Only 50 minutes later, in the tank scuffle, Brigadier General Brown had only 17 tanks left, and his enemy suffered very little losses. To the east, the infantry and artillery under the command of the Chief of Staff of the 24th Panzer Brigade were struggling to resist the attack of two Panzer Divisions, losing nearly a quarter of their strength in a short time, and the troops were already showing signs of collapse.

The whole brigade was compressed by the enemy who was pressing step by step, in a narrow territory less than 15 kilometers wide from north to south and less than 20 kilometers long from east to west.

"Sir, the Germans are demanding that we surrender." Suddenly Richardson's voice came from the headphones.

"Surrender?" Brigadier Brown thought he had misheard.

"Yes, surrender ......," the other man's voice hesitated, but said it completely, "the Germans said they would give us the prisoners of war treatment we deserved." ”

Brigadier General Brown was furious and rebuked: "You coward, how can you say such a thing? ”

"Sir, I ......" Richardson was dumbfounded by his scolding, and tried to say a few more words, but was escorted away by the soldiers behind him—they could not understand the captive's nonsense.

Brown swallowed his saliva secretly, it was his subconscious behavior to angrily denounce Richardson just now, and in the final analysis, the word "surrender" touched his sensitive nerves. After the tank battle, he had no hope of victory, and the telegram from the chief of staff to him said that the situation in the east was dire, the Germans were pressing in, and the troops were almost unable to support them. The tone of the division commander's call was very stern and anxious, telling him that due to the German interception, it might take another hour and a half for him to arrive on the battlefield to rescue him. He smiled bitterly, let alone an hour and a half, it is already a luxury to be able to support another 15 minutes.

He procrastinated, did not give up resistance, did not make any decisions, not because he was going to fight to the death, but because he had other concerns, or to be precise, he could not make up his mind to surrender.

He didn't want to go to a prisoner of war camp, he was only 39 years old and he was already a brigadier general brigade commander in the armored forces, and there was a great future ahead of him, and if everything went well, he would probably become a division commander, a corps commander, and even the position of commander of a group army was not necessarily a fantasy. These hopes were completely shattered when he entered the prisoner of war camp, he didn't know what he would become after the war, but he received a traditional education in the army, and knew that being captured was a stain that would be difficult for a soldier to erase for a lifetime, don't care if the British Empire can survive this war, even if it is won in the end, this victory has nothing to do with him, as a general who has lost a battle and is captured, he can only live in the sympathy and pity of others in the future, and at most there will be a medal to comfort him, Or to prevaricate him with a dispensable position to let him spend the rest of his life in peace - this dishonorable result is not what he wants.

He shuddered and pulled out his gun and prepared to commit suicide, and just closed his eyes in despair, the image of his family appeared in front of him: his family was a nobleman from the time of the War of the Red and White Roses, survived the revolution and restoration unharmed, owned a large estate and was prestigious in the local area, his father was not only a member of parliament in Cumbria, but also opened a textile company, and was very influential in the industry. He has a wife and young son at home, his wife is 4 years younger than him, she is another aristocratic lady, she looks bright and moving, and the two have grown up together since childhood. His eldest son has entered Eton College, and he is not only handsome and handsome, but also has outstanding academic performance, and he is always proud of him. His youngest child, who had just entered kindergarten this summer, was taught pictures of officers and soldiers who had fought so hard to defend the kingdom, and when the child came home he asked his mother about his father's deeds and merits and was very proud, and the news was written to him by his wife, who had been fighting in North Africa.

He was all the family's expectations, his father was waiting for his son to return to inherit the title, his wife was waiting for her husband to come back to spend their lives together, and his children were waiting for their father to return and tell them about the war. He is the sustenance of all, whether he loses the battle or not, whether he is a prisoner or not, this eagerness and hope will not change. If he died, the Kingdom of Great Britain would have one more general who died bravely, but his family and loved ones would have lost everything, and at most he would get a pension, and perhaps a government award, but what was the point? When he was 16 years old, he went to Sparka Bay to see the captured German High Seas Fleet, pointing fingers at the mighty German battleships, and he did not understand why these defeated soldiers did not choose to commit suicide but continued to live in secret. When he had a family and children of his own, he finally understood that no matter what they went through during the war, and no matter how decisively they carried out the "rainbow", they finally endured the humiliation, chose to live and returned to their homeland. Now, this difficult decision-making, this same dilemma has happened to me......

While still hesitating, the armored car he was riding in came to a cold stop, the driver let out a desperate scream, and then there was a violent impact, and the Germans fiercely stopped in front of the armored car with a tank, and he had to thank the other party for finding out that it was a command vehicle and did not choose to solve the problem with artillery, otherwise everyone in the car would have no bones. In the violent impact, Brigadier General Brown knocked unconscious, temporarily unconscious.

When he awoke, he found Captain Richardson crouched on the side, motionless guarding himself, his hands behind his head in a strange pose. He brandished his pistol, struggling to stand up and teach this shameless thing a lesson, his movements were a little large, but he was held down by the other party, and Richardson said in a frightened tone: "Sir, don't move, the enemy will beat us into a sieve." ”

Only then did he realize that he had been taken prisoner by a group of men, and the German soldiers were pointing their MP-38 submachine guns at them, and the movement had already attracted the attention of the guards, and the muzzle of the black hole hole was immediately pointed here.

He let out a long sigh, did not make a useless struggle to break the net, his hand slowly loosened, the pistol fell to the ground with a "clang", and the German soldier who pointed the gun at him immediately took Brown's matching gun, looked at his rank curiously, and suddenly exclaimed excitedly: "Ah...... Caught a big fish! ”

Seeing that the brigade commander's command vehicles were all captured by the enemy, the remaining tanks no longer tried to resist stubbornly, and surrendered one by one with a white flag. It's not that they don't want to escape, but they know that it's useless to escape, the east and west are the enemy's armored divisions, and the north and south are minefields, where can they escape? And if you escape, the weak rear armor of the tank can easily be beaten into a torch by others.

"I'm Colonel Collingwood, who are you?" Hearing that the enemy bigwig had been captured, Collingwood hurriedly grabbed a staff officer who knew English and rushed over.

"I am Brigadier General Brown, commander of the 24th Armoured Brigade of the British Army. Sir, I ask you to treat me and my men in accordance with the Geneva Conventions. ”

"Of course, you'll be treated like you're in the military." Collingwood looked at the other side's rank and the deformed command armored vehicle next to him, and said, "Can I ask your men - I mean the infantry and artillery in the distance who are still resisting to lay down their arms and surrender." ”

"I ......"

"They're surrounded by us." Collingwood said, "Do you think they can escape from our encirclement in such a situation?" I don't want to go on a killing spree. ”

Brown fell into a long thought, the muscles on his face were constantly twitching, showing inner hesitation and struggle, Collingwood was patiently waiting for a response, but he didn't mean to press the other party, after nearly two minutes of difficult choices, Brown squeezed out a sentence from his teeth: "Well, if you can guarantee that they will be treated decently, I can give this order." ”

"I can assure you that we will fulfil our obligations under the Convention. Please give the order quickly, for every minute of delay more people will lose their lives. ”

"Brethren of the 24th Panzer Brigade, I am your brigade commander Brown, we are surrounded by the Germans...... We fought valiantly, faithfully fulfilled our duty for the kingdom, and did our best, but the situation changed very badly, and we were surrounded by superior enemy forces, and I had to make this decision to avoid needless sacrifices...... This forced us to lay down our arms and surrender to ......" Brown choked up and used his last strength to get the words out, "surrender to the German army, and I hope you will obey my orders one last time, may God bless you ......"

With this order, the remaining resistance of the 24th Panzer Brigade gradually weakened, and the German forces surrounding them also gave up their attacks one after another, and both sides invariably chose a ceasefire. Then the British troops waved the white flag, and many soldiers began to cry bitterly, they thought that today was a comedy, but they did not expect that it was a tragedy in the end.