Unlike the fierce and bloody front of the battlefield, the senior officers of the command headquarters behind the mortal legions have always maintained an almost cold look at the battlefield.
In the empire's command sequence, the biggest difference between commanders at the regiment level and those above the regiment level is whether they can break away from their own perspective and turn the casualties on the battlefield into cold numbers.
This kind of ability cannot be cultivated day by day, because the cost is too high. In most cases, such officers have already shown signs of it during the lieutenant stage, and are noticed by senior officers and promoted later.
This is completely different from the standards of the lower-level soldiers of the Imperial Army. Of course, the soldiers prefer "parental" officers who eat and live with them.
In other words, in terms of normal human moral standards and spiritual needs, this is in line with the needs of most events in the entire group's long existence.
But war is just an exception. It has been known as anti-human and anti-humanity from the beginning. All normal human moral needs are shortcomings here, and all normal behaviors for the survival of human groups are flaws.
In a word, the essence of war is against humanity.
Therefore, when the art of war has been studied and studied by the human race for tens of thousands of years, they clearly understand that the logic of the middle and upper levels of war is completely opposite to the logic of the bottom level.
The more you care about the survival of the entire human race, the less you care about the damage to a corner;
The more you want to win a comprehensive victory, the less you can dwell on local costs.
This is the true selection criteria for officers:
The most basic quality requirement for a qualified officer who has separated from the grassroots front line is that he must be able to take a broad view of the overall situation regardless of the gains and losses of a city or a place.
And right now, this is the case for the legion commanders deep behind the positions.
"The 42nd Infantry Regiment is in urgent need of ammunition! Coordinates
B9 position needs to be replenished!"
"The 33rd Motorized Infantry Regiment has approached the enemy at close range! Found a heavy armored unit! Coordinates
B2, request heavy fire support!"
"The 19th Anti-Aircraft Armor Regiment encountered a Tzeentch Demon teleportation raid, coordinates
C15, the target has been eliminated! But most of the weapons are damaged, please change the defense!
Information from the front is raining down from the forward headquarters, and the messengers and communication rooms are overloaded with requests for help from all sources.
"Notify the 42nd Regiment that the legion's transportation unit set off 5 minutes ago, let them hold on for a while longer!"
"Notify the 12th Heavy Artillery Regiment of the coordinates
B2 frontier progressive shooting, three bases!"
"Notify the 16th Armored Air Defense Regiment and arrive immediately
Position C15 takes over the defense! The 19th Regiment is prepared on the spot and can be replenished at any time!"
After seeing the information on the desktop screen, Chief of Staff Colonel Eric frowned and quickly issued the order. After writing it, he confirmed it with his fingerprint and encrypted it and sent it out.
After finishing his work, he raised his head from his seat and inspected the status of the entire hall:
The staff are updating the situation between the enemy and ourselves on the holographic map based on the latest information feedback at all times.
The mechanical priests and officers of the Munitions Department are also always paying attention to the material stocks and the latest consumption index on the front line, and are ready to send materials from behind the second line to support at any time.
In the hall of the entire legion headquarters, seemingly chaotic information is being sorted out in an orderly manner and handed over to decision-makers for processing.
In contrast to these busy backgrounds, in the dim corner below the holographic map, the commander of the Corps, Major General Horn Chavez, is wearing a black and gold uniform coat, holding his pipe in his mouth and thinking silently in the clouds. p>
Compared with these officers who are busy with specific affairs, the veteran who decides the direction of the entire legion's battle is the one who is under the greatest pressure.
Colonel Kane, the chief political commissar of the regiment, tried to interrupt his thinking several times, but he raised and lowered his hands and finally chose to remain silent.
The feedback from the positions of the forward troops that were close to the enemy was very bad. The position was easily lost within ten minutes after entering hand-to-hand combat. Although it was later recaptured by a counterattack organized by the regiment's political commissar, whether battlefield discipline needs to be enforced again is
A question he has been struggling with.
Killing is very simple, just one bullet. But after the command sequence is paralyzed, can the regimental political commissar assume complete tactical command responsibilities?
After a moment of success, what should we do in the next battle? Just rely on the regiment-level political commissar's gun to collapse, the whole team, and follow me?
What to do next after you finish swinging? The bullet is always the most deterrent when it is not out of the chamber, and the battlefield discipline of the political commissar is also the same.
As a veteran who has served as a political commissar of a legion, this is very clear.
So the question is, should he trust the commander at the front? Or to put it more clearly, should he trust the ability of the legion commander in front of him to recognize people?
Colonel Kane decided to wait a little longer. It was true that he had his own difficulties, but the pressure on Horn was even greater. This was an undoubted fact.
Major General Horn, the commander of the Corps, is also making a difficult choice. As Kane knows, what he is facing now is a seemingly stable situation, but in fact it is a mess.
The large forces have already deployed to engage the enemy, and there is no room for retreat and adjustment. However, the defense line of more than ten kilometers, with 32,000 troops invested, is too thin. Fortunately, the pressure from the direction of Nurgle and Slaanesh is not too great.
This gave him a chance to breathe.
This battle mission was beyond specifications from the beginning. Such a narrow defensive front should not have been able to be defended by a mere legion.
However, the war situation is urgent, and soldiers always have no chance to choose their enemies and battlefields.
Whether it's honor or a sense of mission, as the elite of the advance army, they are bound to take on such a difficult task.
The extremely large front line and the larger than expected number of enemies were temporarily notified before the airborne landing. In desperation, they could only activate the worst plan among the emergency plans:
Minefields are arranged in the front-line positions to delay time, while the existence of the second-line troops is actually to prepare for the flexible defense based on subsequent counterattacks.
As for the third-line troops? Sorry, Horn does not have a third-line force. If you take a step back, it will be a ruin.
It’s hard for a good woman to make a meal without rice, this is true in 40K
The same applies to the universe. The current situation is really difficult for this old man who is over fifty years old.
What to do? What to do?
Major General Horn stood up again and looked at the holographic screen. He examined the intertwined red and blue sides on the battlefield situation map.
The six infantry regiments in front have already engaged the enemy, and the five air defense and armor regiments are too small in number and are purely supported by functional equipment.
So excluding the departments directly under the corps, Horn has only three integrated regiments of reserve troops.
Once thrown in in advance, it is like a stud on the gambling table, which means that he has led the entire army to play a gamble in which he loses more and wins less. What is the price? What will happen if he loses? Horn does not dare to think about it, nor does he want to
Think about it.
The chief of staff and political commissar were also aware of his actions, and they understood that the decision the top leader of the legion was about to make would affect the fate of the entire legion.
The entire command hall was affected by the decision Major General Horn was about to make. Everyone's eyes followed his figure, and the atmosphere became quiet and anxious.
At this time, on the huge clock on his left, 49 minutes had passed since the next airborne reinforcements.