At dawn, the British offensive was completely bogged down. The firepower from the German positions completely made Tobruk's already small British armored forces despair. A Matilda tank burned in the sand, looking so lonely and lonely.

The German army has many secret weapons, such as the new jet fighter being developed, the long-range surface-to-surface missile, the superweapon that is being tested, and the more advanced King Tiger main battle tank -- the ancestors of these weapons have already caused the opponent a headache to the extreme, and one can imagine what kind of earth-shaking changes these advanced future weapons will bring to the entire battlefield once they are put into service.

However, there are many improvised and stupid methods in the German army, which make the entire battlefield full of the wisdom of grassroots soldiers, and also give the entire German tactical system a more flexible and changeable special style.

For example, the improvised multiple rocket launchers that are arranged together on wheels are called building demolition machines by soldiers. For example, the 88 mm cannon that is roaring on the position right now.

On the battlefield of the future, if you want to find a weapon, like the German 88mm caliber cannon in World War II, it can be used by all three armies, and this weapon has also conquered all German commanders with its excellent performance and won the favor of front-line infantrymen.

This gun was installed on the Navy's destroyers and submarines and was used as anti-aircraft fire. Even aircraft carriers are equipped with such anti-aircraft weapons, and it can be said that cannons of this caliber are basically the standard anti-aircraft weapons of the German Navy.

At the same time, this artillery was deployed by the air defense forces of the air force in every corner of the entire German occupation zone. As for the number of such guns, it seems that even Catherine herself does not know the exact number, but from the beginning of the accumulation before the war, to the present large number of installations, Germany has at least tens of thousands of such guns, and you can see this kind of artillery in every important port and airport.

It is also a favorite weapon of the army, and the tank gun of the Tiger tank is adapted from this anti-aircraft cannon, and the caliber is exactly the same, both 88 mm. And this cannon is also used by front-line soldiers against tanks, and the effect is shockingly good.

What is even more surprising is that this cannon, which was produced on the Krupp artillery line, has another function worth remembering - it can carry out support fire against the infantry, and it is not small in power.

Rommel liked this cannon the most, because it gave him an unrivaled advantage in firepower. He was accustomed to reinforcing his infantry on the frontal line of defense, which had originally belonged to the air force, and then drawing out more valuable armored forces for flank roundabouts. This is his signature trick, which makes the opponent unguardable. At the heart of this style of play was that one's own infantry could withstand the frontal onslaught of the opponent's armored forces, and Rommel's tactic was to give pressure to these 88 mm cannons.

Shell after shell is pushed into the bay of this cannon, which is then fired immediately and fires a lethal shell, which can be used by skilled artillery crews of German air defense forces to deliver a staggering rate of fire of 23 rounds per minute.

The firing position of the most classic German 88-mm anti-aircraft guns was a shallow pit of almost a meter with communication trenches on both sides. As long as there was time, the soldiers would dig such a classic shallow pit and deploy this anti-aircraft cannon inside. In this way, the cannon is exposed to a height of less than a meter on the horizon, making it even more difficult to detect.

In fact, the phenomenon of transpiration in the desert is very strict, and the targets close to the surface are not visible clearly because of the haze and steaming heat, so that the firing position of the German 88-mm anti-aircraft artillery cannot be found at all, which has become the most frustrating thing for all enemy soldiers.

In the end, the two sides can only compete with the aiming and observation system, and whoever finds that the other side has a long distance and faster aiming speed will survive this desert competition - the aiming system has always been the proudest competition of the German army, and Rice's mirror design can no one challenge at this time period, from the aiming rangefinder on the battleship to the sniper's scope, the German army is much more accurate than the enemy of the same period.

When it comes to the speed and accuracy of capturing the target, as well as the rate of fire after the attack has begun, how can the standard of a tank on the ground be compared with that of an anti-aircraft cannon designed for attacking aircraft? The 88-millimeter cannon was originally designed to attack enemy aircraft at an altitude of 26,000 feet, and hitting a tank at a distance of 1,000 meters is definitely an overkill -- this is not a fair contest at all.

Of course, this gun is not without its drawbacks, and it can be said that the shortcomings are as impressive as its unmatched power. The weight of this 88 mm gun, which was chosen by the Germans as an anti-aircraft weapon, was staggering, and the weight of the 150 mm howitzer, the standard support weapon of the German army, was about the same, reaching a terrible 5 tons. Therefore, compared with the other weapons of the German army, this weapon is obviously too bloated, except in the case of necessity, and in the North African battlefield, where the transportation conditions are relatively convenient, it is rarely used on the front-line battlefield.

Another disadvantage is the high price of the gun itself, including shells. If there is a weapon in the German army that is using the same "gold coin shell" as the external one, then there is no doubt that this weapon is an 88 mm cannon. In the same case, the price of a single fire from an 88-mm cannon was twice as expensive as a Soviet anti-aircraft gun of 76 mm caliber...... Of course, the benefit in exchange for this is a geometric increase in power.

"Boom!" "Boom!" "Boom!" On the core defensive positions of the German army, on the nine anti-tank positions arranged in three V-shaped positions, the soldiers of the air defense unit of the air force used the guns in their hands to shoot a rate of fire similar to that of bolt rifles. And the British armored task force that attacked here on the opposite side proved the terrible opponent with its own losses.

A German officer stood next to the 88-mm anti-aircraft gun, he just stood, he didn't seem to be afraid of the rain of bullets sweeping from the opposite side, he put down the binoculars in his hand, and then gave the order to the two non-commissioned officers who were using scissor periscopes next to him to turn the muzzle and attack the opponent's left flank: "Concentrate fire to the right! Defeat the tanks there first!"

"Boom!" "Boom!" "Boom!" With his order, three guns soon turned their muzzles, and the speed was staggering. The heavy barrel of the cannon gave the cannon a stable firing platform, and the need for aerial fire made the cannon turn and rise and fall very quickly, and with one command after another, the guns were pointed at the corresponding position.

Heavy shells can reach their target at a distance of a thousand meters in just over a second, and with their terrifying impact and penetrating energy, they can easily tear through the front armor of Matilda's tank, and even destroy the engine and fuel tank behind it after destroying the entire cockpit.

The sight was a bit like a high-speed car crashing into a wooden fence, where the sturdy tank was as fragile as the fence in an instant, and the sturdy armor plates were smashed to pieces by the same amount of energy as the planks.

Soon, a British tank was wrecked in advance, the tracks broke due to violent vibrations, and the front driving wheels flew out. Because the fuel tank was punctured, the tank was on fire in an instant, and the turret of the tank was lifted from the inside, but only two hands could be seen twisting and struggling, and only two seconds later, the pain suffered by the owner of the hands was ended, because the ammunition was detonated, and the huge explosion blew the entire tank into a pile of scrap metal, and the British who were struggling inside could no longer be found.

"Boom!" another shell flew out of the barrel of the 88 cannon, but this time it seemed that luck was on the side of the British, and the shell flew over a distance of 1,500 meters in an instant, but did not hit the main part of the tank. The shell hit the front side of the tank, knocking off the sandbags and shovels hanging on it, shattering the tank's headlights and crashing headlong into the sand dunes next to the tank, splashing a cloud of gravel.

The British in this tank were obviously frightened, they thought that their tank had been hit, because the loud noise and the vibration from the tank were so alarming, so the British tankmen lifted their hatches and quickly jumped out of the tank and ran to the side, but then the driver of the tank was knocked to the ground by the German machine gunners, and the commander and gunner had to raise their hands and surrender.

This time the British attack was routed within minutes, leaving the wreckage of more than 40 tanks on the battlefield, most of which had been turned into burning scrap metal due to the explosion, and only a few lucky ones were not killed.

There was also a tank that was almost intact and captured, the guy who had knocked off its headlights. It wasn't until the interrogation of the prisoners that the tank commander, who was lucky enough to escape without being hit, turned out to be the commander of a British armored brigade and a high-ranking officer with the rank of colonel.

The Germans did not treat the British prisoner badly, and invited him to breakfast, and he took the bread and looked at the 88mm cannon that was cleaning the chamber beside him, not believing that the opponent who had beaten his troops all over the ground was such a disgraceful weapon.

However, when he learned that this weapon was a German anti-aircraft gun, which could penetrate the front armor plate of the Matilda tank at a distance of 1,500 meters, he was silent for a long time. His armored brigade lost almost half of its strength in this battle, and more importantly, the British did not recapture the high ground, and the terrible shelling will continue in the future.

"It's not fair. Finally he spoke: "How can you Germans use weapons against tanks with the same weapons you use against aircraft?"