Expedition to Europe

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Fire countermeasures require calculating the approximate position of the enemy's artillery position based on the trajectory of the enemy's shells in a very short time, which requires strong mathematical ability.

As early as the mid-18th century, Griboval, the father of French artillery, founded a special artillery training school, and Napoleon graduated from here. During Napoleon's reign, Napoleon, who came from an artillery background, paid great attention to the training of artillery talents. The French artillery made great progress and became a branch of the army on par with infantry and cavalry.

Compared with infantry and cavalry, artillery is more difficult to train. A qualified artillery commander's attainments in mathematics will not be lower than that of a university lecturer. For this reason, artillery is called "scientist branch" by many people.

Many senior French officers are from the artillery, such as Foch, the commander of the Northern Army Group; Robert Neville, who will soon replace Joseph Joffre as the commander-in-chief of the French Army; and even Joffre himself, the first unit he served in when he entered the army was the artillery.

This reflects the importance the French attach to artillery and the status of artillery in the internal system of the French Army.

In the Battle of Verdun three months ago, the French had repeatedly used firepower to counterattack and knocked out the German artillery positions, thereby effectively protecting their own positions. If it were not for the outstanding performance of the French artillery, the French might not be able to defend Verdun.

Demps Gail is also a professionally trained artillery expert, otherwise he would not have stood out from the talented French artillery and served as the commander of an artillery brigade.

Under Demps Gail's command, the French artillery determined the location of the German artillery positions in a very short time, and then concentrated all the artillery to carry out a covering attack on the German artillery positions.

The effect of the attack was very good. In less than 10 minutes, the German artillery was silent and no longer had the ability to counterattack.

French planes were still circling in the sky, trying to find the remaining German artillery. If found, the observers on the plane would mark the direction and then convey it to the ground artillery units by carrier pigeons. Unless it was a fixed target, the French would not send out bombers. Compared with fighters, bombers were too fragile. The current aircraft engine has only about 150 horsepower. If bombs are installed, it is impossible to install thicker armor.

Aircraft are still in the early stages at this time point. The current aircraft has a speed of about 150 kilometers per hour and a ceiling of only four to five kilometers.

Wars constantly promote the birth of new technologies. The "aircraft shooting coordinator" was first used by the Germans last year. The Fokker fighter equipped with the aircraft shooting coordinator completely controlled the French sky. The Allied pilots did not survive an average of six weeks on the battlefield. From the fall of 1915 to the beginning of 1916, this period was called the "Fokker disaster."

During the war, there were no patents between hostile countries, so the French also installed shooting coordinators on their planes, and the sky was balanced again. Considering the strong production capacity of the Allies, the balance of victory has begun to tilt.

At least in Herbecourt, the sky here belongs to the French.

The ground here belongs to the Foreign Legion under Qin Zhiyuan.

...

Night, Somme River.

The Somme River is not a big river like the Yangtze River and the Yellow River in the usual sense, but a river valley similar to a swamp belt. The river channel is only 20 to 30 meters wide. If it is in summer, you can reach the other side with a dive.

Now it is winter, and although the difficulty of crossing the river is much greater, it also makes the Germans relax their vigilance.

On the north bank of the Somme River, a troop is marching in silence. This troop has about 150 people. They wear M1914 helmets, and the helmets are wrapped with a layer of gray-green cloth. They wear the traditional German iron-gray military uniforms, which are the latest styles just issued this year.

The biggest feature of the M1914 helmet is the gun tip decoration in the center of the top of the helmet, which makes it easy to recognize that it is a German unit, and it is obviously different from the helmets of the French and British.

This unit is the special forces battalion led by Hu Tingfeng and Griff.

The special forces battalion is a code name proposed by Qin Zhiyuan, which means literally, a "unit for special tasks".

This unit is composed of 50 reconnaissance company soldiers led by Hu Tingfeng, 100 soldiers from the second battalion selected by Griff, and ten German-French people. They will undertake the task of infiltrating behind enemy lines.

It has been rainy recently, and there is water everywhere on the ground. The road is muddy and difficult to walk, and flashlights cannot be used for lighting, so the speed of advancement is not very fast.

"Can you arrive at the designated location at the scheduled time?" Griff asked Hu Tingfeng rarely.

The soldiers walked very hard, and some people would slip and fall to the ground, covered with mud and water. Fortunately, the soldiers were very disciplined, and no one complained. Everyone supported each other and moved forward in the dark.

"Almost." Hu Tingfeng looked at the sky and gave an uncertain answer.

It was cloudy and nothing could be seen.

Hu Tingfeng wrinkled his nose and sniffed the air, then suddenly clenched his fists and squatted on the ground.

As if he had received a battle signal, Griff squatted down immediately and reminded the soldiers behind him.

Soon, all the warriors squatted down, like two winding dragons coiled on both sides of the road. The soldiers pointed their guns at the unknown darkness, getting ready for battle and preparing to face possible enemies.

"Secret whistle! At least two people!" Hu Tingfeng pointed to a small forest about forty or fifty meters in front, and whispered in Greif's ear. This was scouted yesterday, and this is also the farthest point that Hu Tingfeng and the others scouted.

Greif nodded, turned around and called a Frenchman over. The two put down their long weapons, each carrying only a pistol and a dagger. Then each took a bottle of brandy, opened it, poured half of the bottle on themselves, and then again After a few sips, they hugged each other and hummed some slang that no one understood, while walking crookedly forward.

our dear ones

This work is compiled and uploaded by Liujiu Book Bar~~

like from ice water

give me this poor samurai

A bright sun

In the end we didn't freeze

Recovering in a hotel

Let our once full wallets

Empty again

…

The Frenchman sang a German mercenary song that was popular in the 16th century, and of course it was sung in German. Greif seemed to have drunk more, and his speech was in tune. He was humming along with the song and swaying forward. Walk.

They didn't go far, and when they were about to reach the small forest, Greif seemed to be in a state of distress, so he unfastened his belt and faced the direction of the Somme River for convenience.

Before the sound of rustling water disappeared, Greif became so drunk that he fell to the ground.

"Ahaha, Bill, you peed on your pants..." The Frenchman laughed loudly, and then came over to pull up Greif.

Drunk people are dead and it is difficult to pull them up alone, let alone a person who is also almost drunk. The Frenchman didn't pull up after a long time, and couldn't help but started muttering: "Damn it, why are you so heavy? Someone help me..."

"Bill, wait for me. I'll go back and ask someone to carry you..." The Frenchman gave up on Greif and stood up to go back and call someone. Unexpectedly, as soon as he turned around, he also fell to the ground. After struggling for a long time, he couldn't. stand up.

"Oh my God, someone help me..." In the darkness, the Frenchman's voice was weak and tragic.

"You deserve it, who made you drink so much!" Anshao finally couldn't help but walked out, wanting to help his compatriots.