Major Zhang Liuji finished arranging the tasks of the second company, and then looked at Wu Peifu and said: "Colonel Wu is still sitting here, but the soldiers of the first brigade must be organized, and after the artillery in the city of the German army is suppressed, except for a few troops, we need to send the main force to the city to fight a harsh street battle with the enemy at one time, which requires close cooperation between infantry and combat vehicles, and also concentrate shotguns, grenades and other weapons......"

"I understand that the troops have also done street fighting training and know how to fight." Wu Peifu replied, "It's just that the German army on the opposite side is said to be a division, and we now have only one brigade in strength, which is half the difference in strength, can we wait until the second brigade of the 33rd Division arrives before starting the attack?" ”

"Can't wait, we have to attack right away!" Zhang Liuji has already struggled with the problem of troops, and if he waits a little longer, maybe the troops will be more sufficient, but the German army is also more fully prepared, and he can now conclude that the German army in Baledik is arranging anti-tank trenches and various anti-tank artillery fortifications, and maybe he is also welcome with cocktail bottles and countless cluster grenades, so the speed must be fast. "Besides, the trucks on your side must be concentrated, and they can only be wheeled, and they must be used to load the infantry to keep up with the chariots."

"I see!" Seeing that Zhang Liuji's determination had been made, Wu Peifu didn't say much, but just wrote down these orders.

"Did you contact the Air Force?" The infantry matter can be less worried about because of Wu Peifu, but Zhang Liuji is very worried about whether the artillery and the air force can cooperate closely, so the next person to ask is Major Tong Wansheng of the self-propelled artillery battalion.

"Got in touch, the nearest airport is in Nancy, and from dawn. They've been flying for more than three hours, and if they really want to attack, I think it's better to wait for them to refuel. Tong Wansheng said.

"What about the second wave? Didn't you say that you would cooperate with us in the whole attack? Major Zhang Liuji asked.

"Presumably the planes of the Germans also came. They're fighting together. Dai Baoshu, a battalion staff officer, said. In fact, the artillerymen wanted planes to be in the air as observation posts, and they did not know much about the specific battles of the air force.

"Then send a telegram to the Air Force. If you want two school artillery planes, Nancy will only be more than 80 kilometers here, and it will take them half an hour to fly over. Major Zhang Liuji suggested, he looked at his watch again, and then said to Major Tong Wansheng of the artillery battalion: "The artillery battalion of the 33rd Division is also under your command, and you will immediately coordinate with them and establish command contact." In addition, we were very short on time, and after the plane arrived, the time for preparing for artillery fire should be set at 15 minutes. After that, the artillery covered the troops with barrage to storm the city of Baledik. ”

Although Major Tong Wansheng felt that fifteen minutes was too short to prepare for artillery fire, the commander set it at fifteen minutes, so he could only shoot as many shells as possible during these fifteen minutes.

After making arrangements for the roundabout flank forces, infantry, artillery, and pre-battle reconnaissance, Major Zhang Liuji looked at his watch again, and then said to everyone: "Please check the table, it is 7:43 and 24 seconds, the artillery should be opened at 8:27, and the attack will begin at 8:43." Prepare your ministries! ”

"Yes, sir!" In the hidden vineyard, several commanders said yes loudly, and then they went back to the troops to arrange the affairs before the attack. After a few people left. Political Commissar Zhang Yannian handed the division commander's telegram to Zhang Liuji, and he said: "The division commander has called and asked us to do it all at once. Capture of Baledik. ”

"Got it." Zhang Liuji didn't know what was going on in the rear, but now he was quite surprised that he could break through the German position so quickly. The division commander, who had been a little hesitant before, was now determined to fight Baledik. "Lao Zhang, you will be in charge of liaising with the division headquarters here." Zhang Liuji glanced at the political commissar. Said.

"Just kidding!" Zhang Yannian immediately rejected his suggestion, "Although I am a political work officer, my car is still a chariot and not a carriage, what are you asking me to stay behind for, watching you sing?" In the future, I, who watched the play, will do ideological work with my comrades, and everyone will still look up to me? ”

"Brother Yannian, this battle is not trivial, although we have attacked the position of a division during training, but this time we have to fight a division stationed in a city, or a regular German division, which is different from the past." Zhang Liuji looked at his own family and was a little helpless.

"What about regular teachers?" Zhang Yannian asked rhetorically in a loud voice, "No matter how regular it is, it is also an infantry division, as long as his artillery is suppressed, then he can only watch us charge helplessly, we can just press over without firing the cannon when the time comes!" Speaking of this, he looked at Dai Baoshu, the battalion staff officer next to him, "Isn't this the reason?" ”

The argument between the battalion commander and the political commissar is not easy for the staff officer to answer, especially at this time when the eyes of the battalion commander and the political commissar are looking over. Although Dai Baoshu did not help, at Zhang Yannian's insistence, Zhang Liuji could only order the guard platoon to send two chariots to escort Zhang Yannian, and as for what would happen on the battlefield, he didn't know the result.

When the troops deployed artillery and liaised with the air force, the armored battalions and the brigade of the 33rd Division were all nervously making the final preparations before the attack. Of the fifty-nine tanks that could still fight after the emergency repair, the remaining fifty-three were to attack the German defense line on the outskirts of Baledik in a wild goose formation, excluding the six sent to the northeast. Twenty wolf chariots, including the battalion commander's command vehicle, were at the forefront, under the personal command of Major Zhang Liuji, who would be responsible for cutting through the German defense line and attacking the city; The remaining thirty-three jackal light chariots followed, commanded by Captain Song Desheng, the commander of the third company, and were tasked with being a wolf-style supplement, but if they saw an opportunity, they could also use their speed advantage to do a flank attack;

The chariot queue was followed by trucks and infantry, thirty four-wheel drive trucks from the motorized infantry battalion, and more than a dozen trucks of the 331st Brigade pulling baggage, who would follow the chariots to assault together, so as to transport the infantry closer to the city, so as to speed up the attack and reduce the German defense time. Not to mention the motorized infantry battalion, as far as the 331 Brigade is concerned, excluding the 500-odd men of an infantry battalion as a reserve, and excluding the battalion taken away by the second company that detoured to the northeast, the remaining strength of the 331 Brigade still has one regiment and one battalion, a total of more than 2,500 combatants, and more than 40 trucks can only carry more than 1,000 people. The remaining nearly a thousand men will follow the chariot at the speed of a rapid march......

Major Zhang Liuji imagined the scene of nearly 1,000 people running towards Baledik, and felt that this was very unreliable. If the artillery fire in the city was not completely suppressed, they would have suffered heavy losses in this charge. What artillery and how many troops are there in the city? Is the establishment of the 86th Division completely complete? Is the will to defend this place resolute or not? When will the nearest reinforcements to Baledik arrive? Thinking about these questions, no one can be sure. It wasn't until the reconnaissance platoon that went to reconnoiter came back that Zhang Liuji learned about some of the enemy's situation.

"Probably we didn't expect that we would be able to break through the front line trenches, the roads outside the city were not destroyed, they were very flat, and there were basically no terrain obstacles, which was convenient for our troops to attack." Captain Song Desheng, commander of the third company, knew that for the armored division, the first important thing was the road and terrain, and if the combat vehicles could not be deployed, then no matter how many vehicles were in vain. "The defense is basically a normal trench defense system. That is, relying on the four components of barbed wire, trenches, machine-gun positions, and field artillery, it is not difficult for us to break through. It's just that we can't know how many anti-tank trenches and anti-tank 77-mm field guns there are behind the trenches, and it's even harder to know how many German troops there are in the city. ”

"That's right, here's the problem!" Major Zhang Liuji stood up from the front of the map with his hands on his back. "Although we are not fighting on enemy territory, this is France, and we are not familiar with the place and the language, so if we don't fight here. The devil knows that this place is called Baledik. When he finished speaking, he turned around and said, "That's it, it's a tiger's den." We're going to take a look at it too! ”

"Understood, battalion commander." Song Desheng also knew that the information obtained from the current reconnaissance was extremely limited, especially since the enemy was already stationed here. At the same time, these men were cowered within the barbed wire fence of the trenches, and he must not break into the trenches and catch one or two German prisoners out.

At 8:15. Varsity artillery planes flying from Nancy reached the skies over the battlefield because of the limitations of radio power. These aircraft were only able to communicate with ground artillery regiments at a fairly limited distance. But no matter how limited the distance is, the plane can shuttle back and forth between the shelling target and the artillery regiment, which is just a matter of turning for the pilot.

As soon as the school guns arrived, the howitzers of the self-propelled artillery battalions that had already been deployed began to be test-fired, and the rumbling sound of the guns could still be heard near the armored units hidden in the vineyards, although far away. The sound of the cannon seemed to be an order, and although the time for the general attack had not yet arrived, the commander of the tank, who could not resist it, started the engine early, and the infantry of the motorized infantry battalion and the soldiers of the 331st Brigade also turned over on the tanks and trucks. In order to bring as many people as possible, not only the chariots and truck compartments were crowded, but even the roof of the truck cab and both sides of the doors were also pickpocketed.

Not to mention, the 33rd Division also fought in the Sino-Japanese War, since they are all veterans, they all know that once the offensive begins, whether the enemy's artillery can be suppressed or not, will always carry out covering artillery bombardment on the attacking side, in this case, only by quickly passing through the starting position to the enemy's trench and wedging into the enemy's army, can they be considered safe. So, the probability of survival in the car is the same as in the car and not in the car.

The commander of the chariot and the truck driver had no opinion on the infantry who were trying to squeeze into their own cars, and they also wanted more infantry to move forward with the convoy, so they moved and crowded, and each truck actually squeezed more than 50 people, and each truck also carried 10 people, just like that, plus the motorized infantry battalion, more than 2,800 people all got on the car, Wu Peifu, who had never seen this kind of scene, was secretly speechless about this, and Major Zhang Liuji was not surprised by this, he originally wanted to stuff all the more than 2,000 infantry into the car, but he didn't expect to wait for his own order, The infantrymen did it themselves.

At 8:415 a.m., the major who had had breakfast came out of the temporary camp, glanced at the convoy that overwhelmed most of the vineyards, and then calmly walked to the No. 065 command vehicle in the lead position of the wild goose parade amid the roar of an engine; At 8:42, standing in the commander's position, half of his body stretched out of the turret cover, he waved his hand forward, and the body of car 065 shook, and the idler instantly overwhelmed the grape trellis and rushed forward.

Although Baledique belongs to Lorraine, it is just a river away from the Champagne region, and its wines are as famous as Bordeaux and Burgundy. In this famous wine region, there are very large vineyards on both sides of the Ornan River Valley, and now armoured troops are galloping through the vineyards, and the grapes are overwhelmed by tracks and vehicles. But this good thing did not last long, and the Germans stationed in Baledik also knew what kind of hidden dangers the vast vineyards would bring to the defense, so just as the Russians had cleared the sorghum fields in the northeast twelve years earlier, all the vineyards within three kilometers of the city were torn down by the Germans. Within two hundred meters of the armoured troops, the vineyards came to an end, and in front of everyone was a small European city with white roofs and gray walls.

Churches, castles, bell towers, and Western-style buildings built with the undulations of the mountains all allow foreign soldiers from thousands of miles away to experience European style; It's beautiful, but the ugly things are all on the edge of the city, the three-meter-high layers of black barbed wire are like a rope sleeve, densely wrapping the whole city into the pockets of the bandits, although it is under fire at this time, but this makes people unable to see what awaits them behind the barbed wire.

The artillery group behind them, guided by the school gun planes, was suppressing the German artillery in the city, but even so, some shells still hit the assault troops' offensive routes, some of which were only a thick layer of dirt, while others were harvesting human lives and splattering flesh and blood. The distance of three kilometers, excluding the trenches of the German army protruding from the perimeter of the city, the real distance to be assaulted was only a little more than two kilometers, and the chariots advanced at a speed of twenty-five kilometers, which only took five minutes, but these five minutes were difficult.

In addition to dispatching a platoon of troops to attack the German positions from the west side, he also commanded 20 wolf chariots to target the machine gun and artillery positions exposed by the German trenches to carry out targeted killings. Unlike the breakthrough at dawn, the Germans defending this place were indeed ready to meet the steel chariots, but they did not expect the speed of the enemy chariots to be so fast, and the barrage from the rear of the enemy troops was suppressing the infantry in the trenches, only the machine guns and field artillery in the civil fortifications could calmly shoot at these armored monsters that were rolling in dust and blood, and as for the 80 and 60 mortars that were all over the main trenches and could also destroy the chariots, there was no chance to shoot in the artillery fire. (To be continued......)