritted their teeth and transferred the tanks, the long-awaited armored units of the American army finally appeared - after seeing the Shermans of as many as seven American troops, the German tanks, which had intended to crush the remains of the tanks, immediately retreated backwards into the town.

And with the support of the tanks, the speed of the attack was faster, and the promised 800 meters was actually a 1,000-meter offensive line, which was easily broken through by them.

"Hit the center of town! We met up with 3 battalions in the center of town! I'm going to have lunch in the tavern in the center of town! Spears' order was conveyed to the whole company, and although no one knew if there was a tavern in the center of Norville Town, the paratroopers of Company E screamed and began to attack the town in response to Spears's mouthful of a treat.

Street fighting breaks out!

Street fighting is the most difficult battle in modern warfare, and sometimes after advancing a few hundred meters, you are stunned to find that the front, left and right are all enemies, and then you turn your head and look, the friendly troops behind you are separated by several houses, and the enemy tanks that are good to die are lying between you and your comrades - in this case, pull the commander out and bounce a hundred times.

Of course, Zheng Yingqi will not make this kind of mistake, he took the unlucky detachment, along the highway to continue to seize one German stronghold, the entire E Company with Zheng Yingqi led by the detachment as the arrow, rapid advance, and the supporting armored troops, also extremely cooperative, the advancing E Company with an unstoppable posture, rapid advance.

The Germans have been reluctant to use the remaining few tanks to confront the U.S. troops, but the reality forced them to go to the U.S.

"Spread out! Disperse! ”

Seeing that a dozen or so tanks were about to use this small square as a battlefield to fight each other, Zheng Yingqi hurriedly yelled and told the unlucky detachment to stay away from here.

Tanks without infantry are soulless, the Germans naturally could not make such a mistake when fighting in the streets, the scattered unlucky detachments and the Germans' infantry launched a fierce battle in the surrounding housing area, Zheng Yingqi led people to rush left and right, and in the dispersion again and again, the people around him were left with Hale, and the rest of the people were scattered around to form a position, waiting for support from behind.

After taking another German-guarded house, Zheng Yingqi stopped dividing his troops, because he was now alone with Hale behind him.

"Let's go to the back of that house." Zheng Yingqi chose a position and pounced with Hale, but when he turned the corner, he saw Compton with three people.

After seeing Zheng Yingqi, Compton shouted: "Jacob! Spears told me on the radio that there were two of our tanks on the left! Go, come with us, follow the tanks to crush the Germans! ”

There can be a steel monster to block the bullet, of course I am willing, Zheng Yingqi took Hale and hung behind them in Compton without saying a word.

Compton, on the other hand, went out of the alley to the roar of tanks, and when he saw the two tanks at hand, he rushed straight up, shouting, "This way! This way! ”

He was showing the tank the way again, but what made Compton distracted was that after the tank commander turned his head, he realized that the other party was actually a German!

The commander of the tank was also startled, and immediately retracted like a turtle's head, and then the turret of the tank began to turn.

"It's Germans! Come on! Compton roared, and the three paratroopers who followed him were frightened and turned to run.

"It's German!"

Zheng Yingqi was sluggish, didn't he run out to join his tank? Why did you come back like a four-legged dog in a blink of an eye? It wasn't until he heard Compton's shouting clearly that Zheng Yingqi understood what kind of oolong was going on, and he turned around and ran without thinking about it-Nima, it's such a narrow alley, if it's blocked by tanks, ten of them have to get in.

The tank blasted away the building blocking the way, the barrel of the black hole hole was aimed at the alley, and began to bombard, Zheng Yingqi dragged Hale into a house, and then trembled against the bombardment of the tank gun.

This German tank was a great bombardment, but the continuous bombardment also attracted the US tanks, and after a ecstatic shell directly flew the turret of the tank, the bombardment led by the German tank could be regarded as coming to an end.

After the explosion stopped, Zheng Yingqi shook off the debris on his body and dragged Hale out of the house that was about to crumble at any moment.

"Find someone!"

Zheng Yingqi roared, the alley before had changed greatly, I don't know if Compton and they are okay, the two of them turned over in the ruins.

"Zachary? Oh my God, what are you ......" Hale exclaimed, and Zheng Yingqi rushed over to see that a paratrooper following Compton was buried in the rubble, his entire left leg pressed by a pillar and at an eerie angle.

The paratrooper named Zakary wailed for advice, and after Zheng Yingqi lifted the pillar hard, he wisely said to Hale, "You go find someone." ”

Hale immediately ran away, Zheng Yingqi gave Zachary a morphine to relieve the pain, and asked Compton where they were, Zachary pointed to a pile of ruins uncertainly, Zheng Yingqi motioned for him to wait, and he ran over to check.

Compton must have been cared for by God, and the guy was in a tripod-propped space with no, but the other two soldiers were not so lucky, one with a piece of wood through the neck, and the other with only half of his body left.

Compton, who was dug up by Zheng Yingqi, blamed himself and wanted to cry, but he didn't have time to cry at all, Zheng Yingqi motioned to Compton to take care of Zachary, who was still pressed by his legs, and he went to find someone - Hale has been out for more than ten minutes, but he hasn't brought anyone over yet, so Zheng Yingqi can't help but think about it.

So what's wrong with Hale?

It's also funny to say, he was ordered by Zheng Yingqi to call people, and as a result, he bumped into six Germans in a room, Hale was also brave enough, rushed over with a submachine gun, and directly captured the six Germans, and then he pressed the captives to try to find the nearest friendly army, but a cannonball exploded not far from him, Hale subconsciously dodged, but at this time, a German officer among the captives pulled out a knife from his boot, and pounced on him with a scream.

Zheng Yingqi rushed over following the German shout, but saw several Germans besieging a fallen American army, and pulled the trigger without thinking, and six Germans were killed one by one.

"Don't move, I'll see, don't be nervous, don't be nervous, relax, relax......" Zheng Yingqi tried to slow down his tone as much as possible, not to cause too much psychological pressure on Hale, and then checked Hale's wound - this guy's luck is a little worse than Compton!

When the Germans were about to erase him, Zheng Yingqi killed the other party, resulting in the knife not cutting his artery, but the esophagus was severed.

"It didn't hurt the artery, the esophagus was cut." Zheng Yingqi skillfully applied sulfonamide powder to Hale's wound, then picked Hale on his back and ran, he found his allies and handed Hale to the medics, who lamented the good fortune of this guy and found a jeep and sent him away.

Then Zheng Yingqi rescued Zakary with a group of people, and plunged into the wave of attack - at this time, the German army was already powerless, E Company hit the center of the town, and the friendly troops expanded the control area along the place occupied by E Company, constantly compressing the German activity space, except for a part of the German soldiers who fled into the village of Lashan, not far away, the rest of the Germans were either killed or surrendered.

The center of the town was in ruins after the collision of tanks, and Company E did not wait for Spears' invitation, but waited for reinforcements from the 17th Airborne Division - the pig teammates were a little more powerful this time, and took over the task of encircling and suppressing the remnants of the enemy in Rashan Village.

"Our mission is over!" That night, when Winters conveyed this sentence to the whole battalion, the entire 2nd battalion cheered like an explosion.

"It's finally over!" Compton's excited bear hugged Zheng Yingqi and almost took away Zheng Yingqi's first kiss, but fortunately, Zheng Yingqi swore to death and kept his chastity.

"From the moment we entered the position, I thought that as long as we took the town of Norville, our mission would be over, see, I guessed right?" Compton told his foresight in a show-off tone, and Zheng Yingqi smiled in agreement, and said in his heart:

"It's too early to be happy......"

World War II is not over yet, what are you excited about?

On the morning of January 17, the convoy of trucks appeared in Norville, and all the people of the 506th regiment began to board.

They will follow the road they had traveled four weeks ago and will go back in a truck.

It's just that this time there are a lot fewer trucks.

"How much do we lose here?" Spears asked Lieutenant Shams beside him.

Shams was confined to the image of waiting for the joy of Company E at Christmas, and after a long time he said: "When we left Momion for Belgium, there were 121 officers and men. ”

"During our time in Bastogne, we received three batches of 43 people."

"Now, the only one who walks with us is ......"

It was a long time before Shams came up with the number:

"52 people."

When you come, you can do it, and when you leave, you ......

A platoon.

……

On the swaying truck, Zheng Yingqi looked at the face in the car body and froze.

There are many, many faces missing.

After a long time, he whispered: "Brothers, our task has been completed again. ”