As time passed, Kalinin clearly felt that the patience of Ribbentrop, who had been talking and laughing with him, was losing little by little.

At the same time, he understood that war was coming. At that time, the entire Soviet Union was busy preparing. Preparing for this coming war.

More than 30,000 "volunteers" of Britain, the United States, France, and other allied countries arrived in the Soviet Union by three means of transportation: sea, land, and air. He was either training Soviet troops in Moscow, or advising on the defense of the Soviet army at a strategic point in Kiev.

And the Germans were not idle. They laid down more than 5,600 tanks, 4,900 warplanes, and more than 47,000 artillery pieces on the Polish and Baltic Sea lines.

Among them, there are more than 37,000 artillery pieces with a caliber of more than 50 mm.

The German Navy scaled back its operations in the Atlantic in favor of full support for the campaign against the Soviet Union. Four German aircraft carriers and nearly 50 battleships and cruisers began to swim in the waters around the Soviet Union.

113 Wehrmacht Army Divisions and 40 Allied Divisions for the ground offensive; Including 19 tank divisions and 14 motorized divisions, all of them have been put in place, and logistical ammunition and fuel have been sent to the front line.

The Japanese expeditionary force against the Soviet Union, an ally of Germany, painstakingly mobilized 150,000 men under the leadership of Ishihara. Although it was not yet formed, the firepower was not too far behind the German army.

The artillery assigned to Ishihara's troops was a heavy artillery of a caliber that was rare in the Japanese army today. For the seven divisions of the Soviet Expeditionary Force, there were a total of 380 heavy artillery.

At the same time, the Japanese tank division, which had a very small establishment, was also transferred to the battlefield. After a long journey, a total of 150 new Type 3 tanks were delivered to Afghanistan.

For the time being, Japan's largest tank force is all in preparation for a sudden attack by the Korean Defense Forces. Just in North Korea, they laid down a chariot army.

This chariot corps has two chariot divisions and one chariot teaching brigade. And the Southern Army is such an important resource gathering place. It was only one tank division and two tank wings.

In Japan and Turkey, there is also a tank division and two tank brigades.

Although the Japanese have obtained the resources of Southeast Asia, they have to consume too much. It includes warships under construction in the Navy and fighters needed by the Army and Navy.

Lost guns and artillery are used as ammunition necessary for war...... and so on, all of which require huge amounts of steel and rare minerals. Therefore, although the Japanese army had a strong demand for tanks, it was not approved by the cabinet and the battalions.

"Ishihara-kun, how are we preparing?!" Hiroshi Oshima surprisingly left Germany and arrived at Ishihara's headquarters after a series of travels.

Ishihara looked at Hiroshi Oshima in front of him, with indescribable complex emotions in his heart. The Army has always wanted to cooperate with Germany. Ishihara also sees it that way.

In this respect, Hiroshi Oshima facilitated cooperation between Germany and Japan, much to the great pleasure of the Army. On the other hand, Hiroshi Oshima seems to have considered German interests more than Japanese interests.

This made many radical generals in the army extremely dissatisfied. Are you Japanese or German?! You might as well be a German.

"Don't worry! We were well prepared. Ishihara looked at Hiroshi Oshima and said, "This time the camp is also full of energy. Want to show our allies how good we are. ”

"That's right, all of you in the big camp are all important ministers." Hiroshi Oshima nodded in agreement and said, "I'm now trying to get their tank and fighter technology with Germany, and they have done a good job in both of them." ”

"But without the support of the empire's record, I can't talk to Germany......" Hiroshi Oshima looked at Ishihara and said with a wry smile: "Ishihara, I know what everyone in China thinks of me. But I want to say yes. What the hell am I Japanese......"

Prior to this, the relationship between Ishihara and Hiroshi Oshima was only a nod of the head. Suddenly, Hiroshi Oshima's words of expression caught Ishihara off guard.

"Ishihara-kun. I know there are a lot of people in the Empire who have a lot of objections against me. But what I want to say is that all this I do is for the sake of the Empire. Hiroshi Oshima stood up. He walked up to Ishihara and said, "Indeed, some of the technology of the empire has gone ahead of the Germans. But in fact, we still have a lot to lose. ”

"No one knows this better than I do. I saw with my own eyes that Germany had crushed all of Europe in just a few weeks. Take Europe into your own hands. I saw with my own eyes how the German fleet, which was weakened and faced with the mighty British Navy, used the support of the air force to destroy the British Empire! ”

said. Hiroshi Oshima looked into Ishihara's eyes and said, "Ishihara-kun, can you imagine more than five thousand medium chariots galloping on the battlefield?!" Can you imagine nearly 5,000 warplanes roaring in the sky?! ”

Ishihara's eyes widened, and his fingers trembled. After a while, he said to Oshima Hiroshi in a trembling voice: "Oshima-kun...... Shouldn't Germany be ...... this time?"

"Yes! Germany used more than 5,000 medium tanks and nearly 5,000 fighters this time, and at the same time had a coordinated attack by the German Navy, and in addition to us, there were forty allied divisions......"

The German attacking troops all spoke to Ishihara Wan'er, and Ishihara Wan'er broke out in a cold sweat when he heard the words. He had imagined the enormity of the German attack, but what Hiroshi Oshima said made him realize how pale his imagination was......

"More than 47,000 artillery pieces, including more than 37,000 heavy artillery pieces with a caliber of 50mm or more!" Hiroshi Oshima looked at Ishihara and said in a deep voice, "Ishihara-kun! You'll soon be able to see the results of the mechanized corps. ”

"This is a completely new German doctrine of warfare, and I know that the whole country was surprised by General Yamashitta's bicycle blitzkrieg in Malaysia. Even for this, General Yamashita was enshrined as the 'Tiger of Malaysia'. ”

Hiroshi Oshima looked at Ishihara and said word by word: "But what I want to say is that this is just a joke in front of the real mechanized corps battle!" ”

"I don't want to admit it, but I have to admit it: many generals in our empire still stuck their combat thinking in the First World War. Even many diehards are still reluctant to accept some tactical and strategic ways of thinking that have yielded great results......"

"Ishihara-kun. Do you admit that the reason why we were able to occupy a large part of Southeast Asia smoothly was because the European countries had transferred most of their troops back to Turkey?! Hiroshi Oshima said unceremoniously to Ishihara: "And the United States did not expect that we would choose to attack Southeast Asia, because they did not deploy elite troops to garrison Southeast Asia at all." ”

These objective reasons are the reasons why we can easily win on the battlefield in Southeast Asia. But it is ridiculous that the generals of the large battalions think that the armies of Europe are nothing more than that. Hiroshi Oshima said, sadly.

"The reason why I pushed the Imperial army to come to participate in the German war against the Soviet Union this time is to tell the generals of the Empire through your mouth: The epoch-making war has come, and if the Empire cannot follow the pace of the war, we will only be defeated......

Ishihara listened to Hiroshi Oshima's words, but remained silent. In fact, he had been wondering why industrial capacity was stronger than that of the Wehrmacht and so many empires in China. Will there be a crushing defeat on the battlefield in China?!

After paying the lives of nearly a million Imperial soldiers, there was still no way to hold those positions. The raw called the Chinese to snatch it back. And that's not all, now they're in Southeast Asia again.

It was a direct threat to the Empire's resource lifeline in Southeast Asia. Why does the Empire always lose when fighting the Wehrmacht?! Where the hell did you lose?!

Not only Ishihara, but even the entire Nichidai camp was thinking about this issue. They have failed too many times at the hands of the Wehrmacht. Occasionally get some tactical victories.

But in turn, they were defeated by the Wehrmacht in a decisive battle. He was forced to choose a strategic retreat to ensure his battle situation.

"After observing the battlefields in Europe and Asia, I came to the conclusion that it was ......" Hiroshi Oshima looked at Ishihara and said, "There is a gap in war awareness!" ”

Ishihara frowned, and looked at Hiroshi Oshima and motioned for him to continue. He was eager to hear what Hiroshi Oshima, deep in Europe, had to say about these things. Perhaps his point of view can be seen more clearly from the standpoint of an outsider.

"The biggest problem of the empire right now. It was because the awareness of war was still at the end of World War I. On the contrary, the Wehrmacht and the German army already had the consciousness of this new era of warfare. ”

Hiroshi Oshima said, taking out a piece and handing it to Ishihara Waner. Ishihara took it with a little interest, opened it and looked at it. Ishihara is interested. Hiroshi Oshima is even more energetic.

"Long before the outbreak of war, the Wehrmacht saw the possibility of using semi-automatic, fully automatic weapons. So they started to develop and manufacture a new type of rifle called the 'Tiger Assault Rifle' very early. Although this rifle is only a handful of equipment due to its huge ammunition consumption, its effectiveness on the battlefield has earned it great acclaim. ”

"Secondly, the Tiger has been jointly developing weapons and equipment including fighter jets and combat vehicles with Germany for a long time." Hiroshi Oshima looked at Ishihara. "At that time, the empire was just beginning to study these, but for various reasons, we didn't invest much. ”

"The Chinese, on the other hand, chose to cooperate with the Germans very wisely. On the one hand, we are getting technical support from Germany, and on the other hand, we are learning from German technical experience. Germany, on the other hand, is unable to conduct full-scale research and development at home due to French surveillance. On the one hand, the Chinese side provided the venue, experiments, including a large number of resource deals, so Germany chose to cooperate with them in research and development. ”

As he spoke, Hiroshi Oshima stretched out his hand and said to Ishihara, "You have seen the results of this cooperation. That is the 'Tiger Shark fighter' that raged in the skies over Annam, Shanghai and other places. Due to the accumulation of technology they received from the Germans, the Wehrmacht began to gradually develop and improve these weapons and equipment on their own. ”

"This unit has never stopped learning, on the one hand, they continue to take advantage of the large-scale unemployment caused by the economic crisis in Europe and the United States and other countries to absorb a large number of technical personnel, on the other hand, they are constantly training their own technical personnel, engineers and scientists."

"It is precisely under this continuous absorption, accumulation and digestion that a large number of new weapons and equipment of the Wehrmacht are available to them." After a pause, Hiroshi Oshima sighed, "The most serious thing is not this problem. Do you know the communication radio?! ”

Ishihara was a little inexplicable, and as a soldier, of course he knew.

"Ishihara-kun, I'm not talking about telegraphs, but radios that communicate directly with dialogue." Hiroshi Oshima emphasized: "I know, our empire is also researching. But until now it has not been able to be applied to actual combat, although the Zero and Type 1 fighters are equipped with radios, but the communication effect is not even as good as the flag language......"

Ishihara was embarrassed, he knew about the situation. In many cases, the pilots on the fighter planes were even extremely disgusted with this useless communicator, and directly dismantled the matter.

Even now, when the Japanese fighters are attacking, they only rely on personal skills and tacit understanding to fight. The only communication is the pilot's gestures.

The tanks were similar, the communicators weren't installed before. It wasn't until the Japanese were beaten by the Wehrmacht, and after capturing several broken tanks at great cost, that they discovered the broken radio communication device inside.

Later, the Japanese army installed these radios, but unfortunately, they were installed like airplanes but often failed. As a result, the Japanese army was forced to use the original flag language to command the tank units in the end.

The battlefield was full of dust and smoke, and the consequences of commanding with the flag language could be imagined. Once the tank units of the Japanese army fought, they all relied on their personal skills to run around.

However, Dayinggen did not let people improve the radio, which led to the fact that the radio system of the Japanese fighters and tanks was still a mess even if it was revised.

"I think the biggest problem here is that the battalion has not kept up with the thinking of the new era of war. For example, the use of radio in warfare, automatic and semi-automatic weapons, and new equipment are emphasized...... And so on, without putting in the power that should be invested......"

Hiroshi Oshima looked at Ishihara and said in a deep voice, "This is my summary of the reasons for our defeat on the battlefield in China......

Ishihara was silent, and after a while, he stood up and gave a military salute to Oshima Hiroshi: "Please rest assured, Oshima-kun, this time I will carefully observe the situation of the German army." Strive for the future of our Imperial Army......"

Hiroshi Oshima looked at Ishihara with a wry smile and sighed, "I hope ...... We'll still be able to finish our update before the war ends, otherwise I won't see any hope of victory in this war......"

ps: I'm busy in the shop, come back and make up the chapters.