I Became a Plutocrat in World War I: Starting with Saving France-Chapter 785

The rain poured down, as thick as smoke and mist.

The lead-gray sky resembled an iron plate, weighing heavily on the land along the French-German border.

Pools of rainwater quickly gathered into small puddles, disrupted by subsequent raindrops, forming turbid ripples.

German Army soldiers clad in raincoats systematically continued constructing their unfinished fortifications inside the trenches.

Opposite, in the British Army’s trenches, Major Monty could vaguely see through binoculars the water and mud being flung out by the German Army.

Occasionally, Monty would envy the Germans.

Their soldiers could construct trenches perfectly under any circumstances.

As for the British and the French Army, they’re fortunate if their trenches don’t collapse or get flooded in the rain. Improvement would require divine intervention.

As for the Colonial Army, the African Legion struggles even with simple trenches.

Next to Monty, British soldiers stood quietly in the trenches in neat formation, holding their rifles, rainwater trickling down their tommy helmets, soaking their faces.

Their eyes were filled with unease, their chests heaving like weighed down by stones, some had trembling lips yet restrained themselves from the impulse to flee.

Someone whispered:

"Why don’t they let Shire command? Even just hearing his opinion would be good."

"Indeed, we are allies. Just a word from Shire might prevent thousands of casualties, why not?"

"Shh, quiet. Do you think our commander-in-chief would admit he’s lesser than Shire?"

...

Everyone fell silent.

Soldiers only sacrificed lives, while generals lost face!

Suddenly, three red signal flares soared into the sky with sharp screams, casting a red light on the soldiers’ fearful faces, flickering like blood.

"Boom."

"Boom, boom, boom!"

...

Dense artillery fire instantly poured towards the German Army’s defense line, explosions lighting up the sky as fragments of fortifications and mud were flung up.

Shells kept striking the ground, the smooth terrain blasted into craters, wire fencing shattered into scattered lengths.

Firing were the British Army’s 6-inch 30-pound howitzers and 20-pound howitzers.

After over a month of rest, to "rejuvenate," they transported over 300 large-caliber artillery and hundreds of thousands of shells from home base and the United States, now crazily pouring onto the German positions.

The bombardment persisted half an hour, still ongoing, gradually advancing into the German Army’s depths.

Sharp whistles followed, rising and falling around the trenches, officers yelling hysterically:

"Advance, boys, kill them all!"

"Today is a good day to die, let’s fight for glory!"

"Victory is ours, pick up your rifles!"

...

Tanks led the way out of the trenches along the slope, soldiers like ants crawled out and followed behind, crowding densely into a mass resembling a light-green ocean.

By now, it’s common consensus to attack like Shire with skirmishing formation.

But in the stubborn Haig’s eyes, skirmishing indeed reduces own casualties but also diminishes impact on enemy defense line.

"The attack mainstay is infantry, without density, even if soldiers rush into the trenches they can’t conquer them, we mustn’t make this rookie mistake."

Haig firmly believed this and persisted, defying opposition, to use dense formation for assault.

Soldiers didn’t believe it, but were helpless, without decision authority; they could only advance according to orders.

The only comfort was the new tank with 5 turrets.

Hoping they’d be effective, British soldiers silently traced the cross on their chests.

Suddenly, shells roared closer, fireballs exploding among the crowd, people screaming as they were tossed into the air. 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

Blood, severed limbs, and unidentifiable body parts and entrails "splattered" down, the rain seemed to turn red.

Suddenly another fiery explosion, a tank turned into a fireball, yet continued moving forward by inertia.

"Hold steady!" an officer shouted waving his pistol in front: "Stick behind the tank, it’ll protect us..."

Before he finished, a shell exploded near the officer, throwing him several meters away by the shockwave.

Passing soldiers clearly saw the officer, covered in blood, face shattered like porcelain dropped on the ground, filled with bright red cracks, blood seeped from his eyes, mouth, and nose; he struggled a bit before kicking his feet, moving no more.

Within the thunderous artillery came scattered gunfire.

To British soldiers, that was good, it meant they’d reached the enemy’s defense line.

However, peeking from tank cover, soldiers discovered it only was the German Army’s frontline warning defense.

The warning defense was no match.

It got crushed in the British Army’s tidal offensive in barely ten minutes.

New recruits cheered loudly, morale boosted, they thought surely the new tank played its part, next defense line would be just as easy.

But veterans wore grim expressions, lips turned pale from tension, some quickly hid within the newly captured trench.

Veterans knew before retreating, German Army at the warning defense line usually reported back to artillery positions by phone: "Enemy has entered position, fire in five minutes!"

Sure enough, shortly afterward, shells rained down across the British ranks, unleashing a bloody storm.

...

Shire was watching motorized unit exercises with Tijani in Bicangxi.

The German Army’s 105MM howitzers had successfully converted into truck-mounted artillery, enhancing both marching speed and deployment speed.

"Communication is key," Shire instructed Tijani: "These units are mobile, meaning they primarily have to use radio to contact frontline units most of the time."

Tijani looked troubled: "But the radio is very unstable, prone to malfunction, moreover we have to implement your ’hit-and-run’ strategy, leaving us barely any time to set up radios."

Without observational points from frontline artillery, long-range artillery were almost blind.

Thus communication became a major issue.

"There’ll be improvements," Shire said: "For now, the solution is equipping more radios as backup. Also train a batch of qualified radio operators, requiring both swift action and repair skills."

Otherwise, no amount of backup radios would suffice.

"Yes, General," Tijani replied.

Just then a communications soldier ran up to Shire and handed over a telegram: "General, the British Army launched an offensive against a German defensive line, reportedly deploying new tanks."

He added a sketch, drawn according to intelligence officer’s narration.

Shire took a glance at the sketch, nearly burst out laughing.

Using infantry tanks to break the Hindenburg Line? Nothing short of suicide!