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Chapter 54: The Bandit Possessed by Clausewitz (1)

The next week, Garland and Leibniz discovered that Chen Dao locked himself in the office every day, and almost never left his home except for eating and going to the bathroom. When Garland and Leibniz went to Chen Dao's office to report on their work, they found that their commander's desk was covered with a huge Nordic map, filled with various books and documents.

Garland took the opportunity of reporting work and looked at the books a few times and found that the types of books were messy. There were military theory books such as "War Discussion" and "Air Supremacy", as well as various secret documents printed with the Air Force logo. Garland even found a Norwegian travel manual inside.

Is Germany going to start a war against Norway? Garland guessed secretly. Seeing that there were many words marked with confidentiality in those documents, Garland wisely hid his curiosity in his stomach, and with Leibniz, he reduced the number of times he disturbed Chen Dao, unless he encountered a major event that could not be decided.

After studying the plan of the "Wish River Exercise" sent by Stutendet and the secret information about Norway sent by Goring, Chen Dao finally had a rough understanding of the intention of the German Supreme Command to attack Norway.

Norway is located in the northwest of the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe, bordering Sweden in the east, Finland and Russia in the northeast, and the Norwegian Sea in the west. The coastline is 21,000 kilometers long, and it is mostly natural and good ports. It has a very important strategic position. Since Germany does not have an exit directly to the Atlantic Ocean, it can only enter the Atlantic Ocean through the North Sea through the North Sea. However, the powerful British Navy has always been a heart-wrenching problem for the German Navy. During World War I, Britain used its naval advantages to cross the narrow North Sea, across the narrow North Sea, and arranged a tight blockade network, leaving the German fleet trapped in its local ports and doing nothing.

On September 3, 1939, after Britain declared war on Germany, the German Navy, in view of historical experience and geographical facts, believed that in order to deal with the dominant British Navy, Germany must try to obtain a base in Norway so that it can break through the British blockade line in the North Sea and enter the Atlantic Ocean unimpeded. German Navy Lieutenant General Wegener vividly compared: "The German fleet in the North Sea was originally a horseless knight, and now he should be allowed to ride on a geographical saddle." This saddle refers to Norway.

On October 10, 1939, the German Navy Commander-in-Chief Raidel met Hitler and expressed concern that Norway might open ports to Britain, which would bring strategic adverse consequences to Germany. He urged Hitler to occupy Norway first as a naval base for combating Britain, and at the same time, it could also ensure the source of iron ore sand in Sweden.

Of the 15 million tons of iron ore consumed by Germany each year, 11 million tons are to be imported from Sweden. In winter, these iron ore sands must be transported by rail to the Norwegian port of Narvik and then shipped to Germany. The entire route happens to be within the Norwegian territorial waters. But in Hitler's strategy, the primary goal was to conquer Western Europe, so he would rather retain Norway's neutral status than take any extramigous military actions.

On December 16, 1939, the leader of the Norwegian National Unification Party and former Minister of Defense, Gisling, visited Berlin and reported to Hitler that Britain was about to occupy Norway under the tacit understanding of the Norwegian government. Gisling asked Hitler to provide economic and military assistance to support him in launching a coup and overthrow the Norwegian government. After the matter was completed, he invited Germany to protect Norway and thus prevent the British invasion. Hitler said he would rather see Norway remain completely neutral, as did the rest of Scandinavia because he was unwilling to expand the battlefield. But if the enemy was ready to expand the war, he would take self-defense action to deal with the threat. He promised to give Gisling a sum of funds and guaranteed to study the issue of military assistance.

However, Britain and France continued to threaten Norway's neutral status. As early as September 19, 1939, the British cabinet passed a plan proposed by Navy Minister Churchill: to lay mines in the Norwegian territorial waters, thereby cutting off the sea transportation line for Germany to import Swedish iron ore sand.

On January 6, 1940, the British government sent a note to the Norwegian government, claiming that the British fleet would not allow German merchant ships to use Norwegian waters. This increased Hitler's concern about security and strategic resources in the north wing. On January 27, Hitler instructed the German Command to formulate a comprehensive combat plan for the occupation of Norway if necessary. To this end, the German Supreme Command specially established a battle preparation staff department composed of representatives from each of the three armed, navy and air forces, and formulated a draft Norwegian battle plan code-named "Wisheshe Exercise".

An incident that occurred on February 16, 1940 finally strengthened Hitler's determination to occupy Norway. On that day, a German warship carrying British prisoners of war, the USS Artemark, was chased by British warships and fled to Norwegian waters for refuge. Churchill ordered the British ship to break into Norwegian waters, boarded the USS Artemark, and rescued the prisoners of war. At that time, two Norwegian gunboats were present and did not respond to the invasion of the British ship. However, the Norwegian government protested to the UK afterwards. However, Hitler believed that the Norwegian government was willing to be an accomplice of the British, and the protest was nothing more than pretending to deceive him. Then Gislin fanned the flames to Hitler and said that the British ship's actions were British and Nobel had planned in advance, which made Hitler even more convinced. So he decided to take the initiative first and quickly occupy Norway.

So under the order of Hitler and under the implementation of Keitel, the Chief of Staff of the Supreme Command, the plan for the "Wish River Exercise" that made Goring jealous was created.

The plan shows that the German army will launch an attack on Denmark and Norway at the same time, landing and airborne in the important Norwegian ports Oslo, Christiansan, Stavanger, Trondheim and Nalvik, and then develop an attack on the inland to capture the entire Norway territory; and use the air force to deal with the British and French navies, but the German navy should avoid large-scale maritime wars with the British Royal Navy to preserve its strength.

The 21st German Army has seven divisions under its command, and the commander is General Nicholas von Falkenhorst, responsible for the attack on Norway; the 31st Army has two divisions and one brigade, and the commander is General Copis Air Force, responsible for the attack on Denmark. The 878 aircraft of the 5th German Air Force and 274 large and small ships of the Navy are responsible for the support.

In sharp contrast to the powerful German forces, Denmark only has two army divisions and Norway only has six short-term infantry divisions. In the prediction of the German Supreme Command, the reinforcements of Britain and France will be the main enemies of the German army.

"The tragic Denmark is just because the Luftwaffe Air Force wants to use Denmark's airports to be occupied. It's really a weak country with no human rights." Chen Dao sighed.

Chen Dao immediately thought that on the day of the attack, the German Navy would send a landing fleet consisting of two battlecruisers, three heavy cruisers, seven light cruisers, 14 destroyers, 28 submarines and several auxiliary ships to carry landing troops to carry landing troops for landing warfare.

Chen Dao knew that these ships were almost all the strength that the German Navy currently possessed. When he asked Redel for advice, Redel once said that as long as he could successfully occupy Norway, it would be worth it even if he lost half of the ships.

Even Radell, a marshal who has always been considered a gentleman in Chen Dao's eyes, has made such a cruel decision that Chen Dao has a deeper understanding of the importance of the Norwegian battle.

Chen Dao read the "Wishi River Exercise" plan seven or eight times, without missing a single detail, and finally came to a conclusion that this plan is a model of coordinated combat between the army, navy and air force, and it also launches an attack in a surprise attack.

Chen Dao confirmed that with the bonus of the surprise attack halo, this plan will inevitably achieve a great victory.

The more he realized the excellence of the "Wish River Exercise" plan, the more Chen Dao felt that he was possessed by the soul of Emperor Alexander, so that he could not even be able to operate his proud IQ.

Under heavy pressure, Chen Daobai picked up a book of Clausewitz's book "On War" boredly, and read it casually, wanting to find some inspiration in it.

"War is the maximum use of violence, and this sentence cannot be used; war is not a short blow, and this sentence cannot be used; war is by no means an isolated act, this sentence is interesting, but it cannot be used; the ending of war is by no means absolute, with a bandit, the ending of World War II is definitely not absolute, but it cannot be used now." Chen Dao was flipping through the book while criticizing "On War" in a high-level way.

"War is not only a political act, but also a real political tool, the continuation of political interactions, and the realization of political interactions through another means.······ Because political intention is the end, war is the means, and means without purpose are never imagined."

Chen Dao's eyes lit up, and he thought that this sentence was quite interesting. From a military perspective, he must be a group of staff members of the Supreme Command. If he wants to fight with such a group of outstanding talents and win, there is only one way, that is, to adopt the theory of misaligned strikes of bandit dialectics, such as interpreting the Norwegian battle from a political perspective.

Thinking of this, Chen Dao felt that he was possessed by Clausewitz's heroic spirit in an instant. After a punch and kick, the evil spirit of Emperor Alexander retreated. Chen Dao's smart IQ reoccupied his brain and started running at full speed.

After looking through the plan of the "Wish River Exercise" again, Chen Dao became more and more certain that this plan only looked at the problem from a military perspective and did not consider political factors at all.
Chapter completed!
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