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Montgomery was furious at the headquarters at El Alamein station, and at first he received a telegram from the 10th Panzer Division saying that it had captured Tella Khakir and found that the enemy had fled, and he was very happy, and pulled de Lagan and his staff to discuss where Guderian was going, but the telegram that came soon after made him slap the table on the spot: the 24th Panzer Brigade had been ambushed by a superior enemy and had been completely surrounded, and was in urgent need of relief.

"Stupid! It's stupid. Montgomery said to his subordinates in grief, "I told them not to push blindly, I told them not to get out of touch, I told them to report to me regularly every two hours and keep in touch." Don't listen to any of them, who is to blame for being surrounded now? Do you blame me? ”

Several staff officers thought to themselves: Everything else can be blamed, but the 10th Panzer Division still fulfilled the request to report the news once every two hours, and after careful calculation, the interval between the capture of Tella Akir and the sending of the encircled telegram was less than two hours.

Montgomery said this, and his anger was like this, but it didn't mean that he could really be indifferent to it, and after thinking about it for half a minute, he couldn't help but ask: "Which is the closest unit to them?" ”

"10th Panzer Division."

Montgomery waved his hand: "The 24th Armored Brigade is the unit of the 10th Armored Division, and it is their duty to go to the rescue, but I think this strength alone is not enough, and we must rely on other forces, what is our original arrangement?" ”

At this time, the troops in the north and south who were outflanking each other sent a telegram saying that they had heard the sound of a fierce exchange of fire in the direction of Terreakir, and that the 24th Armored Brigade could not be contacted for the time being, and that they could not contact the 24th Armored Brigade that had broken through head-on.

De Lagan looked at the map: "The 10th Panzer Division was followed by the 4th Indian Division, the 1st South African Division and the 2nd Free French Brigade were detoured from the north, and the 2nd New Zealand Division and the 1st Greek Infantry Brigade were detoured from the south. ”

"Aren't there any other armoured units?" Montgomery asked.

De Lagan gave him a strange look and explained: "The 10th Panzer Division itself is an armored force, and the South African 1st Division to the north and the New Zealand 2nd Division to the south have their own armored forces, especially the New Zealand 2nd Division, which has an armored force equivalent to an armored division. ”

"There are no particularly reliable armored forces, and there are not enough of them, and to break the encirclement it is necessary to have armored spearheads." Montgomery pondered for a moment, "Can we draw out other troops?" I need fast, pure armored troops. ”

"Except for the 1st Tank Brigade directly under the command of the group army, there are not many other purely armored units, unless the 1st and 7th Armored Divisions that have already rushed forward are turned back." "If we had ordered them to turn to Treacquil for relief," said de La Gangan, "we would have let go of the enemy fleeing along the coastal road." ”

Montgomery waved his hand: "That's not necessary, since Guderian has surrounded the 24th Panzer Brigade at Treacquil, then most of the Italians fleeing along the coastal road are Italians, or part of the German army, and his main force will no longer be able to jump out of the gap to find trouble with the 1st and 7th Panzer Divisions, so there is no need to make a temporary turn." Send a telegram to them, tell them to be careful, not to let the tanks disconnect too much from the infantry behind, lest they suffer the same treatment. ”

"Understood."

"As for Telleakir......" Montgomery hesitated, not knowing what could be done to quickly relieve the 24th Armored Brigade.

"I think our armored force is enough, not counting the strength of the 24th Armored Brigade in the encirclement, the 10th Armored Division in the front still has more than 100 tanks, the New Zealand Second Division in the south has nearly 200 tanks, and the South African 1st Division and the Free French troops in the north have more than 80 tanks combined, the cumulative number is close to 400, which is equivalent to the strength of two armored divisions, this strength exceeds the armored strength of the Germans, and we really can't draw too many other armored forces."

De Lagan told the truth, the first three armored divisions (1st, 7th, 10th) and the 2nd New Zealand Division had a total of nearly 900 tanks, plus some of the armored forces in the direct units of the army group and several other divisions, a total of more than 1,200 tanks in the Eighth Army, which seemed to be much more than the Germans, but it still felt stretched thin to pursue the fleeing enemy on the coastal road and relieve the 24th Panzer Brigade of Terreacakil. Montgomery only complained to London about the lack of troops and equipment, but if Guderian's belongings had been replaced with him, he would have been pushed to Cairo long ago.

"Order the 24th Panzer Brigade in the encirclement to hold on to the spot, and the rest of the forces to be commanded by Major General Ramsden to counter-encircle the enemy, and we will try to solve the scourge of Guderian at Trérkal."

"I'm afraid that Brigadier General Brown won't last that long." De Lagan said worriedly, "After all, he only has one brigade ......"

"How is Major General Gatterhouse's 10th Panzer Division at the moment?"

"They were fighting the Germans, the enemy was the two old opponents of the German 15th and 21st Panzer Divisions, and their blocking was fierce, and the 10th Panzer Division could not penetrate for a while, and according to Major General Gethouse, the fighting was fierce in the direction of Terre-Akakill."

"Guderian still has a 90 lightly armed division in his hands, if the enemy uses two armored divisions to fight and block, then the troops surrounding the 24th armored brigade are too few, it is estimated that one armored division is working with the 90th lightly armed division to deal with the 24th armored brigade, and the other is blocking the tenth armored division, so that Brigadier General Brown must hold on!" Montgomery thought for a while, and finally said in a categorical tone, "Give them an order, the 10th Panzer Division must entangle the enemy in front of it and exert strong enough pressure, all our troops in the encirclement must fight to the last soldier, and when the troops outflanked by the north and south flanks are in place, it is time for us to counter-encircle the Germans." ”

"Yes." De Lagan secretly wiped a handful of sweat, according to the commander's deployment just now, it may be possible to catch Guderian, but the fate of Brigadier General Brown and the 24th Armored Brigade in the encirclement is not good, the commander seems to be determined to sacrifice the 24th Armored Brigade to achieve the overall goal, and only hopes that those guys in the encirclement will be clever and can hold on to the large force to relieve him.

Major General Gethouse, commander of the 10th Panzer Division, who was directing operations on the front lines, felt that he was going crazy, and that part of his contribution was due to the reckless Brigadier General Brown, and in large part to Montgomery's orders. The 10th Panzer Division had two armoured brigades and less than 200 tanks, and Brown's 24th Panzer Brigade had accounted for nearly half. Now he has in addition to the dozen or so tanks left in the division headquarters, there is another 8th Armored Brigade, but the problem is that the enemy who is blocking in front has the number of two armored divisions, and he can't hit it no matter how he fights.

Although the German armored division in North Africa has suffered great losses in the past year because of successive battles, and the strength is not very neat, and the sum of the two is equivalent to a full armored division of the British army, the problem is that the 10th armored division is not yet fully staffed, and it is equivalent to using 1 armored brigade to gnaw at the opponent's 1 armored division, not to mention that he is on the offensive side, and the Germans can still rely on anti-tank fire in defensive positions - those damn 88 guns are indestructible monsters, and the tank crews have a headache when they see it.

After receiving Montgomery's telegram telling him to entangle the Germans at all costs and break the encirclement, he smashed his military hat and opened fire in front of his subordinates in a rare manner, accusing him of "blind command": "A few days ago, he swore that we would never be allowed to attack the German positions, and that the Germans would come and collide with our anti-tank firepower -- this is simply wishful thinking!" Now it's good, let's ram the German anti-tank positions at all costs, I have served in the Army for almost 30 years, and I have never heard such an order from both ends...... Someday I will die under such orders! ”

Seeing the indignant appearance of the division commander, the others did not dare to answer, only the chief of staff coughed and reluctantly changed the topic: "Sir, the telecommunications company reports that the 24th Armored Brigade cannot be contacted now." ”

"Is this bastard alive after all? It's just dead and counting, let's retreat directly, whoever loves to break the siege will go! ”

The others looked at each other, how can the 24th Armored Brigade say that it is also a unit of the 10th Armored Division, and they dare not say that they have merit in breaking the siege, and retreating will be even more criminal, could it be that the division commander and Brigadier General Brown originally had a grudge? I've never heard of this kind of rumor.

Everyone did not dare to express their opinions, and continued to be silent there.

Gathouse's mouth opened and scolded the Air Force again: "The Air Force is also a bunch of rubbish, and after fighting for so long, it doesn't come to reinforcements, really let me have a division, no, half a division to deal with two German armored divisions?" ”

"Sir, Major General Ted has replied to us, the bombers are not strong enough to provide cover in a short time." The Air Force liaison officer replied tremblingly.

"Hell! And what about our planes? The last time they bragged that there were more than 1,000 planes, couldn't we draw 20 bombers to cover us? ”

Gathouse was really wrong to blame Major General Ted's desert air force, in order to delay the retreating Italian troops along the coastal road, he sent all the planes he could to carry out this mission, and the fighters and German fighters fought happily, and the bombers took the time to bomb the ground, and for a time they did not care about Terre-Arcakil.

"Sir." His adjutant suddenly rushed in with joy, "the front-line troops reported that the Germans had retreated and abandoned many positions......"

"It looks like the commander of the Germans is even more stupid than our commander!" Gathouse waved his hand, "Then keep attacking." ”