The Twilight of Empire: Starting from Dunkirk

Chapter 139 The Ghost of Paris

June 14, 1940, 07:30, Paris, France, Champs-Élysées.

Paris is dead.

The morning mist had not yet dissipated, and the surface of the Seine shimmered with a cold, gray light. The streets, usually filled with the cries of vendors, the ringing of tram bells, and the whispers of lovers, were now shrouded in a deafening silence.

The blinds were tightly shut, like the closed eyelids of a dead person. The leaves of the plane trees along the roadside trembled in the breeze; apart from that, the entire city seemed to have been drained of air.

Then, the sound came.

At first, there was a slight tremor in the ground, like a distant subway running illegally. Then, the vibration turned into a deep, continuous rumble, very low in frequency—the sound of a cluster of Maybach HL120TRMV-12 gasoline engines running. It was the sound of tens of thousands of tons of surface-hardened Krupp steel plates crushing the granite pavement.

That was the sound of Jackboots (German military boots) with iron heels striking the heart of France at a pace of 114 steps per minute.

Click, click, click, click.

This is not the rhythm of human walking; it is a countdown from a terrifyingly precise war machine.

Major General Erwin Rommel stood in his vehicle—a Panzerbefehlswagen II with the serial number "01".

On the turret of (Command Tank No. 3).

On this special day, he did not choose the half-track vehicle. Because today, he belongs to the armored corps. He is the spearhead of this steel torrent.

Behind him was the main force of the 7th Armored Division.

Two columns of Panzer III and Panzer IV tanks were slowly advancing at a parade speed of 15 kilometers per hour. The low-frequency roar of the Maybach HL120 V12 engines converged into a wave of sound, which, after being refracted by the massive dome of the Arc de Triomphe, became deafening.

This is the ultimate display of German industrial power.

But these cars are not "perfect".

Although the crew cleaned the vehicle overnight before entering the city, washing away the mud from the Ardennes Forest, the water could not wash away the scars on the steel.

These tanks weren't just parade toys fresh off the production line; they were monsters that had crawled back from the brink of hell. The dark gray anti-rust paint was covered with hideous scratches and charred marks—the "kiss marks" left by the Royal Navy cannons that Arthur Sterling had summoned during the retreat.

Although these tanks were lucky enough to be far from the epicenter of the explosion, the near misses and shockwaves from the large-caliber high-explosive shells still stripped away some of the paint from the tank surfaces, revealing the rough Krupp carburized steel underneath. Some of the Panzer IV tanks even had shrapnel embedded in their side skirts, twisted by the high temperature, showing how close they had come to death.

But this tragic and dilapidated appearance gave the 7th Armored Division a more chilling and intimidating power than its "brand new" appearance.

Rommel wore goggles, his peaked cap pulled low. A Leica camera hung around his neck, but he didn't raise it. His hand, gloved, rested lightly on the gun shield of the 37mm KwK36 main gun—one finger unconsciously tracing a deep groove in the metal, a mark left by shrapnel.

This slender cannon barrel not only survived a near-breakage by the Matilda tank in Alas, but also trembled violently on the scorched earth outside Dunkirk, ravaged by heavy artillery fire. Amidst the destructive roar of the Royal Navy's 16-inch naval guns, it and the tank almost became a pile of scrap metal in a crater, leaving no trace of their remains.

"Sir, this is a historic moment!" The driver's voice, brimming with barely suppressed excitement, came through the radio inside the tank. "We're on the Champs-Élysées! Place de la Concorde is just ahead!"

"Maintain formation, Schmidt," Rommel's voice, cold as ice, came through the throat microphone. "Watch the track tension. The surface here is hard."

He did not share the ecstatic joy of his subordinates.

As the commander of this "ghost division," he knew better than anyone what lay beneath that glossy paint. His gaze swept over the 37mm main gun. Too thin. Against the British Matilda I infantry tanks, the tungsten-core armor-piercing rounds fired from this barrel would be utterly useless, except to make a sound.

If he hadn't risked his life to draw the 88mm anti-aircraft gun horizontally and fire, the ashes of the 7th Armored Division would now be buried in the farmland of Alaska.

Rommel's gaze pierced through his goggles and fell upon the crowds on both sides of the road.

To intimidate the whole of Europe, the bearded man specifically ordered that Parisians be allowed to watch the parade from a distance.

He saw fear, without a doubt.

But he was also looking for something else; he was looking for the sense of industrial oppression he felt in the port of Le Havre, the kind he felt from across the strait.

He instinctively touched the pocket on his chest. There lay a sterling silver cigarette case, a relic of the British soldiers' corpses, belonging to Stirling Industries.

Arthur Sterling, AS.

That name haunted the victorious army like a ghost.

The Germans won because of their tactics, their radio communication, and the French people's folly.

But in the head-on confrontation, Rommel knew he had lost.

"Look over there, sir," the gunner whispered.

Ahead, the grandstand of the Hotel de Crillon was clearly visible. A huge banner hung from the balcony, almost completely obscuring the building's facade. And beneath the banner stood the Empire's high-ranking generals.

General Fedor von Bock, leading a large contingent of commanders from Army Group B, stood on the reviewing stand.

This typical Prussian Junker aristocrat was beaming. He straightened his back, frequently raising his hand in return, basking in the most glorious moment of his life. For him, this was the ultimate cleansing of the defeat in 1918.

But half a step beside him, General Heinz Guderian stood like a silent statue. The "father of the armored forces" stood with his hands behind his back, not waving as frequently as Bock. His gaze was fixed on the tank convoy passing through the square.

Rommel's command tank, Panzer III, was passing the reviewing stand. Rommel turned his head, stood at attention on the turret, and gave a salute to the reviewing stand; their eyes met in the air.

There was no smile.

There was no unspoken euphoria like that of a victor.

General Bock saw the neat formation and imposing steel, but Guderian and Rommel saw the same thing: the exposure of their trump cards.

Guderian understood the meaning in Rommel's eyes; it was the anxiety unique to a frontline commander.

"Look, Heinz, this is all we have."

"What should we do if these 10,000 tanks can't make the British surrender?"

Guderian nodded slightly, a solemn return gesture. But in the instant he looked away, a name also subconsciously surfaced in his mind—Arthur Sterling.

The man who crushed his command post in Ahhe.

Guderian was almost certain that at this very moment, across the Channel in London, that man was enjoying the same adoration and cheers from the British people as General Bock was today.

"That will be the lifelong enemy of the German armored forces," Guderian thought to himself.

He turned his head and gave a cold look at the several staff officers beside him who were fawning over General Bock.

"A perfect formation, isn't it, General Guderian?" A staff officer pointed downwards, his voice full of admiration. "Look at those Panzer IV tanks, they are a symbol of invincibility."

"Invincible?" Guderian snorted coldly, his voice so low that only a few people around him could hear it, yet it was like a bucket of ice water.

"Open your eyes and look, Major General. There are only two battalions of Panzer IV tanks here. The rest are all Panzer IIIs, and there are even some Panzer I and Panzer II training vehicles just to make up the numbers."

"Besides, who are we going to use that short-barreled 75mm gun for? It can only fire high-explosive shells, which are used to blow up bunkers, not to penetrate Matilda's steel plates."

He raised his gloved fingers and pointed mercilessly at a Panzer II tank that was passing by.

"And that thing. Its armor is only 14mm. Whether it's the British Boyce or the Soviet anti-tank rifle, any infantry anti-tank weapon can turn it into a sieve from 500 meters away. We're marching around in tin cans."

The staff officer's smile froze on his face, looking somewhat embarrassed: "But—General, we've won. The French are finished."

"The French are finished. But the British are still here." Guderian turned his gaze to the northwest, as if that were the direction where Arthur Stirling was.

"We released 300,000 British people at Dunkirk. And according to intelligence, Stirling Heavy Industries' new factory in Sheffield is already operating at full capacity. They are more efficient than us."

"They won't keep building those slow Matildas forever. Soon, they'll be producing monsters with thicker armor, more powerful cannons, and better mobility than our Type 3."

"We're going to be in big trouble then." Guderian sighed, took out an oil-stained handkerchief from his pocket, and wiped the sweat from his forehead.

"If Britain is not dealt with quickly, this parade will not be a celebration of victory, but a prelude to a funeral."

An apartment window about 300 meters from the parade route on the Champs-Élysées.

This is an Ottoman-style building.

David Sterling stood behind the half-closed blinds, holding a cup of coffee that had gone lukewarm.

He wasn't wearing a military uniform. He was wearing an old corduroy suit that he'd taken from the apartment's owner—a runaway French painter—a beret on his head, and a red scarf around his neck.

This makes him look like a typical Parisian bohemian artist.

Behind him, the "circus" that Arthur had salvaged from various solitary confinement cells, military prisons, and the London underworld was scattered throughout the room.

Paddy Mayne was sitting on a chair piled with paint tubes, toying with a sharp trench knife in his hand, his eyes fierce, as if the knife was an extension of his body.

Jock Lewis was disassembling a portable radio, trying to stuff it into a cello case, but it was actually a bomb, with freshly prepared flammable solidifying agent at his feet.

In the shadows by the window, Johnny Cooper (The Sharpshooter), a sharpshooter, was not holding a gun at this moment. On a day when German military police filled the streets, bringing a 1.1-meter-long Lee-Enfield sniper rifle into this apartment would be tantamount to suicide.

He held a fine, gilded opera telescope, but he wasn't admiring the spectacular parade. His breathing became extremely slow and deep, his heartbeat seemingly slowing down for that moment of stability. Through the lenses originally intended for listening to sopranos, his crosshairs were fixed on the back of Rommel's head beneath his peaked cap.

"Distance 280 meters, wind speed 3 meters per second, westerly wind, corrected by two microseconds —" Cooper's lips moved silently, and his right index finger tapped lightly on the window frame.

There were no gunshots.

But in his mind, the .303 caliber bullet had already flown across the Champs-Élysées and pierced the skull of the armored division commander.

"Bang." He uttered a single word softly, then put down his opera binoculars, a hint of regret in his eyes.

But then, a soft "click" sound came from the corner of the room.

Reggie Higgins, looking utterly bored, pulled a paperclip from the lock of a homeowner's safe. For hands capable of unlocking the most complex mechanical locks with their eyes closed, this civilian-grade lock was an insult to his skill.

On the sofa, Bill O'Connor (The Thief) – nicknamed "The Thief" – magically produced from his sleeve several still-warm German military watches, a few Nazi badges, and two Luger pistol magazines.

No one knows how he managed to steal these items from the heavily armed German military police during those few minutes he blended into the crowd.

As for the last one, TheLiar, he was adjusting his stolen SS leather overcoat in front of the full-length mirror. He was practicing his purest Bavarian-accented German, adjusting his arrogant expression.

This man possessed a chameleon-like talent; he could bring the dead back to life with lies, and naturally, he could also fool the most stringent Gestapo with a blank sheet of paper.

"They're showing off their muscles," David said, looking out the window.

From this angle, he could clearly see the turret number of Rommel's command tank, and even the camera hanging around Rommel's neck.

"That's Rommel?" Paddy Mayne asked without looking up. "The ghost who beat us to a pulp in the Ardennes?"

"It's him." David took a sip of his bitter coffee. "He looks like a very confident guy. He didn't even close the tank hatch, even though there might be snipers around."

"Give me a rifle." Cooper suddenly stood up, walked to the window, and said, "Three hundred meters. I can blow his head off. The war can end today."

"Sit down, Cooper," David's voice was cold. "Killing him won't do any good. The Germans have countless Rommels. And if you fire the first shot, our group will be turned into mincemeat. There are at least two thousand SS military police below."

"Arthur didn't send us here to be assassins."

David looked out the window again, gazing at the steel behemoths.

As a professional soldier, he had to admit that this was an awe-inspiring army. The mechanical precision, the fluidity of infantry-tank coordination, the discipline that even seemed to have been calculated in terms of the dust kicked up by the tracks—this stood in stark contrast to the chaotic and desperate Allied forces he had witnessed at Dunkirk.

"This is the pinnacle of industrial warfare," David muttered to himself. "Arthur was right, we can't win against these people with chivalry." He turned to look at Jock, who was tidying up the explosives. "Jock, the owner of this apartment left behind a lot of turpentine and linseed oil, didn't they?"

"Yes, sir." Jock pushed up his glasses. "He's an oil painter."

"Very good." David pointed out the window. "Since the Germans like Paris so much, we should leave them some souvenirs."

"While we can't blow up the Arc de Triomphe, this building—" David glanced around the third-floor apartment, "...set a booby trap at the entrance. Use that turpentine. When the Gestapo comes to search this area—they'll definitely be here—"

Give them a warm welcome.

"Understood." Jock gave a childlike smile. "I'll make a delayed fuse. Guaranteed to burn down the entire floor."

"Let's go." David glanced one last time at Rommel, who was being cheered downstairs. "Goodbye, Erwin. Until we meet again."

"Now, our target is the south, Bordeaux."

14:00 PM, Paris, Hotel Ritz.

The parade was over. Rommel returned to the most luxurious hotel in Paris. The German High Command had requisitioned it. The lobby was filled with banners with the "U" symbol, and staff officers in gray field uniforms moved about under the crystal chandeliers, their leather boots making a dull thud on the Persian carpet.

Rommel went into the bar.

This place, once Hemingway's favorite spot, was now packed with German officers celebrating their victory. Champagne flowed like water, and every face beamed with the joy of triumph.

"For the Führer!" "For Paris!" "For the Thousand-Year Empire!"

Rommel found a corner to sit down, still wearing his dusty tank crewman jacket, when Captain Aldin brought him two glasses of champagne. "Sir, these are the best in the hotel cellar. 1928 Krug."

Rommel took the glass, but he didn't drink. He watched the bubbles rising in the glass, his gaze still fixed on the military parade from a few hours earlier.

A figure blocked the light. Rommel looked up; it was Guderian. He too held a glass of wine, his expression equally serious.

"It's too noisy here, Erwin," Guderian said.

"The victors are always noisy," Rommel replied.

Guderian sat down and took a sip of brandy. The spicy liquid slid down his throat, but it couldn't suppress the chill in his heart.

The note he found at the port of Le Havre had been burned, but the phrase "I'll wait for Erwin in the sands of North Africa" ​​resurfaced in his mind at that moment.

Just a week ago he scoffed at it, but now he's horrified.

A week earlier, the Supreme Command had no plans to send troops to North Africa; Mussolini hadn't even declared war on the British. But that Englishman named Arthur had even arranged a firefighting position for Rommel in advance.

It's simply fate.

Guderian looked up at Rommel, who was still quite spirited. He opened his mouth, but ultimately swallowed his words.

I can't say. It sounds too much like a fantasy. More importantly, for an armored commander who needs to make life-or-death decisions on the front lines, telling him "your fate and battlefield have already been written by the enemy" would only destroy his fearless spirit and make him hesitant and indecisive in future command decisions.

"What's wrong, Heinz?" Rommel noticed his silence and looked up to ask.

"Nothing, Erwin." Guderian lowered his gaze, put down his wine glass, and pressed his finger on the map. "I was just thinking about where your 7th Panzer Division should go next."

"Bock just told me that the Führer has approved the plan for the North African expeditionary force. Although it is not large in scale, the first combat unit consists of only a light division and an armored regiment."

"You will be the commander of this unit. The order will be officially issued tomorrow."

Rommel raised an eyebrow.

"Only one regiment? You mean the 5th Panzer Regiment?" His tone carried an unusual air of absurdity, as if Guderian had told him an April Fool's joke about a foot.

"Heinz, are you kidding me? Even if we were to go on a picnic in the desert, this number of troops wouldn't be enough to fill the British's teeth."

They have at least 50,000 troops.

"That wasn't the original plan." Guderian was also helpless, and he knew the difference. "According to the Army General Staff's original plan, Operation Sunflower (UnternehmenSonnenblume), you were to command a complete German Afrika Korps (DAK)." Guderian held up two fingers and made a gesture in the air.

"That's two full-strength divisions, including the 15th Armored Division and the 5th Light Division. That means you'd have over 300 tanks, four motorized infantry regiments, six artillery battalions, and most importantly, a group of 88mm anti-aircraft guns capable of suppressing the British Matilda tanks."

But Guderian immediately withdrew his finger and then shrugged.

"But that plan was scrapped last night."

Why?

"Because we have no ships left. The fire in Taranto not only burned down the Italian battleships, but also destroyed our control of the Mediterranean." Guderian sneered, his eyes filled with contempt for his incompetent ally.

"That sea area is now the British's backyard, and Mussolini's fleet can only cower in the harbor. Those idiots in the logistics department say that without an escort fleet, transporting two armored divisions across the Channel would be like sending them to the Royal Navy."

"So, they reduced your armored forces to a single regiment. And the reason those guys in Berlin drawing maps on marble tables gave was—" Guderian mimicked the stiff, arrogant tone of a Supreme Command staff officer, "that the Italian army isn't short of numbers; they have hundreds of thousands. They just need a little bit of moral support from Germany," to hold Libya.

"Emotional support?" Rommel looked at the sour champagne in his glass and shook his head.

"Yes, typical Berlin mentality." Guderian downed his drink in one gulp. "They think that as long as they send a few Germans over to shout some slogans, those Italian pasta noodles will turn into Krupp steel plates."

"If we're going to Africa, we'll be facing more than just sand." Rommel took the Sterling cigarette case out of his pocket and placed it on the marble table.

"And this too." He pointed to the logo on the cigarette pack. "That Arthur Sterling. He took the equipment of tens of thousands of men from Le Havre, and the most valuable thing, the prototype. Now, the British know what our Panzer III tanks are afraid of, and they may even know our radio frequencies and our tactical blind spots."

"He's evolving, Heinz. And we're still celebrating."

Guderian looked at the cigarette box.

"Therefore, this battle will be very difficult."

"You need to bring the best tanks, and I will do my best to get them for you, even if it means drawing them from my 19th Army."

Rommel raised his glass and clinked it against Guderian's.

Ding.

The crisp sound was drowned out by the surrounding cheers.

"Of course, a light division and the 5th Panzer Regiment are just the first batch of troops. If the situation improves, we will help you transport more tanks and supplies as much as possible," Guderian reassured him, although he also felt that relying on the navy was not very reliable.

"For North Africa." Rommel said nothing more. He took a sip of the priceless 1928 Krug champagne. The liquid flowed on his tongue, the bubbles bursting. It was a superb taste, with fruity notes and the flavor of toasted bread.

But as the liquid slid down his throat, Rommel frowned.

"What's wrong, sir? Is this wine not to your liking?" Captain Aldin asked cautiously, looking at the wine glass Rommel had put down.

Rommel did not answer immediately. His fingers tapped unconsciously on the exquisite Stirling silver cigarette case, while his gaze pierced through the noisy bar, fixing on a gray Ottoman-style building across the square.

"No, the wine is very good," Rommel said, his voice devoid of any drunkenness, "but I tasted a... a flaw."

He raised his gloved fingers and pointed precisely to the third floor of the building.

"Aldin, do you see that window with the shutters half-open? Have the Gestapo checked that area?"

"Those are civilian houses, sir," Aldin replied dismissively, glancing at the security report in his hand. "According to Schellenberg's briefing, all the French in that neighborhood fled three days ago. It's a ghost town now."

"A dead city? On the battlefield, death often means an ambush." ​​Rommel's eyes were cold, the instinctive reaction of a hunter sensing danger.

"As a soldier, I don't believe in coincidences. That window had a perfect field of fire, directly covering the main entrance of the Ritz Hotel and the floor-to-ceiling windows of this bar. If there were any French partisans who hadn't left, or some crazy person who didn't want to leave, that would be a deadly blind spot for the entire square."

Rommel stood up abruptly and buttoned up his top button.

"Get the Gestapo downstairs over there immediately. Grab submachine guns, kick down the door, and search every corner. I don't like having this chilly feeling on my back all the time."

"Yes, sir. I'll make the arrangements right away." Although Aldin felt that his division commander was being a bit paranoid, he immediately stood at attention, accepted the order, and turned to run towards the door.

Rommel sat back down on the sofa. He looked out the window at the gloomy Parisian sky, in the direction David Sterling had just left.

In the distance, a squad of Gestapo officers, guns at the ready, charged toward the apartment building.

Rommel picked up the expensive Krug champagne, watching the bubbles rise in the glass, a bitter taste in his mouth.

"This champagne does taste sour."

17

18:00, southern suburbs of Paris, entrance to the N20 highway.

A dilapidated Peugeot truck slowly drove away from Paris, mingling with the fleeing traffic. The truck bed was piled high with hay and furniture. But beneath the haystacks lay five fully armed men and a heavy cello case.

David Sterling sat in the passenger seat. He had changed back into his somewhat dirty corduroy suit, and had a cigarette he'd tricked from the German sentry dangling from his lips.

The driver was Jock Lewis.

"Sir, how's that apartment building?" Jock asked.

David glanced at the Eiffel Tower receding into the distance in his rearview mirror. Just ten minutes ago, they had passed that apartment building. He saw a black Gestapo sedan pull up downstairs, and several men in black leather trench coats, armed with submachine guns, rushed inside. Judging by the time, the "turpentine booby trap" should be triggered soon.

"I think we left Paris with a passionate farewell kiss," David smiled and exhaled a smoke ring.

Boom! A plume of black smoke rose from the direction of the city in the distance.

Although it was hard to hear clearly from several kilometers away, the plume of black smoke was particularly conspicuous in the twilight sky.

"Let's go, Jock." David turned his gaze back to the long, congested road to the south. "The parade is over."

Now it's our turn.

Next stop: Bordeaux.

"We're going to steal that tall guy named de Gaulle."

The truck roared and sped into the night, like a wolf sneaking into a flock of sheep, disappearing into the vast sea of ​​people.

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