Although Hoffman expressed his guilt for appropriating Guderian's supplies, neither he, nor Speer, nor even Guderian himself could not have imagined that this move would disrupt the operational planning and deployment of the Anglo-American forces in Africa: in early March, the African Army Group successfully completed the occupation of Mogadishu and the rest of Somalia and began an offensive on the northeast coastal corridor of Kenya. Pen? Interesting? Pavilion wWw. ｂiquge。 ｉｎfo

By 25 March, the Germans had crossed the line of Vitu and Kau in the eastern part of the Tana Valley and engaged in an exchange of fire with American outposts, Patton had his first taste of German armored warfare and Tiger tanks, and Guderian had learned for the first time the Americans' defensive counterattacks and air-ground coordination. Both sides gave each other a high evaluation: Patton thought that the German armored forces were tactically skillful and the Tiger tanks were as powerful as they had been rumored, while Guderian believed that the American units cooperated much more with each other than the British, especially the air-ground coordination was quite good, and the infantry light firepower was particularly fierce. After seizing and trying out the M1 Garand rifle of the Americans in the field, Guderian finally understood why the Führer wanted to replace the K98 in favor of the G43 rifle, even though the rapidly increasing ammunition consumption put more pressure on logistical supplies.

In the eyes of the German armored forces, the level of the Sherman tank can really only be said to be very average, and it often turns into a fireball when hit, but it is extremely easy to use as a service tank, whether it is a bulldozer, an excavator, a bridge or a crane, it is better than a vehicle modified with a T-34 or No. 4 tank - because the engine power of the Sherman tank is as high as 500 horsepower, and the remaining power after removing the turret is the largest, which is much higher than that of the No. 4 tank. The mechanical reliability is stronger than that of the T-34.

In the African theater, landmines are a big headache for everyone, and the Germans, who have a talent for "universal transformation", like to transform Sherman into a minesweeper. As a result, when reporting on the battle situation within the German army, it was sometimes inexplicably mentioned how many "bulldozers" or "minesweepers" had been captured, and people who did not know how to do it were confused, and only the officers and men of the front line understood that what they were talking about was actually Sherman -- as long as the chassis and power system were intact, it did not matter whether the turret was intact or not.

From Mogadishu to Kau for more than 800 kilometers, the German army completed it in less than 20 days, but the 130-kilometer road from Kau to Malindi, a port city in eastern Kenya, took a full week, and it was only effectively occupied in early April, and then it was delayed in attacking Mombasa, which is more than 100 kilometers away, which made the British and American coalition forces very nervous. I don't know what bad tricks the Germans are holding back.

The top brass of the African theater of operations was much more modest than the complacent mentality that occurred after the successful landing in North Africa in the past -- because of the pride and complacency and greed for merit, Rommel was taught a lesson at the Kesselring Pass, because the British and American troops had been beaten since the Indian Ocean Campaign, and the Australian and New Zealand soldiers who had retreated from North Africa and Egypt had made the German army stronger, and the American army became very conservative and suffered from both gains and losses.

Faced with the sudden change in the style of painting, the African Theater Command was very troubled: if it wanted to attack, it was afraid that it would not be able to defeat the German army and the Axis fleet that might appear along the coast, and if it wanted to retreat and abandon Mombasa, it was unwilling to defend itself, and this was a process that consumed a lot of patience and will.

Guderian wanted to attack, but because half of his supplies were misappropriated by Rommel, he could not accumulate the materials needed for the attack in a short time, so he could only stop where he was for the time being.

The supply of the African army group generally landed in Mogadishu by sea and then relied on nearly 1,000 kilometers of road transportation to send it to the front line. I thought that the situation would improve after the capture of Malindi, but it turned out that the port facilities were still left over from the last century, not only limited in capacity, but also destroyed by the Americans, and could not be used at all. The only hope was to take Mombasa as soon as possible and restore navigation so that the transport ships could dock directly at the port, but after logistical constraints, he could only look at Mombasa, more than 100 kilometers away, and sigh.

Although the United States had far more supplies and supplies than the German army, it also encountered the same problem of limited transportation, a large amount of materials and equipment were piled up in South Africa, and every bullet, shell, and barrel of gasoline had to be airlifted from South Africa by plane. Even those with strong logistics capabilities such as the United States are facing this situation. During this period, in order to prevent and delay the German offensive, Eisenhower, who lacked armored strength, was forced to use a large number of B-24\B-25 to carry out air strikes, and these bombers usually assume the function of transporting materials together with transport planes, and the more bombers are invested in combat missions, the less they can invest in transportation, not to mention that the German air force is not weak, and the African Army Group can not only be supported by aircraft taking off from Pemba Island, but also have a fighter wing commanded by Garland.

Although the US bombers had the cover of the P-47\P-40, the losses of the German fighter force composed of FW-190 and BF-219 were still not small, and in the air battle of just over half a month, the US military lost more than 70 fighters and more than 60 bombers, while the German aircraft lost less than 40 planes. And since most of the air battles took place over the German battlefield, most of the downed German pilots were rescued in the end, and in terms of the loss of pilots (groups), the Germans had only 10-15% of the American troops.

On the one hand, the skyrocketing consumption and the constant war damage were brought in, and on the other hand, there was less and less transportation and replenishment, and this period of time made Eisenhower almost gray his hair. He was well aware of his weakness - the Panzer Forces were no match for the Germans, and it was only by air power that they could reach a draw. However, the loss of air force was too heavy, although he had more planes than the Germans, and he could still get a steady stream of help from South Africa, but in terms of the quality and level of the pilots, he was no match for the German army, and batch after batch of American and South African pilots were thrown into a senseless strangulation. Over time, the proportion of South African pilots has increased.

For South Africa's Supreme Leader, British Field Marshal Jan Christian Smorz, the Anglo-American troops who came to the aid of the African theater of operations were initially for the moral sake of the allies, but now they are directly fighting for the defense of South Africa - he believes that the next step for the Anglo-American allies after the Axis settles the African theater of operations is to attack South Africa.

In fact, Eisenhower is not clear about one point, the current material import of South Africa has also been greatly affected -- in order to meet Turner's A+ offensive plan, the United States has been mobilizing all the escort aircraft carriers that can be put into use at present, and South Africa's shipping routes are no longer accompanied by escort aircraft carriers, and the German army has grown rapidly in breaking diplomatic relations after obtaining the Azores base, and the fleet to South Africa has become very unsafe, with an average of 3 out of every 10 ships, even though the United States has many free ships available, but the loss of personnel can not be afforded, In addition, South Africa is currently unable to use up the supplies for the time being, and Britain needs materials more urgently, so the United States decided to suspend transportation to South Africa and concentrate on ensuring the material needs of Great Britain.

Patton also wondered if the German army was suspended due to lack of supplies, and wanted to launch an active attack, but this was obviously a very risky act, once the judgment was wrong, the failure of the attack would not only consume the reserves that the American army had so hard to accumulate, but also could have a negative impact on the defense of Mombasa, Eisenhower weighed it again and again, and rejected this suggestion, still aiming to defend Mombasa, and even Ramsden did not support this risk. Everyone is aware of the fact that Mombasa has always been under the threat of the Axis navy, and it is Nairobi rather than Mombasa that is more worthy and easier to hold onto. But Mombasa cannot afford to defend - it is of no significance to the Allies at the moment, but it is of great significance to the Axis, and once the Axis controls Mombasa and unblocks shipping, there will be a steady stream of troops coming ashore to attack in the future, and the African theater of operations will definitely be finished.

With both sides temporarily unable to attack on a large scale, the battlefield temporarily became a paradise for armored scouts, except for fierce aerial battles. The small units of reconnaissance troops on both sides fought back and forth: at night, the Germans often used armored vehicles to penetrate and reconnoiter the positions of the American troops, and as long as the MG42 opened fire slightly, it could immediately summon dozens or hundreds of times more guns and artillery attacks; And after the Americans suffered several losses, they also used jeeps or armored vehicles to touch the German positions.

On the night of 3 April, the commander of the 501st Heavy Armored Battalion, Major Lüdel, was summoned to Guderian's headquarters.

"Sir, have a mission?"

"Tomorrow night, to be exact, there is a mission. I plan to send four tanks from your battalion that are in the best condition and have the highest shooting accuracy to launch an armed reconnaissance at night to amuse the Americans......"

"Okay, that's fine." Rudel first agreed, and then reacted, "We? Night? Tiger tank? ”

"Questions?"

"When it comes to armed reconnaissance, they are not as flexible as armored vehicles, and their vision at night is not good."

"Don't worry, there's new gear this time."

As soon as he heard that there was new equipment, Ludel became excited, and it must be a good thing to be solemnly pushed out by the commander, and then he saw a few strange-shaped "bulldozers", and asked dumbfounded: "That's it?" ”

The engineer on the side showed a proud expression: "Sir, please allow me to solemnly introduce to you, this is the latest technological product of the Empire - the owl!" (To be continued.) )