Chapter 5 The British Two-Front War (2) Repair

  I'm back. I quickly browsed through the chapters that were hastily uploaded, and there are mistakes galore. It's clear that writing a book in a hurry is not feasible. When you rush, accidents will happen...

  On 1 November 1914, the elderly pre-dreadnoughts of the Bellerophon and St. Vincent classes and the battlecruisers Invincible, Neptune, Colossus and Orion, the latest King George V- and Iron Duke-class dreadnoughts, the problematic Indefatigable class battlecruisers and the powerful Lion-class battlecruisers all assembled in Lough Swilly off the north coast of Ireland.

  Since the outbreak of war, the British Empire's naval department has been repeatedly defeated for hundreds of years, with its leaders being anxious and worried.

  In the Pacific, Admiral Spee's bluff had caused the British Empire to divert troops to East Asia in a state of high alert, but news from South America dealt a severe blow to the British Admiralty. The British Naval General Staff was determined to save face and intended to annihilate Admiral Spee's East Asian fleet, but the Royal Navy, which claimed to exist globally, embarrassingly found that they had almost no troops to dispatch.

  In the Indian Ocean, the German light cruiser K?nigsberg escaped under the surveillance of three British cruisers day and night, and sank the HMS Pegasus. The Emden light cruiser wreaked havoc in the Indian Ocean, despite being surrounded by over 30 Allied warships. The British Admiralty had to withdraw troops from East Asia and Africa to try to strangle the "Swan of the East" and the K?nigsberg hiding deep in Lake Tanganyika.

  In the Mediterranean, due to the presence of Goeben, two Invincible-class battlecruisers of the Mediterranean Fleet led by Admiral Berkley Milne were tightly pinned down in the Aegean Sea. As the Turks' hatred for the British Empire grew thicker, the Royal Navy had to reinforce the Mediterranean fleet with gritted teeth, and the legendary seven-turret sacred object, the former Turkish Sultan Osman I, now known as the Agincourt battleship, appeared in Alexandria, Egypt in September.

  In the North Sea, the situation was even more chaotic. During Heidekamp's tenure as commander of the Heligoland Bight defensive circle, the German Navy had been poking and prodding at the Royal Navy with pinpricks, and on August 23, they launched a surprise attack in the Battle of Heligoland Bight, tearing apart the British Empire's tiger skin without mercy. On August 25, Kaiser Wilhelm II forbade his High Seas Fleet from engaging in further battles, and Heidekamp was suppressed and lost actual power. The British Navy was overjoyed, and while they were secretly planning a massive counterattack, the German Navy suddenly brought out Heidekamp's concept of "asymmetric warfare", which he had proposed as early as 1897. Submarine ambushes, torpedo boat attacks, and mine warfare erupted one after another, leaving the newly rebuilt Harwich Force on high alert, while the Channel Fleet sealed off more than half of the English Channel with countless mines, and even deployed heavy troops to guard the remaining entry points.

  The powerful Grand Fleet was not doing well either, and out of fear of the unfamiliar submarine warfare, the Orkney Islands patrol fleet misreported the discovery of German submarines on October 17. The commander of the Grand Fleet, Jellicoe, really disliked those German submarines that were like flies on the bone, and asked the Admiralty to install a submarine defense facility consisting of guard ships, trawlers, patrol boats, minesweepers, destroyers with towing devices, seaplanes, and underwater anti-submarine nets in Scapa Bay. After discussion by the Naval Committee, the Admiralty decided to build a perfect anti-submarine net in Scapa Bay, and authorized the Grand Fleet to retreat to the coast of Northern Ireland on October 24 for several days of rest and gunnery practice.

  November 1st at 9:00 am, Swilly Bay was calm and sunny with a gentle swell rocking the battleship Dreadnought.

  The HMS Audacious was the third ship of the King George V-class dreadnought battleships, with a full load displacement of 25,700 tons, main engine output power of 27,000 shaft horsepower, and a top speed of 21 knots. It was equipped with 10 dual-mounted 13.5-inch/45-caliber main guns, 16 single-mounted 4-inch/50-caliber secondary guns, and 3 21-inch torpedo tubes, making it extremely powerful. However, its defensive armor was not impressive, with a 12-inch waterline belt armor and an 11-inch turret front armor that paled in comparison to the German contemporaneous K?nig-class's 350mm main armor, only matching the 1908-built Helgoland-class battleships.

  As the signal flag was hoisted on the flagship Iron Duke, the cumbersome anchor of the battleship Audacious, belonging to the 1st Battle Squadron of the 2nd Battle Squadron, was pulled out of the muddy seabed by chains, accompanied by a slightly intoxicating sea breeze and the roaring of whistles, the Audacious followed the main force of the fleet to sail out to Swilly Bay.

  Private Kapero was a gunner on the 4-inch gun of the battleship Audacious. He stood near the port side of the Audacious, looking at the giant guns of the nearby German warships flying the Iron Cross flag, and a sense of pride arose spontaneously.

  "The Grand Fleet is far superior to the High Seas Fleet, why don't we go to the Germans' doorstep and annihilate the High Seas Fleet, instead of being driven by those German iron coffins submarines to the desolate Swilly Bay?"

  Young gunners were full of grievances, in his view, the grand fleet should continue to attack with honor and glory, like European knights in the Middle Ages, defeat the German ocean fleet with elegance, rather than being suppressed by a young German officer named Heidekamp and some light cruisers, destroyers and submarines with a displacement of less than 5,000 tons.

  "The French are at the end of their tether, and they urgently need British supplies and troops. The majority of our light naval forces have been withdrawn to the Channel Fleet and the English Channel for convoy duties, the rebuilt Harwich Force is worn out, and the fleets in the Far East, Mediterranean and South America are being held down by German overseas raiders. Now we don't have enough strength to deal with those small, fast and agile German light naval forces. It's not suitable to send these expensive big ships to fight against them, even if we win, but what if they accidentally hit a torpedo or a mine? We would be the sinners of all eternity..." The gunner of the 4-inch cannon came to the young gunner's side and comforted him in a low voice.

  The gunner's explanation was convincing, but the careless Capero did not hear the almost inaudible whisper of the gunner who had turned his back.

  "Is it safe to just hide in Swell Bay......"

  It seemed to confirm the gunner's suspicions, as a dull sound came from beneath the waterline of the battleship Audacious, which was moving at high speed. The massive hull shook slightly, like a boxer clenching his fist. A second later, the boxer's heavy punch struck again, and a sharp, piercing explosion ripped through the water, pounding against Capeiro's eardrums, leaving him momentarily deaf. The Audacious's hull began to shake violently, with its 20,000-ton body jumping up about a meter at an angle of left inclination, even the seaweed-covered shellfish attached to the hull and the explosion hole on the starboard side about ten meters wide were clearly visible. A few seconds later, the battleship Audacious crashed back into the sea, sending a massive column of water high into the air, sweeping everything on the deck - the gunner, Capeiro, lifeboats, and all objects - down into the unfathomable depths.

  "Betty, we've got a problem! The Audacious has struck a mine!" Lampard exclaimed, rushing into the Lion's command tower with his binoculars.

  ****

  The deafening cannon fire gradually subsided, and the dazed, swaying earth returned to calmness.

  At noon on November 1, 1914, a certain highway highland in the French Marne province's eight hundred kilometer defense line, which had been repeatedly pounded by Krupp heavy artillery, finally got a moment to breathe. The German artillery retreated, and the choking gunpowder smoke and flying dust gradually dissipated, leaving the flattened French position suddenly plunged into an eerie silence before close combat.

  "Get the damn cat out of the bunker!" Corporal Bunidu grabbed his old Glaser rifle and, using his coarse Toulon dialect and sharp fists, kicked a group of new recruits who were cowering in the bunker: "You bastards, get back to your positions, the German devils are about to attack!"

  Although he couldn't hear what Bunyod was saying, the vicious expression and gestures of the second lieutenant were rich enough. The 19-year-old French soldier De Kas painfully rubbed his deaf ears, got up dizzily, and felt his way in the dark to his old-fashioned Gras rifle, gritted his teeth and ran towards the trenches.

  This is a highway stronghold in northern France near the coast, according to the French Ministry of Defense's plan, this will be a safe rear, with only a small number of troops guarding it. However, the war situation changed rapidly, and the French army, which had been aggressive before the war, claiming to advance north to recover Alsace-Lorraine and occupy the Rhine-Ruhr region, soon tasted the thrill that their ancestors had experienced. The German army was not in vain, they easily captured the French border fortresses, and this coastal highway quickly became the lifeline of the British and French armies defending the Marne River, so Cardis's reserve troops were urgently reinforced by the Ministry of Defense to here. After the Battle of the Marne, the main force of the German army began to move towards the coast, after a series of short exchanges of fire, the Anglo-French army was defeated, and this highway naturally became the front line.

  The First World War was the most devastating war in human history. Within three months of its outbreak, the elite troops deployed by France on the northern border had vanished, and the number of casualties among British reinforcements was enough to dwarf the bloodiest battles of the Boer War. Fighting continued to this day, with distinctions between regulars and reservists, front-line and reserve units, old soldiers and new recruits, French, British or Belgian troops becoming increasingly blurred. Reservists were instantaneously promoted to regulars, then wrapped in shrouds and carried off the battlefield; reinforcements were surrounded by German forces before they could reach their assigned positions, mysteriously becoming front-line troops, supporting for three to five hours before mysteriously being annihilated; old soldiers disappeared in units as small as battalions, while new recruits with the latest Lebel or antiquated Gras rifles became veterans after firing a few shots, helplessly becoming senior privates and corporals, waiting for their next Hamlet-style existential questioning (to be or not to be).

  Dikas was a raw recruit, and since the outbreak of war he had not even fired a gun. On August 2nd, famous white mobilization orders were posted in every street and alleyway in France, with the tricolor flag printed on them, under the agitation of nationalism and revenge by the government and politicians, Dikas, son of a peasant from the central plains of France, joined the army without hesitation, and was assigned to the reserve troops. Due to the urgency of the war, after a week of crash training, Kardis and his comrades were hastily sent to the front line, while their northward road was crowded with defeated regular armies of England and France and the remnants of Belgium which had already lost its country.

  When Private Dicas climbed up the highway from the reverse slope of the anti-tank gun cave, this scene in front of him shocked him: The thirty or so meters high hill standing by the side of the road seemed to have been cut off by more than half by intense shelling, and the deep and shallow trenches disappeared. More than 100 officers and soldiers who were left on the position disappeared, machine guns placed in the bunker disappeared, and a French tricolor flag inserted on the undulating main peak - 103 high ground was torn to pieces.

  "What are you all staring at? Fix up the trenches! Do you want to be shot by the Germans or what?"

  Bunion's loud voice echoed across the battlefield, Dekkas borrowed a shovel and started digging frantically on the battlefield that had been plowed by cannons. The several feet thick floating soil was quickly cleared away, just as Dekkas decided to strike while the iron was hot, the sharp shovel seemed to have cut into something, and blood gushed out of the deep black earth with a smell of gunpowder.

  "Ah!" The young private was so frightened that he dropped the shovel in his hand, retreated continuously, and then tripped over a stone and fell to his knees on the pine soil.

  The unusual excitement of the private startled Corporal Bouniard, a veteran who had been through the Battle of the Marne. He came over, knelt down on the ground, and with his rough iron hands began to dig into the black earth stained with blood. Soon he unearthed a body still warm with fresh blood.

  That was a tender and delicate body, Bonnie's face didn't change color or heartbeat as she carefully probed the nostrils, shaking her head and cursing: "Merde, just died recently, wasted my effort!"

  A warm breeze swept over the high ground, a corpse that had been identified lay lonely and helpless on its back in front of the trenches, not far from the head, a bunch of blue cornflowers covered with dust were dancing in the wind.

  "Don't be afraid, kid. The German heavy artillery may be fierce, but we're not out of options!" Corporal Bunido, who was only a few years older than Cadiz, sighed inwardly and patted the pale-faced new recruit on the back to comfort him: "Let's count down the time, the British should have landed their heavy artillery support for us by now. Cadiz, I swear, no later than tomorrow, we'll use the British heavy artillery to give the Germans the most ruthless counterattack!"

  "Lower your sights, there's no need to wait any longer, the German devils have launched a charge, and the British heavy artillery that was supposed to support us has long been sent to the bottom of the sea..." The commander of the highway heights, Major Mire, walked over with his waist bent, crouching in the trench, his eyes full of despair. "At dawn, a German fleet raided the port of Rostock, and German minelayers took advantage of the situation to lay mines in the main channel of the English Channel. At 8:44, a British transport convoy encountered German mines, and one escort destroyer and six transport ships sank, destroying a British infantry regiment and a large quantity of supplies, including our heavy artillery!"