My Italian: Chapter 606 Battle of Savoy Part 1

Of course, the French side will not remain indifferent to the Italian army's capture of the Carragher Pass and its entry into the Savoy region.

First of all, the Sixth Army of the French Army, commanded by Admiral Decasternau, sent all three divisions of the reserve team to the Savoy area. That's right, the admiral no longer keeps a reserve team, because the situation of the Italians is already obvious, and they are mainly attacking the Savoy region.

Although the Savoy region is all mountainous, even if it is occupied by Italy, how much of a threat to southern France (just look at the Savoy region, its mountainous terrain limits the army's operations, and it wants to follow the river valley to Lyon Launching an attack is purely a matter of military science).

But this is French territory, and it will never be allowed to occupy it. Therefore, the reserve team of Admiral De Kaciterno needs to play a sufficient role.

In addition to the Sixth Army's response, Lyon had an additional mobilization division stationed. This was France's biggest response to the Italian offensive.

Why did France react so little to Italy's attack on the Savoy region?

The reason is simple. On the one hand, the Savoy region is not important enough (not as important as the Nice region). The second is to get angry and there are more urgent things to deal with. This matter is imminent, and there is no need to rush.

The thing is that German troops have entered northeastern France. After defeating the Belgian and British armies, the main force of Germany has crossed the French-Belgian border and advanced rapidly into the interior of France.

The main force of millions of German troops appeared in the undefended northeast of France. This is a very difficult thing for the French army. It is related to the success or failure of France in this war. Therefore, regarding the Italian attack on the Savoy region, The French army can only hold back first, and then deal with the Italians after blocking the Germans.

However, although the decision to postpone the treatment of Italy was made, it was impossible for the French army to just release Savoy to the Italians on the battlefield.

It is still necessary to fight, but the focus is different.

Therefore, the war between France and Italy in Savoy has never stopped at all.

"attack."

Following the roar of the leading officer, a large group of Italian officers and soldiers attacked the French position on the hillside with their rifles.

At the foot of the mountain, mortars were constantly firing shells at the French army in the position.

Speaking of which, in mountain combat, the favorite of Italian soldiers is this small mortar.

Although its accuracy is very low, its range is also low, and it is not easy to aim, but the convenience of being carried by a single person makes soldiers like this artillery that can follow their own footsteps very much.

Wherever you can get past people, you can use mortars. This has caused the Italian Army to like this mortar very much, and this has also caused the Turin Arsenal to work overtime to build this mountain warfare weapon for it.

Of course, in addition to mortars, light and heavy machine gun infantry also like it very much. Needless to say, the Maxim heavy machine gun is an absolute defensive weapon. As long as the position has a Maxim machine gun as a defensive support, the soldiers don't have to worry about the enemy's attack at all.

However, soldiers actually prefer the lightweight Reverie machine gun to the heavy machine gun that can only be used for defense. The weight of the whole gun is only 9 kg. Compared with the Maxim, which weighs 3-40 kg, the gun can be carried by one person, and it can keep up with the pace of soldiers and provide fire support at any time.

Although in terms of performance, whether it is the rate of fire, range or the persistence of firepower, the Revelry machine gun is far inferior to the Maxim, but its weight advantage allows soldiers to carry out more tactics around this machine gun. Cooperate.

Therefore, in the army, the soldiers' demand for the Revelry machine gun has never stopped.

But it is a pity that due to the current output of the gun and supply considerations, the gun can only be deployed at the platoon level. Each platoon has one, and a few elite infantry divisions can do two. Of course, this has to exclude the paratroopers who are used to performing dangerous missions.

However, although ordinary infantry divisions, battalions and companies have fewer machine guns at the first level, for these troops, the living can still be suffocated to death by urine. Centralizing the use of machine guns at the battalion and company level to increase the density of offensive firepower is what those lower-level officers like to do most.

Especially in the Savoy Mountains, where troops cannot be deployed, the scale of battles is relatively small, usually at the battalion and company level. The most deterrent in his hands are only machine guns and mortars.

Increasing the firepower density of the attack will naturally reduce the difficulty of the attack.

Besides, at present, the French army has very little support firepower at the battalion and company level, basically using rifles. One more thing to say here is that the French company level is called an infantry squadron. Although it also has four platoon-level squadrons, the strange thing comes next. The squad has two platoons (we call them half-formed platoons), and such a platoon has two infantry squads under its control. (1 squad of 14 soldiers and 1 officer, 2 squad of 13 soldiers and 1 officer)

In the entire infantry squadron (company), apart from rifles, there are only officers' self-defense pistols.

That's right, except for Italy, the infantry companies of all countries are based on riflemen at the first level. If you want support weapons, you need at least a battalion level.

Therefore, the French defenders, who were originally in a defensively favorable terrain in the mountain battle, were suppressed by the attacking Italian army. More importantly, after the highly anticipated Saint-Etienne 1907 heavy machine gun on the French position was torn to pieces by mortar shells, the morale of the French army decreased at a speed visible to the naked eye.

This heavy machine gun has excellent French origin. After the advent of Maxim, France decided to manufacture its own heavy machine gun, so an air-cooled heavy machine gun came out. It has to be said that this design is one step ahead of the current water-cooled type.

Of course, the consequence is that the performance of this machine gun is not good. Although the soldiers did not think highly of it, its authentic French origin made the Ministry of the Army very close to it, so this machine gun appeared in France. in the hands of the army.

But it is a pity that compared with the Italian army who has practiced the use of machine guns and the ability to counter machine guns, the current French army is not even a little bit worse in the use of machine guns.

Set up the machine gun at the highest point of the position, it is difficult not to hit it, who made it so conspicuous. So the Saint-Etienne 1907 heavy machine gun, which had not been fired for a long time, was restored to its parts by the mortar gunner.

The French army, which had no firepower, was immediately suppressed by the attacking Italian army with Revelli machine guns, making it impossible for the defenders in their positions to raise their heads. While the opponent was suppressed, the attacking Italian officers and soldiers rushed to the trench at a faster speed.

"The enemy is rushing over."

The defending French soldiers immediately exclaimed in trembling voices when they saw the Italian officers and soldiers approaching the trenches.

Then the two sides threw grenades at each other, and a burst of grenade explosions sounded inside and outside the position.

But when it comes to grenades, Italy uses the same wooden handle grenade as Germany, so we won't say much about its advantages and disadvantages. As for the grenade thrown by the French army, it is a product of another era. We can call it a variant of the bomb thrown by the grenadier (interested readers can go to Bilibili to see how weird it is).

Then after an explosion, the soldiers on both sides entered a **** hand-to-hand battle.

But at this time, in Cosenz's eyes, the battle was over, because the second wave of offensive troops had already arrived halfway, and the third wave had already set off, and the French army guarding the position had no chance of a comeback.

This is indeed the case. After waiting for the second wave of offensive troops to rush into the position, the struggling French officers and soldiers immediately couldn't hold on. Some of them surrendered to the Italian army, while others fled in all directions. Thus the position fell into the hands of the Italians.

But for the victory in front of him, Cosenz did not show a happy expression, because a battalion attacked a company of the French army, what is there to be happy about~www.mtlnovel.com~ The purpose of this persistence is clear at a glance, and it is to delay their time.

I want to hold back the footsteps of their 18th Army and slow down their progress towards Annecy.

Although he knew the purpose of these French troops, there was no good solution to this. It can only gnaw away the French army's positions step by step.

Speaking of which, although the equipment of the French army is not suitable, there is nothing wrong with the tactics. Taking advantage of the mountainous terrain in the Savoy area, layers of blocking made their progress slower.

Although Modriena, Aiguebele, Darbiny and other towns have been captured one after another before, Annecy and Gremoble, which are crucial to Savoy, are still in the hands of the French army, as long as these two places are not captured. If it is captured, the French army can fight and stop whenever they want, which will put the Italian army in the Savoy area at a strategic disadvantage.

Therefore, in order to change this situation, Prince Filiberto, the commander of the Northern Army, sent the 18th Military Region to capture Annecy in the north, and he will lead the main force of the Northern Army to attack the more important Gremoble.

Please remember the first domain name of this book: . :