My Italy - Chapter 693 Battle of Egypt (2)

On January 7, the sky was clear, and the early morning sun could not make the earth hot. At this time, Admiral Bartlett looked at his pocket watch, and the pointer pointed to 9 o’clock.

“fire!”

The order from the headquarters ordered more than 200 artillery pieces deployed on various artillery positions to fire violently at the enemy in the distance.

The fierce artillery fire destroyed everything on the ground, whether it was barbed wire or bunkers, they were all destroyed by the intensive artillery. At this time, the officers and soldiers of the 1st Regiment of the 37th Division of the British and Indian Army who were hiding in the trenches outside the border town of Sallum had never seen such a scene.

There were constant explosions on the position. These Indian soldiers were not trained enough. The soldiers of the 37th Division of the British Indian Army were mainly Bengalis. This race is not as brave and combative as the Sikhs (compared to other ethnic groups in India).

Therefore, the morale of these Bengali soldiers continued to decrease under artillery fire. Especially the screams of the wounded soldiers made these soldiers turn pale. Even if the British officers leading the team kept motivating them, it was difficult to maintain their morale. There were even people who were dominated by the fear of shelling and ran away in fear without obeying the officer’s orders.

But fortunately, these people are very few. And running in the sky under gunfire is such a stupid thing. Either he was hit by artillery fire or the officers enforced military law, and a fresh life was lost in this way.

The bombardment lasted from nine o’clock to eleven o’clock.

During the two-hour shelling, the positions deployed by the 37th Division were riddled with holes. Sections of the barbed wire fence were blown apart, and most of the positions and bunkers were incomplete.

Similarly, the attacks of more than 200 artillery pieces frightened the officers and soldiers of the 37th Division of the British and Indian Army because they had never lost their energy. In addition, their division was only formed in June last year. It takes half a year to complete various trainings for officers and soldiers and transport them to the front line in Egypt. How is this possible?

Just the basic training of a soldier takes three months. Even if London does not regard these Indian soldiers as human beings, it still takes two months of basic training. Then there is the tactical training of squads, platoons, and companies, as well as other aspects of training. Normally, it can barely be completed in one year. If not, it will take at least ten months.

Going to the battlefield in half a year, these soldiers have a problem if they don’t panic.

Lieutenant General Capello, commander of the Fourth Army who was responsible for commanding the battle, keenly saw the enemy’s panic and immediately ordered. “Let the 4th Division launch the attack and order the 16th Division to contain it from the flanks.”

Under the order of Lieutenant General Capello, the two divisions sent troops to attack the enemy positions outside Salum from the southwest sides. The 4th Division and the 16th Division simultaneously sent a regiment to attack the enemy positions.

“attack!”

Under the leadership of the officers, the soldiers hunched over and rushed towards the enemy’s position.

Although this doesn’t look good, it is the best way to reduce casualties in a charge.

This is indeed the case. Straightening the waist increases the area of ​​​​the upper body, which also increases the chance of being hit. As for crawling, it is not only slow but also very energy-consuming, and can only be used in the last distance before charging.

At this time, facing the Italian attack, the British and Indian soldiers on the position also raised their rifles and fired at the enemy amidst the officers’ orders.

The marksmanship of these Indian soldiers who lack sufficient training is somewhat difficult to explain, and the hit rate of continuous shooting is touchingly low.

If you want to rely on these soldiers alone to repel the enemy’s attack, you can only rely on God’s help. The British officers had no choice, even if they whipped them desperately with whips.

Fortunately, Colonel Rodney of the 37th Division did not have such thoughts. He trusted more in the power of the Vickers heavy machine gun and the Lewis light machine gun.

I saw that when the Italian officers and soldiers attacked to a distance of 500 meters, the machine guns behind the position opened fire. The hail of bullets from nearly a hundred machine guns hindered the attack, and the soldiers were overwhelmed and unable to lift their heads.

Faced with the enemy’s intensive machine gun fire, the offensive troops also had methods.

“Mortar, knock out the enemy’s machine gun fire for me.”

An officer saw that his soldiers were suppressed by enemy machine gun fire and could not move, and immediately ordered mortars to attack the enemy machine guns.

At this time, a 60-meter mortar team had completed the construction of a position in a bomb crater. After the observer carefully identified the location of the enemy’s machine gun, he immediately spoke. “Shoot Zhuyuan, azimuth angle 21, shooting angle 63!”

With a “bang”, a 60mm fragmentation bullet hit three meters to the left of the machine gun position, which startled the cheerful British and Indian soldiers.

“Quickly move position.”

The experienced British leader of the machine gun team immediately shouted loudly, and the members of the machine gun team immediately prepared to move the machine gun to the next position. However, the hot machine gun was not easy to move. While the machine gun team was still preparing, the Italian mortar fired again.

The low voice was getting closer and closer.

“Lie down!”

The team leader yelled and immediately fell to the ground with his head in his hands. The clever team members also imitated the team leader and lay down on the enemy. The dumber ones didn’t know what was going on and stayed in place.

However, no matter whether they were lying on the ground or standing still, they saw a 60mm mortar shell land directly and accurately in their machine gun position.

“Boom!” An explosion sounded in the machine gun position, and scattered shrapnel penetrated the figure standing in the position, and some shrapnel hit the unlucky guy lying on the ground.

For a moment, the machine gun position turned into a Shura field. At this time, the team leader and a lucky man coughed and stood up. The barrel of the Vickers heavy machine gun they used had been bent and could no longer be used. .

Situations like this can be seen everywhere along the entire defense line. In addition to the 60mm mortars, the battalion’s 82mm mortars and the regiment’s 120mm mortars were all firing.

But for the front-line infantry, the most important thing is the company-attached 60mm mortar. This gun does not need to wait, and its weight of 19.3KG can also accompany the soldiers in the attack. The rate of fire is extremely fast and the accuracy is pretty good. It is truly the best quality artillery.

Regarding the role of mortars, Britain and France have the most say. After suffering from it, Britain, France and Russia did not hesitate to seize it and start to imitate it.

At present, mortars from the Allied Powers have appeared on the east and west fronts. I believe that it will not be long before both sides have a large number of mortars.

Let’s stop talking about mortars and turn our attention back to the battlefield.

Under the suppression of various firepower of the Italian army, the attacking troops were close to the enemy’s trenches.

“Come in.”

Amidst the shouts, the Italian troops rushed into the trenches.

Hand-to-hand fighting broke out, but compared with the brave Italian soldiers, these Indian soldiers of the British and Indian Army were much worse. The cooperation was not tacit, the assassination movements were not standardized, and the Italian soldiers had trench sweepers such as submachine guns and shotguns. The hand-to-hand combat ended in less than a quarter of an hour.

The defenders fled towards Salum in the rear at a speed that only wished their parents had lost two legs.

At this time, General Bartlett, who had watched the entire attack process, spoke to Lieutenant General Capello beside him. “Colonial divisions like the British are so bad at fighting. I want to sleep in Salum at night.”

“As you command!”

For Lieutenant General Capello, he did not think the general’s request was excessive. Judging from the peripheral battle that just ended, the opponent couldn’t hold it back within two hours, which fully illustrates many problems.

He was confident that he would capture Salum before dark, so after the general left, he issued the order “Order the 4th Division and the 16th Division to prepare for battle. I want to have dinner at Salum.”

As Lieutenant General Capello’s order was issued, the fighting in Salum broke out again. The shelling had just stopped for two hours, and this time it opened fire on the city of Salum.