Four Hundred Fifty-Five Street Fighting

A German soldier with dusty shoes bent over and jumped into a pile of rubble. He held his steel helmet in one hand and a G43 rifle in the other. When it slid into the bottom of the pit, it brought up a cloud of dust.

"Sir! There are some British soldiers in the opposite building with machine guns in their hands." The soldier in charge of the investigation saw his company commander and platoon leader in the bomb crater. Near the crater, there were about 70 German soldiers scattered.

The company commander carefully looked at the map near the block, and then looked at the deputy beside him: "The enemy has set up defensive positions here and here. If we attack directly, we will suffer losses. Either wait for the 'Demolition Brigade' For those rocket launchers, either go around and try to attack them."

"Wait a minute, the news from the battalion said that in the afternoon, we will have some powerful support weapons rushing over." The deputy looked at the map, gestured twice and said, "Such a dilapidated block, come here by force." not worth it."

There was a rumbling sound from the corner of the street, and a huge gray monster appeared at one end of the street, followed by another strange tank, but the black and white iron cross on the tank's body reassured the German grenadiers. few.

The first was a German No. 3 assault gun. There was nothing special about this tank, but looking at the dozens of records on the barrel, one knew that this assault gun was definitely the best among the infantry. And the strange car body of the No. 3 tank in the back is also a strange car body, which makes the soldiers a little strange.

On the hull of the No. 3 tank, there is a round semi-open turret that looks a bit huge. The front of the turret is not a cannon, but four small cannons that look majestic. That's right, this is a German 30 mm caliber quadruple self-propelled anti-aircraft gun tank. Usually these special vehicles belong to the air defense force of the division headquarters, but now they have been transferred over to participate in street battles as the hottest "super weapons" in urban warfare.

"Hey! Let me tell you! Is this what the battalion is talking about as support?" A grenadier swallowed his saliva, and asked the comrades and company commander who were standing there in a daze. He heard that this thing is powerful, it is even more powerful than the "building demolition device" in the hands of those engineers.

"I don't know..." The company commander of the grenadier shook his head, but there was a hint of a smile in his eyes. The support he expected was nothing more than some rockets and other weapons, but he didn't expect such powerful equipment to arrive. It seems that the attack will become extremely simple for a while, and his troops will be able to lose a few fewer soldiers.

Soon the German army's new round of attack kicked off again. This time it was the No. 3 self-propelled anti-aircraft gun that started. Out of the dazzling tongues of fire.

"Boom! Boom! Boom!" The shells easily pierced through the thick concrete building, smashing the furniture inside into shattered powder, carrying gravel and broken steel bars, these metal torrents penetrated It swallowed the body of the person inside, and then splashed around with blood and broken limbs. In just ten seconds, a building guarded by dozens of people in the UK became a ruined wall full of bullet holes.

Apart from the desperate groans inside, there was only the occasional sound of falling gravel.

"Boom!" There was a crisp gunshot. The British defenders finally started to fight back, but compared with the overwhelming firepower of the German army just now, this gunshot was as weak as a groan.

"Ding!" The bullet hit the artillery shield directly in front of the No. 3 self-propelled anti-aircraft gun, creating a spark, but the bullet was obviously no different from the thick anti-aircraft gun shield, and soon the anti-aircraft gun The huge turret began to rotate, aiming at the window that had just fired.

"Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!" The four anti-aircraft guns roared again, and the shells directly hit the window full of holes, and the entire window frame fell to the street. The shells hit an oval shape. The German grenadiers who watched behind had no doubt that the people in this room were absolutely dead and couldn't die anymore.

Because the self-propelled anti-aircraft gun has a high enough elevation angle and relatively comprehensive armor protection, it is like an artifact in this kind of street fighting. Because it has to deal with targets such as aircraft, this weapon can adjust the angle of the turret very quickly. Relatively The reaction time is also shorter, so it is faster to deal with threats from all directions.

After a long period of use, the German army has also mastered the method of using this weapon in street fighting. For example, arrange assault guns to accompany the battle to deal with possible threats from the opponent's tanks; for example, let the infantry cover the rear, protect the vulnerable rear open turrets of the anti-aircraft guns, and so on. In short, this weapon is very easy to use in street fighting, and it is simply the most terrifying weapon for tackling tough battles.

With an order, the German grenadiers began to jump out of the trenches and charged the British position from several directions. However, the British defenders who were supposed to fight back did not come until the German army rushed into the building , Only then came the sparse gunshots from inside.

Ten minutes later, a German platoon leader with a cigarette in his mouth walked out of the building and came to the company commander leaning on the fender of the self-propelled anti-aircraft gun: "It's done, there are 45 British soldiers inside. When we went in, there were only 45 British soldiers left." 17 of them, fighting for a while in several rooms, we got 2 killed and 4 wounded."

"When are you leaving?" the company commander asked the sergeant standing on the anti-aircraft gun hull.

The commander smiled slightly, pointed to a street corner not far away, and said with a strong Ruhr accent: "We were ordered to help you take over there, and then go back to the division headquarters to replenish ammunition and fuel."

Then the engine of the tank was passive, and the exhaust pipe shook and spewed out thick black smoke. The German offensive continued, and the British began to retreat from the surrounding area. Just half an hour later, the Germans occupied half a block nearby, took control of two bomb shelters, and wiped out about 200 British soldiers.

The grenadier's company commander sent off the armored vehicles that supported them, stepped down a British air-raid shelter that smelled of decay, and saw the disgusting sight inside.

This place may have been abandoned for a few days, and there are corpses piled up here and there. Although it is only March, insect repellents and swarms of flies can already be seen inside. Because the ventilation fan was turned off, the temperature was very high, so the corpses here also began to rot and deteriorate.

There were civilians in the corpses, about dozens of them, and it could be seen from the tattered clothes that there were children and old people, as well as men and women. Of course, the faces of these corpses have long been unrecognizable. It is unbelievable that, judging from the scene, many people were killed by grenades. In the center of this air-raid shelter, a few grenades exploded, and it was over. The lives of these bodies in this bomb shelter.

Of course, there are more than a dozen corpses of British soldiers, which were obviously moved later. It was the soldiers who were killed by the nearby British defenders. When it was still controlled by the British, it was used as a huge morgue.

From some details, it can be seen that this place was once used as a hospital and headquarters, but it was abandoned because of a power outage. A few bandages were messily discarded next to the corpses of two wounded British soldiers who had obviously been rescued, and a few maps were thrown on the ground, which looked dusty.

"Notify the people from the engineering battalion to come and deal with this place." The company commander covered his nose with his hand and frowned and said, "Tell everyone, don't stay here overnight, and try to stay away from here as much as possible after disinfection."

Looking back at a corpse without wrists lying not far away, judging from the traces, it was the British soldier who exploded here holding a grenade. I don't know why he made the move to die with these civilians, but obviously many people were not killed by the bombing, but left the once crowded air-raid shelter.

The German grenadier company commander walked out of the air-raid shelter and returned to a place where the sun could shine. He turned around and asked his deputy: "Have you checked in another air-raid shelter?"

"It was very clean, just a few dozen panicked British refugees. They surrendered their grenades and were very cooperative," replied the deputy, lighting himself a cigarette.

The company commander nodded, suddenly remembered something, and continued to ask: "Are there any prisoners?"

"Yes! Two wounded soldiers." The deputy replied: "Their men didn't take them away when they left. They were both seriously injured. I guess it would be useless to know that taking them away."

"Well." The company commander also lit a cigarette, then threw the empty cigarette box at his feet, and said with a wry smile: "Give them a good time, we don't have any extra medicine to waste for them. Let the brothers Let's hurry up and eat something, on time at 3 pm, we will try to attack again."

This is war. When you see dozens of corpses lying in front of you, you have no other special emotions except nausea. You no longer feel pity or sadness. What you have is indifference, which makes people unable to distinguish between good and bad. indifference.

When ordering the execution of the other side's wounded soldiers, there is no longer any sense of guilt, because it is just a matter of course. In the next second, it is possible that those saved medicines can save yourself-of course, can these medicines save you? Save your conscience at the same time, and only God knows.

On March 21, street fighting continued in London.