"Shoot hits the target...... Well done, boys! ”

The sergeant who spoke, with a steel helmet covered with foliage, held a pair of camouflage binoculars with a clover embroidered with a clover pattern. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 Info next to him is a MK19 37 mm light anti-aircraft gun - the most basic and effective anti-armor weapon equipped by the Allied army, finalized and put into production in 1919, fast rate of fire, high accuracy, light and durable, easy to operate, so far no less than 30,000 guns have been manufactured, in addition to the seven European allies widely adopted, but also exported to Asia, the United States and African countries, becoming the most influential Krupp artillery another classic model.

With the clanging of empty shells and the clanging of the bolts closing, the gunner shouted calmly and powerfully: "Reloaded!" ”

As soon as the sergeant gives the order, the other gunner will turn the mechanical crank as fast as he can, thus aiming the muzzle at the new target.

"Wait...... The guy didn't stop, it was still moving, and it continued to shoot. Guys, one more shot! ”

Although the shooting did not change, the gunner cautiously reconfirmed the target through the direct sight before signaling the rope to fire.

The light anti-aircraft gun, which had a very low failure rate, roared as expected, and the sergeant in charge of observing the firing frowned. Although it was a clear and moonlit night, without the help of artificial light, he could only judge whether the shell hit or not, and it was difficult to intuitively judge the results of the shooting.

The crisp clanging sound and dull clanging sound came to the ears one after another, and except for the gunner, the rest of the crew members were waiting for the sergeant to speak.

After a few moments, the sergeant said with difficulty: "The target is still moving, we have not been able to kill it, the enemy's chariots are more difficult to deal with than we expected, those are not lightly armored reconnaissance chariots, they are probably infantry chariots of the British, or 'cowboy chariots' bought from the United States." ”

In the last war, the tracked chariots equipped by the German army began to show their edge, and played a positive role in sweeping the Entente countries; more than ten years after the war, the great powers were not willing to be left behind, and they have invested a lot of manpower and material resources in this new weapon, and the United States and Britain have relied on their own developed automobile industry, combined with their own land strategic thinking to establish their own chariot systems -- the reason why American chariots are called "cowboy chariots" is because they pay special attention to the mobility of chariots, Equip the vehicle with powerful and high-performance suspension to make it come and go like a cowboy. The British Army's primary mission was to defend its homeland against invasion from the European continent, so British tanks were divided into two types, the heavily armoured infantry support vehicles with superior firepower, and the Ranger fast mobile vehicles. In 1930, at a military parade held to celebrate the 65th birthday of King George V, the British Army publicly displayed for the first time a "super artifact" weighing more than 40 tons and equipped with twin turrets and triple machine gun turrets.

The German military decision-making department made long-term and careful preparations for the war against Britain, which can be seen from the stormy sea, land and air offensive on the day of the war. Judging from the information collected by the intelligence agencies, whether it is a six-ton light tank "Vickers" or a multi-turret heavy tank "Paladin", the thickness of the armor in the main part does not exceed 40 mm, and the armor-piercing ability of the MK19 anti-aircraft gun is enough to deal with these "British cans" at medium and close range, but each country has its own secret weapon, which has been common in previous wars.

Upon discovering the presence of British tanks on the battlefield that could not be effectively penetrated by anti-aircraft guns, the officers and men of the Irish Marine Corps were surprised but not panicked. The sergeant did not let his gunners make any more futile attempts, but ordered them to withdraw the armor-piercing shells from the chambers and replace them with cannon-fired flares.

Half a minute later, a small flare burst into an incandescent glow two or three hundred meters in front of the coalition position, and the half-hidden landscape of the lute in the moonlight was finally clearly revealed--the tracked combat vehicles marching in front of the attack array had a wide angular hull and an inverted bathtub-shaped turret, and their appearance and structure were not identical, some of them were equipped with a short-barreled gun in the front left front of the hull, and some had only a protruding machine gun barrel.

Realizing that the situation was not quite right, it was obviously not only this patriotic anti-aircraft artillery group, and in an instant, a few more flares would light up more areas in the field, and the coalition artillery fire had been firing fiercely for more than ten minutes, but there were not a few British tanks lying in the nest in sight, and among the tanks thrown into the attack, there were few vulnerable "Vickers"!

The sergeant's thick eyebrows were almost furrowed at the sight of these unnamed and unclear British tanks, but he did not intend to give up, but ordered the gunners to aim at the tracks of the enemy vehicles.

The flares provide near-daylight for a limited period of time. The gunners quickly loaded the armor-piercing shells and took advantage of the flares to take sight. The British tank they were eyeing had come to a distance of about two hundred meters from the Allied trench, with only one machine gun mounted on the front of its hull, and it was constantly spewing flames into the Allied positions, its turret had an arc similar to the edge of the bathtub, and in the center was a gun that looked similar to a light anti-aircraft gun.

With the hope of the entire artillery crew, another armor-piercing shot ejected into the chamber. Apparently because of the light, after waiting for more than ten seconds, the sergeant excitedly shouted: "We did it, great, we broke its right track, now it's time for it to stop advancing!" Yes, it stopped moving forward! ”

"Continue the attack or divert the target?" The gunner asked, tilting his head sideways.

Without hesitation, the sergeant replied, "Attack the next target in this way." ”

Unless it is a vehicle suspended by Christie, breaking the tracks is indeed an effective way to prevent the enemy vehicles from continuing to advance, but the real problem is that the exposed area of the tracks is only a small part of the front of the tank, separated by two or three hundred meters, and the visual environment is not ideal.

Watching the British chariots get closer and closer with the rumbling roar, the hands of the Irish paratrooper Gallaher began to tremble a little, and he now risked being hit by enemy machine gun bullets every time he fired, which felt like facing the Grim Reaper who was constantly wielding a scythe, and it couldn't be worse that once these steel monsters ran over the trenches, the anti-aircraft guns, heavy machine guns, etc., would definitely be swept away by them. Rifles and bayonets alone were not enough to stop the British infantry, but after the defensive line was breached, did people still have the courage to continue fighting?

After about half a minute in the bunker, Gallah took a deep breath, got up, raised his gun, and took aim in one go, but the flickering flares confused the vision, and the most eye-catching thing was the gunfire that burst out of the British tanks, but ordinary rifle bullets had no effect on these guys. When his eyes were finally able to adjust to the light, Gallah saw countless figures swaying behind the British tank, pulled the trigger after a slight adjustment, and then flew back to cover - how much of the defensive firepower could be maintained with such a combat rhythm?

Just as Gallah was gradually falling into despair, a loud explosion was suddenly heard in front of the position, and a moment later, another one, although the tremor from the ground was not as strong as the previous heavy artillery bombardment by the British army, but it was also felt that the power of the explosion was extraordinary.

"The enemy has run over the heavy mines we planted!" Gallah heard someone say with relief.

Immediately afterwards, a non-commissioned officer trotted along the trench and gave the order: "Everyone prepare sticky bombs, throw them as soon as the enemy tanks approach, all see the throwing and nail them in front of the position!" Grenades are also prepared, take out the chariots and immediately deal with the enemy infantry who will follow, and the rifles are loaded with bayonets! ”

Calming the panicked soldiers with a countermeasured defense, Gallah pulled out his bayonet from the scabbard, loaded the rifle with great agility, placed the rifle against the wall of the trench, and unscrewed all the grenades at hand, including the "sticky grenade" that was distributed to the front-line positions after landing - this is the nickname given by the soldiers to the M30 anti-tank grenade, which relies on magnetic attachment to the armor of the combat vehicle, and uses the jet effect of the hollow charge to penetrate the steel plate and kill the occupants. It is another technical equipment contributed by the Irish military industry to the Allied camp.

With these preparations ready, Gallah picked up his rifle, because he was not as comfortable as before, and he had to be more careful, but this time he just poked his head out, as if he had been beaten with a stick, and his head was blank, and the whole person suddenly fell into the trench, and it took him a long time to come to his senses. took off the steel helmet on his head and saw that the bullet that hit him was actually stuck on it, if it weren't for the good quality of this product, I am afraid that I would have died.

After a while, someone in the trench shouted: "Fifty meters, sticky bomb ready!" ”

The gunfire around them suddenly became much quieter, and it seemed that everyone was preparing to throw anti-tank grenades.

The front of the steel helmet was concave, and I don't know if it would affect its bulletproof effect, and Gallaher didn't care about it at this time, so he buttoned it to his head, picked up the rifle and stood up.

The grinding of the metal tracks sounded like it was right in front of it.

Before he could touch the placed anti-tank grenade, there was a short screech of cannonballs slashing through the air, and the fire, impact, and explosion rushed in an instant, causing his mind to crash again, and the man staggered to the ground.

What's the situation?

Behind the Allied trenches, more than a dozen "Celtic warriors" were deploying their guns in the wheat field, aiming at the British tanks by the moonlight and the firelight on the battlefield. These 20-ton medium tanks were originally designed and developed as Allied standard tanks, so they required simple structure, balanced performance, moderate cost, and the mass-produced version fully met these standards, but due to the influence of complex factors such as national strategy and political interests, this type of tank failed to become the general equipment of the Allied camp, and was only in service in Ireland, Germany, Spain, and Austria-Hungary, and by the time of the outbreak of the war, the total output of "Celtic Warriors" was less than 800, far less than the main tank of the German Army's 30-ton class" Teutonic Knights".

Balanced performance does not mean mediocre performance, the "Celtic Warrior" was put into production in 1924, and its technical performance indicators were not outdated even in 1933, and from 1930 onwards, most of the "Celtic Warriors" successively replaced the original Krupp 42 times diameter 50 mm gun with a new 56 times diameter 50 mm gun - in the case of ordinary armor-piercing shells, it can penetrate 60 mm thick homogeneous armor at a distance of 500 meters, and the armor-piercing thickness of 100 meters is 80 mm, If tungsten alloy armor-piercing bullets are used, the armor-piercing ability is increased by about 20% on the basis of ordinary armor-piercing bullets. Its excellent performance made it a standard feature on German medium vehicles, and even the early Teutonic Knights chose it as their main weapon.

(End of chapter)