The Third Reich in Desperation

Text Chapter 172 Mussolini's Grand Strategy

"Leader!" Hearing Mussolini's roll call, the witty Graziani immediately stepped forward.

Obedient to please the leader Mussolini, this is the biggest reason why he can now sit on the throne of Italian Marshal.You know, General Gambala, who was originally the most hopeful to take this position, was sent to the logistics department by Mussolini and left idle because he always questioned the leader.

During the Spanish Civil War, General Gambala led the Italian Expeditionary Force, and he made a lot of major military exploits. Although it was inferior to the German teenager Rommel, it was a military exploit after all.In the end, because of a quarrel with the leader, he was demoted and punished on the grounds that "improper command caused excessive casualties"!

How can anyone not die in a war?Anyone with a sound mind can see the real reason for Gambala's demotion.In turn, that's why he got Graziani's promotion.

With a bitter face and a thin figure, Graziani took off his flat military cap and waited respectfully for Mussolini to give instructions.

Pooh!This dog only knows how to flatter people.Many of the Italian generals present looked down on Graziani with disdain.

"The German head of state suggested that we send troops to the Alps and threaten the south of France. What do you think about this?" Mussolini walked up to Graziani, hanging a cigar, and asked.

"Everything is subject to the leader's arrangement!" Graziani, who had made up his mind a long time ago, was now preoccupied with how to please Mussolini, and of course he said his words carefully.

Mussolini nodded with satisfaction, and Graziani's submissive attitude made him very pleased.In fact, what he is after is this kind of feeling that one person is above ten thousand, and a word is a thousand words.

Satisfied with his momentum, Mussolini turned his appreciative gaze to Graziani, smiled and said: "Don't be so serious, tell me your opinion."

Of course he needs one person to express his humble opinion, so that he can draw out his own clever and wise grand strategy.

Graziani, who understood what Mussolini was thinking, raised his eyebrows slightly, and deliberately pretended to be stupid and analyzed: "The Germans are afraid of encountering a two-front war, so they turned to us in Italy, hoping that we can serve them in France. In the south, when France attacks northern Germany on a large scale in the future, it is better to have a knife that can stab the French army from the back."

What Graziani said was superficial things, even ordinary people who did not graduate from military school could imagine.He chose such a simple and superficial statement, obviously to satisfy Mussolini's feeling that he saw everything clearly, so that the leader could speak a little more brilliant point of view.

However, his remarks have already caused serious dissatisfaction among a group of Italian generals. With this amateur analytical ability, he is simply ruining the position of Italian Marshal.

"What you said makes sense." Unaware of the dissatisfaction of the other generals, Mussolini said in a tone that he thought was inscrutable: "The Germans dared to launch this war, and their confidence was from the very beginning. Relying on the fact that we have a powerful ally like the Kingdom of Italy by our side. Let me tell you, the French are still afraid to send troops to Germany. In the end, it is because they are afraid that Italy will take the lead for the Germans, and that the Italian army of one million will attack them!"

"Yes, yes, what you said, leader, is so reasonable. Why didn't I think of this?" Graziani smiled obsequiously, and kept nodding his head, pretending to be enlightened.

Shit suddenly realized!Several Italian generals who still wanted to show their faces could hardly hold back the urge to beat him up.Although their level is not high, they can obviously feel that Mussolini's self-deceiving nonsense just now is unrealistic.

At the beginning, Germany asked Italy to send some soldiers to "hunt" Poland, and I never saw the leader so confident and dared to speak up.Why did the Germans become so popular with their Italian allies after they showed their courage?

With such arrogance, how could an Italian prime minister and an Italian marshal still nod their heads?The self-aware general has begun to worry, how can Italy save itself in this coming troubled world?In short, relying on the leader and the marshal will definitely not work!

Not at all affected by the disdainful gazes of a group of generals, Graziani was still enthusiastically cooperating with Mussolini and asked: "But leader, the question now is, do we want to follow the Germans' wishes? "

"Yes! Why don't we?" Mussolini laughed under the surprised eyes of everyone: "For us in Italy, isn't this a great opportunity to reproduce the glory of the Roman Empire?"

Then, Mussolini revealed his well-thought-out grand strategy in the expressions of a group of people who saw the ghost: "The French army has sent troops to the Saarland border in Germany, which shows that the French will attack the Germans in the near future." Yes, and it was ruthless. I have to say that the timing of the French was very good, just when the main force of the German army penetrated into Poland and was about to take Warsaw, the capital of Poland."

Then Mussolini cleared his throat, and said in a louder voice: "The Germans must be reluctant to give up Warsaw, a piece of fat that reaches their lips, so they will definitely take Warsaw first and then go back to deal with France. Then, just rely on Those on Germany's western frontier, even if they had a 'Siegfried Line', couldn't hold back the French."

Having said that, Mussolini paused deliberately.After Graziani took the lead to let the generals applaud, he then emphasized in a fast voice: "But! The French forgot that there is another military power on the European continent with millions of troops like them. That's our Italy! When they break into Germany, one of our elite troops from Italy crosses the Alps and raids the south of France, and they will face annihilation!"

"Wonderful! You are indeed the leader. In this way, the Germans have entered the territory of Poland, the French have entered the territory of Germany, and we have entered the territory of France. In this way, the great powers on the European continent Inside, only our mainland of Italy has not been subjected to war." Graziani immediately seized the opportunity and sang together with Mussolini.Even he himself was surprised by his own reaction, with such a great talent, it would be a shame not to be an actor!

A lieutenant general really couldn't stand the awkward duo of Mussolini and Graziani, stepped forward and said in advance: "Since the leader is going to send troops, why didn't you tell him when the German head of state called? What? Wouldn't this reassure our German allies?"

After Mussolini heard the words, he shook his index finger and said lightly: "This point, of course, I see farther than you. The reason why I didn't immediately agree to the Germans' deployment is because I ordered them Now we are asking for help. Without the help of our Italians, the Germans are definitely not France's opponents by themselves. So I will not agree to them first, and wait for them to come to me. In this way, you can take the opportunity to blackmail the Germans and get a profit Yet?"

"Oh...but the head of state of Germany seemed to have hung up the phone just now. Doesn't he look like he wants something from us?"

The lieutenant general's words were like a hot slap in the face of the self-righteous Mussolini.

Main text Chapter 173 Miracles in the military world

In the urban area of ​​Rhodes, groups of soldiers shuttled back and forth on the streets, bringing a depressive and tense atmosphere to the city at war.

The empty trenches dug and built in the urban area were already full of soldiers withdrawn from the front line.Looking down from a height, the trenches temporarily set up between the streets cut the originally smooth city avenues into individual grids.

Some grids are smaller, and there are only a dozen or so soldiers inside.Some grids are larger, and may even be filled with a company of soldiers.

And a gray building in the city center that temporarily served as the headquarters of the 30th Division was surrounded by endless bandaged soldiers.Since this is not only the location of the 30th Division's headquarters, but also the last line of defense, their division commander Hans von Furmanreid decided to gather all the active wounded of the whole division here as a last-ditch effort.

There was a hustle and bustle in various positions, and the remaining soldiers of the 30th Division ran back and forth between the streets, transporting ammunition boxes and dry food bags.Many soldiers with better marksmanship were arranged by the windows of buildings in Rhodes, holding Mauser 98k rifles with scopes, acting as quasi-snipers in street battles.

In the previous defensive battles, many officers had been killed under the concentrated artillery fire of the Polish army. Many low-level officers, even non-commissioned officers, were temporarily appointed as commanders in the trenches of the streets.The surviving senior officers gathered together in twos and threes, discussing how to deploy defensive gradients and firepower configurations in the dozen or so districts divided into the city.

Due to the previous defensive battle, the 30th Division is now severely understrength.Hans assigned the remaining troops to five newly established battalion-level temporary headquarters for decentralized management. However, these five temporary headquarters said that what they needed to command was not an ordinary battalion, but was split into squadrons. The platoon is a unit, and the blocking forces deployed on every street are scattered sporadically.It can be said that the command difficulty of the temporary headquarters is actually quite complicated and difficult, and it is almost impossible to effectively command every unit after the war begins.

At this moment, both officers and soldiers are desperately strengthening the crude defense lines in the urban area. Even many large furniture such as tables and cabinets found in empty buildings were placed in the trenches by the Germans. In front, it is used to block a burst of enemy troops rushing forward, so as to make time for the bayonet to start the next step of hand-to-hand combat.

Although on the European battlefield, bayonet decisive battles are rare most of the time, this does not mean that European armies will not use hand-to-hand tactics!

In fact, the bayonet fighting training of the 30th Division of the German Army is quite outstanding among its peers.As the German head of state, Reinhardt visited the bayonet fighting technology of the 30th Division before this battle, and distributed 300 M98 parade bayonets equipped with Mauser 1908 rifles to the division headquarters of the 30th Division.This 430 mm long bayonet is definitely a good thing in hand-to-hand combat.

When Major General Hans distributed these bayonets to the soldiers who had just entered the trenches, he also lamented that fortunately the head of state rewarded these bayonets at the beginning, which happened to be used in this platoon.As everyone knows, the situation that the 30th Division is now facing is something that Reinhardt has known for a long time, just because he wants his confidant Manstein to take this opportunity to plan a brilliant response plan like in history In order to establish prestige, this purpose did not point out to anyone.

It is a pity that Major General Hans and the officers and soldiers of the 30th Division were used by Manstein as a bait to attract the Polish Supreme Command without knowing it at this moment.A German infantry division that was crippled and seemed to be taken immediately was too tempting for the Polish High Command.Because only if the 30th Division can be captured, it will be able to threaten the rear of the attacking German 8th Army, thus forcing the German 8th Army to stop its offensive and turn around to fight again with the carefully assembled counterattack force in Poland.

In order to plan this counterattack, the Polish High Command took great risks to deploy 9 infantry divisions, 3 cavalry brigades and 10 infantry divisions from other areas on the Western Front on the suggestion of Major General Berente of France. a newly formed division.

According to Berente's vision, this counterattack army, which entrusts all the remaining essence of the Polish army, can be used to carry out a large-scale counterattack between the bends of the Vistula River. fate.And advance to the south bank of the Vistula River through a counter-assault, opening a way for the defeated Polish army there to retreat to Warsaw, allowing them to re-train in Warsaw before re-entering the battlefield.

Everything was so reasonable at first, but at the breakthrough point carefully chosen by Berente, where the 30th Division of the German Army is located, an unexpected situation appeared.

A division of German infantry, under the attack of a Polish army in turn, under the firepower of 9 Polish artillery regiments, actually carried it for 48 hours abruptly!

How can this be? !

When Berente received the battle report from the Polish army the next afternoon, he was so surprised that he couldn't speak for a long time.After two days of fighting, the elite force of a Polish army could only snatch a main forward position and a cover position that had been evacuated from the hands of a German division.This is completely against military common sense!

Berente believed that even if he called a senior military teacher from the most famous military academy in France to analyze it, he would not be able to explain the reason for such a battle.

If one division can block the full attack of an army group, then why did my own commander, the famous French Marshal Petain, need to mobilize the same number of people as the German army in the Battle of Verdun in the last World War? The large French army came to resist, but in the end they managed to win a narrow victory?

Did the Germans get reinforcements?No, that's not possible either.The breakthrough of Rhodes was found by his French officer corps of Berente after a long time of research. He chose this place as a counterattack position, and the Polish Supreme Command also repeatedly said yes.At that time, they saw that the German army's military strength in Lodz would not exceed one division, and there were hardly any large reinforcements within a hundred miles.

Moreover, according to reports from the front-line troops, they have found a large number of dead medical soldiers on the German forward positions just occupied.These medical troops with Red Cross armbands are not holding medicine boxes, but live ammunition!

From this point of view, the German division stationed in Lodz should have reached the point where there were no soldiers to adjust, and had to arm the health battalion and send it to the front line.From this point of view, the Germans look more like they have received reinforcements.Otherwise, they wouldn't have fought so hard, even taking out the most precious health battalion.

After preliminary statistics, Berante estimated that the German division in Rhodes should have a casualty rate of 50.00%, no matter what?From Berente's point of view, it is simply a miracle in the military world that this German division can persist until now!

Text Chapter 174 Traps

In fact, Berente's estimate is already very conservative.The casualties of the German 30th Division were not 50.00% of his estimate at all, but 70.00%!

According to the current common sense in the European military circles, under normal circumstances, an army loses its offensive capability when its casualties reach about 10%.

And a 30% casualty rate has reached the normal casualty limit of a normal army.If this limit is exceeded, the general army will lose its organization, collapse, flee, abandon its position, and surrender.From a military point of view, the troops at this time were already extremely lacking in fighting spirit, and it was difficult to complete any combat missions.

Factors such as downsizing, destruction of formation, loss of weapons, suppression of the enemy's superior firepower and other factors have caused the troops to lose the effective combat effectiveness they should have.In this case, the large loss of non-commissioned officers and lieutenants is equivalent to a person's peripheral nerve damage. Even if the muscle strength is still there, the combat effectiveness will be greatly reduced, and the ability to complete the tactical intention will inevitably collapse.From a military theory point of view, no amount of fighting will can make up for this!