The soldiers on the front line were waiting, and so were the generals of the High Command in Berlin. After June, William II's health deteriorated, his mind began to become unclear, and sometimes he fell into a coma. Doctors could not detect William II. What went wrong, but everyone knew that William II's body had reached its limit. In other words, the person in front of him had reached his death time.
The physical condition of William II and the approaching time of Operation Barbarossa have become the two things that Lin Wei is most concerned about every day. These two things largely determine the fate of Germany. Lin Wei has worked hard for so many years and is Success or failure depends on this decisive year of 1941.
"June 17, there are five days left! Your Majesty, you once said that you will personally give the order to attack, you must do it!" Lin Wei closed his eyes in the office and began to pray for the fate of Germany. .
The border actions finally alerted Stalin, but Stalin still believed that Germany would not launch a war this year. However, in order to investigate the situation on the Soviet-German border, Stalin sent Molotov to Germany to discuss the relationship between the two countries and resolve the Soviet-German border dispute.
Lin Wei looked indifferent to Molotov's visit. Now, unless God appears, nothing can stop Germany's attack. The Soviet Union's industry has huge matching resource support, and its potential will increase as it goes forward. big. In other words, if Germany does not attack now, it will have no chance of defeating the Soviet Union in the future. On the contrary, if Germany defeats the Soviet Union and gains territory and resources, it will have the strength to face the United States alone. The Cold War may be larger in scale and last longer. For a long time, there was only one entry ticket for a superpower, and Europe could not accommodate two super military powers. A war between the Soviet Union and Germany was simply inevitable.
There are only a few days left before Operation Barbarossa, which is destined to be the final peace between the Soviet Union and Germany. After June 22, either the Soviet Union will fall or Germany will perish. In the last few days, Lin Wei's Chinese habits came into play again. Although he was confident of winning the war, Lin Wei still had to leave a way out for himself. If he failed, he would definitely not be able to escape the gallows. According to his status Generally speaking, there is zero hope of escaping after defeat. The escape plan prepared by Lin Wei was nothing more than to arrange a way out for the Krupp family. After so many years of war, Lin Wei also looted a lot of wealth from all over Europe. Various famous paintings, antiques, and gold have accumulated to a level that is as rich as any country today. scale.
Famous paintings and antiques naturally have to be kept, but gold is always a hard currency. Lin Wei secretly deposited it in a Swiss bank under his wife's name, so that if the war was defeated, the gold would not be confiscated by the victorious country.
Lin Wei didn't know why he did this. After much deliberation, he could only attribute it to his motherland. In his previous life, Lin Wei had seen the lifestyle of too many parents. They saved money all their lives and gave it all to their children after their death. But maybe Lin Wei never dreamed that he would have such a day.
Lin Wei deposited more than hundreds of tons of gold into Swiss banks in the name of his wife Ronald's family within a few days. Germany's prestige is now at its peak, and it has gained the trust of Germany's famous big families. The Swiss Bank has shown its efficiency. Lin Wei has taken the gold from its original storage location to depositing it in the Swiss Bank. It took two days.
After Germany annexed Liechtenstein, Switzerland could only acquiesce to the fact of German occupation. But fortunately, Germany has not broken its promise and still guaranteed Switzerland's neutral position. Maintaining Switzerland's neutrality is not necessarily a bad thing. At least in the history that Lin Wei knows, many Germans used Swiss banks to escape heavy losses. Of course, there are also Many families were wiped out due to the war, and the things they stored were free and cheap for the Swiss.
While Ribbentrop and Molotov were wrangling diplomatically, the last military meeting was held at the Supreme Command, a short distance away from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Due to Wilhelm II's serious illness, the meeting was chaired by Minister von Marshal Blomberg presided over the meeting. Commander Loeb, commander of Army Group North, Marshal Bock, commander of Army Group Center, Marshal Rundstedt, commander of Army Group South, and Marshal Guderian, commander of Armored Group, all appeared at this meeting. Although Marshal Stetter and Marshal Guderian had just finished the war on the British side, they still started preparations for the Barbarossa Plan from the first moment they returned home.
Supplemented by the Waffen SS tanks, the Armored Group Army under Marshal Guderian was unprecedentedly powerful. The number of tanks under its jurisdiction reached 4,500, which was more than twice the tanks under the Wehrmacht of the French Campaign. With such a With more tanks, Guderian was also optimistic about future wars.
"The talks with the general staff headquarters of Romania, Hungary and Finland have been completed. Turkey's condition is to occupy two of the four major cities of Kiev, Leningrad, Moscow and Stalingrad! This should not be a problem for the empire! "Lin Wei said sternly, "Finland has been expanding its army since the Soviet-Finnish War. Now the Finnish Army has about 500,000 people. Compared with their population, I have to say that this is an amazing achievement. Twenty-two The Romanian army with a division of 350,000 will participate in the war. The Hungarian army will not have many troops participating in the war in the first phase, but it can guarantee that a group army will be sent to the battlefield within a month! In this way, the imperial army will have one million allied troops after the war begins. Cooperate! So within one month of the start of Operation Barbarossa, the empire and the allies invested a total of 4.4 million troops! Generals, this is an unprecedented war, let us be proud to participate in this war personally! "
"As for the economic aspect!" Economics Minister Schacht stood up and said, "Not only have all plans for the attack on Russia been completed, but also the complex work of mass mobilization of troops, artillery, tanks, aircraft, ships and supplies has been carried out as planned. It has begun. Naturally, there is no need to mention the regulation of the national economy. Simply put, the imperial economy can guarantee all the support needed by the army within two years. Taking into account the strength of other allies, the imperial army can use its maximum strength to fight three Years of total war without any scruples!”
"Very good!" Marshal von Blomberg, the commander-in-chief, praised, "Thank you to the Ministry of Economic Affairs for its contribution to the empire!" Germany has made all the preparations it can for the Wehrmacht. If Germany cannot win the war in this way, With victory, the National Defense Force can really be disbanded. In response to Marshal von Blomberg's compliment, Dr. Schacht just smiled and said nothing.
After Marshal von Blomberg finished speaking, he turned his attention to Navy Marshal Raeder. On the issue of how to block the Soviet Union, the navy played a great role. The end of the British Campaign marked that the navy no longer had to spend great efforts to create Although the task of manufacturing submarines is still ongoing, it is foreseeable that the German Navy, with more and more battleships, can play a greater role in the Barbarossa Plan.
"The preparatory warship mobilization work for Barbarossa has been completed!" Redl said briefly, and then seemed to have thought of something, and continued, "The Bismarck-class battleship built for the Soviet Union has been completed, and it will be here according to the date. It will be handed over to the Soviet Union in a few days! I think I can make a fuss about this! If the defense of the Soviet Red Navy in the Baltic Sea is forcibly broken, it will have a beneficial impact on the offensive of Army Group North!" Following Marshal Redl's words, the North Marshal Loeb, commander of the Army Group, nodded in agreement. With the cooperation of the navy, the battle of the Northern Army Group would undoubtedly be smoother.
Despite the daunting task, everyone is confident as they examine the final details of the largest military campaign in history—an all-out assault on a roughly 1,500-mile front stretching from Petershammer in the Arctic Ocean to the Black Sea. Lin Wei also saw this from Marshal von Blomberg and von Brauchitsch. This final military meeting lasted from 11 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.
In the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the confrontation between Molotov and Ribbentrop was also going on intensely. Molotov mentioned the further violations of the border by German aircraft. After that, he turned to another issue, "There are several signs that the German government is dissatisfied with the Soviet government. There are even rumors that a war between Germany and the Soviet Union is imminent? The Soviet government cannot understand the reasons for Germany's dissatisfaction? If you can tell me the reasons for the current situation in German-Soviet relations, I would be grateful."
"Mr. Molotov, I have not received any news that a war will break out between the two countries! It is well known that Germany's defeated enemies really want to see a war break out between the two countries!" Ribbentrop said with an innocent look, "However, we do not rule out the possibility of war. The troops at the border are suspected of having misfired. You have to know that there are too many troops in the border area, and there is no guarantee that there will be no problems with such a large number of troops!" At the end of the sentence, Ribbentrop looked helpless.
"Can't we withdraw our troops from the border? This would be a good thing to maintain the relationship between the two countries!" Molotov suggested.
"I will report this matter to His Majesty, but Mr. Molotov, you may not know that His Majesty is in very bad health right now. I don't know if he can survive this time!" Ribbentrop said with a low expression. .
"Yao, this is really bad news!" Molotov said, "Then, Mr. Foreign Minister, I will go back first!" After a while, Molotov brought the critically ill William II to the Soviet Embassy. The message was sent to Moscow, and he added his own opinion, "While Wilhelm II is critically ill, I think it is impossible for Germany to launch a war!"