Chapter 391: The Weirdos

“No way? They brought our group all the way from Rouen to Paris, just for this strange reason?” Carius said with a look of dejection, leanin

“No way? They brought our group all the way from Rouen to Paris, just for this strange reason?” Carius said with a look of dejection, leaning against the hull of tank 113, his voice full of dissatisfaction. “We had just finished training that bunch of rookies. I thought they were going to send us to Britain.”

Seeing that Rein did not speak, and that Michael Wittmann on the side was even nonchalantly filing his nails with a small file, the youngest, Carius, continued to complain, “We are tank warfare experts! What does ‘expert’ mean? It means the strongest! Our tank company can take out an entire enemy tank regiment!”

“That’s right! If we had a wing of Stukas, we could take on two regiments,” Wittmann said with a smile, putting away the small file in his hand and pointing at Rein with a smile. “He’s the boss on the tank killer list now. He’s not even excited. What are you getting excited about?”

Rein finally spoke. In Andre’s surprised gaze, he said his first words of the day. “This can’t go on. The higher-ups are intentionally not letting us participate in the battle because they are afraid that we will be lost in the fighting.”

“A very correct approach,” Wittmann said with a smiling nod. “If I were in charge of the armored forces, I would also hope that aces like you could pass on your skills, and even, if possible, turn every tank into an ace.”

Rein smiled helplessly, then shrugged and said, “Then they’ve picked the wrong people for that. To find those who have destroyed five or six tanks to be instructors, that would be making the best use of things. To bring people like us here, apart from causing trouble, what kind of decent things can we do?”

His words were not without reason. In the Rouen area, their few crews had already sent off dozens of rookie crew trainees. As a result, most of the work had been done by the few crews with the lowest combat records, who had helped to train them for a few days. And they, these tank combat super aces, had on the contrary been the few who had contributed the least.

It was really not their fault that they could not contribute their strength. It was just that the skills they could teach those newbie eggs were really too limited. The rules that were written all over the operation manuals were almost all gone on these super aces, and the things they taught were also really a bit unacceptable.

There are many examples of this phenomenon in real life. For example, a university professor who is proficient in economics might lose his shirt if he were to play the stock market, but this does not at all prevent him from explaining economic knowledge to a group of university students in the classroom. And a stock market god who is sufficient to sway the market trend would not even be able to explain the most basic theories to a group of students. If he were to say that he relies on intuition, then he is probably not lying to you.

To put it in reality, when a group of new recruits from the armored forces gathered around Rein’s crew, most of them felt as if they were listening to a book from heaven:

Rein would tell these tank commanders how to climb a big tree with an assault rifle on their backs to secretly observe the enemy situation around them, but in school, for a commander to do so was forbidden. Naturally, if Rein were to tell them to go and capture a prisoner to probe a position, most of these commanders would also not be able to do it.

Baumann on the side was explaining to a group of drivers how to cooperate with the gunner to stop and shoot. This was the tacit understanding that he, Bruce, and Andre had honed with their lives—how many seconds it took for Bruce to load a shell, how many seconds Andre needed for a rough aim, how many seconds it took to stop and aim carefully, how many times the tank would shake after firing, and at which shake to push the clutch and control lever to make the tank move the fastest… These things had been said countless times, but it was a pity that the other crews just couldn’t do it.

The result was that after a week of intensive training, Rein’s crew could fire a shell in 4.5 seconds and accurately hit the target, while the group of new recruits took 8 seconds to fire a shell and still had to rely on luck to hit the target.

Those new recruits who had seriously studied the coordinated rhythm of Rein’s crew, in most cases, had either damaged the tank’s clutch or had fired their shells at least 20 meters away from the target. This result was even worse than their performance before they had started their learning.

Wittmann’s side was even worse. It was said that this smiling and amiable commander did not teach anything but took the trainees to a complex terrain in their tanks for a mock battle, often taking out a whole company of new recruits with one tank. After he had had his fun, he would leave, calling it letting these new recruits “experience it for themselves.”

Carius was even more speechless. He, who had not yet had his 17th birthday in a few years, was just like a big boy. His most classic line of instruction was, “If that place over there is like that, then it means that there is an enemy tank over there. Just wait two seconds and let the gunner fire.”

Most of the tank commanders who had heard this classic line, who were in their thirties, had almost gone mad. Big brother, which one are you talking about? Which thing on which side? And you haven’t even mentioned the aiming process. You’re telling us to fire after waiting two seconds?

It was really not that Rein, Wittmann, and Carius were unwilling to impart all their knowledge. It was just that this was not a single-pilot fighter, but a tank controlled by five soldiers. The kind of tacit understanding where Rein would shout a word to Baumann, and Baumann would be able to guess whether it was to turn or to advance, to stop or to reverse, was something that could only be understood, not explained.

In the end, it seemed that the division headquarters had also realized this point and had directly handed over the group of assigned new recruits to some ordinary crews with combat experience to be trained. The effect was much more obvious. These crews, which had not destroyed many tanks but had rich combat experience and were closer to standard operating procedures, were more easily understood and accepted by the new recruits when they served as instructors, and the training results were also more satisfactory.

“Since they want to see us, let’s show them what real aces are like,” Rein said, looking at Wittmann with a smile. “Consider it the last gathering of us tank aces, and also the prelude to the official start of our competition.”

“Agreed! When the war is over, we’ll compare our combat records. The one with the most kills buys the drinks, and the one with the fewest has to sing the Panzerlied under the table!” Wittmann nodded, a look of anticipation on his face.

Carius thought for a moment and then protested with dissatisfaction, “Hey! That’s not fair! I have the lowest combat record now! Won’t I be at the biggest disadvantage?”

“Simple! We’ll reset all our scores to zero and start counting from now, one by one!” Rein laughed out loud.

“Alright! It’s a deal!” Wittmann jumped off Rein’s war machine and walked toward his own tank not far away. “Then let’s let the Führer, and those Frenchmen, see our style!”

“Let’s go! 1st Company, 501st Heavy Panzerjäger Battalion, mount up! Move out!” Rein commanded loudly. “Baumann! Start the tank! Form up, advance!”

On the viewing stand, the French Prime Minister, Pétain, seemed to have blurred vision from old age. He was dozing off as he watched the German infantry marching past the street in neat formations below. His purpose in proposing to participate in the German victory parade in Paris was actually to see the troops that had defeated France. Who would have thought that on this makeup parade, the ones passing the rostrum were all honor guards?

The battle-hardened veterans of Germany, who had really been tested on the battlefield, now mostly had their own missions. Not many of them were idle and had nothing to do to participate in this kind of performance-based drill. Just as the soldiers of the honor guard looked down on the frontline troops who were covered in dust, most of those wild and fierce frontline soldiers also disdained the honor guard in the rear.

“Mr. Prime Minister, are you satisfied with our German army?” Akado asked with a smile, sitting on the viewing stand and pointing to the soldiers below, whose uniforms were brand new, their steps neat, and their Mauser 98K rifles slung over their shoulders. “The strongest troops in the whole world are no more than this.”

“If you are talking about goose-stepping, then they are the best,” Pétain said, his eyelids slightly raised. He seemed very dissatisfied with Akado’s perfunctory attitude. “I don’t believe that the French army was defeated by this group of soldiers whose shoes have not even gotten dirty. Of course, if I were to spend 400 million francs a day just to support such soldiers, I would also be very unwilling, my Führer.”

Akado laughed out loud. He did not seem to be angry at Pétain’s words. On the contrary, he was in a very good mood. He laughed for a few seconds and then said to the Field Marshal of the Army, von Brauchitsch, beside him, “You see, I told you these pretty things wouldn’t impress Marshal Pétain. Now do you believe me?”

He then turned his head and said with a smile on his lips, “Marshal Pétain, you had better keep your eyes wide open and wait, lest you fall asleep in a little while and miss the real good show.”

With Akado’s words, as if it had been prepared long ago, the drumbeat of the military band suddenly changed. From the generous and impassioned melody, it changed to a heart-pounding rhythm with a heavy air of killing. The drumbeat was muffled and deep, as if it were pulling people into a bloody and cruel battlefield.

The sleepy expression on Pétain’s face disappeared. He opened his eyes and looked with a trace of anticipation and a bit of gravity at the road not far away. There, even the air seemed to have become thick. The old marshal, who had experienced Verdun, seemed to have smelled a familiar atmosphere again, seemed to have felt that unique smell of smoke again.

Akado slowly stood up, stretched his right hand diagonally toward the sky, his tall body standing ramrod straight. As he stood up, so did the Field Marshal of the Army, von Brauchitsch, followed by a swath of military bigwigs behind him.

As if a virus were spreading, more and more people stood up, spreading farther and farther. Around the viewing stand, the German generals all followed suit and stood up, raising their right hands. Then came the sound of “Heil Führer Akado Rudolph,” like a sea wave, one wave higher than the last.

“Only when facing these heroes of the German people will I stand and salute, Prime Minister Pétain. And only they are worthy of being remembered by all!” Akado said, staring at the road in the distance. “Now open your eyes wide and look! These are the soldiers of Germany! The true number one in the world! You Frenchmen… did not lose in vain!”