Reborn South Africa as a police officer

Chapter 914 Encounter

The 11nd Los Angeles Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade of the [-]th Division was also in the sequence of the attacking troops. Half an hour after the combat order was issued, Sergeant Ruiz and Corporal Wilson were ready to fight.

"Don't bring a backpack, it will affect your actions. Throw away all the extra things, and take your pistol and sapper shovel. When fighting hand-to-hand, pistols and sapper shovels are more useful than bayonets. You should prepare a few more magazines. If it is not enough, go to the quartermaster and close the safety. If the action fails due to a fire accident, you can kill yourself directly. Hang the grenade on your chest. Remember to throw it when I tell you to throw it. Hold on to me and Corporal Wilson, remember what the instructor taught you on the training ground, save your life, and you will be a veteran when the battle is over—” Ruiz carefully told Private Tommy before departure, Tommy obviously A little nervous, he held the bayonet-loaded rifle in one hand, and the engineer shovel in the other, with the pistol in the holster on his chest.

Like everyone else, Tommy is also covered with a white sheet, which will make it harder to be found in the dense fog. The 11th Division will set off at 05:30 in the morning, arrive at the combat position before [-] o'clock, and start on time at [-] o'clock attack.

"Drink this. Before you drink it, you are from southern Africa. After you drink it, southern Africa is yours—" Corporal Wilson handed the vodka to Tommy, and Tommy drank it without saying a word.

Unlike Ruiz and Tommy's Lee Enfield, Wilson is equipped with a BAR jointly designed by the Nyasaran Military Industry Group and Browning.

The full name of BAR is "Browning Automatic Rifle", which is the first individual automatic weapon determined by the Ministry of National Defense of Southern Africa. 30 kg, although it is much heavier than Lee Enfield, which weighs less than 6.5 kg, it has more violent firepower and is quite reliable. No matter what the weather is, it rarely breaks down, so the southern African army is equipped with a large number of The BAR can be used as squad firepower in extreme cases.

At 05:30, there were no military posts and no military drums. The officers and soldiers left the battlefield in a file and marched towards the opposite German position.

The battle group Tommy was in was the vanguard of the [-]nd Infantry Regiment in Los Angeles. Wilson slowly moved forward in small steps and was at the forefront of the entire team. Ruiz and Tommy followed Wilson to form protection. Although the safety of the rifle was not turned on, the bayonets were already fitted.

The fog was getting thicker and thicker, and the line of sight was only two or three meters at most, and nothing could be seen clearly beyond two or three meters. Not long after Wilson left the position, he suddenly heard movement in the thick fog on the opposite side, maybe someone stepped on the ground Dead branches, making the sound of dead branches snapping.

Then Wilson heard a deliberately suppressed scolding sound.

German!

When he heard this German sentence, Wilson instantly felt his hair stand on end, and a feeling similar to an electric current passed from the spine to the back of the head.

After all, he was a veteran. Wilson didn't speak, and leaned his back against Ruiz, then half-kneeled on the ground and leveled the automatic rifle in his hand, with his fingers on the safety pin, and it could be opened with just a push.

Ruiz directly put down the rifle in his hand, and while pulling out the pistol, he pulled out the engineer shovel with his backhand.

Tommy silently took out a grenade.

Almost suddenly, a German soldier with a pointed helmet and frost on his eyebrows and beard appeared in front of Wilson.

The distance was only two or three meters, and the German soldiers probably didn't expect to bump into Wilson. For a moment, their pupils dilated, and their mouths grew too big to howl, so they straightened their bayonets and stabbed forward.

Bah!

Ruiz fired first, and Wilson opened the safety while yelling "enemy attack" before pulling the trigger.

While Wilson was shooting, Ruiz also fired one after another. The target was not the soldiers opposite Wilson, but a dense fog of nothingness in front of him.

The grenade in Tommy's hand was finally thrown out, don't care if it can blow up people, just throw it to the opposite side.

Almost instantly, the originally silent winter night suddenly burst into loud gunshots, explosions, shouts, and howls like hell.

Wilson emptied the magazine in his automatic rifle and put on his gas mask first.

Although smokeless gunpowder is smokeless in name, there will still be gunpowder smoke when it is fired. In a foggy environment, the gunpowder smoke cannot be dispersed in time, and the smell can choke people to death. Wilson clearly heard the dense fog in front of him. Some of them were coughing violently.

"Charge, charge, charge with all your strength—" the officers made a decisive decision. Unlike the African Division, which rarely participated in the offensive, the 11th Division was composed entirely of junior soldiers, and the officers had to follow the troops when fighting.

Wilson didn't speak. After replacing the new magazine, he didn't rush to charge. He emptied three magazines in a row before walking forward. Whenever he saw a German corpse along the way, no matter whether he was dead or not, he didn't forget to fill it up. gun.

This job was quickly taken over by Tommy and Ruiz. It was more convenient to use a bayonet for repairing the gun, and the bullets had to be saved for the living German soldiers.

The position between the two armies is actually only two to three hundred meters away. If you sprint with all your strength, you can rush across it in one minute.

There will definitely not be a full sprint on the battlefield. The advancing ground is covered with the dead bodies of German soldiers. Many German soldiers are still alive and moaning in pain. When someone passes by, the tenacious German soldiers will pull the grenade on their bodies and explode. The sound came and went, and the attacking troops also suffered heavy casualties.

When we reached the German position 50 meters away, we could vaguely see the bonfire burning in front of the German position.

At this time, there is no need for the officer to remind, all the soldiers took out the grenades, shouted one, two, three and moved forward at the same time, and the real sprint was only after two rounds.

The German army, who also wanted to sneak attack on the expeditionary army's position, had already made defensive preparations. The Maxim heavy machine gun was still very powerful in frontal defense. The first batch of expeditionary army soldiers who rushed out of the dense fog were knocked down one after another, but the follow-up The soldiers of the expeditionary army were desperate, and the heavy machine guns were immediately bombarded by grenades. Countless soldiers with engineering shovels and pistols jumped into the German trenches one after another, and the battle fell into brutal hand-to-hand combat.

Wilson's automatic rifle also lost its function at this time. After the last magazine was emptied, Wilson smashed the automatic rifle in his hand at a bearded German soldier——

The bearded German soldier refused to give way, let the automatic rifle hit his body, and at the same time straightened his Mauser rifle and stabbed at Wilson who was drawing his pistol——

Bah!

Ruiz knocked down the bearded soldier with one shot, and Tommy howled and stabbed the bearded soldier's bayonet into the bearded soldier's chest.

It was only then that Tommy understood why the instructor used the sound of "huh" when describing the bayonet stabbing into the body.

The human body, especially the important chest, is protected by the sternum on the periphery.

When the bayonet stabs into the human body, the blade will scrape across the sternum, and at this time it will make a sound like "ho, ho" instead of the "poof, poof, poof" chopping pork.

The bearded soldier was tenacious, clutching Tommy's rifle as he died.

Tommy tugged, but couldn't move at all.

"Throw away the rifle, take out your pistol and engineer shovel—" Ruiz kicked the bearded German soldier's body down while not forgetting to remind Tommy.

Only then did Tommy notice that there was an edelweiss flower on the collar of the bearded soldier.

At this time, the edelweiss was not a symbol of mountain infantry, but it was already a symbol of bravery. Only the bravest warriors were eligible to wear an edelweiss on their collar after crossing the Alps.

Under normal circumstances, the battle loss ratio of hand-to-hand combat is basically around 1:1, and the Southern African Expeditionary Force has a big advantage in equipment, so the battle loss ratio with the German army is about 1:3.

But even so, the casualties of the Second Cavalry Division and the 11th Division still made Rock unacceptable.

"The encounter was too sudden. I didn't expect the German army to take advantage of the fog to attack. Among the attacking German troops was the most elite Prussian Guard Regiment. The commander should be Prince Eitel of Prussia who performed well in the Battle of the Marne. Friedrich, from now on there is no such thing as the Prussian First Guard Regiment—" Paul Cocker had an ugly expression, but his voice remained firm.

Although it was unexpected that the troops suffered heavy losses, if Roque hadn't ordered the attack and the troops guarding the position were attacked by the most elite troops of the German army unprepared, the casualties would have been even more severe, and the entire front might have collapsed.

The German army invested two armies in this attack. Except for the most elite Prussian First Guard Regiment, the other troops had just finished training in Germany and only reinforced the Western Front after the New Year.

"How many casualties do we have?" Rock didn't care about the Prussian First Guard Regiment, only the casualties of the troops.

"We dispatched a total of six divisions with 900 casualties, including 11 casualties and 700 casualties in the Second Cavalry Division, and [-] casualties and [-] casualties in the [-]th Division—" Paul Kerr Kerr knew what Rock was concerned about, and it was acceptable for the troops to have casualties. Both Paul Coker and Rock were mentally prepared, but with such a large casualty ratio, Paul Coker truly realized the cruelty of the world war .

"How is the progress of the troops?" At this time, Roque understood the feeling of Joffre and Frenzi reading the battle report. When he first arrived in France, Roque would feel heartbroken when he read the battle report. Now it is much better, maybe for the generals It is said that the casualties of the troops are just cold numbers on the battle report.

Like the weather outside.

"We completely defeated the enemy, wiped out at least three divisions of the German army, including the most elite Prussian 7st Guards Regiment, the German army suffered more than 11 casualties, and we captured nearly 11 prisoners. In statistics, the [-]nd Cavalry Division and the [-]th Division are still attacking, the [-]th Division has already attacked Ghent, the German army in the north of Ypres is retreating, the Belgian army and the troops of Marshal Frenzi are also attacking—”Paul Coker finally showed a smile on his face. Although the troops suffered heavy casualties, the results were equally brilliant.

Ghent is nearly 60 kilometers from Ypres.

In the New Year's offensive organized by Joffre and Frenzi, the British and French allied forces had 17 casualties before advancing the front 500 yards.

(End of this chapter)