"Prepare air defense! Withdraw to the protected area of self-propelled anti-aircraft guns! Hubey's heart at this time seemed to have 10,000 alpacas running wildly. He really couldn't figure out what the Luftwaffe, which had the overall advantage, was doing. If you can't provide reinforcements, why do you still let the other side's air force be so arrogant! At this time, the distance between the two sides is about 600 meters. The German armoured forces began to maintain a constant distance from each other. And now, it is obviously impossible to completely twist together. The opponent is moving too fast, maybe in a moment the bombs and shells will fall on their heads, but fortunately, they still have some anti-aircraft vehicles equipped with 40MM Bofors anti-aircraft guns, these things may make the low-altitude attack bombers more restrained!

There were not many incoming fleets, only 6 aircraft. But the impact of these six twin-engine attack aircraft on the battle situation was enormous, and Walker's battle group was able to withdraw from the battlefield. And Hube has to face the wrath from the sky! The height at which the opponent entered the battlefield was very low, only about 200 meters. A total of 12 rounds of 250 kg submunitions were dropped during the first wave of rapid sweeps across the battlefield, and a large number of small bombs were scattered downward in the body of the projectiles that burst in the air, which were difficult to completely destroy the tank, but if they landed on the top of the engine cover or hit the tracks, gearboxes and other components, the shaped charge could still paralyze these behemoths.

Raindrops rained down and fired small bombs that covered a retreating German tank company. The deadly glow of the explosion of hundreds of small bombs shone in the smoke. The constant sound of explosions and the flames that rose from time to time broke Hube's heart! Although the accuracy of such bombs can be described as a few percent, there are too many of them, after the smoke of gunfire. About 7 tanks were disabled. And that's just the beginning. Before the anti-aircraft artillery could be fired, the opponent had one more chance to make an attack with the 6-pounder gun in the nose.

Don't look at the 6-pounder gun on the ground that has limited lethality against tanks. But the 6-pounder gun placed on the plane meant that it was not too easy to open the top armor of the tank, although the accuracy was also not good. But a single hit was enough to inflict heavy damage on Tank 4, and a retreating Tank 4 did not notice an attack aircraft coming from behind its flank, which pressed the nose slightly, and then firepower poured out from the muzzle like a wasp's deadly tail stinger, and thanks to the automatic loader, the tank was shelled three times in 12 seconds, one of which pierced the rear fuel tank and ignited the entire tank.

The losses from just two rounds of attacks were comparable to the losses caused by the head-on confrontation with the Walker battle group. Don't look at the fact that the Americans don't play well with tanks, but the planes are quite slippery. Hube saw it with his own eyes. A tank No. 4 and another Sherman tank were directly within 300 meters of each other, and then an attack aircraft flew over at an altitude of less than 150 meters, and an armor-piercing shell accurately cut a hole in the side of No. 4 tank. This attack accuracy (or luck?) And the audacity of the pilot made Hube have to say a word of obedience!

BUT FORTUNATELY, THIS TERRIBLE ATTACK DID NOT LAST LONG, MAYBE IT WAS BECAUSE OF THE 40MM ANTI-AIRCRAFT GUNS BEHIND THE TANK GROUP? (Well, that's unlikely.) Or rather, the attack just now has consumed all the ammunition of these attack aircraft. After three rounds of attacks, the opponent flew away, leaving wreckage and debris everywhere with a wave of his sleeve. Looking at the Walker battle group in the distance, Hube couldn't help but shake his head, now he doesn't want to continue to attack, how to clean up these damaged chariots to prevent the other party from attacking is probably not enough. The main forces were still three days away from themselves. Who knows if the other side's bombers will not come again?

So Hube gathered his troops on the side. While reporting to his superiors on today's engagement. It's time to put one's literary literacy to the test. Different ways of expounding the same thing can lead to very different results, and the most obvious example is the difference between repeated defeats and repeated defeats. Although they all lose when they fight, the nature is different! What's more, today's battle was won by the Germans, and the reason for the final defeat was due to the lack of air cover.

The previous report first described the whole story. And after listing the losses of both sides, on the whole, the Germans still had a great advantage. If calculated based on completely destroyed tanks, the exchange ratio between the Hube battle group and the Walker battle group is about 1 to 2.2. Moreover, many of these losses were caused by attack aircraft and when they tested their opponents in the first place. Losses in a simple tank battle will be smaller, of course. In addition to the completely destroyed items, Hube also had a large number of damaged tanks that needed to be replaced or overhauled. The number of these tanks is probably more than 20 units. And then there's the wrecked and other vehicles that can't be dispatched. Hube had only about 40 combat-ready vehicles left, plus other attrition. Hube could only stand by for the time being.

The introduction of the combat situation is just an appetizer and does not have much effect, the rest of the content is the key! "The battle revealed a lot of problems, and although my battle group was one of the most elite mechanized units in Germany, it was still ineffective in the face of many threats. The qualitative gap between our armored forces and the American and British units has gradually leveled up, although the No. 4 improved tank has a certain advantage over the Sherman, but it is not decisive, according to the principle that the performance of tank destroyers on the same chassis and weight is higher than that of tanks. If the opponent has a tank destroyer modified from the Sherman tank, then it will cause great damage to our armored forces in a defensive state. The other side has already gained a certain understanding of our weakness, and they have learned the tactics of first using anti-aircraft artillery to consume us, and then throwing in armored forces to counterattack, although they are not yet proficient, but this tendency is noteworthy. ”

"Tank No. 4 was an excellent medium tank, but it was not suitable for a breakthrough at that time, because there were too many guns to threaten it. So we needed a Breakthrough tank that would not only be immune to most artillery attacks in the front, but also be able to withstand most artillery attacks in the flanks. At the same time he needs to have as much artillery as possible, because we also need to deal with all kinds of civil fortifications. In order to ensure the smooth progress of the breakthrough, we also need to have sufficient infantry and supporting firepower. The 1-to-1 ratio between armored units and mechanized infantry in my battle group is obviously a bit low, and we need more infantry and support firepower. At the same time, these support firepower needs to have a certain amount of anti-armor capabilities, which can be used to ensure the safety of our flanks and prevent the opponent's counterattack, relatively speaking, I think that in the Italian war, my armored unit and the Austrian unit were more reasonable. (To put it bluntly, additional large-caliber self-propelled cannons are needed to provide anti-suppression firepower and superior anti-tank firepower.) ）”

"Finally, and most importantly, we must strengthen air defense, whether it is to increase anti-aircraft artillery, or to coordinate with the air force, or even to build up the army's own air force, we need to strengthen air defense, and this is not the first time that we have failed under the air attack of the other side. Especially this time, I really can't understand why the other side's air force is more active and deadly than ours! It is simply a crime for the ground offensive forces to be left without cover, while the Air Force is doing nothing hundreds of kilometers away! Hu Bei pondered and wrote the last two words, which shows how deep this guy's resentment against the Air Force is!

To Hube's surprise, his telegram had an extremely far-reaching impact on the future of the war. When the angry German army top brass angrily questioned the air force's support plan, the air force rarely made much of a defense, but actively mobilized a large number of aircraft originally deployed in the north to the south according to the army's intentions. And the ground support mechanism has been re-improved. This situation made the German Army, which was originally ready for a big fight, feel very puzzled, but then Bock and others figured it out!

"With the intervention of the Kaiser, the Army's strategy followed the intention of settling the Anglo-American situation first and then engaging China with China. As for the air force, the will of the Kaiser and the complete combat effectiveness of the Chinese air force, Marshal Richthofen was not satisfied with this, but could not lightly improve the plan, so their choice was to deal with it passively first, and then find a suitable excuse to turn the spearhead to the United States and Britain. Well, maybe that's a bit of a stretch, but the Air Force's intention to shorten the distance from the airfield to the battlefield by relying on the advance of the Army is true. And Major General Hube (promoted during the war. The report just gave the Air Force an excuse. And in return, the Luftwaffe going south did give the army considerable help in future battles. It's a fair trade, right? Guderian wrote in one of his post-war memoirs.

Of course, this news is definitely not good news for Britain and the United States. From then on, the Anglo-American coalition forces had to counter the combined strike of the German Army and Air Force, of course, this is still a later story, and after Hubey, then Walker must also talk about it. As the vanquished, he had to give an account to Patton and to the American leadership. In fact, from Walker's point of view, he didn't make any big mistakes in the general direction. It is an unavoidable problem for the other party to set up a cordon, and there is nothing to be done if you happen to be ambushed. In the tank battle that broke out between the two sides in the end, Walker's command was no problem, and it was not easy to hold out with an armored force that was inferior to the Germans in terms of equipment and suzhì until the air force support arrived. Of course, another more important reason is that if Walker doesn't do it, there really won't be a more suitable commander in the current US military stationed in Iraq. Wartime is the most lenient for capable generals. Of course, if the immediate need to solve the problem can be solved, then Walker's defeat is nothing at all. And the most pressing issue is the replenishment of armored forces.

Thanks to the book friend zhouyu1976, the reward of the lost stone ~~~. (To be continued......)