Gibraltar area riots

  Zhou Tianlei held the joint operation report of the German Ocean Fleet, the German Marine Corps Amphibious Reconnaissance Unit and the coordinated German Airborne Troops in his hand, sitting on the sofa, with the commander of the German Marine Corps Amphibious Reconnaissance Unit standing in front of him.

  His face was very unsightly. He sat there and said, "Your battle achievements are really brilliant, our brave assault team members died 10, injured 92, 32 seriously injured. Almost let the French open the sea valve. You should be lucky that our 'Scharnhorst' battleship, 'Gneisenau' battleship and 'Admiral Hipper' heavy cruiser arrived in time, otherwise who would be whose prisoner is really hard to say."

  After seeing the flustered face of the action commander, Zhou Tianlei knew that his tone was too heavy and slowed down: "Of course, you are executing a special warfare mission for the first time, and your experience is insufficient. It's not your fault that you can do it this way. But you must remember for me, on the battlefield there is no rule that new recruits are immune to death. This time in your report, you said that during the raid on the 'Dunkerque' cruiser, a soldier's climbing hook was caught because the black cloth strip was not wrapped well on top, so it was exposed and reflected by the light of the French warship's searchlight and discovered by the French warship sentinel. Is that the reason?"

  The acting commander straightened his back and said loudly, "Yes, sir." Zhou Tianlei said, "This is not our formal headquarters, and we are both wearing civilian clothes now, no need to be so formal."

  "Remember, you are no longer ordinary infantry units, you are the Marine Corps, a glorious and brave unit, and you will be among the elite troops of the German army along with their airborne and mountain troops. So when you fight, don't think like an ordinary infantry unit."

  "You must pay attention to every detail in your plans and actions. Make every detail perfect, this is the key to success. You are no longer fighting like before, let me give you an example, it's like walking on a tightrope, if you take a wrong step, you know what awaits you. So I want you to remember these words: details determine victory or defeat. If you make a perfect plan and execute every detail perfectly, it will be hard for you to fail."

  "I'll repeat it again: details determine victory or defeat, this is your motto for special operations. Alright, you can go now." (Haha, Zhou Tianlei, you're plagiarizing someone else's words again!) Zhou Tianlei looked embarrassed and said, "Big brother, I'm just saying what you told me to say, it's not like I came up with those words myself!"

  From then on, the sentence was hung above the gate of the German Marine Corps training base. After Zhou Tianlei finished dealing with the problem of joint operations with the German troops, he immediately received a report from the Operations Staff of the Command Center about the situation in Gibraltar. It was something that greatly exceeded his plans.

  A large riot broke out in the Gibraltar area. The cause was that Spanish agents disguised as British people were finally caught on the spot by locals during a fake operation. However, the angry locals did not see through their identities and still treated them as British people. The angry locals wanted to take these "British people" to the British Governor's Mansion, thinking they had evidence and the British would have nothing to say (they also thought the British were perfunctory in dealing with those who used fake currency). Other Spanish agents who arranged the operation saw their companions in trouble and were about to be taken to the British Governor's Mansion by the locals. They knew that once they went to the British Governor's Mansion in Gibraltar, it was possible that the small actions played behind the scenes by Germany and Spain would be exposed. In a hurry, they drove to stop them. They drove cars with British Army signs, suddenly rushing out of an alley and firing guns into the air. The angry locals did not expect the "British military" to react this way and were frightened, running away with their heads covered. A few people did not give up, firing guns above the heads of fleeing locals. Then they rescued their bound companions and quickly escaped. To grasp the dynamics of the locals, two newly arrived Spanish agents were ordered to take a detour from another road to observe the reaction of the locals. After the two newly arrived Spanish agents took a detour back to the scene, the locals in Gibraltar had already gathered from all directions. Later, the British garrison in Gibraltar also rushed to the scene after hearing the gunshots, but the perpetrators - the Spanish people - had already run away without a trace. Only two newcomers were left behind. The British garrison in Gibraltar asked everyone present to squat down and accept their inspection in search of the gunman.

  But the non-British locals in Gibraltar were furious, having just seen a car with British military insignia rescue and drive away the 'British' people who had been caught using counterfeit currency, even firing warning shots at them. Now the local British garrison was demanding that they submit to checks by British soldiers. They thought this was the British army showing off in front of them. Their faces were filled with anger. Even a few bold young men already had stones cocked in their hands. The two Spanish agents who had just arrived saw the situation was about to erupt, and after a brief whispered conversation, suddenly shouted at the top of their lungs "Beat these shameless British people."

  They were the first to pick up stones and throw them at British soldiers, and the locals in Gibraltar were infected by two Spanish agents, so they also picked up stones and threw them at British soldiers. The British garrison was puzzled and enraged by the actions of the locals. They were puzzled because after the Anglo-Spanish War, the people of Gibraltar had undergone a long period of transformation, plus a large number of British immigrants, and now it is very difficult to hear anyone speaking Spanish in the area, and the local residents already consider themselves British, no longer considering themselves Spanish, Britain's colonial policy of cultural aggression has achieved great success.

  What's infuriating is that these Spanish people who have been Hispanicized and were previously friendly to themselves are now attacking themselves as if they had taken the wrong medicine. Moreover, several British soldiers have already been injured. Meanwhile, the two Spanish agents who started the trouble have slipped away to a quiet little building nearby to observe the conflict on the scene. The commander of the British army could no longer hold back, he loudly ordered the soldiers under his command to form a formation, raise their guns and fire at the local people of Gibraltar who were throwing stones at them in self-defense.

  As the dense gunfire of the British troops erupted, about twenty locals in Gibraltar fell to the ground, with blood gushing out of the bullet holes in their bodies. The enraged locals in Gibraltar finally realized that the British troops were serious. They immediately scattered in all directions amidst a chorus of screams. Seeing that the locals had dispersed and fled, the British commander ordered his troops to cease fire. They began to evacuate their wounded while deploying sentries to guard against another attack by the locals. Meanwhile, some soldiers started checking on the locals who had fallen to the ground, dragging away those who were already dead and separating them from those who were still alive.

  The Governor of Gibraltar, upon hearing the shots, also rushed over and found the scene to be like a slaughterhouse. The blood on the ground, although washed away by British soldiers with water, still remained in some hard-to-reach crevices, hinting at the recent massacre. The bodies of the local people were dragged to one corner, with some still oozing blood. Others lay on the ground, writhing in pain. The Governor took out his handkerchief, removed his glasses, and carefully wiped them clean. A British officer approached him, asking what to do next. The Governor irritably replied, "You've made this mess, don't ask me to clean it up for you. You've started this, now don't make it worse. There's no one else here, we can still keep this a secret." He then made a shooting gesture with his hand and turned away.

  The British officer nodded in understanding, and after the Governor of Gibraltar got into his car and left, he turned around and ordered the soldiers to kill those who were injured. However, little did they know that a pair of Spanish agents, who had started the trouble earlier, were watching from a nearby rooftop with their cameras and binoculars. When they saw the British troops opening fire on the locals, they became enraged but didn't dare join the fight. Instead, one of them used his binoculars to observe the British soldiers' movements while the other took pictures of the British troops' actions as evidence for their next move. As they watched, they saw the British governor leave, and then the British soldiers started shooting at the wounded locals on the ground and stabbing them with bayonets in vital areas. The two agents became even more furious because earlier they had only fired into the air without aiming at the crowd, let alone shooting at the injured. They realized that the British soldiers were trying to kill witnesses and cover up their actions.

  After the two men escaped from the British army and unfolded a search for survivors in a nearby gun battle, they returned to report to their leader. Their leader and the rest of the Spanish agents were shocked after hearing their account and only believed them after watching the photos they had washed out. The commander of this team of Spanish agents did not dare to delay and quickly reported the situation to the country via wireless telegraphy. Spain sent a copy to the temporary command center of Zhou Tianlei's German Ocean Fleet after receiving the intelligence. After Zhou Tianlei received the intelligence report, he thought that although he wanted to use some methods to alienate the relationship between the local people and the British, he did not expect such results, which were beyond his expectations. How could this situation be transformed into a favorable one for them?

  He sat on the sofa, deep in thought. Suddenly, he remembered the Korean Boeing 747 that was shot down over Soviet territory in 1983. Although it was unclear whether the plane was on a normal flight mission or an American reconnaissance mission, as neither Russia nor the US had made any information public, the US had severely criticized the former Soviet Union for its reckless disregard for human life, shooting down a civilian airliner without investigating the situation first, resulting in massive casualties. If he were to release the materials he had obtained through some channel and explain it from the German perspective, although he didn't dare say what impact it would have on Gibraltar, it could deal a severe blow to the British. He stood up and called his aide, dictating a telegram requesting that the German propaganda department make as much of this incident as possible and send back photos and other materials. The aide took note and quickly left. Zhou Tianlei thought to himself: This is truly "having flowers bloom unintentionally". He sat back down on the sofa, humming a tune from the Peking Opera "The Empty City Strategy".

  The German Minister of Propaganda, Goebbels, got the report in no time and was overjoyed. Germany was worried about not being able to grasp Britain's weakness, but now the British had sent it themselves. He immediately called his assistants and asked them to quickly find a few reporters. After the reporters arrived, Goebbels dismissed his secretary and discussed with the reporters alone for half a day before they left the German Propaganda Ministry, carrying a special pass to rush to the plane flying from Germany to Italy, then transferring to Spain.

  On the second day, Germany's Berliner Tageblatt reported on the events in Gibraltar with a half-page article on its front page. The headline read: "The Englishman who took off his gentleman's mask", and below it was written: Yesterday, the English, who have always been called European gentlemen, finally took off their hypocritical masks of gentlemen and committed a massacre without precedent in Gibraltar. The reason for this event is as follows: Some individual Englishmen used large amounts of high-denomination pound sterling counterfeit notes in Gibraltar. When the locals discovered this, they complained to the British Governor of Gibraltar, but instead of punishing the English who used the counterfeit notes, he tried to downplay the matter by delaying it. When the locals finally caught an Englishman using a high-denomination pound sterling counterfeit note, the British army fired at the locals to rescue the captured Englishman. In the subsequent demonstration by the locals, the British army used force to suppress it and killed many more locals who were injured in the demonstration in order to cover up their massacre. We are extremely concerned about this behavior of the English and have now dispatched additional personnel to Spain to report on further developments at any time.

  Next to it was a photo of British soldiers shooting survivors, taken by Spanish operatives. Other German newspapers also issued extras in the afternoon, which carried reports from the Berliner Tageblatt. The various papers repeatedly used terms such as "shameless Englishmen" and "barbaric British troops" to describe the actions of the British military that day. The extras were quickly reprinted in multiple languages and smuggled into foreign countries.

  Within two days, Italy, Japan, the United States, and even the Soviet Union, including the Pope, were aware of the incident. Various countries issued reports and comments, all of which condemned the British army for massacring unarmed locals in Gibraltar and attempting to cover up the incident. Except for a mild comment from the US government on the same day: "We hope that order will be restored as soon as possible, and the US government will pay close attention to developments." There was no other movement, and many governments of other countries expressed their outrage to the British government through diplomatic channels or press releases. Especially Spain's diplomatic protest was the most severe.