Lieutenant Vincent Deere, a platoon commander in the British Army's 3rd Infantry Division, walked listlessly across the snow-covered plains, followed by a dozen or so soldiers as unmotivated as he was.
They were conducting routine patrols west of Hartlepool, and in the middle of the battlefield where the two armies were facing each other, there was a large vacuum between the front lines of the area to facilitate tank exchanges.
If the Germans or the Anglo-American forces were to launch an armored cluster attack, they would most likely set up a tank attack formation in this vacuum.
Therefore, both sides will send patrols to patrol this vacuum area to detect the enemy's armored clusters ready to attack as soon as possible.
In the early hours of this morning, they, the unlucky Britons, had to brave the bitter cold wind and goose feather snowflakes to walk 10 miles on the prescribed route, to be hit by bullets from somewhere, and then die miserably.
Dying for the country with a smile should have been the duty of a soldier.
Having fought in France, shed blood in North Africa, and fought German tanks in Ireland, Lieutenant Dill was a true soldier who should not be feared to die.
But from the news of the "London protests" a few days ago, this soldier, who had fought for the British Empire for more than three years on the battlefield, suddenly felt that the battle had lost its meaning.
Fighting the most ferocious enemies on the front lines with his brothers, he couldn't sleep soundly for weeks, couldn't eat a hot meal, forgot what his wife looked like, and could die or be disabled at any time.
But everyone still gritted their teeth and insisted, and no one would give up their responsibilities.
But in the rear, in London, those who live in a comfortable big city, living with their families in a scart but comfortable enough life, jumped up, chanting the slogan "Bread, milk, peace" and went out into the streets to make trouble, and it was not one or two, but a million that forced Churchill to declare the dissolution of parliament and call a general election, in fact, preparing to hand over the country to the capitulationists When Dill heard the news, he was shocked, then angry, and then extremely disappointed and sad, who am I defending, who am I fighting for, and is it worth it for the shameless people in the city of London who are ready to surrender to give their lives for these people So from then on, Lieutenant Dill began to be afraid of death, very afraid And Lieutenant Dill also saw fear in the eyes of everyone around him, including his superiors, colleagues, and subordinates.
When the battle is meaningless, everyone is afraid of death.
"Okay, that's it," the distraught Lieutenant Dill suddenly shouted, "We've completed our mission, now go back." ” The patrol mission was not completed, only about half of the allotted distance was covered, but who cares The whole country is waiting to surrender, and who cares that there is a small group of British poor worms on the front line in Hartlepool who has not completed the task Lieutenant Dill had just turned around to take his men back after giving the order when a shrill whistle rang in his ears, sounding as if something was flying through the air.
Immediately, someone screamed "Oh God, I got hit" "The Germans, the Germans are coming" "God, what shall we do" The Germans themselves encountered a German patrol, and Lieutenant Dill immediately threw himself into the snow, and a feeling of fear came over him from all sides.
At this time, the gunfire rang out more intensively, and it sounded not German FG42 paratrooper rifles and KB42 automatic carbines, but dozens of bolt-action rifles firing indiscriminately.
Then Lieutenant Dill heard shouts in about Italian, and it was then that he remembered that the shots were fired from Italian Calgano rifles.
Lieutenant Dill breathed a sigh of relief and shouted to his subordinates who were already lying in the snow: "Don't be afraid, it's Italians, let's fight and retreat." ” Now the British army could only fight and retreat when they encountered useless Italians, but after a few minutes, Lieutenant Dill found that he could no longer even hide from the Italians.
Because the gunfire on the side of the Italians is getting more and more intense, apparently there are quite a few of them.
Small mortars fired, and there should have been several 45 small mortars fired at the same time, and the shells rained down like snowdrops, kicking up patches of snow.
Diere's soldiers soon became unable to bear it, and they stopped firing back and began to flee, and the firepower on the British side suddenly weakened.
The Italians, on the other hand, took the opportunity to charge, and dozens or hundreds of enthusiastic Italian fascists rushed forward with their old Calgano rifles, all loaded with bright bayonets.
"Long live the fascist party, long live Mussolini" Hearing the Italian slogan, Lieutenant Dill subconsciously took out his bayonet and wanted to charge, but when he held the bayonet in his hand, he suddenly thought of what slogan he should shout For the sake of the king, that guy who couldn't even speak clearly had fled to Canada a long time ago For the sake of Britain, the British government will soon surrender For the sake of the British people, forget it, they only know bread and milk Thinking of this, Lieutenant Dill threw his bayonet and rifle away, and then sat down on the snow and covered his face and cried.
His actions seemed to infect the others, except for those who had been killed or had already escaped, a dozen battle-hardened British men all threw their weapons and cried.
"Captain, it's time to move on, our Italian warriors have already eliminated all the British soldiers in front of us, and have captured 18 prisoners" Ten minutes after Lieutenant Dill and his men were captured, an Italian paratrooper ensign on a motorbike told the surprising news to Captain Rudolf von Ribbentrop, who was in contact with the 3rd Company of the 516th Heavy Battalion, equipped with the No. 4F tank, by radio.
"What" Captain Ribbentrop was stunned by the news, he was very uneasy about sending an Italian paratroop company to his tank company as the vanguard, so as soon as the front fought, he immediately asked the accompanying German marines to arm around the tank.
It was also wanted to call a platoon of No. 4F tanks on the radio for reinforcements, a tank with a short-barreled 75 gun, which was designed to deal with infantry.
As a result, before he could tell the commander of the 3rd company behind him, the Italian paratroopers had already defeated the British.
"Ernst," said Captain Ribbentrop to the commander of the 3rd Company through the throat communicator, "there is no need for your tank, the valiant Italians have done their job." ” "Rudolph, are you kidding" came the voice of the commander of the 516 company of the 3rd battalion through the headset.
"No, it's true, I've seen the Italians come with British prisoners," said Captain Ribbentrop, "and it seems that we need to get acquainted with the Italians again." ” It is not the Italians who need to be reacquainted, but the British In the early hours of January 16, the collision of the power search screens between the two sides on the battlefield west of Hartlepool was decided in a very short time.
The Germans' tanks and armoured vehicles were left unplayed, and small squads of infantry alone cleared British patrols and forward posts, and captured hundreds of prisoners.
Through the interrogation of the prisoners, the attacking German-Italian forces quickly figured out the location of the minefields and the approximate deployment of the British army's forward minefields.
On the basis of this important information, the German-Italian artillery group soon began a targeted bombardment, and the front on the western side of Hartlepool, which was defended by the British, was immediately overwhelmed by heavy artillery fire.
At the beginning of the bombardment, Major General Bradley, commander of the 28th Infantry Division of the United States, was having breakfast with Patton, and by the way discussed the question of attacking Stodonk.
He had been busy from noon yesterday until the early hours of this morning, before settling his troops near Stodonk.
According to Stilwell's plan, the 28th and 2nd Panzer Divisions would attack Stodonk three days later.
General Patton, who had been on the battlefield for a while, reacted quickly, and jumped as soon as the cannon sounded.
"Artillery the enemy is firing artillery," he shouted to his chief of staff, Colonel Guy, "go and find out the situation and see if the enemy is going to attack." ” Five minutes later, Colonel Guy ran from the war room into Patton's office in a panic.
"General, the forward positions of the British 3rd Division west of Hartlepool have been heavily shelled" "Hell, the Germans are going to fight back," General Patton made an accurate judgment at the first time, "they chose an open area, and obviously they were going to put in the armored cluster, and the 3rd Division of the British would definitely not be able to resist it for long, and the Germans' armored cluster would soon rush behind us."
"No," Bradley had heard of the name of the 3rd British Division, "Isn't the 3rd British Division elite?"
"The British here are all elite before the damn London protests," Patton shook his head, "but not now, if you go around their positions and camps, you'll know that they're finished."
No, we can't sit idly by, and if we let the Germans rush behind our backs, it's all over. ” Bradley looked at Barton who seemed to be panicking in some surprise, "George, is it that serious?"
"Of course," Barton nodded affirmatively.
"Then shouldn't we remind Lieutenant General Stilwell" Bradley very disagrees with Patton's evaluation of Stilwell, he was Stilwell's subordinate when he was an instructor at West Point, and Bradley admires Captain Stilwell's military academic level very much.
"Come on, that optimistic fool won't listen."
Barton said as he walked out, walked to the door, and then turned back to Bradley and said, "Omar, I'm going to arrange for the troops to break out, you can arrange it too."
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"Breakout" Bradley was stunned and stunned, when did Barton become so timid and bent on escaping t1706231537: