Chapter 389: Infantry “Blitz” (1)

Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios

After the plan was deployed, all the troops entered the preparation stage, but the heavy artillery brigade was still carrying out artillery missions every day. The sound of artillery was constantly recalled on the defense line 20 kilometers ahead. In the Allied Headquarters in Paris, Pétain and Haig were studying how to use the American military.

“What does the United States mean by using such a young general, and their first echelon doesn’t even have a lieutenant general. Although they took over some of the defense, it’s only twenty kilometers,” Pétain said.

Haig didn’t think much of it. “That’s normal. The U.S. military is all new recruits. They haven’t experienced war. Although there are fifty divisions and twenty brigades, their establishment seems very small. Each division only has about ten thousand people, less than half of ours. But their weapons are good.”

“Well, that’s true. It’s impossible to count on them. But where do we need to supplement the troops we replace?”

“Let’s add the front line of the Marne River and try to attack again at the end of the year?” Haig wanted to attack.

“Well…” Pétain had to think about his predecessor. He was fired because he lost too much in a battle, so he was hesitant and changed the subject. “I heard that the Americans are firing artillery every day. Are they doing something?”

“How is that possible? What can those new recruits do? Good equipment doesn’t mean combat power.”

Neither of them knew that Wesley had deployed the attack without notifying headquarters at the same time. A two-pronged spy war had been going on. Wesley did not know if information would be leaked, so he did not inform them at all. Although the drawbacks of doing so were great and it might leave the U.S. military alone, Wesley did not care at all. His troops were strong enough to deal with it, and he was not afraid of facing two million enemies.

On September 27, 1917, the battle here would be different. At six o’clock in the morning, the heavy artillery brigade began to fire again. This time, there were ten heavy artillery brigades, plus 50 divisions of 105mm howitzers. This was the first time in human history that rapid-fire artillery had been used on a large scale. This was not something the French’s ‘Miss 75’ could compare with. It was on a completely different level.

Boom! Boom! Boom! The 20-kilometer German defense line was caught in a sea of fire, and the troops of the First Army were already preparing. They would cooperate without running. After an hour of shelling, the shelling began to extend, and then the soldiers jumped out of the trenches. The first squad was divided into three combat groups and advanced in the finished word suit. Their tactics were completely in accordance with the new infantry manual.

These soldiers were new recruits, but they had been training for two years. There was no problem with their tactical movements, but soldiers who had never seen blood were still new recruits, and this was their first time.

The vanguard troops of the three divisions were concentrated at three points, and the follow-up troops still followed up. The artillery bombardment had been replaced with 75mm rapid-fire cannons. The heavy artillery was all extended to prevent accidental injuries. They began to deploy mortar groups 500 meters in front of the local position. When the soldiers reached 200 meters from the local position, the artillery bombardment stopped, and a large number of machine guns began to prepare, and the soldiers attacked.

The German positions were in a panic. They did not know if the enemy had attacked, but the observation posts could finally see the situation in front of them. “The enemy has attacked.” There were shouts, and the surviving observation posts shouted loudly. Then the whistle was blown. Whistle was commonly used in World War I, and it was very useful for delivering news.

The German troops picked up their weapons and went to their combat posts, but at that moment there was a sharp whistling sound, “Shelling.” Mortars had been used in World War I, but not very much, but these soldiers had been under different shelling for two years and they were used to it, but this time they miscalculated because there were too many mortars. The 60mm, 80mm, and 120mm mortars fell directly into the trenches, which were not serrated now.

In a straight trench, the lethality of a cannonball could be maximized. After five minutes of artillery bombardment, the infantry had already moved to a position 100 meters away from the front line. They had prepared grenades and the bombardment stopped. The soldiers jumped up and quickly rushed to a distance of 50 meters, and then the grenades were thrown out.

Boom! There was another explosion, and the German troops were about to collapse. A week of artillery fire, followed by a larger artillery attack today, followed by another artillery attack. Now they could not tell what it was.

“Bang… Da Da Da… Tu Tu Tu Tu” Different gunshots sounded. The American troops had already entered the front line position and the power of the automatic weapons was fully displayed. “Continue to attack and advance.” The forces of the first three divisions had no other task but to attack and advance. In the trenches, they were like fish in water. From the back, Gibson submachine guns opened the way. Under the alternation of automatic weapons, they were unstoppable.

Meanwhile, behind the German defense line, a fleet suddenly appeared on the coast of the North Sea, followed by artillery fire. However, it seemed that the artillery fire did not hit anything, and the landing craft began to move continuously towards the coastline.

This was a Marine Brigade that Wesley had personally trained. Four brigades of troops were to land one brigade at a time, and their positions were behind the German Army. This was Wesley’s trump card. He wanted to drive the German Army out of Belgium at once, and at the same time, destroy as much of the enemy’s strength as possible.

The Dark Fort was the most terrifying because of the presence of machine guns inside. It was the infantry’s nightmare. The U.S. military encountered a large number of Dark Bunkers and found some of them through artillery reconnaissance, but there were still many that they did not find. However, as soon as the Dark Bunkers opened fire, they would see a terrible weapon flying over with white smoke.

The rocket launcher instantly became a favorite of the soldiers. There were not many concrete attacks, and most of them were dark forts made of wood and sandbags. They were completely unable to resist the attack of the rocket launcher, especially the armor-piercing bullets.

How could Wesley not pay attention to the Dark Fort? This was the biggest problem. And the main function of the bazooka was not to fight tanks, because he could only respond to World War I tanks with “hehe.” The U.S. Army sent several tanks, which were developed by Ford.

The American 1918 tank, which was supposed to only appear in 1918, appeared ahead of schedule. Because Wesley worked with them to make the sedan, and the power company produced the new engine, both gasoline and diesel, the tank’s power was not a problem.

However, Wesley was not too advanced, so the tank of Ford did not change much. After Wesley saw it, he directly ordered, “Throw it away.”

He didn’t know how to design his own tanks if he needed them? The conditions weren’t mature yet. It didn’t mean that you could do it just because you had the technology. You needed a lot of skilled industrial workers to learn. Wesley’s factory workers were undoubtedly the best workers because new technology was the first to come into contact.