Sedang, this historically famous city, was founded on the Meuse River, about 60 miles from the border area. With a population of only 13,000 people, the city center should be a small city with little name.

However, the city became famous for its war, which was occupied by German troops for four years during the First World War, and in 1870, it became France's greatest military disgrace when Emperor Napoleon III and his troops were defeated and accepted their unconditional surrender.

And this time, the French again lost the color of the color, and lost it very cleanly, and did not even put up a decent resistance that put the German army under a slight pressure. Compared to the previous ones, this time the French are even more sloppy.

But there was one German front-line general who was even more cowardly, and this man was Rommel, the Führer's confidant. In the Battle of Poland, he commanded the German 7th Panzer Corps to rampage through northern Poland and achieved brilliant results, earning him the reputation of "Imperial Twin Jewels".

But this time he was hidden, yes, no doubt in the snow. He and his 7th Panzer Corps were placed in an inconsequential position, with no important combat mission at all, they just followed the troops, and kept on the road.

The task given to him above is very clear, that is, let him rest his troops, follow the army all the way to the west, and join the battle at the most critical time. Therefore, the famous German 7th Panzer Army turned out to be the follower of other units.

This qiē made Rommel so depressed that he almost collapsed in depression. He has always felt that he himself is the center of the world, a disaster for the enemy. But now he has to face a very cruel problem, that is, there is no war to fight.

When he heard the news of the occupation of Sedan by the 2nd Panzer Corps, and when he heard that the 3rd SS Specialist Division had crossed the Sedan River, he finally wrote a personal letter to Accardo, in which he expressed his eagerness for battle.

Soon he received a reply, and the Führer gave him an enthusiastic reply. However, what touched him the most was that at the beginning of the chapter, Accardo greeted him about his physical condition and instructed him to eat on time in order to maintain a strong body to command the troops in continuous battle. His stomach ailments had always plagued him, but it was a great pleasure to have this little secret revealed and comforted.

And he got the result he wanted, Brauchitsch ordered the Germans to carry out Operation Scythe, his troops were ordered to take the lead, and the 1st and 2nd Panzer Corps, which had been opening the way in front, were responsible for his rear.

The young general was standing on the side of the pontoon bridge in Sedan, watching his armored forces pass through the pontoon bridge as fast as they could. And not far from him, an 88-mm anti-aircraft gun stood there, with a long barrel pointed at the sky.

The 2nd SS Panzer Division has completed its crossing of the river, and now the 7th Panzer Division is crossing the pontoon bridge. The staff officer reported to Rommel with a report of record: "We received a large-scale replenishment this morning, with plenty of fuel and ammunition, and enough other supplies for us to use for five days. ”

"What about the intelligence of aerial reconnaissance?" Rommel asked, watching a Leopard tank speeding past the pontoon, and the truck behind the tank pulling a 150 mm cannon also drove across the widened and reinforced pontoon bridge without slowing down.

"The latest information provided by the aviation liaison officer an hour ago indicates that French forces are massing, but the other side has no heavy weapons. The Stuka bomber forces bombed these French staging areas, the effects of which are being evaluated. The staff officer glanced at the information in his hand and said.

"Send a telegram to the division headquarters of the 2nd SS Panzer Division, ordering them to send reconnaissance detachments to reconnoiter an area within a radius of 30 kilometers and, if encountering resistance from small French forces, to destroy them on the spot. Rommel narrowed his eyes and thought for a while and said, "Let the motorized rifle divisions behind hurry up, we have no time to waste." ”

"Yes!" the staff officer saluted, then turned to leave.

Just a few minutes after the staff officer left, the mournful air defense sirens sounded. Rommel looked at the sky in the distance. There, the fighters of the Luftwaffe were constantly tearing at the dense British bomber group.

Every now and then, a plane falls from the sky with a trail of pitch-black smoke, and then shatters in mid-air with a tragic explosion. But the grim anti-aircraft sirens continued, and the surrounding German anti-aircraft gunners were busy, carrying the shells to the convenient position and placing them in a row.

"Long live the Führer! A captain of the ground air defense unit of the Air Force came over, saluted Rommel, and then said anxiously: "The battle alarm has been sounded here, please follow my people to the designated place for refuge." ”

"What?" Rommel pointed to the majestic-looking 88mm cannon behind him, glanced at the captain who had come forward to persuade him to dodge, and said with a smile: "Captain, this is an anti-aircraft cannon! Do you think there is a safer place than where I can stand?"

"General, I'm responsible for your safety, so you'd better get out of here with my men!" the captain said stubbornly.

"Captain, I think you're mistaken! You're here to keep that pontoon bridge absolutely safe, not to protect a general like me. Don't you know that my personal safety is negligible for the outcome of the entire campaign?"

"But. "What else does the captain want to say.

But Rommel interrupted him: "I'm standing here, and I'm going to see how you repel the enemy planes!

"Yes, General!" the captain saluted, then walked over to the anti-aircraft gun beside Rommel and began to set up his mission. Sure enough, he never looked at Rommel again, as if the general of the armored unit did not exist at all.

Despite the heavy losses, the British bombers gradually approached the German pontoon bridge, and these bombers received an order to destroy the pontoon bridge at any cost to prevent the Germans from continuing to advance, and they carried out this order with the utmost loyalty.

Just now, German fighters had shot down nearly 20 British planes, but these crazy British pilots continued to attack the Luftwaffe defenses, and finally dragged the German fighters to the sky near the pontoon.

"Suddenly, suddenly!" a Bofors anti-aircraft gun in the distance fired, with a high rate of fire, the anti-aircraft gun fired desperately into the sky, the impact caused a cloud of dust to rise around, and Rommel could see the position of the defensive position without a telescope.

"Boom!" Suddenly, the 88mm cannon behind Rommel opened fire, and the loud noise startled Rommel. As the flames erupted from the barrel, the cannon barrel moved backwards with the help of the brakes, and quickly returned to its original position on the gun mount. A unique gadget on the position of the bolt helped the German gunners complete the process of unloading, the bolt opened, and a heavy shell fell to the ground with a clanging sound.

"Reload!" a young artillery commander commanded loudly.

A gunner came to the gun position with the shell in his hand, quickly stuffed the shell into the chamber, and then the soldier next to him quickly closed the bolt. At the moment of closing, he shouted the password he had shouted countless times during training: "Done!"

"Boom!" Without the slightest hesitation, the cannon opened fire again, firing its second shell under Rommel's gaze, Rommel quickly looked at the position where the muzzle of the gun was pointing, and saw that an airplane there was just hit by a shell, surrounded by a ball of flames at an altitude of thousands of meters, and instantly shattered into parts.

"Hit the target! Adjust the angle of the gun! Keep loading!" shouted the young officer in charge of the artillery, putting down the binoculars in his hand.

Several artillerymen hurriedly began to rotate several rotating wheels of the 88mm cannon, and the cannon began to rotate rapidly, and there was no hint of bulkiness. And in the process of turning, another shell was pushed inside the chamber.

"Boom!" the British bombers dropped their first bomb of the day, which was at least 30 meters away from the pontoon bridge, and the huge waves rose on the water, but only splashed the clothes of the German engineers on the pontoon.

"Boom!" Rommel fired again at the 88mm cannon next to him, the shells flying up in an attempt to destroy anything that stood in its way, but this time it did not hit the British plane, but flew straight into the sky and exploded not far away.

But the soldiers of the German air defense forces once again adjusted the angle with great speed, loaded the shells and hit another shell into the sky. Combined with the extremely high rate of fire of the Upper Bofors anti-aircraft guns, the German anti-aircraft fire formed a dense air defense net over the pontoon, and every British plane that crashed into this huge net was instantly shattered.

Rommel saw the soldiers of the Luftwaffe anti-aircraft artillery regiment loaded with shells sweating, and he silently watched as these soldiers fired frantically into the sky, and with the efforts of 40 mm Bofors anti-aircraft guns and 88 mm anti-aircraft guns, all 40 British bombers that rushed past the German fighters were shot down near the pontoon bridge.

He witnessed the birth of an anti-aircraft ace, and this anti-aircraft gun beside him shot down 11 British bombers in the space of an hour.

The efforts of these anti-aircraft gunners were not in vain, the pontoons were unharmed, and Rommel's steel army passed through Sedang as fast as possible, passed the German 1st Panzer Corps, which was on guard in front, and rushed to the forefront of the entire German attacking force, appearing on time where they should have been.