Expedition to Europe

At the end of March, from Flanders to Reims, from north to south, there were the British First Army led by Henry Horn, the British Third Army led by Julian Bean, the British Fifth Army led by Hubert Gough, the French Fifth Army led by Bastien, and the Foreign Legion led by Qin Zhiyuan.

Haig made a mistake in judging the direction of Ludendorff's attack. Haig believed that the German army would launch an attack in Flanders, so he concentrated more troops on the Belgian coast.

The Fifth Army led by Gough became the weak point of the entire defense line. Gough did not have enough troops and had to defend a long front. At the same time, he did not have a solid position. By the end of March, only 3,500 laborers helped Gough build the defense line.

The British treated laborers extremely harshly. Laborers were unwilling to work for the British. Many people would tear up their contracts with the British and run to the labor camps in France.

Relatively speaking, Qin Zhiyuan had too many favorable conditions. The number of laborers near Reims reached 50,000 to 60,000, which helped the Foreign Legion to reduce its workload to the greatest extent.

At the end of March, all German troops were finally in place.

Before the offensive was launched, the First Army and the Third Army faced Otto von Bilo's 14 divisions and 2,200 artillery pieces.

Bilo commanded the troops to win the Battle of Caporetto. Bilo's task in this offensive was to tear through the defense line of the British First Army, advance to Arras, and then turn right to encircle the British troops north of Arras, forcing Haig to dispatch reserve troops and weaken the British forces in Flanders.

This offensive plan was called the St. Michael Plan.

Bilo's left wing was Georg von Demarwitz's Second Army, who commanded the Cambrai counterattack last year. His task in this offensive was to advance with Bilo.

The left wing of the Second Army was led by Hutier with 21 divisions and 2,600 artillery pieces. Hutier's mission was to stop the French troops from supporting the British.

The combined forces of Bilo, Demarwitz and Hutier amounted to 1 million men, the main force of the Germans in this offensive, and they were enough to defeat the British defense line, which was not well prepared.

In early April, the Germans' long-planned offensive finally began.

At 2 a.m. on the morning of the 1st, Picardy was shrouded in thick fog, with visibility of only a few meters. In March and April, Picardy often had such weather.

At 5 a.m., the fog still did not dissipate. As the wind direction could not be determined, the Germans were somewhat hesitant about whether to drop poison gas bombs.

After the commander of the artillery unit, Bruchmuller, learned the truth, he immediately ordered the artillery to start bombarding, regardless of the wind direction, just fire the shells.

So the unprecedented bombardment began immediately.

On the 40-mile front between Sens and Ois, the Germans concentrated 6,473 artillery pieces, including heavy cannons, light cannons, howitzers, scoop guns, railway guns, etc.

When more than 6,000 artillery pieces fired at the same time, the momentum was really earth-shaking. Whether it was the Germans who fired the artillery or the British who were in hell, they were stunned by the unprecedented density.

Bruchmuller has a nickname, called "Breakthrough Miller".

This fully describes Bruchmuller's combat style.

Under Bruchmuller's command, all artillery pieces were responsible for different areas according to the length of the range. They took turns to fire high-explosive bombs, shrapnel shells, and poison gas bombs, and tirelessly cleared the British positions. Even if the bombardment effect could not be detected due to the thick fog, the artillerymen still tried their best to fire the shells.

The bombardment continued until eight o'clock in the morning, and the bombardment reached its climax. All the artillerymen did their best and fired at full force at the risk of destroying the artillery. The explosions were almost continuous and did not stop at all.

This intensity of bombardment lasted for an hour, followed by five minutes of silence, and then the barrage bombardment was carried out.

The barrage bombardment was also planned. The Germans had set the shooting parameters, and even had a plan for how many shells to fire at a certain angle.

Five minutes later, the bombardment continued.

In these five minutes, the German soldiers launched a ground attack.

What made Ludendorff feel relieved was that there was no one on the British position. They had already abandoned the first line of defense and retreated to the second and third lines of defense.

During this retreat, the British command was confused.

Goff's troops were the first to fail. His troops had the smallest number of people, and because of the fog, they could not see the attacking German troops clearly, so they abandoned their positions and fled backwards. Byng's troops insisted on fighting at Follaiquiers, which was the result of the Battle of Cambrai last year. The British paid the price of more than 100,000 soldiers to capture it. Byng did not want all this to come to naught.

The German vanguard ignored the resistance of the Third Army. They followed the requirements of the tactical booklet and bypassed Follaiquiers to continue chasing Goff's troops.

So far, the German tactical actions have strictly followed the requirements of the tactical booklet.

In this tactical booklet, the German army's first day of combat mission is to "destroy the British artillery positions", and the second day's combat mission is adjusted according to the progress of the first day. When encountering resistance forces, the tactical booklet requires German soldiers "not to rigidly implement the previous combat plan, but to flexibly use the correct tactics to break through the British defense."

At the same time, according to this idea, the reserve troops will not be deployed to the deadlocked areas, but to the areas where progress is smooth.

After conquering the first line of defense of the British Army, the German troops participating in the attack had a rare full meal.

The time of the attack was eight o'clock in the morning, which was the time for breakfast. The British prepared breakfast, but the Germans had already launched the attack, so the British retreated in a hurry, and all the prepared breakfast belonged to the Germans.

The morale of many German troops was greatly boosted because these German soldiers had not eaten steak for a long time, and there was not enough wine and tobacco. So when the German soldiers crossed the first line of defense of the British Army, many German soldiers had an extra backpack issued by the British Army, which was full of canned food, cigarettes, and various wines.

In the propaganda of the German General Staff, the Allies and Germany were in the same predicament of material shortage, but now it seems that the British have abundant supplies, which also made many German soldiers have a little doubt about the General Staff, but soon, these doubts were driven away by the long chase.

Gough retreated five miles on the first day, which made Gough's front line longer and his troops more stretched. So when night fell, Gough retreated another ten miles to defend behind the Somme River and the Kroozie Canal.

Gough's retreat led to Bing being besieged by the Germans at Fleurs. Ludendorff hoped to capture this place on the first day of the offensive, so he ordered Demarwitz to attack Fleurs.

The battle was extremely fierce. Both sides were fighting for honor. The British were equipped with a large number of tanks, and the German tanks were finally equipped with troops. The two sides fought hard.

The original text is in Liu # 9 @Shu/Bar!

Among the three German armies, Hutier's troops made the greatest progress.

Finally, they did not have to face the Foreign Legion led by Qin Zhiyuan. Hutier fought very unrestrainedly. Hutier's troops almost tore through the British defense line with a crushing state. The speed of the troops' advance depended on how fast the German soldiers could run.

By noon, Haig was finally able to determine the direction of the German attack, but at this time Haig had no reserve troops, so Haig requested reinforcements from Foch according to the previous agreement.

If according to the order of the military, Foch should shrink his position to ensure the safety of Paris.

But Foch did not do so. He pulled out seven divisions to reinforce Haig, one more than the promised six divisions.

In the first day of the attack, the Foreign Legion led by Qin Zhiyuan was also attacked by the German army, but the scale of the attack was much smaller than that near Arras.

There will be no fog in the morning in April in the Reims area. The visibility here is good, and there are complete defensive positions, as well as support from artillery and tank units. Therefore, Xu Sheng and Griff, who were attacked, attacked boldly. In just one morning, they defeated the two German divisions in the front with the same devastating method, killing more than 2,000 people and capturing more than 6,000 people.

After that, the Germans did not launch any offensive. It is estimated that they have fully realized that the situation in Arras cannot be repeated. Even if it is repeated, the roles of both sides are estimated to be reversed.

Foch was also paying attention to Qin Zhiyuan. At noon, Foch sent a telegram to Qin Zhiyuan, asking him about the situation here.

Qin Zhiyuan reported truthfully, but Foch did not reply.

In the evening, Foch sent another telegram to Qin Zhiyuan, asking Qin Zhiyuan to withdraw two divisions to reinforce in the direction of Yamin, and attached the battle report of the day.

Qin Zhiyuan was surprised to find that the victory won by Xu Sheng and Griffin was the only victory won by the Allies on that day. In other battlefields, it was either stalemate or retreat, and Reims became the only bright spot.

In fact, the British were retreating in almost all the German attack areas, except for Folkestone.

Folkestone has now become a meat grinder. In just one day, three divisions of Bin's men were crippled, with more than 20,000 casualties, and they also caused almost the same number of losses to the Germans.

Qin Zhiyuan could not refuse Foch's order, so he drew Liu Zizheng's division and Jin Taihe's division on the second line and a regiment of the armored forces to temporarily form an army to reinforce Yamin.

This army is the largest organization under Qin Zhiyuan, with Liu Zizheng as the commander.

Yamin is about 150 kilometers away from Reims in a straight line. Qin Zhiyuan gave Liu Zizheng a time limit of 24 hours, which means that Liu Zizheng must move to the place within one day.

Qin Zhiyuan's troops are now equipped with a considerable number of trucks, which can basically be regarded as semi-mechanized troops. 150 kilometers seems far, but it is not an impossible task. The only trouble is the tank troops. These tanks must be transported by train, otherwise even Chen Kangjian cannot guarantee how many tanks can reach Yamin.

Yamin, that is, the place where Qin Zhiyuan and his team fought when they first came to France as laborers. Now a year and a half has passed, and the Foreign Legion has finally returned to Yamin.

Compared with a group of farmers who were full of uncertainty about the future at that time, the Foreign Legion now has a clear goal.