On December 22, 1914, half the world was preparing for Christmas, with the rich busy shopping for the holidays, the poor still working hard for Christmas dinner, and only the carefree children were the most carefree.

On the winding side of the Austro-Italian border, 2,363,000 Austro-Hungarian soldiers, 72,000 German soldiers, 50,000 Russian soldiers and 8,000 Turkish soldiers are ready to fight, this coalition army has a large number of Austro-Hungarian infantry, well-equipped German armored units, brave Cossack cavalry and loyal and reliable Turkish soldiers, more than 7,000 guns are raised majestically, countless war horses are roaring in a low voice, and everyone here is waiting for the order to declare war on Italy.

On the Italian side, 1.36 million Italian soldiers from 79 divisions stayed in their positions with anxiety, and due to the backward economy and industry at home, many poor soldiers still had outdated weapons, and some officers even had to pay for their own guns. Depressed and remorseful in the face of a well-equipped and morale-high Allied Allied forces, these Italians were now among the glorious victors if their government had insisted on the German-Austrian-Italian Triple Alliance. However, the conflict between Austria-Hungary and Italy was long-standing, and war between Austria and Italy was inevitable, and Italy's attitude in the early stages of the war saved the Austrians the effort of finding a pretext for war.

The north-south line of the French-Italian border was relatively flat, and the French government, under German "good persuasion," agreed that German troops and supplies would be stationed on the Franco-Italian border through southern France. On the French side, General Hausen's German 3rd Army, with 280,000 soldiers and more than 1,000 artillery pieces, was waiting for the order to attack, and the 30,000 French troops under the leadership of Marshal Foch became the most loyal spectators; On the Italian side, the 260,000 Italian troops did not dare to slack off, the trenches were barbed wire, and the minefields were dense, after all, the combat effectiveness of the German army had been recognized by the world on the battlefields of France and Poland, and the Italians could only pray that the British would attract more attention from the Germans.

In the northern part of the Adriatic Sea, the Austro-Italian fleet, of equal strength, almost came out of the nest, and hundreds of warships confronted each other tense at a distance where they could see the pillars of smoke rising from the opponent's chimneys. After the Anglo-German naval battle, another large-scale battle between armored warships will take place in the ancient Adriatic Sea. On the Italian side were 6 dreadnought battleships, 4 armored battleships, 17 cruisers, 35 destroyers, and 25 submarines, and on the Austro-Hungarian side were 5 dreadnought battleships, 5 armored battleships, 15 cruisers, 30 destroyers, and 14 submarines, and 2 Turkish armored battleships, 5 Turkish cruisers, and 10 German submarines fought directly against the Italian Navy as Allied forces.

At 8 o'clock in the morning, when the sun had just risen over the horizon, the Prime Minister of Austria-Hungary, in place of the aged Emperor Joseph, read out the edict declaring war on Italy in the imperial palace:

On behalf of Austria-Hungary, all the citizens of Austria-Hungary, its allies who fought side by side with it, and those friendly countries that love peace and are strictly neutral in war, I would like to announce an important decision to the world on behalf of Austria-Hungary.

Italy and its untrustworthy government, ignoring the Triple Alliance Treaty signed in 1882 by Germany, Austria and Italy and renewed four times in 1887, 1891, 1902 and 1912, refusing to fulfill their obligations as allies after the outbreak of war in 1914, and privately negotiating with the Entente countries in violation of the Treaty of Alliance and national morality, as our now solid Russian allies can attest. It is incumbent upon our great Austro-Hungarian soldiers to punish such a country that has lost its integrity and poses a great threat to our Austro-Hungarian Empire, and our most loyal allies of Germany, Russia, and Turkey will firmly support us in persevering this war to the end.

Two days ago, we submitted an ultimatum to the Italian Government, in which it kindly demanded that the Italian Government hand over the culprit for violating the Treaty of Alliance, that it should ban the old government controlled by British spies, and that the new government controlled by the Italian people be reorganized, and that in order to ensure the security of Austria-Hungary and the Allied countries, Italy should reduce its army and have the Allied countries jointly send troops to maintain law and order.

Therefore, I officially declare that from now on, Austria-Hungary will enter a state of war with Italy!

This seemingly impassioned edict of declaration of war did not cause much madness, and since the events in Sarajevo, the people of the world have become accustomed to war. For the majority of the common people of Austria-Hungary, how to fill their bellies was more important than punishing their treacherous neighbors; For the German people, the main army of the German Empire disdained to attack a weak country like Italy; As for the Russian and Turkish peoples, their governments are merely symbolic in sending troops.

After Austria-Hungary declared war on Italy, Germany, Russia, and Turkey also declared war on Italy on the same morning. It was a terrible morning for the Italians who, when they woke up, found their country's so-called neutrality crushed by four powerful enemy powers, who either surrendered to the Central Powers and overthrew their own government, or silently took up arms and followed their own armies to resist. There were not many Italians who remembered themselves as descendants of the great Roman Empire, and even fewer who could uphold that tenacious and courageous style, and a dozen or so small political parties quickly declared their opposition to the current Italian government, while calling on the people to rise up in response to the "just cause" carried out by the Central Powers.

At 8:30 a.m., after the Allied countries had concluded their declaration of war, the Allied forces began to attack Italy from the east and west.

On the Austro-Italian border, thousands of artillery pieces let out an earth-shattering roar, and countless shells fell on Italian soil like a meteor shower of terrifying scale, and the sound of explosions in a row was almost audible from a distance; More than 120 Austro-Hungarian planes crossed the border and bombed a number of military installations in Italy and engaged in fierce air battles with Italian planes that came to intercept them.

On the Franco-Italian border, French soldiers sat on the hillside with great interest to watch the German artillery bombardment of the Italian border defense line in the distance, and more than 70 German planes and 10 German airships performed bombing and school shooting. The Italians, well aware of the superiority of German aviation weapons, did not deploy aircraft on this side, but resisted with some anti-aircraft weapons that France had secretly handed over to them before their surrender.

In the Adriatic Sea, the warships of both sides lined up in their own battle formations and pressed towards each other, and with the sound of a thunderbolt, the large-caliber naval guns of both sides began to bombard each other, and the tall water column mixed with stinky fish and rotten shrimp continued to rise, and the long-term tranquility of this sea area was finally broken.

This morning, most of the earthlings were focused on the Italian battlefield, and the British were clearly more concerned about the anticipated landing maneuvers across the Channel.

Calais, France.

"Everyone, get ready to land! 2 minutes later start charging towards the beach! ”

On a flat-bottomed landing ship, a lieutenant shouted at the soldiers on board. Behind the thick steel plate at the bow of the ship, 137 soldiers with rifles and serious expressions waited for the moment when the steel plate was lowered, while the engines in the stern of the ship were roaring desperately, and two high-level dual-purpose machine guns were also trying to rain bullets on the beach not far away.

Around this landing craft, hundreds of landing craft and small-tonnage boats are heading towards Calais beach. From above, the boats look like the teeth of a dense comb, dragging white water marks towards Calais Beach. Farther from the beach are medium-sized transports whose soldiers will begin to swim towards the beach in deeper waters, and next to these medium-sized transports are small and medium-sized warships that provide close-range fire support, firing small- and medium-caliber shells that create a low flat arc and deliver more accurate direct strikes at targets on the beach.

As far as the eye can see, there are larger, larger transports and heavy warships. The most striking of these are, of course, the three largest aircraft carriers with a very different appearance from other warships: the 12,000-ton "Super Duck Mother", the 15,000-ton "Lisa" and the newly launched 19,000-ton "Prince".

The Prince's expected service date was January 1915, and thanks to the efforts of the workers and sailors, the Prince was able to enter active service a month ahead of schedule for the landing in England for battle, and this was also the first time it had trained with the main fleet. The equipment on this aircraft carrier has been perfected, but the crew is still a little rusty in operation and cooperation, and the pilots of the carrier-based aircraft are also seizing every opportunity to practice.

In the command room of the "Prince", Chen Tian and many generals were using high-powered telescopes to watch this huge exercise with relish.

"Your Highness, His Majesty the Emperor has read out the edict of declaration of war!" The Communications Officer handed over a document.

Chen Tian took the piece of paper and glanced at it, then handed it to the other generals beside him. The content of this edict declaring war is no secret to him, the German "acting crown prince", it is just a reason to join the war with Italy, and it is always necessary to rely on strength on the battlefield.

"For us in Germany, although this time it is a two-front battle, the current situation is very different from the beginning of the war!" Chen Tian is not optimistic about the combat effectiveness of the Italian army, history is the best proof, but the performance of the Austro-Hungarian Empire is becoming more and more impressive, this empire is like a rotten tree that is strong outside and dry in the middle, and the momentary high spirits cannot hide the internal contradictions, and the various nationalities are like a plate of scattered sand. If nothing else, the old emperor of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Joseph, did not live for more than two years, and the only crown prince, Archduke Ferdinand, became the fuse of the great war and burned out his life. In the event of instability in Austria-Hungary, the annexation of Austria would be a good option for Germany.

"The only thing the Italians are not at a disadvantage is probably their navy! According to our intelligence, the Italians have already launched two seaplane carriers, but the current situation may not drag them into service. "The Chief of Staff of the Navy, Marshal Bohr, was not praising the Italian Navy, but in order to secure the Allied maritime transport in the Mediterranean, this ill-intentioned naval force would sooner or later have to be removed.

After Chen Tian became the acting crown prince, most of the admirals were fully supportive, and this Pol was a relatively neutral one, until recently, Chen Tian's contact with this naval marshal gradually increased.

"There must be a lot of foreign spies gathered around Calais today, and the busiest must be the British spies!" Falkenhain held a telescope and seemed to search for the spies.

"If nothing else, spies from Britain, the United States, Japan and other countries are all observing our exercises from some dark corner!" Chen Tian said and glanced at the medium-sized ships that were the third wave of landing force, the first wave of landing force today was composed entirely of infantry, and tanks and armored vehicles would go ashore through the trestle, all of which was of course shown to the spies. In fact, before testing with real objects, even Chentian did not dare to guarantee how deep his tank and armored vehicles would be able to wade through the water during the stall landing. After countless tests, they determined that these iron guys could completely launch from landing ships close to the beach, and that the fire out rate in the sea water below 1 meter was no more than 2 percent, and the fire out rate in the sea water of about 1.5 meters was about 10 percent, and if the sea depth exceeded 2 meters, they would become out-and-out "submarines".

Around the three aircraft carriers, more than a dozen destroyers acted like hounds to serve as guards. So far, 90 percent of German destroyers have been equipped with sonar and depth charges, and more British submarines have been sunk since December, so much so that there are almost no British submarines active in the North Sea as we approach Christmas. British spies finally gained intelligence on German sonars and depth charges, and the British Navy improved their own hydrophones and depth charges accordingly, and began equipping British warships. This was naturally bad news for the German submarine forces, but compared to the current weak shipbuilding strength of the British, the losses caused by these new weapons could be fully compensated by the new German submarines launched every month and the newly graduated crews.

On the south side of the carrier formation, that is, on the side closer to the coast, fifteen battleships and armored battleships lined up in two rows, and the ear-damping sound came from their 280 mm or 305 mm guns. After the white smoke rose, rows of orange-red shells whistled towards the beach, and after they plunged into the beach, craters with a diameter of several meters or even more than ten meters were created. These battleships were to carry out a covering bombardment of the landing beaches to achieve the effect of ploughing clearance.

Over the beach, more than 100 planes shuttled back and forth, all of them carrier-based aircraft taking off from aircraft carriers. At the time of the actual landing operation, most of the land-based aircraft had to undertake the heavy task of airborne landing and bombing, and due to the distance, they were likely to be unable to support the battlefield in time. In addition, there are more than a dozen naval zeppelins for vigilance and calibration in the high altitude above the fleet, and most of them will also carry out airborne or bombing missions in actual combat.

Eventually, the forward landing ship reached its predetermined position and stopped advancing, and after the bow baffle was lowered, the German soldiers bravely jumped into the knee-length or waist-high water, the smell of which was still a little unfamiliar to these land elites, although they had already carried out several small-scale landing drills in detachments. The soldiers waded through the water as fast as they could, while the mortars, who remained on the landing ships, suppressed the "defensive positions" behind the beach with slap shells with strong arcs. After landing on the beach, the first group of soldiers lay on the ground and fired suppressive fire on the enemy in front of them, covering the follow-up landing force to continue to advance, and then alternately covering the advance between groups of landing troops.

The first wave of landing soldiers used rifle machine guns, mortars, grenades and small-calibre artillery to occupy the empty "enemy positions" behind the beach, then the second wave of landing boats brought up the follow-up troops, and then the sappers began to erect trestles in preparation for the troops and equipment behind.

It wasn't until the third wave of landing ships approached that the tanks and armored vehicles slowly climbed onto the beach through the trestle. All this, the British spies hiding near the beach naturally saw it clearly. The Germans had no way of completely preventing spies from entering the wide Calais beach, and they had no intention of denying them a visit, so that the British commander would get the information that "the German armoured troops would not be able to get to the beach until the trestle had been erected."

Of course, it was also for this reason that the German Airborne Forces did not join the exercise.

While the Italian battlefield and the Calais landing exercises were in full swing, few people noticed the strange convoy heading towards the "Royal Treasury 11" in the western suburbs of London, England.

When the convoy of two trucks and a dozen ox carts and wagons appeared in the sight of the defenders of the vault, even the British soldiers were dumbfounded, but they were not alarmed, because they saw through the binoculars that the convoy was full of ordinary British officers and soldiers. The commander of the vault garrison, Major Kuks, did not link the convoy in front of him to the German commandos who had turned Brighton and Dover upside down, and in fact he was not given any order to be on special alert.

Cooks called the adjutant and instructed: "Call the London garrison command and ask if they have sent a convoy over!" ”

"Yes!"

"I really don't understand, the headquarters is full of inefficient guys, there are always some inexplicable mistakes and omissions recently, last week the team actually forgot to notify in advance, the day before yesterday was the wrong time. If I were the commander of the garrison, I would have thrown those guys to guard the beach! Coux muttered disapprovingly, but he also knew that the Germans and Christmas were coming, and everyone was busy, very busy!