Back to 1939 Sea Wolf

  Joseph walked along, seemingly carelessly glancing around left and right.

  As they passed through a small grove, Joseph's eyes lit up and he saw more than 10 large cannons in the woods, along with caissons. He walked quietly up to Captain Jett and said: "Captain, let us rest here for a while."

  "Alright, from now on you can just call me Jade, no need to address me as Captain. Take a 15-minute break where you are."

  The soldiers sat down, several seriously wounded ones also lay on the ground with the support of others. However, if you look closely, Joseph's soldiers seem to be sitting randomly on the ground, hugging their guns in their arms, actually sealing off all angles, and several people's gun muzzles are unintentionally or intentionally swaying towards Captain Jed's soldiers.

  Joseph pulled out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, took one out and sniffed it hard under his nose before saying: "Old buddy, I haven't had you for a day, I miss you so much!" As he spoke, the other hand was rummaging through his other pockets non-stop, but couldn't pull anything out.

  Captain Jade saw Joseph's embarrassed look and chuckled to say: "Younger brother, is your lighter gone?"

  Joseph also looked up at Captain Jed and smiled: "I think it must have been when I was firing at the Germans that the thing dropped out of my pocket, so those Germans got a bargain. My lighter is a good one, too! Have you got a match?"

  Captain Jade pulled out a delicate lighter from his own shirt pocket. Joseph hastily took out another cigarette from the case and handed it to Captain Jade, then waited for Captain Jade to light his own cigarette with the lighter before taking the delicate lighter back and lighting his own cigarette.

  Two men were there on the misty and cloudy Da Shan when a lieutenant colonel of artillery suddenly ran out from the woods, with an angry face, shouting at them: "What do you want to do? Smoking in such a dangerous place! This is a no-smoking zone. I order you to put it out immediately!" Lieutenant Jed and Joseph hastily piled smiles on their faces, extinguishing the cigarette butts under their military boots. The artillery lieutenant colonel kept watching them until the cigarette butts were indeed extinguished before turning around and leaving.

  "Is this your battalion, Captain Jedd? I see it has a large caliber. It should be a divisional howitzer. Shouldn't it be placed farther away from the front line?"

  Captain Jade gazed at the artillery position with a scowl and said, "According to regulations, this indeed isn't our regiment's, it's the division's howitzer troops. However, during our division's retreat, we took in some artillery troops that lost contact with their main force. The division commander knew that the section our regiment is defending is relatively important, so he placed these divisional howitzer troops behind our regiment to provide direct fire support for us. Anyway, the division commander said that in the end, these cannons might not make it back to England, so let's just have them fight their last battle here and blow them up after they run out of shells. What a pity."

  Joseph's mouth was echoing Captain Jed, but his eyes were staring at the artillery battalion's position.

  "Joseph suddenly said to Captain Jade: 'We are now going to join you in fighting the Germans, but we still don't know the internal layout of your position. If we are ordered to reinforce at that time, I'm afraid I and these soldiers will take a wrong turn. Can you give me a map of your position, marked with firepower points and artillery positions, as well as the deployment of your combined forces?'"

  Captain Jade smiled and said to Joseph: "No problem, you come with me to my command center, tell your soldiers to take a rest!"

  The two of them arrived at Captain Jade's command post together. Captain Jade took out the battle map and spread it on the table.

  Joseph looked at the map carefully and asked: "Where is your regimental headquarters?" "Less than 2 kilometers away from us." "Which regiment are you in the Third Infantry Division?"

  "We are the 5th Battalion of the 3rd Infantry Regiment. You see, to our left is the British 2nd Infantry Regiment, and to our right is the French 75th Infantry Regiment. That's about it..." Lieutenant Jade's words were cut off by the whistling sound of a 210mm heavy artillery shell. The sand on top of the command post fell onto the map on the table.

  "TMD, the German devils are attacking again. You'd better take a look at the map and get familiar with it quickly. Our defensive strongpoints are all marked on this map. I have to rush to the front line to keep an eye on those Germans." Captain Jade spat a few mouthfuls of saliva on the ground. "Damn, the German artillery fire is fierce!"

  Joseph quickly folded up the map on the table and left Captain Jed's command center after Captain Jed had left.

  On the British defensive positions. British soldiers in the gun emplacements hugged their own weapons, enduring the German heavy artillery bombardment.

  "Sir, when will this German's heavy artillery stop?!" Private First Class Johann spat out the sand in his mouth and asked Corporal, who was holding his head with both hands.

  "I don't know, those damned Germans, my eardrums are almost shattered by them. When the German artillery fire stops, get me to the front line immediately, and let me kill those damned Germans fiercely." British Army Lance Corporal Pop also spat out the dust in his mouth and cursed.

  After more than ten minutes, the artillery fire that made these British soldiers feel like years finally stopped. The British soldiers shook off the thick dust on their bodies, crawled out of the gun holes, and entered the position, setting up their weapons on the chest wall, aiming at the German position, waiting for the appearance of German soldiers.

  After a while, a group of German soldiers wearing brown-green uniforms and M35 helmets appeared in the eyes of British soldiers. These German soldiers were using various terrain features to quickly approach the British position. After approaching within 500 meters, the German soldiers saw that the British soldiers did not move, stood up and began to charge.

  Major Jade observed the actions of German soldiers with binoculars. When the German soldiers started charging, he waved his arm and ordered: "Fire at will."

  The ZB26 light machine guns on the British defensive positions began to bark, and the experienced gunners controlled the rate of fire. Without encountering a German infantry charge, they generally used three-round short bursts, followed by six-round long bursts after three short bursts had passed. Instantly, several German soldiers fell down. The remaining people hastily lay down and began to alternate cover and retreat out of the British firepower range.

  Captain Jade continued to observe with binoculars, discovering that the German soldiers had only retreated a short distance after being repelled in their charge and were setting up machine guns under cover of favorable terrain for counterfire against British machine guns. Soon several German soldiers set up two 50mm mortars behind the machine gun positions and began bombarding the British position. He quickly ordered the machine guns to shift positions and requested artillery support from battalion headquarters.

  Two machine gun positions in the British position were slow to move and were suddenly hit by German mortar shells. Machine gun parts and human bodies were blown high out of the trenches. The British firepower instantly weakened. German soldiers took advantage of this to launch a second charge against the British position.

  But just then, Captain Jade's requested artillery support arrived, and shells screamed down into the midst of the German soldiers. Instantly, the German troops' charging crowd was torn apart by flying flesh and blood, shredded clothing, and severed limbs. The German officers, seeing that the British army's blocking firepower was too strong, and not knowing their position, unable to suppress them, ordered the troops to retreat. The British soldiers were greatly encouraged, and began pouring bullets into the retreating German formation. Meanwhile, British Army Corporal Pop yelled out: "Stop firing, stop firing, quickly enter the artillery shelter, the German heavy artillery counterattack is coming immediately!" He dragged those excited soldiers into the artillery shelter by pulling and tugging.

  In less than five minutes, German heavy artillery shells were flying into the British positions.

  The sky gradually darkened, and Rommel and Sepp Dietrich were like ants in a hot pot, frantically rushing around the command center. The assault troops they had sent out to infiltrate the British positions had lost contact for quite some time. Rommel and Sepp Dietrich waited for a long time, but couldn't hold back any longer, so they organized their troops to launch three tentative attacks on the British positions, hoping to find weaknesses in the enemy's defenses. However, the results were disappointing. The British positions did not reveal any obvious vulnerabilities. Moreover, the artillery fire was also questionable in its effectiveness against the British soldiers. After the heavy artillery bombardment ended, there was no noticeable decrease in the number of British soldiers. Furthermore, they failed to break through the British lines and create a breach, and the terrain also imposed significant restrictions on Rommel's armored forces. The British had laid out minefields on both flanks of their positions, preventing his armored forces from making a flanking attack on the British defenses. Only by breaking through the British defensive line in front of them could they effectively launch an armored assault.

  Just as Rommel and Siegfried Westphal were losing patience, the latter's sentry suddenly brought in a man wearing a British Army uniform. The sentry reported: "Report, we caught this surrendering British soldier at our front line. He says he has important intelligence to give to General Rommel. We therefore brought him here."

  Romell took a closer look and found that the British Army uniform on this person was torn in many places, and some small wounds could be seen in some areas. He felt that this person looked very familiar. After the man lifted his head, he suddenly recognized that it was Hans Hauptmann, the adjutant of his division, who had been sent to participate in the assault team, and couldn't help but excitedly call out Hans' name.

  Captain Hans gave a standard military salute to Rommel and Theodore Eick. "Commander, I've come back with the deployment map of the British defensive position." "Why did you take so long? Is everything all right?" "Reporting, they're all fine. We managed to deceive the British, but there were too many of them in their rear during the day, and we couldn't get past their lines without being detected. We didn't dare use the radio either, so it took until now to send out the intelligence." Captain Hans said, his head involuntarily lowering as he spoke.

  "There's nothing, it's not your fault. I thought you had been discovered by the British and secretly executed. You go down and change your clothes, rest for a while, give me the map, and I'll notify you later." Rommel said.

  Romell and Theodore Eckert leaned over the table studying the defensive deployment map of the British command post they had obtained in England. After calling Captain Hans to explain, they understood the deployment of the British. They decided to start the attack at dawn. And contacted the assault team behind the British defense line by radio, assigning them tasks.

  At 5 am, the attack of the 7th Armored Division and the Waffen-SS began. Before the attack, they coordinated their offensive steps with their friendly forces, that is, when the 7th Armored Division and the Waffen-SS attacked, the friendly forces on both wings also launched an attack on the opposing British and French troops, making it impossible for them to support each other. If one unit broke through first, all other units would unconditionally cooperate. At the same time, they reported their combat plan to the headquarters of Army Group A, which quickly agreed to their plan.

  Before the start, Theodor Eicke proposed a creative idea that after the heavy artillery bombarded the British position for a period of time and stopped bombarding, the British would definitely think that German infantry was about to move out. When they entered the position, the heavy artillery resumed bombardment, which could cause massive casualties among the first-line soldiers in the British defensive position, reducing resistance to the attack.

  The plan was highly praised by Rommel, who wrote down the creative suggestions made by Theodore Eicke in his own war diary. Meanwhile, behind British lines, Joseph's German shock troops were secretly gathering in a small forest, marking their British uniforms with identification marks and preparing ammunition. Listening to Commander Joseph issue specific combat orders for the shock troops.

  At 4:30, the German heavy artillery opened fire. The British positions were engulfed in flames and smoke. The battery assigned to support the battalion was hit by a German shell in its ammunition dump without firing a shot, causing an even louder explosion on the British position, with a mushroom cloud rising into the air. The British had lost their only artillery cover at the start of the battle.