Although Lieutenant General Sterz knew that His Royal Highness the Crown Prince had been conceiving a big battle plan, and the two had also discussed some details of the operation. But when Heldon came up with his whole plan, his chief of staff was still taken aback by his ambitious plan.

It is logically the business of the General Staff to formulate a battle plan, but Lee Hayden has been breaking the rules, and he does not like the rigid and dogmatic battle plans in the General Staff, but always has ingenuity.

Lehdon's goal was to besiege the Russian 3rd Army in the fortress of Przemyr, not to crush, but to annihilate it.

"It is better to cut off one of its fingers than to hurt its ten fingers."

Sterz thought for a while and then understood the meaning of this sentence from the east, he found it difficult to understand some of the Crown Prince's thoughts, from the discussion between the two, the Crown Prince's way of fighting was - run, run if he couldn't fight, run in a large area, and then look for opportunities to annihilate the enemy.

This is not in line with the military theory of a frontal decisive battle in the West, but is a bit like the thinking habits of the cowardly Orientals.

Sterz didn't dare to say this.

Lehten's plan was for the 3rd Army to go north to meet the Germans, but it was just for example, and the life or death of the reckless Mackensen group had nothing to do with him, not to mention that the Germans were indifferent to the defeat of the Austro-Hungarian army in Galicia in the previous stage, and they did not see them pull in at a critical moment.

After advancing northward, the 3rd Army quickly turned to the San River valley and cut off the retreat of the Russian 3rd Army. At the same time, the Austrian army concentrated the 2nd, 6th, and 7th armies to launch a full-scale attack on the Russian army besieging the Přemyr fortress, coupled with the cooperation of the defenders of the fortress inside, 750,000 Austro-Hungarian troops against 250,000 Russian troops, and the Austrian army had an absolute advantage.

In addition, the Austrian 1st Army will defend the Russian reinforcements in the Carpathian direction, while the 4th Army will pin down the Russian 8th Army in Limburg.

"It's a big plan." "But how can the 1st Army hold the offensive of the three armies of the Russian army in the Carpathian direction?" Sterz said. ”

"If we don't let them hold it, we just need to delay the enemy's reinforcements, and we need 3 to 5 days." Lechelton said, picking up a pencil and drawing three diagonal lines on the map, "The 1st Army only needs to build these three lines of defense in advance, and then, retreat one by one, it's always easier to defend than to attack, right?" ”

Sterz nodded, it is true that the losses on offense were much greater than on defense. "But how can we be sure that we will be able to crush the Russian army in Przemir in three days?"

"This has been carefully calculated by the staff officers, and besides, we have some fresh secret weapons." Lechelton paused slightly, and he sold a pass, "You'll see when the time comes." ”

"Well, well, in principle I agree with such a plan, but I need to study it carefully."

"That's all you have to do, Baron Herzendorf is coming in a hurry." Lee Hydon laughed.

"Oh my God, you definitely did it on purpose." "So that I don't have enough time to discuss with the General Staff," Sterz exclaimed. ”

"You can think so, but I'm just afraid that their shouting will scare the Russians away."

Admiral Condra rushed to the Austrian Front Command in Clava in the afternoon, and this time His Royal Highness the Crown Prince pleased him. Immediately after a brief meeting with him, the crown prince called Colonel-General Boloyevich at the front and ordered him to immediately lead the 3rd Army north to relieve the Germans. To his greatest satisfaction, the crown prince finally promised to launch the long-awaited all-out offensive in two days' time.

He was in high spirits and painstakingly inspected the troops scattered within an 80-kilometer radius, while Lee Hayden remained in Kvala, carefully studying the battle plan with the personnel of the front-line staff.

The Battle of Warsaw-Ivangorod, launched by the Germans, seemed inevitable to be defeated. The German-Austrian army lacked cooperation and collusion, and in the emergency situation of the Galician campaign, the German army did not provide any help to the Austro-Hungarian army. Now that they were in danger, Moltke repeatedly asked the Austro-Hungarian Army for full reinforcements.

"Franz, your problem is that you trust the Germans too much, and this is the root cause of the failure of the Galician campaign." Lechelton took Moltke's telegram from Kondra asking the Austrians to attack Ivangorod with all his might, put it aside, and then said to the chief of his general staff, "The whole plan for the Galician campaign requires the Germans to send one or two armies to cooperate, but what about the Germans? Only one corps was dispatched, with a total of four divisions, which was not enough to stuff the Russians. ”

"However, if we do not act, the German army on the front line in Warsaw may be annihilated by the Russian army." "We could lose this war. ”

"Why don't the Germans think for us, if we suffer heavy losses, we will also lose this war. Now their telegrams are one after another, but where are they at a critical moment in the Galician campaign? We lost a whole 350,000 people! Lechelton became angry and said sternly, "If the Germans continue to be fearless towards us, I'd rather withdraw from this damn war now!" ”

"But how are the Germans going to give an account?" Kondra gestured to the telegraph that LeHaydon had thrown on the table.

"This was taken into account in the development of the campaign plan, and the 3rd Army, commanded by Bolojevich, would conduct some tactical diversionary operations on the flanks of the Mackensen cluster." "The whole campaign will be waged the day after tomorrow, and we will not count on the support of the Germans." ”

According to the battle plan, the entire campaign will officially start on November 3. But the troops had begun to set out the night before, and Helton had gathered enough vehicles, cars and trucks for the three armies involved in the attack, and, of course, a cart drawn by two mules. Sterz finally knew what the new gadget Lee Hayden was going to throw in, more than a hundred armored trucks and loaded with heavy machine guns and small-caliber artillery.

The "tanks" mentioned by His Royal Highness did not reach the front, and the complex mountainous terrain of Galicia did not seem to be suitable for that use.

"Tomorrow is the first performance of the Air Force." Lechelton said, pointing to the more than 130 biplanes parked in a large flat field.

The Austrian 6th Army actually followed behind the 3rd Army and immediately set off. The 6th Army shifted from Hilta to Przemyr, while Boloyevich commanded the 3rd Army to flank the Russian 12th Army with Mackensen's German 9th Army.

For mobile phone users, please go to M. to read.