"Reich Marshal, Walter. Wink played well and scared the British away, and Dublin was kept for the time being. Pen ~ Fun ~ Pavilion www.biquge.info"

At noon on 5 May, as soon as the Chief of the General Staff Kesselring, who had traveled from Tsosen to Berlin to attend a meeting of the High Command, saw Hersmann and immediately told him about the "Battle of Sworth".

Although the Battle of Sworth was only a clash of two brigade-sized units, it was decisive for the situation on the island of Ireland. The British temporarily abandoned their plans to attack Dublin and went on the defensive, which gave the Germans the opportunity to increase their forces in Ireland...... Of course, the British could also massively increase their troops in Ireland.

Although Germany had sea supremacy and air superiority, it was not yet able to cut off maritime communication between Northern Ireland and Scotland.

Because after the German landing in Ireland, the fighter units of the British Royal Air Force not only gave up the struggle for air supremacy in the English Channel, but also almost ignored the air defense of southern England, and used all their strength on the air defense of Northern Ireland, Scotland and the Iceland-Scotland route.

At the same time, the British Home Fleet spent most of its energy on mine warfare in the waters near Ireland, not only dispatching fast mine-laying cruisers and destroyers to lay mines, but also using a large number of submarines to lay mines on the Brest-Cork Bay shipping lane, which also added a lot of trouble to the German army's reinforcement of the island of Ireland.

It was not until the morning of May 5 that the steamers carrying the 3 Panzer Division, under the layers of destroyers and minesweepers, all arrived at Cork Bay, much later than originally planned.

However, the airlift to Dublin proceeded relatively smoothly. In addition to the 7th Airborne Division, which had been airborne in Dublin from the beginning, 1 paratrooper regiment, 1 parachute anti-tank battalion, 1 tank battalion and 1 artillery regiment of the 22nd Airborne Division were also airlifted to Dublin on the morning of May 4 and 5.

In addition, the 1st Marine Division, which arrived in Cork on May 2, has basically completed the unloading operation, and the troops are heading to Dublin one after another.

"By tomorrow evening at the latest, our troops in Dublin will be able to increase to nearly 50,000 men in three divisions." "It's slower than planned, but it's generally satisfying." ”

Hersman shook his head slightly, "But the British are moving troops to Northern Ireland faster, faster than we originally predicted, so we must also speed up our actions." ”

On his desk were two reports from the Reich's General Security and the Military Intelligence (a development of the intelligence agency of the General Staff and under Hersman's control), both of which pointed out that the British were going mad and were transporting troops to Northern Ireland, and had even drawn many troops from the south of England to Ireland.

"The British are ready to fight us in Ireland, which is consistent with the Sea Lion Project's master plan for the Battle of Ireland, but the British are more fierce and determined," Hersman said. But this is better, the bigger the battle of Ireland is fought, the faster Britain will fall. If all the elite units of the British Army were wiped out in Ireland, the British Isles might soon be surrendered without a fight. With steel mills, shipyards, and aircraft factories on the island of Britain, Europe's industrial output could match that of the United States. ”

Although Hersman had always been a staunch anti-British, it was never his idea to reduce Britain to ruins. The real victory is to get the British industrial center in its entirety. So the situation in Ireland is right now in Hersman's hands - unlike southern England, which is full of factories and big cities, Ireland is a big rural village, full of pastures and potato fields, and it is not easy to break them. It would have been ideal to fight the British Army there.

"And the British Empire is actually finished, but the British themselves don't know it." Hersman laughed and said: "Although we are trying to defend Dublin, in reality we don't necessarily need Dublin, it is enough to have Cork Bay." Because we have a lot of long-range aircraft, if we had built a large air base in Cork Bay, the Fokker Zero, P.108, S.M.79, JU88, DO217 and He-219 would have a combat radius of the north-west of Scotland, and those planes would have covered the north-east of Scotland from Bergen.

As long as Cork Bay is in our hands, the British mainland will be in our pockets, and the amount of supplies imported from overseas will be at least fifty or sixty percent less than it is now. So there will be no suspense in the decisive battle on land in Ireland, we don't need to take the initiative to attack Belfast, just take the defensive. By the time the airfield at Cork Bay is expanded, we will be able to force the British into a death-defying offensive with bombing and blockades. This would allow us to win the battle of Ireland with a ground force equivalent to one-third to one-half of the British army. ”

Although the terrain of the island of Ireland is flat, it is not very wide, but it is an island of 84,000 square kilometers. Too many troops can't be put away, and it's impossible to rely on mechanized troops to fight a blitzkrieg or a big in-depth assault, because you can't get to the beach in a few clicks. As long as the belligerents do not completely lose their sea supremacy, they can take advantage of the night or the weather that is not suitable for aircraft sorties to send supplies to the troops on the island, so it is unlikely that they will completely cut off the rear route of the British troops on the island. The greatest possibility is that the British and German armies will fight a war of attrition on the island. Due to the limitations of the island's terrain, this war of attrition is bound to be more favorable to the defenders.

Kesselring's brows kept furrowing, he quietly listened to Hersman's words, pondered for a while, and then spoke: "There is nothing to worry about in the battle of Ireland, the absolute advantage is on our side, and we can always win." But the situation on the Eastern Front has been worrying lately, with both Marshal Guderian and Senior General Rommel reporting that the Soviet Air Force has become increasingly frequent in cross-border reconnaissance and that spy infiltration has been rampant. Moreover, the intelligence services also detected that the Soviet Union's No. 2 battleship, the Soviet Union, and the Kronstadt-class battlecruiser's No. 1 ship, the Kronstadt-class battlecruiser, began to move towards Molotovsk without completing all outfitting...... In the opinion of the General Staff, all these circumstances indicate that the USSR is about to start a war! ”

Germany had long known that the Soviet Union was preparing for war, and it was impossible for a military mobilization of several million people to hide from an opponent like Germany, who had been in wartime for a long time and had maintained high alert in all respects.

However, preparing for war does not mean that war is about to start, and the mobilization of the Soviet Union can also be defensive. But the transfer of two Soviet-class battleships and one Kronstadt-class battleship from Leningrad to Molotovsk was clearly preparing for an offensive.

Because the anti-ship capabilities of the Luftwaffe and naval aviation were obvious to all, the lead ships of the Soviet Navy could not play a role in the Baltic. Even once the Soviet offensive on land began, it was highly likely that these 3 valuable warships would be blown up and sunk in the harbor. Therefore, the Soviet Union had to transfer these three warships to the safety of Molotovsk in advance, and then attack from there and coordinate with the British and American naval fleets.

In addition, the intensive cross-border reconnaissance of aircraft was clearly also preparing for the offensive. If the Red Army had been preparing only for defense, the main theater of operations would have been on the territory of the USSR, and there would have been no need to repeatedly reconnoiter German territory. Moreover, such reconnaissance can easily become the fuse for the outbreak of war, and it will certainly be cautious for the side that wishes to maintain peace.

"The Soviets are waiting for us to increase our troops in Ireland in a big way," Hersman couldn't help frowning at the thought of the Soviets, which were moving towards war step by step. "It seems that Stalin did not want to live with a united Europe after all."

Hersman then laughed again, saying, "It is not easy to delay the outbreak of the Soviet-German war until now...... In fact, Stalin reluctantly waged war when the international situation was unfavorable to the Soviet Union. As long as we deal with it in the right way, we will win. ”

The so-called correct approach naturally refers to the "blue plan". The general policy is to first take the defensive, open the door, lure the enemy deep, then annihilate the enemy in the Polish plain, and finally counterattack to seize Ukraine and the Caucasus, forcing the Soviet Union to cede land and sue for peace.

As for the destruction of the Soviet Union, it was never the means that Hersmann wanted to take, because that would cause Germany's vitality to be over-depleted by the Soviet Union, and thus give the United States a respite. The United States will defeat Japan, and at the same time strengthen its control over South America, forming a "US sphere of influence" in North and South America + the Asia-Pacific region to compete with Germany -- although this is the outcome of the war that Hitler's government is willing to accept, it is something that Hersmann does not want to see.

Hersmann thought for a moment and then said: "Albert, at today's meeting of the High Command, you should try to emphasize the war potential of the Soviet Union, and you must let Hitler know that the Soviet Union is an opponent that is difficult to defeat from the outside. If we went to war with the Soviet Union, it would be a long and protracted war of attrition. Victory at a lower cost was possible only if the resources and population of the USSR were fully consumed, while preserving our own vitality as much as possible.

Of course, until then, we should make a final effort to achieve lasting peace between the Soviet Union and Germany. ”

"For peace?" Kessellin was stunned for a moment, and immediately shook his head, "This can't be...... And what kind of peace conditions can we give? ”

"I know it can't be," said Hersmann, waving his hand, "but we should make it clear to the German people, the people of Europe, to every Soviet person, that we have no ambitions for the territory of the Soviet Union, that we do not want to destroy the Soviet Union, that we want to live in peace with the Soviet Union...... In addition, the difference between us and the USSR was not the struggle of the two peoples, Germany and Russia, for living space, but the difference of line between National Socialism and Scientism. It's a disagreement between comrades! (To be continued.) )