Starting with the smashing of Dunkirk

Chapter 2: One company holds off three divisions; the advantage remains with us!

Under Captain Andri’s instructions, several soldiers immediately led Lelouch and Crozier to a cellar next to the mill ruins.

A hole was deliberately smashed in the cellar door, and a cable just happened to come out of the hole, connected to an antenna that looked like a clothes rack.

When he transmigrated, he inherited some of the subconsciousness and skills of the original body owner, who was originally a communications technology officer.

So he glanced at the antenna and casually asked the soldier leading the way, "Are you even equipped with F08 miniature radios?"

As the guide opened the cellar door, he gave him an admiring look: "You're really professional."

Without wasting any words, Lelouch strode into the cellar and went straight to the radio to start operating it.

This type of radio has a power output of less than 50 watts, and its effective transmission range should be between 10 and 50 kilometers.

This number is never fixed, because weather and day/night cycles both affect the atmospheric ionosphere.

Launch distances at night are several times greater than during the day, and on sunny days they are greater than on rainy or snowy days.

It's afternoon now, but the weather is clear. The terrain here is relatively high, so I estimate we can make contact with friendly forces within 20 kilometers.

In 1914, the German army rarely had radio equipment, generally only up to the regimental level. Battalions and companies below that level had to rely on horseback to deliver orders. However, Captain Andrei's company was a reconnaissance company, which needed to promptly relay the latest enemy information to the rear, hence the high level of equipment.

Lelouch pressed the send button so many times it was smoking, he didn't even bother with encrypting the content too much, at most he just added some identification codes to prove the sender's identity.

"Reconnaissance Company of the 12th Division reports: Urgent! Our unit has discovered that Billy King's army has set up explosive devices on the dikes downstream of the Isel River! The dikes could be blown up at any time! All troops that have already crossed to the north bank must immediately abandon all non-essential equipment and assemble in Neoport as quickly as possible! Repeat, assemble in Neoport and hold it!"
All friendly forces that have not yet crossed the river, please do not drag heavy artillery and supply trains to low-lying areas along the river! Find the nearest high ground and move to safety! All low-lying areas within ten kilometers of the banks of the Isel River are at risk of being flooded! Division headquarters, please contact reconnaissance aircraft as soon as possible to conduct supplementary reconnaissance…”

Lelouch didn't even draft a telegram, and the wording of the telegram was very blunt and straightforward; he was practically racing against death.

If anyone else had been present to review his telegram at that moment, none of these messages would have been sent.

But since the communications platoon leader was killed in action and the reconnaissance company commander was busy resisting the French army, only a corporal could do whatever he wanted.

The signal drifted across the sky and through the fields, instantly covering an area of ​​twenty kilometers in radius.

……

At the same moment, in the fields about seven or eight kilometers southeast of the town, the headquarters of the 16th Infantry Regiment of the 12th Division, which had just crossed the Isère River, received Lelouch's warning message through a backpack radio receiver.

The Demanian communications officer was always very efficient, and the clerk quickly delivered the translated telegram to Colonel Lister, the regimental commander.

"Colonel! Urgent military intelligence discovered by the division's reconnaissance company!"

Colonel Lister was a serious middle-aged man nearing fifty. He gripped the telegram in his hand, clipped on his monocle, glanced at it, and immediately began to tremble.

He stood there for a few seconds, his mind racing, beads of cold sweat dripping down his forehead, as if he were making a painful decision.

Ten seconds later, he took a deep breath and finally gritted his teeth and said, "Have the first three battalions gather horses to pull up a few 77mm field guns, and abandon all other heavy artillery on the spot! Gather the 77mm shells!"

Abandon all the tents in the supply wagon, and discard the field kitchen! Keep only enough rations for three days, and discard the rest! Run at full speed! Anyone who is slow will be shot!

"You few, leave a few horses and wagons here with the radio, watch over the abandoned supplies, and wait for official orders from division headquarters! If there are no further orders from division headquarters within half an hour, or if flooding is detected, then you must follow them immediately!"

The entire group immediately fell into chaos.

Fortunately, the Demacians were known for their strict adherence to military orders, and the soldiers cleared out hundreds of heavy wagons in just a few minutes.

All the draft horses originally used for pulling baggage were also used to pull people.

Only a small group of soldiers, ordered by the regimental commander to stay behind temporarily to guard the abandoned supplies, remained in place with their radios.

Abandon heavy artillery, break cooking pots, burn tents, carry only three days' rations, and the entire army marches forward at full speed.

Similar scenes have been repeatedly occurring within 20 kilometers of the town of Neoport.

Some groups were decisive, while others hesitated.

Some regiments acted immediately, while others still needed to consult with the division headquarters.

……

Soon, the 12th Infantry Division headquarters also received the telegram. After the cipher clerk handed the telegram to Major General Karl Luitpold, the major general glanced at it briefly before taking it seriously.

"If there's no flood, we can still recover the equipment, and even if there are some losses, it's acceptable. But if there really is a flood, the entire division might not be completely drowned, but the heavy equipment will definitely be lost 100%, and it will be impossible to reach Neoport Town in time..."

Major General Karl frowned and had someone quickly bring him a military map, which he then scanned thoroughly.

His gaze swept back and forth between Ostend to the east of Neoport and Dunkirk to the west, as he gestured the distances with a ruler.

Finally, he slammed his fist on the marching table in anguish: "The Billy Kings should know that if they let our entire division penetrate into Neoport and cut off the coastal highway, their entire army would surely perish! It seems they really might do such a thing!"

Immediately order the entire division to take this matter seriously and draft another formal order based on the reconnaissance company's warning! Furthermore, send a telegram to the army group headquarters requesting the urgent allocation of reconnaissance aircraft from nearby areas to conduct thorough supplementary reconnaissance along both banks of the lower reaches of the Neopot River!

Major General Carl's orders were immediately and methodically implemented. His division headquarters was still more than 20 kilometers away from Neoport and had not yet entered the low-lying area on the south bank of the Isère River, so there was no need to worry about it being flooded after the water was released.

He can only temporarily stop moving forward and observe how things develop; after all, an hour or two won't make a difference.

……

Lelouch's telegram could actually have been intercepted by the Franks or Belgeins in the vicinity.

However, in the chaos of the battlefield, even if the enemy intercepts intelligence, it will take them longer to decipher it than their own, even if it's not fully encrypted. And even after deciphering it, they may not believe it, or they might mistake it for deliberate misinformation spread by the enemy to undermine morale. In the final stages of the "Heading to the Sea" campaign, both sides were exhausted, and the already chaotic battlefield further reduced communication efficiency.

There was also a lack of communication between the Franks and the Biligin. Whether the Biligin were going to blow up the dam was a secret decision they made themselves, and the Franks could not possibly have known.

Therefore, it is perfectly normal for the enemy to realize the problem an hour or even two hours later than our side.

Lelouch never expected to avoid being intercepted by the enemy; he only needed to create a time gap.

After sending and receiving the telegrams, he tidied up his wording and handed the transcript to Andri, who had just finished commanding a small battle:

"Captain, I have already broadcast a warning to the nearby friendly forces. The 16th Regiment has replied, saying that they are still seven to eight kilometers away from us and have begun to advance lightly equipped."

They also said they had consulted with the division headquarters, and the division headquarters had approved their contingency plan. Therefore, our suggestion has been officially approved by higher authorities.

Andri glanced anxiously at his watch: "How much longer until Commander Lister arrives?"

Lelouch: "They've already crossed the river and are speeding up their advance. Even if the Belgian army realizes the change and immediately breaches the dam to release the water, I estimate that by the time the water reaches their feet, they'll only be two or three kilometers away from here."

The last part of the journey can be completed on foot or by wading through water; no one will drown, at most some supplies will be lost.

Andrei breathed a slight sigh of relief: "Even if the whole division can't get here, if Colonel Lister's regiment can, we still have the resources to keep fighting."

The Franks only arrived in De Panne, about seven kilometers west of us, from Dunkirk in the early hours of this morning. The Franks attacking the town now all started from De Panne.

Although the enemy's numbers outnumber ours by more than ten times, they will gradually reach the front lines, thus employing a piecemeal tactic. With just one regiment, we might be able to hold out!

Andri's analysis relieved Lelouch.

The Battle of the Sea was indeed fought in such a chaotic manner. Both sides were racing for their lives, desperately rushing northwards in a frantic maneuvering. The troops on all sides were stretched into a long, single-file line by this frantic rush.

A division might stretch for more than ten kilometers, and when the first regiment of a division is deployed to battle, the last regiment might still be half a day away from the battlefield.

This was true not only for the German and French armies, but also for the Belgian army retreating from Antwerp.

They appear to have three divisions, but only the vanguard of the first division is about to reach Neoport, while the third division hasn't even reached Ostend, twenty kilometers to the east.

Seeing that Lelouch had recovered, Andri handed him back the rifle that was lying on the ground beside him: "If you don't need to contact your superiors anymore, take your platoon and join the defense, or go check if the other sergeants in your platoon have woken up. The pressure on our defense is getting heavier and heavier."

As he spoke, the sound of artillery shells exploding sporadically came from afar, and the whistling of machine gun fire never stopped; clearly, everyone was fighting hard.

Lelouch looked at the rifle in his hand and felt that it was a waste of his abilities for a technical sergeant and military enthusiast transmigrator to do infantry work. He could have changed so much more.

Besides, he'd only been here a few hours and hadn't fully adjusted yet. You only have one life; it's best to avoid things that involve directly facing bullets.

So he racked his brains and thought quickly, and surprisingly, he soon came up with another idea, which he immediately suggested:
"Captain, I think I can make a greater contribution to the campaign if I stay in the communications room. No matter how difficult things are on your end, you won't be short of an infantryman."

Andri raised an eyebrow, intending to reprimand him, but then he remembered that Lelouch had indeed done something significant, so he gave him another chance: "Then get to the point!"

Lelouch: "I can also listen to the enemy's shortwave plaintext telegrams nearby and see their reactions. Maybe I can even deduce whether the enemy has changed their minds, such as wanting to blow up the dam ahead of schedule or something."

Oh, right...we could even consider sending a pre-emptive, French-language public address system alert to the surrounding towns and villages of Bilikin, if necessary, to allow innocent civilians to evacuate in advance!

If the Belighin people were to breach the dikes, land stretching for tens of kilometers north to south and nearly a hundred kilometers east to west along the river would be flooded to varying degrees. Even if no one drowned, more than a dozen villages and towns would be destroyed.

These people of Billy King are innocent! They are also victims of the Billy King military's actions!

Andri was taken aback by what he heard. It wasn't that he thought it was wrong, but rather that it didn't align with his earlier assessment of Lelouch's character.

"Are you serious? Doing this may align with a soldier's sense of honor, but do you really care about the lives of these civilians?"

Lelouch spoke rapidly: "What I think is not important! The key is that doing this not only has humanitarian benefits, but also military benefits!"

If we don't issue a warning broadcast, this whole mess will become a disaster! The enemy might even falsely accuse us of shelling the dike, and with the battlefield in such chaos, there's no way to prove anything!
Civilians, and even ordinary soldiers, mostly lack military strategy knowledge. They don't understand which side would benefit more from the breaching of the dike, so they tend to believe their own side's propaganda and harbor even greater hatred towards us!

However, if we can seize this opportunity to promote our humanitarian efforts, and even have our allies, while lightly equipped for their northward advance, rescue some innocent local civilians along the way and evacuate the lowlands, these people could potentially become witnesses to our humanitarian work in the future! This could potentially lower the enemy's morale—

If the fleeing Billy King soldiers in the east knew that their generals had breached the dikes and drowned their own people, while we were rescuing them, would their resolve to break through to the death still be so firm? Would they waver a little more when considering surrender?

Captain Andrei was stunned by Lelouch's series of deductions.

It must be said that compared to the Easterners, the Demacian officers were far too naive in their use of tactics such as propaganda, psychological warfare, and counter-espionage.

Lelouch simply flipped through a few pages of the Twenty-Four Histories and military strategies he had read in his previous life, and these straightforward officers were already amazed.

Andri swallowed hard and said with difficulty, "Then... when are you going to send the message? If it's too fast, won't it provoke those Biligin people to immediately breach the dike?"

Lelouch: "It won't be quick! I need you to provide me with a few soldiers who understand Frankish or Netherlandish as assistants! I need to translate the broadcast message into a foreign language before I can send it! The translation will take at least half an hour!"

Andri gritted his teeth: "Fine, even if the defensive pressure is high, we won't miss a couple more people! I'll find you a translator! You guys just focus on translating and sending messages in the basement! We'll handle the fighting up there!"

Corporal Lelouch, I don't think you're an ordinary sergeant. Even if you didn't go to military academy, I guess you went to university, right?

Lelouch recalled the history of this body and frankly admitted: "You guessed right, I am actually a citizen of the Oreo Empire, but also a Demanian."

I was always the top student in math in my entire school, and I had just graduated from the Royal College of Art's architecture department in July. I was just about to look for a job when the war broke out. I didn't like the mixed ethnic atmosphere in the Oreo army, so I preferred to cross the border and join the army in the Kingdom of Barea in Demania.

“No wonder you’re so smart.” Captain Andre suddenly realized that everything made sense. “With your expertise, you should be in the engineering corps, not the communications corps. It’s such a waste of your talent that the people in charge of enlistment only made you a corporal.”

(End of this chapter)