Chapter 298： Battle of Deva (End)

The night wind in winter blows across the Transylvanian plateau, and a new day begins. After a night's rest, the two armies in Hateg were also preparing for a new fight against the advent of the sun.

"Hurry up and bring all the ammunition over."

"Rome, come and check if there is a problem with this gun."

"Hurry up and clean the barrel, it will be used in a while."

In the artillery position, the artillery is busy doing pre-war preparations. As the **** of war, Romania is also very important, and it is also implemented in comparison with other powers in training. For example, due to the invention of the goniometer, the sight-seeing scope and the use of wired communication equipment, major countries have successively implemented indirect aiming and shooting, and the observation post and the artillery position were arranged separately. And Romania is not behind them at all, and they are all following up in the same way. This is also the point where Romania can rival or even surpass Austria-Hungary in artillery.

At the artillery position, as the temporary commander of the artillery cluster of the two divisions, the artillery regimental commander of the 1st Imperial Guards Division, Colonel Matt Tizzi, also made the final preparations.

"Do you all know the importance of fighting today?"

"know."

"Are you all ready?"

"Ready."

Looking at the artillery officers of the two divisions who were under his control like a rainbow, Colonel Matetti sighed very vigorously and waved his hand. "Go back and prepare."

When the artillery position was ready for today's battle, in the front command post, Lieutenant General Ankodar confirmed the final pre-war plan with Major General Dortrid.

"Major General Dotrid, who all served as the commander of the division, I don't say much about the importance of today's attack plan. We must break through today's attack. We can't worry about casualties at this time."

Looking at Lieutenant General Ankodar, who spoke with his heart and heart, Major General Dortrid knew that this was not the case of the first division of the Imperial Guard, the teacher became mother-in-law wanting to nag, and yesterday the nineteenth division played too badly, he was afraid that he would be worried about it. He was worried and didn't dare to give it a go, but Ankerdal looked down on himself too much.

Major General Dortrid said about this. "Please rest assured, Lieutenant General, today I will take the enemy's position at the expense of casualties, as long as the 7th Division defending the flank cannot reinforce the position."

In the face of Major General Dortrid, Lieutenant General Ankodar confirmed to speak generally. "Don't worry about this. The First Guard Division will be able to break through the flank positions without saying, but it can be guaranteed that the 7th Austro-Hungarian Division will not be able to reinforce the frontal battlefield."

At the end, Lieutenant General Ankodar said. "Then I will leave it to you in the future, I wish us all victory."

"We must all win."

After Lieutenant General Ankodar took the personnel of the First Division of Guards, he called for the staff and ordered. "Now drafting my order, the artillery will immediately launch an artillery attack on the enemy in front of me, and shoot me all except the 2 base ammunition that must be left. The combat troops must approach the enemy’s position within 200 meters before the end of the artillery. The raid began immediately after the shelling ended. In addition, a separate secret order was issued to the front-line commander. I only need to break through the enemy's front line of defense without giving me casualties."

Major General Dotrid's words made the staff take a breath, but after seeing the face and tone of his teacher, he immediately lost his mind and hurriedly issued the order to the front-line commander.

After the staff left, the chief of staff of the 9th Division, who stayed aside, had to persuade him. "Commander, it's easy to accidentally get injured when approaching the opponent's position 200 during the shelling. Are you thinking about it?"

"Don't think about it, I know that there must be a lot of accidental injuries, but how can a war not kill people."

Considering that his tone might be too blunt, Major General Dortried explained one more sentence. "Today is the day to decide the victory or defeat. Neither we nor the Guards Division 1 can hold off. We must come up with some trade-offs."

Major General Dortrid's order was quickly conveyed, and the artillery clusters of the two divisions remaining on the front battlefield were about to hit the defenders with their prepared artillery shells. The Austro-Hungarian 35th Division, defending in the front, immediately felt the pressure on the battlefield. They were all veterans who had been fighting for several years. As the commander of the 35th Division, Major General Arz felt wrong.

"Do the Romanians think there are too many shells?"

After the shelling began, Major General Alz passed through the observation post and felt the difference in the shelling but thought of the reasons for it. Until he observed through high-precision telescopes, Romanian soldiers on the battlefield took advantage of the shelling to touch their positions, and there were a large number of them.

"No, this is the Romanians who want to launch a general offensive."

Wanting to understand, Major General Arz immediately picked up the phone and connected to the artillery position behind the battlefield. "I am Arz, and immediately started shelling the front of the position."

Following the order of Major General Arz, the hidden Austro-Hungarian artillery also threw artillery shells on the heads of the officers and soldiers of the 9th Division who were about to advance. For a time, the soldiers on both sides endured the opposing shelling. However, as the artillery superiority, the Romanian artillery cluster led by Colonel Mattizzi, of course, will not turn a blind eye to this. After the artillery position of the defending army was being measured, the artillery fire from the attacking side immediately fell on the artillery position that was ravaging his comrades. The fierce artillery fire caused the Austro-Hungarian artillery positions to misfire one after another. From time to time, the violent explosions of the artillery shells detonated made the Austro-Hungarian artillery positions a shura field.

When the artillery of the defending army gradually disappeared, the officers and soldiers of the 9th Division who had moved to the front of the position immediately launched a surprise attack. Taking advantage of the fact that the defenders did not respond from the artillery blow, the officers and soldiers of the 9th division immediately entered the position and carried out a fierce attack. Contention.

"Rush in, rush in."

As the elite of the 9th Division, the 7th Company led by Captain Mizick certainly appeared on the battlefield. But now Captain Mizk is not too good. On his right face, which was smoky like an African born, there was a wound cut by shrapnel. However, as the commander of a company, Mizick didn't care about this. He wanted to command his soldiers to capture the position in front of him, because he was given the order to take this position without hesitation. For the sake of himself and his subordinates' lives, he can only command as much as possible to reduce the casualties of the company.

When Mizick gave orders to his soldiers loudly, he also became a thorn in the eyes of the Austro-Hungarian soldiers. The dirty uniform of the officer who can still be distinguished, coupled with his pistol, immediately made him a very valuable target for shooting. So in a machine gun position that collapsed not far from him, a rifle quietly stretched out from it.

Mizick, who didn't know at all, commanded his soldiers to move forward, and at this moment a corpse that he hadn't noticed brought him down. Then he heard a "pop" gunshot, and felt a blast of heat flying past his ears. Only then did he realize that he was almost hit.

The 7th company soldiers realized that their company commander was almost killed at this time, so they followed the direction of the sound and found a cartridge case in the collapsed machine gun position.

"Don't worry about him, quickly seize the ground, we have more important things to do."

Seeing that the enemy was not found, Mizick immediately asked the soldiers to rush to seize the position. In fact, in the entire 35th Division’s defense, the 7th Company is not an exception. With the 9th Division’s artillery advantage and the casualties are not counted, the 35th Division has already broken through multiple positions. The 35th Division launched several counterattacks under the order of Major General Arz, but they were all blocked by artillery and soldiers from the 9th Division. For a while, the frontal battlefield of the Austro-Hungarian army showed signs of being broken.

The sign of the Austro-Hungarian 35th Division’s discontinuation has long attracted the attention of both parties. As its commander, Major General Arz can only ask for help. Now he can only ask for help from the Austro-Hungarian 7th Division, but now the 7th Division is completely guarded. The first division was entangled and couldn't draw out troops.

"Kumanek, now I need reinforcements. The frontal enemy offensive is too fierce, they are crazy and completely ignore the casualties, my 35th division will not be able to withstand it."

"My artillery has been exhausted, and you have seen that the other party has too much artillery than ours. There is no way at all."

"You can't give reinforcements right now, and I definitely can't stop them. Now my soldiers have retreated to the last line of defense, and they can only be defeated if they are broken."

So at 4:30 in the afternoon, the 35th Austro-Hungarian Division, which had suffered successive blows and could not receive reinforcements, collapsed. The soldiers who had suffered fierce attacks and demoralized abandoned their positions and fled to the rear.

Seeing this situation, Major General Arz had red eyes, and he muttered to himself with his hair in a look of loss. "It's over, it's all over."

However, other officers in the command headquarters would certainly not sit back and watch their division commander. Two staff officers immediately picked up him and retreated to the rear and the 7th Division Commander Kumar, who was fighting with the 1st Guard Division on the defensive flank, was entangled. Neck is also quite decisive, and immediately retreats with the remaining soldiers of the 7th Division after leaving a regiment to defend.

"Victory."

When the battle report from the front line was sent to the command headquarters, the officers cheered, but Lieutenant General Ankodar and Major General Dortrid, as the main commanders, would not be satisfied.

"Immediately report to the troops on the front line, order them to leave some troops to clean the battlefield immediately, and all others will turn to chase the enemy. The enemy should not be given a chance to breathe and trim, and at the same time, a small group of elite troops should be organized to detour in front of the enemy immediately. Go to the main road to Deva and let them hold the enemy."

So far, the Hateg battle has basically ended. According to later statistics, the Austro-Hungarian army that was the loser in this battle had a total of 47 casualties, captured, and missing. Among them, the 35 divisions suffered more than half of the casualties. The 7th division was also defeated in subsequent pursuits. As the victorious side, the Romanian army suffered a lot of casualties. Among them, the number of casualties reached 879, of which the 9th division as the main attack accounted for 70 casualties.

However, the biggest effect of this battle was to put Deva directly in front of the First Division and the Ninth Division. Now it is like a red fruit waiting to be picked.