Arc of Gunfire

Belka Test Ground No. 2.

The new assault gun had just completed its driving test and stopped directly in front of the emperor and his party.

The officer who personally drove the assault gun climbed out of the hatch, landed lightly, straightened his clothes, and then saluted the emperor: "Your Majesty, the new assault gun performed well. I hope it will be delivered to the soldiers as soon as possible!"

Emperor: "Did it withstand the fire of 100 enemy artillery pieces?"

"Yes, and its walking ability and reliability are currently quite excellent."

It's just that maintenance is too cumbersome, but no one will say this directly in front of the emperor.

"Very good." The emperor nodded, "There are still three to four months before our attack is launched. We must produce them as soon as possible and put them into battle!"

General Moltke frowned: "The assault gun has no turret and is not suitable for offensive operations. When Rokossov used his assault gun, it was all used for defense and rarely used for offense.

"Even if it goes into attack, it will be used as long-range support firepower. The ones in front are still T34 tanks."

The emperor turned and looked at the Director of Armored Forces: "You mean, did I make a mistake in naming a vehicle like the assault gun?"

"Uh, no, there's no such thing."

Emperor: "You just said that Rokossov once used his assault guns in attacks, so we can refer to his tactics."

General Moltke: "This... is difficult, because their assault gun's maneuverability is similar to that of the T34, or even better. And our experimental assault gun..."

Emperor: "I don't understand. The Anters can achieve high defense capabilities with so little weight, why can't we do it?"

At this time, the academician of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, who had been listening nearby, interrupted: "After our calculations, Rokosov's new heavy tank should be sixty tons, which is similar to our new tank."

(Actually, it is a forty-ton class.)

Emperor: "But his new tank is already galloping on the battlefield, and it has left a psychological shadow on our soldiers! This is supposed to be the effect of our Panzer 6 tank on the battlefield! It should make Ant's soldiers fear us. Panzer VI, as fearful as our Reich itself!

"Now it is our soldiers, the creation of Ant who is not strong in fear technology! You should be ashamed! Everyone in the Imperial Academy of Sciences and the Imperial Design Institute should be ashamed!"

The academician nodded repeatedly.

At this time, Air Marshal Grand Duke Meyer said: "The Air Force's new fighter jets have recently begun to equip the troops, which can ensure that we completely gain air supremacy."

The emperor frowned slightly: "Have the troops been equipped? When I reported the progress last time, didn't I say that the first flight would not be until April?"

"Well, it's not a jet. It's the Tower 152 fighter jet that we improved on the Focke-Wulf 190. Its performance is higher than the 190, especially at high altitudes..."

As soon as he finished speaking, the air defense siren sounded.

The emperor frowned: "Air raids during the day? Don't the rats of the Royal Air Force only dare to attack the empire's cities at night?"

Before he finished speaking, the messenger from the test site rode a motorcycle and rushed to the emperor. After getting off the car, he saluted: "Report! Multiple observation posts and radar stations in the empire have discovered a large fleet of aircraft, which is rushing toward the interior of the empire."

Grand Duke Meyer was sweating: "This has never happened before, but I have deployed enough fighter wings to control the air. They will never succeed!"

The Army generals all looked askance at the obese former ace (Marshal Meyer was a former ace).

Suddenly, anti-aircraft guns near the testing site opened fire.

The emperor, the generals and scientists turned their heads to look in the direction of the air defense position, and then looked up together.

The first batch of shells had exploded into black clumps in the sky. Judging from the size of the clumps, the explosion height was very high.

Then countless white lines appeared, and it took the emperor a second to realize that they were the track clouds of airplanes flying at high altitudes.

The white lines are obviously distributed at three to four different heights, densely stacked together.

Giles: "This flight direction is Prosonia, they are going to bomb the capital!"

Grand Duke Meyer wiped his sweat with a handkerchief and said: "We saw more than 300 aircraft alone. How can such a large fleet be possible! Didn't Rabelais report that there were only 1,000 heavy bombers in the United States? This Dispatching one-third at once?”

Emperor: "Let all citizens of Germania enter the air raid shelters. My Air Force Commander, where is your interception?"

"There!" shouted the adjutant of an unknown general, "flying from the northeast!"

Everyone's attention turned to the sky again.

Sure enough, there was a row of white lines in the northeast approaching the large aircraft group.

"Why is there only so much?" the emperor asked again.

Grand Duke Meyer: "It looks like this is already a fighter wing, no less, no less Your Majesty!"

The white line of fighter jets broke into the dense formation of bombers. The self-defense firepower network of the bombers could not be seen clearly from the ground. Everyone could only watch the progress of the situation helplessly.

————

At this time, there was a fight in the air.

The bombers in dense formations fired intensive firepower at the Prossen fighters trying to intercept them.

The latest modification of the B17 bomber is simply a hedgehog in the air, with self-defense cannons and machine guns inserted all over its body. The firepower of a single aircraft may be stronger than a destroyer of the Fuso Empire.

A dense formation composed of more than 300 large aircrafts projected ultra-high density firepower. As soon as Proson's fighter jets rushed into the formation, several of them burst into flames and fell to the ground with billowing smoke.

The pilots of the Eighth Air Force have been training locally for more than half a year, and their marksmanship and other skills are guaranteed. What's more, the missions of bomber self-defense firepower and ground-based anti-aircraft firepower are similar: they both drive away enemy aircraft and force the enemy to give up the attack.

As the enemy planes rushed in, the fleet also entered the fire net of ground anti-aircraft guns.

If it is a Royal Air Force aircraft, they will most likely choose to avoid ground anti-aircraft gunfire and compete with the gunners.

However, the Air Force of the United States adopts a completely different strategy. The generals believe that Proson's fixed anti-aircraft artillery fire will not have much effect at the altitude where the aircraft group flies. It is better to maintain a dense formation to deal with the threat of enemy fighter jets.

So more than 300 bombers plunged into the area where shells continued to explode.

As the generals said, the enemy's anti-aircraft artillery basically has no accuracy at all - and it is unlikely to be accurate. Ground attacks on bombers flying at this altitude usually just aim according to the parameters issued by the air defense commander, and then shoot according to the parameters. That’s all.

Even if a bomber is really shot down, the anti-aircraft artillery team on the ground will not know that they have made a contribution because they cannot be sure whose shells killed the bomber.

————

Emperor Prossen kept his head raised and watched the enemy bomber group leave the field of vision.

He only looked back after the anti-aircraft guns stopped firing.

The emperor's expression was ugly.

Emperor: "The United States has begun bombing our industrial cities. If the Air Force does not work hard, our industry will soon come to a standstill. But for now, let us forget about the United States' blatant daytime bombing and go back to the Wolf's Den to see us. plan of attack!"

The Eagle's Nest is far away from Prosonia, and naturally far from the Belka test site.

The Wolf's Lair is the code name for the secret palace of Emperor Prosonia, and it is also the emperor's wartime headquarters.

An hour and a half later, the emperor led a group of generals into the large conference room of Wolf Lair. The staff had prepared maps in advance, and a draft of the battle plan was placed on the table according to the number of participants.

After the generals sat down, the emperor said: "Last year and the year before last, we tried to end the war quickly, but our efforts failed. This summer, we will try again to end the war, and at least strive for a more favorable peace. Marshal Celtic, tell me."

Marshal Celtic stood up, picked up the map stick, and came to the map prepared by the staff: "Everyone, in order to achieve your Majesty's goal, we believe that the fastest way is to annihilate a large number of the enemy's effective forces.

"This is also more feasible than the goals of the previous two years. In the past two years, we were defeated by the mud and severe winter, because we required the troops to march straight in to capture the goals in the vast territory of Ant. This put a huge pressure on our logistics supplies .

"This time, we will only fight in areas that can be easily reached by our army's supply lines. We can expect that our army will have relatively good supplies during the battle."

After the chief of general staff finished speaking, all the generals nodded. Grand Duke Meyer added: "The battle line is very close to our Yonggu Airport, which is in good condition, and the air force can also use its full strength."

Marshal Celtic nodded: "That's it. The shorter thrust distance also helps us to quickly complete the campaign objectives. Then the next question is, which part of the enemy should we eat.

"Currently on the front, the Ants have five heavy troop groups. The northernmost one is the St. Andrew's Fort Front. From north to south, they are the Beliks Front, the Western Front, the Shepetovka Front, and the southernmost Kobelka Front. Thalia Front.

"Let's talk from north to south. The combat areas of the Fort St. Andrew Front in the north are all dense forests and swamps with dense water networks, making it inconvenient to conduct large-scale encirclement operations.

"The three front armies in the middle are actually connected together. In the area they are holding, the battle line has been stable since the winter of 914. There are many large industrial cities and a large number of reinforced concrete fortresses have been built. If you want to eat up the enemy's heavy army here, It's equivalent to pulling out a tooth from a tiger's mouth!

"And please see, the terrain in the entire central part is not suitable for our attack, because our control area protrudes towards Ant, like a big belly..."

The Celtic Marshal looked at Grand Duke Meyer.

Emperor: "That's enough, that's enough, we know what you mean."

Marshal Celtic nodded: "There are not many options left. In fact, there is only one option, which is to occupy the first Kozalia Front in Borsk. The good news is that we were almost surrounded here. The Bolsk Front, but we were deceived at the time and threw our forces in the Yeisk-Yarvik direction.

"Now, we will not divide our troops. We will be here to surround Rokosov's Khazalia Front!"