Conquer Europe from the West

Chapter 103: Ah! Navy

As soon as the words fell, the conference room immediately became lively.

Several army commanders looked at each other, obviously not believing Brian's assurances.

But what they distrusted even more was Ryan.

"Before the 12th?"

"You speak in a rather arrogant tone."

"The Flig who received the Blue Star Marx Medal last time?"

"He only has one reinforced regiment at his disposal right now, right? What good can a force of just over 3,000 men do?"

The main ones who raised questions were the commanders of the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th Army Groups. This was normal, after all, they had always been carrying out offensive missions, and the attack on Verdun naturally became the subject of discussion among these commanders.

According to the intelligence they had and the experience they had accumulated over the years, in order to complete the occupation of Verdun, the northernmost fortress of the Farland Fortress Line, they would have to mobilize the forces of at least two or three army groups.

But now, this young brigadier general actually said that he only needed one regiment to completely capture the fortress city that originally required two or three armies to capture?
Are you kidding me?
If he really succeeds, how will we, the army commanders, have the face to sit in our current positions?

These army commanders just looked at Brian, and what they were thinking was completely written on their faces.

But there was someone more excited than them.

That is the commander of the Fifth Army.

"Wait, Brigadier General Brian."

General Constantine's eyes twitched. He looked at Brian, his entire upper body leaning forward. "What about my Fifth Army?"

"That guy Flig said he could capture Verdun with just one regiment. If that's the case, then why did we need my Fifth and Sixth Armies to attack them?"

As the commander of the Fifth Army, General Constantine immediately felt obvious disgust after hearing what Brian quoted from Ryan.

But Brian was prepared for this!
He immediately said, "Major Flig can certainly lead his troops to capture Verdun, but all this is based on the fact that the Fifth and Sixth Armies can draw away most of the Farlander Army's firepower for them on the front line."

As he spoke, Brian picked up his briefcase and stuffed the glass plate for projection, which was intended to be used in a subsequent meeting, into the still hot projector.

The original picture was immediately replaced, and what appeared in front of everyone was a map covering the entire Verdun and all the roads and terrain within a radius of 100 kilometers.

Constantine wanted to interrupt Brian's action because he felt that this kind of advance plan could not really determine the direction of the battlefield to a large extent. After all, the actual battlefield situation was changing rapidly. But before he could open his mouth, Brian stuffed a new glass plate in.

The complex offensive situation immediately appeared in front of everyone.

The fierce offensive and the impenetrable defense line built by the light infantry regiment almost filled the entire picture. The attack bands drawn with different arrows and the battle line change curves made it possible for even laymen who knew nothing to see the professionalism of this map at a glance.

The Crown Prince of Bavaria, the sixth commander who was also responsible for carrying out the attack plan on the Verdun fortress, saw the small words "AS" written in the corner of the map at a glance.

"Did the old marshal deduc this himself?" The Crown Prince of Bavaria was shocked, his eyes full of disbelief.

The old marshal was talking about Schlieffen, and the last time he saw Schlieffen was several years ago.

As the person who laid the foundation for the current basic theory of the Empire's defensive warfare, even though Marshal Schlieffen did not participate in this war, everyone present was commanding the troops according to Marshal Schlieffen's plan.

Therefore, in everyone's opinion, apart from the changes due to Moltke the Younger's revisions and the fact that Farland was the initiator of the war, it is not an exaggeration to say that the rest of the war was commanded by Field Marshal Schlieffen himself.

And now, they could actually see the battle plan personally formulated by the old marshal who had completely retired!

The other marshals, except for Hellingen who had been prepared, also glanced at Brian.

"Exactly."

Brian, feeling uneasy at being stared at, swallowed his saliva and forced himself to continue in a steady voice, "This battle was reported to the Marshal last week. The initiator of the proposal was Major Ryan Flig."

"What you generals are seeing now is the Marshal's version of the proposal submitted by Major Flig, which he has revised several times."

"Considering that Major Fligg's special forces unit currently requires the highest level of confidentiality in the entire military, the footage you see has omitted the offensive inside Verdun, retaining only the outer battlefield."

Brian didn't say much about the rest.

Because every one of the generals in front of him could be said to be a student and subordinate of Marshal Schlieffen, and his rash explanation would interrupt their thinking.

And things developed exactly as Ryan had told Brian earlier.

[After seeing the Marshal's signature, that old man, Moltke the Younger, didn't dare to say a single word. As long as you can let the staff see this, you don't need to interfere with the rest. They will reach an internal consensus on their own.]
The only difference is that Ryan originally wanted Brian to use this thing as a treasure to deal with the General Staff and Moltke the Younger, but now it has become a thing to be used against the commanders of the various army groups of the Central Army.

But the result is still the same.

After a long silence and reflection, the Bavarian Crown Prince of the Sixth Army was the first to raise his hands: "I have no objection to the Marshal's plan."

The commanders of the First, Second, and Third Armies also echoed, "No objection."

Only the Fourth Army had some thoughts: "My troops are not deployed in the eastern part of the front. Why is that?"

He saw that there were no troops of his own on the right wing of the Fifth Army, and thus he had some doubts.

Brian immediately said, "That's because the battle is expected to end by the 12th at the latest. The Fourth Army's withdrawal from the front lines was taken into account during planning, so it wasn't mapped out."

Duke Albrecht was visibly displeased upon hearing this, but he still said, like everyone else, "Episode 4 is fine."

The seventh episode about General Hellingen and the eighth episode about Hindenburg were because one was more than 300 kilometers away from the front line, and the other was just here for formalities, so there was no need for them to express their opinions at all.

But they still looked at General Constantine of the Fifth Army with Brian.

The unanimous approval of all colleagues immediately put a lot of pressure on Admiral Constantine.

But he was clearly more afraid that he would mess up the battle that Field Marshal Schlieffen had personally arranged.

He hesitated for a long time, and then said:

"I want shells, more shells. No matter who has them, as long as they are empty, send them all to my army!"

In the battle plan modified by Schlieffen, the artillery unit in the fifth episode was the main force among the main forces, so Constantine looked at everyone with a look that said, "Since you all agree, I will suck your blood."

Then everyone nodded in unison.

the reason is simple.

Now everyone understands that the battle against Palu proposed by Moltke the Younger will definitely fail.

Then, the First to Fourth Armies will inevitably shift their combat focus from occupation to preserving strength.

What the front line needs is persistence and consumption. In this case, a large amount of ammunition can naturally be provided to the Fifth Army.

Furthermore, this was a plan personally finalized by Field Marshal Schlieffen.

If they don't agree, they'll probably never be able to join the Imperial Army again.

And this is exactly what Ryan wants.

In fact, the entire operation was based almost entirely on Wren's memories of the First Battle of Verdun in World War I, so in a sense it was Wren's own decision.

However, the participation and revision of Field Marshal Schlieffen added a card named Alfred von Schlieffen to this battle.

Even if the Imperial staff did not approve of Ryan, they had to recognize Marshal Schlieffen.

This can also be considered a disguised form of political kidnapping.

Of course, this also has a prerequisite - it must be Schlieffen.

If it were Moltke the Younger or someone else, no one would buy it.

The situation will probably become - who do you think you are to expect me to listen to you?
In the conference room.

As everyone's opinions became unified, Brian, who was the focus of everyone, finally breathed a sigh of relief.

He took another tentative look at Admiral Constantine and only turned off the projector after getting the other's tacit consent.

General Hellingen said, "Everyone, just pretend that what happened here today never happened."

Everyone looked at each other, agreed with Hellingen's statement, and left one after another in silence.

Hellingen and Brian were the only ones left in the large conference room. Just as Brian was putting the glass back into his briefcase, he heard Hellingen's voice: "Brigadier General, did Major Fliger say anything to you earlier?"

"What do you mean, General?"

Brian was a little unsure of what Hellingen meant.

Then he saw General Hellingen wave his hand in front of his nose twice: "No, I'm just a little curious."

"Major Fleagle is an invaluable talent, but earlier this month I was furious that he was trying to take two battalions from my command."

“This is the first time I’ve heard of this.”

Brian vaguely remembered that Ryan had mentioned to him before that General Hellingen was a good person, but now it seems that General Hellingen probably controlled his expression very well.

"That's all in the past." Hellingen knew what he said wasn't very nice, so he immediately changed the subject and looked at Brian's briefcase. "When did you get this from him?"

"Just two days before the Perijie Kingdom surrendered." Brian said.

Hellingen paused. "So, he's already prepared to attack Verdun?"

"I'm also surprised. After all, the major's troops are only this small, but they've already achieved several victories despite a gap of more than ten times their strength..."

"This is no longer an achievement that ordinary people can achieve."

When Brian said this, his tone was full of admiration and praise, without a trace of jealousy.

Because he knew clearly that if he encountered the situation that Ryan had to face, he would probably not even survive the first level.

Dying in the 502nd Battalion camp might be the only outcome for him and everyone else.

Hellingen had an envious expression on his face: "I guess neither Strantz nor you ever thought in your lifetime that you would have an Imperial Marshal under your command..."

"It was just good luck."

Strantz was previously the commander in charge of conscription for the Fifth Military District and the commander-in-chief of the Fifth Military District. On the day of the Farlan attack, Brian reported directly to Strantz.

Strantz is now in charge of front-line and logistical manpower management in the Fifth Army and is considered one of the most important people in the Fifth Army headquarters.

But the other party had no direct contact with Ryan, and Hellingen knew this, so he was actually praising Brian.

But Brian obviously didn't dare to take up such a question.

The main reason he pulled Ryan out of the military academy was because when he was looking through the list, he heard from others that there was an idiot in the officer class who slacked off in class every day and never got a F on the exams. He was about to graduate, and he didn't know which military region that person would be assigned to and cause trouble to others.

Out of curiosity, Brian did some research and found out that this idiot who always failed the exams had given up his medals in exchange for the qualification to study the officer course, just like him.

As a person of commoner origin who had never been granted a noble title, Brian knew very well how difficult it was for those whose names did not contain the character "Feng" to endure in the general officer course.

They cannot overshadow the traditional heirs of the nobility, nor can they embarrass the new nobility, and they will also miss the opportunity to train in elite troops.

Under such great pressure, people like Brian and Ryan can only use a completely different set of score calculation models to distinguish themselves from those nobles.

Testing duck eggs is their solution.

As Brian's Modern Imperial Chinese teacher in junior high school said, it's easy to get a zero on an exam, but it's not easy to get a zero on a full exam.

Because this means you have to miss every answer perfectly, and people who don’t know the correct answers will always accidentally miss a few of them.

The Imperial Military University does not allow students to leave their exams blank, and this is especially true for those studying for officers' courses.

Even Brian used to only get around 20 points on exams.

In other words, you got 80% of the test score.

Then here comes a genius who can get 100% score on the test paper.

It would be against the will of heaven if we don't arrest him.

But Hellingen obviously didn't know about this.

So Brian thought he was praising himself.

"No need to be so formal, Brigadier General Bryan."

Heilingen, sensing Brian's thoughts, took out a cigar and held it to his lips: "I'm not one to hide things."

"This time, it's all thanks to you."

He was referring to the fact that Brian used Ryan's rhetoric to fool young Moltke.

"In fact, I and others were already unhappy with him when he wanted to strengthen the front and left wing."

"But now it seems that as long as our plan succeeds this time, we won't have to worry about future enemies."

As the former Minister of War of the current empire and one of the most senior generals in the army, Hellingen was obviously well aware of the problems with Moltke the Younger.

But the good thing about Moltke the Younger was that he was very similar to his uncle Moltke the Elder in terms of command. He often just set goals and did not interfere with specific actions.

In contrast, Field Marshal Schlieffen paid more attention to details, which enabled the troops to better perform combat missions.

The reason why the commanders of the eight armies did not raise any objections just now was because of this.

This was especially true of General Constantine of the Fifth Army.

The unique friction sound of a lighter was heard in the conference room.

Hellingen exhaled a puff of smoke and said, "Speaking of which, where is Major Flig now?"

Brian: "I heard that he will be promoted to lieutenant colonel in the next two days. He will probably be in the imperial capital, not in the camp."

"That new camp that was built overnight?"

Heilingen thought of the new 502nd Regiment camp he had seen when he flew to the Imperial Capital. "Then I won't bother him. As for you, are you planning on staying at the General Staff Headquarters?"

The staff officers of the Imperial General Staff often rotate between the rear and the front lines. Logically speaking, it is not time for Brian to rotate back to the rear yet.

Brian immediately understood that this was Hellingen giving him a chance, so he said immediately, "According to the person in charge of personnel in the General Office, I won't leave the Imperial Capital until I'm promoted to Major General. I haven't decided which unit I'll join yet..."

"Oh?"

Brian's words obviously surprised Hellingen.

After all, it stands to reason that there are very few brigadier generals with meritorious service and combat experience who have not yet been appointed. Each unit should be busy looking for a suitable front-line commander. Brian must have already chosen the army group he wants to join.

"Is it because he hasn't been conferred a title?" he asked immediately.

Brian smiled bitterly: "Maybe that's part of the reason."

Hellingen thought for a moment, then put down his cigar.

"Why don't you try the navy?"

"Navy...huh?"

Brian was stunned for a moment: "But this is against the rules, right?"

"What's the problem?"

Helingen folded his hands over his chest, his gray beard trembling slightly.

"Since no unit in the army wants you right now, maybe we can switch to another unit."

"My younger brother, Constantin von Hellingen, is currently the commander of the Baltic Coast Guard. If you don't mind, I can arrange for you to serve as his chief of staff for a few months in the Baltic Sea. Or, you could lead an army to support him in battle. We could recruit them from the new recruits of the Fifth Military District. You have experience in logistics command and training, so this shouldn't be a problem for you."

"Then I will respectfully obey your command!"

Without hesitation, Brian decided to seize this opportunity immediately.

Hellingen was very satisfied with this, and just as the two reached an agreement, Ryan just happened to go into the stairs leading to the basement of the General Staff.

(End of this chapter)