Chapter 442 It’s Time to Mobilize

"Marshal, a telegram from Marshal Guderian."

Hersmann's adjutant, Colonel Schnetz, walked through the YSL-style corridor and pushed open the door into a completely European-style restaurant. Hersmann was having breakfast with his wife Chloe inside.

They were now in the Gulistan Palace in Tehran, the capital of Iran. Tehran was the end point of Hersmann's trip to the Middle East. Hersmann, who arrived in Tehran, naturally became a guest of Reza Khan and moved directly into the Iranian palace, receiving the most generous hospitality.

Iran is now ruled by the Pahlavi dynasty, the unlucky dynasty that failed to hold on to the United States and was overthrown by the religious revolution led by Khomeini.

However, in this time and space, Hersmann would not allow such a thing to happen. Because Hersmann was still very clear about how European civilization got out of religious fanaticism-this was not based on democracy with one vote per person, but on a group of unforgivable feudal monarchs and bureaucratic profiteers who pulled the Pope and the bishops off the altar in the process of constant struggle.

If the ignorant serfs in the Middle Ages were allowed to vote, who could elect the Pope of the Catholic Church? He is God's general agent on earth!

Therefore, when Hessmann was in Baghdad, he clearly told several leaders of the Arab Renaissance Movement that you can be dictatorial, as long as you follow the path of secularization, Europeanization and nation-state, Germany and Europe will definitely support them. Let's talk about democratic elections in 100 years... It took more than 100 years for European countries to go from fighting Catholicism to democratic voting.

In the talks between Iran and Reza Khan, Hessmann expressed the same position - Iran must be secularized, Europeanized, must be a nation-state, and must not engage in pan-Persianism. Under these major principles, the Pahlavi family can engage in "enlightened dictatorship", and Germany will firmly support it.

If Marshal Hessmann's position were placed in the 21st century, he would either be driven down by the European white left or be killed by various YSL Saints. Fortunately, the Nazis and fascists who even Saint Seiya fear are in charge of Europe, so Hersman is very safe.

As for progressive dictators with ideals and ambitions like King Reza Khan and Prime Minister Kailani (in fact, their dictatorship is relatively progressive), they are almost cheering for Hersman's actions, because from now on, they can finally be happy dictators!

So they agreed to all other requests made by Hersman, such as settling oil in European marks, buying German government bonds during the world war, and accepting Palestinian and Lebanese Muslims. And they also agreed to the German army stationed in Iran and Iraq (including Kuwait).

Because the trip in Iraq and Iran was very smooth, Hersman was in a good mood all the time. Last night, he also enjoyed the belly dance performed by Chloe. I don’t know what King Farouk of Egypt thought, but he sent a young and beautiful "dance teacher" named Farah to Chloe. Chloe has learned a little from her during this period, and performed it for her husband last night.

Although it was a little too plump and the skin looked loose, Hessman still liked it very much... So he slept late today and didn't get up until noon to have breakfast.

Before he finished breakfast, Colonel Schnetz ran in hurriedly and brought Hessman some very important news.

Seeing Hessman's brows frowning, Chloe asked with concern: "Dear, what happened?"

"A lot of things happened!" Hessman paused. There were a lot of things. Some things were confidential and could not be told to his wife, but there were also things that could be told.

"A US fleet entered the capital of the Azores, Porto Angra, yesterday afternoon and occupied it. At the same time, the US government also announced that the US military would take over Iceland's defense."

These are all things that can be said, because they are not military secrets, and the whole world will know about it in a while.

What can't be said is that Hitler is squandering oil. And he also proposed a plan for German spies to pretend to be British MI6 agents to support the YSL Saint Seiya in Afghanistan. Guderian could decide whether to implement the plan to support the Afghans in their resistance against the Soviet Union, as the current General Staff had this power. However, Guderian did not know how to deal with the act of speeding up the integration of Europe by squandering oil reserves, so he sent an urgent telegram to ask Hersmann for instructions.

"It seems that I must go back to Berlin." Hersmann handed the copy of the telegram to his adjutant Schnetz, "Go and notify the plane to take off this afternoon, and the destination is Berlin."

The straight-line distance from Tehran to Berlin is more than 3,500 kilometers, because one section of it has to fly through Soviet airspace, which is very unsafe. Therefore, Hersmann chose to take a long detour, flying to Ankara first and then to Berlin, so the whole journey took nearly 10 hours. When Hersmann arrived in Berlin, it was already early the next morning. However, when he returned to his estate in Zossen, Guderian and Lieutenant General Paulus, director of the Ministry of Defense's Oil Reserve Bureau, were already waiting there.

"Marshal, the original shortfall was only 2 million tons, but now it has suddenly increased to 6.2 million tons. By 1943, the Petroleum Reserve Bureau will not have much reserves to deal with emergencies."

Lieutenant General Paulus calculated the accounts for Hessmann on his fingers. Guderian on the side also echoed: "Now I am afraid that the oil collection volume in the Middle East will not reach 11 million tons in 1942...Here in Europe, the most 6.5 million tons can be dug out in 1942. In addition, I am also worried that 1942 may There will be a war with the Soviet Union, and oil consumption will further increase, and we are likely to face an oil crisis in 1943. "

Tired from the journey and a little sleepy, Hessmann steeled himself to listen to the opinions of Guderian and Paulus. Then there was silence. After a long while, he said: "The Prime Minister is still too timid. Why did he leave more than 6.8 million tons of reserves for 1943? All oil reserves should be used up, at least 6 million. tons, just leave 800,000 tons for emergencies.”

"Use them all?"

"Marshal, what are you talking about?"

Guderian and Paulus were both shocked. Hitler was already profligate enough. Why did Hessmann go even further? All the oil reserves were used up in 1942. What will happen in 1943?

"We will have enough oil to advance the war by 1943!" Hersman said slowly, "As long as we can achieve a comprehensive advantage in 1942, only if we achieve a comprehensive advantage can we get more oil."

He paused and then said: "I have calculated that Iran's Khuzestan Oil Field will be able to increase production to more than 15 million tons by 1943, and Kirkuk Oil Field will provide more than 10 million tons of oil. Kuwait and Saudi Arabia's oil fields will also provide 1 million tons of oil each, and the oil fields in the Sinai Peninsula and Syria can provide a total of 1 million tons... In this way, we can collect 28 million tons in the Middle East alone, and Romania, Hungary, Poland and Western Ukraine. The local oil production will reach 7 million tons by 1943, and the production of synthetic oil will exceed 8 million tons, so we will have 43 million tons of oil, so we no longer need to reserve more than 6 million tons. tons of reserves to expand arms production and expand the size of the air force and armored forces.

Therefore we are now going to implement larger-scale military and economic mobilization! Now the United States has begun to accelerate its armed forces, and has also entered the Azores and Iceland. This means that they will soon join the war. We must be prepared for war with the United States, so we must increase mobilization efforts. "

Military enthusiasts in later generations often blame Germany's failure in World War II on the fact that general mobilization was too late, so that there were not enough aircraft and tanks in the most critical three years of 1941, 42, and 43.

However, in the view of Hersmann, who is now the Chief of Staff of the German Wehrmacht, the reason why Germany did not carry out general mobilization in time was still the lack of oil.

The current expansion rate of the German air force and navy is far faster than that of the same period in history, and the price is that the consumption of oil is far more than that of the same period in history. If it were not for the large reserves before the war, Germany would not be able to maintain its current size of navy and air force.

To finally win the war, further mobilization will definitely be needed, not only to mobilize the power of Germany, but also to mobilize the power of the entire Europe. Then the consumption of oil will be even more alarming!

The reason why Hitler generously provided more than 4 million tons of crude oil was to take advantage of the current situation that seemed to be very favorable to Germany, and in one fell swoop bring France, Spain, the Netherlands, and Norway, which were still neutral on the surface, into Germany's favour. chariot. In this way, Germany can further mobilize European manpower and material resources to fight against Britain, the United States and the Soviet Union.

But if we want to mobilize Europe's manpower and material resources, we have to spend more oil! In the final analysis, it is still an issue of oil.

Seeing that both Guderian and Paulus were hesitant, Hessmann smiled and said: "As long as we can gain a greater advantage in 1942, there will not be any oil shortage problems in 1943. If we lose In 1942, we can only rely on the nuclear fission bomb of Project U to achieve a decent peace."

Guderian frowned even more tightly, "Will we go to war with the Soviet Union in 1942?"

"This is a situation that we must try to avoid," Hessmann shook his head, "but we still have to prepare for war. Therefore, the armored forces must also be strengthened to a certain extent. The development of the No. 5 and No. 6 tanks must be in June 1942. It will be completed before the end of the month and mass production will begin in July.”