The encirclement of Vienna with ground forces was not the whole plan of the German Army High Command, and the encirclement of Vienna with a large number of troops could indeed bring a powerful deterrent to the officials and residents of the city, but the best way to do so was to use both "sound and color"!

For this, the German army high command specially prepared a super drama for the Austrians. After the German Army invaded Austria and Bohemia, German engineering troops were busy around Rosenheim overnight, and the project was not completed until the day before the operation, and they built a total of 33 medium and large temporary airship bases, enough for 400 Zeppelins!

However, the War Office was only able to find 125 airships of all kinds, so His Majesty the Supreme Kaiser waved his pen, and the Air Force and the Admiralty contributed their own strength, and by the day before the operation, a total of 382 airships had gathered around Rosenheim on this side of the German-Austrian border, of which 155 were large and super-large Zeppelins.

For a time, Rosenheim became the kingdom of the giants of the sky!

For a week, several large German printing houses worked overnight to print 50,000,000 leaflets before the operation, and it took 42 wagons of these leaflets to reach Rosenheim, and by the time of the departure on February 4, the bomb bays of each airship were filled with such leaflets, and even then, only half of the entire leaflets were finally loaded!

At 8 o'clock in the morning, the sky was already bright, and with the arrival of the scheduled time, one airship after another untied the cables tied to the ground, and the middle and low altitude of Rosenheim suddenly "dark clouds". Due to the large number and size of the airships, in order to ensure safety, the 382 airships took off in 11 batches, each group sailed one or two kilometers before the latter batch began to take off, and the cautious Germans also pre-set the flight altitude for different batches of airships, ranging from 400 to 3,000 meters.

In this way, wave after wave of airships did not all leave Rosenheim until 11 a.m. Then. The first airship had already flown over Linz, Austria.

In order to achieve the best results of such a "large-scale psychological offensive in history", Chen Tian and his propaganda warfare experts and airship warfare experts agreed that these airships should be allowed to fly all over Vienna, and it is best to produce a spectacle that "covers the sky and the sun". As a result, the airships that set off first were slower at first, and after the batches of airships gradually closed the distance, they gradually formed a predetermined formation, and then flew east at the same speed of 40 kilometers per hour.

Along the way, everyone who witnessed this scene was dumbfounded. To know. Usually a airship is 120-250 meters in length, 12-30 meters in diameter, and has a cross-sectional area of 1,500 square meters, nearly 400 airships are divided into different echelons and heights, and the entire formation will form a huge "dark cloud" with a total area of more than 1 million square meters! Coupled with the low height, the sheer size of a single airship, and the gray livery of those airships, ordinary people will inevitably mistake it for an alien invasion when they look at it!

Even the German officers and soldiers on the march along the way were speechless in surprise when they saw this scene. The long procession came to a halt involuntarily, and everyone looked up at the staggering sight, thousands of people without making a sound. There was only a slight hum of the airship's engine.

According to the arrangement of the German Army High Command. From the departure and departure of the huge airship formation to the delivery of leaflets, dozens of reporters accompanying the army were involved in the whole process, and reporters from the United States, Japan, Turkey, and other countries were also invited to accompany them. And specially arranged the camera for close-up and long-distance shooting.

Before making this plan, Chen Tian said to his senior generals:

"I hope not only that the Austrians will lose confidence in resistance because of fear, but also that the whole world will see this great scene! We're going to make a special promotional video and send it to ambassadors to take home to their governments and people! I want them to realize the terrible nature of the German Empire's air battlefleet, to pursue it, to worship it, to build their airship units! ”

Psychological offensive, political propaganda, and military inducement, this airship operation is destined to reap countless results!

At 3 p.m. on February 4, 1916, more than 10 kilometers east of Vienna. Provisional command of the 2nd Panzer Corps of the German Panzer Group.

"Haven't our airship units arrived yet?" As he spoke, General Fleming took out his pocket watch and looked at it, "It's an hour late!" ”

"General, don't worry too much, didn't the headquarters send a telegram in the morning saying that the airship unit has departed, let us prepare to cooperate?" Fleming's lieutenant reminded him that airships were no better than airplanes after all, and that a gust of wind could delay them for half an hour.

As it happened, the trouble encountered by the airship formation was unfortunately told by this inconspicuous little adjutant. At a distance of more than 60 km from Vienna. The huge German airship formation encountered a strong wind, and it was reasonable for the wind to blow in winter, and it did not bring any losses to this airship formation, but the formation that was originally arranged according to the plan was blown into a mess, and from the ground, they looked like a large group of smelling headless flies, a group in the east and a west area, and the air deterrent was greatly reduced with high hopes!

"We have to regroup again!" The captain of the LZ-086, Lieutenant Harp, was depressed, and it took more than an hour to assemble this large formation in the morning, and now it seemed that he had to do it all over again.

"I hope I'll be back before dark!" Sergeant Studenter, the navigator and machine gunner, also looked helpless, if there was no need to pay attention to flying in formation, then at the speed of their airship, I am afraid that it would have already flown back and forth between Rosenheim and Vienna.

The same is true for ship formations, especially those with more numbers and more complex ship types, the slower they tend to sail.

Fortunately, the wind soon stopped, and after a while, a light signal was emitted from the leading airship at the front, and Student took the telescope and looked at it carefully, and reported the leader's order from his mouth:

"Assemble with the 7th Squadron as the center, each team still maintains a predetermined altitude, pay attention to the surrounding friendly boats when moving, and safety first! Safety first! ”

After receiving the order, the engines of each airship began to accelerate, and the steering of the cigar-shaped behemoth in the air seemed quite laborious and slow, and there was only one formation training before, and basically the crew of each boat was cautious.

When the formation is gradually formed, from a certain airship in the air, the surrounding up, down, left, right, front, and back. Everywhere there are airships in the same gray livery, and their hulls are also marked with a prominent subway cross in the same place.

The huge formation of German airships marched forward and formed, and by 4 p.m. they were finally able to see the city of Vienna in front of them.

At the same time, the people of Vienna also discovered this huge dark cloud from the west. In the past two days, people have become accustomed to unnatural objects flying from the west, and German planes and airships have visited Vienna many times, and without exception, they have flown from the west. Therefore. People are starting to think that the west is a bad direction.

At this time, the inhabitants of Vienna were not yet clear about what this dark cloud would bring.

382 zeppelins, with a total emptiness of nearly 20 million cubic meters, with 2,676 German ** people and 32 military reporters, 1,078 tons of paper leaflets and unparalleled power, gradually approaching at a speed of 40 kilometers per hour.

As the sun was already in the west, the huge shadow cast by the airship formation entered Vienna first, and at this time, the pedestrians and vehicles in the streets, the adults and children cleaning the snow in the garden, and the women washing and cooking by the windows. And then there are the officials who are worried about the big windows in the conference room. People were facing west, their heads up, their eyes wide. Open your mouth.

God receives countless calls in this moment.

In the embassy area on Hernals Street, west of the city center, diplomats from the United States, Russia, Japan, the Netherlands, Spain, Norway, Sweden and other countries were also stunned by this scene, and they stood on the balcony or in front of the window one by one, forgetting in an instant who they were and forgetting their mission, but only sincerely admiring the greatness of mankind.

Against the backdrop of the blue sky, those huge gray objects seem to be invaders from outside the sky, silent and silent, but they give people a feeling of suffocation at the top of Mount Tai.

The whole of Vienna stopped breathing under this dark cloud.

At this time, even the thud of taking pictures is so harsh.

After a brief pause. Neutral people used every means to record this unprecedented spectacle, with cameras, notebooks, and brains. As for the Austrians, who were born and bred without any diplomatic immunity, adults, children, old people, women, except those who prayed on the spot, began to flock to the refuges—bomb shelters built during the war but never used, churches with crosses, and other safe places imaginable.

At 4:25 p.m., the pilot airship signaled that all airships were powered off.

At 4:28, the 1st Airship Squadron, which was at the forefront of the formation, began dropping leaflets. In a flash. Snowflakes of paper are falling from the sky, and even the biggest snow in winter has never been so magnificent.

In just five minutes, more than 2 million leaflets landed on the streets of Vienna, rooftop balconies, garden meadows, fountains and ditches, and even the Danube River was covered with leaflets in German, Hungarian, Czech, Polish and other languages.

"Germanic supremacy! Rejection of Slavic rule! Long live freedom! ”

This is just the beginning, in the next nearly an hour, more than 20 million leaflets with similar content fell from the sky, batch after batch, so many that people were frightened, so many that people were helpless, and there was nowhere to escape!

After a squadron of airships had finished distributing leaflets, they restarted their engines, flew over Vienna, turned again, flew over Vienna again, and finally flew back to Germany as a single squadron.

It wasn't until dusk, when the last German airships left Vienna and the nearly two-hour spectacular performance came to an end, that the Viennese's tense hearts were finally relieved.

Looking at the last few pieces of paper that were still fluttering in the wind, people suddenly felt like they were done with the sauna, and they finally got rid of the stuffy and oppressive atmosphere, and everyone greedily gulped in the fresh air.

Next, people can't help but worry, this time it's a piece of paper, will it be a bomb next time?

In Vienna's most beautiful court, high-ranking government officials gathered silently on both sides of the long table.

Everyone here has seen the thrilling scene before.

There are palpitations!

"What else do you think?" The voice of weakness came from the weak man, Mario, the prime minister of the central government of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the poor old man's heart could not bear this stimulation, and several times he felt that he was going to go with the old Austrian emperor.

There was silence in the huge conference room.

Even the two people who had quarreled the most before, Duke Andras and Duke Cabas, were silent as if they had lost their ability to speak.

"Why don't you wait until Her Majesty comes?" The Foreign Minister, Baron Léopold von Berchdald, whispered his proposal, and when the old Austrian Emperor Franz Joseph I was still there, he did not speak with such humility, Baron Condra was gone, Admiral Anton House was gone, and there were no more people in military uniforms in this conference room, and it was the turn of the former emperor to speak to the red man in front of him.

"I'm afraid Vienna is already surrounded by German troops! Even if the Empress comes, what can she do? Mario squinted, his eyes already somewhat numb, and although he had not yet received definite information, he guessed that the Germans should have almost completed the siege of Vienna. The original city defense of Vienna and the remnants of the troops withdrawn from St. Pölten still had a total of nearly 85,000 men, but as soon as Kondra left with his cronies, there was not much left.

However, General Offenberg, who suffered defeat in St. Pölten, did not leave Vienna with Kondla, and now, Vienna's defense is basically supported by him and another veteran, Baron Vladimir, who was the commander of Vienna's city defense and had made great contributions in the arrest of Count Albert's assassin, but later developments seemed to be a trap that led Austria-Hungary into a dead end.

Having seen the terrifying air power of the German army, General Offenberg and Baron Vladimir were sitting in silence at this time, and they were thinking more about how to launch this war without suspense with dignity.

"And ......" Mario was very reluctant, but at this time, he still told everyone the terrible news: "The Empress has returned to St. Petersburg this morning, and now, we are afraid that we are only ourselves!" ”

As soon as this remark came out, the following suddenly exploded, before which people regarded the Empress and Russia as the greatest hope, and when the situation got worse and worse and the hope was suddenly dashed, the sense of loss in people's hearts can be imagined.