artillery arc

Chapter 387: Air-Ground Integration

Yeisk, Headquarters of the 1st Mobile Army.

Pavlov: "What if the enemy adopts a defensive strategy? Cavalry has no ability to attack."

Wang Zhong: "Just think about how people in the era of line infantry would deal with this situation."

While Pavlov was stroking his chin in deep thought, Vasily spoke up: "In the era of line infantry, phalanxes were used to deal with cavalry. Cavalry basically had no way to deal with phalanxes. They could not charge at all. The way to deal with it is to bring the phalanx within the range of artillery."

Wang Zhong: "Yes, the enemy is staying indoors and forming a tortoise shell formation. Our artillery can show its power. The air force can strike at places that the artillery cannot reach."

Pavlov said, "In fact, it doesn't matter if we don't deal with the enemy's turtle shell. Our goal is to delay the enemy, not to annihilate him. If the enemy shrinks and doesn't move, our goal will be achieved."

Wang Zhong snapped his fingers: "You said——"

At this time, there was a noisy sound at the door.

"What's going on?" Wang Zhong turned his head and asked.

Senior Sergeant Gregory: "I'll go out and take a look."

Soon Gregory came back and brought with him the old herdsman who had provided Wang Zhong with the map information.

The herdsmen were wearing old cavalry uniforms, fur hats, and shining George Crosses on their chests.

If you look closely, you will see that the old man's cane has been replaced with a saber.

Vasily gasped.

Wang Zhong hurriedly asked: "What's wrong?"

Vasily: "That saber should have been given by the Tsar. The shape is the royal saber."

Well, die-hard royalists.

The old man's son said to Wang Zhong: "Please try to persuade my father! He insists on going to the front line!"

Wang Zhong: "Old man, you have provided information about the grassland, which has been a great help..."

"I am eighty-five years and five months old, and I am in very good health! When the Anatolians invaded, I chopped off their heads with my saber!" The old man patted his chest, "I want to defend Ant as I did before, how can you stop me?"

Wang Zhong: “You are 85 years old!”

"Ha!" The old man looked at Wang Zhong with disdain. "General, you may not be as good as me in chopping off heads on horseback! Let me go, General!"

Wang Zhong: "Let's leave it to the young people. They can handle it."

Wang Zhong said to the old man's son, "Help your father to rest quickly. It would be terrible if he falls."

Just at this moment the phone rang. Pavlov, who had been watching the fun, ran to answer it: "This is the army headquarters. How many enemy planes are there? Got it."

Before he put down the receiver, the air raid sirens sounded outside.

Pavlov looked at Wang Zhong: "48 twin-engine aircraft, and the same number of Stukas, with 24 109s providing cover."

Wang Zhong: "Fortunately, we set out early, otherwise the loss would be huge."

"What? They're setting off? So many cavalrymen outside the city are setting off? Take my old bones with you!" the old herdsman yelled, and deliberately did not lean on his saber, but stood directly on his legs, "Look! General, look!"

At this time, the sound of anti-aircraft guns and the roar of Stuka dives were heard outside.

Wang Zhong and others all fell down.

The old man's son wanted to throw him to the ground, but the old man pushed him away: "Don't push me! I'm not afraid, it's just a plane!"

The sound of an explosion came from outside the window, and the aerial bomb caused the ceiling of the warehouse to fall into pieces.

The old man stood in the dust, waving his saber: "I'm not afraid! A sissy thing like an airplane can't scare the son of the grassland! It can't scare him!"

----

At the same time, Drachenko once again led the 4th Fighter-Bomber Regiment to patrol the air.

"What's that thing running on the ground?" He muttered, turned on the radio and asked his wingman, "Hey, deputy commander, what's that thing running on the ground?"

The deputy regiment commander tilted his wing and replied, "It doesn't look like an armored unit. The smoke is too small and too fine. Track dust shouldn't be like this."

Then there was a brief silence on the radio.

Someone suddenly asked, "Could it be the cavalry?"

"Cavalry? Didn't they say that the cavalry's organization has been reduced recently? How come there are so many cavalry?"

Everyone started discussing.

Drachenko suddenly said, "Never mind all that. One thing is certain. Prosen has no cavalry! This is our army! Their mighty charge must be an attack! We fly ahead of them and blow up the enemy's defensive position first!"

"Okay, that makes sense!"

Drachenko lightly stepped on the rudder pedal, slightly corrected the plane's course, and flew in the direction of the cavalry's attack.

Soon the dust raised by the cavalry could no longer be seen.

Ten minutes later, someone called out on the radio: "Front! There are armored vehicles in a circle on the ground!"

Drachenko shook the wing and looked down, and confirmed it almost immediately: "That's right! And the armored vehicles are all painted gray! Squadron 1, follow me down, Squadron 2 and 3, go a little further and see if there are other enemies! We can't waste firepower!" "Okay!"

While his men were responding, Drachenko's plane had already rolled 180 degrees and turned upside down.

While diving, Drachenko suddenly thought that he should learn from Prosen's Stuka and equip the plane with a whistle to make a sound to undermine the enemy's morale.

As of now, the Prosen people hadn’t even noticed the air raid!
As soon as he thought this, a Prosen pointed to the sky with his mouth wide open, probably shouting.

The next moment, Proson's camp was like an ant nest filled with water, with panicking ants everywhere.

"It's too late!" Drachenko pressed the bomb button.

----

Lieutenant Joseph of the Plosson Rear Mobile Brigade was lying on the ground. A large amount of mud fell on the back of his head and slid into his clothes through the opening at his neck.

He yelled Plossom's national curse.

Ever since the Ants were equipped with these ugly, fat-looking bombers, the intensity of their air raids suddenly increased.

At the beginning of this year, when Lieutenant Joseph was accepting reinforcements, he told these soldiers that the enemy's Il-2 looked scary, but in fact most of the attacks missed the target, and they could only use the density of firepower to make up for the poor accuracy.

He also said that only people with very bad luck would be hit during the Il-2 air raid.

This is indeed the case. Last year, the rear mobile brigade encountered Il-2 air strikes many times. Generally, hundreds of Il-2 sorties only caused two to three hundred casualties, with each plane killing three people on average.

The losses of trucks are slightly greater, but generally do not exceed 10% of the total number of trucks.

Therefore, the Mobile Brigade concluded that the Il-2 was not a big threat, especially when there was cover from friendly anti-aircraft guns. Ant pilots would attack randomly and then run away, and rarely return to attack again.

In contrast, the Ants' twin-engine bombers posed a much greater threat because these aircraft had greater attack accuracy and their bombs were more powerful.

The Il-2 had too much armor and too few bombs and rockets.

But things changed this year.

First, the Il-2 began to fire a type of cluster bomb, which covered a large area at once and caused huge casualties to the unprepared Prosen people.

But the Prosens soon discovered the flaws of this rocket and began to increase the spacing between parked vehicles, stretching out the formation, and the killing efficiency of the cluster bombs dropped sharply.

But then the enemy's dive bombers began to come into action.

This fat fighter jet, which looks like a baby bottle, can carry large-yield ammunition and deliver it with relative accuracy. It can retreat quickly after the bombing and can even engage in air combat with the 109 fighter jets that come to provide cover. It is extremely terrifying.

If the troops were found without anti-aircraft artillery cover, the bombers would return to strafe, killing ground personnel and light armored vehicles with fierce machine gun fire.

Their 12.7mm ammunition can even penetrate the top armor of the covered 251 half-track vehicle.

With the appearance of this new bomber, the efficiency of the enemy's air attacks suddenly increased.

It is said that this is because the Ants selected elite pilots to fly the new aircraft, and only pilots who performed well on the Il-2 would be transferred to the bomber regiment equipped with the new aircraft.

In any case, in April, Lieutenant Joseph could no longer pat his chest and tell the recruits that the enemy air raid was no big deal.

Instead, he would teach new recruits that if they heard the sound of an engine coming from a low altitude, they didn't need to worry too much, because it was an Il-2, but if they saw something reflecting light in the sky, they had to be careful, because it could be a bomber like the Il-2 or the Pe-.

Lieutenant Joseph looked up and listened attentively for a while. After making sure that the enemy plane had flown away, he stood up and tried hard to wipe off the mud that had run in through his collar.

When the mud was being driven away, a few lice were startled and jumped up and fell into the grass nearby.

"Is anyone hurt?" he shouted.

"Hans was hit in the shoulder by a machine gun!"

"Sunny Tower!" Lieutenant Joseph shouted.

Immediately, a medic came running over with a small bag carrying a red cross on it: "Lieutenant, are you injured?"

"No, our Private Hans was hit by a machine gun. Over there!" He pointed in the direction where the sound came from.

The medic immediately rushed over and squatted next to the recruit who was holding his comrade: "Let me see!"

"Please save him, doctor!"

"I'm not a doctor, just a paramedic. I've received field first aid training." The medic felt the wounded man's pulse and said, "Put him down. He's dead."

"What?" The recruit's eyes widened.

"He's dead. I suggest you look for any letters or other relics he may have from his family. Then put him on the body truck."

The recruit immediately covered his face and said, "He is the only fellow countryman in the entire brigade! How can I explain to his mother?"

Lieutenant Joseph was about to go over to comfort the new recruit when he heard someone shout, "Ah, pain! There's dust approaching us in the distance!"

Joseph looked up and saw dust rising on the horizon.

The headquarters had just announced on the radio that the enemy might launch a cavalry attack, but we didn't expect it to come so soon!

Or it was when the enemy planes had just carried out an air raid!
The lieutenant stepped forward and grabbed the still crying recruit. "Get up! The enemy cavalry is coming! If you don't want your head chopped in half, get to the half-track! Get moving, you pigs!"

(End of this chapter)