Gather a large army in the Ardennes, take the national fortune as a bet, and make a throw. The first hurdle to win this gamble is how to distribute the roads and staging areas.

The reason why the Defence Force chose Ardennes as the starting point for the fatal blow was entirely due to the delusion and psychological paralysis that its various inconveniences brought to the opponent. When the enemy is at a loss, the armored forces will take the vanguard and quickly move to the back of the enemy's defense line like lightning to launch a surprise attack, and the subsequent mechanized troops will follow up to complete the encirclement battle - this is the main purpose of the "Yellow Plan".

In other words, the highlight of the "revolving door" – the forced crossing of the Maas from the Ardennes and the capture of the city in one fell swoop – revolves entirely around the rugged terrain of the Ardennes. In the face of the limited number of roads and railways that can be used, how to deploy troops, arrange marching routes, and ensure the rapid passage of troops while ensuring logistical support has become a major prerequisite for the success or failure of the entire operation.

The Ardennes region is densely forested, and the geomorphological characteristics of many hills and rivers make the usable area quite limited, and now more than 100,000 people are crammed into it at once, and it takes a lot of effort just to divide the garrison and arrange food and lodging, and the land for parking and repairing vehicles, ammunition hoarding points, field hospitals, command headquarters, and so on continue to heat up the battle for turf. It is not uncommon for a group of division commanders and regiment commanders to compete for a parking lot or even a public toilet around the map table with their faces blushing and thick necks. The roads were even more miserable, with Army Group B having nearly 50,000 motor vehicles under its jurisdiction, but only four roads were available, each of which could be divided into nearly 400 kilometers of marching columns...... In addition, after the start of the battle, everyone rushed to complete the task within the specified time, but there were only a few roads, and the big guys scrambled to squeeze into it...... It is foreseeable that it will be a tragic traffic jam that will make all the officers and soldiers participating in the war collectively doubt their lives.

So is it a solution to let the fast-moving armored divisions use the passage first, and the relatively slow mechanized infantry divisions follow up? I'm afraid it still won't work, the armored troops can't act alone, even if the Wehrmacht chariots are thick and rough-skinned, and all of them are as strong as solid iron kings. Charlemagne's side is not short of fierce men who come up with explosives bags and cocktails to lash out at the Iron King, no matter how thick your armor is, no matter how powerful the artillery is, the engine compartment will still lie on your stomach. In order to ensure the smooth development of the offensive, the armored units must be accompanied by infantry units to follow up the operation.

Obviously, the Defence Forces needed a well-thought-out and feasible plan for the march so that their painstakingly planned surprise attack would not be stillborn due to traffic jams.

The solution for the Defence Forces was to split one Panzergrenadier Division into battalion-sized units and assign them to the Panzer Division that served as the Assault Vanguard to form battle groups. These Panzergrenadiers did not get out of their vehicles during the rapid march, but sat in their armored vehicles and charged with them, smashing any outlaws who tried to get close to them with dense automatic fire. If you encounter a target that needs to be attacked, you will carry out the strategy according to the step-tan coordination tactics, and never stop after breaking through the target, and continue to move towards the next target. Mechanized infantry divisions followed closely, leaving the occupation and consolidation operations to the motorized infantry units that arrived later.

After arranging the problem of marching, it is necessary to work on the logistical supply.

Unlike the previous Ziegfried Line, which had sent supplies to fixed positions, this time the logistics troops had to keep up with the Scud-like forward troops, delivering all the ammunition, parts, provisions, and equipment they needed to the designated troops, while also leaving a passage for the marching troops.

This is not an easy task, considering that the 1st and 7th Panzer Divisions are mainly equipped with 20-ton light tanks and wheeled armored vehicles to maintain the speed of the assault, while the 3rd Panzer Division and the Panzer Training Regiment are equipped with a large number of "Tiger" and "Panther" and including the attached fire support vehicles such as self-propelled anti-aircraft guns and self-propelled howitzers, these 4 armored units alone need to supply at least 6 caliber shells, 2 machine gun rounds, as well as 9mm pistol rounds (for submachine guns and pistols) and 2 7.92mm rifle rounds (full-power rifle rounds for semi-automatic rifles and intermediate power rounds for assault rifles and carbines). If you include the equipment of the Panzergrenadiers, you add such equipment as explosives, flamethrowers, grenades, iron fists, mortar shells...... And that's just the weapon.

The core of armored forces and mechanized units is motor vehicles, and in order to continue to make rapid breakthroughs in depth, it is necessary not only to ensure the integrity and adequacy of combat vehicles, but also to meet the basic needs of logistics support vehicles. Defence Force motor vehicles do not have to burn oil, which reduces the logistical burden and eliminates the need to spare a special fleet of vehicles to transport fuel and empty oil drums back and forth. However, various spare parts, including Tianjing, are still indispensable, and if timely follow-up and replenishment cannot be realized, it is very likely that a large number of vehicles will break down and lie on the road.

In order to overcome logistical difficulties, in addition to using air transport at any cost to reduce the pressure on land transportation, the Defence Forces have also pooled their wisdom and exhausted all means to overcome logistical difficulties. For example, the units were required to minimize the amount of supplies they received from the supply chain and instead carry as many supplies as possible; all supplies were placed as close to the border as possible so that the troops could be supplied at the offensive initiation stage; all convoys were loaded with various supplies before the campaign began, and departure positions and field maintenance workshops were set up at several transportation hubs after the campaign began; the rate of attrition of the troops was accurately calculated, and such items as ammunition, military rations, First-aid medicines and other supplies are sealed and buried in secret hoarding sites marked on military maps for emergency use. If the breakthrough is successful, the follow-up troops will dig it out for their own use or send it forward to improve efficiency;

In addition, as Roland predicted, all kinds of construction vehicles, temporary prefabricated roads and bridges, and emergency plans were prepared, and in the event of damage to roads and bridges by Charlemagne, the air transport force would immediately airlift prefabricated components to the site, including the engineer battalion if necessary.

Everything was done to ensure the speed of Army Group B's assault, and from the point of view of battle preparation alone, the performance of the defense forces could indeed be called perfect.

Be well prepared;

Avant-garde ideas;

Advanced equipment;

morale is high;

It seems that all the elements for victory are in place, and when the time comes, the huge revolving door will complete the flank maneuver according to the schedule set by the General Staff, creating a miracle in the history of war in one fell swoop.

However, the senior commanders and staff officers sitting in the "Eagle's Nest" all looked solemn.

This is not only the tension before the big war, but also a trace of hidden worry in their eyes.

A pair of worried eyes swirled back and forth between three points on the map.

Thionville;

St. Vitus;

Bastogne;

The ownership of these three places will directly determine whether the revolving door can turn as expected, and it is not an exaggeration to say that the success or failure of the entire "Yellow Plan" depends on whether or not they can be captured.

The line from Thionville to Metz is the axis of the entire revolving door, and at the same time the weak flank of the assault group, if Charlemagne masters Thionville, he can threaten the logistical supply lines of Army Group B at any time, making the torrent of steel unsustainable.

Saint-Vitus and Bastogne are two of the most important transport hubs in the Ardennes, with a population of less than 2,000 people, and the road network that runs around the Schneeivre mountain range intersects and from where the road network spreads in north, south and west directions. Although the breakwater-like Schneeifel mountain range blocks it, the six roads that merge into St. Vitus are not considered to be the main military arteries. However, the occupation of St. Vitus would allow for the security of supply lines in both the north and south directions, and it would also be possible to use the road network in the area to continuously support the main breakthrough from the flanks.

Bastogne's importance is even greater than that of Saint-Vitus. It is an extremely important road junction, with 7 hard-faced roads extending from the town centre square and 2 railways passing through it. In the Ardennes, with its rugged terrain and dense forests, its status as a transportation hub is particularly important. As long as Charlemagne captured the town, they would force the Panzer Teaching Regiment and the 3rd Panzer Division to make a detour towards the Maas River, thus buying Charlemagne extremely valuable time. According to the war games of the General Staff, if the capture of Bastogne fails, the Panzer Teaching Corps and the 3rd Panzer Division will be delayed for at least 3 days. At the same time, the follow-up troops will have to devote their forces to remove this "nail", which will inevitably weaken the combat strength of the front-line troops; and more seriously, the supply channels of the front-line troops will be blocked, the replenishment of materials and personnel will not be able to reach the front quickly, and the wounded and damaged vehicles will not be able to retreat in time. Over time, this effect will become more and more apparent.

If Charlemagne captures Saint-Vitus and Bastogne, the entire Army Group B will be stuck in the road, like a giant python with a nail in its head, and then attack from Thionville, sweeping the unsuspecting logistics line......

No matter how strong the python is and how tenacious its vitality is, after the body is separated, it can only wait for death.

The whole of the Wehrmacht knew this, and Roland, who was familiar with the operational ideas and concepts of the Wehrmacht, would sooner or later find out about it.

Knowing all their own and their opponents' hole cards, both men sat down at the table with all their chips and waited for the opening bid. But just as it is impossible to win a grand slam in the first step in a game of bridge, and it is not a general to play a game of chess, the prologue of a battle often begins with a series of deceptions and confusion. What no one expected was that the way in which the Defence Force, or the dictator, opened the curtain on the first act, would be so ...... "special".