Warhammer: Hail to the Void Lords!

This was Horatio's first land battle training. Without Sir Wellesley and his lieutenant colonel team,

he was the highest authorized commander in this area.

Everyone was waiting for his order.

The defense line near the airport was planned by Horatio according to the land battle manual given to him by Sir Wellesley, combined with the knowledge learned from the modern army combat manual read in the warship library during his long life at sea in his previous life.

As a time traveler, Horatio knew very well from the beginning of coming to this world that the Imperial Navy could not win independently on the front line, especially now that it was at the end of the 41st millennium.

He wanted to be a generalist like Macharius, although he dared not say that he could definitely save the empire. At least, he wanted to keep everything he loved before the end of the world.

He let out a long breath, looked at the war sand table for a while, and raised his finger to click.

Unlike the traditional Star Army who likes to fill the line with human waves, Horatio used the wisdom of his ancestors to plan the battle line and combat tasks for the light infantry, and at the same time used the "modern mechanized corps" combat theory of his time to arrange a mechanized mobile defense reserve.

He used the war sand table to set up a forward observation command post, which was selected as the basic command post of the base camp at the Fortress Defense Group Command Post on Mount Montachia, and the rear command post was located in the airport tower war room.

There were more than a dozen lieutenants belonging to the Star Army, and even a major was dispatched by him to different command posts.

Based on the major battalion commander, he established his own combat staff team at the base.

Although Horatio seemed to be only a naval captain, in terms of rank, he was a serious imperial Commissioned civil servants, rather than local civil servants appointed by the Military Affairs Department of the Conscription World like the Astra Militarum lieutenants.

Navy captains are higher than their Astra Militarum colleagues in the rank list, roughly between the Astra Militarum lieutenant colonel and the Astra Militarum major.

In terms of the battle line, he preset a battle depth of 15 kilometers.

The first 5 kilometers are mobile harassment positions, where skirmishers conduct reconnaissance and harassment of the enemy and provide reference for artillery fire points.

The front line is 10 kilometers away from the airport, based on three trench lines dug by the Astra Militarum this morning. The jungle and slopes next to it were sent by Horatio to the heavy weapons group, where they will use sandbags and fast-building ceramic steel bunkers to build defense-counterattack positions.

Then, he began to set up the company and battalion battle line.

A large Astra Militarum company of more than a thousand people, Horatio Lei Xiao did not intend to use them as a real "company".

Instead, he planned to use them as a "battalion" that could fight independently, a battalion of the ancient Terra Blue Star standard, to lay out the battle line.

In principle, the basic command post should not interfere with the site selection and construction of squad-level fortifications. This task is usually arranged by the front-line observation command post because they know the terrain of the front-line positions best.

But Horatio, who has the command hand and the war sand table, can see the terrain ahead even more clearly than the front-line command post. This tactical artifact of looking down from a high place and being able to adjust and zoom at will and compare the shooting range allows him to inspect whether the place is suitable for building the corresponding defensive position without going to the site in person.

He first set up a combat alert position in front of the first position. This is a salient located in front of all defense lines, used to warn and alert the enemy The movement of the attacking forces.

They are a ripple for the entire front. Once they open fire, all the troops in the subsequent battle depth will move like gears.

For the Astra Militarum, the combat alert position is usually abandoned, because it is very difficult to evacuate this position. There is often a rather empty "no man's land" between them and the main position. A rash attack is equivalent to giving up the advantages of fortifications and falling into the field battle stage that the attacker likes most. Therefore, the Astra Militarum vehicles can only watch them being surrounded and annihilated without fast maneuvering vehicles.

But with limited resources and manpower, Horatio does not intend to waste these manpower. There are enough Avirus landing crafts at the airport to carry members. Anyway, there is no need to transport supplies and no need to break through the atmosphere. After removing unnecessary loads, as a classic horse of the Imperial Navy, it is still no problem to squeeze more than 50 people in it.

Then, according to the actual terrain and the mobile-position defense doctrine, fake positions, squad-level fire support points built on tank pits, mortar positions, and logistics support positions are all available.

5 kilometers away from the airport is the second line of defense, which consists of four trenches spanning 3 kilometers.

Compared with the first line of defense, the defense network here has reserved many preset positions.

The combat mission of the first line of defense is mainly to rely on heavy weapons and artillery firepower to attack the enemy and defeat the enemy's first wave of offensive momentum.

The expected engagement distance is 800-3000 meters.

He did not think that the first line of defense could stop such a fierce enemy, so each line of defense reserved a transportation hub for retreat, which could help the Star Army troops withdrawing from the front to quickly retreat to the second line of defense with heavy weapons, and transfer to the preset positions to block the enemy.

Once the enemy approaches within 500 meters of the first line, the mechanized infantry will rely on the tank vehicle defense support points located in the tank pit to cover the heavy weapons and retreat.

Then the infantry and tanks will alternately cover each other, gradually moving from the first trench to the second trench, and burying traps and mines in the first trench and the communication trench.

When they moved the three trenches, Horatio expected that the heavy weapons on the first line of defense had almost all been moved to the rear along the traffic line.

The mechanized infantry would abandon their positions, all board the vehicles, and let the Chimera vehicles drive in reverse to cover the rear.

As the order was issued, everyone saw their own psychic beacons in front of them with their naked eyes. Each unit would only see their own combat mission beacons, so they would not be confused with the beacons of other units.

On the war sand table, all units began to move in an orderly manner like ants.

Amid the panic-stricken and piercing alarms, the British line soldiers took up their rifles, jumped off the military trucks, and then straightened their hats, just as they had rehearsed thousands of times in training, and rushed to their respective positions.

"Anti-tank guns in place!"

"Automatic guns in place!"

"Laser guns in place!"

"Heavy bombs in place!"

"Firing positions are being built urgently!"

"Laying mines and pulling barbed wire!"

Next, he began to build a wired communication network for company and battalion defense.

Wireless communication is an extremely unstable factor in war. It is easily interfered with and even more easily eavesdropped on. Therefore, wired communication is still not outdated on the battlefield of the 40,000th year.

The messenger rode a tricycle and led the engineers to lay cables on the triple defense line. All the cables were hidden in areas that were not easily blown off.

As a time traveler, Horatio had a rough idea of ​​the troops owned by the greenskins, as well as their equipment and weaknesses.

Considering that there might be jumping storm boys carrying rockets among these greenskins.

These bold, violent, and fearless greenskin boys often use homemade jumping rockets to jump thousands of meters, and then fly to the rear of the battle line to cause huge chaos and sneak attack the defense positions.

In order to deal with this possible threat, Horatio used the anti-air assault and anti-airborne tactical theories of Blue Star in his previous life as a reference.

Hydra self-propelled anti-aircraft guns and mobile reconnaissance teams of anti-airborne troops were deployed between the defense lines.

These troops consisted of wheeled light reconnaissance vehicles and motorcycle teams of reconnaissance companies. Although their firepower was a little poor in anti-armor, it was enough to deal with the threats of those Storm Boy infantry-level.

"Sir, the fake positions used to deceive the rebels have been built." The front-line observation command post sent a message.

"Very good, how long will it take for the rebels and greenskins to enter the front harassment line?"

"At most 10 minutes, sir, the rebels' flank troops and the greenskins have already decided the outcome, and the greenskins have won."

"Understood."

Horatio inferred from the report of the observation post that the greenskins should attack from the right and front, while the rebels,

would attack from the left wing after the remnants joined the main force.

With this information, he quickly made a judgment and increased the proportion of fake positions on the left wing, making the rebels mistakenly believe that the Astra Militarum Army deployed its main force on the left defense line.

"How long will it take for the follow-up reinforcements to pass through the Montachia Pass?" Horatio asked the major of the sub-battalion.

"The first batch of reinforcements will arrive in 45 minutes, sir, but they are used to support the front line of the First Brigade."

"I will make a decision based on the situation. If the defensive situation is more severe than I expected, this reserve will have to be requisitioned. Later, the Avirus transport aircraft will be used to transport personnel and supplies to the front of the First Brigade."

"Yes, sir—————." Seeing that the naval officer was so strong, the major of the sub-battalion had to obey his wishes.

I thought that I could show my skills and make a wave of military merits when I met an outsider, and see if I could be promoted to a lieutenant colonel battalion commander when I was awarded honors after the war.

Now it's good, how come this naval officer seems to know more about land warfare than those senior lieutenant colonels of the Astra Militarum Army? He doesn't look like a novice at all.

The major of the battalion couldn't find any fault with the layout of the defense line on the war sand table. Each one was recorded in the Astra Militarum manual, and the layout of this naval officer even looked more advanced.

Horatio certainly knew that his tactics and strategy were more advanced.

Are the tactics of 20XX not more advanced than the Astra Militarum manual that is comparable to the First World War?

The Astra Militarum didn't have much air power, so it was understandable that they fought like the First World War.

Now that he had both air and ground power, if he still followed the old-fashioned tactics of the First World War, wouldn't it be a waste for him, as a time traveler, to read so many books in the military academy library?

"Sir, the enemy is approaching the 15-kilometer outer harassment zone."

The officer in charge of observation reported.

Horatio immediately stepped forward quickly, opened his monocular and looked forward.

As an advanced observation tool that can help the navy to fight against artillery at hundreds of kilometers, with a built-in micro-thinker array, he felt that this thing was better than the artillery telescope.

As expected, the scene in the mirror showed that the vast sea of ​​greenskins had already rushed over with a ferocious war roar, and the ugly graffiti faces on the tall killing jars seemed to be shouting at him.

Even on the mountain, he seemed to feel the ground shaking.

"Let the blocking troops start the action according to the plan, and the artillery positions start calibrating the parameters in advance." Horatio raised the telescope to observe and calmly issued the combat order.

"Yes!"