"I haven't gambled for a long time, and I really want to gamble. Pen @ fun @ pavilion wWw. ｂｉｑUｇE。 info" Hoffman turned his head to Rommel, who had been attending the meeting but had not spoken much, "Erwin, would you like to gamble with me?" ”

"Of course, my Führer! Wherever you point, I will hit, no matter how difficult the task is, you can leave it to me! Rommel stood up respectfully and showed his loyalty, while the rest of the crowd froze: Bet? The Führer said to gamble? God, I heard you right, right?

Hoffman nodded in satisfaction and revealed his mystery to the crowd: "I want to start the 'Amazon' project first......"

"Führer!" Yodel sprang up as if his ass had been burned by fire, and exclaimed, "This is too risky. ”

Several generals of the navy and air force looked at each other, not knowing what the Führer was talking about, even Zeitzler was ignorant, Rommel was even more confused, and everyone present knew basically nothing about this, except for Keitel and Yodle, who knew the inside story very well.

Keitel knew that the Führer's brain had always been relatively large, and his strategic thinking was unlimited, and as the chief of the General Staff of the Supreme Command, he had been trying to keep up with this rhythm, but found that he was completely powerless, and sighed and couldn't say anything, only a look of shock on his face.

The crowd looked at Yodel curiously to hear him explain what the Amazon Project was, and the latter reluctantly explained it at Hoffman's beckoning.

The Amazon plan is actually a plan to conquer and dismember Brazil, a key component of Hoffman's grand strategy towards the United States, and in fact does not complete the entire plan. Far from being accomplished, even the initial strategic significance and objectives are ambiguous, because there are two arrangements for Brazil – either to win over the United States to keep Brazil to the United States, or to win over Britain to dismember Brazil and give part of it to Britain.

In Yodel's words, the Amazon plan cannot be called a plan at all, and compared with the specific combat plans such as the "white plan" and the "yellow plan" at the beginning, it is at best a campaign idea, otherwise Cranke would not have been asked to take the staff of the Supreme Command to the Falklands to ask Mandol and others for their opinions, and to go to Argentina to investigate the situation on the ground. According to the original process, the plan could only be formulated after the situation and situation were fully explained, fully contemplated and deployed after Crake and others returned to China. Of course, the direction of the Amazon plan is clear, and the core idea is to first incite pro-German forces to riot and split in the four southern states of Brazil, and then the main German fleet will force a landing in Brazil under the premise of mastering the sea control in the South Atlantic, and at the same time, with the troops stationed in the Falklands and the Wehrmacht forces of the La Plata bloc, they will work together to launch a Brazilian strategy - either instigating a coup d'état in Brazil to become a member of the Axis camp, or dismembering (partially splitting) Brazil.

After hearing this, everyone frowned: how can Brazil be said to be a big South American country, can such a huge plan be easily implemented in just a few words? According to Yodel's words, the plan is not mature at all, and the prerequisites for its development are not yet in place, and the countries of the La Plata Group that need to cooperate are probably not ready, right?

Fortunately, everyone knew that the Führer was actually very cautious under the surface of wild and domineering, and it was clear from the development of the SEAL plan that there were clear boundaries between the Führer's estimation of his own power and the use of military strategy, and that the setting of fire in the Caucasus was also deliberate, and that many risky moves, such as the Kungunir plan and the 20,000-kilometer expedition to the Falklands, had been successful afterwards, and they waited quietly for Hoffman to explain to them.

"I know it is difficult for you to understand my decision, but I would like to say that you have the common German disease of being too delicate, too rigid, too obsessed with the completeness and comprehensiveness of the plan, and the slightest ambiguity and uncertainty will make you uneasy. Shouldn't it be carried out with imagination on the basis of correctly assessing one's own strength, the strength of one's opponent, and taking into account the situation on the battlefield? Hoffman said with a smile, "I have repeatedly claimed that high-ranking generals, especially those above the rank of general, should read through and intensively read three books, have you done it?" ”

The three books are the three military works that Hoffman has repeatedly emphasized: Clausewitz's "On War," Ludendorff's "Total Warfare," and China's Sun Wu's "The Art of War." They are considered to be important works that consider strategic issues from the three dimensions of politics, comprehensive national strength, and military affairs. Everyone nodded hesitantly, but everyone here had received hardcover copies of books in lambskin encapsulated by the Führer's signature—all those who could get their hands on these books were regarded as the Führer's henchmen, and others could not get their hands on them.

"Since everyone has read it, then I will test you, how do you understand the two sentences in the "Art of War" in "Sun Tzu's Art of War", "the first army to fight, the second to attack, the last to attack the city" and "the impermanence of soldiers, the impermanence of water'?"

The first sentence is easy to understand, and the Germans are actually already doing this - why not focus on the breakthrough of the central battlefield and the field assault in cities of the index meaning such as Moscow and Stalingrad? It takes a lot of effort to explain it with other ideas, and the sentence "the last siege" explains the problem thoroughly.

But the second half of the sentence is not so easy to understand, but Hoffman has his own thoughts: "Brazil is a very large country, even larger than the whole of Western Europe, and it is not possible to accomplish strategic tasks by one or a few surprises, and everyone knows that the roads in Brazil are very poor, far worse than the eastern front, which we consider to be the worst, and it can even be said that there is no backbone road through the whole country in Brazil, what does it mean?" ”

Everyone looked at each other, not knowing what the Führer was trying to express, Keitel had been with Hoffman for a long time, and he tentatively asked: "Does this mean that Brazil cannot be regarded as a complete and effective administrative system, and it is easy to divide under the influence of external forces?" ”

Hoffman clapped his hands: "That's right, that's what it means." Originally, I was afraid of the strength of the US fleet and did not intend to use this method, but now the Americans first divided their forces and were beaten by us, and then deployed the fleet in the Danish Strait, and the Brazilian navy was defeated by us last time, in other words, the sea control in the waters near Brazil is at your fingertips! If I send the guerrilla fleet to Brazil now, who will be able to stop us? ”

Everyone looked at it hesitantly, and felt that although this was an exaggeration, it was not unreasonable.

"Of course, the navy alone is not enough, no matter how strong the fleet is, it can't go ashore, but if we want to go to the army, are we afraid?" Hoffman walked to the large map and pointed to the southernmost point of southern Brazil, Rio Grande do Sul, "This area is 280,000 square kilometers, which is about the size of Italy (300,000 square kilometers), but do you know how many people there are?" It's just over 160,000, and 60% of them are of German and Italian descent! The National Socialist Party has always been active, but it has been banned by the Brazilian government. Is it because of the poor geographical conditions of such a large place and such a small population? On the contrary, the conditions of this place are very good, the north belongs to the Paraná Plateau, with an average altitude of 600-900 meters, which is not very high; The southern part is gently rolling hills and plains, very flat, with many dunes and lagoons along the coast, and a well-equipped port. This is the most important agricultural region in Brazil, with about half of the country's soybeans, wheat and corn production, and a quarter of rice. ”

Rommel said, "Then the Americans really can't sit still." ”

"I don't even have to go on the offensive to get things done. Don't the Uruguayans often note that we want us to come to their aid? You can do it all at once, send the army into Uruguay, and then make the state chaotic, and then we'll take it over — that's a very common way. Hoffman smiled, "The strength is ready-made, 1 Panzergrenadier Division is enough, at most an aviation wing, and of course, you can also consider putting a Marine Brigade in Uruguay to make the Uruguayans feel calmer." So we have 2 brigades in Argentina and Uruguay, and an Panzergrenadier division in German Brazil, and guess what the Americans are going to do with us? ”

The so-called very common method is easy to understand as soon as you hear it, and this is just a copy of Czechoslovakia: first the Sudetenland was rebelled, then Germany came to support, and after the Munich Conference, the Sudetenland was swallowed, and then the remaining territory of Czechoslovakia was encroached upon and Slovakia became independent. Brazil is better, you don't even have to find excuses, it's a country that has declared war on each other, and it's not a matter of course to fight you? I don't know how many times I have played Brazil in the past year or so! What if I hit you again?

"In the eyes of the Americans, in addition to the size and resource endowment of the region, there is a hierarchical difference in value, the mainland is the first priority, North America (Canada and Mexico) is second, the Caribbean and Central America are third, South America is fourth, followed by the United Kingdom and Australia and New Zealand, and then it is the turn of others, now the mainland and North America can't fight, and the US military in Central America is very strong, so I will start with the southernmost place in South America."

Rommel shrugged his shoulders and didn't have a big deal, whether it was Iceland or Brazil, they were all following orders, and in a sense Iceland was definitely much more difficult to fight than Brazil.

"Only the British and American fleets can pose a threat to us in the South Atlantic, but now the US South Atlantic Detachment has only one aircraft carrier available, if I send the second-echelon aircraft carrier guerrilla fleet over, we will have 3 aircraft carriers, 2 battleships, anyway, sooner or later we will have to increase troops to South America, it is better to take the opportunity to increase enough at one time, to see whether Roosevelt wants to protect Britain or Brazil! As for the American fleet there in Iceland, he can go or not. If he doesn't leave, let him and Commander Ozawa stare at each other slowly; If you're gone, it's time to land in Iceland! Hoffman smiled slightly, "Intelligence shows that there are no U.S. troops or U.S. air forces in the state, only less than 2,000 Brazilian troops, and it is estimated that one armored battalion can solve them." ”

The crowd began to talk about it......