After an unsuccessful attempt to outflank the two flanks, the German Chief of the General Staff Falkingham soon came up with another plan, which was to concentrate forces on a frontal breakthrough in the enemy's weak areas, a tactic also known as the Central Breakthrough.

After the failure of the encirclement plan, Hindenburg and Ludendorff also had to obey the command of Falkingham, and the East Prussian army and the Austro-German army began to implement a central breakthrough.

After a series of complicated comparisons and judgments, the German General Staff finally chose the core area of the breakthrough in the Gorlitzer area in the upper reaches of the Vistula River.

The Vistula River is a river that originates in Hungary and runs north through Warsaw, dividing most of East Prussia.

The real reason for the implementation of breakthrough tactics in this area is that most of the Russian army groups in this area have been annihilated, and the newly transferred Russian troops are all new recruits, resulting in a relatively weak defense in this area.

What's more, the two new Russian armies here have been greatly reduced because of the previous Carpathian campaign, which led to the transfer of one army group.

In addition to the superiority of troops, the terrain here was also very favorable for the German army.

Because it was not a narrow terrain, the advantages of the German army's superiority in strength could be brought into play. In addition, the Vistula valley to the north and the Beskids Mountains to the south limited the support of the Russian army, ensuring the security of the two flanks of the group responsible for the assault, allowing the Germans to drive straight into the area without worrying about flanks and backs.

The German High Command, including the Chief of the General Staff Falkingham, was confident in the central breakthrough plan.

Although the current situation facing the Allies was dire, the Germans still believed in the fighting power of their own army, and Falkingham still believed that the valiant German army could resolve any threat at any time.

According to Falkingham's plan, if the central breakthrough could be successfully achieved, the Russian threat to Hungary would be completely eliminated and the current dire situation facing Austria-Hungary would be changed.

In this way, Austria-Hungary only needed to send a small number of troops and was able to hold Italy in the west, the Balkans in the south, and Russia in the east.

The remaining main army could fight with Germany, either to eliminate Russia or to go south to eliminate the Balkan states, which was a good choice.

The assault force designated by Falkingham was the German 11th Army, and the commander-in-chief was General Mackensen.

In order to facilitate unity of command and prevent any accidents after the campaign was launched, Falkingham did not set up a new main attack force, but incorporated the transferred baseline troops of the 10th Army and the 41st Guards Army, as well as the 6th Army sent by Austria-Hungary to fight in coordination, into the 11th Army, under the unified command of General Mackensen, and the rest of the army was responsible for containing and covering the main attacking force.

In the area of the breakthrough was the Russian Third Army, which had seven cavalry divisions, but most of them were newly replenished recruits.

Even if we only compare the German 11th Army and the Russian 3rd Army, the German army has a sufficient strength advantage.

After various integrations, the 11th Army had more than 360,000 German-Austrian troops, as well as more than 1,200 small and medium-caliber guns, more than 300 large-caliber guns and 100 mortars.

On the Russian side, although it also has 220,000 soldiers, most of them are new recruits. It also had a disadvantage in terms of artillery, with only nearly 700 small and medium-caliber guns, and single-digit large-caliber guns.

The Russian Third Army was dominated by cavalry divisions, so it was not equipped with large-caliber artillery, which also caused a relatively obvious gap in the comparison of forces between Germany and Russia.

In order to conceal the tactics of the central breakthrough, the Germans even prepared a feint on the Western Front to attract the attention of the entire Entente.

This, coupled with the fact that at the end of July, a considerable part of the Entente's attention was on the Ottoman Empire, and even Russia sent part of its troops in the Caucasus, which also led the Germans to believe that a good time had come for a new campaign.

It is worth mentioning that the Germans used poison gas for the first time in their feints on the Western Front.

This also caused many casualties among the British and French forces on the Western Front, and these poisonous gases can not only suffocate, poison and kill people, but also make people blind and incapacitated for a short or long time.

When the Germans used poison gas, they all wore relatively advanced gas masks. On the side of the British and French forces, either a simple two-layer cloth wrapped around the mouth and nose, or a more complex gas mask, which was easy to suffocate the soldiers.

When it comes to poison gas and gas masks, the Germans are leading in the study. Australasia has not done much research on poison gas, but there has been considerable progress in the study of gas masks.

Most of the current gas mask technology of the Germans also uses activated carbon for adsorption to eliminate some poisonous gases in the air.

Australasian gas masks also use this principle, and they still have a very good effect on the protection against poison gas.

Because of this, Britain and France urgently purchased a batch of gas masks from Australasia, and even Russia, which had not yet suffered from poison gas, urgently asked Australasia to buy gas masks.

At the same time, Britain and France were also urgently studying the use of poison gas bombs, preparing for a new round of retaliation against the German army.

On the last day of July, when the attention of Britain, France, and Russia was attracted by the poison gas used by Germany on the Western Front, Germany launched the Central Breakthrough Program on the Eastern Front.

In order to ensure the smooth implementation of the plan, except for a small number of commanders-in-chief and army commanders of the group armies, even some important division commanders did not know where their troops were really going and could only obey the temporary orders of their superiors.

At the same time as the real main forces launched a surprise attack, part of the Russian army also made a feint in the northern region, attracting the attention of a part of the Russian army.

This succeeded in paralyzing the Russians, who were unprepared for the impending German offensive.

By the time Ivanov, commander-in-chief of the Southwestern Front, found out that something was wrong, he ordered to strengthen the defenses along the Vistula, but by this time it was already a little late.

In summer, along the Vistula River, the trees and grass are verdant, and the temperature is not hot, making the scenery very beautiful.

But with the roar and indiscriminate bombardment of more than 1,000 artillery pieces of the German army, the temporary tranquility of the area disappeared again, and the war enveloped the whole land.

The bright light from the explosion of the shells illuminated the destroyed Russian positions and the panicked, fleeing Russian soldiers.

As soon as the artillery of the Russian army wanted to return fire, it was suppressed by the artillery of the German army. Faced with such a situation, the artillery positions of the Russian army were either silent during the war, or they were destroyed by German artillery.

Although Russia had already received some aid at this time, there were not so many divisions of the Russian army on the front line.

On average, each German gun can get hundreds of shells per day, but the number of shells that a Russian gun can fire per day is basically not more than ten.

There was already a gap in the number of artillery, and the number of shells fell into a disadvantage, so that the Russian army lacked artillery assistance, and also led to the Russian army under the attack of the German army, there was almost no room to fight back.

Throughout World War I, the most effective weapons for defense were heavy machine guns and artillery. But for the Russian army, machine gun bullets and shells are the easiest to consume and the most precious.

The bombardment of the Germans continued for several hours, and only in the first half hour did the Russian artillery respond a little.

For the remaining hours, the Russian defensive positions were subjected to heavy bombardment by German artillery, and the occasional fireworks that burst into the land illuminated the wails and anguish of the Russian soldiers.

And that's not all. After hours of bombing, the Germans came out next.

A year ago, these Russian recruits were illiterate peasants. They were shocked by the iron birds spitting death flint overhead, like death's pets asking for their lives, which damaged the morale of a large number of Russian soldiers, and they buried their heads in the trenches when they saw the German planes, for fear that death would capture them.

Although it has been a few years since the birth of airships and their popularization, Russia also had its first aircraft.

The problem is that neither airships nor airplanes are too distant for the average Russian peasant.

They have not had the opportunity to fly in airships, let alone the planes that Russia has not yet trained pilots, and it is natural that they are in awe of these things that can fly freely in the sky.

Among the great powers, St. Petersburg, the capital of Russia, was the capital of the great power with the fewest round-the-world voyages.

This is not only because St. Petersburg is located in the icy northern Europe, but also because St. Petersburg is too far from the main trade routes of other countries.

London and Paris are the most popular stops for round-the-world voyages in Europe, followed by Berlin and Rome, Vienna.

The Germans did not have many planes, and there were only a little more than 100 of them at full capacity. And these planes are relatively rudimentary, and the main attack method is a machine gun mounted on the plane.

However, although the aircraft did not inflict a large number of casualties on the Russian army, it caused a serious burden on the psychology of the Russian army.

Many Russian soldiers even developed a war-weary and war-phobic mentality, and if it weren't for the fact that the Russian commander urgently dealt with a few deserters who wanted to flee the battlefield, I was afraid that the Russian army might collapse.

On August 1, the German-Austrian forces began to officially implement the breakthrough. At the forefront was a division of German cavalry, brandishing sharp sabers, and receiving gifts from the Russian soldiers before they had barely put their heads out of position.

Under the combined fist of the German army, the Russian Third Army soon collapsed, and the military law and the warlords could no longer control them.

The Russian army fled in confusion, and some of the Russian soldiers who scrambled to flee also abandoned almost all of their equipment in order to lighten their loads.

By the time Ivanov, commander-in-chief of the Southwestern Army, learned of the rout of the Third Army on August 2, German troops had already occupied favorable terrain in this area.

Ivanov moved quickly, and he immediately ordered the Russian troops on both sides of the Gollitzer area to drive the breakthrough German troops back to the west of the Vistula at all costs and hold the area.

On Ivanov's orders, a large group of unprepared Russian troops hurried to the front and launched a suicidal swarm charge against the Germans.

You must know that the German 11th Army is not only equipped with a large number of artillery, but also hundreds of heavy machine guns, as well as forbidden weapons such as poison gas.

And the cluster charge launched by the Russians, to put it bluntly, is a group of people standing together, under the dense machine-gun fire network and artillery bombardment of the German army, which is tantamount to making the Russian army line up to die.

In just two days, the breakthrough of the German troops in the Goerlitzer area not only did not shrink, but became larger and larger.

Even if the Russian army was lying with corpses on the banks of the Vistula and in the Beskid Mountains, it could not stop the German army from advancing.

The brutality of the battle is evidenced by the already reddened Vistula River, which also made the inhabitants around the river afraid to eat fish for a long time.

Speaking of the gas bombs of the Germans, there was also a surprising episode in this charge campaign.

After the last time the Anglo-French forces suffered heavy losses by dropping poison gas bombs on the Western Front, the Germans quickly decided to also drop poison gas bombs on the Eastern Front, making the Russians suffer.

The poison gas used by the Germans at this time was asphyxiating chlorine, which was three times heavier than ordinary air.

When poison gas is released, a special team is required to determine the direction of the wind. When the wind and direction are right, the lid of the cylinder containing the poisonous gas is opened, and the yellow-green smoke is entangled, floating on the ground, and is blown forward by the breeze.

However, the gas release force apparently did not take into account the sudden change in the direction of the wind, which caused the gas to be blown back to the German position by the sudden change of wind direction.

After the poison gas was pressed to the ground and entered the trenches, it quickly spread over the German positions, causing many unprepared German soldiers to suffocate to death in agony.

According to the secret statistics of the Germans, this poison gas accident, which resulted in the death of hundreds of German soldiers, was an extremely serious accident.

In order not to affect the morale of the military and not to let the army and the population doubt the safety of such a forbidden weapon, the German General Staff chose to keep it strictly secret.

This was not revealed until many years after the end of the First World War.

Of course, this accident did not affect the large-scale use of poison gas by the German army.

The day after the accident, the German army reused poison gas on the Eastern Front, causing great suffering to the Russian army.

Coupled with the dense firepower network of the German army, the Russian army that filled the gap suffered more than 100,000 casualties in two days, and the Russian southwestern front was very few.

It is worth mentioning that the Germans' use of poison gas with such fanfare caused the price of gas masks to soar.

Britain, France and Russia purchased gas masks from Australasia at the same time as they began to develop their own gas masks.

The current market price of gas masks has tripled, but British and French purchase orders are still in short supply.

That's all for these 4,000 words today, it's not very comfortable, rest.

(End of chapter)