After the voice coming from the machine called the "recorder" disappeared, the huge room fell into silence like a morgue.
The room was hung with thick black curtains, and the sunlight outside the window could not illuminate the world inside the room at all. In the dark room, there was only the faint red light provided by the tepidly burning fireplace.
On the wall, the white Star of David loomed in the dim and flickering light, while the faces of the people sitting around the fireplace were always hidden in the darkness.
"'Boys and girls who wear the Star of David will be able to work hand in hand with white boys and girls.' This dream is really, really tempting, Your Excellency, Secretary of the Navy." Finally, one person in the shadow said this.
, "I haven't heard such an impassioned and passionate speech for a long time. It reminded me of my youth. At that moment, my blood seemed to be boiling again, almost making my old blood vessels unable to bear it.
live."
"But," another person said in the darkness, "can we really believe this declaration? Can we really believe the goodwill of the Chinese people? The European government also did what we did when it needed our money and business capabilities.
I have made such beautiful promises, but now, without exception, those promises have become examples of the hypocrisy of human nature."
"Yes, human nature is hypocritical." The third person said, "In my life, I have seen so many deceptions that it makes people wonder whether mankind has lost the love of God."
"But even in this ugly world, there are still beautiful things." The fourth person seemed to be expressing his different opinions to the first two people in a subtle way.
As a result, silence fell into silence again by the fireplace. Only the crackling sound of burning firewood sounded in the room from time to time.
I don’t know how long it took, but the old man who first spoke said: "The German government has issued a new order, allowing us to join the army and serve as officers. The young people are gearing up, hoping to win the recognition of the Germans through bloody battles.
To gain a suitable position for us in German society. I thought, why don't we give the Europeans one last chance before turning to the Oriental for help?"
"Hmph, it must have been another deception in the end."
"But we have gotten used to it, and the Lord has taught us to be patient."
"At the same time, the Lord also teaches us to always have hope."
It seemed that an agreement was reached between the four of them, so the old man in the lead stood up from the sofa. His face appeared in the firelight for the first time. It was an old and wise face with deeply sunken eye sockets.
Shining with perseverance.
He picked up the Bible on the table, pressed his hand on the gilded cross on the cowhide cover, and said with great piety: "May the Lord bless us, Amen."
"Amen." The other three responded.
What the old people didn't expect was that outside the door of the room where they were conferring, someone was squatting in the corridor, quietly eavesdropping on their words using small gadgets that were stuck into the room from under the door.
"Well..." the girl fiddled with the gadgets in her hands. "Damn it, I can't even hear what grandpa and the others are saying!"
As she spoke, she angrily threw the thing on the ground beside her, put her hands on her knees together, and raised her neck to look at the exquisite reliefs on the ceiling - even among the generally wealthy Jews, who could live in such a gorgeous house?
It is also rare.
"However, I heard the Eastern man's speech very clearly."
The old people in the room just played the English version that was re-translated and recorded by Lin Ji's translation agency. Many live sound effects were added during the recording, so the girl thought that Lin Youde was speaking in English when he gave his speech...
"I have a dream. I dream that one day, the valleys will rise and the mountains will fall; the bumpy and tortuous road will become a smooth road, and the holy light will be revealed and shine on the world. What a beautiful sentence, what a beautiful dream!" The girl repeated the sentence she just heard,
His face was slightly intoxicated.
Return to the battlefield.
General Kluck and General Bulow of the German right wing attack group were confused. Their troops were progressing smoothly on the right wing. Although the advance was slower than expected, it was still within an acceptable range. Moltke and France
Jin Han also sent a telegram expressing satisfaction with their work.
What confused Kluck and Bülow was that although their troops were progressing smoothly, their casualties were much greater than expected.
In order to clarify this problem, Kluck specially visited the field hospital, asked the wounded soldiers about their conditions on the front line, and tried to figure out where these excessive casualties came from.
Soon, Kluck understood the situation as he wished: the submachine guns in the hands of the French had caused huge damage to the Germans. Since Lin Youde widely used this type of individual rapid-fire weapons in the Sino-Russian War, various military units have followed suit.
The Chinese equip their troops with submachine guns, but the scale of equipment varies greatly from country to country.
The Germans believe that this kind of weapon has only one effect in the hands of poorly trained and inexperienced soldiers, and that is a waste of ammunition. A popular view is that an ordinary big-headed soldier with a submachine gun will just fire randomly, destroying all the bullets on his body.
There is no enemy. Therefore, German submachine guns are equipped with elite troops. Correspondingly, the German submachine guns have complex structures, very good firing accuracy and firing stability, are also more expensive, and require more manufacturing time.
many.
The French army's submachine guns are mainly purchased from Holland. They are simple in structure and low in price. Bullets fly all over the sky when fired, and their accuracy is extremely poor. French commanders who advocate offense believe that fierce firepower can effectively increase the number of soldiers who can kill the enemy during the attack.
.So the number of submachine gun equipment of the French front-line troops is equivalent to that of Lin Youde's Marine Corps, and their firepower is very fierce.
This is where the German troops suffered.
When a small group of French troops encountered a large group of German troops, they would often shoot them with submachine guns until they ran out of bullets and then simply raise their hands and surrender. This behavior caused terrible casualties to the German troops.
And this also made the grassroots commanders of the German army finally realize what mistakes they had made before: lack of training of new recruits, even if they hold a slow-firing, high-precision gun like the Mauser 98, they may not be able to eliminate them before they run out of bullets.
an enemy.
So now, the German front-line troops are picking up the Chinese submachine guns dropped by the French. They discovered that the submachine guns produced by the Chinese and their Mauser military bullets are actually universal, so the demand for Mauser military bullets on the front line suddenly increased...
…
After understanding this, Kluck sent a telegram to the German headquarters to request that he immediately start imitating the captured Chinese submachine guns, and at the same time asked his procurement officer to increase the supply of Mauser military ammunition to the frontline troops.
As a result, the right wing of the German army, which was gradually getting fiercer, came to a situation where troops from both sides were using cheap submachine guns made in China to fight against her.
Although they suffered far more casualties than expected, the German troops showed that they were far superior to the average European army. Many front-line troops have been disbanded, but the soldiers are still heading towards the attack target under the leadership of grassroots sergeants.
go ahead.
The German army is indeed the army with the highest quality of individual soldiers in Europe. If it were the French or British army, they would never be able to maintain an offensive posture when they suffered such casualties and the troops were disorganized to this extent, without the need to stop advancing and regroup.
The whole troop.
On October 13, 1908, the German troops on the front line were already in extreme fatigue, and so were the French troops. The French were exhausted in their retreat, and the Germans were exhausted in their attack. They were mixed together, and they were all over the mountains and fields.
, the Germans didn't even bother to fire at the French who were also running away in their field of vision. The French wanted to fire, but they didn't have much ammunition anymore.
On October 14, Kluck encountered determined resistance for the first time.
Lieutenant Jack led a platoon of the British Expeditionary Force to dig trenches on the edge of this bush for five days.
Jack's father is a poet. He has written many passionate poems in the past month to praise the resistance to German atrocities.
Jack, who is short-sighted, joins the British Army and becomes a second lieutenant.
Military life was a little different from Jack's imagination. His platoon was all veterans of the Boer War. They didn't take Jack seriously at all and always called him "Little Mao Tou" and other insulting titles in Jack's opinion.
He, on the other hand, ignored Jack's orders.
This made Jack very distressed. Whenever it was quiet at night, Jack would lie on the camp bed that was not comfortable at all, and he would think of his warm home, school, friendly classmates and strict but kind teachers. All of these seemed
So far away, now the only things around him are rude and foot-picking men, the smell of cigarette smoke and dirty trenches.
"It sucks," Jack wrote in his diary, "It all sucks. How I wish the fighting would start as soon as possible. Then at least I would have something to do instead of being laughed at in the trenches all day long.
.”
As if someone had heard Jack's wish in the dark, in the early morning of October 14th, Jack was unceremoniously woken up by a big man who suddenly broke in and picked his feet.
"German Army, Mr. Second Lieutenant, the German Army has appeared!"
It was very strange that Jack did not feel the usual contempt for himself from the sergeant in front of him, which made him wonder if this was a trap set by these veterans to see him panic.
For fun. So he forced himself to be calm, picked up his glasses with a very calm movement, wiped them, put them on, and then asked slowly: "How far away are we? Can you see how many people there are?"
"It's not far away. They will be in front of us in ten minutes. There is a whole line of skirmishers! There are still people coming out of the woods behind!"
Jack read the shake on the old sergeant's face, and was finally convinced that this was not a joke on him. At the same time, he almost instinctively realized that the veteran was habitually seeking spiritual support from the officers - before the company, the battalion
The major in the military once said to Jack: Once a battle breaks out, even a rookie officer will become the support of the soldiers. The soldiers look at you, look at your epaulettes and big caps, and they need you to show courage.
So Jack took a deep breath, showed his unprecedented dignity, and ordered to the sergeant: "Don't panic, we have fortifications, and the Germans must be exhausted after walking so far. Let's fight hard.