The battle had the tone and melody of a musical master, and on May 20 and in the days that followed, the force flew through the sky. ~~~ Its combat units rushed into the sky over Crete with a thunderous crescendo, covering everything. For the first time in history, the Airborne Forces landed in front of the enemy and defeated them with supplies and support from the air

Hitler sent the paratroopers into the cold, which was undoubtedly a disaster for the 15th Panzer Army, which had three formed paratroopers, and in addition to cursing the damned Wehrmacht grandsons in his office, Li Mo was also working on a new parachute battle plan, targeting the island of Malta.

The strategic location of this Malta island is also very important, as long as Germany occupies the island of Malta, and then uses the airport above, and arranges some planes on it, it can cut off the Mediterranean route between Britain and France, and the various strategic materials plundered by Britain and France from the Middle East and Southeast Asia will not want to be transported back to Britain from the Mediterranean, and must make a detour of more than 20,000 nautical miles to return to Britain, which is a huge disaster for Britain.

Germany's occupation of the island of Malta has another stealth strategic advantage, that is, between Italy and North Africa, a route will be established that can be protected by the air force at any time, even if Germany does not have a single warship in the Mediterranean, and is not very afraid of the British and French fleets, Germany only needs to transport dozens of submarines to deal with the British and French submarines. Historically, Rommel was in North Africa because of the lack of adequate supplies, which led to failure. Now, if Li Mo can take the island of Malta, then the history of North Africa must be rewritten.

Don't underestimate the North African front, at this time, Sicily, Malta, and the first line formed a sharp sword through the Mediterranean. Straight into the Mediterranean lifeline of the British army. The supplies needed by the North African Corps will continue to be sent to Africa, and then directly threaten Egypt and West Asia from the sea, and at the same time, the offensive of the North African Corps can easily drive the British army out of the Mediterranean.

Pro-German forces in Turkey and Syria and Iraq in West Asia would smoothly come to power and break away from British control. Taking advantage of this advantage, it would be easy to defeat the remnants of the British army in West Asia, and thus Germany's broad southern flank, from the Persian Gulf to the North Atlantic, would be once and for all.

Even if an operation against the Soviet Union was launched, it could echo the offensive of Army Group A from the Caucasus and flank the Soviet army from the north and south. In addition, the two sea transportation routes from the Bosphoru Strait and the Dani Strait to the Black Sea and from the Persian Gulf to the Caspian Sea by land were also important sea lines of communication for the Soviet Union. It was also an important lifeline for the Soviet Union to accept supplies from its allies in the future war against the Soviet Union. Blocking this road was also an important move to strangle the Soviet Union.

In addition, Germany has other strategic options, after taking Egypt, to take the Suez Canal, which can completely turn the Mediterranean into an inland sea of the European Union. The Middle East, colonized by Britain and France, was completely exposed to the torrent of German steel. It is not known that Britain and France are losing oil in the Middle East. Will it become a country with a serious oil shortage, like Germany?

That's the strategy for the future, while it's two months now. Limmer had to get the paratroopers of the 15th Panzer Army to strike again, and Malta was only ninety kilometers away from the Italian island of Sicily, which was really not a distance.

Li Mo also has no way, Hitler has already stated that he will not use paratroopers on a large scale, but Li Mo has to hand in a campaign plan for the large-scale use of paratroopers at this time, if it is replaced by someone else, most of them will let Hitler go to the end, of course, Hitler will not do this to Li Mo, unhappy but sure, you are not a slap in the face of the great Führer. But for the sake of Germany's future strategy, Limer had to carry out this plan. Hitler and his old man should be angry if they want to be angry, but Li Mo still had no choice but to hand over the parachute plan to Hitler.

Limer's plan was written in great detail, and he made it very clear why Germany wanted to occupy the island of Malta, and Hitler knew the strategic advantage that Germany had gained by occupying the island of Malta. Li Mo's previous battle plan was usually approved in one day, but this time Li Mo waited for five days, and Hitler finally approved Li Mo's parachute plan.

On July 22, 1940, Li Mo was approved by Hitler to carry out the parachute plan, and Li Mo waited for Hitler's approval for a few days, and was not idle, trying his best to collect relevant information about the island of Malta.

There was originally a British infantry division stationed on Malta, but the British army in Sicily, the Greek and New Zealand troops, all retreated to Malta, and now the island has nearly 50,000 troops, the British and French air forces have three flying groups, 80 "Spitfire" fighters that Britain has recently produced, a kind of piston aircraft comparable to the BF109, 40 bombers, and a full aviation regiment.

In addition, Britain urgently sent about 20,000 tons of various strategic goods to the island of Malta. As for the British Mediterranean fleet, it can't help much except transportation, and Li Mo doesn't fight a naval war with them, and Germany doesn't have naval strength in the Mediterranean, as for the Italian navy, it looks strong, and it has been beaten by the British fleet several times, and it can't help Li Mo.

After Li Mo analyzed the British army, he began to take stock of the strength in his hands, Li Mo could use only three paratrooper divisions, and one aviation army to provide support for himself, all of which were deployed on Sicily, which could easily support all of Li Mo's actions.

Li Mo discussed the battle, how could it be without Rommel? At this time, Rommel was still the commander of the 15th Army, and Rommel's latest appointment would take a few days to come down, and Rommel most likely went to other places to serve as the commander of the army. The two men began to have a heated discussion in front of a huge sand table:

"Li Mo, we have three paratrooper divisions, they are all light weapons and light artillery, these 30,000 people, without the support of the armored division, if they take the liberty of parachuting, they will not even have a chance to retreat, waiting for them can only be annihilated, if you don't come up with a perfect plan, I will not agree to you to carry out this risky plan."

Rommel's bullish temper has come up, and it seems that Li Mo must come up with some "dry goods" to persuade Rommel.

"Hehe, of course my commander, we have been cooperating for so long, when did you see me arbitrarily, those three elite paratrooper divisions, I am not sure, dare to send them into the tiger's mouth?"

"Then please tell me."

"I plan it this way, the first step is to bomb the airfield on the island of Malta, and their chicken coops will be smashed first, so that the British and French forces will completely lose the support of the air force, so that our paratroopers will not be afraid of the enemy's air threat.

In the second step, we will use fifty ju89 planes to parachute tank No. 3, and then use hundreds of transport planes to parachute a division of paratroopers and three base ammunition, so that we will have a paratrooper armored division, and the task of this paratrooper division is to occupy the airfield on the island.

The third step is to wait for all the planes to reverse the flight, and we are using all the planes to parachute once, but if it is not possible, the three airborne divisions will be used together.

…… (To be continued.) )

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