The sun is shining, the heat wave is pressing, and the red sun of early summer has begun to gradually show its blazing and brilliance.

Qingying's clothes flew and she stood quietly on the top of the tower of a magnificent church, just in time to see the winding cobwebs of the northern outskirts of Theonville. Above the position, the gray figures of the shadow and longing had been greatly reduced compared to yesterday, and several reconnaissance sentry horses took off and galloped towards the north.

"Your Highness, these are the most nervous days in my heart in the nearly thirty years I have been in the army." Sickert glanced at the young man beside him, and said to Qingying in a slightly reproachful tone, "Although we have absolute superiority in weapons and equipment and intelligence reconnaissance, you can't take such risks. In order to complete the battle on the southern front, you went so far as to draw all the main forces, leaving only one defender in the foothills of the Ardennes and the headquarters. If it weren't for the blessing of Frederick the Great's soul, something happened that even we didn't expect, and we would have been in a completely passive situation by the loss of Theonville. ”

Qingying smiled awkwardly and did not refute Sickert's words. Historically, since the French army would turn to retreat and defense after its defeat in the border battle, there was almost no chance of destroying it as a formation; Therefore, Qing Yingcai took advantage of the early stage of the war when the French army was still convinced of the power of the "desperate attack", and used all the main forces to pull up an encirclement for the French on the southern flank, and bleed the French rooster. However, what he did not expect was that the French had already fully understood his intentions and took advantage of the situation to strike a fatal blow in the Ardennes forest, where the Germans had neglected to take precautions.

However, the Germans had a huge tactical advantage. But Qingying, who had stepped into the trap of the French army in terms of strategy, successfully survived the crisis. With a dense staggered set of crenellated trenches, timely reinforcements from the 27th Infantry Regiment, which had been temporarily redeployed back to headquarters, and weapons represented by machine-gun mortars. The frontal line numbered less than a third of the German defenders of the French army. Still firmly under the city of Tionville, the French held the blow of the French. With the frontal advance of the Duke of Württemberg's German Fourth Army, the French army that attacked Tionville was even more at a serious disadvantage; Their flanks and rear had completely lost their barrier cover, and they were threatened with being outflanked by the Germans in the north.

From the early hours of 20 May, the French army began to retreat along the road from which it had come. The gray haze that had hung over the German headquarters for several days finally cleared and the rain cleared, revealing a brilliant clear sky. As for the retreat of this French army, Qing Ying also had no idea of taking advantage of the victory to pursue; It was not easy for one's own troops to hold the line with the advantage of trenches, so where would they dare to attack a French army three times their size without the support of heavy artillery and aerial bombardment?

"Although the process is not satisfactory. It was even full of viciousness and risk, but the end result was a complete victory. The French attack on Theonville was bankrupt under the strong defenses of our army, while our main army completed the encirclement of the large French forces on the southern flank. Qingying paused, a happy smile appeared on his face again, and said, "Hans, how is the offensive of our main army, the French should have all been wiped out by our army, right?" ”

Hearing Qingying talk about the battle situation of the Southern Wing Army, Sicot's face, which was still slightly disgusted, gradually revealed a joyful look. He pushed the one-sided glasses on the bridge of his nose, and then explained the recent situation in the south. Concisely and concisely said to Qingying.

It turned out that as early as May 18, the commander of the French Fifth Army, Lüf, was shocked by the rapid advance of the German southern flank cluster. Sensing that the situation was not good, he hurriedly ordered the troops that were used as bait to withdraw quickly. However, in order to lure the Germans to take the bait, this main army was in a position that was quite deep into the German encirclement, and it was difficult to withdraw from it for a while; This, combined with the constant bombardment of the road bridges by German air forces, made the retreat of the French army even more sluggish, more than twice as slow as when they arrived from Longvi.

By 20 May, when the French forces outside the encirclement began to cooperate with the troops in the encirclement to launch a flanking attack on Alvi, the French army was still trudging through the damaged roads. By the time they arrived at their intended retreat on the evening of the 21st, Alvi was firmly occupied by the main forces picked up by the German southern flank cluster. Frightened, they launched a decisive night attack, while the Germans engaged them in a night of bloody combat in the dazzling white light of the flares. And the defense of the main German army is not the same as that of the part of the force that fell from the sky. The battlefield of Alvi, which had just been swept away, was now filled with the corpses of the French army again, and the original brown soil had been completely dyed red with a strong bloody atmosphere; After a night of fierce fighting, the French were bleeding from their heads in front of the German lines, and they were still trapped in a cage!

In the early morning of 22 May, all the main forces of the German Fifth Army gathered on various fronts and launched the most rear-end attack on the French troops in the encirclement. The German heavy artillery roared like thunder, and the huge air wave generated by the explosion swept through and was invincible. Fighter planes roared, airships covered the air, and dozens of tanks as spear tips for the attack suddenly pierced into the French positional defense.

It was only at this point that the French troops in the encirclement finally felt that the end was near. The German artillery and artillery shells rained down on each other far more violently than any previous battle: thunderous explosions, shattering fortifications, debris and flames. The German reconnaissance planes hovered high in the air, and while overlooking the entire deployment of the French army, they also served as the eyes and ears of their own heavy artillery units, such as the artillery positions, fortifications, trenches, fortresses, and barracks of the French army...... They were all hit by the thunder and artillery fire, and the fragments exploded, falling into a raging sea of fire. The Kirov airboat flew into the air, dropping cylindrical aerial bombs from time to time, whipping up earth-shattering waves of fire and flames. Tanks went on a rampage, running over barbed wire and crossing trenches; The roar of the artillery machine gun purified and redeemed all the French soldiers in the field of vision.

Although the German southern flank cluster had been fighting for a week before, the physical strength of the personnel and all kinds of ammunition were very high; However, due to the relatively small area of the border battlefield and the fact that the distance from the supply base of Tionville to the front line was not very far, the logistical constraints on the German offensive advance were much smaller than the right flank of the German army, which Schlieffen planned. Coupled with the overall planning and dispatch of the German staff officers, who have always been known for their rigor and meticulousness, this corps cluster, which gathered all the main forces of the Fifth Army, was still able to maintain a fairly strong firepower during the eighth day of fighting. And also because of the relatively small main battlefield, the German officers and soldiers who actually advanced not far away every day had no spare strength to fight, and the smooth attack with triumphant songs along the way pushed their morale to a peak. As long as they thought that they had surrounded the main force of the French army and were about to stage the second great and glorious Battle of Sedan, the German soldiers were even more excited, high-spirited, and rushed to the French troops and fought to the death.

The explosion was deafening, and the artillery fire was like a rainbow. On a front more than 20 kilometers long, the German offensive was as overwhelming as Mount Tai. The huge encirclement shrank like a punctured water bag, and after the German army advanced, it left behind a bloody and desolate scene of gunpowder. Countless human and horse corpses lay in pools of blood, and the lives that were not yet dead were in a futile twitching struggle. Flesh and blood are all over the place, and the smoke of gunpowder is all over the sky; The crater-like, moon-like battlefield was littered with discarded debris and debris from the explosion. The blazing flames and the fiery red sunset glow complement each other, making it magnificent, desolate and sad.

Late at night on the 22nd, the French troops in the encirclement sent the last telegram to Lüf: "We will fight to the death until the last breath." At this point, the French command had no news of this one corps and two divisions. The frightened Luff telegraphed back to the troops in the encirclement, and ordered them to break out of the encirclement at all costs tonight, but instead of a positive reply from the French, he was replied with a statement of German victory. On the evening of the 23rd, the last French unit laid down its weapons, and the French troops in the encirclement completely became a cloud of history.

At Tionville, Qing Ying was also amazed by the magnitude of his achievements: almost all of the more than 80,000 French troops in the encirclement, except for 20,000 killed in battle, entered the German prisoner of war camp. More than 200 cannons were captured by the Germans, the vast majority of which were famous 75mm cannons for the French army; Although they did not play much of a role on the Western Front, where trenches were pitted, they were able to play a dominant role in the Eastern European Plain, where the frontal attack was predominant. As for the captured horses, ammunition and various supplies, the Germans were busy for several days to transfer these items.

At midnight on the 23rd, in a twinkling starlight, the Germans entered the fortress of Longvi, which had been abandoned by the French. At the same time, a statistical table was also placed in front of Qingying. In the 10-day battle, the German Fifth Army annihilated nearly 170,000 French troops, the three French units no longer existed, and the French Third Army, which had lost two-thirds of its strength, was already in name only. As the victors, the German losses were still heavy, but they were insignificant compared to the French: more than 30,000 were killed, wounded, or captured in the battle. Because the French officers and soldiers wore blue shirts and red pants that had no concealment at all, the Germans gave full play to their firepower superiority in this border battle, and achieved a disproportionate complete suppression of the French army in terms of casualties. (To be continued......)

PS: Thank you book friends for reassuring two copies and PT cat's monthly pass support ~~~