The great victory of the German army on the Western Front caused panic on the side of the Entente. At the same time, although the Allied war on the Eastern Front held back the Austro-Hungarian offensive, Turkey and Bulgaria prevented the Russian army from holding the Germans in check, leaving the Germans with more troops to gather on the Western Front.

When it came to life and death, France had to fight back and withdraw troops from the Eastern Front to prevent the German army from attacking Paris.

However, the successive victories of the German army and the successive defeats of the French army cast a shadow on France, thinking that the outcome of the Franco-Prussian War would be repeated again, and France would also pay reparations for the defeat and land. The frustration of the French also affected the mood of the British allies who rushed to reinforcements, and made them even more discouraged from the future of the war.

On February 4, the German army had advanced into Paris, and the French political axe was forced to retreat to Bordeaux, and at the same time announced the defense of Paris.

The whole world is watching whether the Entente can hold Paris, and if Paris falls, it will be a heavy blow to the Entente, and some countries in the atmosphere will also fall to the camp of the Central Powers.

The German Army, with the help of white phosphorus bombs, a weapon of mass destruction, was able to quickly seize the fortress and bring Belgium to its knees. Lie said that the fortress fell so quickly that the French army did not have time to prepare the defense of the French mainland, giving the Germans an opportunity.

Moltke Jr. of the German General Staff strictly implemented the battle plan against France formulated by Schlieffen, the former chief of the General Staff, in 1905. Russia was pinned down by the million-strong armies of Austria-Hungary, Turkey, and Bulgaria, so Germany used only 9 divisions to monitor Russia, while on the Western Front it concentrated 7 army groups, a total of 78 divisions, divided into left and right flanks with Metz as the axis. 2 armies on the left flank, with a total of 23 divisions, guarding the positions in the Alsace and Lorraine regions on the Franco-German border south of Metz; Five armies on the right flank, with a total of 55 divisions, broke through the northern border of France through Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.

Since the end of the Franco-Prussian War, in order to avenge the defeat, the French army began to formulate one war plan after another against Germany from 1872, and there were as many as 17 before the start of the war. The latest plan was drawn up by the Chief of the General Staff of the French Army, General Chauffeur, the "Plan No. 17". At the heart of the plan was the idea that the Germans would be massed along the fortified Franco-German border, so that the French would launch an aggressive offensive here and regain the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine, which had been lost in the Franco-Prussian War. When the German army on the right flank invaded Belgium, several main French army groups launched an attack on the German left flank according to "Plan No. 17". However, the initial battles showed that "Plan No. 17" was bad. At Greene, the French 1st and 2nd Armies were overwhelmed by the attack on the German defenses at Saarburg and Molange. After the occupation of Belgium by the right-wing German army, nearly a million men and horses of its 5 armies, like a wielded sickle, penetrated diagonally from Belgium into France.

Walking on the far right was the 1st Army under the command of Kluk, about 300,000 men, which was seen as the main force of the right flank and the main attacking force of the march to Paris. The army group entered France from Belgium on 30 January. On February 6, the Germans captured Namur. In order to hinder the advance of this German right-flank force, Xia Fei mobilized troops from the Grimm battlefield to form the French 6th Army, which was commanded by Mao Laoli.

By 9 February, the vanguard of the German Army Group Crouc had advanced to only 15 miles from Paris, and the efforts of the main French army under the command of Xapé to stop the German right flank had failed. The Parisians were panicking, and the last of the French political axes were also involved in Bordeaux.

At dawn on 10 February, the Germans concentrated 500 artillery pieces on Paris and launched an attack on the Correy area north of Paris.

The Correy line became the main area of resistance in Paris near the ground. The French Sixth Army had only about 90,000 men in total. These forces were not enough to build a strong defense over the entire area, so much so that the French fought very hard.

In many fierce battles in the Correy defensive area, the French put up stubborn resistance to the superior German forces, holding them back in the areas of Santis and Chantilly.

On 14 February, the Germans broke through into the Santis area and tried to weave a detour through the flank and rear of the French Sixth Army. Although the Germans wiped out a large number of French forces in the battle of Chantilly, the sleet turned the roads outside Paris into a mud swamp as the weather changed, almost paralyzing the German offensive. The Germans were forced to halt their advance on all fronts until the ground froze after the sleet. The temporary halt of the German offensive gave the French precious respite.

On 15 February, the French High Command successively withdrew some units from the German-French front as reserves, so that the French Sixth Army could get the necessary rest, and new reserves were also arriving in a steady stream.

Paris became the target of the bombing of the German airships, which purchased more than 2,000 rounds of white phosphorus bombs from the Chinese Empire at a large price and bombed the city of Paris every day, causing a sea of fire in the city of Paris and more than tens of thousands of casualties every day.

During the Battle of Paris, the French Air Force and the Luftwaffe fought stubbornly, and French reconnaissance planes, armed with pistols, took off to attack the Luftwaffe Zeppelins and shot down one or two. But soon the Luftwaffe also sent planes, which also engaged French reconnaissance planes with pistols and rifles.

Both sides used reconnaissance planes as fighter jets, inspired by last year's air force exercises of the Chinese Empire. At that time, the Chinese Empire dispatched the Jian-1 fighter jet, and its powerful attack power shocked the two major military groups, and then each began to develop a fighter jet. However, due to the restrictions on the export of equipment and technology of the Chinese Imperial fighter jets and the registration of patents, after watching the large-scale exercises of the Chinese Empire's navy, land and air force, various countries did not want to have friction with the Chinese Empire, so they did not dare to directly imitate them, but found another way to seek ideas.

New ideas and new designs take time, and in the field of aviation, the Chinese Empire is in an absolute monopoly hegemony, with more than 200 airlines in the world, of which more than 150 are in China, and the top 20 in the world's aviation power ranking are all of the Chinese Empire.

However, the industrial bases of European countries were there, and after visiting the advanced fighter jets of the Chinese Empire, they soon had a research and development project for their own fighter jets.

Germany developed the Pigeon fighter. However, it is interesting to note that this fighter was not invented by the Germans themselves, but by the Austro-Hungarians, who were already known as Bo Xishan.

The pigeon machine is the Austrian engineer Mr. Igoetrich (Igoetrich) long-term observation of the maple winged fruit species when falling, with the wind fluttering in the smooth phenomenon of flying, aroused his association of making airplanes, and after many tests of a variety of different shapes of the wing surface surname obtained. In 1910, referring to the characteristics of a cat demon monoplane secretly photographed by Mr. Trajanvuia, a Romanian lawyer in France, near Yanjing Nanyuan Airlines in China, he commissioned the Lohnerwerke machine factory in Vienna, Austria-Hungary, to build his first self-designed aircraft, and successfully tested it in November 1911.

As soon as the Austro-Hungarian pigeon monoplane was finalized, it was violently suppressed and sanctioned by the Chinese Imperial Aviation Management Committee, claiming that it had stolen the design of the Chinese Imperial Cat Demon aircraft, and filed a lawsuit against the Austro-Hungarian Nole Machine Factory. Under pressure from the Chinese Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire convicted the Noeller Machine Factory of infringement, which led to the bankruptcy of the factory, and Iyi-Ellichi was fined 50,000 dragon dollars, and his family was bankrupt, leaving only his pants, so he left the Austro-Hungarian Empire in a fit of anger and went to Germany.

However, the pigeon did not stop there. Upon his arrival in Germany, he was taken in by the German side. The German side ordered it to continue to design the pigeon aircraft for Germany, and asked it to avoid colliding with the Chinese Empire in terms of appearance design.

At first, there were only pigeon reconnaissance planes and trainer planes, but the German military attache who returned from the Far East told the German side that the Chinese Empire had a very aggressive Jian-1 fighter. The German side was asked to start developing fighter jets as well.

To this end, the German side has allocated research and development funds to Iyi-Eirich to develop a pigeon fighter that can carry weapons.

After a tireless demonstration, Iyi-Etrich installed a machine gun on the pigeon and strengthened the propellers to prevent bullets from damaging the propellers when firing. Finally, at the end of 1912, Germany had its own pigeon fighter, which undoubtedly opened the door to the German fighter industry, although the shooting accuracy was due to the incongruity between the propeller and the bullet.

The pigeon fighter weighs 470 kg, has a maximum speed of 60 kilometers per hour and a flight time of 2 hours. The engine was a 50-horsepower 50-horsepower four-cylinder upright water-cooled engine with a 1898 Maxim heavy machine gun.

Due to the fact that the speed of the aircraft was too slow and the engines were not up to par during the test flight, the Luftwaffe never procured them. However, after the start of the air battle in Paris, it was too wasteful for the two sides to use reconnaissance planes as fighters, so the Luftwaffe immediately purchased 20 planes for the air battle in Paris.

After the appearance of the German version of the pigeon fighter, Italy and Austria-Hungary shared the technology and introduced production. It was at this time that large aircraft factories such as Albatros, DFW, Gotha, Ruhper and Jean grew up.

Although the pigeon fighter is much worse than the advanced cat demon fighter of the Chinese Empire, and even the surname is inferior to the oldest Jian-Yi fighter of the Chinese Empire, it is undeniable that this pigeon fighter has undoubtedly become one of the strongest fighters in Europe.

Similarly, after the French military attache saw the advanced Jian-1 fighter from the Chinese Empire, he immediately reported it to the French [***] side. Subsequently, the French side also began to invest in the development of fighters.

The French Nieuport 5 "Silverfish" appeared in France a year before the First World War and was developed by the Newport company Veran. This aircraft is completely a copy of the Chinese Imperial Jian-1 fighter, because Newport Company introduced the design drawings and technical patents of the Jian-1 reconnaissance aircraft of the Chinese Imperial Nanyuan Airlines, so it can be directly produced. However, Newport was very smart, because the core engine components had to be imported from the Chinese Empire, and each modified aircraft had to pay a high royalty to the Chinese Imperial Nanyuan Airlines, so in order to reduce costs, Veran modified the Newport 5 aircraft to make it light in weight and good in life.

The weight of the aircraft is 370 kg, and the engine uses a BT10 four-cylinder gasoline engine of Beiyang Power, with a power of 60 horsepower, a maximum speed of 70 kilometers per hour, and a cruising time of 2 hours.

The aircraft was used as a standard reconnaissance aircraft and training aircraft of the French Air Force, and when it learned of the Jian-1 fighter of the Chinese Empire, France immediately installed a Maxim heavy machine gun on the Newport 5 reconnaissance plane.

On 20 February, the French Air Force took the lead in sending five Newport 5 fighters to participate in the air battle in Paris, and as a result, it shot down 12 German reconnaissance planes, setting a record for the first aircraft air combat in human history.

Subsequently, the French Air Force used fighter jets to massacre German ground forces, killing thousands of German soldiers under Newport fighters in a single day, and also creating the first example of an air force fighting ground forces. For the next five days, the German Army was so harassed by French aircraft that ground operations could not be carried out and were forced to be suspended, thus giving the French Army a breather.

On 25 February, the Luftwaffe also sent 20 Pigeon fighters to engage 17 Newport fighters of the French Air Force. After an hour of fighting, the Luftwaffe won with the advantage of losing 7 and shooting down 12 of the French Air Force, and the French Air Force fled.

In the following week, the German and French air forces engaged more than a dozen battles one after another, with mixed victories and losses. And both Germany and France began mass production of aircraft, but the volume of production clearly could not keep up with combat consumption.

On March 3, the Germans resumed their large-scale offensive, and the French army and the citizens of Paris actively built new defensive areas, mobilizing 450,000 inhabitants of the capital, 75% of whom were women, for the construction of fortifications. Paris evacuated many of the most important enterprises, and the National Defense Council imposed martial law in Paris and its vicinity. The authorities ordered the inhabitants to build fortifications in the streets, even near the Palace of Versailles, and to form new militia divisions to prepare the city for street fighting. The French political axe retreated to Bordeaux, but the French Ministry of Defense remained in Paris. In order to boost the morale of the people and the army, Xia Fei ordered a military parade to commemorate the revolution of the French Third Republic on March 7 at the Place de la Parliament. The procession was paraded in front of the National Assembly and then headed straight to the front. The French reinforced the Sixth Army with reserves and replenishment.

On 10 March, the units were ordered to hold the occupied area and prevent the Germans from making a detour to Paris from the northwest and southwest.

From March 15 to 18, the German army relaunched its offensive against Paris after adjustment and replenishment. The Germans carried out the main assaults in the direction of Versailles and Saint-Denis, respectively, in an attempt to detour Paris from the north and south.

Due to the equal strength of the German and French air forces, the German airships were able to bomb Paris again under the escort of fighter planes, and the white phosphorus bombs were overwhelmingly smashed, affecting a wide range, and the lethality and destructive power deeply shocked the French people, and the resistance became more and more cruel and powerless.

On April 5, the Germans invaded the city of Paris at the cost of 100,000 heavy losses.

At this time, the city of Paris was already in flames, no one put out the fire, and most of the houses were burned to the ground, and there were corpses and bones everywhere, which was shocking.

The French Sixth Army also suffered casualties, including the casualties of the newly arrived French troops, the French army lost 160,000 men in the defense of Paris, and more than 100,000 Parisian citizens were killed in the battle.

On 8 April, the Germans cleared the last of the resistance elements in the city and declared the occupation of Paris. At the same time, the French army retreated to the middle and lower reaches of the Marne and continued to build the Marne defense line.

When the news broke, the whole of Germany cheered, the whole of France mourned, and the rest of the world was shocked.

As Germany occupied Paris, it was not in the interests of the Chinese Empire to further oppress France militarily, and it was very likely that France would be forced to surrender in a short time. The Imperial Chinese Mission to the Entente then convened an emergency meeting to discuss a viable plan to help France resist Germany.

At the meeting, it was unanimously decided to export the Jian-1 fighter jets of the Chinese Empire to France to help the French Air Force defeat the Luftwaffe, so as to stop the bombing of the German airship and recapture Paris.

The French side is very grateful for this, and it does not care about the fact that the price of a Jian-Yi fighter of the Chinese Empire is as high as 10 dragon coins, and only asks the Chinese Empire to deliver a large number of advanced aircraft to the French Air Force in a short time.

It's obviously very easy. The only fighters currently equipped by the Chinese Imperial Air Force are the J-4 Cat Demon monoplane fighter and the J-5 three-wing fighter, and others such as the J-1, J-2, and J-3 fighters have long been withdrawn from active service, with a total inventory of more than 10,000 at present, and they are still in production, just to prepare for export to the Allied and Entente countries.

More than 3,000 of these fighters are stored at bases in Cyprus and Kuwait, and the rest are stored in the country, in order to facilitate the timely provision of aircraft support to the Entente and the Central Powers, because the war in this era still relies on quantity, and the quality advantage is not too obvious.

The first batch of 100 Jian-1 fighters arrived at the Rouen airfield three days later, and the French hastily painted the planes so that the Germans could not see that they had been imported from the Chinese Empire. Since the Newport aircraft of the French army itself is a miniature version of the Jian-1 of the Chinese Empire, it cannot be seen at all after the exterior is painted.

On April 12, the Germans crossed Paris and marched towards the Marne River to cooperate with the German 2nd Army commanded by Bíraud to encircle and annihilate the French 5th Army.

Because the Germans were arrogant, they thought that the French planes could not beat them, and the French army would definitely be vulnerable under the bombardment of their airships Hellfire bombs. In this way, the Germans had the audacity to flank the revolving front to pass near Rouen and cross the front of the French 6th Army.

The Germans thought that the French Sixth Army had been crippled and could no longer be combat-ready, so they did not care about it.

Chauffeur could not grasp this opportunity quickly, and he ordered his troops to continue to retreat, but General Gallieni, the commander of the Rouen garrison, saw this at once, and he excitedly shouted: "They have sent the flanks to the door!" How can the Germans be so stupid! I can't believe there's such a thing, it's great. ”

He immediately ordered the remnants of the French 6th Army in Maunoury, plus the Rouen garrison, to prepare for an attack on the right flank of the German army. He called Xia Fei again and asked him to approve the attack, but Xia Fei did not say anything. Gallerien drove to the British headquarters in the hope of winning their support, but the British chief of staff was not optimistic about the war and was blindly defensive, saying that he was "not interested" in the plan to attack the right flank of the German army.

On the evening of 13 April, Cluke reached the Marne, and the French 5th Army and the British Expeditionary Force outside of which he was pursuing had crossed the Marne earlier in the day. These two troops, who had retreated hastily and were exhausted and confused, had repeatedly received telegrams to blow up the bridge, but neither had done so. Having captured these bridgeheads, Kluk prepared to cross the river at once in the early morning of the following morning, despite the order of the Berlin High Command to keep him in step with Bíró's 2nd Army, and to continue his pursuit of the French 5th Army.

On this day, the officers and men of the Kluk Army Group marched almost 30 miles. According to Second Lieutenant Li Xiaodong, an observer of the Chinese Empire, "When the German soldiers reached the vicinity of the north bank of the Marne, many fell to the ground, exhausted, and only muttered in a daze: '30 miles!' 30 miles! He was so tired that he couldn't say anything. Cluk overwhelmed his soldiers and outpaced his supply convoy and heavy artillery fleet. It seemed to him that the French army, in the midst of its successive defeats, would never be able to turn its head against his morale and ability with a single trumpet. He did not expect that there was an old fellow named Gallerien in the French army, who was waiting for his negligence. ”

On 14 April, Kluk pushed forward and bluntly told the High Command that he could not carry out the order to keep him behind as a flank of the German 2nd Army. Waiting for the German 2nd Army in Biro to catch up with him would have to halt the advance for two days, which he believed would weaken the entire German offensive and give the French time to regain their strength and move freely. In fact, Biro's 2nd Army was just as exhausted. So, Kluke put aside the orders of the Supreme Command and continued to advance to the southeast, in other words, he was going further and further away from Paris.

In Berlin, everyone from the Kaiser to the common people was immersed in the great joy of the capture of Paris, believing that the French army was about to be completely wiped out and that German victory was imminent. Only the Chief of the General Staff, Moltke Jr., was full of doubts: "The victors must have captures, but where are our prisoners since the pursuit of the French army?" There were 20,000 in Grimm and Paris, and in the rest of the world combined, there were only 10,000 or 20,000, and the number of captured cannons was also small. Are the French retreating in a planned way? ”

On the morning of 15 April, the report of the French reconnaissance plane made Gallieni see the moment when he "had to act immediately." The adventurous advance of Cluk's forces southeast of Rouen had made his Royal Highness a target for the French 6th Army and the British in Mauroli.

At 9 a.m., without the consent of Xia Fei, Gallieni issued a pre-order to Maunuri to prepare for battle. He then called the General Headquarters and asked Xia Fei to give an official order to attack. But Xia Fei did not comment.

In fact, Xia Fei also had a counteroffensive plan, and the plan also included the plan to use Maonuli's 6th Army to attack the outside of the German right flank. Xia Fei hoped that one more day would allow reinforcements to arrive and the 5th Army to make arrangements, so that he would have more time to win the cooperation of the British army. After listening to Gallieni's request, Xia Fei faced the battle map and thought. Xia Fei was an overly composed person, he could sit in his chair and think all day without saying a word, regardless of what others said about him.

In the afternoon, when Gallieni called again, Chauffeur finally approved the attack of Mauroli's 6th Army from the north bank of the Marne, and at 10 o'clock that night ordered the rest of the French army to stop retreating and launch a full-scale counteroffensive on April 16.

However, the British refused to carry out this counteroffensive plan. Xia Fei was in a hurry and personally went to the British command to persuade the British commander, Sir French. Eventually, French agreed to Xiafei's request and said that he would "do his best" to fight.

In the evening, Xia Fei returned to his headquarters and issued a brief mobilization order to the troops: "We are about to participate in a battle, which is a battle that will affect the fate of our country. Now that the retreat phase is over, we should now go all out to attack the enemy and drive them back, and if the troops cannot advance any further, then hold their positions at all costs, preferring to die rather than retreat. Under the current circumstances, any gesture of weakness will not be tolerated. ”

As Army Group Kluk passed east of Rouen, its right rear flank was attacked by the French 6th Army and the Rouen garrison in Maunnouri. Kluke immediately ordered the 3rd and 9th armies to turn back against Mao Laoli, and these two corps were tasked with covering the right flank of the German 2nd Army. So their retreat created a gap of 20 miles wide between the German 1st Army and the 2nd Army. Because the British army, facing this gap, had retreated rapidly, so Kluke dared to take this risk.

For the Germans, the key to victory was whether they could break the French flanks, Maunnouri's 6th Army and Foch's 9th Army, before the main French forces and the British could take advantage of a gap to break through their own waists. Cloc focuses on Maunuri's forces. When Maunuri was about to lose it, he asked Gallieri to send reinforcements from within Paris.

This request inspired Gallieri to organize the first mechanized column in the history of warfare, using the Chinese Empire's taxi fleet in Rouen. Gallieni ordered Rouen to recruit about 1,000 taxis and transport 1 division of troops to the battlefield, so that Maunuri was not finally defeated by Kluk. ”

In the early morning of April 17, the French army launched a counteroffensive on all fronts. The French 6th Army continued fierce fighting with the German 1st Army on the Olqua River.

At this time, the Germans sent 30 standard planes to escort 30 airships, ready to burn the French army in one go. But what they didn't expect was that the French army dispatched 119 fighters, and as a result, in the air battle of Rouen, all 30 German pigeon planes and 30 airships were shot down, and the losses were heavy.

Subsequently, the French Air Force attacked the German offensive forces, causing the German offensive to be blocked.

At the same time, the French 5th Army also turned around, turned its retreat into an offensive, fought with the German 1st Army, and exchanged fire with the right flank of the German 2nd Army; The French 4th and 9th armies intercepted the German 3rd and 4th armies, isolating the German 1st and 2nd armies. On April 18, at a critical moment, French led the three armies of the LinkedIn Army to quietly climb into the gap between the German 1st Army and the 2nd Army, separating the German 1st Army from the 2nd Army, and putting Kluke and Biraud in danger of being divided and surrounded. So, on April 19, Biro ordered his 2nd Army to retreat.

By 21 April, all the German corps had withdrawn. The French army regained Paris in one fell swoop.

(To be continued)