A round of red sun jumped out of the clouds, staining the land with a layer of golden brilliance.

In the vast wilderness, countless German troops in gray uniforms were gathered everywhere, and a rough estimate was at least 50,000 people. One by one, the artillery pieces were stripped of their armor and began to be erected in the busy work of the surrounding officers and soldiers; Horses and mules on reins towed wooden wheeled vehicles laden with supplies, transporting ammunition and weapons into place. On the front position, infantry armed with rifles were sitting or lying in the one-man high attack trenches, relieving the tension and anxiety of the battle by swallowing clouds and spitting fog. After all, after this battle, no one can guarantee that they will still see the newborn sunshine tomorrow morning......

Next to the makeshift command post, a lean old man with a slender waist is holding a Zeiss telescope and slowly looking ahead. The place where he stood was on a hill in the middle of the field, and the terrain was high, and it was the perfect platform for commanding battles. When the old man's mirror tube turned, he could clearly see that the army under his command had been fully deployed on a four-kilometer-long front, and in the flying banners of hunting, countless German soldiers were flowing and rushing like a tide.

On 16 May, the German airship unit detected that the main French force stationed in Longvi had begun to move near the city of Visolang, and Qing Ying immediately ordered the main force to attack from the southern flank of Lorraine in the north. The spearhead of the German offensive was the Sixth Army commanded by the old Russell. During the previous half-day march, the small French troops on the opposite side were all defeated at the first touch, and it was not until they advanced more than ten kilometers that they really encountered the head-on interception of the main force of the French army. According to the reconnaissance troops, the 32nd French Division and the Algerian Third Colonial Division, which had just arrived from the North African Sea, were standing in the way of the German Sixth Army. Among them, these swarthy fellows were brainwashed by the education of the foolish people under the long rule of the French. Before setting out on the expedition, they all vied an oath. Willing to defend France, the "mother of North African culture".

The lean old man Russell looked into the distance. However, it was found that the situation in the French position on the opposite side was completely different from the past.

If it had been placed in the past, after discovering the traces of the German army, the French would have immediately gathered their whole army to kill the generals and launched a stormy and desperate attack. This time, however, the French were surprisingly calm; During the period when their own troops were in position on the battlefield, the French troops on the opposite side did not even make any movement. This greatly disappointed the vanguard troops, who had quickly set up their machine guns on the front line and were ready to face the enemy, who said that they had been given the opportunity to hunt the Gallic turkeys, only to be destroyed by the cowardice of the French.

Besides. The positions of the French were also very different from before. The positions of the French army in the past could not be called positions at all, and they advocated offensive without any defensive and concealed facilities at all; This time, however, they have improved dramatically in these areas. The criss-crossing trenches replaced the original ecological land, and the important facilities were quietly covered with branches and loess; What surprised Russell the most was that the French army had also set up two one-man high barbed wire fences in front of his position, which were densely covered with sharp barbs, and the whole position looked like the standard German trench system! Seeing this, Russell's brow furrowed; For, judging by this situation, the French were going to fight a defensive war, and completely abandoned the offensive attack that they were so proud of. A thought crossed his mind. Had the French been prepared to take a defensive position in the fields of Lorraine in the north to fend off their own attack?

Russell guessed right.

According to the strategy developed by the commander of the French army, Lüve. The French sent a strong main force to the vicinity of Visourand in order to attract all the main German forces to outflank it, thus creating an opportunity for their surprise attack on the northern front in the Ardennes. However, because this "bait" to attract the Germans was so important, Lüf had to ensure that the main force sent to lure the enemy still had enough space to retreat in the event of being outflanked by the Germans. Therefore, his order to turn the northern garrison of Lorraine, which was stationed on the road of the main German army, to go on the defensive, was the only inevitable move. In Luff's view, it was time for him to "save his forces in certain areas", and as long as his garrison in this area could hold out for more than four days, everything would be done: the main force of the French army to lure the enemy would be calmly withdrawn in an almost unscathed manner, and the surprise troops in the Ardennes would create an immortal feat that would determine the outcome of the First World War!

Unfortunately, while Luff's strategic plan was impeccable, he suffered from major tactical flaws. Lüf only focused on the perfect performance of the German army in Alsace in defensive warfare and used it as a model to emulate it, but did not dig into the root cause of this phenomenon. The reason why the Germans were able to create a jaw-dropping battle loss ratio in the Battle of Salbul was that in addition to the construction of tightly entrenched barbed wire positions, they relied on a large number of machine-gun equipped troops, many years of familiar defensive training, and the fact that the French army as the enemy was armed with only 75 mm field cannons. In the northern part of Lorraine, where the offensive and defensive situation of the two sides changed, the French did not have any of these conditions.

After a while, Russell put down the binoculars in his hand. A warm breeze blows on his face, bringing a warm and refreshing feeling. He pondered for a moment, then suddenly asked, "How's the situation with Toco's 17th Panzer Regiment?" ”

An adjutant next to him replied respectfully: "Your Excellency, Lieutenant Colonel Toye's armored regiment has broken down on the way after more than four hours of marching, and 16 of the 62 tanks have broken down on the way. Lieutenant Colonel Toyo has sent a tow truck to tow the broken down vehicle to the camp for intensive repairs. ”

Russell snorted faintly and said, "Before the battle began, the troops lost more than a quarter of the first; I really don't understand, what is the point of His Royal Highness the Crown Prince making such a sick iron box? Seriously, I'd rather keep the original cavalry regiment than transform it into the current armored regiment that has to spend a lot of effort to take care of at all times! Go tell Toco that he's got three more hours to tinker with his damn shit, and by the time the artillery is ready, I'll need all 5 of his armored companies on the front line of attack! ”

"Yes, General." The adjutant saluted, and was about to turn and walk towards the command post; Russell's eyes suddenly twinkled, and he was called back again. Russell looked down at the pocket watch in his hand, and said, "Order the artillery unit to start fifteen minutes later to start firing on the French position." At the same time tell the guys in the aviation that they can make a sortie. ”

After a while, a high-pitched and loud alarm bell sounded over the German position, and its sound was like a large valley in the Changchuan River, with a dangerous peak. Hearing this, the German artillerymen's hands moved faster, and began to carry out the most difficult inspection work of the artillery for which they were responsible. For a time, the entire front-line position was a tense scene of imminent war, and the German artillery stuffed cotton regiments into their ears one after another, quietly waiting for the arrival of the last moment.

At 9:30 a.m., a 210-millimeter heavy howitzer in the German position erupted with a roar that shook the wilderness, like a sudden explosion of rolling thunder in the bright sun. The fiery red cannonballs were like meteors in the sky, suddenly slamming into the French position, and the air waves exploded, sweeping the gravel and gravel into the air dozens of meters into the air. At the same time, all types of field heavy artillery on the German positions let out their own earth-shattering roars, which were like thunder and thunder.

Compared with the artillery bombardment of the German 135th Division, which was used as a decoy under the city of Visolang, the artillery of the Sixth Army, which was the spearhead of the assault of the entire German Fifth Army, was far from being comparable to that of an ordinary infantry division. The thunderous chorus composed of more than 200 large-caliber heavy guns was like a flash flood, carrying hundreds of millions of trillions of rags, and a large number of heavy shells were pouring down on the French positions. As far as the shells reached, all obstacles were blasted into powder; The vigorous and rushing flames roared and swept away, igniting the trees, branches, flowers, and even people they touched.

Under the ferocious bombardment of the German army's massive heavy artillery like a thunderbolt, the French army suffered huge heavy losses on the spot. The French soldiers, who had just been ordered to move from a desperate attack to the defensive, were apparently unfamiliar with this new mode of warfare of squatting trenches: the trenches they dug were not only narrow and shallow, but also had no additional reinforcement in key areas that were prone to collapse. In the face of wave after wave of heavy artillery bombardment from the Germans, the French troops who were crawling in the trenches could not avoid being pierced by the fragments of the shells that exploded at close range.

A low hum, like the blood sickle of death, roared an hour after the German ground artillery roared, four fat "sharks" with beige bodies burst out of the dense clouds. Their fierce eyes narrowed slightly, their bloody mouths opened, and they writhed their colossal bodies like cigars, and slowly stopped above the French position. After the Belgian defenders of the fortress of Liège, another army felt the power of this giant bombing airship. When the first 250kg bomb with a charge of nearly 50% was dropped, an area of more than 100 meters was swept away with overwhelming waves of fire and flames; A large section of the trench was shattered and collapsed, and the earth and stone fortifications that were scattered by the shattered explosion were blown to an altitude of 200 meters by the majestic air waves. To the despair of the French officers and soldiers, these airships seemed to have an extremely terrifying bomb load; The Kirovs twisted their positions, and another round of bombs rained down from the sky...... (To be continued......)

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