The Rise of the Third Reich

"Boom, boom, boom..."

When bursts of violent explosions came, Lieutenant General Joseph Collins, commander of the 6th U.S. Army and commander of the ground forces on Newfoundland, was watching the battle at the "Churchill" Naval Fortress near the port of St. John (the capital of Newfoundland). .

St. John is the largest city on the island of Newfoundland and an excellent ice-free port. It is located on the north shore of the Bay of Fundy and the mouth of the St. John's River on the Avalon Peninsula. The population is not large, only tens of thousands.

Although the geographical location here is not the core of Newfoundland, but is located in a corner, at the eastern end of the Avalon Peninsula, it has the best port on Newfoundland, so it naturally becomes the top priority of defense. Heavy.

Since the "fall" of the British mainland in 1943, the US Army Corps of Engineers has been continuously constructing in St. John's and its surrounding areas, building the largest "Stilwell Military Airport" on Newfoundland (to commemorate the United States who defended England). Freedom fighter Lieutenant General Stilwell) and "Churchill's Naval Fortress" (in memory of the great anti-Nazi fighter Churchill).

The former is currently being attacked by hundreds of Me264 bombers, and the latter is the core of the US military's defense on Newfoundland and the headquarters of Lieutenant General Collins. At this moment, he was standing at the observation port of a glasses fort in the "Churchill" Naval Fortress to watch the air raid.

The situation was dire and beyond Lieutenant General Collins' expectations. The Germans actually used dozens or hundreds of missiles that could be remotely controlled (TV-guided to be precise) and fired from the sky over Concepcion Bay, 15,000 meters away from the Stilwell Military Airport. This distance completely exceeds the maximum range of the 127mm anti-aircraft gun deployed at Stilwell Military Airport. So now the Americans can only watch as missiles land accurately on the airport runway and explode into big craters.

Oh, and it’s not completely blind. The anti-aircraft guns and anti-aircraft machine guns on the airport can also attack the missile itself. However, the effect of the attack was not good, not many were hit, and most of the missiles seemed to hit the target. But such results are actually not very interesting, because the big holes on the airport runway are not difficult to repair. The Americans have long been prepared. Each airport's emergency repair team has a lot of mechanized equipment, and the speed of filling holes is very fast.

"It seems... Stilwell Airport will be paralyzed for a day or two!" Vice Admiral Bruce Austin Fraser, commander of Churchill Naval Fortress and commander of the Newfoundland Fleet of the Royal Navy of the United Kingdom (Canada), also spoke with Lieutenant General Collins stood watching the battle, muttering and shaking his head, his face looking very ugly.

The reason that made him depressed was not just the somewhat confusing battle situation on Newfoundland, but the news coming from Labrador - the enemy landing under the banner of the Royal Army! And he also claimed that he came to liberate Canada...

"Are the other airports in Newfoundland now the same as Stilwell Military Airport?" Vice Admiral Fraser put down his telescope, shook his head and said to Collins, "Joseph, are the Germans really going to attack Newfoundland?" Log in?"

"Maybe." Collins paused and frowned, "But it doesn't matter. The defense of Newfoundland is strong enough. If they want to land, they will definitely suffer heavy losses! And... the F-13s of the Navy's First Fleet are also No new landing fleet has been found within 500 nautical miles of Newfoundland. Have you discovered anything?”

"Neither did we..." Vice Admiral Fraser shook his head. "Except for the 10,000 or 20,000 Germans who landed in Labrador, there is not a single German ground force officer or soldier near Newfoundland."

Lieutenant General Collins shrugged and frowned: "So what if tens of thousands of people want to land? We have more than 200,000 people, and there are also 50,000 people from 3 airborne divisions (belonging to the 18th Airborne Army) Multiple people can be airdropped to Newfoundland at any time. The inventory of weapons, ammunition and other supplies on the island is enough to support 300,000 troops for six months. The terrain of Newfoundland is so dangerous that it is impossible for the Germans to succeed."

Newfoundland is completely different from Trinidad. The latter has flat beaches and the island is also flat. There are terraces everywhere on Newfoundland, and the most common ones on the coast are cliffs tens of meters high. There is such terrain all around Port Josef, there is not even a beach! As long as there are a few regiments stationed on the cliff, the German army of 1 million cannot get ashore.

But why do the Germans spend so much money to bomb the airport with expensive guided munitions? Don’t they know that American engineers who have a large number of construction machinery are very good at filling holes?

"Could it be airborne?" Vice Admiral Fraser was still worried. "The Germans are best at sneak attacks with airborne troops."

The British Vice Admiral was actually fooled, but it was of no use because he himself did not quite believe in this judgment.

"Unlikely..." Collins looked confused, "Our troops have been on the highest level of alert for a long time. How could they be defeated by airborne troops without heavy equipment? And we also have two to three thousand tanks/tank destroyers. , Can the German airborne troops defeat so many tanks? "

When the two people were discussing the situation of the war, there were no longer continuous explosions coming from the direction of Stilwell Military Airport. The missile attack finally ended, and the Me264s in the sky and the Fokker 636s that escorted them also flew away. Lieutenant General Collins and Lieutenant General Fraser also finished observing the battle and returned to the headquarters located at the core of the "Churchill Naval Fortress" along the completely hidden underground passage.

The "Churchill Naval Fortress" was built on a cliff several tens of meters high, and is divided into two parts: above ground and underground.

The above ground part mainly consists of concrete turrets and armored turrets for coastal defense artillery (respectively equipped with 3-cannon and 406mm naval guns), as well as various light artillery, anti-aircraft guns and machine gun firepower bases, and a glasses fort for observation.

The underground of the fortress, that is, various facilities built inside the terrace several tens of meters high (a large area of ​​the terrace is hollowed out), include storage warehouses for weapons and ammunition, long and winding underground passages, shelters that can withstand the attack of 460mm caliber heavy artillery and death missiles, and the core command center located in the strongest part of the fortress, which can maintain contact with all Allied forces on Newfoundland Island through wired and wireless communication.

As soon as they returned to the extremely busy core command center, Lieutenant General Collins and Lieutenant General Fraser received a news that made them feel even more strange.

"Sir, I just received a notification from the Northeast Allied Command in North America that a large group of slow heavy bombers is approaching Newfoundland and is expected to arrive in 7 hours at the earliest."

"A large group of slow heavy bombers?" Lieutenant General Collins was stunned, "Do you know what kind of bombers they are?"

"I don't know." The staff officer shook his head, "I only know that there are a lot of them, and the speed is very slow, only about 300 kilometers per hour."

Collins turned his head and looked at Vice Admiral Fraser of the British Royal Navy, who had served as the Third Sea Lord and Deputy Commander of the Home Fleet and had some research on German aviation weapons.

"Maybe they are transport planes." Fraser frowned, "Maybe the Germans don't have enough long-range heavy bombers, so they converted the heavy transport planes into bombers. Maybe... maybe these planes are carrying paratroopers."

"Paradox?" Lieutenant General Collins was about to ask the staff how many planes there were, but the staff next to him reported a new situation, "Sir, the Northeast Allied Command in North America has issued another notice. A large group of bombers took off from the Azores and flew towards Newfoundland."

What's going on?

Collins and Fraser looked at each other, and Collins said, "Will the Germans send two waves of paratroopers?"

Fraser thought for a moment and said, "A large transport plane can only carry dozens of paratroopers at most. Even if 1,000 transport planes are deployed, there are only 40,000 to 50,000 people, and there is no possibility of any heavy equipment. Because heavy equipment is dropped by gliders, and gliders cannot fly more than 2,000 kilometers."

"If it is really a transport plane," Fraser paused and expressed his judgment, "the target cannot be Newfoundland Island, but should be Saint-Pierre and Miquelon Islands."

"Impossible?" Collins said, "There are 65,000 Free French fighters there, and they are well-equipped and have solid fortifications to rely on. Can tens of thousands of paratroopers defeat them?"

"It's hard to say." Fraser shook his head slowly, "The current French Empire is the second pillar of the European Community, and France's interests are actually reflected. Moreover... the Free French fighters and the supporters of the Pétain government are actually the same kind of people. That General de Gaulle is actually the successor of Pétain and Weygand!"

Vice Admiral Fraser's words are a bit heartbreaking. But in fact, there is nothing wrong, because the backbone of Free France is not the big white left in France - the big white left in France at that time were all kinds of intellectuals who didn't want to fight, and there was no military madman like de Gaulle who wanted to form a mechanized force to raid Germany all day long. So the backbone of Free France was originally a big right-wing who shouted and killed Germany, and they were all "disciples" of people like Pétain and Weygand.

And their disagreement with Pétain, Weygand and others was just whether to admit defeat or not, and there was even a suspicion of betting on both sides!

France now has a high status in the European Community and has secured its second place (in the European system originally led by Britain, France was also second, and it is still second now, but its position is more stable and its security is more guaranteed). It has also gained rich economic benefits and realized its long-cherished wish to fully incorporate French North Africa into the mainland, and its territory has also been greatly expanded.

In this case, is it necessary for the Free French Movement to continue to fight?