Chapter Forty-Eight: King to King (I)
In June, the land of France is full of life, those stubborn weeds paint the endless field with a charming green, and countless unknown wildflowers of different colors have begun to show their charm to the world, they are composed of various patterns that only they can understand scattered on the green flannel, with the breeze gently swaying in the bright sunlight and flashing the brilliance of life, Two months ago, the yellow land, which had been barren and desolate, now radiated like a magnificent Persian carpet.
Unfortunately, this idyllic landscape, which was supposed to be as beautiful and peaceful as the Garden of Eden, was destroyed by something that was suddenly not supposed to exist there, ugly artifacts, piles of steel wreckage, adding a discordant note to this peaceful idyll. The twisted, blackened steel skeleton pointed at the blue sky in an eerie pose.
In their own way, they remind people of the nightmarish battle that took place here not long ago, and many of the warriors never left the place, and the steel helmets of various styles hanging from the tops of the crosses that dotted the road showed everyone the most tragic end of the game.
It's a terrible mark of war on the land, but it's not an indelible mark that time and the mighty nature will wear away. In just ten years, the land will return to its original scenery, and these foreign objects will be contained by the endless force of nature, they will become a part of nature, a part of the earth, and only those legends and faint sorrows that have been modified and distorted will remain.
"About a month ago, a supply convoy of the 41st Panzer Corps was ambushed here by British and French troops. They fought very stubbornly, but there were too many enemies, and all the officers and men remained here. But they also let hundreds of enemies shed their last drop of blood. When the rescue units of the 41st Panzer Corps arrived, the entire convoy was shrouded in raging flames, and the nearby fields were littered with tangled corpses and mutilated weapons. They later discovered that the enemy had tried to take the bodies of their soldiers before leaving, but they had been unsuccessful. Captain Seithausen, the liaison adjutant of the Cyprus Corps Headquarters, explained to Xu Jun in a deep tone the origin of the pile of wreckage outside the car window.
"Why didn't they make it?" Listening to Sethausen's words, Randolph looked out the window with a solemn look on his face that he had never seen before.
"Because the soldiers were holding each other so tightly, our rescue team had to break their fingers when they wanted to separate the tangled bodies. On some of the corpses, we found traces of fingers being pulled hard, indicating that the enemy also tried to separate them, but for some reason, they were not able to succeed. ”
"Oh......" Randolph nodded and never spoke again.
"These are our soldiers, whose unwavering will to fight and their unparalleled spirit of sacrifice will forever be recited by our children and grandchildren. I am proud that we have such great soldiers, and it is impossible to find such great warriors in the world. Dogan sighed.
"There may be an army that can match their fighting faith......" Xu Jun muttered as he looked at the cross passing by the car window with deep eyes.
"What? Do you know of an army that can compare to the warriors lying here? Your Excellency Marshal." Daogen looked at Xu Jun suspiciously.
"I know there's an army that's as tenacious as this, it's ...... in my memory," Xu Jun didn't continue, he turned his face out the window.
Yes, Sethausen's description struck him so familiar, that in that time, in those days, the ability of that army to perform miracles on the battlefield and the spirit they displayed were completely superior to all their European counterparts. Maybe everyone will know about this army and their prestige in the near future, but for Xu Jun now, he can only bury him as a precious memory in his heart, because he is too far away from home.
Seeing that Xu Jun was reluctant to continue, Dogen swallowed the question he had just wanted to ask back into his stomach, and he turned his head to look out the window on his side. He has always regarded himself as the most standard soldier, he knows when to ask questions and what questions to ask, and according to the current situation, the best performance of a soldier is to shut up.
"My marshal, there are still more than thirty kilometers to the destination, I think you can close your eyes a little and rest, you haven't closed your eyes all night." Hans's words broke the solemn atmosphere in the car.
Xu Jun turned his head and smiled at his loyal adjutant, and he nodded and replied, "Okay, I'm suddenly feeling a little tired now, I want to rest for a while, Sethausen, please wake me up before I arrive." ”
"Yes, Marshal."
Hans and Randolph hurriedly closed the thick curtains, and the strong sunlight reflected a dull dark green in the car through the curtains, Xu Jun closed his eyes with his head resting on his soft head, and his lieutenants all lowered their heads and closed their eyes.
They had been on the road all night, and they had to stop Hitler before he could reach Liz. Intelligence showed that Hitler's convoy had begun to move, and although it remained as slow as ever, the destination of its advance must have been Lis, and the German Führer was steadily approaching the headquarters of Army Group A.
However, although the road was only a little more than 80 kilometers long, it had been completely destroyed by the previous battles, and the poor road surface would have dulled the already slow Führer's convoy, and according to Keitel's estimates, Hitler would probably not be able to advance as fast as on foot.
Despite this, there was not much time left for Xu Jun, according to the plan, he had to stop that man before he entered the defense line of the Liz garrison, and also settle the battle in the shortest possible time, evacuate as quickly as possible, and everything had to be done as if he had been attacked by the enemy's hidden remnants, which would be a very difficult test for Xu Jun.
In terms of combat effectiveness, secrecy, and loyalty, Xu Jun decided to select a unit from the 6th Motorized Rifle Regiment under his direct command to complete the job. Now this motorized infantry regiment is not only fully mechanized, but also a number of second-line armored units have been strengthened. Of course, it can't be heavy equipment like tanks, which are basically just light armored vehicles, but this has made his firepower far superior to other teams of the same level in the German Army.
Due to the need to maintain speed, it was impossible to bring the whole regiment with him, Xu Jun only selected almost one battalion of infantry and one company of armored reconnaissance vehicles to participate in the operation, but even if it was a battalion, Xu Jun was confident enough to take out all the guards of that person. The 6th Motorized Infantry Regiment followed him through countless bloody battles, and these soldiers were the elite trained by fighting again and again on the battlefield, and they were by no means the rookie guards of Hitler, who had not participated in a single battle on paper.
Now the soldiers of the battalion are sitting in their respective Type 251 armored personnel carriers or Mercedes-Benz two-ton off-road trucks at a speed of 50 kilometers per hour, with six Macerus versions of Type 231 six-wheeled armored reconnaissance vehicles in front and behind the convoy, which are responsible for guarding the ends and flanks of the convoy.
The 20-mm guns on these armored vehicles could take out any infantry unit that had no armored units and no heavy firepower, and Hitler's current guards were exactly such troops, they only carried two light 37-mm anti-tank guns, and the rest were just some small arms. Xu Jun had already predicted that the battle would be a bombardment encounter, in which the armored vehicles would be the main force of the attack, although the armor was a little thinner, it could compensate for the lack of protection with its speed advantage, and the dense firepower it possessed would become a nightmare for all the Führer Guard soldiers who dared to stand in its way.
The infantry of the 6th Motor Infantry Regiment will cooperate with these armored vehicles to attack the opposing side, and in addition to covering the armored vehicles, they will also have the task of encircling and suppressing the remnants of the enemy, and they will follow these armored vehicles to launch the final assault and liquidation of Hitler's convoy.
All the soldiers knew what they were going to do this time, and they all knew that their guns would be aimed at the man they had sworn allegiance to. But not a single soldier showed the slightest hesitation, for they now had more worthy of allegiance, and for the sake of their great commander, they would not hesitate to kill even if they were facing a holy God.
A terrifying murderous aura permeated the convoy, and the soldiers' blood boiled with excitement from the impending battle. But no matter how excited they are, they don't show it on the outside. They are battle-hardened veterans, who do not reveal any of their true emotions to outsiders except in the presence of their most beloved commanders, and who act as serious and ruthless as a solid rock at all times and in all places.
With the exception of lookouts and machine gunners, all the soldiers sat silently in their seats and stared ahead, their eyes only on the equally determined eyes of their comrades sitting across from them.
"Marshal, we're almost there." Sethausen opened the curtains between the front and rear seats.
"Oh...... Is it? Where are we now? Xu Jun opened his eyes, and he asked as he stretched his waist.
"It's almost Bettina already."
"Okay, we should be in front of the man by now, stop at the junction of the highway and we're going to make the final arrangements. Prepare the soldiers for battle, and from there, we can run into that convoy at any time, and I hope to be able to end the battle as planned. Xu Jun said as he opened the curtain on one side of his side and looked out the window at the field.
"What are those things?"
Xu Jun found that there were strangely shaped stakes or things that looked like wooden stakes standing in the field not far from the road, because some of the stakes were twisted in shape that did not look like they were naturally formed.
These things aroused Xu Jun's curiosity, because he had never seen the same scene before, these wooden stakes were lined up in a line, each one was about five or six meters apart, and it was divided into several rows, it seemed to be some kind of formation, from the appearance Xu Jun really couldn't guess what it was for.
"Ah, are you talking about the stakes?" Sethausen asked.
"Yes, what's that for?"
"Oh, those are the remnants of the last war, and behind those stakes are the trenches built by the French in the last war, and those stakes are the stakes from which the barbed wire was hung." Seithausen had an emotional look on his face.
"Really? I've never seen anything like it, and it seems that the French put a lot of effort into it. Xu Jun didn't expect to see the remnants of the battlefield during the First World War, looking at the wooden stakes, he imagined in his mind the scene of those young German soldiers stumbling with rifles and charging towards the dense barbed wire with rifles in the face of dense machine gun fire, which was simply a tragic suicide.
"Oh, there are a lot less of them now, because many of the piles are made of metal, and the French government has recycled those metal piles, and now only the wooden piles remain, although there are still some metal piles, but that is also because the texture has been burned by the artillery fire."
Seithausen finished speaking, pointing to the window on the other side. "There are the same piles over there, but that's the position we built in the last war. The positions at the forefront on both sides are less than a kilometer apart, and what a hard war our predecessors fought. ”
"Really?"
Xu Jun hurriedly turned his head and looked out the window on the other side. Indeed, the same rows of wooden piles were erected at about the height of the road, and it appeared that the road passed right through the middle of the positions on both sides.
Xu Jun looked back at the ruins of the battlefield not far away, he could now finally identify some of the fortifications of the position, because those places are now full of green grass and wild flowers, if you don't look carefully, you really can't see that it was a military fortification that once cost countless lives, and ordinary people might think that it was just a few natural small dirt slopes or irrigation canals.
Suddenly, Xu Jun vaguely saw that there seemed to be a few figures shaking on the ruins of the French position in front of him, and then a small bright spot flashed violently on a small dirt slope, Xu Jun felt a tremor in his heart, and an ominous premonition filled his whole body.
"Something is wrong, ...... there," Xu Jun shouted in that direction.
But before he could finish his sentence, a fierce burst of gunfire rang out from the window, and strings of bright tracer bullets swept towards the convoy like rain.
"Ambush!"
Hans pounced on Xu Jun, he pressed Xu Jun hard under the seat, and then covered his marshal with his body.
Dense machine-gun bullets hit the bulletproof body of the luxury Mercedes-Benz and sent a series of scalp-numbing "soaring" sounds, and the bulletproof glass of the windows was covered with snowflake bullet marks in an instant.
"Protect the marshal!"
"Prepare for battle!"
"Stop!"
Xu Jun's lieutenants all shrank to the floor of the car, avoiding the windows that could be broken at any moment, and they shouted loudly.
"Don't stop! Rush over. ”
This last sound was shouted by Xu Jun, and he finally struggled to break free from Hans's suppression. Stopping in such a premeditated ambush position is simply looking for death, and rushing out of the enemy's ambush circle at maximum speed is the only way out of the crisis.
The fierce gunfire continued, and a Mercedes-Benz personnel carrier in front of the sedan had no bulletproof ability, it was immediately beaten into a sieve by the dense bullets, and the soldiers in the car were also hit in an instant, just like the truck, and they were killed in their seats before they could react. The driver of the truck did not escape the same fate, and the truck lost control and rushed towards the side of the road, leaving the entire rear of the truck in the middle of the road.
Xu Jun's driver hurriedly stepped on the brakes when he saw that the situation was not good, and the sedan screamed and stopped almost two meters away from the truck, and the huge inertia made the officers in the sedan roll into a ball.
However, the disaster did not pass, and a Type 232 armored communication vehicle that followed Xu Jun's car failed to brake in time, and it slammed into Xu Jun's car from behind. That's not all, the driver of the armored car was nervous at the time and wanted to avoid it, so he turned the steering wheel to the right, and the result was that it not only crashed into Xu Jun's car, but also knocked the limousine off the shoulder of the road, slid down the slope of the road into the drainage ditch on the side of the road, and it itself leaned against the side of the road and lay on its stomach.
The vehicles in the front team hurriedly stopped when they saw what was happening behind, and the vehicles behind were also in a mess due to this sudden situation, but in the end, there was no more unfortunate collision accident like Xu Jun. The ambushers finally reached their first goal, and they managed to stop the convoy. However, judging from the fact that they are still shooting wildly at the convoy, their purpose is very clear, that is, to completely annihilate this convoy.
When the vehicle came to a stop, the uninjured soldiers jumped out of their respective cars at high speed. They braved locust bullets to rush to the side of the road, and their experience in a hundred battles made them not panic at such an emergency. The soldiers jumped off the roadside gutter, which they used as a makeshift trench to erect their weapons and return fire at the enemies who were shooting at them in the distance.
The armoured vehicles reacted from the momentary panic, turning their turrets and raining 20mm high-explosive shells at the ambushers. Due to the ferocious firepower of these armored vehicles, the enemy's fire was suppressed at once, and the convoy finally stabilized their position.
Everyone's hearts were now pressed against a big rock, and several officers ran desperately down the ditch towards the car leaning on the edge of the ditch.
The soldiers all prayed in their hearts that their commander would be safe, and they turned this anxiety into anger at the sneak attackers, and they all secretly swore that no matter whether the commander was okay or not, just for the sake of those comrades who had sacrificed, they would let those guys taste the consequences of doing so, and they would make those guys regret coming into this world.
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