ff37;ww.ff35;ff18;xff33;.ff23;om u85c0f;8bf4;66f4;65b0;6700;5feb;5c0f;8bf4;9605;8bfb;7f51;     While the United Nations Army successfully opened up the second battlefield in Europe, the coalition command judged the situation and believed that the Nazi German army, the backbone of the Allied Army, was shrinking its defense in an allied manner. The coalition forces liberated half of France to force the German army to withdraw from the battlefields of Spain, Italy and the Soviet Union.

General Cai E, the commander-in-chief of the coalition, believed that the other two landing areas that were originally used to cover the real landing operations of the coalition in Normandy should also be changed to the main landing areas, namely the feint landing troops along the coast of Gibraltar, Spain, and the feint landing troops in Sicily, Italy and southern Italy. There is no need for these two troops to feint attack and fight again, and can be changed to the main landing operations, because the main German forces there were drawn back to Germany in large quantities, and the remaining Spanish and Italian troops had low combat power and could not stop the coalition landing at all.

The coalition forces returned to France and had already gained a foothold in France. The German army retreated completely and defended the local area as the top priority. In order to be able to smoothly attack the German area in the next military operations, the coalition forces opened up the third battlefield in Europe and landed in southern Italy. In addition, the Turkish and Armenian troops in the northeast will attack the German area from the north, forcing the German army to mobilize heavy troops to defend and reduce the military pressure on the coalition forces on the Western Front.

Cai E's combat plan was quickly approved by the General Staff of the Chinese Empire and was approved at the Military Conference of the United Nations Command.

The coalition originally planned to start the landing operation in Sicily on July 11, but on July 8, a huge change occurred in the Spanish capital. The Spanish Revolutionary Party launched a military coup, killing Franco and his Nazi bests guards, and seizing the Spanish regime.

The reason why the Revolutionary Party was able to easily kill Franco and seize the Spanish regime was due to the great victory of the United Nations Army on the French battlefield and the fierce offensive of the United Nations Army landed in Gibraltar. Franco and his army had no power to fight back against the fierce attacks of the United Nations Army without the strong help of the German army.

The German army had actually given up Spain, and Spain was surrounded on all sides and fought alone. The Spanish people realized that the United Nations army's invasion of Madrid was unstoppable, and the panic caused the Spanish military and political officials to shake the loyalty of Franco. In order to avoid retaliation after being occupied by the United Nations army, Spain's only way out was to severely punish Franco and other Nazis. Therefore, the revolutionary party's coup was acquiesced and supported by the powerful and wealthy businessmen of all walks of life in Spain. Franco betrayed everyone and became the only bargaining chip for Spain to show goodwill to the United Nations army at the last moment.

The leader of the Spanish Revolutionary Party, Sheffield, officially announced to the world on an international public broadcast channel that Spain terminated its alliance with its allies and withdrew from World War II. At the same time, Sheffield used the wireless telegram from the Swiss Embassy in Spain to generate electricity to the Prime Minister's Office of the Imperial Empire and the United Nations General Command, announcing that the Spanish government would not be enemies of the United Nations forces and requested to join the United Nations camp.

Spain's sudden turnaround caused Hitler's Nazi operation in Spain to fail. Hitler tried to control Franco to delay the time when the coalition forces attacked Germany as much as possible and declared bankruptcy.

For the coalition forces, the Spanish battlefield is not the main battlefield. The coalition forces will basically lose much troops to capture Spain, but it will delay a lot of precious time.

After research, the United Nations Headquarters believes that the request of the Spanish government can be accepted. As for other issues, the United Nations member states unanimously agreed that the issue can be temporarily shelved. We will discuss it after defeating Germany and the United States and completely eliminating the fascist group of allies.

As a result, the United Nations forces quickly stopped their attacks on Spain. However, the Chinese Empire retained military occupation of Gibraltar, Spain and demanded that the Spanish government recognize it. Faced with the strong demands of the Chinese Empire, the Spanish Revolutionary Committee had to agree and recognize that the "Treasure of Lease on the Chinese Gibraltar signed in 1913 will continue to be valid, and the Chinese Empire's 99-year lease control over Gibraltar remained unchanged.

The Spanish battlefield ended in the blink of an eye, and the United Nations forces concentrated their forces to launch landing operations in Sicily, Italy and southern Italy, and were able to launch them in advance.

The landing operation code-named "Mediterranean Spear" was in the early morning of July 11, 1943. The Chinese Empire Navy Atlantic Fleet and the Royal Navy's local fleet formed a special mixed fleet, with 43 battleships, 117 cruisers, 221 destroyers, 106 submarines, 115 aircraft carriers, 2743 troop carriers, and 6015 landing ships and landing craft gathered on the sea near Sicily, stretching for hundreds of kilometers and endlessly.

Just after the early morning, the Allied Forces' special mixed fleet ships carried out fierce artillery fire on various Italian defenses on Sicily. 1,400 bombers flew from the Cyprus base poured more than 10,000 tons of aviation bombs onto the heads of the Italian defenders.

After four hours of carpet bombing and saturated naval gun strike, the entire island of Sicily was filled with fire. Most of the Italian defenders' fortifications were destroyed, and the defenders were killed and injured.

At four o'clock in the morning, 745 large transport aircraft that took off from the Cyprus Air Force Base arrived over Sicily. The 3rd Airborne Division of the Chinese Empire, 5,550 warriors and 42 M36 main battle tanks of the RAF's 1st Airborne Division began to airborne in the C3 area.

At this time, most of the Italian defenders' anti-aircraft artillery were destroyed. The C3 airborne area chosen by the coalition airborne was the first wave of violent bombings, and there were few Italian defenders there. At this time, the artillery fire of the coalition forces had already extended, so the coalition soldiers who were airborne here would not be accidentally injured.

The coalition airborne troops assembled in a small area afterwards and followed the direction of the coalition artillery fire and attacked everywhere to attack the Italian army in chaos.

The Italian defenders, who had lacked the awareness of decisive battle with the United Nations, had just been shocked by the powerful artillery fire of the coalition forces and their morale was depressed. When they met the coalition airborne troops with automatic firearms, they thought that the coalition forces had landed successfully, so most of them resisted and fled. This further caused the Italian defenders to be in chaos.

At five o'clock in the morning, the 160,000 United Nations army commanded by General Chang Qing, the commander of the Mediterranean coalition, landed in the southwestern and southeast of Sicily on more than 7,000 warships and troop transport ships under the cover of more than 2,000 aircraft.

At this time, the coastal positions were blazing with flames and thick smoke. The permanent fortifications that Mussolini boasted of had long been shattered, and the morale of the Italian defenders on the coast was extremely low. Faced with the overwhelming number of UN landing forces, they only made a weak resistance and gave up.

Just after 10 a.m., the troops of the British commander of the coalition forces, Montgomery, took the lead in the landing field of Area A. This was the first time that the British army had completed a landing operation in a high-intensity landing operation before the Imperial Army in a high-intensity landing operation. The British Times reported this extensively, and major newspapers of the Chinese Empire also gave the British army a positive evaluation, which made the British excited.

At around 11 o'clock, the landing forces of the coalition forces basically successfully boarded their respective target beaches and maintained an attacking posture.

Due to the fierce offensive of the coalition forces and the destruction and harassment of the airborne forces, the Sicily defenders did not start counterattack until 1:00 pm under the command of Lieutenant General Guzoni of the Italian Army.

At the same time, the 15th Armored Division, which assisted the Italian defense, was also transferred from the west of the island to the east coast to prevent the British 8th Army in Montgomery from moving to Augusta to the north. The German Goering Armored Infantry Division and the two motorized infantry divisions of Italy launched a counterattack on the 5th Army of the Imperial Army commanded by General Chang Qing.

The German Air Force dispatched 644 aircraft to frequently bomb the coalition beachhead troops. More than 1,400 carrier-based aircraft from the coalition fleet aircraft carrier battle group quickly came to intercept.

The two sides broke out over Sicily, the most intense air battle over the Mediterranean since World War II.

The German Air Force had a deep understanding of the coalition fleet aviation at this time. The German aircraft were no longer having a head-on one-on-one competition with the coalition aircraft, but instead rushed directly over the coalition landing ground and fought against the coalition aircraft near the coalition fleet.

In this way, the air defense weapons on the ground of the coalition landing ground and the air defense artillery of the coalition fleet can only be shelled regardless of the enemy and us, and often accidentally shot down their own planes. British and French allies will basically give up firing to avoid injuring their own planes. Only the air defense firepower of the Chinese Empire still does not stop fire, and as a result, the aircraft of the allies British or French army were shot down.

The fierce battle lasted for a day, and the German tanks almost advanced less than 2 kilometers from the beachhead of the 5th Army of the Empire.

This is because in order to fight against the powerful m36 Tiger King main battle tank of the Chinese Empire, the German army specially developed a giant rat-type super-heavy tank. This tank is extremely huge, with a caliber of the main gun as high as 140 mm, and its armor protection is enough to block the close-range armor-piercing energy of the Tiger King tank.

The Imperial Army encountered such a huge armored monster for the first time, and the Tiger King tank fought head-on with the giant rat tank. As a result, the Imperial Army lost more than 20 tanks, while the German army only lost one.

After General Chang Qing learned about the situation, he knew the crisis of the war and immediately went to the front line to command the Imperial Army to fight back.

Fortunately, General Chang Qing quickly saw the biggest weakness of the German giant rat tank, which was its huge size and slow speed. Therefore, Chang Qing made a quick decision and ordered the tank troops of the Imperial Army to pretend to be defeated. He retreated to the beach, and at the same time ordered the two ultimate battleships and four super battleships of the coalition fleet to prepare for artillery fire.

Sure enough, the German army was eager to drive the Chinese Imperial Army out of the sea, forgetting that they had no control over the sea, and there was also a powerful Chinese Imperial navy on the sea.

The German tank troops were caught near the beach and were immediately hit by the powerful battleship artillery fire of the coalition fleet. The German invincible giant rat tank quickly turned into a braised rat in front of the 20-inch giant cannon.

In the evening of the war, the German army lost a large number of giant rat tanks. Due to the high cost of giant rat tanks, the German army deployed a total of 40 vehicles in Sicily, 31 of which were destroyed on the beach by coalition warship artillery fire, 3 were destroyed by coalition anti-tank soldiers, and the remaining 6 were damaged during retreat and captured by the coalition forces.

The German army had no giant rat tanks, and the other No. 4 and No. 5 tanks were soon at a disadvantage in fighting against the Tiger King main battle tanks of the Imperial Army.

At about 7 p.m., the Chinese Imperial Army took advantage of the situation to capture the city of Jera. At the same time, the British 8th Army conquered Sirakuza.

After the German and Italian army failed in the first counterattack, Kesselin knew that the situation was hopeless, so he had to fight with the coalition forces to delay time and restrain the coalition forces, and then retreated to Calabria, Italy through the Strait of Messina.

Hitler personally approved Keselin's plan to transfer the 29th Armored Division of the German Army stationed in Calabria and the 1st Airborne Division stationed in Hungary to Italy.

While strengthening its troops, German and Italian troops stepped up their mobilization to prevent the British 8th Army from threatening Messina Degolin's Armored Division from being transferred to Catania in the east. The German 1st Airborne Division also airborne in Catania. The German 15th Armored Division prevented the 5th Army of the Imperial Army from advancing north near Enna. The newly transferred 29th Armored Division was deployed in the southwest of Edna. In this way, German and Italian troops built a solid defense line from Enna to Catania.

On July 12, the British 13th Army under Montgomery fought hard to assault Catania. General Chang Qing ordered 345 aircraft of the coalition forces to carry 1,900 soldiers of the British 1st Airborne Brigade from Tunisia to airborne in Catania and cooperate with the ground forces to jointly attack. The German army resisted tenaciously with the Degorin Armored Division and the 1st Airborne Division, firmly controlling the coastal road from Catania to Messina. Montgomery's frontal attack was frustrated and was forced to transfer the 30th Army to bypass the west side of Mount Edna, and attacked Messina from a new attack with the support of the 5th Army of the Imperial Army.

As an outstanding commander of the Chinese Empire, Chang Qing was naturally unwilling to let Montgomery play the leading role. He divided his troops into two groups, one by the 4th Army of the Chinese Empire to support the British army in central Sicily, and the other by the 11th Land Fighting Brigade of the Imperial Marine Corps, Palermo, the capital of Sicily.

On July 19, the Chinese Imperial Army defeated Palermo without fighting and captured 53,000 Italian troops. Chang Qing's little vanity was greatly satisfied, and General Cai E was also excited for the victory of the Chinese Imperial Army.

At the same time, Montgomery was in trouble in both important directions. His 13th Army was blocked from Catania, and the 30th Army, which was detouring westward, was also wandering in the Adrano region.

The Imperial Chinese army conquered Messina on the 23rd with the opening of aircraft, tanks and cannons. The German army stationed at the garrison received the order from Hitler to give up Italy and took the last train to Germany and left. After a chaotic period of chaos, the remaining Italian defenders surrendered to the Imperial Chinese army under the leadership of the commander Lassan.

At this point, the land battle of the Battle of Sicily ended.

When Mussolini learned that the coalition forces were attacking Sicily, he immediately sent the world's second-strongest naval fleet that he had always advocated to set out and head to the Sicily Sea to fight with the United Nations fleet.

But only his commander General Chalin knew the best of his mentality. They were all paper tigers who could not defeat the United Nations fleet at all.

Therefore, after leading the Italian fleet to travel around the Sicily Sea for half a circle, Chalin sent a cruiser team to harass the United Nations fleet and retreated in a hurry.

However, for the United Nations fleet, it is absolutely unwilling to be tolerated to harass it and want to run away after a while. The movements of the Italian Navy have always been under the control of the intelligence departments of the Chinese Empire. The coalition fleet sent a battleship team to pursue and used 245 carrier-based fighters to attack Chalin's cruiser team. Finally, four cruisers and two destroyers of the Italian Navy were sunk.

The coalition fleet that followed drove the Italian Navy's main fleet back to Genoa, but Chalin did not dare to turn back and fight back. Many years later, when Chalin learned that four coalition battleships were chasing his main fleet (23 battleships), he regretted that he wanted to buy a piece of tofu and kill him.

The Battle of Sicily ended like this. During the Landing Campaign of Sicily, the coalition forces suffered a total of 12,811 casualties and 2,869 were missing. The German and Italian troops suffered 43,000 casualties. 142,000 were captured, and 260 tanks, 670 cannons and 1,700 aircraft were also lost.

Although this battle failed to eliminate the large number of active forces stationed in Italy, it achieved the political purpose of forcing the German army to abandon the Italian battlefield and the Italian government to withdraw from the war.

On July 25, Mussolini was forced to step down. After his successor Bardoglio came to power, he had secret contact with the Chinese Empire to test the possibility of surrender.

The Chinese Empire attached great importance to the Italian battlefield. It hoped to use Italy as a springboard to attack Germany's mainland and end the European war as soon as possible, because the Chinese Empire's army had a more important task, that is, to prepare to attack the United States. Because the Chinese Empire's emperor Chen Hao always had hostility to the United States, the military and civilians of the Chinese Empire were more concerned about when to launch a landing operation against the United States.

After secret consultation, China and Italy reached an agreement. The Chinese Empire accepted Italy's surrender and did not force the Italian army to intervene in future combat operations against Germany. However, in order to eliminate the concerns of the United Nations army, the Italian army must be disbanded immediately and only local police forces will be retained to maintain public order. Italy will assist the United Nations army in logistics and hand over the strategic transportation center in Italy to the United Nations army for management.

The Italian government understands that the United Nations forces are preparing to use Italy as a springboard to attack Germany. Considering the current situation, the Italian government agreed to the conditions of the Chinese Empire.

Seeing that the Chinese Empire agreed, other members of the United Nations agreed and agreed to shelve the dispute and resolve it in the future and accept Italy's surrender.

On July 29, 1943, the Italian government officially announced its withdrawal from the Allies and World War II, and attended the United Nations Conference as a quasi-United Nations member state.

Hitler had long expected Italy's surrender. But what he did not expect was that Mussolini did not have the courage to subvert the Italian royal family from beginning to end. Faced with the Italian royal family's removal and imprisonment, Mussolini did not resist. Instead, he persuaded his subordinates to put down their weapons and surrender, which made Hitler furious and scolded Mussolini as a waste of no seeds.

Although Hitler planned to carry out strategic defense, most of the German troops in Italy withdrew from Germany, in order to prevent the United Nations forces from opening up the third battlefield in Southern Europe, Hitler left about 100,000 German troops in Italy, harassing the coalition forces everywhere, attacking the supply line in the rear of the coalition forces, and delaying the time when the coalition forces attacked the German mainland.
Chapter completed!