Back to 1939 Sea Wolf

  The British troops were caught off guard and suffered significant casualties in personnel and equipment. However, as a seasoned veteran unit, they quickly regained their composure from the initial chaos and shock, with officers swiftly taking up their command positions. The soldiers also grabbed their weapons, ready to enter the trenches and counterattack the German infantry that was about to launch an assault. At the battalion headquarters of Lieutenant Colonel Berlau, he received a rather unfavorable report: the 25-pounder artillery group assigned to him by General Montgomery had been destroyed in the first German bombardment, with the ammunition depot being annihilated and 80% of the guns being put out of action. All wireless and landline communications with the regimental headquarters were also severed, making it impossible for him to contact the regimental commander. He was forced to dispatch a messenger to report on the situation at the front lines and attempt to reestablish communication with the regimental headquarters. With no other choice, he ordered the surviving artillerymen to take up infantry weapons and join the battalion reserve. He thought that when the Germans attacked, he would only be able to rely on the infantry's handheld weapons.

  After 15 minutes, the bombardment of German heavy artillery ended. The British sergeant blew his whistle and British soldiers carried their weapons into position, repairing the damaged parts of the trench, setting up their guns, preparing to exchange fire with the advancing German troops.

  But the German soldiers waiting at the starting line of the attack were quietly waiting there, after the bombardment that could shake a person's internal organs out of place, they blew the horn to advance, and the soldiers also let out a roar of charge, but not one person jumped out of the starting line. On the British side, the British soldiers heard the Germans' angry roars, and aimed their guns at the pre-designated firing points, waiting for the appearance of the German soldiers' shadows.

  But the British did not expect that many of them would never see the Germans again. Because at this time, the German heavy artillery suddenly opened fire again, and the shells fell on the British position with a strange whistling sound caused by air friction. The British sergeant's face turned pale, loudly cursing the German army, and hastily drove the soldiers into the artillery trenches. The soldiers also jumped up and down in the shell craters like rabbits whose tails had been set on fire, desperately rushing towards the artillery trenches.

  The German heavy artillery seemed to have divine assistance, with shells landing accurately in the midst of the chaotic British troops. With each shell that fell, fragments of clothing, weapons, shrapnel and human limbs flew everywhere, continuously knocking down more British soldiers. But the surviving British soldiers couldn't care less about that anymore; they only knew to quicken their pace, and quicken it again, in order to rush into those artillery shelters as soon as possible.

  When those lucky British soldiers rushed to the shelter, they found that many of their shelters had been destroyed by German heavy artillery. Their battalion commander was nowhere to be seen. Behind them, the German heavy artillery began to extend its firing range, and shells started pouring down on their heels. Meanwhile, German soldiers who had been hiding in ambush along the attack line, ignoring the "earth rain" of mud and stones falling from the sky due to the German artillery fire, charged forward with bayonets fixed on their rifles, yelling loudly as they trampled over the shell craters towards the British position. The British survivors' morale finally collapsed. Lower-ranking officers, seeing that all was lost, abandoned their troops and ran for their lives, discarding the honor of the British Empire's army and choosing to save their own skins. They wished they had eight legs to run away from those terrifying Germans as fast as possible.

  The British soldiers, like their officers, abandoned their weapons and packs and everything they considered a hindrance and began to flee behind the officers, while those wounded British soldiers knelt on the ground, holding up their guns in their hands, waiting for the German soldiers to take them prisoner. Nor did they care how they had just cursed the Germans, they only hoped to save their lives on this battlefield like hell.

  The German soldiers ran swiftly, like a broken bamboo. They quickly stormed into the first line of defense of the British army facing them and began to cross the position and rushed towards the depth of the British position. When they passed by the British soldiers who raised their hands in surrender, they left only a few people responsible for collecting the weapons of the British soldiers and lining them up in queues, waiting for the follow-up troops to deal with them. The rest did not stop at all and went straight to the depth of the British position.

  Before the German artillery opened fire, Joseph brought his assault team to a small grove to assign tasks. The team was divided into two groups: one group went with Joseph to raid the command post of the British 3rd Infantry Division, while the other group split into several pairs of snipers scattered throughout the British positions, looking for opportunities to pick off British forward commanders and non-commissioned officers known as "mother of the army".

  One of the teams assigned to the task was responsible for Lieutenant Jed's platoon. The two men took out camouflage nets from their backpacks and inserted many branches and dry leaves they had found in the woods onto the nets. The main sniper, Grand, took out his disassembled Mauser 98K rifle from his bag, unwrapped them from the oiled paper, carefully wiped off the grease on them under the dim light, and skillfully assembled the rifle. Then he pulled back the bolt, loaded a round, raised it to aim at a distant target for a moment. He then ejected the cartridge from the chamber, closed the safety, gently placed the rifle on the ground, and began to prepare his ammunition, using a small whetstone to grind each bullet into a long pointed shape, grinding off the outer casing to reveal the steel bullet head.

  And his assistant and spotter Erich assembled the MP38 submachine gun. He filled the magazine with bullets, put the loaded magazine into his own ammunition pouch, and then carefully wiped the telescope with a silk cloth he carried with him. (It was Zhou Tianlei's suggestion to Rommel to set up tactical snipers in infantry units. He said that equipping a sniper in an infantry squad was equivalent to equipping the squad with a mortar, which could greatly enhance the squad's long-range precision firepower capability. Rommel tried out Zhou's opinion after taking over the 7th Armored Division, and found it very effective. The infantry squads strongly demanded that the trial be extended to all infantry units in the division, so Rommel's unit was one of the earliest in the German army to recognize the role of tactical snipers. In the attack sequence of Rommel's unit, the sniper usually took up a position at the end of the squad. During the North African campaign, these snipers performed exceptionally well. The tactical snipers selected by Rommel for this operation were all outstanding personnel, many of whom would be sent to sniper school for advanced training after the war. Originally, tactical snipers did not have assistants, but Rommel still equipped them with spotters as a precaution.)

  They donned the camouflage nets with well-arranged grass leaves and applied irregular camouflage paint to their faces with black camouflage oil. Carefully taking cover behind the trees, they slipped past Captain Jade's command post and reached a clump of grass 300 meters away from Captain Jade's command post. Grand set up his sniper rifle, while Erich whispered data to him: "Target distance 300 meters, south wind level 2, no need for correction."

  As the shelling began, Lieutenant Jedd was awakened by the deafening roar of the shells. He cursed the German army as he hastily put on his gear and rushed out of his command post to join his troops at the front line. Just as he emerged from his quarters, Grand had already taken aim at him with his rifle. With a slight movement of his finger, a bullet shot towards Lieutenant Jedd from the front. The bullet encountered resistance from his breastbone but easily penetrated it due to its high speed, piercing through his heart and creating a large wound on his back. The bullet continued its trajectory, flying into the mud-covered roof of Lieutenant Jedd's command post, stubbornly burrowing deep into the earth before finally coming to rest after exhausting its kinetic energy.

  While Lieutenant Jade's back and front burst out a blood flower, a deep red blood spurted out from the gunshot wound on his back, his body shook for a moment, but still ran forward 2 steps with inertia before falling to the ground.

  In a thicket of grass 300 meters in front of him, Erich carefully observed the body of Captain Jed, while Grand pulled back the bolt of his rifle, chambering the next round and continuing to aim at Captain Jed's command post until an artillery shell landed on it, destroying it completely. The two men observed their surroundings when they suddenly saw British soldiers fleeing from the front line of the British position towards the rear. Erich cocked his MP38 submachine gun, raising it to fire. Grand grabbed his hand and shook his head, indicating that the two of them would not be able to stop the British soldiers. He then made a gesture, indicating for him to follow the fleeing British soldiers and take out the high-ranking officers who were trying to intercept them.

  They stood up, both bodies covered with camouflage nets full of grass and leaves, irregular black oil paint on their faces under the flash of gunfire like ghosts, a strong killing intent in their eyes. After watching carefully for a while, they confirmed that no one was lurking in secret. The two quickly turned around, alternately covering each other as they retreated back to the small woods behind them, heading towards the fleeing soldiers.

  Such things kept happening on the British positions, and every time a British junior officer or sergeant tried to restore order, organize the British fugitives to regroup and fight back, bullets from unknown sources took advantage of the explosion and flash of shells to knock them down. Although shooting at night was not very accurate, it still severely damaged the confidence of the remaining British junior officers and sergeants, who fled with the fugitives. The British soldiers lost the strong command of their officers and fell into complete chaos.

  The assault troops, except for a few soldiers who formed into 2-man sniper teams to pick off British commanders and disrupt the internal communications of the British army, causing confusion among the British soldiers. Another twenty or so people formed a powerful assault team under Joseph's leadership to approach Montgomery's division headquarters.

  Montgomery was also awakened by the deafening artillery fire of the German army, he rushed out of his command post and saw that the sky above his troops' positions was illuminated by the German gunfire. He immediately returned to his command post and telephoned the command posts of various front-line positions to inquire about the situation of the German army's attack. However, not a single call could get through, he realized that the front-line positions might have been lost. So he quickly made a decision, preparing to order his reserve troops to rush forward and stabilize the front line, then he continued to call the command posts of friendly forces on both flanks, wanting to know their situation. But it was also unreachable, Montgomery knew that German sabotage teams must have infiltrated into his positions. They were definitely carrying out sabotage in his own positions. Therefore, Montgomery did not hesitate at all, immediately ordering the wireless operator to quickly contact the higher authorities and request permission to withdraw to the second line of defense. At the same time, he ordered the guard troops of the division headquarters to strengthen their vigilance and prevent German surprise attacks. He himself took two guard platoons and drove to his reserve troops in a car, wanting to personally lead them to intercept the fleeing soldiers retreating from the front-line positions, reorganize them into a combat-effective force, find favorable terrain, build temporary fortifications to conduct delaying defense against the German sudden attack, and win time and space for other troops to withdraw.

  Joseph did not know that the commander of the British 3rd Infantry Division, Montgomery, had left his division headquarters and gone to his reserve troops. He brought his assault team near the headquarters of Montgomery's 3rd Infantry Division, raised his binoculars to observe the British 3rd Infantry Division headquarters, and found that the British had significantly strengthened their guard. Patrol teams were very dense. No obvious defensive weaknesses were found in the British. With the light from the lamps inside the British division headquarters, he saw people constantly moving inside Montgomery's 3rd Infantry Division headquarters, with people constantly entering and exiting a house. Moreover, several cars inside had already started their engines. What annoyed him was that Montgomery's 3rd Infantry Division headquarters was on a small hill, surrounded by open terrain, which was very unfavorable for the attacking troops. There were also solid firepower support points. If he launched a forced attack, his assault team would suffer heavy casualties.

  Joseph, based on the situation he observed, knew that the British might escape at any time. He decided to deploy his troops, with some men ambushing the British retreat route and ordering snipers to occupy advantageous terrain to lock in key British targets. He ordered communication soldiers to contact the 7th Armored Division headquarters, requesting a dispatch of an armored force to reinforce them so that they could annihilate the British completely. After the snipers were in position and signaled him, he ordered his troops to stand by and ordered the snipers to pay close attention to the movements of the British Infantry's Third Battalion headquarters at all times.

  At the headquarters of the British 3rd Infantry Division, Montgomery's chief of staff, exercising the highest authority in the division, ordered the operations staff to try to outline on a map the scale of the German attack, the strength and weakness of their firepower, and the estimated situation of the second echelon of German troops.

  Joseph asked the signalman if he had contact with the division, and the signalman replied that he already had. He took over the receiver, and inside came Rommel's urgent voice: "Have you caught Montgomery?"

  "Report to the General, we did not capture Montgomery. We have reached the outer perimeter of Montgomery's infantry 3rd Division headquarters. However, the terrain here is very unfavorable for our attack. We have sent people to cut off his command post retreat route. We need armored support and request that an armored force be dispatched to support us."

  "Alright, I'm ordering the 25th Armored Brigade to send a battalion to support you," Rommel said over the radio.