Germany does not seek survival

At this moment, Faust suddenly noticed that an airplane was taking off from Ptolemy Airport. It had a light beige linen cover, the wings had the iconic French red, blue and white concentric circle emblem, and the vertical tail also had red, white and blue stripes. It was a French Caudron G.4 reconnaissance bomber.

Then, another biplane Newport fighter took off into the sky. Could it be that the Allied forces had discovered the surprise attack of the Grossdeutschland Battalion?

The plane had already taken off, and in a moment, the roar of the plane echoed and crisscrossed among the mountains.

Faust took a G98 and said, "Let's go take a look!"

Sorge urged: "This is too dangerous..."

Faust smiled and raised the gun in his hand: "I am not afraid of face-to-face combat. That would be more dangerous than now."

Faust climbed to a higher position on the roof with a gun in hand and saw a Gaudron G.4 reconnaissance bomber and a Nieuport 11 fighter flying over the Grossdeutschland Camp.

There were thousands of people in the Grossdeutschland Battalion. It was impossible for them to hide at this time. The soldiers kept shooting at the sky with their rifles, but to no avail. Faust frowned. He saw another Allied plane flying over, so he raised his gun and aimed at the enemy plane.

When the Allied planes aimed at the position of the Grossdeutschland Battalion and flew a short distance closer, Faust opened fire. He kept pulling the bolt until he had used up all the bullets. Then a huge ball of fire exploded and burned in the air, and debris fell down.

The soldiers of the Grossdeutschland Battalion were stunned, but another Allied Newport fighter approached and tried to straf Faust with its synchronized machine guns.

Faust dropped the rifle in his hand and grabbed a stone. He waited until the Newport fighter got closer, then threw the stone upward with all his strength.

There was a loud bang, and soon the plane in the air caught fire, emitted thick smoke, and then fell down.

Chapter 48: Deceiving the Romanians

Amidst the vast forests and snow-capped mountains, two Allied planes that were sent to Romania for aid fell like meteors, emitting black smoke.

After the plane landed, it caused a new explosion, and flames ignited, lighting up two large fireballs on the snow. Faust knew that after such an encounter, the Romanian defenders stationed at Ptolemy Airport would no longer be unaware of it.

The distance between the Grossdeutschland Camp and the Ptolemin Airport was very close, and the enemy could not escape. Faust was most worried that the Romanians would temporarily fly away all the planes, causing him to lose a lot of spoils.

The mission of the Grossdeutschland Battalion was to destroy the Tolmin Airport so that the subsequent detour of the main German force to the Skudok Pass would not be discovered by the Allies. From the mission requirements alone, even if all the planes escaped, as long as Faust led the German army to destroy the airport facilities, the mission would be considered completed.

Because in that case, the Allied aircraft would not be able to operate with Tolemin Airport as the center, and the enemy's reconnaissance range would only be greatly reduced in the direction of Bucharest. The 22nd Army's operation to bypass the Skuduk Pass would also not be interfered with.

What Faust was actually worried about was that if the military achievements were too small, it would inevitably affect the development of the National Socialist Party.

"Now I'm most afraid that the plane will escape, and I'm also afraid that the Romanians will become alert and increase their vigilance."

Few of the officers in the Großdeutschland Battalion had ever flown a plane. Only Captain Thomas had come into contact with early military aircraft from the World War I era.

Captain von Thoma said: "The Romanians had to use funnels or hoses to manually pour gasoline into the aircraft's fuel tanks, which took 20 to 30 minutes. If they were attacked, the time would definitely take longer due to the scramble. And the planes also took time to take off. A single plane took about 10 minutes from start to lift off."

Faust had observed that the Ptolemin Airport in Romania had four dirt runways, so he asked curiously, "If the airport had four runways, how long would it take for 200 planes to take off?"

Thomas did a quick calculation and replied, "Aircraft rely on long rolls for takeoff. They need to be spaced three to five minutes apart on the same runway to avoid wake turbulence. Even if we take off urgently, with only half the fuel, two hundred aircraft will still take six or seven hours to fly."

Thomas emphasized: "And this is an ideal situation. In reality, any error that causes a pause may cause the time to be doubled."

Faust was relieved now. He no longer had to worry about the plane escaping. The remaining problem was how to capture Ptolemy Airport.

Faust looked around at the people around him and noticed that the thousands of troops of the Great German Battalion had launched a surprise attack all night, skiing down the mountain and crossing the mountain stream with a rope bridge. The continuous actions day and night had made everyone very tired.

Many soldiers fell down because they dozed off, some rolled down snowballs, and some bumped into big trees, but as soon as the snowballs hit the trees, the sleepiness disappeared immediately.

Everyone had bags under their eyes, only Faust's spirit was still shining. However, he alone could shoot down a few planes, but he couldn't deal with hundreds of planes.

Faust banged his head against the tree trunk, making a loud bang that caught everyone's attention. He said self-deprecatingly, "Comrades, who's feeling sleepy? Trees are great cures for sleepiness. Just a couple of bangs will definitely cure it."

Faust's words caused the soldiers to laugh. Faust then scooped up a handful of snow and smeared it all on his face. After smearing it several times, he put the ice and snow in his mouth to refresh himself. Many soldiers also followed his example, drank the ice and snow, and woke up with a shudder.

Tito stepped forward and proposed an idea: "I understand Romanian. We can put on Romanian uniforms, disguise ourselves as sentries, sneak into the Ptolemin Airport, and cooperate with the actions of the main force."

Rommel objected, saying, "Using enemy uniforms for camouflage is a violation of the laws of war."

Faust thought for a moment and said, "No need to change into Romanian uniforms, just the Romanians' snowcoats. The Romanian snowcoats are all different and not a special uniform, so this wouldn't be a violation of the rules of engagement."

Rommel reluctantly accepted Faust's idea, and Tito took more than 20 soldiers from the Great German Battalion, all wearing Romanian winter coats, and then advanced on skis, risking their lives to directly break into the Ptolemin Airport.

"Once you succeed," Faust warned Tito, "send the flare immediately."

Faust climbed up the tree and saw that Tito and his team had skied into the Ptolemin Airport. His heart was in his throat. He was also worried that Tito's team's disguise would be seen through by the Roman army.

Tito was actually not very fluent in Romanian, and few of the other soldiers in the squad could speak Romanian. Their camouflage was not very good either. Under the captured parkas were neat German uniforms.

As long as the defenders of Ptolemy Airport were a little more careful, it would be difficult for Tito to deceive them.

But the defenders had just discovered several planes had crashed. Considering that a small unit was unlikely to be equipped with new large-caliber anti-aircraft guns and multiple anti-aircraft machine guns, the Romanians naturally panicked. They all felt that the Tolmin Airport had been attacked by a large German force.

The Germans have at least a division, and it is not impossible to say that they have an army.

For a time, people in the airport were in panic. In the chaos, no one carefully identified the authenticity of Tito's team and let them into the airport.

As soon as Tito entered the airport, he immediately asked to see the garrison commander in broken Romanian. There was an understaffed brigade stationed at the airport, and the garrison commander was Constantin Christescu, commander of the Romanian 5th Infantry Brigade.

The organization of the Romanian Army's brigades was similar to that of the German Army before World War I, consisting of two infantry regiments, an artillery company, and a cavalry company. However, the actual organization was often not full. For example, the 5th Infantry Brigade had no other technical arms, only two regiments, and a total strength of about 3,000 people.

Brigadier General Christescu immediately came to meet Tito's team. Only one of his staff officers hesitated and said, "We should check the identities of these people! To avoid any mistakes in the chaos."

The person who raised the question was named Ion Antonescu. He was not the Prime Minister of Romania or the leader of the Iron Guard during World War II, but just a young staff officer in the Romanian army.

Antonescu was a lowly figure and his influence was not taken seriously. Brigadier General Christescu was very nervous and absent-minded and did not listen to what Antonescu said at all.

Brigadier General Christescu angrily shouted, "What a time! I've always said that the people at the Military Academy are always dragging their feet and have no practical experience at all!"

Brigadier General Christescu, along with several of his regimental commanders, battalion commanders, and staff officers, ran out of the headquarters. As soon as they saw Tito, Brigadier General Christescu immediately asked: "Are the enemies Germans or Austrians? How many are there?"

Tito saluted Brigadier General Christescu with the Austro-Hungarian salute, and his disguise was very inadequate. However, the Romanians were so panicked that they didn't notice it at all.

Tito reported: "The enemy is all Germans, a total of three divisions! The German army has surrounded the Tolmin Airport from three directions!"

The Romanian officers present were all shocked. Brigadier General Christescu said anxiously, "It's bad! Quick, quick, evacuate the plane immediately! We must retreat to Bucharest immediately! Go, go!"

Under the threat of several German divisions, Brigadier General Christescu instantly lost his will to fight, and the other Romanian officers were busy escaping. The defenders at Tolmin Airport also abandoned their heavy weapons one by one and began to evacuate the airport.

It didn't take long for order in the airport to break down. The guards fled in all directions. Several other regimental and battalion commanders said they were going to lead their troops to evacuate, but they disappeared in a short while. Brigadier General Christescu was busy evacuating the planes and had no time to take care of his troops.

Seeing the opportunity, Tito's team immediately fired a flare into the air. Faust saw the flare and immediately applauded: "Our comrades have succeeded. All companies are now free to move. The goal is to capture the airport."

Several companies of the Grossdeutschland Battalion, together with the heavy-equipped company commanded by Kesselring, launched an attack on the Ptolemin Airport. Waves of intensive firepower poured towards the airport. The Romanians, who were already frightened, were further convinced by Tito's words and fled in panic.

Chapter 49: Victory Seized

The German army did attack from three directions, but Faust also left the Romanians an escape route.

So not surprisingly, the battle had just begun when many Romanian troops fled south in an organized manner.

Among all the Romanians, only Antonescu remained somewhat calm. He soon realized that the number of German troops did not seem to be three divisions.

As for the firepower of the German army, it currently only has machine guns and mortars. If there are three divisions, there should be a large number of howitzers!

Antonescu tried to reorganize the Romanian army and resist, but the reaction of just one staff officer was far from enough.

The officers of the Romanian 5th Infantry Brigade, from the brigade commander to the regimental commanders and battalion commanders at all levels, were now all in chaos. The situation at the airport was extremely complicated and chaotic. Many planes began to take off in a hurry, but under the attack of German mortars, after more than ten minutes, only one plane successfully took off.

Several other planes had been hit by German mortars, and the runway at Tolmin Airport was filled with smoke and flames, further hindering the escape of Allied aircraft.

Antonescu was very skeptical. He believed in his own judgment that the German army was not stronger than the Romanian army. Perhaps the enemy did not even have a regiment. As long as the Romanian army organized a resistance, not to mention destroying this German army, at least in a short period of time, the German army should be unable to do anything to the Romanians.

Antonescu picked up a rifle from the ground. He first took a few staff members he was familiar with, and then began to gather the defeated soldiers in the airport. Soon he gathered hundreds of Romanian soldiers.

The number of people in Antonescu's team grew. After Antonescu had gathered more than 200 soldiers, he began to speak to them:

"The Germans don't have that many! We shouldn't scare ourselves. If they really had three divisions, they would have destroyed the airport with overwhelming artillery fire. The Germans only have one division at most, maybe even fewer. Don't be afraid! Follow my command, gather together, and we can fight back!"

Brigadier General Cristescu of the Romanian 5th Infantry Brigade had also disappeared at this time, leaving Antonescu to gather more than 200 defenders and launch a counterattack.

The defending soldiers were originally very panicked, but with Antonescu as the backbone, they were able to stabilize their position temporarily and began to fight back against the German army.

A platoon of the Grossdeutschland Battalion, led by Tito, was rushing towards the airport runway when it was suddenly blocked by Antonescu's assembled troops. After a burst of gunfire, several German soldiers fell to the ground.

Tito found a bunker and hid himself first, but a German platoon had only fifty or sixty people, and it was not easy to wipe out more than two hundred Romanian soldiers.

The two sides fired at each other across the bunkers. Tito was suppressed by the firepower of the Romanian soldiers and could not raise his head for a while.

Tito soon became anxious because he knew that the Romanians were quickly defeated because they misjudged the strength of the German army. If they were allowed to react, it would be hard to say what would happen on the battlefield.

Antonescu was overjoyed when he saw that the German army was suppressed by him: "Brothers, quickly gather here, there really aren't that many Germans!"

Antonescu waved his hand and the Romanian army rushed towards Tito's small force. When the Romanians were celebrating their victory in their hearts, they were unexpectedly hit by a burst of fierce firepower.

Faust was standing on a wooden tower at the airport, holding two light machine guns. His shooting immediately knocked the Romanian soldiers to the ground.

Antonescu was unwilling to accept defeat and organized a second charge, hoping to defeat Tito's platoon of German soldiers with bayonets.

But as soon as the Romanians rushed up with bayonets, Faust had already jumped off the tower, blocked the middle of the road, and fired with two machine guns. When the Romanians rushed to the near side, Faust replaced the light machine gun with a hand shovel in one hand and a trench stick in the other, shooting left and right, and instantly killing the Romanians and making the blood flow into a river.

Antonescu's eyes nearly popped out of his head as he roared, "Impossible, absolutely impossible!"

The troops that Antonescu had organized with great difficulty were blocked by Faust, and their morale immediately plummeted to the bottom. They were also attacked from behind. The rest of the German troops rushed over and shot the Romanians from behind. Several of Antonescu's friends were killed. Looking back, he saw that Rommel had already commanded the first company of the Grossdeutschland Battalion to surround the Romanian army.

Fierce fire penetrated Antonescu's assembled troops, and the Romanians were defeated in an instant without even having time to return fire.

Antonescu could only sigh and do his best and leave the rest to fate. The quality of the Romanian army was so poor. It was very difficult for this country to resist Germany because it declared war on Germany in a hurry.

But Antonescu did not think that Romania would be defeated. He believed that Germany would be defeated by the Allies sooner or later. This was the result of the resource endowments between the two major groups and could not be changed by human power.

However, during the period before Germany's defeat, the Romanian people were bound to face a tragic fate.

The Roman troops in Ptolemin Airport were now either fleeing or dying. Although the 5th Infantry Brigade was not understaffed, it still had 3,000 people, but it was defeated by the 1,000-man Großdeutschland Battalion in an instant. The gap in combat power between the German and Romanian armies was so huge.

Antonescu did not want to become a prisoner of the German army. He saw that the German army led by Rommel had not completely blocked the road, so he fled to the south with a rifle.

The Grossdeutschland Battalion was busy controlling the airport to prevent the Romanians from blowing up the more than 100 planes themselves, so it did not send any more troops to intercept the Romanian fleeing army.

Antonescu escaped from Tolmin Airport along with the crowd of Romanian fleeing soldiers. He looked back at the airport for the last time and wondered when Romania would be able to recover the land of Transylvania!

The Grossdeutschland Battalion quickly took control of the entire airport. Rommel and Scherner took two companies to continue pursuing the Romanian fleeing soldiers. The German army used skis and was much faster than the Romanians. They captured many prisoners along the way, but this was insignificant compared to the hundreds of planes seized at the airport.

When the German army attacked Tolmin Airport, the Allied pilots all wanted to fly their planes away, but due to the limited runway and chaotic situation, only fifteen of the more than one hundred planes at the airport finally flew away.

The fifteen planes that escaped all left in a hurry and were not fully fueled. Not long after, Rommel found the wreckage of six crashed planes in the wild.

At the airport, Allied pilots were still desperately destroying planes. Twenty planes were severely damaged and unusable, and more than twenty planes suffered non-fatal damage.

But there are still about a hundred intact planes left.

Faust looked at the rows of intact planes in front of him with satisfaction: "Once we capture Ptolemin Airfield, the retreat route of the Skuduk Pass will be completely isolated, and the 22nd Army will be able to launch an offensive freely."

The mustache man was equally excited: "It's been less than a week, and Colonel Epp hasn't even arrived at the front, and we've already achieved such great results. It turns out that Mr. Faust is a better leader than Colonel Epp."

Sorge, who always disagreed with the mustache, also said this time: "Yes, we should unite and write to General Galwitz, His Royal Highness the Crown Prince, or the General Staff, requesting the removal of Colonel Epp and that Comrade Faust be the commander of the Great German Battalion."

Faust is only a lieutenant now, and can only be addressed as "Sir" instead of "Your Excellency". To be a battalion commander, he must at least have the rank of major, and Faust is still far from that.

"It's best to discuss this issue privately with His Royal Highness the Crown Prince and Lieutenant General Galwitz," Faust said with a smile. "There's no need to bring it to the General Staff."

The most ideal candidate for battalion commander in Faust's mind was of course Rommel.

Relying on the military achievements in the last three battles, the Großdeutschland Battalion successively captured Hill 1794, Les Sulouis Hill and Tolmin Airport, killing and capturing thousands of Romanian soldiers. Its outstanding military achievements were enough for Rommel to be promoted to the rank of major and become a battalion commander. This was an exception, but not too excessive.

Based on the combat achievements of the Grossdeutschland Battalion, it would not be an exaggeration to promote all officers by one rank.

The most important thing is that, according to Crown Prince Rupprecht, the experiment of the Great German Battalion itself must have been a success, and it would be natural to expand the battalion into a regiment.

This group must also be under the absolute control of the National Socialist Party.

Chapter 50 The Second Trajan

"Victory! Another victory!"

The news that the Grossdeutschland Battalion had successfully captured the Ptolemin Airport made Major Rundstedt overjoyed. He now regarded Faust as the lucky star of the 22nd Army, and agreed to all of Faust's requests.

In terms of supplies and equipment, Major Rundstedt has obtained the approval of Lieutenant General Galwitz, commander of the 22nd Army, to replenish the Grossdeutschland Battalion with the highest standards.

In addition, Major Rundstedt, an elite of the General Staff, has a good political sense. He has been with Faust for so long that he naturally feels that the officers of the Grossdeutschland Battalion do not welcome Colonel Epp's wishes.

Rundstedt then devised a trick. He called the garrison at Sebes Railway Station and arranged for an Austro-Hungarian officer he knew to stop Colonel Epp in Transylvania.

reason?

There were many reasons. They could ask the Austro-Hungarian officials to arrange a welcome dinner for Colonel Epp, or let him inspect the Hungarian army and arsenal. In short, they wanted to stop Colonel Epp and prevent him from reaching the front line.

The situation on the front line has fundamentally improved. After the Grossdeutschland Battalion successively occupied the Resulouyi Heights and the Tolmin Airport, Romania's Skuduk Pass defense line was wide open. The 22nd Army can now easily launch a roundabout pincer attack without being interfered with by the Allied Air Force.

Lieutenant General Galvitz was particularly satisfied with the actions of Faust and others. Faust hoped to gain enough credit before Colonel Epp arrived, and so did Lieutenant General Galvitz.

As an Eastern Front general of Hindenburg and Ludendorff, Galwitz also hoped to capture Romania before Falkenhayn arrived at the headquarters.

"We will immediately begin planning the general assault on Skuduk Pass."

Rundstedt took Faust back to the army headquarters. Along the way, there were German soldiers preparing to launch a general offensive. The gray column meandered forward in the snow, and there was no end in sight. The horse teams transporting ammunition also headed south continuously. On the front line, a white mist slowly rose from the snow. Behind the mist, the entire main force of the 22nd Army was ambushed.