Chapter 210 Tank Generation Gap
If tanks at that time were divided into generations, then there was actually a generation gap between the "Char A1" tank and the A7V tank.
The turret of the Char A1 tank can rotate, while the A7V tank cannot.
This may not seem like much of a difference, after all, a tank's success often depends on whether its artillery can penetrate the enemy's armor, but this is not always the case in actual combat.
Because the A7V tank does not have a rotating turret, its gun firing angle is greatly limited. When the target is about to turn to the side, it can no longer shoot. At this time, the driver must control the vehicle body to turn.
At this point, an extremely embarrassing situation may occur: the driver turns and stops, and the gunner is about to aim but finds that the target has moved out of the shooting angle, and then the driver needs to turn again... and this happens repeatedly, and the driver may never be able to aim or shoot.
The "Char A1" tank is different. The turret rotates in all directions without blind spots. Once it stops, it can aim and fire immediately. The driver does not need to know whether it hits the target. When he hears the gunshot, he steps on the accelerator and continues to move forward, looking for the next flat ground to repeat the action.
In this way, the mobile warfare of "stop and fight, fight and leave" was perfectly realized.
The driver and gunner do not need too much coordination, they can almost do their own things and still fight smoothly without any pause.
The two tanks also have unequal hit rates:
The target of "Char A1" is a fixed target.
The A7V was turning on the spot, slowly and clumsily. Its body was as huge as a giant, and its side armor stood in front of the gunner like a wall, making it easy to hit the gunner without much aiming.
A7V's target is a moving target.
Although the "Charter A1" also stopped for a while, it was very short. In addition, the target was very small, so before the A7V had time to aim, the "Charter A1" had fired a shell and started again.
This made the A7Vs exhausted and they didn't even have a chance to open fire, and they could only be destroyed one after another by the "Charter A1" tanks.
This scene stunned the French soldiers who were fighting. They were originally worried that the "Charle A1" tanks would be taken away by a few shots from the A7V tanks, but they did not expect that they were so agile as monkeys and could easily tease those "big guys".
Even Colonel Browne had not expected this situation. While commanding his troops to continue suppressing the enemy infantry, he observed this first tank battle in history and sighed in his heart: "The Germans are finished!"
The most devastated was the German commander Colonel Matteo. He had thought that his A7V tank could crush the enemy tanks with absolute advantage, but he did not expect to be crushed by the enemy instead.
After the embarrassment of turning continuously but failing to hit the target, Colonel Mateo decided to take a risk. He shouted: "All machine guns, switch to K bullets!"
The K bullet was designed to deal with the Mark I tank. Each of the six machine guns was equipped with a belt containing 250 rounds of K bullets.
Colonel Mateo waited for a while, and the machine gunners responded one by one, "Ready!" Mateo turned to the driver and ordered, "Stop the car, hold still!"
Matteo thought this way: A7V has firepower on all four sides. In addition to the artillery on the front, there are two machine guns on each of the other three sides. If they can penetrate the enemy's side armor, then A7V will still be able to fight.
"Da-da-da, da-da!"
“Da da da…”
The sound of the K bullet when fired is particularly crisp, which is the result of the intense friction between the steel core bullet and the rifling.
Colonel Matteo stared at the targeted tank from the observation window, but the reality made him despair, the turret of the target tank was still turning without being affected at all.
This is the result of Charles' estimation. The K bullet can penetrate 13MM steel plate within a distance of 200 meters. The side armor of the "Charr A1" tank is set at 13MM.
If it is one millimeter more, the added weight may affect the speed and maneuverability of the tank. If it is one millimeter less, it will not be able to block the K bullet. It needs to be carefully weighed.
"Colonel, what should we do?" the German tank soldier asked Colonel Matteo loudly.
Colonel Mateo could not answer this question because he did not know the answer.
He only knew one thing, that A7V had already lost, and lost completely, without any suspense at all!
He looked at the small tank outside the observation window and saw its turret slowly turning towards him. Colonel Mateo turned around helplessly and said to his men who were looking at him: "Pray!"
Before he could finish his words, there was a crisp "clang" sound, and the shell penetrated the armor and then hit the engine in the middle of the tank.
Broken armor and shell fragments flew everywhere in the tank cabin, and rivets that were broken by the shock ricocheted repeatedly in the cabin like bullets, causing screams in the cabin in an instant.
Colonel Mateo only felt a pain in his abdomen. He lowered his head to check his wounds, but found that he could not see anything. The thick smoke from the engine had obscured everything, and it even made Colonel Mateo unable to open his eyes.
In a daze, Colonel Mateo felt someone open the tank door.
Colonel Mateo relied on his memory and used the last bit of his strength to climb to the cabin door. He tried to stick his head out. A cold wind blew and he felt relieved. He finally breathed some fresh air.
Colonel Mateo's consciousness became increasingly blurred, and he finally saw a fire...
The battle lasted only a dozen minutes and the French army won a complete victory. Only one of the ten A7Vs retreated under the cover of German infantry, while the others were either paralyzed on the position or burned into a fireball.
The French army had a "Charger A1" tank whose tracks were broken by shrapnel.
It could also be considered a loss because the French army had no time to repair the tanks, and in this race against time in this interspersed operation, it was impossible to stop the entire army because of a tank.
For reasons of secrecy, Browne had explosives placed inside the tank and then set it on fire.
The French army did not pursue the retreating German army because the Samoq Straight was not the French army's target. Although the straight road could shorten the distance, it was built into a trap by the German army.
Of course, Charles would not be stupid enough to let his troops fall into a trap.
As for rescuing the 2nd Special Artillery Division trapped in it, it was only necessary to destroy the German howitzer regiment.
French reconnaissance planes have given the specific location of the howitzer regiment, which is about five miles northeast of the town of Samok and is covered by only one or two infantry companies.
The German army put almost all its forces into encircling the French army, leaving its rear empty with no extra forces to protect them.
The French army had tanks and sidecars, and it would undoubtedly be another massacre to deal with an artillery regiment that had almost no close combat capability.
…
Inside the Samok Straight, Major General Tijani half-believingly assembled his troops on the north side of the straight.
There was still some artillery fire in front of them, which seemed to be a warning from the German army to them.
No one dared to pass easily, they could only lie in a hidden place and wait quietly.
This may be their last hope. If the shelling does not stop as Charles said, they will have no choice but to surrender.
Suddenly, the sound of artillery stopped.
Tijani was stunned.
Immediately, people around cheered excitedly: "We are saved, Charles did it!"
(End of this chapter)
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