In fact, Xiao Letian has always had an inexplicable premonition of worry. No matter how detailed his memory bank is, it is impossible to capture all the details in history. There are many times when he only vaguely feels that something exists but he always remembers it. Just don't get up.
In the Franco-Prussian War, Prussia fought very smoothly. It seemed that France had no ability to fight back at all, but Xiao Letian knew that was not the case. France had several beautiful counterattacks in history.
It is said that there was another position that wiped out the charge of two thousand Prussian troops in one morning. So how did they do it?
It wasn't until the heavy machine guns under the city of Saarbrücken started firing that Xiao Letian suddenly realized that he had forgotten the heavy machine gun in France that had selected the wrong technology tree.
The Mitrayotz heavy machine gun is a short-lived swan song in the history of the world's machine gun development. This is a national weapon popularized by France to deal with breech-loading needle rifles. However, it is a pity that it was replaced by Krupp's steel during the Franco-Prussian War. The cannon was completely crushed.
It has to be said that the performance of this heavy machine gun is still very good. Both the range and the rate of fire can easily crush the charge of the infantry regiment. However, France also has two fatal flaws in using it.
One is that France lacks high-quality artillery to match this kind of heavy machine gun. Although the machine gun can easily shoot the charging infantry regiment, as long as their position is exposed, they will be accurately hit by the enemy's field artillery.
The second is the overly complicated operation, which turns those small number of machine gunners into baby bumps!
I don’t know what the Emperor was thinking. He hid this weapon too deeply. In order to keep it secret, he even blocked the information from the frontline combat troops.
Almost all the soldiers in the current establishment had not operated this kind of weapon. It was not until the beginning of the war that the Emperor assigned machine guns and a group of specially trained machine gunners to the front-line troops.
This is the biggest weakness. Xiao Letian discovered this keenly. When he got the information about the appearance of the heavy machine gun artifact, he quickly made a decision and sent thirty of the best snipers to follow the three regiments of the Prussian Army. Reinforcements penetrated into the city of Saarbrücken.
When it got dark and night fell, the snipers began to launch a counterattack, shooting the French machine gunners who were close at hand to death one by one on the position.
"Damn, it's the Chinese sharpshooter again! The heavy machine gun pushes back... looking for cover!"
"Turn the muzzle of the gun, shoot at the city wall, suppress the sharpshooters..."
In the chaos, the machine gun positions suddenly became busy. Some pushed the machine guns to the rear to find cover, while others tried to turn their guns around and shoot at the city wall to suppress them.
However, no matter how powerful the machine gun fire is, it is difficult to suppress those ghost-like snipers. These dark elves shoot from one place to another, consuming the lives of the enemy with one shot after another.
They were neither impatient nor impatient, and their mentality was as calm as water. The war presented before their eyes was as exquisite and clear as a surgeon's anatomy diagram.
Don't be greedy for success or make rash advances, but you won't miss any opportunity to shoot!
The Prussian soldiers who were shooting down from the top of the city were dumbfounded. They saw these Chinese juggling on the wall like madmen, sometimes trotting quickly, and sometimes lying on the ground and crawling forward.
They kept changing their shooting positions and sniping at the enemy troops under the city, almost without missing a beat!
"Get my machine gunners to retreat! Damn it, put out the torches next to them! Isn't this a living target?"
Frossard was bleeding with distress. Of course he knew how valuable these weapons and machine gunners were. If this delay continued, all these soldiers would probably die on the spot.
The Mitrayotz machine gun retreated to a safe area in dejection. The French army, which had lost heavy firepower support, suffered unprecedented casualties. There were more and more Prussian troops on the city wall, and the condescending shooting caused heavy casualties to the attacking French army.
The most ruthless ones were the sharpshooters in the darkness, who searched for key targets one by one and opened fire. Countless front-line company and platoon commanders were killed by snipers, and the French army's command system suddenly became chaotic.
Time passed minute by minute, and Frossard looked at his pocket watch. It was already past eight o'clock in the evening. After a full eleven hours of attack, this damn city still had not been captured.
Commander Alfred next to him couldn't stand it anymore. "Sir, let the brothers come down and rest! If we continue to fight like this, the Second Army will be crippled!"
"Anyway, we have isolated the city. All the land outside the city is under our control, and the pontoons crossing the river are safe. We have actually completed our mission!"
"Why bother to compete with this city? Your mission is to build a bridgehead to attack Prussia! Now that we have crossed the Saar River and helped His Majesty secure the position, the mission has been completed. Why should we sacrifice so many more people? Woolen cloth?"
"Let the artillery come up! Only the God of War can conquer this castle now! Don't let our young man die in vain..."
Frossard closed his eyes in pain, "Okay! Let our artillery fire! Let the soldiers come down to heal..."
Boom boom boom... The French artillery fired with fury, as if they wanted to vent all their negative emotions today. These artillerymen did not consider the consumption of ammunition at all, and actually fired more than 1,500 rounds of artillery shells throughout the night.
If you look at this number during World War I and World War II, construction would be nothing. But in 1870, this was already a staggering amount of strategic bombing.
It is no exaggeration to say that in this small town of Saarbrücken, there will no longer be a single house with a complete roof after tonight.
Next to the blazing bonfire, there were screaming French troops everywhere. After the bloody battle, the doctors were the busiest. They used up all the anesthetics in just an hour.
"My legs... my legs..." The French soldier whose legs were blown off screamed and pointed at the bone fragments exposed in the air, which were pale and reflected the firelight.
"God bless me... I don't want to die... I don't want to die..." The wounded man during the operation couldn't get even a hint of anesthesia. Four strong soldiers held his hands and feet while the doctors and nurses opened his chest directly. The intestines were sutured on the abdomen.
"Where's the doctor? Where's the doctor? Save our squad leader, for God's sake, save him..."
"Go aside and line up! Let alone the squad leader, now even if the army commander comes, he still has to line up!" The usually charming little nurse was as bad-tempered today.
Scenes of tragedies continued to be staged in the camp of the Second Army. There were no more bodies waiting to be buried on the banks of the Saar River. Countless soldiers were digging holes to bury their comrades in the dark night.
Frossard was walking among the soldiers, his face extremely pale. He suddenly realized that he had made a huge mistake!
"I really shouldn't have let them retreat, I should have continued the field battle... in one go!"
"In war, soldiers rely on their blood, so they are not afraid of life and death... But now we have not won the battle, but have retreated. How should I maintain this morale?"
"How can we fight this battle tomorrow?"
