The offensive battle was fought on the third day after the arrival of the light mechanized division. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

This is because when the light mechanized division arrived, nearly half of the tanks were unusable, in fact, some tanks broke down after only driving a dozen kilometers, and then some were even dragged all the way by trailers to the defense line.

It took some time for the French to carry out a full-scale repair of the tanks to ensure that they would not fail when they were on the battlefield, but in the end, more than two dozen tanks were declared scrapped, and all they could do was to dismantle useful parts and use them for other tanks.

The battle began in the early hours of the morning.

Zhang Chi also did not recommend launching an attack at night, because night battles require the quality and coordination of the troops, otherwise let alone attack, and even the enemy may be mistaken in which direction.

In this respect, the German army obviously had an advantage, not to mention that air and sea supremacy were still on the side of the French army.

So the battle unfolded in a big scene:

First of all, more than 800 guns of several artillery regiments of the French army fired almost simultaneously at the German lines...... The French army did not have much else but a lot of artillery, which was also determined by their strategic idea of "complete defense", and at the same time, the First World War was also fought like this, the two sides dug their own trenches with each other, and then laid artillery behind the trenches, and then there was nothing to do with a cannon shot at the enemy's position, and sometimes the artillery fire even bombarded intermittently for several days.

Then there was the naval guns of the Toulon fleet, the bombardment of the naval guns of more than 300 millimeters was really different from the grenades, and the radial dust raised was at least tens of meters high, and there was a kind of standing out from the crowd in the smoke from the artillery, and even Zhang Chi, who was several kilometers away, could feel the vibration of the ground when it was hit by the shells.

However, Zhang Chi felt that the order of the bombardment was reversed, and the large-caliber naval guns should fire first, because it was powerful and required accurate fire to destroy the enemy's strong fortifications, while the other artillery carried out carpet bombardment to clear obstacles.

The French army did the opposite, using artillery first and then naval guns, which directly led to the smoke and dust of the artillery covering the target and making the naval guns lose their accuracy...... So the bombing turned into a kind of campaign that seemed to be extremely powerful but actually had little effect.

Then the American bombers also came up to be brave, but their situation was similar to that of the naval guns, and the smoke and dust rising from below made it impossible for the pilots to see the target clearly, so they could only hurriedly drop the bombs into the smoke.

After tossing and turning like this for half an hour, a French officer shouted: "Boys, rush! ”

"Rush!"

The soldiers of the Zoaf Corps rushed forward with the tanks in their guns and towards the German lines.

Tanks are mostly Renault R35s, and there are also several Somoan S35s.

THE FORMER IS SIMILAR TO THE GERMAN NO. 3 TANK IN TERMS OF PROTECTION, AND THE FIREPOWER WILL BE WORSE, WHILE THE LATTER SURPASSES THE GERMAN NO. 3 TANK IN TERMS OF PROTECTION, FIREPOWER AND EVEN SPEED, AND CAN BE SAID TO BE QUITE GOOD IN THIS ERA AND EVEN THE BEST TANK IN THE EARLY DAYS OF WORLD WAR II, ITS 47MM CALIBER CANNON IS THE MOST POWERFUL TANK GUN ON THE WESTERN FRONT, AND THE 55MM ARMOR THICKNESS MAKES THE GERMAN ANTI-TANK GUN ONLY AIM AT ITS TRACKS AND HIT THE SIDE ARMOR AT CLOSE RANGE WHEN FACING IT.

Therefore, France in World War II was not without a fighting force against Germany, and they even had an advantage in equipment, and it was not completely unreasonable for the French Army to claim to be the strongest in the world at that time.

However, the French had too much hope for the "Maginot Line", and when the "Maginot Line" lost its effect in front of the German army, their psychological defense line was also captured by the German army, so they no longer had the confidence and will to resist...... All this proves that their army is far from being the strongest in the world.

The sound of artillery soon rang out, it was from the direction of the Germans, a few sparse shells, these shells can almost be described as "cold" compared with the preparation of the French artillery...... This is also normal, the German and Italian armies in Africa have always been in a state of supply difficulties, and finally took possession of air supremacy to improve the situation, but they were immediately recaptured by the Allies.

This, in particular, was Hitler's order to advance into Tunisia...... It should be said that this is certainly a strategic mistake, it seems to cut off the French army's road to Libya, but in the absence of an increase in supplies, it has sent twice as many troops, and a war on two fronts will make the already tight supply in Africa even worse, and now the German army does not even dare to fight more shells.

This, in turn, greatly encouraged the French soldiers who were charging, the Algerian soldiers led by the French officers to be exact.

The French officer shouted excitedly: "You see, the German artillery has been blown up by us, what are you waiting for?" Come on! ”

This was a morale-boosting tool, although many officers knew that this was not the case.

However, the Algerian soldiers seemed to be at a loss for this, and they shouted and quickened their way towards the German lines.

Two kilometers.

The German artillery was still firing without a sound, and Zhang Chi even suspected that they only had one artillery battalion and a dozen guns returning fire.

However, although the German artillery shells were few, they were accurate, and it can be seen that they were coordinated by the artillery observers in the front, and the shells always flew accurately to the most densely populated areas of the Zoaf Corps, and then brought a burst of blood.

Although the French had much more powerful artillery, they did not know how to suppress, because their infantry could not see the position of the German artillery behind the defensive line, and there were several reconnaissance planes flying in the sky, but there was smoke and dust everywhere below, and the German artillery positions could not be found either.

In fact, Zhang Chi knew that even if he found it, it would be useless, there were only a dozen artillery pieces fighting, and they could be completely dispersed to different positions for flexible guerrilla warfare.

Fifteen hundred meters.

Despite being bombarded with only a dozen guns, the Zoaf Corps, which had never been on the battlefield, was already in a little disarray...... In the aperture of the telescope, he saw several Zoaf soldiers lying on the ground and refusing to get up until the French officer ran up to them and kicked them in the ass.

One kilometer.

The Germans still did not return fire, apparently intending to bring the enemy closer to fight again in order to save ammunition.

What is even more frustrating is that a few French tanks still broke down halfway and could not move forward, which caused several gaps in the formation of the charge, and the soldiers rushed up with their guns without cover.

Seeing this, Zhang Chi couldn't help but shake his head, if this could capture this German defense line, then the German army should not have wreaked havoc on African soil a long time ago.