After obtaining the programmatic documents of the meeting and the list of key personnel attending the meeting, Gan Yongxing and Tan Renhao left Zhoushan by plane, and flew to Tehran after two half-way landings and refueling.

Because the supreme commanders of the two sides have reached an agreement on the basic opinions, the scope of discussion at the meeting has also expanded a lot, and there are mainly five issues. The first is the next stage of operations on the battlefield against Russia; the second is the general decisive battle on the battlefield in Western Europe; third, the strategic posture on the battlefields in the Eastern Mediterranean and North Africa; fourth, the timing of the United States' participation in the war in Europe; The last one was the combat operations of the Tang Imperial Navy in the Atlantic.

The last topic was added temporarily, according to the previous arrangement, if the focus was on the battlefield against Russia, then the Tang Imperial Navy did not need to rush to launch an operation in the Atlantic, and now the direction has been revised. According to the plan provided by Germany, if France was defeated within a year, the combined fleet in Europe would be much weakened, and then the Tang Imperial Navy could take a strategic offensive in the eastern Mediterranean, or in the Atlantic, to assist Germany in defeating Britain. At the same time, this is again a matter of least concern, after the situation in the Pacific theater is determined, before the US Navy is completely defeated, it will be difficult for the Tang Imperial Navy to send heavy troops into the Atlantic, and therefore it will not be able to take effective strategic offensive actions in the Atlantic direction.

"The appetite of the Germans is really not small." Tan Renhao finished reading the programmatic documents of the conference on the plane, and the last point was the new demand made by the Germans. "Now we don't even see any hope of victory in the Pacific, and we don't even have two strategic points, Australia and Hawaii, so we are going to send troops to the North Atlantic. No matter how powerful the Imperial Navy was, it was impossible to launch strategic offensive operations in two directions at the same time. ”

"It's a German ploy." Gan Yongxing saw it more thoroughly. "Advance is a retreat strategy."

"What do you mean?" Tan Renhao looked at Gan Yongxing, "You mean." Are the Germans ready to bargain with us over this? ”

Gan Yongxing smiled and picked up the cigarette. "We all know the situation in the Pacific, and the Germans know better. If it weren't for our active offensive in the Pacific, which forced the US military to continuously increase its troops in the Pacific theater, I am afraid that the US GIs would have been fighting in the European theater by now.

According to our incomplete statistics, 30% of the U.S. Army's strength is in Australia, and the Hawaiian Islands are also in the Hawaiian Islands. Heavy troops were deployed on several other islands. If we send troops to the North Atlantic now, we must switch from offensive to defensive in the Pacific, and the United States will certainly adopt a corresponding strategy, they will either launch a large-scale counteroffensive in the Pacific, and the result is obvious, we are very likely to return to the state before the United States entered the war, and then draw a large number of troops to strengthen the Pacific theater, and finally Germany has to face the threat of Britain, France and Russia in two directions alone. Either we would send a large number of troops to Europe before we even entered the North Atlantic, and the result would be that Germany would have to face the American Army in the theater of Western Europe. And their plan to defeat France within a year was just a plan. ”

"In other words, Germany's aim is simply to make us make concessions on other fronts by making this unrealistic demand?"

"Yes. That's certainly what they think. Dwell on this issue first, try to reach a compromise with us, and then let us make concessions in other areas. Gan Yongxing lit a cigarette, "But well." The army side has already thought about it. ”

"Army?" Tan Renhao was a little surprised again, this should be the contradiction between the Navy and Germany, what is the Army going to do?

"To be precise, the Prime Minister had anticipated this, so he had already made arrangements." Gan Yongxing laughed, "If Germany proposes that we contribute to the Atlantic theater, we and the Persian Empire will ask Germany to also make a certain contribution in the direction of southern Europe, so that Germany can send troops to attack Italy." ”

"It's obviously impossible." Tan Renhao was stunned for a moment, and then laughed, "So, there is no need for us to worry about sending troops to the North Atlantic?" ”

"There should be no problem in the big picture, but in the small aspect, it is still indispensable to have a fight with the Germans." Gan Yongxing shrugged his shoulders, "You should first read the information of the German generals who came to this meeting, so that it will be more convenient to negotiate with them." ”

Tan Renhao nodded, and continued to read.

If the North Atlantic was the weakness of the Tang Empire, then the southern front of Europe was Germany's weakness. So far, although Germany and Italy have declared war on each other, they have both declared war without war, first, because the terrain in the mountainous areas of central Europe is extremely harsh, which is not suitable for large armies to fight, and second, the contradictions between the two sides have not yet reached the point where they have to fight a battle.

Germany was already exhausted on the Eastern and Western Fronts, and if there was one more Southern Front, it would be difficult for Germany to hold on. Therefore, after Germany and Italy declared war on each other, Germany only deployed fifteen mountain infantry divisions in the direction of the Alps, and with the help of favorable defensive terrain, it was able to hold back several times the Italian army in this direction, and several skirmishes between the two sides ended in the victory of the German army, as a result, Italy also stopped attacking Germany on the grounds of poor terrain and inconvenient transportation.

The main reason for Italy's entry into the war was also not the contradiction with Germany, but with the Persian Empire. Shortly after the end of the last war, Italy and the Persian Empire came close to a large-scale war that had begun in the colonies of North Africa.

Before World War I, Abyssinia (present-day Ethiopia) was an Italian colony, but during the Great War, the Persian Empire sent troops from Egypt and quickly swept away the colony in the fast East African Horn and claimed it for itself. In the post-war negotiations, the Persian Empire refused to exchange Abyssinia for Italy, and installed a pro-Polish emperor here. Italy and Poland have made a feud.

After the economic crisis, Italy embarked on the path of fascist expansion, and in 11 years sent troops to invade Abyssinia, at a time when the Persian Empire was in internal and external difficulties, and could not help the client state against Italy. Ultimately. The Persian Empire connected with the Tang Empire, Germany jointly sanctioned Italy, while Britain, France, the United States, Russia and other countries secretly supported Italy.

It provides Italy with a large amount of oil, steel and other most important strategic resources.

Before the outbreak of the Great War. The Abyssinian struggle was still ongoing, and the pro-Polish emperor had gone into exile in Tehran and established a government-in-exile. The Persian Empire was also providing military assistance to the resisting armies, but was not in a hurry to intervene in the war. When both sides entered the war, the Persian Empire immediately sent troops to cut off the land lines of communication from Italy to Abyssinia. The presence of the Tang fleet in the South Atlantic also made it impossible for Italy to send troops to the Abyssinian battlefield by sea. As a result, in 22, the year after the outbreak of the war, the Persian Empire, with the help of a small expeditionary force of the Tang Empire, quickly swept through Abyssinia and drove Italy's tentacles out of the Horn of East Africa.

It was also from this point on that Italy united with Spain, which also had a major conflict with the Persian Empire in its colonies in North Africa, and France sent troops to North Africa, attacked Egypt, and fought to conquer the Suez Canal.

Expelled the Persian Empire from North Africa. This was also the main reason why Italy entered the war.

From this point of view, Italy did not actually have much contradiction with Germany, and the main purpose of Italy's entry into the war was to colonize North Africa. And not the hegemony of Europe. As a result, the southern European front of Germany and Italy has also become a silent front, and neither side has the intention or strength to launch a strategic offensive, so there is naturally no need to invest too many troops in this secondary battlefield.

Germany made an almost insatiable demand to the Don Empire. In return, the demands made by the Tang Empire were actually beyond the reach of Germany. After all, an alliance is only an alliance, and the contradictions between the two countries still cannot be eliminated. To put it bluntly, both sides are trying their best to fight for their own interests, and although most of the time the common interests of both sides coincide, in some special respects, the interests of both sides are contradictory.

After Tan Renhao understood the Prime Minister's intention to let Germany send troops to southern Europe, he didn't think much about it. It was just a game for politicians, and he was going to Tehran to face German soldiers, so he was more interested in them.

Because this time the main discussion was about combat operations on the mainland battlefield, the main participants on both sides were army generals, and the naval generals were just foils. The chief representative of the German delegation was Field Marshal Manstein, and the Luftwaffe and Navy also had generals.

The marshal of Germany was not the same as the marshal of the Tang Empire. In the Tang Empire, the marshal was to a greater extent a symbol of status and status. Since the establishment of the military rank of "marshal" in the Tang Empire, it has been stipulated that only the commanders of the two armies are active marshals, that is, the marshal is linked to the commanders of the services, and the other marshals must have served as commanders of the army and navy. And in Germany, the marshal was to a greater extent an honor, as well as a reward. Except for a higher rank, the marshal did not have an equivalent position in terms of command authority, so there were many marshals in the German army, especially during the war, and the marshals were almost "mass-produced". For example, by now, there are more than a dozen marshals in the German Army, and this situation would not exist at all in the Tang Empire.

Tan Renhao read Manstein's information very carefully, he didn't get much information, and the content was also very concise.

Manstein, originally surnamed Lewinsky, was born into a nobleman, but changed his surname to Manstein when he was a young man after he joined his uncle's family, and his biological father was an artillery general. He joined the army at the age of 18 as a midshipman in the Guards Infantry Regiment and became a full-fledged officer a year later. He was promoted to captain while participating in World War I. After the end of World War I, when Germany was affected by the economic crisis and had long restricted its armament development, Manstein participated in a committee dedicated to the reorganization of the armed forces and served as a senior staff officer. Before the outbreak of the war, Manstein was exposed to a lot of information and experience in armored forces during his visits to other countries, and then joined the German General Staff, where he was promoted to general, and successively held many important positions, which gave him access to the German military's high-level decision-making.

At the outbreak of the war, Manstein fought several extremely beautiful battles with the Russian army on the Eastern Front as chief of staff of Army Group South. Later, he was transferred to the Western Front and served as the commander of the 38th Army, and withstood the fierce attack of the French armored troops on the Western Front, and reversed the defeat on the Western Front through a series of decisive, rapid and fierce counterattacks, and finally invaded Belgium, surrounded France from the north, and completely reversed the situation on the Western Front. He then went to the Eastern Front again and commanded the 56th Panzer Army to withstand the fierce attack of the Russian army on the Vistula River, and it was his excellent performance that finally brought the Russian army to a halt a step away from Berlin, unable to move forward. Here, Manstein was promoted to field marshal for his outstanding performance and outstanding contributions.

From this resume, it can be seen that Manstein was a very proficient commander in armored warfare, and that he was by no means good at defense (in the German army, the best at defending in adversity was Moder), but offensive. Although Manstein's chances of command were all battles in an unfavorable situation, he still broke up the enemy's offensive through effective counterattacks, and his victories were achieved on the basis of limited defenses and rapid counterattacks. Thus, Manstein was actually a general who was better at attacking than a general who was better at defense.

"This time it was Manstein who was in charge of planning the offensive on the Western Front?" Tan Renhao looked up at Gan Yongxing, who was also reading the documents.

Gan Yongxing was stunned for a moment and said, "We don't know the specifics, maybe." Do you think there is a problem? ”

"No, it's just speculation." Tan Renhao smiled and shook his head, "Judging from this resume, Manstein is very good at attacking, if he commands the strategic offensive on the Western Front, maybe Germany will really be able to complete the operation to sweep France within a year." ”

Gan Yongxing put down the file. "It depends on how much support Manstein can get and how well his generals are."

Tan Renhao sighed secretly, a good general is not enough, what is needed on the battlefield is a good army!