Chapter 238: Army aircraft

Less than half an hour after Charles left the front line, the front line miraculously returned to its proper fighting state, as did the entire defense line.

Xiafei was still worried, and he ordered the infantry military police to rush to the front line for inspection as planned.

However, the report of the captain of the gendarmerie was: "They are fighting very seriously, general, we confirm this, and the fighting is fierce, with gunshots everywhere!"

Xiafei was stunned, this was a bit unreasonable.

Then the gendarmerie asked for instructions: "General, do we still need to implement the killing order?"

When Xiafei received the telegram, he fell silent and seemed undecided.

Kanais advised from the side: "General, they chose to obey the order. If the result of obeying the order and disobeying the order are the same, both will face the killing order, and the killing order will lose its intimidating significance!"

Xiafei was right when he thought about it. When the troops had chosen to obey the order, implementing the killing order would not only be ineffective but might be counterproductive.

Thinking of this, Xiafei nodded and said: "Remove the leading officer and investigate, and let him hold a rifle and become a soldier!"

His idea was that with such a high casualty rate on the battlefield, converting these officers who had a tendency to "disobey military orders" into soldiers, who would soon become wounded or appear on the death list, was equivalent to "dealing with it."

"Yes, General!" Kanais breathed a sigh of relief when he responded.

…

It was already past ten o'clock when Ciel returned to the headquarters.

Gallieni didn't ask any more questions. He seemed to have guessed what method Charles used, and he could see through it without revealing it.

He just asked Ciel to eat something and go to the dormitory to rest. If anything happened, he would send someone to call Ciel.

This was exactly what Charles wanted. After a long night of toil, he still felt tired even though he slept on the train.

However, it was such an unlucky thing that Charles was stopped by Lieutenant Colonel Fernand as soon as he returned from the officers' mess.

"Colonel!" Lieutenant Colonel Fernand handed a telegram to Charles: "German machine gun planes appeared, and they shot down three of our reconnaissance planes."

Charles was surprised and asked: "What model?"

"The specific model is not sure!" Lieutenant Colonel Fernand replied: "But it is obviously a two-seat aircraft!"

Ciel said "Hmm".

During this period, only two-seat aircraft had enough load capacity to fly into the sky with machine guns. Otherwise, just two machine guns could overwhelm a single-seat aircraft or change the balance of its fuselage.

This shows that his estimate was correct, and the German army did not have time to produce a dedicated fighter jet.

Fernand continued to report: "We estimate that the Germans were trying to use machine-gun aircraft to restore the fighting status of the two armies."

Ciel paused, and then he understood.

There was a truce on the front line, and Germany was as anxious as France. The way they came up with was to use planes to break the truce agreement: using planes to swoop in and hit the French defense line indiscriminately would create enough chaos.

The French soldiers who suffered losses thought that the Germans were breaking the agreement, so of course they fired back.

The German soldiers had difficulty defending themselves. Although it was not done by them, it was done by German aircraft. They had no choice but to fight back.

Soon, the fighting will spread to the entire front, and the truce will be in vain.

What the Germans did not expect was that fighting had resumed on the front line before they could play their role.

The German pilots who had nothing to do could only vent their anger on the French reconnaissance planes, so they shot down three reconnaissance planes.

Otherwise, the German machine gun planes are likely to remain dormant for some time.

As soon as Charles walked into the headquarters, Gallieni waved to him.

When Charles approached, Gallieni pointed to the map on the office and said: "We plan to add several airports on the front line and send pilots to the front line to fight. Do you think these locations are suitable?"

Charles glanced at the map and gave a negative answer: "At least fifty kilometers away from the front line."

Gallieni had doubts on his face: "Fifty kilometers means that it takes half an hour for the plane to fly to the front line. Colonel, I think the airport should be as close as possible to the front line, so that our planes can enter the battlefield faster and more timely!"

"So, the airport is only ten kilometers away from the front line?" Charles asked.

"What's the problem?" Gallieni looked at Charles in confusion: "This is already outside the range of enemy artillery fire."

This is not to blame Gallieni. He does not know the situation of future air combat, nor the development of future air combat. He has even become accustomed to France having absolute air supremacy.

"General!" Charles said, pointing in the direction of the enemy on the map: "We should consider one thing: the enemy also has aircraft, and we cannot always control the air. If we set the airport ten kilometers away from the front line, the Germans will be very It is easy to detect it, and then their planes will target our military airport and launch an attack..."

Gallieni said "Oh" and nodded slightly.

A distance of ten kilometers.

When front-line soldiers saw the German aircraft, they did not even know whether the aircraft were targeting artillery, infantry, or airfields, and therefore could not provide early warning for the airfield.

Even if an early warning is provided, the pilot is given only about 10 minutes to take off. This was too little time to prepare them.

The "50 kilometers" mentioned by Charles can avoid these problems very well.

The airport is separated from the frontline troops, and the enemy aircraft group flies over the frontline target without any movement, which means that their target is the airport behind.

At the same time, there is half an hour of preparation time for 50 kilometers, which is enough for the airport fighters to take off in formation.

Thinking about it, Gallieni nodded and agreed to this plan: "Do as you say, Colonel, move all the airports back!"

"The airports that have been built should also be moved back." Charles emphasized: "Otherwise we can't provide cover for those airports!"

After a pause, Charles added: "It is best to put all the aircraft into the air force for unified command."

Charles was referring to the aircraft in the hands of the army.

At this time, the aircraft organization of the French army was very chaotic. Some were organized under the army, some were organized under the division, some had and some did not, and the models were varied and the tactics were also very powerful.

Galieni was puzzled: "If all the army aircraft are organized into the air force, how will the army solve the problem of aircraft needs?"

Charles did not hesitate at all: "Contact the flight brigade, and the flight brigade will send aircraft to complete the designated tasks."

Galieni thought about the map for a while, and seemed to understand the benefits of doing so: it can reduce the command pressure of each department and reduce the possibility of confusion, and maximize the use of resources such as aircraft, airports, pilots, and ground crew.

However…

Galieni laughed: “You may be right to do this, but do you know what Joffre will think?”

Charles nodded. Joffre would think that Charles was weakening his power.

After all, this meant that all the planes, airports and pilots in the hands of the army were “confiscated” and handed over to Charles!