Operation New Lion controls French Navy

  On a pitch-black night, a dozen or so warships were anchored on the surface of the sea. At this moment, some small black dots suddenly appeared in the distant sky.

  Let's take a closer look at those small black dots, and we can see that they are dozens of aircraft composed of German JU-52 transport planes. The fuselage is painted in dark gray. At this time, the green preparatory jump light suddenly lights up inside the JU-52 transport plane, and the commanding officer asks the soldiers wearing dark gray uniforms to stand up and hang their parachutes on the parachute hooks above their heads. Then they checked each other's parachuting equipment, and then pushed open the cabin door of the plane. As the reports came over from the back to the front, the officer stared at the red jump light on the wall of the transport plane cabin. When the light flashed, he waved his hand, and the paratroopers walked to the opened cabin door one by one and jumped out. The officer saw that all the soldiers had jumped out, and he pushed against the cabin door and also jumped out with the soldiers.

  When the umbrella flower blooms on the paratrooper's head, if someone goes to observe carefully, they will find that those umbrellas and the parachutes in World War II have a big difference. The parachute is not round but rectangular, which is what people now call a wing parachute. This kind of parachute can glide through the air with airflow, and a group of paratroopers are like large birds gliding from high altitude to the fleet of warships anchored over there.

  As the paratroopers began to fly over the warship, they had already taken out bow and arrow launchers from their waist bags, and a burst of arrows shot out. The arrows hit the targets on the warship. Then the paratroopers jumped into the sea. In the sea, a group of heads floated up in an instant, and they approached the warship, then threw out grappling hooks, hooked onto the protruding objects on the warship, and the paratroopers climbed up the ropes to the warship one after another. After they climbed onto the warship, they formed a defensive formation. Then the lights on the warship suddenly lit up. Several German airborne officers held stopwatches in their hands, and they took out some forms and papers, strictly checking the time used by the German paratroopers for the simulated raid, combat positions, etc., and scored them. One of the officers shouted at one of the paratroopers: "Felix, your voice was so loud when you threw out the grappling hook, did you want to alert all the enemy sailors? Do you want to be a lone hero? If you do, I'll send you on a mission alone, and if you can come back, the Knight's Cross will be yours!" The surrounding German paratroopers burst into laughter, and someone even whistled.

  Then a German paratrooper officer said to the paratroopers wearing the dark green uniforms: "Your assault time was five minutes and forty seconds, not counting your time in the air. You met the requirements on time. Rest for two hours before starting practice on the next subject. Your responsible officers will specifically explain the mistakes you made during the action. Dismissed."

  As these exhausted paratroopers began to disembark from the warship down the gangway into small boats, a periscope appeared on the surface of the water in the distance. Forty minutes later, some frogmen appeared on the surface of the water, secretly approaching the warships.

  In Paris, Hitler had arrived in Paris, he was to avenge Germany's defeat after signing the armistice agreement with France, and this armistice agreement Hitler considered it evil, wanting to throw Germany into an abyss from which it could not escape, and Germany almost fell into this abyss and couldn't climb out. He himself was the savior of Germany, although he was Austrian. He rescued Germany from that abyss. He took advantage of England and France's desire to see him fight with the Soviet Union as a joke, step by step expanding Germany's territory. Now it was time for him to demand restitution of Germany's rights from England and France.

  On the draft surrender agreement previously sent to France, at the request of naval commanders such as Zhou Tianlei, the German Supreme Command added that all French naval vessels would be handed over to the German Navy and all French shipyards would be handed over to Germany as war reparations. Otherwise, Germany will consider that France has no intention of making peace at all. Some very extreme measures will be taken. Regardless of whether this is an action by the French government or military, or a collective action by grassroots soldiers.

  The French Navy, upon learning of the draft's contents, was outraged and unanimously declared that the Germans had gone too far and would not cooperate with them at all.

  The French Navy did so because they thought that with the power of the French Navy, even if the German Navy passed through the Strait of Gibraltar, they would not be able to defeat the French Navy. The failure of the British Home Fleet was considered by the French Navy to be a self-inflicted wound, grossly underestimating their opponent - the German Navy. The German Navy seized on this point and eventually paid dearly at Dunkirk, not only losing its main fleet but also dragging its air force and army into the disaster, causing them to suffer heavy losses due to the failure of their home fleet.

  But they themselves were different. They had already studied the performance of the German Navy in that sea battle based on the intelligence they had collected. The French Navy believed that it was capable of dealing with the German Navy's attack, let alone the fact that the German Navy had not been active in the Mediterranean at that time. So there was even less attention to the warnings from the Germans in the draft.

  Before Hitler arrived in Paris, he ordered the German army to pull out the Foch carriage from a museum in France. The surrender ceremony of Germany after World War I was held inside the Foch carriage at the Compiègne Forest railway station. According to historical photos at that time, Germans restored the Foch carriage and pulled it back to near the Compiègne Forest railway station, preparing for Hitler's arrival to re-enact France's surrender ceremony.

  On the historically famous June 22nd, Hitler and G?ring arrived together at Compiègne Forest railway station. At that time, the signing ceremony had not yet begun. After Hitler got off the train, he and G?ring surrounded the carriage looking at it, he was very excited and couldn't help but dance a jig in front of G?ring (a kind of Austrian folk dance).

  Zhou Tianlei and Long Mei'er had already arrived at the Leidao Station by their own special train. After getting off, they did not show an excited expression like other generals when they saw that carriage, but instead whispered to each other there.

  "Longmei asked: "Gao Te, I heard you agreed to a marriage yesterday."

  Zhou Tianlei said: "Yes, what's wrong? She is not a Jew."

  Lohmeyer said: "She is of course not a Jew, but to marry a woman who is not purely Aryan like us I always felt was somehow not quite right."

  Zhou Tianlei said: "What's the big deal? You know our Air Force Chief of Staff, Milch, is Jewish, and Heinrich's wife is also Jewish. Our leader even attended their wedding celebration. Besides, we had a period of friendship with China back then, so what's the big deal about me marrying a Chinese wife?"

  Long Mei'er said: "I won't argue with you anymore, I won't talk about this with you."

  "Hey, what was that move you used that night?" Long Mei'er asked suddenly. "I've never seen you use it before, and it seems to be related to China."

  Zhou Tianlei cursed in his heart: You little devil, your eyes are sharp, but I can't tell you that it's what I used to practice in the Chinese army. No one would believe me if I said so, anyway, there were Chinese students from Prien Military Academy who could be used as a shield. He said, "That's what I learned from Chinese students when I was in military school. Didn't expect it to be so useful."

  Long Mei'er said: "There is time to teach me. I also want to learn."

  Zhou Tianlei said: "Alright, when I have time, I will definitely teach you Chinese Kung Fu."

  At that moment they saw Hitler and G?ring arrive at the Compiègne Forest railway station, their conversation was interrupted.

  When the French delegation arrived, Hitler showed a rare smile on his face. He and several high-ranking officers entered the carriage, followed by the French. Officers like Zhou Tianlei and Rommel were not qualified to enter, they could only wait outside the carriage, they were originally ordered by Hitler to be drawn from the front-line combat troops to come and attend the ceremony. Of course, there was no qualification to enter that carriage.

  Zhou Tianlei lit a cigarette and smoked it leisurely. With his mouth puffing out smoke rings, he was waiting for the arrival of that historic moment.

  At 6:15 pm, Hitler, G?ring and the French emerged. The French army commander who signed the surrender agreement, Huntziger, was led away from the carriage by a German army officer. Meanwhile, Hitler was saying something to the head of the French puppet government, Pétain, which probably included the words that caused the French such pain: "France can no longer participate in a large war."

  Zhou Tianlei looked at Pétain's slightly curved body, he knew this was a manifestation of his extreme sadness, otherwise how could Pétain's decades-long military career have resulted in such a curved body? He felt very pitiful for him. In World War I, he rose to fame with the famous "Meat Grinder" Battle - the Battle of Verdun. He led the French army in Verdun and held off the German army's attack of dozens of divisions. Became a hero of France in World War I. But now he was forced to sign this surrender agreement with Germany. Zhou Tianlei knew his heart was extremely uncomfortable. He couldn't be like Charles de Gaulle, the future President of France, who escaped to Britain to organize the "Free French" movement. People would forget his contributions during World War I and remember the moment he signed the French surrender agreement.

  He glanced at his watch, knowing that the French Navy would never hand over their warships to the Germans. They would rather scuttle them and escape to Algeria in French North Africa, where they had historically been unable to escape being sunk by the British Mediterranean Fleet. But now he was here, he couldn't let the French warships be scuttled or sunk by the British either. What would he use to fight against the rebuilt British Navy and American Navy in the future?

  Zhou Tianlei found Liddell and told him that the original backup plan, code-named "Lightning Strike", to attack the French fleet and military ports and shipyards, was going to be implemented. Liddell strangely said: "Didn't we include in the surrender agreement that France would hand over its fleet and shipyards to us Germans? Do you think they will violate the treaty they signed?"

  Chou Teh-nien said: "In view of the French character, it is quite possible that they would do such a thing, and at present Marshal Petain has no control over the French Navy. The French Navy is practically independent. I am only worried that if we go too late, we will see a fleet sunk in the sea. If you are afraid that we will be the first to violate the treaty, we can find evidence on their ships."

  Raidel hesitated for a moment, seemingly considering Zhou Tianlei's suggestion in his mind, and finally nodded: "Alright, but we must be careful with our actions, can't let others grasp our weakness."

  Zhou Tianlei gave a military salute to Rader, then turned and left after Rader returned the salute. As he sat in his own car, he said to the driver: "Hurry up and go to the temporary naval command post set up here." The car started, speeding towards Paris.

  In the French naval port of Toulon, all French sailors knew that France had signed the surrender protocol, and the clause in the surrender protocol that made the French Navy extremely angry, which would hand over all French warships to the German Navy, was not changed at all under the insistence of the German negotiating representatives.

  The French naval officers and men were extremely indignant, believing that the French Navy was now the only branch of the French military that still upheld the spirit of Napoleon. They decided not to surrender to the Germans but also did not want to implicate other Frenchmen, so they decided to scuttle all French warships tomorrow, leaving not a single one for the Germans to salvage.

  That night, French sailor Jean Théneau was on duty on the warship, patrolling the deck with a rifle. Suddenly, he felt something flying over from the nearby bridge, but it was too fast and he didn't see what it was at all.

  Just as he turned his head in confusion, he suddenly felt a chill on the back of his neck, and then he knew nothing. A crossbow bolt fired by German paratroopers hit him squarely in the neck.

  The German paratroopers' raid on the French warship went very smoothly, and after flying over the French warship, they jumped into the sea one after another. Since the sentry on the French warship had been cleared by the German paratroopers just now, the sound of their jumping into the sea did not alarm the French sailors.

  After they took off their parachutes in the water, they avoided the parachutes floating to the surface and swam to the side of a French warship. The lead paratrooper threw out a grappling hook to catch onto something on the ship, then jumped out of the water and climbed up the rope.

  On board the warship, the first German paratroopers formed a defensive formation to cover their comrades boarding the ship.

  After most of the paratroopers boarded the ship, they went to their assault positions according to the previously arranged plan.

  As the platoon leader gave the order, German paratroopers began to blow open some of the hatches on the deck with explosives. Instantly, alarm bells rang out on the French warship. The French sailors jumped up from their bunks and rushed to their battle stations on the deck, running into the cabins. As they reached the hatch, they were met with a fierce barrage of fire from the German paratroopers, and the unguarded French sailors and low-ranking officers fell to the ground one after another.

  The German paratroopers, who had already been prepared, stormed the holds of the various warships. Along the way, they fired continuously with their MP38 submachine guns and Mauser-made American shotguns used in World War I, killing the panicked French sailors running out of the cabins.

  The German paratroopers completed their mission within half an hour, securing the French warships that the German Navy had planned to capture. In the port of Brest, the German naval infantry also performed a similar process. But their main target was still over 1,100 tons of gold that the Banque de France had not yet been able to transport away.

  The German Army also proceeded according to plan and swiftly stormed into major shipyards in France.