The Rise of the Third Reich

"Why do they have so many infantry? Where do they come from? Who asked them to come?"

On January 15, General Patton's loud voice suddenly rang out in the British and American Allied Forces Headquarters in a secondary school outside Darlington (near Hartlepool and Middlesbrough).

Outside the headquarters, large groups of American infantrymen were driving from the direction of Darlington Railway Station, carrying rifles and packages. These infantrymen were the reason why General Patton, who was rushing back from the front line on the Teez River to attend the meeting, was annoyed.

"George, who provoked you this time?" Bradley's voice, commander of the U.S. 28th Infantry Division, reached General Patton's ears.

Patton turned his head and looked over and saw that Bradley, dressed as a soldier, had appeared in the headquarters with a dusty appearance, carrying an M1 carbine on his shoulder.

"Omar, it's so sad to see you." General Patton walked over quickly and hugged his old friend. "So, those dejected infantrymen outside are all your people?"

"Dejected? I don't think they are all good guys." Bradley frowned as he looked at Big Mouth.

"They will soon become dejected, as if a disaster is imminent!" Barton lowered his voice, "Because they are really going to be in big trouble... Omar, we can't stay here! Your people have to leave quickly. , go to Edinburgh, and then board a destroyer to escape from this desperate battlefield!”

"Oh my god! Why did you say that?" Bradley was stunned by Patton's words. He knew that Patton was a militant and very courageous, and would not be frightened by the cruel battlefield at all.

Patton pulled Bradley into a smelly toilet. When he saw that there was no one else inside, he sighed and said, "The situation is terrible. After the bad news came from London, the British began to slack off. , they have had enough of the war and are thinking about the days after the armistice.

Moreover, the Germans are very difficult to deal with. It turns out that the Germans have an honest propaganda minister. Goebbels, who is often ridiculed by us, did not lie. The German soldiers were all blond and blue-eyed supermen! My tank is as fragile as paper in front of them! "

Patton smiled bitterly and said: "Now the Stodonk and Tees River Bridges can't be taken down at all! And part of the British army inserted along the Tees River between Hartlepool and Middlesbrough, and part of them surrounded it from the other direction. Hartlepool and Middlesbrough...actually formed a stalemate!"

"I know, that's what I'm here for," Bradley said. "Lieutenant General Stilwell thinks that if we work harder, we can break the deadlock."

It turned out that Bradley's 28th Division was the original that Stilwell wanted from Eisenhower. As soon as the turmoil in London subsided, Stilwell personally went to Eisenhower to ask for troops, and promised to capture Hartlepool and Middlesbrough.

Eisenhower was not willing to give up on Britain just like this, so after consulting Washington, he sent the heavily armed 28th Division (their weapons were not given to the Bolsheviks) to Stilwell.

"Nonsense!" Patton stamped his feet, "No other general on the Hartlepool-Middlesbrough battlefield would think so. Stilwell's optimism has reached the point of being hopeless! This is a disease. !”

General Patton has been commanding at the front these days and is very familiar with the situation of the German and British troops, and his Second Armored Division has also suffered a lot. Two-thirds of the M10 tank destroyers have been damaged in battle, and this was achieved without seeing any German Tiger tanks.

What worries Patton even more is that the morale of the British army has plummeted since the "London Troubles". The British gentlemen have already recognized the cruel reality - Britain has been defeated, and now the question they have to consider is how to defeat gracefully!

However, Stilwell stubbornly believed that there was still a chance of victory on the Hartlepool-Middlesbrough front, so the US military should go all out to win the battle, and then consider whether to withdraw from Europe as a winner.

Before the war meeting began, Patton and Bradley were first taken to Lieutenant General Stilwell's office by a captain.

The overly optimistic Stilwell said to the two: "George, Omar, the Hartlepool-Middlesbrough battle is probably the last battle for the British, so they are ready to go all out. This is for us. It is also a good opportunity...an opportunity to deal a heavy blow to the German Nazis!"

Hearing Stilwell's reasons for optimism, Barton just shook his head feebly. Stilwell ignored him and just kept talking: "The British Guards Armored Division, 1st Armored Division, 6th Armored Division, 11th Armored Division (just transferred from Ireland), 1st Infantry Division, The 3rd Infantry Division (also just transferred from Ireland), the 15th Infantry Division, the 51st Infantry Division, the 52nd Infantry Division and the Cumbria Division are all here, and we have the 2nd Armored Division and the 28th Infantry Division. The infantry divisions, with a total strength of 12 divisions and a strength of nearly 200,000, should be able to win.”

"Lieutenant General, but my armored division is almost out of tanks." General Patton reminded. "Several British armored divisions have also lost a lot of tanks... Now the five armored divisions on the Hartlepool-Stalmeier Fort frontline only have a maximum of 350 operational tanks."

The battle from the afternoon of the 9th to the present, in the words of General Patton: "This is simply a series of anti-tank tactical exercises! If you hadn't seen it with your own eyes, no one would have thought of such a big guy like the M10. , to be so fragile, so vulnerable!”

Although the U.S. Army has been paying attention to tank warfare on the European battlefield, it has also hired some Soviet instructors to teach the expeditionary officers and soldiers the secrets of tank warfare and anti-tank warfare. But when he faced the Germans on the battlefield, Patton discovered that the Germans were more capable of dealing with tanks than he had imagined and even better than what the Russians had introduced.

The effective range of the German "Pektok" anti-tank grenade launcher is not the 30 meters mentioned by the Russians, but a full 100 meters! In the Battle of Stodonk, the losses of the armored group commanded by Patton reached alarming proportions!

In addition to the "Iron Fist", Germany's light troops also have another anti-tank weapon - recoilless rifles, including 88mm and 105mm. The range of these weapons exceeds the Iron Fist and can reach 200-400 meters. The armor is also powerful enough to deal with the American M10 and the British Churchill tank/tank destroyer.

As for the German anti-tank guns, General Patton was even more eye-opening. Not only did they have large calibers (almost all of them were 75mm), but they were also all motorized and lightly armored. It can't be dealt with at all by mortars, and the effect of covering fire with heavy artillery is not good either.

And their No. 3 assault gun is well-deserved. It can hit infantry, tanks, and fortifications. It is very powerful. It is also particularly good at ambushes. It always likes to use its low body to hide somewhere and suddenly hit you. Caught off guard.

In addition to the amazing anti-tank firepower, the German infantry also had powerful firepower that surprised General Patton. Almost every one of them has a "light machine gun", and the firepower of one squad can equal that of a company of the US military!

During battles, these infantrymen who use "light machine guns" often attack the side of the M10 tank destroyer in a roundabout way - the M10 tank destroyer has a hand-cranked turret that is very inconvenient to rotate, and only has one anti-aircraft machine gun installed. The commander must jump out of the turret and stand on the engine cover to operate!

Therefore, this tank destroyer must rely on infantry protection to charge on the battlefield. The infantry who could protect the M10 tank destroyer were often hit with heavy casualties by the Germans using intensive "light machine gun" firepower.

After the M10 lost the infantry cover, they became the prey of various German anti-tank firepower.

However, Stilwell did not regard Patton's troubles as insurmountable difficulties. He said: "George, don't worry about the lack of tanks. Your 2nd Armored Division will be replenished. We have stockpiled tanks in Edinburgh. A batch of M10s and M4s are on their way to the front line. In addition, 120 tank crews will be transferred to you from the 8th Armored Division (also part of the American Expeditionary Force), giving you 3 days to reorganize the troops. The coalition will launch a general offensive on January 19th. We will first remove the nail in Stodonk, then counterattack Middlesbrough, and finally Hartlepool!”

In fact, it was not just the British and American forces that were preparing to attack. At the same time that Stilwell was handing over the offensive mission to the two American division commanders, Patton and Bradley. In Hartlepool, Rudolf von Ribbentrop had just accepted a spearheading mission from his superior, Major Max Wünscher.

His 22 Tiger G tanks will attack from Hartlepool 10 hours later, in the early morning of January 16, 1943, under the cover of early morning darkness and winter snow!

This attack had been planned on January 10. The 506th Heavy Armored Battalion, the 516th Heavy Armored Battalion and the 3rd Tank Destroyer Battalion would fight with the infantry of the 2nd Marine Division and the Italian 185th Lightning Division. A temporary tactical group was formed, commanded by Lieutenant General Walter Wink, and launched a counterattack from Hartlepool to Stodonk, 13 kilometers away.

The distance is only 13 kilometers. If the counterattack goes smoothly, the assault can be completed in up to half a day. By then, at least two British and American divisions will be trapped south of Hartlepool, north of the Tees River, and east of Stodonk. level cluster will be surrounded by the German army and then ruthlessly crushed.

Although the scale of this counterattack was not large, the instructions issued by General Halder clearly told all officers and soldiers participating in the counterattack that considering the current political situation in Britain, the victory of this counterattack is likely to end the war that began in 1939. The Anglo-German war that continues to this day!

Therefore, this will be a battle that will go down in history!