The sky is blue, and the white clouds are leisurely dotted in the air. Located not far from the foothills of the Ardennes, the Tionville hills are undulating and verdant, reflecting the flowers and gurgling streams, which are even more fresh and beautiful.

On the outskirts of the city, there are bunkers and ravines, and sections of barbed wire are firmly erected on the flat traffic arteries, and sharp barbs are all over the body. In the jagged trenches, gray figures armed with 98K rifles rested; They either lie on their sides on the dirt, snoring and sleeping, or they have a shoddy cigarette curled by their lips, and express their negative emotions through the swirling purple mist. In the sheltered position not far away, a group of guns with thinner pipes had also taken off their gun coats; The gunners gathered in twos and threes to unseal and carry boxes of shells.

After nearly 40 hours of assault construction by German officers and civilians day and night, a group of fortifications that could barely be called a defensive position finally appeared on the outskirts of the city of Tionville. As the French were about to attack from time to time, the German troops finished the construction of the fortifications a few hours ahead of schedule and began to recharge for the upcoming battle. In the field command post located at the rear of the position, a little nervous sweat quietly leached out of Qingying's hands. If the base of Tionville had fallen quickly under the ferocious offensive of the French army, not only would the Fifth Army be in trouble, but even the entire central axis of the German army on the Western Front would be in danger of being smashed by the French army in one fell swoop. And if the German troops can stubbornly resist the attack of the French in this peripheral position, then Qingying's southern flank corps, which has exhausted all its main forces, will definitely be able to give the opposite French Third Army a complete bloodletting, and the victory of the German army in the entire Western Front will also be established!

The sun is warm and the breeze is blowing. The clock on Qingying's arm was ticking and spinning quietly. I don't know how long it took. A sharp and poignant alarm suddenly sounded over the entire field. It's not too late. Several Fokker I monoplanes swept out from behind the positions and sped towards the French hot air balloons and lookout posts. The German artillery also began to stuff shells and propellants into the breeches, then shook the elevation angle to the maximum, and only waited for the French target to enter the firing range, and then launched the most violent strikes according to the guidance of the air force.

"Boom!" A dazzling wave of orange-red light suddenly exploded over the German position without warning, and the debris flew and danced violently, and the loud noise exploded in anger. Moments later, cannonballs rained down like meteors. The German frontline was caught in the blazing heat and rushing air of the explosion.

Compared with the German artillery preparation, although the single shot power of the French artillery is far less powerful than the German heavy artillery, it is as dense as a rainstorm; The German soldiers were all prostrate at the bottom of the trenches, motionless, lest the scorching clouds of fire and fire over their heads take their lives.

After a while, the German artillery still did not launch a counterattack; All of its cannons were raised to their maximum elevation angles, but none of them made a thunderous sound. Qing Ying was furious, and a flash of inspiration flashed in his mind, and he instantly understood the reason why his artillery had not counterattacked until now.

Due to the current defensive posture of the enemy, and the fact that the Germans had transferred all their large-caliber heavy artillery to the southern flank, the German defenders stationed in Tionville were stationed. The few dozen regimental infantry guns in their hands must be carefully protected. For this reason, the Germans naturally chose a relatively conservative position in the rear when constructing artillery positions. There is still some distance from the front line of the battlefield. The performance of the French 75-mm cannon was superior to that of the German artillery of the same caliber, and it was far superior to the enemy in terms of single shot power, firing speed and range. Therefore, if the French artillery was spewing artillery fire at the German positions at maximum range, the German artillery would not be able to reach these French counterparts, and there would be no artillery counterattack!

The artillery roared, and countless fire regiments scrambled to crash into the German positions, and between the thunderous roars, the waves of light bloomed in the air like colorful chrysanthemums. As the German fighters cleared the observation balloons of the French artillery, the accuracy of the French artillery preparation plummeted; Therefore, although a large number of shells crashed down on the German positions, the actual damage caused was not obvious. Seeing this, Qingying couldn't help but quietly breathe a sigh of relief. A large part of the rapid defeat of the previous two German infantry regiments was due to the fact that the machine gun fire was quickly knocked out by the French artillery, and an effective fire blockade could not be formed; As long as your machine gun is saved, your chances of holding Tionville are increased by one point!

Two hours later, the roar of the French artillery gradually subsided. Seeing this, the Germans hurriedly released reconnaissance planes to overlook the movements of the French troops on the opposite side, which had an absolute superiority in strength. With the hum of engines, several white biplanes soared from their positions and staggered toward the north.

In addition to being able to carry out normal reconnaissance missions, this "albatross" reconnaissance plane is also an aerial eagle eye specially designed to guide targets for German ground artillery fire. Unarmed, they have two flight seats, which allow them to have the most direct contact with ground artillery units through communicators and transmitters in the back seats. In addition to the absolute superiority in caliber, the expansion of the field of vision of the reconnaissance aircraft was also an extremely important reason why the German artillery was able to suppress its French counterparts. Although the German artillery fire was at a great disadvantage in terms of quantity and quality, it was still able to deal a heavy blow to the enemy by virtue of the aerial vision provided by the aviation units. After a short time, the German gunners began to adjust the horizontal angle and pitch of the muzzle through the message sent back by the albatrosses; After a slight pause, orange-red dazzling fire erupted in the thunderous roar.

The French officers and soldiers who were bombarded by the German artillery fire shortly after the charge; In an instant, dozens of people were hit by artillery fire and died on the spot. Nearly 100 people were pierced through their bodies like swords by shrapnel spears and swords, and the blood was like a flash flood, spraying several meters away, and they fell to the ground and convulsed to death in a terrible scream. The war horse, which was pierced by shrapnel, neighed and fell forward; The knight on horseback was tossed high, and then fell to the ground, breaking bones and breaking brains, and the smell of blood suddenly spread through the air.

In the face of the powerful counterattack of the German artillery, the French army was not afraid at all and advanced straight and fast in the undulating terrain. The waves of earth roared and debris shot out in a colorful manner, setting off a whirlwind of death in the attacking crowd of French troops. To the advantage of the French, the terrain of the Ardennes foothills was not as unobstructed as the frontal battlefield at Salbul: this undoubtedly gave them a considerable amount of mounds and ravines to cover during the attack, greatly reducing the chance of being swept away by German frontal fire. After a short time, the French successfully rushed to the periphery of the German position after throwing down a large number of corpses. But before they could catch their breath, a gray cannonball suddenly fell from the sky at a great parabolic angle, rushing towards them, and the sharp-eyed French soldiers could even see the tail fin behind these shells!

"Boom!" The red light exploded in anger and arrogance, and the French soldiers hiding behind the bunkers were engulfed by a powerful wave of fire. Previously, in order to avoid the German machine-gun fire, the French officers and soldiers gathered towards the rear of these natural bunkers; This allowed them to avoid direct fire from German machine guns and infantry guns, but they could be attacked without pressure by curved mortars with a drop angle of more than 60 degrees. These mortar shells, which surpassed the strength of howitzers of the same caliber, exploded in the dense crowd, causing unimaginable casualties to the French soldiers in an instant. For a time, a large number of severed limbs of the human body flew into the sky, and the torn flesh and blood shot out in the air; The corpses of hundreds of French officers and soldiers were scattered everywhere, the flesh trembled, the internal organs wriggled, and the situation was as terrible as a nightmare hell.

This German attack hit the French hornet's nest. The 75-mm cannon thundered and roared, bombarding the German positions like a rain of bullets and a storm, and the dense and continuous explosions immediately suppressed the fire of the German mortar unit. However, because the German mortars were well concealed and camouflaged, and some even fired directly from the trenches, the French artillery dealt a very limited blow to them. As soon as the French shelling was over, these light and dexterous creatures showed their sharp minions again: shells with tail fins flew in the air, whizzing and falling, blowing up the corpses of French officers and soldiers hiding in the corners for hundreds of meters, and blood gushed all over the field.

Under the bombardment of mortar shells flying in the sky, the French army was forced to abandon the prudent strategy of advancing on the ground by layer, and instead chose to carry out a direct and rapid attack from the front. In the face of the German army's skillfully arranged trench defense system, the French army, which charged forward with only flesh and blood, was once again beaten by German machine gun and rifle fire. Feeling the dense fire of the German machine guns, the French 75-mm cannon opened fire again; However, having lost the observation of the hot air balloon, they faced the machine gun positions that the Germans had focused on camouflage and reinforcement, and their suppressive effect dropped by more than one notch compared with the battle of the foothills!

For a time, a one-sided slaughter was once again staged in front of the German position; In front of the barbed wire fence in some sections, the corpses of French officers and soldiers piled up to a meter high. Although there were occasional German machine-gun positions that were destroyed by French artillery fire, the ratio of kills to enemy losses caused by them was also surprisingly high. In the fierce fighting that broke out between the German and French armies on the outskirts of Theonville, the German troops still had the upper hand in the trenches.

Faced with this situation, the French army began to change its tactics. (To be continued......)

PS: When the first chapter arrives, the author immediately goes to write the second chapter and weakly begs for subscription~~~~