Long before the operation of the central armored group, Army Group B on the northern flank had already launched an offensive in advance.

At 3 a.m. on 10 May, at the field airfield in Cologne am Rhein, the commandos responsible for the assault on the Eben-Emer fortress and the three bridges had been assembled. The commander, Captain Koch, revealed the hidden secrets to the soldiers, who were about to launch a surprise attack on the Belgians. There were no impassioned pre-war remarks or enthusiastic encouragement to mobilize, and Koch gave the order to board the plane as soon as he informed his troops of the objectives of the operation. He was sure that after half a year of arduous training, his soldiers' will to fight had reached a high point.

In the inky darkness of the sky, 41 Junkers transport planes towed 41 DS-230 gliders took to the air. Originally produced by a civilian company for meteorological observations, the long-winged glider was ordered by the German Army Aviation to fill the capacity gap of the transport aircraft unit due to its good load capacity, which could carry two pilots and eight heavily armed soldiers. This raid is the perfect moment for them to show their value.

According to the established battle plan, 11 of the 41 gliders were used to seize the fortresses, and the remaining 30 were used to seize three bridges. However, after the operation began, trouble came to the 11 planes that captured the fortress one after another. Less than 10 minutes after takeoff, a Junkers transport plane, due to a mechanical failure, unexpectedly threw off the glider towed behind it while flying over the Rhine, and on that glider happened to be the leader of the detachment that had raided the fortress, Lieutenant Wichge. The glider, which had not yet risen to a sufficient height, almost plunged headlong into the Rhine, but thanks to the pilot's skill, it barely landed on a small lawn by the river, and Lieutenant Wichge could only sigh at the moment.

After 20 minutes of flying, the unfortunate incident reappeared. The pilot of one of the gliders, presumably too nervous and dazzled, misinterpreted the flashing lights of the Junkers transport machine as a signal to attack, so he immediately untied the towing rope and began to glide. At this time, the plane had not yet reached half the distance, and the altitude was less than 2 kilometers. Eventually, the glider landed safely on the border, hundreds of kilometers away from its target.

Before the battle had even begun, the men who raided the fortress of Eben-Emer had lost nearly 20 percent of their men – including their commander. Thankfully, thanks to the rigorous training they had previously set, each group had already defined its own tasks; Even without a commander, they know what they have to do and how to take the place of their comrades who have fallen behind. The group flew to the border between the Netherlands and Belgium, and the gliders parted ways with the transport planes as planned, and under the guidance of the stars in the night sky, they flew silently towards Belgian territory like bats in the night.

Dozens of kilometers away, in the Eben-Emer fortress, the Belgians were not as dazed and asleep as the Germans had predicted. Since the beginning of May, the clouds of war have been gathering rapidly over Western Europe, and Germany's large-scale deployment of troops on the Western Front cannot be concealed, and although the Belgian government still hopes to avoid war, it also issued an order to the whole army on May 7 to prepare for war. At this time, all the scout sentinels of the Eben-Emer fortress were on duty, paying attention to the movements around them. As it was dark before dawn, the Belgian sentries could only listen from inside the outpost in case of a possible air attack.

But after waiting for a long time, I didn't hear any noise from the aero engine. Seeing that the eastern sky had changed from ink to dark blue, and was about to usher in the dawn of dawn, the sentries of the Belgian army were gradually discouraged, and they inevitably relaxed their vigilance. By this time, nine German gliders had successfully circled directly west of the fortress and quietly dived from the side to the rear at a wide angle in the twilight sky. In order to speed up the landing, the German pilots pressed the lever with all their might, and the glider descended as fast as a falcon predator.

Due to the unexpected direction of the appearance of the German commandos, no sound was made beforehand. So, it wasn't until the gliders were within striking distance that the Belgian sentries saw the enemy suddenly appear before their eyes. The sentries were all stunned, their minds blanked, and none of them thought to sound the battle alarm. It was the loud crash of the glider as it landed, as well as the shouts of the German soldiers, that woke up the defenders inside - the enemy had already landed above their heads!

With a continuous roaring impact, 9 gliders quickly landed on the surface of the fortress in less than 20 seconds. Although the terrain was narrow and uneven, it was a nightmare for any plane to land, but after six months of hard training by the German commandos, this difficulty was no longer an obstacle to their advance. Before the glider was knocked into a twisted and scrapped plane, 90 commandos jumped out of the cabin like rabbits, and then they launched a fierce attack on the enemy who was caught off guard like tigers in a flock of sheep.

The smoke curtain first rose rapidly in all directions on the top of the fortress, its wide range and the thick fog like a cloud, and the view of the few Belgian sentries around was immediately blocked by the smoke bombs thrown by the German commandos, and it was impossible to distinguish for a moment whether to rush into the fog and play with the enemy, or stay where and wait for reinforcements. Taking advantage of this moment, the German demolition crews carrying a large amount of explosives rushed straight to the target, and with the support of their comrades armed with MP38 submachine guns, they began to carry out the destruction of turrets, pillboxes, and tunnel mouths one by one.

"Boom! Rumble! Rumble! "The explosions rang out one after another, deafening, and the ground fortifications on the top of the fortress shattered and exploded, and thick smoke gushed into the sky. The flamethrowers were even more powerful, facing the enemy who were entrenched in the thick machine-gun bunkers, they sprayed furious dragons directly into the shooting holes or observation ports, and in a matter of seconds, the Belgian soldiers inside were either burned to tar black charcoal, or the oxygen in the bunkers was suffocated to death by the flames. The dozen or so sentries scattered on the surface were no match for the wolf-like, tooth-armed German commandos, and they fell to a pool of blood with bullet holes in their faces.

As the core of Belgium's eastern defence, the Eben-Emer Fortress was guarded by a total of 1,200 soldiers, and under normal circumstances, even if the German commandos were all iron-blooded, they would definitely not be able to defeat so many opponents with a mere 90 troops. As long as the Belgian defenders reacted and launched a counterattack, the German commandos were bound to be overwhelmed by the sea of people. However, the special structure of this fortress has become the grave of the Belgians who hate to break their halberds.

In pursuit of defensive power against giant siege guns and aerial bombs, the Belgians built the fortress with a very complete group of underground tunnels. Almost all soldiers can operate artillery combat in fortifications deep underground, and ammunition and food are underground, so you don't have to worry about being destroyed by enemy artillery fire. As a result, the Belgian defenders usually stayed inside the fortress, leaving only a few sentries to guard the surface. This deployment was naturally invulnerable in the face of the enemy attacking head-on, but once it was ridden in the face by the enemy, it immediately fell into an extremely embarrassing situation.

By the time the Belgian soldiers in the fortress came to their senses and prepared to launch a counterattack, the German commandos, who had been prepared, had already rushed to the exit of the tunnel and set up crossfire with the MG-34 machine guns to wait for harvesting. The Belgian soldier Fang Fu rushed out of the pit, and before he could unfold, he was swept down by the dense gunfire fire, and the tunnel was in chaos, and the people who wanted to retreat in front and those who were still rushing forward in the rear collided violently, trampling on each other, and screaming one after another. After finally settling down, no one dared to take a step beyond the thunder pool.

What's even more deadly is that since the fortress was designed with no idea that the enemy would appear directly at the top of the center through the "wormhole", all of its turrets and machine gun bunkers were limited to the bottom of the perimeter, and there was no way to deal with the enemy who exploded from the rear. After the ground resistance was cleared, the Belgian defenders could only be trapped in the ground in great humiliation, allowing the Germans to destroy the artillery on the surface of the fortress; Even though the four heaviest cannons were hidden underground, the Germans blew up their firing ports above the surface, making it impossible for them to fire outward.

In just 10 minutes, the world's strongest fortress's external attack ability was completely emasculated. At the same time, the other 3 squads that seized the bridge also quietly landed on the west bank of the Albert Canal as planned, and swooped towards the bridge from behind. The Belgian defenders of the two bridges were subdued by the commandos before they could even blow up the bridges with the flip of a button, and only one bridge was blown up by the defenders in time. After that, the commandos began to build fortifications to block the Belgian army's counterattack on the bridge.

Similar to the friendly forces that stormed the fortress of Eben-Emer, the German detachments that captured the 3 bridges were only 100 men each. As long as the surrounding Belgian troops take advantage of the unstable foothold of the German army and rise up in groups, the certainty of recapturing the bridge should be at least 70%. However, the Belgians were frightened by the enemy's appearance like a god-like soldier, and they were directly less daring. They felt that the sky was still dark at this time, and they did not know the reality of the enemy, and they should wait for dawn to confirm the situation before taking corresponding action. This dashed the last hope of the Belgian army to retake the bridge.

At 5:30 a.m., the east was almost all clear. When the Belgian troops, who had completed the assembly, were ready to inflict a thunderous blow on the German troops in front of them, there was a discordant roar in the sky. Dozens of German warplanes whizzed and flew over the Albert Canal quickly, and before the Belgian soldiers could react, the screeching of Stuka dive bombers sounded like the roar of hundreds of locomotives.

In an instant, the red flames collapsed like a tsunami, and the thunder exploded in all directions, and the Belgian army was instantly blown upside down, and flesh and blood corpses flew into the sky. This attacking force was in disarray, and soon broke and fled under the continuous air raids, and the officers and men were completely unable to understand why the aircraft could have such a huge impact on the battlefield.