Chapter 48: The Fearsome Golden Combination

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  Roberts wants to attack the city hall with his own strength, no wonder he wants my cavalrymen to see that they can still bite the Germans without me. Of course, according to common sense, the German defense forces are some of the remaining troops who retreated from the front line. It's not too difficult to take down such a defensive force, let alone with the support of armored and air forces.

  "Captain Conti! We'll meet at City Hall!" Roberts said with a smile.

  "Alright, see you at City Hall!"

  I shook hands with Roberts and led my men away, since I wasn't going to the town hall, so I had to cover Roberts' flank and advance towards District D, then encircle the German army's retreat route from the side. Since it was a joint operation, Roberts generously let Sherman tanks follow me to clear out the German forces in District D, while he charged towards the town hall under the cover of two tanks.

  The Sherman Crocodile tank is just a modified special tank, its main cannon has been replaced with a flamethrower, of course much larger than the lightweight flamethrowers used by soldiers. If it fires at buildings, in just a few seconds, the entire building can be engulfed in a raging inferno! I'm extremely fond of this monster, although it's useless against enemy tanks, but for its ability to kill soldiers, I still can't help but treasure it like a gem and keep it hidden behind me.

  "Luca, take a squad of soldiers to guard this iron thing, don't let the German anti-tank guns destroy it with one shot!" I called out to Luca.

  "Captain, it's not that easy!" Luca laughed.

  "Be careful, you see all these buildings around here? If an anti-tank gunner pops out, it'll be too late to react!"

  In fact, during the Siege of Cherbourg, Generalmajor Jodl made a bold adjustment in response to the insufficient troops. He broke up the troops into small groups and formed special assault teams at key points with three people each, consisting of one machine gunner, one sniper, and one anti-tank gunner. Machine guns are often surprisingly effective for suppressing infantry, and just a few machine guns can lock down and suppress unarmored units. Snipers can take out threatening movements and tactics, while anti-tank gunners can protect the group from tank attacks and other armored vehicles. This combination is considered the best in urban defense warfare examples of later generations, known as the "Golden Combination".

  In the early 1990s, Chechen separatists in Russia also employed this tactic from World War II against the initially arrogant Russian army. Despite having armed helicopters in the sky and numerous tanks on the ground, they suffered heavy losses. For example, during the Battle of Grozny, the 131st Motorized Rifle Brigade lost over 800 men killed or captured out of a total of 1,000 soldiers, including the brigade commander. The brigade also lost 20 out of its 26 tanks and 102 out of its 120 armored vehicles. It can be said that the 131st Motorized Rifle Brigade was almost annihilated. Despite the subsequent intense bombing campaign that turned Grozny into ruins, the Chechens' fortifications were so well-built that they continued to pose a mortal threat to the Russian army. As a result, the Russian military was forced to withdraw under pressure. Now I wonder how many lives we would have to pay in order to counter this "golden combination" of German forces.

  "Captain, how long do you think it'll take Lieutenant Roberts to secure City Hall?" Jones and I walked abreast.

  "It's hard to say, maybe it can be done in an hour, or maybe it can't even be done in a day!"

  "Intelligence says that four German battalions are still largely unaccounted for, and it's making me damned uneasy!" Jones said.

  "Never mind that, we don't need to worry about it, someone upstairs will take care of it for us." Just as Jones was saying this, someone shouted: "Officer, a roadblock has been found ahead!"

  I rushed past and found a tank stopped there without directly crashing through. "What's going on?"

  "The tank is afraid of ambushes on both sides, so it won't move!"

  Are there ambushes on both sides? I took a look, and indeed, there were many buildings standing tall on both sides. Except for the distant sound of artillery fire, the entire street was eerily quiet. This eerie scene made me feel uneasy too.

  Fighting a regular army with tanks, armored vehicles and anti-tank guns in an urban area is extremely dangerous, as one mistake could lead to my own demise. Urban warfare differs from field battles, where the outskirts of the city may be advantageous for firepower, but also vulnerable to direct fire attacks from our side. Therefore, General Schwerin did not deploy the main force of the German army on the outskirts of Cherbourg, but instead placed the main line of defense within the brick-built urban area, which was more favorable for the German defense.

  In war, another place different from urban warfare and field warfare is that the density of defending troops is very large. Usually, a company can only control about two blocks, with a distance of less than one kilometer wide. Such a high density requires the attacking troops to have at least twice or several times more strength in order to break through the layers of ambushes and obstacles set by the defender, and be prepared to pay a huge price for this city.

  "Lin Bona, deploy the combat formation and sweep house by house for me! Even if it's just a mouse, I want you to dig it out!" No way, in this situation, we have no choice but to grit our teeth and go up!

  Lin Borna divided his troops into four combat groups by class, and began to search the buildings on both sides. Unexpectedly, the first and second groups had just advanced less than ten meters when they suddenly came under suppressive fire from an MG42 machine gun on the second floor of a building on the left side of the street.

  When the shots rang out, Sergeant Shiman, the squad leader of the first group under attack, immediately ordered his men to return fire according to infantry manual's command clause. On the left side downstairs, Sergeant Seli heard German gunfire above his head and immediately turned around, preparing to throw a hand grenade to destroy this armed stronghold. At that time, I saw it clearly from behind. "No! Watch out on the right!"

  My warning had become useless at this point, and in the building on the right side, the familiar sound of an MG42 machine gun suddenly rang out. Sergeant Seely's squad was caught off guard by a sudden attack, and although they returned fire against the German machine guns, their counterattack seemed weak compared to the powerful MG42 general-purpose machine gun of World War II. The sudden attacks on both sides immediately resulted in casualties for both Heimann and Seely's squads, leaving the two men dazed and disoriented.

  "Requesting backup! Requesting backup!" Schumann screamed for help with a torn heart and lungs!

  "Tank coming! Tank coming!"

  The Sherman tank was actually not far from them, only a dozen meters away. Under the cover of another group led by Linberna, it moved forward two more steps and stopped when the shooting angle to the German-occupied strongpoint was still good. The tank's turret slowly turned to the right. The Germans on the right side had apparently noticed the arrival of the Sherman tank, and when they saw the tank's turret turn towards them, they immediately stopped firing, picked up their machine guns, and rushed desperately towards the next ambush point.

  After the Sherman tank's cannon was aimed, there was no loud noise, only a fire dragon that was tens of meters long sprayed out. The building that was hit immediately fell into a raging fire. The German armed forces hiding in the left side saw that things were not going well and wanted to escape, but they were blocked by Sergeant Himan who had just escaped from death and was furious. He didn't care if there were any mines at the door and kicked it open, charging in alone. Just then, he ran into two German soldiers coming down from upstairs, preparing to escape through the back door!

  "Damn bastards! Where are you going!" Schumann yelled, his Thompson submachine gun firing non-stop, the bullets instantly turning two German soldiers who were about to retreat into bloody pulp. When other soldiers rushed into the house, they only saw Schumann crazily sweeping his gun back and forth over the German corpses.

  "Sergeant Heimann, stop! They're all dead!" Sergeant Morrissey of another platoon grabbed hold of the crazed Heimann.

  "Is he dead?" Schumann finally calmed down, his face pale as he walked out. When he saw that his subordinates were not dead but wounded, clutching the wounds torn open by machine guns and rolling around in agony, his anger gradually turned into a sorrowful expression.

  "For God's sake! Quick, get the wounded down!" I disregarded the German sniper and hastily rushed over, saying: "We must set up a casualty collection point. There are too many wounded now. Otherwise, before we can send them down, even more people will die from lack of timely medical treatment."

  "Yes, sir!" Sergeant Nagele of the medical squad replied.

  "Miller, get in touch with Captain Roberts and tell him that things are pretty bad on our side. We have a large number of Germans defending in front of us and machine gun fire points that weren't there before are now appearing! Yeah, tell him I can still smell the cordite!"

  "What's this?" Miller was just about to ask me, and tell our allies whether it was inappropriate or not, when suddenly a sharp cry followed by a thunderous explosion!

  "Mortar! Goddamn it, the Germans are firing at me!" I covered my helmet and ducked behind a solid cover, "Where's that mortar fire coming from?"

  "I don't know, sir!"

  "Damn it, there must be a German artillery observation post here, get everyone back! Get everyone back!"

  The troops retreated quickly like a receding tide to the position where the battle started, and at this time the German artillery fire also stopped as if it had eyes.

  "Damn it! All units report casualties to me at once!"

  After a rough count, in the brief raid just now, my troops suffered another six or seven casualties. This is a very poor situation. Since the attack on Serburg began, my troops have lost more than a dozen men so far. For a company, this loss is not small.

  When I reported this situation to the headquarters of the First Army Corps attacking Zerbst, the officers in charge of the Allied Command began to reflect on the sudden and drastic increase in casualties among other troops, and also started to feel that things were not going as smoothly as expected. However, how strong was this feeling, and who knew how much?

  "Captain Roberts, how's your situation?"

  "I'm busy and can't chat with you, the German resistance is fierce, they're desperately trying to stop me from advancing on City Hall!" Captain Roberts yelled at the top of his lungs over the infantry phone!