Chapter 191 Tank Base

Finally, the price of the shells was set at 15 francs per round, which was exactly ten times that of the hand grenade.

But of course, Charles still made a lot of money.

The cost of the mortar shells was only 5 francs, and he could earn 10 francs per round. In the future, thousands of them would be thrown at the enemy on the battlefield. Every time Charles fired a round, his pocket would "jingle". No wonder there is a saying that "a cannon shot is worth a lot of gold".

…

That morning, more than two hours before Charles' training course started, Schneider headquarters received detailed information about the mortar.

Paulina handed the statistics table to James' desk, with a helpless tone: "The military has placed an order for the first batch of 200 mortars and 50,000 shells, equipped with an infantry division and tank unit. If the trial goes well, this type of gun will be equipped with all 44 divisions on the front line, and even the reserve army!"

James, who was staring at the document in a daze, nodded heavily: "A division needs 100 guns, and the entire army needs more than 5,000 guns. If you add the damage, malfunctions and aging, Saint-Etienne will receive a steady stream of orders and astronomical shells!"

Paulina sighed softly: "They have tried their best, but they can't stop the use of mortars in the army, because they all agree that this is the artillery needed on the front line, and refusal means death."

James said "um" to show his understanding. He hesitated for a while and said to Paulina word by word: "I don't care about the money. I just want You know, where did we lose? Is it technology, experience, funds, or something else? Why are we powerless to fight back against the attack in Charles? "

"Sir!" Paulina replied: "I think it's still the reason I said before."

James recalled for a moment and said: "Actual combat experience? But Charles doesn't have it either!"

"But Charles can think of what the army needs!" Paulina also didn't understand this, but she still thought it was like this: "He seems to know how to win, how to defeat the enemy, strategy, tactics, and even what weapons can work on the battlefield. All he has to do is produce these weapons, and we don't even know there are such weapons!"

James nodded slightly. Paulina's analysis was very accurate, from tanks to rocket planes to machine gun planes, and then to the recent grenades and mortars...

Every piece of equipment can defeat the enemy at a critical moment, and every piece of equipment is irresistible.

As the officers said, "Rejection means death and failure."

James was a little frustrated: "Such an opponent holds the lifeline of the war. How can we defeat him? Or, just watch him eat away at our territory?"

Paulina stood up straight and replied: "I think we should study him, sir!"

"Study him?" James' eyes lit up and nodded in agreement: "That's right, Paulina! I need to know the detailed process of his command of each battle!"

"Yes, sir!" Paulina responded calmly.

...

It was rainy in the 12th district of Paris. A few kilometers east of Lyon Train Station, it was a wasteland. It was on the edge of Paris and could even be said to be a suburb.

Between the hills and trees, people would not notice that barbed wire had been pulled up here and a military restricted area had been marked out by soldiers with live ammunition setting up sentries.

The core of this military restricted area is a basin surrounded by a small mountain, where the first tank base of France was located.

This was for confidentiality reasons. Since the tank unit won the victory in the La Fox area, the only tank unit in France was pulled to this base for protection.

All the highlands and woods were checked and guarded, and the area within a radius of three kilometers was cleared. Fighter planes were even arranged to patrol in the air to prevent enemy aircraft from approaching for reconnaissance.

The tank unit was organized into the First French Tank Brigade, with Colonel Browne as the brigade commander and Colonel Estiny as the chief of staff.

Gallieni's idea was that such troops should not be sent to the battlefield in a hurry, but should summarize a complete set of tactics in the rear training, and then send them to the battlefield in batches for verification after having more tanks and replicating the tactics.

"They represent the highest combat effectiveness of France!" Gallieni said firmly: "The tactics of this unit may subvert all French combat theories. If their victory can be replicated, it proves that they are correct, which will become a solid tactical theoretical foundation. Therefore, we cannot allow it to have any possibility of leaking secrets!"

Therefore, the tank base is only allowed to enter but not leave, except for people like Charles and Estiny.

But even Charles needs to apply in advance to explain the reason, and has to go through layers of inspection.

When Charles saw Colonel Brownie, he was sitting in the sidecar of a sidecar looking at a training map. A few Mark I tanks were roaring and training infantry in the mud a hundred meters away.

Brownie was so absorbed in the map in his hand that he didn’t notice Charles approaching until the guard reminded him.

“Charles!” Brownie exclaimed. His tense face blossomed into a smile like a flower the moment he saw Charles. He jumped up from his seat and gave him a warm hug: “I was just thinking about you. I didn’t expect you to come! Look at you, you’re already a major. You’ll be my superior soon, right?”

Charles smiled and didn’t answer. He asked casually: “How is it here? Colonel, is everything okay?”

Brownie laughed: "This is great. As a tank base, we can meet all our needs. The only thing that makes me regretful is that you are not here."

Speaking of this, Brownie raised the training map in his hand and complained: "They asked me to summarize a set of tactics. Isn't this the job of you and Colonel Estiny?"

"You are the brigade commander, Colonel!" Charles explained: "In principle, everything is related to you. To put it another way, if you don't have a full understanding of tactics, it will be difficult to accurately command troops to fight on the battlefield in the future!"

"I know!" Brownie rolled his eyes: "But I miss the old days. I didn't need to consider anything before, I just needed to consider how to kill the enemy!"

"So, is there any problem?" Charles raised his chin towards the training map in Brownie's hand.

"Oh, yes!" Brownie remembered the problem that had troubled him just now. He took the training map and came to Charles, writing: "I am thinking about a problem. What if our tank troops encounter the enemy's ambushed artillery troops? I mean, the Germans' 77MM field guns!"

Charles nodded slightly. This is what the Germans often do.

The German M field gun was far inferior to the French 75 gun in terms of range, rate of fire and accuracy, so the Germans often hid it near the defense line to provide fire cover for the infantry within visual range.

Since they couldn't fight the enemy's artillery anyway, they simply hid near the front line and waited for the French to pull up their artillery to suddenly attack them.

And this kind of fighting method posed a great threat to tanks!