The Twilight of Empire: Starting from Dunkirk

Chapter 180 The Steel Wolf Pack Under the Night (Please subscribe and vote with monthly tickets)

November 11, 1940, 14:00, Egypt, 30 kilometers west of Alexandria, the field assembly point of the 7th Panzer Division.

The edges of the Sahara Desert are revealing its brutal nature.

A moderate sandstorm had just passed, accompanied by howling winds, and the temperature remained stubbornly stuck at 38 degrees Celsius.

The air was completely dried out, and every breath felt like inhaling burning embers into the lungs.

The yellow sand, swirling in the air, was whipped up by the gale, scraping against everything in the assembly area like rough industrial sandpaper—from canvas tents and truck trailers to the soldiers' exposed, cracked skin.

This was a large, field-based machine repair shop filled with the pungent smell of engine oil and diesel exhaust, and it was also the front line of the British Empire against the Italian army.

There were no welcoming ceremonies for the new equipment, no military bands playing Scottish bagpipes, and no senior officers standing on a platform delivering those tedious, inspiring speeches.

So close to the front lines, the engagement of war machines is reduced to pure efficiency.

Hundreds of mechanics from the 7th Armored Division, covered in oil and stripped down to only yellowed coarse cloth vests, were working under the scorching heat to carry out intensive assembly work around sixty A15 "Meteor" medium tanks that had just been unloaded from the port of Alexandria and transported directly to the front lines by heavy trailers.

This is the first batch of combat test items delivered by Sterling Heavy Industries to the North African battlefield.

A second batch of 8 will be available soon.

"Take that damn original air intake cover off! Hurry up! Don't act like a starving woman!" A sergeant major covered in black solid engine oil roared as he stood on the Meteor tank's wide engine hood.

His voice had to be raised to the highest decibel level to barely drown out the howling sandstorm and deafening metallic clanging around him.

Two mechanics with bulging veins on their foreheads immediately wielded heavy, specially made long-handled wrenches to forcibly remove the air filter housing, which was originally designed to meet European temperate climate standards.

With the crisp sound of bolts falling onto the steel plate, the delicate air intake was completely exposed.

Immediately afterwards, a heavy crane belching black smoke slowly drove over and lifted the huge metal cylinder, which was packed in a rough wooden box, onto the top of the engine compartment.

That was an oversized, double-layered oil bath dust filter that Sterling Heavy Industries had specially manufactured overnight for the extremely harsh dust environment in North Africa and shipped with it.

The mechanics spared no effort, using brutal and forceful methods to tighten the heavy fixing bolts, even slamming them with hammers to ensure a complete engagement.

In the Sahara Desert, sandstorms are the deadliest killer.

Once those tiny silica particles are sucked into the cylinder, this 600-horsepower V12 diesel engine, converted from a Merlin aircraft engine, will completely seize up and become unusable within a few hours due to severe wear of the piston rings.

They must put the most secure "gas masks" on these steel behemoths before they go to war.

At the same time, several Bedford heavy trucks, fully loaded with ammunition, reversed, kicking up a cloud of dust, and pressed the rear of their trailers tightly against the edge of the tank tracks.

"Crowbar! Open the box!"

The quartermaster shouted the order.

Inside the box were neatly arranged, golden-yellow fixed artillery shells that emitted a strong, smokeless gunpowder smell.

Loaders and commanders spontaneously formed a sweaty human assembly line, continuously unloading 57mm six-pounder capped armor-piercing shells and high-explosive shells from the carriage, passing them through the narrow turret hatch, and then forcefully stuffing them into the ammunition rack at the bottom of the turret basket.

The brass cartridge case clashed violently with the ammunition rack latch, producing a series of dull, suppressed metallic scraping sounds.

Each shell was heavy, carrying the weight of death.

Lieutenant General Richard O'Connor, commander of the Eighth Army, issued a stern order with no room for negotiation: every tank must...

Before setting off, it must be loaded with seventy-two six-pound shells with intact primers.

In this desert where supply lines could be cut at any moment, these seventy-two shells were what tore apart the Italian defenses.

The only reason they could survive in enemy territory was that losing even a single bullet could result in their vehicle being destroyed and them dying.

Of course, not finishing his sentence could also have caused the ammunition rack to explode.

On the other side of the tank's wide hull, several infantrymen were carrying mud-covered iron buckets and holding rough pig bristle brushes.

The contents of the iron drum were not military camouflage paint produced by a regular arsenal, but a "homemade recipe" invented by frontline soldiers themselves—a viscous mixture of fine sand, waste and deteriorated black engine oil, and a small amount of matte primer.

The soldiers haphazardly and extensively applied this mud-like coating, which emitted a pungent chemical odor, to the originally smooth, reflective metal surfaces of the Meteor tank, spare track plates, turret shields, and any other components that might produce a mirror-like reflection in the strong sunlight.

They even grabbed dry sand from the ground and threw it directly onto the car body, which had just been painted and was not yet completely dry.

In just two days, these sixty steel behemoths, which had just rolled off the production line and originally possessed the cold beauty of an industrial assembly line, had all the traces of Sterling Heavy Industries' manufacturing process completely erased from their original state.

Their iconic sloped armor was covered by a thick layer of sand, perfectly blending into this sea of ​​sand filled with the aura of death, completely assimilated into the 7th Armored Division's combat order, becoming a group of bloodthirsty predators lurking behind the dunes.

1940年11月12日，19：30，第七装甲师机动指挥部，此刻是第8集团军的心脏。

The desert at night reveals a completely opposite side of its character.

As the sun sets, the Earth's surface heat dissipates rapidly, and the temperature plummets to 12 degrees Celsius within just a few hours, and continues to drop.

The gale, carrying icy sand, violently ripped the massive canvas tent of the command post, making a series of cracking sounds, as if someone were constantly whipping the tent with a leather whip.

The interior of the tent was stuffy and oppressive. A high-pressure gas lamp hanging on the central support pole swayed constantly in the strong wind, casting distorted and enormous shadows of several senior British commanders on the canvas in its dim light.

Lieutenant General Richard O'Connor, commander of the Eighth Army, stood with his arms crossed in front of a huge military map of the North African theater spread out on a folding table.

His brows were furrowed, and his eyes were thoughtful.

Major General Michael Craig, commander of the 7th Armored Division, and several of the division's armored regimental commanders all stood around the table.

The air was thick with the smell of Havana cigar smoke and the astringent aroma of black tea.

On the map, the blue markers representing the Italian 10th Army are densely clustered near Sidi Barrani, forming a large, fortified area with mutually dependent firepower.

Nibeiwa, Tummar, and Sofafi, these desert fortresses built by Italians over several months, are tightly connected by large areas of anti-tank minefields, barbed wire, and deep anti-tank trenches, like a blue chain stretching across the Egyptian border.

Lieutenant General O'Connor took a hardwood baton from his adjutant, walked to the map, and struck the tip of the baton heavily on the southern edge of the Nibewa Fortress.

"Listen, gentlemen." O'Connor's gaze swept quickly across all the armored regimental commanders present, his words rapid-fire. "The operational plan called 'Operation Compass,' drawn up by the Army Group Staff a few days ago, is outdated. We must abandon traditional infantry-tank combined arms tactics. In the past, we would first conduct hours of artillery preparation before letting those tortoise-like Matilda infantry tanks provide cover for the infantry charge, and finally send your cruiser tanks to expand the gains."

At this point, he slammed his hardwood baton onto the map with a thud.

"But now, throw all those outdated dogmas you learned at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst into the Mediterranean Sea!"

O'Connor's eyes burned with intense fighting spirit.

"We now have sixty heavily armored monsters manufactured by Sterling Heavy Industries! The frontal armor of these A15 Meteor tanks is so thick that even our own two-pounder tungsten-core armor-piercing rounds can't penetrate it, while their aviation diesel engines allow these twenty-eight tons of steel to reach off-road speeds of forty kilometers per hour in the desert! I believe every one of you knows what this means. It means that any premature artillery preparation will only foolishly wake up those Italians who are sleeping soundly in the trenches, cooking pasta!"

"This time, we must abandon those slow-moving infantry; we must learn from the German tactics used in Poland and France—the Blitzkrieg!"

O'Connor stretched out his finger and forcefully drew a deep line across the vast, empty area south of the Nibewa Fortress.

"Look here. According to the intelligence brought back by our long-range desert scouts, there is a fatal gap in the Italian defense system here. That old fox Graziani believes that this area is extremely soft, deep sand, making it difficult for large troops to march, and heavy armored units absolutely unable to pass through silently. Therefore, this area has the fewest minefields and the weakest troop strength."

O'Connor straightened up and issued the final tactical order: "At nine o'clock tonight, the entire army will be under absolute radio silence. These sixty Meteor tanks will form a vanguard formation, avoiding any unnecessary engagement with the Italian outer perimeter positions. I want you to use the cover of night to force your way through this fatal gap, like a sharp scalpel, cutting right through their belly and crushing the core of their defenses!"

The armored regimental commanders looked at each other, their eyes filled with shock.

This tactic of completely abandoning infantry cover and initial artillery fire, and even carrying out large-scale heavy armored formations to march through the pitch-black desert at night, is not only extremely reckless, but also seriously violates the Royal Armoured Forces' consistent operational principles.

Navigating the desert at night is a nightmare for armored forces.

After a brief silence, they hesitated.

"General, this is too risky." Major General Craig, commander of the 7th Armored Division, stared intently at the map and pointed out the biggest blind spot in this radical tactic: "The noise of sixty 600-horsepower aviation diesel engines combined is like a small earthquake. In the still of the night, that low-frequency rumble can travel for kilometers in the open desert. Unless the Italian sentries are deaf, they will definitely detect our surprise attack in advance."

"Without surprise, we would be sitting ducks if we charged into enemy lines at night."

O'Connor waved his hand, a smile playing on his lips.

As a veteran who had spent many years fighting in the desert, he had already planned out every detail.

"I won't send you to your deaths. The Royal Air Force's Blenheim twin-engine bomber squadron will fly over Sidi Barani and Nibewa at the exact same time you advance to within five kilometers of enemy positions, conducting random, indiscriminate night bombing raids."

"The roar of hundreds of aircraft engines, combined with the massive sound waves from high-explosive bombs exploding on the ground, will perfectly mask the noise of your tracks crushing the sand. The Italians will think it's just a routine nighttime air raid and will never imagine that a huge armored formation is approaching their throat."

He straightened up, adjusted the collar of his uniform, and ended the pre-battle meeting.

"Now give the order. Have our lads check the ammunition, fill up the fuel, and get ready to go. When the sun rises tomorrow, I want to see Graziani's entrails pulled out by the tracks and laid out on the dunes."

21:00, the 7th Armored Division departs from its positions.

The weather was clear, moonless, with only dim starlight adorning the deep sky. The temperature had plummeted to a frigid 8 degrees Celsius.

The desert temperature drops at an alarming rate after sunset.

The scorching sand that could bake a person alive during the day now exudes a bone-chilling cold, forcing the armored soldiers to don heavy wool uniforms and leather jackets.

The entire massive armored assembly site was plunged into deathly darkness. There was not a single ray of light; the headlights and searchlights of all tanks were strictly prohibited from use, and even the act of armored soldiers trying to light cigarettes in the turrets was sternly stopped by officers.

If even a single spark were to ignite the night sky, it could invite a devastating attack from Italian artillery.

Strict military discipline severely suppressed the breathing of tens of thousands of soldiers and hundreds of war machines.

Only the mournful sound of the cold wind blowing through the metal armor remained in the air.

At the very front of the formation, a faint blue signal light illuminated on the roof of the command vehicle leading the way. An extremely long visor was fitted over this light, restricting its beam to a very small angle that could only be seen directly behind, barely visible to the tank commanders following behind.

As the faint blue light flickered twice in the darkness, the order to launch a full-scale attack was officially given.

"Start the engine. On your marks."

Sergeant Thomas, a 30-year-old veteran and commander of the "Iron Fist" tank, stepped on the foot pedal of the intercom.

The driver pulled the heavy ignition switch hard, turning on the preheating valve.

"Boom!"

"Boom!"

Sixty large-displacement Merlin modified V12 diesel engines emitted a muffled yet ferocious ignition sound almost simultaneously. The twelve cylinders roared deeply at idle, like a group of enormous ancient beasts awakening in the night.

Thick, pungent diesel exhaust fumes, from unburned diesel, quickly filled the cold night air, making people's throats tighten.

There were no commands from any loudspeaker; everything proceeded in perfect unison.

The entire desert surface began to tremble subtly, yet persistently. The massive steel column, like a giant black serpent in the night, formed a wide and highly aggressive wedge formation.

The driver depresses the clutch and pushes the heavy gear lever into first gear. Abundant power is brutally transmitted to the rear-mounted drive wheel.

The 400-millimeter-wide high-manganese steel tracks gripped the cold sand dune surface tightly, stirring up the fine sand and relentlessly pushing forward.

The commanders of the sixty A15 Meteor tanks all leaned half their bodies out of the hatches of their command cupolas. They wore heavy windproof goggles and leather winter hats, and the biting night wind, like a sharp razor, swept across their cheeks, taking away the last bit of body heat.

But they didn't care at all.

Due to the strict implementation of radio silence, no verbal communication was possible between the vehicles. In this boundless, undulating sea of ​​sand with absolutely no terrain references, the vehicle commanders could only strain to look up and rely on the stars and the faint prism compasses they clutched tightly to confirm their course, and on the dim light of their taillights to keep the massive assault formation from falling apart.

This is an extreme form of torture for the driver and the commander.

The rustling sound of nearly a thousand road wheels crushing sand, the sharp screech of metal rubbing against track pins, mixed with the suppressed roar of sixty V12 diesel engines, intertwined in the lifeless night sky, exuding a chilling murderous intent.

The Meteor Tank's prized Christie suspension system demonstrated its exceptional off-road capabilities. The robust coil springs resiliently extended, contracted, and rebounded across the undulating dunes, perfectly absorbing the impact of the ground. Under the cover of night, the 28-ton steel chassis moved resolutely towards the Italian positions to the west, like a heavy cruiser navigating waves.

The Western Desert Campaign, at this bizarre time that no one could have predicted, with its fierce, long-range armored penetration tactics that completely subverted the traditional British Army manuals, prematurely opened the bloody curtain.

Behind these Meteor medium tanks charging at the forefront were a large number of cruiser tanks and hundreds of dark towed gun barrels.

Under the dim starlight, they point westward, like silent death, awaiting the dawn that will drink its fill of blood.

"Buzzing" Just as the tank commanders were worried that the noise of the tracks would alert the enemy, another, even more magnificent roar came from the high sky.

Lieutenant General O'Connor's promised Royal Air Force Blenheim bomber squadron arrived as scheduled.

The enormous roar of the aircraft engines rolled in like a tsunami, completely drowning out the noise of the ground armored forces in the boundless darkness.

November 13, 1940, 06:00. Egyptian border, Nibewa Fortress, Italian forward defensive positions.

The desert was shrouded in a thin mist in the early morning. A gentle breeze stirred up fine sand, which rustled softly against the helmet.

The sun had not yet fully risen above the eastern horizon, and only a pale, grayish-white hue appeared on the horizon. The desert morning was bitterly cold, and the outer positions of the Nibewa Fortress were shrouded in a layer of murky air mixed with morning mist and fine sand, resulting in extremely poor visibility.

Stationed here is the "Maretti" mechanized group, an elite force from the Italian 10th Army in Morocco.

However, even these so-called elite Italian soldiers were clearly not fully awake from their sleep the previous night.

Based on their rigid defensive doctrines and the combat experience of the past few months, they believed that if the British launched an attack, they would be prepared with heavy artillery fire that would last for hours and be intense enough to overturn the entire position.

The shelling usually started at four in the morning.

At this moment, the area in front of the position was deathly silent, with only the occasional sound of wind.

This means that today will still be a boring, dull, and absolutely safe day.

Several Italian sentries, wrapped in thick wool blankets, leaned against a machine gun emplacement made of sandbags. For comfort, they pushed their heavy M33 helmets back and yawned while holding Carcano rifles in their arms.

A corporal with a mustache was crouching at the bottom of the trench to avoid the wind, lighting a small fire with the crude solid fuel he was issued to heat up the military-rationed coffee in his aluminum mess kit.

The bitter aroma of coffee wafted through the trenches, bringing a rare sense of warmth.

The corporal picked up the blackened aluminum lunchbox, brought it to his chapped lips, and prepared to enjoy the first refreshing drink of the morning.

Suddenly, without warning, a fine, high-frequency ripple appeared on the surface of the dark brown coffee liquid in the lunchbox.

"Huh?" The corporal paused for a moment.

Immediately afterwards, a dull tremor, like thunder suppressed from deep underground, traveled through the soft sand.

The vibration penetrated the rough soles of the military boots, striking the soldiers' kneecaps and hearts, causing a strange sense of panic.

The corporal's hand jerked violently, and the scalding coffee spilled directly onto the back of his hand.

He didn't even care about the excruciating pain from the burns. Instinct drove him to stand up abruptly, grab the Zeiss binoculars hanging around his neck, lie on the edge of the sandbag, and stare intently at the eastern horizon.

Through the telescope's optical lens, a terrifying scene appeared that would haunt him with nightmares every night for the rest of his life.

The eastern horizon is rising violently.

Accompanied by the collective roar of sixty Merlin modified V12 diesel engines tearing through the camouflage, sixty sandstorms, each over ten meters high, suddenly burst forth from the eastern sand dune ridge.

Sixty massive A15 Meteor medium tanks, painted in desert yellow, formed a wide, despair-inducing wedge-shaped assault formation, like sixty charging steel rhinos breaking through the morning fog.

Unlike the infantry tanks that Italians were used to, which had to advance slowly alongside infantry, these Meteor tanks did not wait for the infantry to follow, nor did they receive any prior artillery support.

They floored the engine accelerator, reaching a terrifying off-road speed of nearly forty kilometers per hour, like a steel tsunami appearing out of nowhere, carrying clouds of yellow sand, and fiercely rushed towards the Italian army's positions.

Distance is being compressed at a speed visible to the naked eye.

"Enemy attack!! Armored forces! British tanks!!"

The corporal screamed at the top of his lungs.

He scrambled and stumbled toward the rusty hand-cranked air raid siren at the edge of the trench, frantically cranking the handle.

The piercing air raid siren instantly shattered the tranquility of the early morning.

The entire Italian camp erupted in chaos, as if a hornet's nest had been stirred up.

Countless Italian soldiers, disheveled and in disarray, scrambled out of their canvas tents, some without even putting on their boots properly, and grabbed their rifles as they tumbled and crawled toward the defensive line.

The officers drew their pistols and kicked the soldiers who were still in a daze, cursing loudly.

Inside the command vehicle of the "Iron Fist" amidst the charging Meteor tanks, the atmosphere was as cold as an icebox.

Sergeant Thomas, the tank commander, firmly planted one foot on the bottom of the turret basket, gripped the periscope handle tightly with both hands, stared at the crosshairs, and calmly pressed the intercom pedal with his other foot.

"Target spotted directly ahead. Italian outer perimeter earthen machine gun emplacement. 800 yards away. Gunners, take note, load high-explosive rounds, fire freely while on the move!"

"Roger! High-explosive shell loaded!" the loader roared, forcefully pushing a brass cartridge case of HE shell into the breech.

The lock made a crisp "click" sound.

Sterling Heavy Industries' significantly optimized Christie suspension system demonstrated its revolutionary tactical value in actual combat.

On the rugged, pit-filled desert and Gobi, the wide 400mm tracks and robust vertical coil springs perfectly absorbed the impact of the violent undulations in the ground.

Even at a high speed of 40 kilometers per hour, the 28-ton vehicle maintained an astonishing level of chassis stability, and the vertical movement of the gun barrel was minimized.

Gunners no longer needed to give the driver the traditional instruction to stop and aim.

Their eyes were glued to the precision optical sights, and their hands moved rapidly through the elevation and directional handwheels to lock onto the target.

"Fire!"

Accompanied by violent muzzle blasts and bursts of red flame, sixty 57mm long-barreled six-pound cannons roared deafeningly as they moved at high speed.

The dazzling flames instantly illuminated the dim morning, tearing the morning mist to shreds.

The thick warhead tore through the air at extremely high initial velocity, accompanied by a sharp and piercing death shriek, and accurately struck the Italian army's newly awakened defenses.

The instant the six-pounder high-explosive shell struck the earthen bunker, the instantaneous fuse precisely detonated the high-energy explosive filling inside the warhead.

Boom! The sturdy defensive sandbags instantly disintegrated and vanished under the violent overpressure shockwave. The swirling yellow sand, mixed with deadly metal fragments and rubble, swept across the area like a shotgun blast from the Grim Reaper, leaving no blind spots.

The sturdy wooden support pillar was brutally snapped in half. The three Italian machine gunners hiding behind the bunker didn't even have time to pull the trigger before they, along with the heavy Breda machine gun, were violently thrown into the air by the fireball from the explosion.

Limbs and severed bodies rained down on the trench behind, accompanied by mud, and blood instantly stained the dry sand.

"Counterattack! You cowards! Bring the anti-tank guns up! Fire!" An Italian major drew his Beretta pistol and fired a shot into the air, frantically urging the artillerymen, who had fallen into a daze, to fire.

The Italian artillerymen on the defensive line seemed to wake from a dream, frantically tearing off the camouflage netting covering their cannons.

A dozen or so Italian 47mm "Elephant" anti-tank guns (Cannone da 47/32), which the Italian army was so proud of, were hastily pushed into the pre-designated sandbag firing positions. The artillerymen, their eyes bloodshot, gritted their teeth and aimed the muzzles at the steel behemoths that approached like demons in the sandstorm, pulling the firing ropes with all their might.

"Open fire! Blast them to pieces!"

"Boom! Boom! Boom!"

In an instant, a dense hail of 47mm armor-piercing rounds, trailing streaks, slammed into the charging Meteor tanks.

The crisp sound of shells hitting metal armor echoed across the battlefield.

But what happened next completely shattered the psychological defenses of all the Italian soldiers lying in the trenches, plunging them into the abyss of despair.

The 47mm armor-piercing rounds that were usually enough to easily create fatal holes in the vertical and thin armor of the British A9 and A10 light cruiser tanks lost all their lethality when they hit the A15 Meteor tank's exaggeratedly 60-degree sloped upper frontal armor.

Accompanied by a series of sharp, ear-piercing metallic screeching sounds, the high-speed armor-piercing projectile ricocheted violently the moment it made contact with the sloped armor surface.

Brilliant sparks exploded densely on the desert-yellow armor plates, like molten iron splashing in a blacksmith's shop.

The warhead was abruptly deflected, launched into the air with a tremendous whistling sound, its destination unknown.

The armor-piercing shells that the Italian anti-tank soldiers had high hopes for could only leave shallow white scratches on the surface of the Meteor tank's armor, and could not even cause the inner armor to collapse.

The advanced sloped armor design, combined with the robust surface-hardened steel plates from Stirling Heavy Industries, transformed these sixty tanks into an invincible heavy cavalry force completely ignoring Italian direct-fire fire.

Despite the intense Italian artillery fire, their speed was not slowed down in the slightest.

The roar of the V12 aircraft engine grew louder and louder, and the vibrations from the tracks rolling over the ground caused sand to slide off the edge of the trench.

"Holy Mary—we failed to penetrate the enemy's armor!" The Italian artillery commander's legs went weak as he looked at the tank in the rangefinder, which was getting closer and closer, almost touching his face. His voice was filled with uncontrollable fear.

Their prized anti-tank guns were like children's toy guns in front of these monsters.

"Fifty yards away! Hold on! Prepare for impact!"

The driver of the "Iron Fist" Meteor tank shouted a warning to his crew, gripped the control lever tightly, and revved the engine to its limit.

The next second, the leading Meteor tank, with overwhelming force, crashed head-on into the dense barbed wire defenses at the front of the Italian positions.

There was no pause or slowdown.

With its terrifying weight of 28 tons, coupled with wide high-manganese steel tracks, it mercilessly snags thick wooden chevaux-de-frise and barbed wire under its wheels.

With a piercing sound of wood breaking and a terrifying metallic ripping, the first outer defensive line was instantly crushed into a pile of rubble.

The tank charged aggressively to the edge of the trench, the driver pulled the control lever, the front of the tracks suddenly lifted up, and then it heavily crossed the wide anti-infantry trench.

The dozen or so Italian soldiers hiding in the trenches let out a shrill, desperate scream as they watched the steel tracks crashing down on them like Mount Tai.

They didn't even have time to drop their weapons and escape along the trenches before they were cruelly crushed down by the heavy tracks and the collapsing sand.

The muffled crack of bones breaking under tens of tons of pressure was completely masked by the roar of the engine.

The tank tracks relentlessly crushed the chests, heads, and Carcano rifles of the Italian soldiers, burying them deep in the mud of the trenches, leaving only a deep track mark at the bottom of the pit mixed with blood and bits of flesh.

Sixty Meteor tanks, like sixty heavy warhammers wielded by gods, easily smashed the skeleton of Nibewa's outer defenses.

They didn't stop at all; the turrets, with their smooth electric pivots, continuously spewed out deadly high-explosive shells and coaxial machine gun fire, destroying every Italian firing point that dared to expose itself.

Subsequently, this tsunami of steel continued its wild advance into the heart of the fortress.

The Italian army's outer defenses of Nibeva, which they had painstakingly built up over several months and believed to be impregnable, collapsed completely within the first ten minutes of contact with the Meteor tanks.

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