I Became a Plutocrat in World War I: Starting with Saving France-Chapter 123 Easy as Pie

The balloon slowly ascended again, airplanes circled the gray sky like dragonflies, it was the same for both sides.

At this moment, the battlefield was like a large chessboard, the no man’s land in the middle was the border, the soldiers were positioned on both sides of the defensive line, the command posts were in the rear, along with guns and guards, all set up for a fierce battle.

Albert I looked at the balloons and airplanes rising from the German Army direction with some confusion. He asked, "The Germans clearly know Shire has already put machine guns on planes, sending up balloons is just asking to be destroyed, isn’t it?"

"The Germans have no choice!" General Charles explained, "In such weather, only at balloon height can you see the flash of artillery fire from kilometers away. To counter the French artillery, they must face possible danger!"

"But how do they protect themselves?" Albert I looked incredulous, "This is no different from suicide!"

Charles answered gravely, "Infantry charging enemy trenches is also suicide, but they still charge, this is war!"

Albert I fell silent, realizing that although he was with the soldiers, his understanding of the war was still only the tip of the iceberg.

...

However, General Kross did not think this was suicide.

He positioned eight Maxim Machine Guns around each balloon. The moment any enemy plane approached the balloon, it would be met with a barrage of ground machine gun fire.

The artillery positions were no exception; Kross had practically surrounded them with Maxim Machine Guns.

Kross even instructed his pilots, "If your plane is being chased by the enemy, immediately head toward the balloons or fly to the artillery positions!"

The machine guns would solve the pilots’ problems, Kross thought, just as Fajin Han said.

...

Paris City Defense Command, Shire received a new deployment from the enemy via telegram.

The intelligence was obtained by the reconnaissance aircraft of the artillery regiment; the German planes had no machine guns, they could safely fly over German positions and see everything.

The German pilots were still nervously avoiding these reconnaissance planes, fearing they were armed with machine guns.

Major Fernan placed several machine gun models around the balloons and artillery positions, looking towards Shire with some worry.

At this period, planes had a speed of only about 100 kilometers per hour, lacked fuel tank leak-proof devices, and had no underbelly armor, making them significantly threatened by ground machine guns.

But Shire still ordered the first squadron to attack.

...

Brutal war unfolded once more in Ypres, but this time neither side opened fire, only masses of German soldiers launched an assault on the Belgian defensive line through the muddy ground.

The French artillery waited for orders; Gallieni’s directive was not to open fire without command, even if the enemy charged right up to them!

The artillery commander, Major General Thierry, was puzzled, wasn’t this handing the artillery directly to the enemy?

He anxiously looked at the observer on the balloon, who was signaling that the enemy had entered artillery range.

Deep down, however, Major General Thierry knew that General Gallieni might be right.

Since the French 75 cannon was fitted with a hydraulic recoil mechanism and could fire 30 shells per minute, the Germans had given up competing with the French in rate of fire, opting to develop range and power instead.

Now, although the German howitzers could only fire 4 rounds per minute, they had an advantage with a range of 12 kilometers. The 105mm shells required only one shot, and without a direct hit, merely hitting nearby could shock all the artillery crew to death!

Major General Thierry understood that if he gave the order to fire, the 105mm shells from the opposite side would immediately rain down and blow them all to smithereens!

But what is the point of this? Would they not fire a single shot out of fear of enemy bombardment?

Major General Thierry awaited the artillery’s fate!

At that moment, the sound of "rumbling" engines came from the sky. Major General Thierry turned to see several rows of "Aphro" flying towards the German direction, their identical models and neat formations exuding a sense of power.

"The same attack as yesterday?" Major General Thierry was somewhat confused.

His reconnaissance personnel had forwarded the enemy’s deployment to General Gallieni; enemy positions around the balloons and artillery were like a hedgehog bristling with Maxim Machine Guns, even if the plane attack succeeded, it would come at a terrible cost!

...

However, Carter, commanding in the air, thought differently. He nonchalantly gestured to both sides, ordering the squadron to climb higher.

"These idiots, they never realized planes fly in the sky!" Carter murmured.

But he felt a bit ashamed because, upon hearing about the machine guns around the balloons, he reacted like everyone else, he was terrified and asked over the phone, "What do we do? Bombard them amidst gunfire?"

Shire responded with surprise, "Do you need to do that?" frёeωebɳovel.com

Carter paused for a moment, then with an "Oh," he knew what to do, it was incredibly simple!

"Maintain altitude!" The squadron climbed to about 1500 meters, Carter gestured and ordered, then let the squadron attack freely.

Without radios, once the squadron broke formation to attack the target, they could no longer issue commands and depended entirely on the pilots’ individual performance.

...

Standing on the ground, General Kross observed through binoculars the "Aphro" approaching the balloon from above, puzzled, what were they doing? At that height, their rockets wouldn’t hit the balloons, right?

Suddenly, he realized the reason, quickly put away his binoculars, and shouted, "Retract the balloons, retract the balloons! Immediately..."

But it was too late to retract the balloons now.

Several "Aphro" drew a beautiful arc in the sky, diving vertically towards the balloons from above. As they approached, rockets were fired with a "whoosh" sound...

"Boom!"

A balloon exploded into a ball of fire under the German Army’s watchful eyes, the machine gunners below did not fire a single shot, failing completely to offer any protection.

Everyone thought the enemy would approach from the side as usual to destroy the balloon, but they didn’t expect the top of the balloon had a large blind spot.

This blind spot allowed planes to strike from above, remaining outside the range and angle of machine guns.

"Boom boom!"

Balloons exploded one after another, turning to ashes in the sky.

Almost simultaneously, the French 75 cannons roared.

Four artillery regiments with hundreds of cannons fired a rain of shells at the dense formations of German soldiers charging by the trenches at a rate of 15 rounds per minute!

General Kross paled, realizing that all this might have been a planned tactic by the enemy!

And this was not all, two "Aphro" fired rockets towards the artillery positions from afar, these rockets didn’t explode but released smoke, soon enveloping the German artillery positions in the valley in a "sea of smoke"...