The 22nd Panzer Brigade, another tank unit of the British 7th Armoured Division, had even worse luck than the 4th Panzer Brigade, which only ran into a Tiger company, but they ran into the 501st Heavy Armoured Battalion, which had the main force of the whole battalion, and with the cooperation of a company of No. 4 tanks, Major Ludell simply and neatly almost completely annihilated the entire 22nd Panzer Brigade, but the Tiger casualties also appeared: a Tiger was pierced through the frontal armor by a 17-pounder gun hidden in the corner at a distance of 1,000 meters, and the members were safely evacuated; The other was even less lucky, being directly activated by a large-caliber howitzer, and all the members of the car were killed; The third was unfortunately pressed by an anti-tank mine, and the track was blown off and unable to move, in addition to these three Tigers, the Germans also lost an additional 5 No. 4s, but their record was no less brilliant, and all but 7 Shermans or Churchills tanks of the 22nd Panzer Brigade were wiped out except for 7 Shermans.

After the threat of tanks was eliminated, the next battle was easy to fight, the position was full of German panzergrenadiers, they broke into the position under the cover of tanks, and used MG42 machine guns to wantonly harvest the lives of British soldiers who refused to surrender, although they were also embarrassed, but the desert rats were worthy of the title of the ace division, and did not collapse instantly like the colonial troops or allied troops but chose to resist resolutely, British soldiers used grenades, rifles, machine guns, Mortars and everything else at their disposal held back the wave of German tanks, and they had never fought so tenaciously and bravely, and in this desperate counterattack, the Germans still lost many tanks and armored vehicles. Some of them were even blown up with grenades by British daredevils. But in the face of superior armoured firepower, the struggle was doomed to be futile, and one of the Queen's infantry battalions had to resist with a stretch of trenches and fortifications. When they were discovered by the German rocket artillery company, they were taught how to behave with a Himmler organ salvo on the spot, and in the words of Lieutenant Colonel Merlinzin - after 400 rockets were pounced, the whole world was suddenly cleared......

Despite stubborn resistance, the 7th Panzer Division, having lost all its armored strength, could not stop the German onslaught, and by 2 o'clock in the afternoon, all positions of the division had collapsed on all fronts, and countless tanks, trucks, and armored vehicles were burning. A large number of British soldiers were scattered in the desert, and the whistling of shells was still ringing, but most of them were only German firepower. The British artillery positions had been smashed by the German tanks that had broken through and had lost their ability to fight back, and the battlefield was littered with large pieces or fragments of metal -- gun bolts, engine pistons, water tanks, suspension devices, steering wheels, and shrapnel -- scattered like rain on the vast desert, and the British infantry, artillerymen, engineers, and baggage men who had lost their positions and had no danger to defend were rushing to escape, and the entire battlefield on the western front of Tobruk was shrouded in a cloud of smoke. There were flames and explosions everywhere. Everywhere there are wounded soldiers with mutilated limbs, wounded bodies and mutilated limbs.

During the morning battle, Guderian also specially asked the 21st Panzer Division to organize a large-scale roundabout outflanking operation, targeting a large supply depot in the desert more than 70 kilometers away from the LinkedIn Army. To this end, Major General Bismarck not only carefully selected the rapid reaction force, but also brought a large number of empty trucks to prepare for the capture of the booty, which they originally thought would be enough to get some oil supplies, some Argentine beef, Canadian butter, authentic American cigarettes, milk and canned goods. If you can seize some English jam and chocolate candy, it will be almost perfect.

The results were several times richer than they had imagined, and the British logistics, who were busy pouring gasoline and planting explosives, were frightened by the machine guns of tank No. 4 and armored vehicles. When the German officers and men opened the half-buried underground warehouse, everyone could not help but gasp, and the abundance of contents and materials inside was almost blinding everyone's eyes: more than 30 armored vehicles, trucks, and all kinds of accessories - from spark plugs to lampshades, from engines to tires, various brands of lubricants and gasoline, various types of cannon barrels and shells, mines, explosives, desert tents, mosquito nets, insecticides to eliminate bed bugs, military rations, radios and batteries, Military uniforms and boots, bugles and even Scottish bagpipes, as well as rations such as chocolate candy, whiskey, cigarettes and tobacco were neatly stacked on the shelves, and the soldiers also found the most famous black tea, coffee, butter and cheese of the British Empire sealed in iron cans, movies and books for the amusement of the soldiers, shiny aluminum cutlery, canned salted meat and fruit, iron barbed nets, machine tools for repairing tanks and oxayne welding tools, oxygen concentrators, bitter water desalination, jewelry and rifles that won over Arabs, steel helmets, Kettles and compasses, concentrate feed for camels - although the desert is mainly transported by vehicle, camels are clearly a good substitute, as well as a variety of medicines, surgical instruments, blood plasma, and even an X-ray machine......

Major Siegfried, commander of the Panzergrenadier Battalion, asked the officers of the logistics department who came with the team in an incredulous tone: "The British have so many supplies in one division?" Are they here for war or for vacation? ”

The latter shrugged his shoulders and humorously replied: "Who knows? But I only know that these are all ours......" He looked at the trucks and armored vehicles parked outside, and then at the officers and soldiers who came with him, frowned and said, "Is it enough to rely on our cars?" ”

This was obviously not enough, even with the British own inventory of trucks was not enough to move these things, but the clever Siegfried immediately thought of a good way, he emptied all the armored vehicles, except for the driver, the rest of the space was used to load things, as for the infantry who originally arrived with armored vehicles, let them take tanks back, even so, those bulky machine tools, maintenance equipment could not be moved, and finally in a reluctant gaze, Everything that couldn't be moved was blown to pieces along with the X-ray machine......

Afterwards, they learned that this was not the supply warehouse of a division of the Seventh Panzer Division at all, it was the general warehouse and logistics transit base of the British Army on the entire Western Front, which was to be supplied to 6 divisions and 100,000 people together, because the Seventh Division had the strongest combat effectiveness, and the German army had never attacked in this direction, plus the terrain was conducive to digging warehouses before they chose here, but they did not expect that the materials that had been hoarded for 2 months were all cheaper for Guderian.

When he received Langton's report that the tank units of the 7th Panzer Division had been completely annihilated and the positions were lost, Montgomery was almost about to collapse, from 6 o'clock in the morning to now, only 10 hours, the entire Panzer Division was finished, and the order he gave Langton was to hold on for at least 48 hours, and now the armored units of the New Zealand 2nd Division and the Australian 9th Division rushed to the rescue did not even have time to collide with the Germans, and received the officers and soldiers who had retreated from their own positions.

De Lagan frowned and said: "Langton reported that the Germans sent a new tank, they were invulnerable and invulnerable, all our tanks could not do anything with him, and this is how the two armored brigades were reimbursed......"

"Humph! Indestructible, invulnerable, is this a monster? Montgomery let out a sigh of hatred from his nostrils, "The last time they met the T-34, they said the same thing this time, and this time they said it again, our commanders are used to using such an excuse to shirk responsibility, no matter how strong the Germans are, they are just tanks." ”

"What now? Will the two divisions continue to support the past as planned? ”

"This loophole has to be closed, otherwise our gap is too big." Montgomery sighed, glanced at the map, and said, "What should we do if the German forces protrude from the gap and can easily outflank the left and right flanks?" Is the whole line retreating? ”

De Lagan was silent: it is certainly not a good idea to retreat on the whole front, London was already deeply dissatisfied with the fact that the Eighth Army could not take Tobruk as soon as possible and only chose to besiege it, if it could not even maintain the encirclement now, I was afraid that it would be even more angry, which was much more terrible than losing a seventh armored division, not to mention that now the entire encirclement was a line, and once the Germans launched an attack would cause a chain reaction, the situation would be too bad.

"General Ted replied to us that the Air Force could be dispatched tomorrow." After thinking about it for a long time, he didn't find any good ideas, so he could only tell Montgomery a positive message.

"How many troops does Langton's latest report say are there for the Germans attacking him?"

"Let's keep that statement -- at least 500 tanks, 50,000 to 60,000 people."

After the destruction of the super-secret, the British did not know the situation of Guderian very clearly, but the approximate number can still be judged, believing that the total strength of the German army was between 10-120,000, Montgomery initially did not believe Langton's judgment, he thought that Guderian could not use half of his forces to break through the attack, so that his remaining defense line would be very weak and difficult to maintain, but the facts in front of him did not allow him not to believe: in just one day, there were nearly 20,000 people, The 200-tank 7th Panzer Division was destroyed - if not the total annihilation, it was a loss of combat effectiveness. He knew the combat level of the division, and if Guderian did not concentrate 2-3 times the number of troops, he would not believe that the 7th Panzer Division would easily break through the defensive line.

Montgomery walked to the map again and thought hard, and all the operational staff officers in the headquarters did not dare to make a sound, only quietly waiting for the commander's judgment.

"If Guderian really sent at least 2 armored divisions to carry out the western offensive, then he shouldn't have many troops left?"

"I think so." De-Lagan understood Montgomery's thoughts and tentatively asked, "Would you like ......?"

"All movements and deployments in the west remain unchanged, and the east should adopt a more active response strategy." Montgomery had an idea in mind, and the flowing order was passed on at once. (To be continued.) )