"Retreat quickly, French, retreat quickly!"

Mitterrand heard someone shouting at him in French, but he still didn't get up and was still firing randomly with the m1 rifle in his hand. He knew that the Germans had "beaten" and now it was the opportunity to defect to freedom.

But the opportunity passed by him again. He was pulled up and dragged backwards. The man ran while saying in stiff French: "Now is not the time to fight hard, we have to leave here quickly..."

Mitterrand turned his head and looked at the man. It turned out to be the platoon leader Flam (Brandt), who had just been promoted to the lieutenant. He was about to pretend to fall, and then he threw away the annoying Nazi. A loud "boom" came from behind.

Mitterrand quickly looked back and saw that the explosion smoke had not yet dissipated on the battlefield illuminated by the flares. Amid the smoke, a huge T-26 (m-26) tank seemed to be lying down, and the armor plate on the right side of the front was charred. It was obvious that this unlucky tank pressed on the German "Taylor Magnetic Anti-Tank Mine". The "Taylor Magnetic Anti-Tank Mine" is a powerful magnetic mine with a load of up to 5 kilograms, which is enough to blow up the chassis of the m-26 tank.

However, this 41.9-ton big guy did not completely lose his combat power, and the m2 Browning heavy machine gun at the top of the turret was still firing violently. The other m-26 and m4a3 tanks on the battlefield stopped advancing and began to shoot wildly with machine guns and artillery.

The fires with these tanks were also the US self-propelled artillery, and perhaps some towed artillery. The shelling came quickly and violently, which was in sharp contrast to the "slow" of Soviet artillery on the Soviet-German battlefield. Brandt, who had fought hard on the Soviet-German battlefield, even believed that the US artillery and tank coordination level was almost comparable to that of the German army!

Faced with such firepower, Brandt dared not continue running. He pulled the crater that might have been scared by the fierce artillery fire and jumped into a crater that had just been blown out by shells. All veterans on the battlefield knew that the crater was a good place to avoid shelling, because there were not many 2 shells falling on the same point (it would not appear if the fire density of the shelling was not large enough).

Just as Brandt and Mitterrand jumped into the crater to avoid shelling, Lieutenant Colonel Schwarzenegger had commanded the armored cluster to retreat next to a small lake. Small lakes and swamps are very common on Newfoundland Island, but it is still a relatively cold April, and most of the swamps have not yet thawed, but the ice on the lake has melted, and now it is full of ice, which has become an inaccessible danger.

A road built through the small lake, which is the main passage to Grace Harbour to the south. Although the terrain of Newfoundland is mainly a platform, it is not a critical point (it is a critical point to attack from the beach, and it is not difficult to move on the platform). There are many places for tanks to pass through, but the road is still the fastest. Moreover, the US Armored Division and Infantry Division also have a large number of wheeled vehicles, which are not suitable for off-road.

In addition, Grace Port is now facing a fierce attack by German troops, and most of the US troops who are providing rescue will not choose to pass through the wilderness.

So Lieutenant Colonel Schwarzenegger decided to set up an ambush on the side of the road based on a lake full of ice, and delay the Americans again.

When Lieutenant Colonel Schwarzenegger was busy deploying his tanks and tank destroyers, the American bombardment stopped again. Brandt and Mitterrand had good luck (they got together, and their luck would naturally not be bad), and climbed out of the crater without any damage and continued to retreat. On the way to retreat, the two also saw two burning German armored vehicles and incomplete bodies scattered around that were scenting and smelling burnt, as well as other damaged weapons and fragments of unknown things.

Seeing this scene, Mitterrand thought: The German paratroopers suffered some losses in the round of artillery attack just now.

"French," Brandt suddenly said to him at this time, "Don't worry, these losses are nothing. The Americans are still too slow to act. They beat too carefully, and they do not have the ruthlessness of the Russians, otherwise we will be miserable."

His analysis is not bad at all. The 16th American Armored Division, which is now attacking, actually has enough power to crush and block the German army that only needs to lose more than 100 tanks and add two or three thousand casualties.

Not to mention the Soviet Red Army, even if the US elite troops who fought the bloody battle in the Hawaiian Islands were replaced, the German blocking troops had been defeated. However, most of the elite troops transferred from the Pacific battlefield went to the Caribbean battlefield, and the troops who drove to Newfoundland had never been on the battlefield. Even Major General Ross, who was commanding the battle, had never been on the battlefield in this world war.

Although he is a division commander of an armored force, his way of thinking is still positional warfare. Tonight, the combat method he adopted was also a very war-like "infant artillery and tank combination propulsion". He fought carefully. When he encountered the "stubborn blockade" of the Germans, he immediately used overwhelming artillery fire to hit the squad, and then crushed it with tanks and infantry. With such steady and steady battles, he advanced nearly 5 kilometers in just three or four hours. Such results were good during World War I, but they seemed very conservative at present. After all, the 16th Armored Division is an armored force with sufficient mechanized forces.

"General, our advancement can be accelerated a little." Colonel Kabayev, Major General Ross' Soviet adviser, was timid than Major General Ross a few hours ago, but now he is brave.

"Can you still speed up?" Major General Ross stood on a high ground, holding his arms and looking at the tanks and infantry that were organizing an offensive formation on the flat ground below, and asked with a smile, "Isn't it fast enough now? At this speed, you can advance to Grace Harbor before dawn."

Kabayev shook his head and said, "Major General, the Germans don't have many tanks and tank destroyers, there are about thirty vehicles. As long as we are not afraid of losses, we can definitely defeat them quickly and then take another hour to rush to Grace Harbour."

"Aren't you afraid of losses?" Major General Ross frowned. He had heard of some Red Army's fighting styles on the Soviet-German battlefield regardless of casualties.

"Yes! We still have 55 m26, m4a3, m10 and m36 that can be activated, and the number of m26, m4a3, m10 and m36 can exceed 150. We will concentrate and attack the wave, and lose up to 100 vehicles and 1,000 to 1,500 soldiers, and we can completely defeat the enemy in front of us. Moreover, most of the vehicles can be repaired. The Germans do not have 88mm and 105mm artillery, so their damage ability to the vehicles is limited."

Although this Soviet Red Army tank soldiers colonel was very young and was a cadre promoted after the Great Purge, after the baptism of the Soviet-German War, his understanding of the German army and the use of armored soldiers had reached a very clever level. However, his oriental baby face (he was a Kazakh) and GC-centric warrior still made his words lack such credibility.

"Vehicles are not a problem," Major General Ross shook his head, "but it's too much to lose 1,500 people to save two or three hours..."

His armored division is not large, less than 14,000 people, and now there are three or four hundred casualties. If he fights 1,500 more, the casualty rate in one night will be as high as 14%, which is too many.

"Major General..." Colonel Kabayev frowned. He could not imagine that a major general division would care about the losses of less than 1,000 or less than 2,000 lives. "Time is tight, if you don't hurry up, Port Grace and Port Cabernier will likely be occupied by the German army."

While the two were talking, a staff officer from the division came to the front in a jeep and reported loudly: "General, I just received a notice from the military headquarters that the Germans have occupied the Port of Calberney."

"What?" Major General Ross was stunned, "So quickly?"

"Where is the Port of Grace?" Colonel Kabayev asked hurriedly. "How is the situation there?"

"Very critical." The staff officer replied, "The Germans ignored the casualties and the offensive was very fierce!"

"Major General!" Kabayev immediately persuaded, "If the Germans occupy the Port of Grace, they will have two available ports... Once the ships ships carrying reinforcements drove into Consepsin Bay, we will have great trouble!"

Major General Ross seemed a little hesitant. After thinking for a while, he shook his head and said, "Port Cabernet is larger than Port Grace, and there is also a fishing port called "Expected Bristol" nearby, which will probably fall into the hands of the German army soon. In this way, the Germans have two ports that can be used on Newfoundland... It doesn't matter whether there is Port Grace, so it's better for us to make steady progress."

Kabayev sighed in his heart. He knew that the American major general in front of him had made a conservative mistake. This was a common mistake for the "old man" who was inexperienced but had a high position... Now the Americans are probably going to fall into a tough battle on Newfoundland!

Almost at the same time, Lieutenant General Fraser, the British commander on Newfoundland, had arrived at the fiercely fighting Harbour in Grace in a Fairmare B-class gunboat.

The battle in the port area has come to an end. Unlike Major General Ross's 16th Armored Division, the Germans' fierce attack on Grace Harbor is completely inconsistent with casualties! Tank No. 4 was directly involved in street fighting, risking being destroyed by anti-tank firepower to approach the building complex guarded by the US military, and bombarding every house with 75mm artillery! Their paratroopers were like man-eating beasts in the dark, rushing towards all the bullets and shells that were fired at them, rushing towards the buildings that were smashed into ruins by tank guns, and then no one could drive them away from there again.
Chapter completed!