Chapter 208: Occupation (1.5)
Müller pushed open the glass window in the hallway and poked his head out to look downstairs, where a group of gendarmes was walking down the alley in front of the apartment with rifles on their backs, one of them holding a German black back.
It seems that the British are doing a good job of protecting the environment, and the airport is surrounded by large green fields and dense woods, and the base camp can be seen everywhere with manicured bushes and green trees on both sides of the road.
This is the case in many European countries in these years, because the land is vast and sparsely populated, and many lands are simply not cultivated by manpower, and the original scenery is still maintained. But the situation on the British side is different from that of Europe, hundreds of years of aristocratic feudal hereditary, there is no one inch of terra nullius on this island, every mountain forest and wilderness has a belonging, all of which are evidenced by the title deeds printed with the royal insignia.
Many landlords were hereditary aristocrats themselves, and they had channels to make money, and they did not need to rely on cultivating their own territories to make a living. Not only that, but they also violently drove out the yeoman farmers on the public lands, and took the hills and rivers into their own pockets, and they bulldozed the fertile fields into pastures, and raised well-bred sheep, because the overseas trade in British woollen goods was growing rapidly, and the snow-white wool was equal to the shining silver in those years.
History called this turmoil the enclosure movement, and it also had a very vivid nickname, sheep eating people. After this trend, the central and southern parts of England became what they are now, and until the 21st century, the British countryside is still full of large open meadows, overgrown with dandelions and alfalfa, and when the autumn breeze blows and snowflakes fly all over the sky, who would have thought that behind this dreamlike beauty is a bloody history.
Mill didn't know much about history, let alone did any research, that is, because he was about to land in England, he gnawed on a few British histories, trying to have an objective understanding of the enemy in front of him from the historical records. The results were an eye-opener for him. These guys even dared to insult the Germans as barbarians, and look at what they did all over the world, even the Vikings were ashamed of themselves. Looking back, it is right to think that they did have the blood of those pirates, and the guys who rowed the dragon boats did not fail to plague the British women.
Mueller took a deep breath of the cold morning air, raised his wrist to look at the time, then turned and continued down the hallway.
"Good morning, General Müller, General Wehrle is waiting for you inside." Wehrle's lieutenant stood at the door, and he opened the door sideways for Müller.
"Good morning. Miller, you look so energetic today. Mueller said with a smile, bowing slightly at the other party, and strode into the room.
"Good morning, Mueller." Dressed in a crisp uniform, Wehrle sat down at the living room table and enjoyed breakfast.
"Good morning, Your Excellency." Mueller nodded in salute, walked over to the table, pulled out a chair and sat down.
"How was your rest last night, Your Excellency?" Mueller shook off the napkin and tucked the corner into the neckline. The orderly placed a breakfast in front of him.
"Oh, that's great, Muller, last night was the sweetest sleep I've had in all my time."
"I can understand. Your Excellency, the responsibility on your shoulders is great, and Your Excellency the Führer has great confidence in your wisdom. Müller picked up his knife and fork and began to cut the caramelized German sausage.
"In the presence of the great Führer, I am not a wise man at all. The only thing I can do is rely on the superficial experience I have accumulated in the past to do some auxiliary work to pick up the missing pieces. Wehrle rolls up a slice of omelette with a fork and puts it in his mouth.
"Your Excellency is so modest." Mueller said with a smile that he had always admired the wisdom of the old chief.
"Don't talk about that. As I told you last night, the Wehrmacht must complete the occupation of London as soon as possible, and the situation inside the city is too complicated at the moment, with all the forces entangled, and it is completely incomprehensible to the relationship between them, which is very detrimental to our plans to conquer this country. Wierle changed the subject, he still had an important task to accomplish.
"You're confused, aren't you, that's why I wrote that report."
"So His Excellency the Führer sent me here, which is really nerve-wracking." Wehrle picked up a slice of bread from the blue bread, broke off a small piece with his hand, and scraped the yolk of the egg on the plate.
"Our task now is to completely control the city, and we must re-establish order." Wehrle shoved the bread into his mouth.
"Restrictions should be issued to reassure ordinary citizens."
"This is the job of the army group command, leave this to the professionals. What is the current situation in the city, I need to be updated. Wehrle picked up the coffee pot on the table and refilled himself.
"As far as I know, until the early hours of this morning, there were still sporadic exchanges of fire in the city, some of the Guards hid in residential areas, and many citizen self-defense groups and militias retreating from the south continued to resist our attack with the help of barricades and bunkers." Mueller put down his knife and fork, and he wiped the corners of his mouth with a napkin.
"We cut off power to most of the area last night to avoid chaos in the city, and the scheduled Letter to the Citizens of London was not released to the London area via Radio London until this morning."
"What about the rest of the media?" Weirle asked.
"The British had been prepared for this for a long time, and we found out that they had prepared two front-page headlines, one for ordinary government propaganda and the other for a press release announcing the fall of London."
"You can call it at any time, isn't it, this can be understood, more than ninety percent of the uncrowned kings of this group of fleet streets are wall grass." Wehrle picked up a napkin and wiped his mouth.
"Muller, get the car ready, let's go around town."
"I've been ready for you to do so, Your Excellency." Mueller replied respectfully.
The organized resistance in London was almost over, although there were still one or two gunshots from time to time, and it was the Germans who were clearing up the stragglers. On this night, most of the citizens stayed up all night, hiding in their homes, waiting in fear for fate to arrange for them. The devout citizens knelt before the icon and prayed to God for their protection from the mighty invaders.
A timid citizen secretly abandons the weapons issued by the community self-defense organization to each family, which triggers a chain reaction of the surrounding neighbors, and everyone admires the death of the instigator who is faster than others, and is really smart enough. London has fallen, what do you still want to do with your weapons, do you have a malicious intention to kill German soldiers? Now that there is nothing at home that can be used to kill people except kitchen knives, this is enough to prove to the Germans that they are just ordinary people, great good citizens. As a result, the back alley of the row of apartments was littered with guns and ammunition overnight, which really startled a German detachment that had advanced here, as it looked as if a company of troops had abandoned and fled from the alley.
When the sun rose, the efficiency of the German army was significantly improved, perhaps because of Weierle, his arrival invisibly brought a lot of pressure to the senior commanders of Army Group E. Although the Führer's henchmen had little influence among ordinary soldiers, he was well-known among the top echelons of the army, and he was the chief thinker around the Führer, the most relied on among the Führer's most trusted ones, and no one dared to underestimate his influence on the Führer.
Sorry, that's all there is to it today, the cervical spine feels a little uncomfortable, and I don't dare to sit for too long.
Thank you all for your support. (To be continued.) )