novelaction Chapter 224: The 1st Fleet Heads South and Begins Landing Operations
Chapter 224: The 1st Fleet Heads South and Begins Landing Operations
Ross Lewis, Lieutenant General of the John R. Army Infantry, is currently the Head of the Foreign Military Advisory Group to the President of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC).
He also recently arrived in SAARC with an advisory group of nearly a thousand people.
Currently, all of these advisers are helping the Yugoslav Army train troops in the rear, while some are assisting the Yugoslav Army in combat on the front lines.
When President Wu Zhichang received the news of the fall of Hongcheng, Lieutenant General Lewis saw it with him.
"What? Hongcheng was lost?"
"God, how is this possible?"
For two or three days, there was no battle report from the Xunyang front, which Wu Zhichang himself found a bit strange.
But when today's battle report came in, his heart sank to the bottom.
Hongcheng is the rear base of the Xunyang Defense Line, and it also bears the responsibility of connecting the eastern and western regions. It is a very important strategic location.
If Hongcheng falls at this time.
Not only will the Xunyang defense line be attacked from both sides, but the hundreds of thousands of troops in the direction of Tanzhou will also be threatened from the flank.
In addition, his money bag, Dongjiang Province and the southern region will be threatened.
It can be said that the Renaissance Army blossomed directly in their center.
From here we can see the importance of Hongcheng.
Lieutenant General Lewis took a map and spread it out on the table. He even roughly swept all the water cups and documents that were in the way to the ground, and then lay down on the map to look at it carefully.
The more he looked, the more solemn his expression became.
"Boom boom boom..."
Then there was a knock on the open office door.
Lu Jianzhang and Gu Ziqi appeared at the office door at the same time.
"President, has Hongcheng really fallen?"
Wu Zhichang looked at the two of them, hesitated for a moment, and then nodded, which was considered a response to them.
Suddenly, both of their faces looked very ugly.
They didn't know much about military affairs, but they also knew that the fall of Hongcheng meant the end of their Changhe defense line.
And the war had only been going on for a few days.
"Are the hundreds of thousands of troops in the Third Corps all idiots? Why were the Fuxing Army able to bypass them and directly occupy Hongcheng behind them?
And what about the defenders of Hongcheng? I remember that Hongcheng also had the reorganized 48th Army of the Third Corps, a fully American-equipped unit with machine guns and artillery.
Can't tens of thousands of fully armed people even defend Hongcheng?"
Minister of Finance Lu Jianzhang said excitedly.
"There's a problem on the Dabie Mountain front. It's about to be penetrated by the Fuxing Army, so the reorganized 48th Army was transferred to the Dabie Mountain front. Hongcheng is left with only the temporary 8th Army."
Wu Zhichang didn't say anything else.
They knew very well what the temporary troops were.
Although the reorganized 8th Army had tens of thousands of people, they were poorly equipped and had low combat effectiveness, so it was normal that they could not withstand the surprise attack of the Fuxing Army.
"But what about Liu Jing? In just two days, the battle in Xunyang has deteriorated to this point. How can he command it?"
Wu Zhichang frowned upon hearing this and said impatiently, "The telegram is on the table. Take it and read it yourself."
Only after Lu and Gu read the detailed battle report did they understand the entire process of the battle.
After the war broke out, the Fuxing Army directly destroyed many front-line command posts, causing chaos in the command system of the front-line troops.
Then, unknown interference was carried out on their radio, and the radio was unusable at this time.
Especially in the direction of Hongcheng, Liu Jing, the front-line commander, only learned the news after it fell.
Liu Jing, the front-line commander-in-chief, has completely lost control of the war on the front line because of the communication cut-off.
This was also the main factor that led to the disastrous outcome of the Xunyang War.
"We can't hold on any more. Xunyang can't be held any more!"
As the three of them were silent, Lieutenant General Lewis dejectedly put down the marker in his hand and shook his head.
The hearts of Wu Zhichang and others sank to the bottom.
"Is Xunyang truly undefendable? If I mobilize troops along the river to reinforce now, can I stop the Fuxing Army's attack?"
Lieutenant General Lewis shook his head and said, "Now that Hongcheng has fallen, it will be useless even if more reinforcements are sent there.
What you need to do now is for the Third Corps to evacuate Xunyang and reorganize the defense line at Madang Fortress. As long as this place is not lost, they will not be able to threaten Jinling.
At the same time, troops were mobilized to the Taihu and Qianshan lines in Anqing Province to strengthen the defense, and together with the Madang Fortress, they blocked the Fuxing Army on the north and south banks of the Yangtze River.
The troops in the Tanzhou direction immediately mobilized their troops eastward along the railway line to deploy defenses in Pingxiang area of Jiangnan Province.
There are many mountainous terrains here, which are not suitable for the deployment of large-scale troops and can completely block the attack of the Renaissance Army.
The same applies to Dongjiang Province and Lingnan Province.
As long as the area is surrounded on all sides, the Restoration Army's central attack strategy will be ineffective."
Wu Zhichang did not accept the proposal in its entirety, but instead summoned several senior generals from the Southern Alliance to hold a small high-level military meeting.
The discussion mainly focused on the proposal put forward by Lieutenant General Lewis.
Finally, the meeting passed the resolution and began to distribute it to the troops on the front line.
At this time, no general had the confidence he had before the war.
The swift attack of the Renaissance Army directly shattered their confidence and cast a shadow over their hearts.
Some generals even believed that the Southern Alliance was about to collapse and that it was inevitable that the Renaissance Army would unify the world.
Some ideas in my mind began to come alive.
Although the Southern Alliance blocked the news of the fall of Hongcheng.
But the news still spread through hundreds of thousands of Parrot radios across the South.
This news was like a depth bomb, causing huge waves throughout the entire Southern Allied Forces.
Especially for the hundreds of thousands of troops of the Second and Seventh Corps in Southern Hunan Province, this news was like a bolt from the blue.
The people were in panic and the army was in turmoil, which was a reflection of the situation of the defenders in southern Hunan.
Liu Jing, commander of the Third Corps on Mount Lu, also received instructions from the top leaders of the Southern Alliance.
Let him lead the remaining troops to the Madang Fortress and Taihu Lake to reorganize the defense line and resist the offensive of the Fuxing Army.
After receiving the instructions, Liu Jing did not hesitate at all. After deploying the rearguard troops, he decisively led the remaining troops to retreat overnight.
He himself had already arrived at Madang Fortress by plane early.
Liu Jing regained some confidence when he saw the Ma'an Fortress with its huge cannons.
In addition to the remnants of Liu Jing's Third Corps on the Ma'an Fortress side, the Jinling Defense Line also dispatched four temporary armies with more than 4 troops to reinforce Liu Jing, allowing them to continue to be responsible for commanding the battle on the front line of Ma'an Fortress.
From this we can also see Wu Zhichang's love for Liu Jing, his trusted and beloved general.
If it were any other general, he would have been dismissed immediately.
On April 4, the fourth day after the war broke out, the Third Army of the Fuxing Army successfully captured Xunyang and successfully joined forces with the 4th Airborne Assault Division in De'an.
From then on, the entire northern part of Jiangnan fell into the hands of the Fuxing Army.
At this time, a new force was successfully formed and reinforced to the Central Plains Military Region.
This force was the Seventh Army, which had four motorized infantry divisions under its command.
This unit was also formed by Jiang Hua in four days.
Sub-base No. 2 can produce a main division of troops every day.
It can be seen from the newly formed Seventh Army that there are no mechanized divisions or armored divisions.
This is also because tanks with a tonnage of more than 30 tons can hardly move in the southern region.
It is precisely because the M41 light tank has a tonnage of around 20 tons that it can operate in some areas, but there are still many bridges that are impassable.
Therefore, the engineering troops had to build a pontoon bridge to allow the tanks to pass.
This is just one of the main obstacles for tanks.
Another obstacle is that many roads in the southern mountainous areas are impassable for tanks.
Because its body is too wide, more than three meters long.
Some roads are not even two meters wide, and jeeps can barely pass through, let alone big guys like tanks and self-propelled artillery.
At this time, the advantages of towed artillery are reflected.
Although self-propelled artillery is highly mobile, it cannot be used in some areas in the south, while towed artillery can be towed by trucks.
This is also the reason why towed artillery has not been eliminated.
Cost is one factor, and the operational environment is another.
It is for this reason that all the troops formed by Jiang Hua later were motorized infantry divisions.
If there are some areas where even motorized troops cannot go.
At this time, the National Guard, which is a light infantry, comes in handy.
Although the National Guard is only a garrison force, their current equipment is not bad.
Rifles, machine guns, and artillery are all on par with the main force.
After taking Xunyang, the Third Army of the Fuxing Army continued to move south along the river and continued to launch attacks on the Madang and Taihu lines.
The Seventh Army, which was still incomplete, was assembled in Hongcheng.
They have three offensive lines next.
They are respectively towards Tanzhou, Dongjiang and Lingnan.
Their main task is to keep pressure on these three regions.
Therefore, the General Staff asked them to proceed steadily and step by step.
As the new group army commander, Hu Hanping also understood the intention of the General Staff and continued to advance steadily in the subsequent battles.
A major breakthrough was made on the Xunyang defense line, but there was not much progress on the Zhuolu and Yunmeng Lake defense lines.
This place is very different from the Xunyang Defense Line.
The Zhuolu defense line relied on urban warfare to block the Fuxing Army.
The Yunmeng Lake area is densely covered with water networks, which is not very friendly to tanks.
Therefore, both directions are steadily advancing by relying on firepower advantages.
The war seemed to have fallen into a certain stalemate again.
How could Ling Liang, a strategic master, be limited to this level?
Now the attention of the entire Southern Alliance is focused on Madang, Zhuolu and Yunmeng Lake, which is a good opportunity to carry out landing operations.
Under the escort of the First Fleet, a large landing force has arrived in the northern waters of Canghai, not far from Shanghu.
Six larger warships were added to the First Fleet.
The six warships are four Iowa-class battleships and two Midway-class medium aircraft carriers.