There is noo such thing as too much British Imperialism, for are not the Brits destined to rule the universe, kill the French and miss penalties?
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You forgot that is also their destiny to be beaten by ze Germans on the Football field.
Sorry, but who won in the last game old chap..... and it was a goal in the 1966 world cup, whatever you say.
No it wasn't.
You lot can't always rely on having Soviet referees. Also, that last game was only a minor slip. We'll be back. *puts on Pickelhaube*
I could resurrect Zombie Rommel, but let's not let this get out of hand, shall we? This will have to be settled on the field methinks.
Perfect, he'd have great tactics but absolutely no grasp of logistics. The German side would have a stunning first half then be absolutely knackered come 50 minutes and concede dozens as they were too tired to run.
Then on about 80 minutes he'd start abusing the German FA and be forced to leave the field. On that basis he'd be my choice for the German side.
Hehe. Speaking of which, he will probably appear in the next chapter.Perfect, he'd have great tactics but absolutely no grasp of logistics. The German side would have a stunning first half then be absolutely knackered come 50 minutes and concede dozens as they were too tired to run.
Then on about 80 minutes he'd start abusing the German FA and be forced to leave the field. On that basis he'd be my choice for the German side.
and 'french resistance'
and as to the football topic, i'll let this link speak for itself http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/1515667.stm
i was going to post the wikipedia page but it seems to have been deleted in the last 5 minutes since i searched for it. weird...
Still, shall we get back to the AAR. Although if the British EMpire remains, will we be able to draw player from places such as India and Africa?
The French technique. Raiding the colonies has proven a most successful strategy, ever since they've been forced to rely on actual Frenchmen they've been rubbish.
Indeed. And with the massive Post-war populations, we'll have plenty of talent to draw on. Of course if we still have India Cricket should be good for us.....
Let's go bit by bit.
Bearing in mind that the world is not enough, James Bond would agree with this point, but...
No. Brits lost that right with the Space Girls. Sorry lads.
Dunno what Fernando Torres would say about this, but Spamiards are going to get angry if, in addition to Gibraltar, you take their traiditional enemies away.
Now it's when I miss Paul Gascoigne...
England world cups: 1966
Germany world cups: 1954, 1974, 1990.
By the way... I feel a bit of a heretic being the only one in this page of replies not flying the Union Jack...
Don't feel bad. Once the custom avatars are finally fixed I shall change that.
I did, but I couldn't avoid to feel a bit of a heretic. When the custom avatars return -on the very next day to King Arthur's second coming
- all will be fine, indeed.
Chapter 87
2nd May, 1940 06:45 PM
Somewhere in North-Western Germany
All along the borders on the western flank of Germany, Axis soldiers were hunkered down in the trenches that spanned much of the length of what was soon to become the western Front. The organization of the two Armies had been surprisingly simple. The Germans, admittedly still with the better tactical doctrine for the terrain and better knowledge of the same would be tasked with achieving the initial breakthrough, while the Soviets would hold down the enemy forces at the base of the breakthrough and secure the flanks of the surging Panzer spearheads, who themselves would be supported by a few select Soviet Tank Divisions, equipped with the newest the arsenals in the Ukraine could offer. Behind the tanks followed the Infantry, tasked with actually securing the territory the armoured units captured, and behind the Infantry, hundreds upon hundreds of Artillery pieces were lined up, their barrels pointed into the direction of the unsuspecting countries that lay to the west of them, shells in their breeches and their crews just waiting for the order to fire. The small group of Generals assembled on one of the few hills in this part of Germany was standing in-between the Infantry and the Artillery batteries, ready for the clock to strike the appointed time. Had any Allied observer been present he would have noted the amount of stars assembled, and the names that went with them. It was nothing less than the forward Command post of the two Commanding Generals, in this case Georgi Zhukov, who had proven himself during the latter half if the campaign in Poland, and who had replaced his predecessor who had fallen out of favour with Stalin, and Lieutenant General Heinz Guderian. The two men had been instrumental in making the military aspect of the Alliance work, and had been awarded a corps command each, and together they would form the spearhead of the spearhead, commanding the Tank units that would smash the Allied Armies to pieces. A bit further west, another General was standing on top of his command vehicle, cursing in a low voice. He would have loved to wait until his Division, the 7. Panzerdivision, had received the new Panzer IIIs that had been allocated to it's second heavy tank battalion, but alas, their lords and masters had decided that France had to be defeated now, instead of waiting another two weeks. As a result of this, Major-General Erwin Rommel was not a happy man. He figured though that it could have been worse. Last year at this time the Division, not yet under his command, had been equipped with these stupid tin-cans that called themselves Panzers. He too watched the minutes tick away, and awaited the appointed time. His second in Command approached him and asked: “General, would you care for a cup of Coffee? It's probably going to be the last hot one for a while, so I guessed...” Rommel nodded. “Thank you, Hans.” He greedily accepted the tin cup and washed his bitterness down with the hot liquid. There was work to be done.
A few kilometres away, the Artillery crews watched as the clock struck eight, as one, almost five-hundred artillery pieces fired in one incredible, thunderous barrage, shaking the earth beneath them while the shells flew towards the unsuspecting Dutch and Belgian Armies. At the same time Leutnant Willi Kramer, made an Officer for his exploits in Poland, promotion was somehow not the right word in his mind, could see the shells crashing into the ground ahead where intelligence suspected Belgian positions. “That's the signal, boys. Tell the rest of the platoon to advance in line formation.” Soon the Panzer IIIs of 2. Zug/1st Battalion/Panzerregiment 25/7. Panzerdivision advanced in line formation towards a small patch of trees, just beyond the border. When they rolled across it, Kramer could see a few German and Soviet Military policemen demolishing the border posts, beating up the poor unsuspecting Belgian official while they did so. He turned away in disgust and concentrated on the job that needed to be done. For almost an hour the German and Soviet troops advanced into Belgium without meeting any sort of organized resistance. It seemed that tactical surprise had been achieved, something that had seemed impossible when the Division had moved into position all these weeks ago. The Panzers passed the last houses of a small village and reached the bank of a small creek. Here the first sign of military activity was encountered, because the gunner yelled: “Belgians, they are running away from the bridge!” Sure enough, when he looked through the commander's viewports, Kramer could see three Belgians running away from the bridge to a small hut a few dozen yards further down the road, hunched in between the two tree lines at the side of the road, pursued by machinegun fire. Before he could bring his own co-axial gun to bear, they had disappeared. Suddenly Kramer realized why they had run. “Oh Scheisse. The bridge is wired!” The crew of his tank looked up in alarm, and the radio operator instantly signalled for all units to halt. However much to his horror, Kramer could see an Armoured Car of the reconnaissance company approach the bridge. Before he could even order it called back, the armoured car reached the centre of the old stone bridge, and sure enough, the Belgians chose this moment to connect the wires. The Bridge exploded, throwing the armoured car aside into the creek, burning up the remainder of it's fuel and munitions. Before the explosion had subsided, the Germans were greeted with a hailstorm of machinegun and anti-tank fire from across the creek, cutting down the supporting infantry in droves. The German Panzers returned fire, and Kramer yelled, in order to be heard over the constant sound of battle outside the armoured hull.
“Raise the Regiment. Tell them we need artillery or air support on the following grid reference...” he rattled off the co-ordinates and waited for a reply. “No luck, Leutnant, I can't get through to the regiment.” Instead of a proper reply Kramer let loose a string of unprintable profanities, and surveyed the line again. “And could you lazy bastards be inclined to return fire? I can see... Anti-Tank gun, three yards from the edge of the treeline. High Explosive.” “Loaded.” “FIRE!” Finally his tank joined the carnage. The shell closed the distance in less than two seconds and smashed right into the shield of the gun, exploding it and the ready round in the barrel, vaporizing everything around it and setting fire to the woods as three more Belgians joined the mounting number of casualties. Still, the Belgians had an edge on the Germans, as those were forced to keep their Panzers out in the open were they to return fire. The edge however was short lived, because soon the Germans were retreating into cover behind the houses. The Belgians however started to celebrate too early, because only seconds later they could hear the roar of aircraft engines. A group of four Ju-87 Divebombers appeared overhead, and soon the Belgians were to learn why this plane had such a fearsome reputation already. One after another, the Stukas dipped over their port wings and dove down on the their position, their sirens wailing in the customary, boneshaking sound. The Belgian soldiers could see them release their bombs and pull out of their dives, just before the bombs detonated amongst them, forever turning their world into darkness. As soon as the Stukas were gone again, the Panzers re-appeared and crossed the relatively shallow creek just besides the bridge and the still burning armoured car. The creek was just deep enough to prevent cars from crossing it, but the Panzers had no problem at all with it, and soon they passed the former defensive line, leaving the mopping up to the Infantry. The Panzers had other things to do.
7th Armoured Division deployment camp
South of Dundee, Five, Scotland
Aside from the night watch, most of the soldiers of the Division were still asleep, unawares of the battles that were now raging all over the low countries. The members of B Squadron/2nd Royal Hussars/4th Armoured Brigade/7th Armoured Division were no exception, and neither was their commanding Officer, Captain Niemczyk. He was however about to be woken, when a wireless operator rudely interrupted his dream about wife and kids back at home in Glasgow. “Captain, Sir, wake up.” Cursing under his breath and slowly waking up, Niemczyk sat up on his cot and looked at whoever had said the offending words. “Sergeant, although you were only just transferred to my Squadron and might not yet know the rules, what in the name of the bloody hand of the devil gives you the right to interrupt me?” “Ah..sorry, Sir, but the Colonel wants you. It seems something big's up.” Niemczyk grunted something intelligible and rose to his feet. He quickly dressed and walked past the slowly waking Squadron outside to the command post. It was barely day, but the troops were already awake, so something really big had to be going down. He entered the CP and saluted to Lieutenant Colonel Stafford, the new Commander of the 2nd Hussars. “Ah, Captain, glad you could join us. I trust you didn't give the Sergeant a too hard time?” “He did wake me, Sir.” Stafford grinned and said: “I'm afraid this was the last sleep you'll get. It seems that the balloon has gone up, Niemczyk. We've received reports that the Axies have crossed the border into Belgium, and our lords and masters have finally decided that it might be a good idea to deploy the BEF after all, and the 2nd Hussars have received the honour of forming the vanguard of the vanguard. It'll take at least three weeks to deploy all of the force, but we are due to land in Belgium three days from now. I guess we were chosen because we are already embarked, eh?” Niemczyk nodded and said: “At least our kit, Colonel.” He was referring to the order two weeks back, when the 2nd had been stripped of it's equipment. It had been pre-loaded on the transports that were waiting in Dundee and all over the Firth of Forth, in order to be able deploy at least part of I (UK) Armoured Corps in order the Axis powers were so unsporting and attacked before London had sorted out the troubles with the French. “Aye,” Stafford continued. “I've spoken with the Cannon Fodd..ehrm our dear friends from the Infantry, and they say that a battalion of the Royal Irish Fusiliers should arrive in Belgium about at the same time we do, so we won't go into battle naked. Also, Niemczyk, how are the Malayans holding up?” B Squadron had been chosen to host the 2nd Hussars share of the new Imperial recruits that were filtered in throughout the Army, and two Tank Crews were now manned with recruits from Singapore and several villages to the north of it. “They are still a bit green, Sir, but eager to learn. They are a good bunch, Colonel.” Stafford nodded. “Well, Captain, you better go and wake up your lads. We'll move out in an hour.”
[Game Notes: Case Yellow kicked off, and the Phony war is over.]
STOP! COOKIE TIME