Looking at the clouds of smoke rising from high places, Miller murmured: "That doesn't look good..."
At this time, the field phone rang. He quickly went over and picked up the phone, but as soon as he picked it up, he heard an urgent cry for help coming from inside: "Poison gas! They used chemical poison ammunition!"
From not knowing French at first to being able to communicate proficiently, it took Miller about a month, which can be said to be quite fast.
But the rumbling explosions significantly affected the effect of wired communication, so he thought he heard wrongly.
poison gas? That is something prohibited by international conventions!
"What's going on?" Zhou Changfeng on the side was scooping out canned meat with an iron spoon.
"They said they may have been attacked by a chemical agent, I'm not sure..."
Zhou Changfeng threw the half-eaten can aside with a click, picked up the telescope and strode out.
He hunched over and emerged from the command post through the rear passage, then raised his telescope and looked up at Highland 109.
The smoke that filled the entire mountain was indeed a bit strange. Generally speaking, the smoke emitted by white phosphorus or red phosphorus smoke bombs commonly used by armies of various countries is gray-white.
But now it can be seen that the color of the smoke is a bit darker. If you look carefully, you can see that some wisps of smoke that have not dispersed are brown-green.
"It may be chlorine-containing compound gas." Zhou Changfeng briefly stated his judgment, and then ordered without hesitation: "Open the artillery group and attack the enemy's artillery position. After firing six effective rounds, move immediately."
His guess was correct. The poison used by the Italian army was diphenylchloroarsine, a sneeze gas that was born during the European War. Both sides had used it, and Italy was no exception.
Although diphenylchloroarsine seems to be backward nowadays, as a typical representative of pauper imperialism, Italy, with its limited industrial capacity and financial resources, is naturally reluctant to spend more money on upgrading in this area. Anyway, the ammunition in stock twenty years ago is not inoperable. use.
As for the artillery group of the 50th Brigade, because it was difficult to collect some assets and lacked anti-aircraft weapons, it has not fired until now to prevent it from being exposed and causing enemy air attacks.
But after weighing the pros and cons, Zhou Changfeng immediately made a decision - if you do something immoral, you will be beaten violently!
After receiving the order, Chretien personally directed more than twenty barrel artillery pieces of different models, calibers, old and new to fire together.
"D15 area, polar coordinates 345214, enemy artillery unit, instant fuze, six rounds, effective fire, fire when ready."
The artillery positions of the 26th Italian Division have not changed in the past few days. At first, they were worried that the other side would counterattack with artillery fire, but they did not find any movement from the other side for so long, so everyone subconsciously relaxed their vigilance.
Just as they were unhurriedly unlatching and loading ammunition, suddenly, a series of rumbling sounds like dull thunder came from a distance.
Aha? Is the thunderstorm coming again?
A few seconds later, a sharp "squeak" and a low "pop" sound reached their ears, and the artillerymen realized that a catastrophe was coming.
What came was not raindrops at all, but dense shells!
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
More than a dozen explosion points appeared almost at the same time. The rapid shock wave knocked the artillerymen to the ground. Hundreds of high-speed fragments scattered in all directions. The artillery position with a radius of nearly a thousand square meters was instantly turned into a purgatory!
In fact, when using the instant fuse, the crater that the shell can explode is quite shallow. The 105mm high-explosive bomb can only blast a shallow crater the size of a bathtub in ordinary soil. However, due to the aging of the fuzes, many artillery shells manufactured twenty years ago almost naturally evolved into delayed detonation, resulting in large craters with a diameter of three meters and a depth of about half a meter.
The blown earth, rubbish and various debris fell one after another, followed closely by the broken limbs and internal organs, like rain.
A sergeant who was stunned by the bombing staggered up from the ground. What he saw was a deformed and twisted 75mm field gun, and a section of it hung on the red-hot barrel and was being burned. Sizzling intestines.
What immediately frightened him was that the shelling just now caused some ammunition to explode, and gray-green and yellow-brown diphenylchloroarsine gas also rose from the messy position!
The leaked poison gas undoubtedly caused secondary damage to the artillery position that suffered heavy losses. The wounded who were bleeding all over the ground were stimulated to cough and vomit, which greatly aggravated the bleeding and shock.
The frightened medical soldiers hurriedly put on gas masks and rushed into the billowing toxic smoke.
However, the battle was still going on. A few kilometers away, under the 109 Hill, the Italian army, knowing that it was an unmissable opportunity, immediately launched an attack.
The Italian army, determined to win, prepared a full eight levels of offensive troops, one after another like a surging wave.
After discovering that it had been attacked by chemical weapons, Company C of the 72nd Battalion quickly put on gas masks. However, because this thing was easily cut and damaged, many soldiers found it after taking it out of the canvas strap. damaged.
On the other hand, the German tin can containers, which have been criticized by people, although bulky and inconvenient, can effectively protect gas masks from damage.
In response to the almost crazy repeated attacks by the Italian army, the defenders on the 109 Hill position also suffered numerous losses. At the same time, due to the extended artillery fire blocking the route, subsequent reinforcements could only look at the fierce fighting on the 109 Hill and worry.
After a fierce battle until three o'clock in the afternoon, the Italian army's seventh echelon, more than a hundred people, once again attacked the top of the mountain. This was already the third time.
Many of the poisoned Frenchmen expended a lot of extra energy from crying, coughing, and vomiting, but the Italians still encountered fierce resistance.
The two sides fighting together are using everything that can kill the enemy to attack each other, including grenades, engineer shovels, bayonets, and fists!
But as the eighth echelon of Italian troops also followed up, the remaining twenty-odd soldiers of Company C had to abandon their surface positions and retreat to the tunnels.
At this point, the Italian soldiers truly realized the horror of Highland 109.
During the previous confrontation for more than half a month, these guys from all over the world actually dug this hill into caves and secret passages?
Confused, they tried for half an hour without making any progress - although they seemed to have captured the high ground, it was only on the surface, and there were still an unknown number of defenders under their feet!
At this moment, more than a dozen grenades suddenly flew down from the west, shocking the Italian soldiers and scattering to find cover.
Company A of the 73rd Battalion had actually received an order to reinforce Highland 109 long ago, but was unable to pass due to enemy artillery blockade. The Americans waited for several hours and finally figured out the interval between the artillery fires, so they passed through the blockade zone without any danger at the cost of ten casualties.
After throwing a round of rifle grenades, Company A, which had reached the top of the mountain, immediately launched a counterattack. More than a hundred American volunteers rushed towards the disgraced Italian army with rifles equipped with bayonets!
The high ground instantly fell into a brutal hand-to-hand battle, with blood spurting out and screams filling the small top of the mountain.
A quarter of an hour later...
Looking at the defeated Italian troops retreating in embarrassment, Ricardo, Enrique and others had gloomy faces, while the officers of the other battalions were somewhat gloating about their misfortune.
I have already said that there is no need to continue attacking this difficult place. This is the consequence of paranoia.
If you don't hit the wall, you won't look back. If you hit the wall, you'll have to hit your head and bleed out before you give up.
However, the offensive and defensive battle at Highland 109 was only part of the entire battle.
On the left wing of the 50th Brigade, the 32nd Infantry Division of the Republican Army also suffered a large-scale attack in the past two days.
The Tsarist Russian intervention force made its debut. Its 8th "Sakarov" Infantry Division cooperated with the 96th Infantry Brigade of the National Army and crossed the Tejo River at various locations downstream.
The 32nd Division was attacked in four directions. The front line was in a hurry, all the outer positions were lost, the second line positions were in danger, and the casualties were close to 2,000 people.
A brigade heading for reinforcements was attacked by three consecutive air attacks on the way. The brigade headquarters was directly hit by an aerial bomb. The commander survived but the staff suffered heavy casualties. The entire unit was in chaos and it may take some time to regroup.
"Sir, the 32nd Division is asking for our help."
"veto."
Under the attention of the officers, Zhou Changfeng decisively refused.
This has nothing to do with the fact that the 50th Brigade has limited troops. It is already stretched to defend the existing positions. It is obviously impossible to divide the troops to help.
Because of this, on the night of June 18, the 32nd Division retreated eight kilometers during the night. Only then did they get a chance to breathe and barely stabilize their position.
The 47th Brigade on the right was defeated at the first touch, and the 32nd Division on the left was defeated in two days?
The loss of the defense zone of the neighboring troops caused the 50th Brigade to be attacked on both sides. A dangerous salient was formed here!
Only belatedly, the Republican Army headquarters realized that the situation was not good.
At first, they thought that the opponent was launching a tentative attack, so they planned to wait and see for a while before making any plans. However, they did not expect that their side would retreat so quickly.
This suddenly disrupted the original battle plan, and now the entire front has the possibility of collapse.
However, even at this juncture, senior officials in the Republican Army headquarters and the government are still shirking responsibility and arguing with each other.
The German General Staff as far away as Berlin smelled the crisis. The Red Eagle Corps received a secret telegram. Berlin asked "It now seems that there is no possibility of victory or stalemate in the strategic decisive battle."
Although there is little hope, the Red Eagle Corps still proposed a counterattack plan together with the International Brigade—quickly deploy a part of the strategic reserves to cooperate with the 50th Brigade that is still holding on to launch a fierce counterattack against the enemy forces that have crossed the river and retake the south bank. position, thereby temporarily reversing the passive situation.
Obviously the Germans are also unhappy now. They believe that the internal fighting in the Republican Army has seriously affected the prospects of the regime, and the hope of victory in a strategic decisive battle is slim.
Even if this counterattack achieves a tactical victory, it does not mean that the final victory will be achieved!
Not only were the German military advisers on the General Staff Committee complaining about Spain's internal affairs, but Zhou Changfeng couldn't help but curse.
"This kind of bad fight is nothing!"
But of course everyone couldn’t understand his complaints in Chinese.
After calming down for a moment, he turned to English and sighed: "A normal strategic decisive battle should be a stalemate with gains and losses. After a period of fighting, the disadvantaged side gradually loses. However, once the battle line begins, It almost collapsed at the beginning... There is no need to continue this battle.”
While Chretien and Roald were comforting themselves, Miller, who was somewhat delighted, ran into the headquarters.
He stood at attention and saluted: "Sir, the German liaison officer has arrived on time!"
A gray-green Fi-156 liaison plane flew over the location of the 50th Brigade. Looking at the field covered with craters like the surface of the moon, the pilot flew the plane in two circles in the sky before finding a suitable place to land.
This type of high-wing, three-seater, single-engine small aircraft produced by Feizele Company is not eye-catching, but it is indispensable for military operations, such as transportation of officers, observing the impact of artillery shells, forward reconnaissance, etc. It can do all kinds of chores, and its unique design allows it to have a quite exaggerated take-off and landing distance - fifty meters of flat land is enough.
When two officers from the Red Eagle Legion walked into the headquarters, Zhou Changfeng was leaning over the table, holding a pencil in his mouth and another in his hand, writing on the large-scale map. painting.
"Where is your commander?"
A female voice came into his ears, interrupting Zhou Changfeng's thoughts.
He stood up straight in surprise and displeasure, reached out and took off the pencil from his mouth, "That's me."
Both men and women have the rank of captain. The man looks like a standard German - his face is as tough as if it was cut with an axe, brown hair and brown eyes; while the woman has blond hair and blue eyes, probably from Northern Europe. bloodline.
Probably because they were surprised by Zhou Changfeng's age and style, the two of them were a little surprised. They were stunned for a second before the male captain saluted: "Mr. Commander, the plan of the Staff Committee has been approved by the headquarters. We are here to convey the order." .”
Zhou Changfeng calmly took the combat orders in the document package and quickly browsed them. Then he looked at the two men and asked seriously: "This is related to the lives of all the volunteers of the 50th Brigade and the value of sacrifice. Can you guarantee to arrive on time?"
"Sorry, Mr. Commander, we are only responsible for conveying the order to you and confirming your agreement." This captain of the signal corps is probably the kind of person who speaks and acts strictly.
This plan plans to use an armored battalion and a motorized infantry regiment of the Red Eagle Corps as the spearhead of the offensive, supplemented by the 11th International Brigade, the 105th International Brigade, and the 14th Infantry Division of the Republican Army, with a total strength of 20,000. Detour to the west and cross eastward along the Tejo River to divide, surround and annihilate the enemy forces on the south bank.
The plan was wonderful, but the key was to wait for these troops to be deployed, which meant that the 50th Brigade had to fight alone and hold on to the protrusion, thereby attracting the enemy forces on the left and right flanks to continue the siege.
To be honest, Zhou Changfeng didn't want to accept this task, but the addition of the Red Eagle Legion made this plan much more reliable?
And it doesn’t take a particularly long time—forty-eight hours.
He knocked on the table and frowned: "If we can't guarantee that it will be in place within 48 hours, I refuse to carry out this task."
At this time, the female captain spoke, "We will do everything possible to ensure transportation and assembly, please trust us."
This branch line is almost finished.
(End of chapter)
