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The Germans conquered Liege with Krupp 420 mm howitzers and some 305 mm howitzers loaned by Austria-Hungary. Because at the time of the construction of the forts in Liège, Belgium considered the largest mobile cannon on land to be a 210 mm howitzer, which was not designed to withstand shells from larger siege guns.

After the fall of the fortress of Liège, German engineers quickly repaired the railroad damaged by Belgium, and German trains began to transport German troops to Belgium without stopping, with up to 500 cars crossing the Rhine every day. Initially, 2,160 trains per day passed through the Cologne railway bridge, almost every ten minutes, to transport troops and war supplies. The million-strong German team entered Belgium with great spirits.

By the morning of 17 August, the German 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Corps, in accordance with Schlieffen's plan, continued to sweep the remaining Belgian troops, forcing them to retreat to Antwerp.

The British Expeditionary Force had arrived by this time. However, as soon as Rouen came ashore, he assembled in the areas of Le Cato and Maubèges, where he was warmly welcomed by the French and Belgian populaces along the way. On 17 August, Sir French, commander of the British Expeditionary Force, met with General Langrezak, commander of the French 5th Army, and misunderstandings and antagonism arose due to disagreements on some specific issues.

On 20 August, the German 1st Kruger Army attacked Brussels. The Belgian army was vulnerable to the powerful German army, and the desperate Brussels, without the aid of the British expeditionary force, surrendered without a fight. Heavily armed German lancers armed with flagpole spears appeared on the streets of the Belgian capital. A grand military parade was held. The German army was huge and stretched, and the number and equipment surprised the Belgians. Most of the frightened citizens just watched from the sidelines.

After the German army occupied Brussels, at that time, Western Europe, to which Brussels belonged, was an hour behind Central Europe, where the German capital Berlin was located, and Germany wanted to erase this time difference, so it ordered the clocks of all government buildings and stations in Brussels to be set one hour forward. All residents' watches and home clocks are also subject to the usual change to enter German time.

At the beginning, the German troops who entered the city were relatively civilized. At the beginning of the city. Three German soldiers on bicycles also politely asked passers-by how to get to the North Railway Station. But soon, the German troops entering the city were coldly shot by some Belgian militants and partisans. So the Germans began to return fire, shooting civilians. If the battle develops into a house-to-house war. Premises are immediately burned or shelled. Some villages were razed to the ground. Therefore, in any form of war, once the flames of war are ignited, no matter which side is passively involved or which side is actively initiated, the pain will be inflicted on every civilian indiscriminately.

Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the German Army: "Our march into Belgium must have been brutal, but we were also fighting for our lives, who stood in the way." Whoever has to reap the consequences of his own life. ”

General Conrad was the commander of the Austro-Hungarian army, and in 1906 he became Chief of the General Staff on the recommendation of Crown Prince Ferdinand. August 12th. At the urging of Archduke Ferdinand, he sent 460,000 troops into Serbia, began a war to punish the Serbs, and soon crossed the plains of Serbia.

After the German army occupied Belgium, it continued the Schlieffen plan and sent 5 army groups through Brussels and swooped straight to the northwestern border of France, aiming at Paris!

At this time, the chief of the general staff of the French army was Joseph. Jacques. Césaire. Xia Fei. After the outbreak of the war between Germany and Luxembourg, he was originally the commander of the Third Army of the French Army. Messimi recommended the meritocracy, and promoted Xia Fei, who was not outstanding at the time, but was relatively young, and was politically moderate, and made him deputy chairman of the Supreme Military Council and chief of the General Staff.

Xia Fei imagined that the German army could not advance west of Luxembourg, so he did not send troops to support the German attack on Belgium. Just as Schlieffen had expected, in August, the white-gloved officers of the five French armies gathered their brigades and marched majestically to Alsace-Lorraine, eager to regain the territory lost in the Franco-Prussian War. At this time, France admired the "offensive theory" put forward by the famous French general Fuxi: if you want to win, you must move forward", emphasizing the attack at all costs! The military plan of the French was: to get to Berlin before the Germans captured Paris!

Schlieffen's strategy was to use a small left wing to draw the French army in Alsace-Lorraine, and to use a strong right wing to outflank the western part of Paris through Belgium, so as to take Paris in one fell swoop. Because Paris has long played a strategic role in the defense of France, all the major railway lines concentrate on and pass through this political and cultural center, which is surrounded and protected by fourteen inner and twenty-five outer batteries. Taking Paris is almost the same as taking France.

The German defenders on the Alsace-Lorraine position were the Sixth Army of Crown Prince Precht of Bavaria, as well as von Anderson Precht's Army. General Helingen's Seventh Army. Their task was to pin down as many French troops as possible.

On 7 August, the French Seventh Army attacked from the Vosges Mountains and engaged the Germans in a brutal hand-to-hand battle. Groups of French cavalry began their reconquest charge and battle to the rousing military music and drums of the "La Marseillaise"! After hours of hard fighting, they finally captured the Alsatian border town of Artekich, but were unable to take advantage of the victory to capture Mulhouse.

On August 14, the French army launched the "Battle of Lorraine". The French General Bo's "Alsace Army" relaunched an offensive on Alsace, Dibay's 1st Army and Decastelno's 2nd Army also attacked Salbull and Moregerlang in the Lorraine region at the same time, and the German 6th Army of Bavarian Crown Prince Ruprecht and Herringen's 7th Army in Lorraine fought and retreated as planned for the first four days in order to lead the French army into a "trap".

On 20 August, the French attacked the fortified positions of the Salbul and Mogerlande armies, due to a lack of adequate artillery cover and errors in the use of tactics. Suffering a serious setback under heavy German shelling, Morrilang was crammed with the corpses of French soldiers all over the mountains.

The French team suffered a setback in attack. There is an important reason, that is, the French infantry wore blue pants and red shirts on the battlefield at that time, which was very conspicuous on the flat ground. Their artillerymen wore black and gold uniforms, and their goals were particularly clear. During the charge, the French army generally appeared in the best formation of the nineteenth century, with white-gloved, beautifully groomed officers walking in front of the phalanx. Their officers and men braved artillery fire and machine-gun charges, but unfortunately, courage could not overcome the guns. German machine guns and shells often hit the French army, and the Germans finally extinguished the brilliant flames of French dogma "attackism" with artillery fire.

The attack on Lorraine was frustrated, but it did not discourage Xia Fei, who believed that the main force of the German left flank was entangled. The time has come to break through to the middle. The French General Staff always believed that the German army was weak in the center and that the French army had an advantage in this area. He first dismissed Commander Bono and two other division commanders, transferred one regular division and three reserve divisions to augment the 7th Army, specially formed an "Alsatian Army", recalled the retired one-armed General Bo to command this army, and prepared to relaunch the offensive.

On August 20, Xia Fei issued an order to attack the Ardennes Mountains. Ruffy's French 3rd Army advanced to the southern part of the mountains, tasked with driving the German 5th Army under the command of Prince back to the area from Metz to Tionville. It was then besieged and the Briais iron ore area was recovered.

Dranger's French 4th Army attacked from the northern part of the mountain. The task was to encircle and annihilate the German 4th Army under the command of Albrecht, and if the two French armies succeeded in the center, the right and left flanks of the German army would be severed.

On 21 August, Chauffeur drew three divisions of about 50,000 men from Army Group Ruff and formed a Lorraine corps with four other reserve divisions, which was garrisoned between Verdun and Nancy under the leadership of General Monuri to cover the offensive in the direction of Lorraine and the Ardennes.

In the next four days, the two sides fought a bloody battle in the Ardennes Mountains, the German army had the advantage of strength and artillery, far beyond the expectations of the French army, in addition to the six active armies identified by the French army before the war, there were also four reserve armies that joined after rapid mobilization, and Xia Fei confusedly treated the opponent's 10 armies as 6 armies.

It's a classic encounter. The 14 French and German divisions attacking Gordon collided head-to-head.

The German tactics were more correct, digging trenches, and the French army always despised trench combat training, using bayonet charges, and was swept down by machine guns one after another. Of course, the French artillery also inflicted heavy casualties on the Germans, and thousands of dead people still stood, leaning against the buttresses of what appeared to be a 60-degree slope made of piles of corpses.

Unlike the French, the German vanguard conducted reconnaissance of the Ardennes Forest and placed sentries when the main forces entered the forest. Reconnoisers warned them that the French were approaching. The Germans built a strong defensive base on the heavily jungled hills, armed with enough machine guns and artillery. The French attacked again and again, but with no effect other than death. A third of the French soldiers were shot and killed. On August 22 alone, the French lost 27,000 casualties.

On 23 August, the French began to retreat with heavy losses, with the 3rd Army retreating to Verdun and the 4th Army retreating to Sterné and Sedan to reorganize the defensive line on the west bank of the Moos, and the Battle of the Ardennes ended in a crushing defeat for the French.

On August 22-23, in the Battle of Mons, Alexander, Germany. Feng. General Cloke's First Army, in addition to repelling the French forces rushing to this area to support the Belgians, also repelled the British expeditionary force. At the Sambre River, the French Fifth Army was routed by the German Second and Third Armies, and the heaviest fighting was concentrated in four days, from 20 to 23 August, with a total of 300,000 French casualties.

This time, the results of the frontal engagement on the front, which was more than 230 kilometers wide, enabled Germany to seize the strategic initiative on the Franco-German battlefield. The Anglo-French forces were defeated on all fronts north of Verdun and were forced to retreat south, and the French offensive plan was thwarted.

After the French offensive was frustrated, Prince Ruprecht, the Crown Prince of Bavaria, was unwilling to play only a secondary role in such a decisive battle for Germany, and did not want to retreat himself when others attacked, and he began to constantly put pressure on the German staff headquarters to change the plan of the left flank to continue to retreat and immediately counterattack.

Schlieffen, the chief of the German General Staff, refused the request of Prince Ruprecht, Crown Prince of Bavaria, because the French 1st and 2nd armies did not enter the trap set by the Germans. Schlieffen still insisted on drawing two corps from this area to join the right flank attack force and strengthen the right flank attack. Therefore, when the 3 armies on the left flank of the French army were all defeated and retreated, and the 2 armies on the right flank were still struggling on the Lorraine front, the 5 armies on the right flank and the center of the German army, as well as the two armies on the left flank, were like a sickle sweeping across Europe, cutting from Belgium to France and approaching Paris!

"Ginger is still old and spicy! Schlieffen still has to be more strategic than Moltke! Song Xiaofei received the battle report of Schlieffen's refusal of Prince Ruprecht's request for a counterattack, and suddenly jumped up from his chair and said to himself. Song Xiaofei has a strong premonition that next, the outcome of Germany's defeat in the Battle of the Marne River in history may be rewritten, and the fate of Paris and the French may also be completely rewritten! (To be continued......) u