December 27th

Offensive day

From 6 a.m

The earth-shaking artillery bombardment on all fronts reached its climax, and after two hours of heavy shelling of the German front-line trench positions, the sky was already bright.

A little after 8 o'clock, a group of fighters taking off from the rear flew over the battlefield, and instead of the usual dive-bombing and strafing tactics, they circled counterclockwise in the air, as if waiting for something?

At 8:10, as the flares that shot into the sky exploded, the Imperial armored forces finally showed their hideous fangs.

With the 305th Division (Armored Wolf Cavalry Division) as the main offensive force, led by three T-5 "Tiger" tank battalions, three goose-shaped attack arrows were presented on the 8-kilometer-wide offensive front, and the sound of "booming" engines resounded throughout the battlefield.

Behind the 1st Wave of Armored Attack Group was the 2nd Wave Armored Attack Group, consisting of 6 "T-2" Cheetah Medium Tank Battalions, behind more than 300 tanks, followed by the 4th Infantry Division of Kalimantan.

Farther away, the 3rd Wave Attack Group was ready to go, with the 303rd Division (Armored Tiger Cavalry Division) as the main force and two infantry divisions forming an attack arrow, which was extremely powerful.

They will advance along the gap opened by the 305th Division, and after the 305th Division's attack potential energy has weakened, they will take over the heavy task of continuing the attack, breaking through the German defense line 23 kilometers deep in one fell swoop.

This battle

It was the first battle in which the Ocean Empire Expeditionary Force appeared in Europe, and it was also the decisive battle, and it was also the battle in which the Imperial Marshal Li Xuanzhu pressed all the chips to the stud.

Whether it is successful or not depends on this hammer deal.

The T-5 Tiger tank, equipped with heavy iron armor, discharged a strict line of geese, and slowly approached the German position at a speed of 3~4 kilometers per hour.

Behind the tanks were armoured half-tracks that accompanied the attack, and these open-top armoured half-tracks, armed with mortars and heavy machine guns, carried out follow-up strikes at German firing points.

Behind the armored vehicles were the soldiers who followed the attack, and they slowly advanced under the cover of the armored vehicles.

After 17 consecutive days of aerial bombardment and 5 days and 5 nights of artillery bombardment, the German front-line trenches suffered heavy casualties, but they also replenished from the rear while the night was dark, and the infantry anti-artillery holes hidden deep in the ground still had quite strong defensive power.

After observing through the periscope that the attacking forces were approaching, the German commander immediately gave the order to "counterattack on all fronts".

The shrill whistle sounded through the German trenches, and a large number of German troops immediately poured out of the originally empty trenches, and they skillfully pounced on the heavy machine gun positions and the edge of the trenches, and drew their rifles to prepare for battle.

And this is as if it was a signal, the bombers of the Ocean Empire hovering in the air swooped up from the sky with a sharp whistling sound to carry out low-altitude precision bombing.

All this changed in just two or three minutes, and before the Germans who were buzzing with their heads under artillery fire could react, the bombs that split their heads and covered their faces fell down along the trenches, and then there was a fierce aerial machine gun fire, which caused a long bloody rain in the wide German trenches, killing and wounding.

And this was just an appetizer, the bombers that swooped down from the sky carried out low-altitude bombing without fear of danger, and one after another frantically strafed and dropped bombs along the trenches, setting off a bloody storm all over the sky.

At its lowest, the bombers were only a dozen meters away from the German trenches, and the heavy machine gun fire caused the German soldiers to fly their flesh and blood, which was unbearable to see.

At a distance of about 700 meters from the German trenches, the attacking Oceanic Empire armored tank units stopped their advance, and the tank barrels slowly turned, looking for any German firepower points that were firing, and then carried out roll call clearance.

Under the frantic blows of the aviation forces, the Germans lay in the trenches with very few heavy machine guns and small and medium-caliber guns to output firepower, and they were soon sent into the sky by tank shells.

As if there was a tacit understanding in advance, the attacking armored tank units were not in a hurry to advance, but waited for groups of bombers to wreak havoc wildly over the German trenches, and after throwing out the shells, they flapped their wings and flew into the air, and successively formed a formation to return to the airfield to reload.

It won't be long before these bombers return to the battlefield, bringing with them a rain of death fears.

More than ten minutes later

The tank armoured group advanced again, and at this time the heavy firepower that the Germans could counterattack in the front-line positions was almost lost, and even if some small and medium-caliber shells hit the tank armor, there was no other way to achieve anything other than a spark and collateral damage to the soldiers in the rear.

And these German artillery fires will then be sent into the sky by tank guns, and the counterattack is quite weak.

Ten minutes later

The armored tanks had already attacked more than 30 meters in front of the German defense line, and the infantry following them threw out a round of grenades, many of which fell in the trenches and exploded, and the Germans cried wolf.

Soldiers armed with semi-automatic rifles quickly attacked, jumping into the trenches like dumplings to clear the remaining German troops, and soon occupied the front-line positions.

At this time, more than a dozen strange-looking tank bridge-building vehicles drove over in the rear and quickly built steel bridges above the German trenches to facilitate the passage of one tank after another.

Just over an hour

The attacking Imperial troops occupied the German front-line positions on all fronts, during which they did not encounter stubborn resistance, and the stumps and broken arms that covered the German trenches fully illustrated the problem.

At the beginning of the eight-kilometer-long attack front, at least nearly 40,000 German troops were still defending, but under the frantic attack of hundreds of Royal Army Air Corps aircraft, more than 15,000 people were killed and wounded in just ten minutes, and the heavy firepower was almost lost.

Thousands of men were lost again in the ensuing armoured tank attack and grenade fire, and the rest were almost terrified, and all but a few recalcitrant Germans were killed.

After opening the breach, the three leading battalions of the T5 Tank Regiment of the slightly adjusted Panzer Wolf Cavalry Division set off again and pressed towards the German second-line positions.

The Imperial soldiers who followed behind poured into the trenches in the dark, expanding along the trenches to both sides, engaging in fierce battles with the remaining enemy forces.

These soldiers fought in a very orderly manner, throwing grenades before attacking, rushing up to replenish their guns after exploding, continuing to throw grenades after clearing the trenches in front, and then rushing up with light machine guns to fire and replenish their guns.

When the grenade was thrown, he retreated, let the brother troops go up, and rushed all the way.

The battlefield was full of gunfire, and the British Fifth Army and the French Tenth Army, which were assisting the attack, saw that the main attacking First Army occupied the German front-line positions, and launched large-scale infantry attacks one after another.

From time to time, fighters hovering in the air swooped down and fired along the trenches, dealing heavy blows to the resisting German soldiers and cooperating with friendly forces.

Looking down from the sky

In the ranks of the Imperial soldiers attacking along the trenches, there was a group of flag soldiers who unfurled a long and narrow white flag, which was about 3 meters long and 1 meter 2 wide, and there was only a thick red arrow sign on it, which pointed in the direction of the German army, which was very eye-catching and conspicuous.

This pointed out a clear direction and position for the fighters who strafed along the trenches, and despite the fierce scuffle between the soldiers on both sides in the trenches, the fighters of the other side were still able to give strong support.

After the fighter plane swooped down, it turned on the "flesh alley mode" several dozen meters in front of the flag, and the three heavy machine guns equipped with the "Lightning" fighter were extremely powerful in their dive strafing, and one round of dive strafing was more than 100 meters away, and the German troops were flying bloody and bloody.

After the fighter in front pulled up, the fighter in the back dived down, combed the trench with heavy machine gun bullets, and opened the offensive channel for the attacking soldiers, the combat efficiency was very high, and the lethality was amazing.

The Imperial soldiers flooded the German positions on both sides to expand the breach of attack, and the sound of guns and shouts of killing was deafening.

At this time

Squadron after squad of bombers flew back from the rear and began to circle over the battlefield, autonomously looking for targets to attack.

This created a big problem for the German army, to fight or not to fight?

The second-line German positions are about 4~5 kilometers away from the first-line positions, compared to the first-line positions are almost completely destroyed, the positions here are more or less well preserved, with a small number of artillery positions and machine-gun bunkers remaining, and the trenches are also roughly complete.

If you don't fire back, no one will find it.

If you fire back, you will immediately reveal your position, which will attract aerial bombardment and tank fire.

Only after a brief hesitation

The German commander chose to resist to the end, and the second-line trench positions reverberated with a sharp whistle again, and a large number of German troops poured out of the shelter, and the commander shouted hoarsely, saying; "Air combat, fast, fast, fast, air combat ......"

The German soldiers lifted the camouflage net covering the heavy machine-gun positions, turned their guns and opened fire on the diving plane, and the blazing fire whip was thrown into the sky, drilling dozens of bullet holes in the silver plane.

The swooping plane emitted thick black smoke and burst into flames on the ground near the trench, rising into a mushroom cloud of blood and fire.

The Germans in the second line of defense retained a considerable part of their heavy weapons, mainly heavy machine guns and small and medium-caliber artillery, which resisted stubbornly in anti-aircraft operations, demonstrating the true strength of a world-strong army.

One after another fighter planes were shot down, forcing the bombers circling in the air to pull up the altitude to carry out medium-altitude bombing, and the free-falling iron bombs fell on the surface of the position, exploding in all directions, and smoke and dust soared into the sky.

The visual effects are really good, but the accuracy of the blow is just a few streets away, and it's just lonely.

The German concealed artillery positions also began to exert their strength, destroying several T-5 tanks in succession, using 76mm rapid-fire guns, mostly destroying the side armor of the T5 Tiger tanks.

Just from this point of view

The German army deserves to be regarded as a world power, and after discovering that the 76-mm rapid-fire gun could not destroy the frontal armor of the T-5 tank, it quickly changed its tactics and focused on the side armor of the attacking armored forces, and succeeded.

The attacking tanks kept firing shells, blasting the enemy into the sky one after another, but the continuous emergence of 37mm and 76mm anti-tank guns put the battle into a fierce stalemate.

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