Chapter 725: 725 Guilty Redman
Chapter 725 725 Guilty Redman
What Feng Kezhi didn’t know was that at the same moment, Redman was also frightened by his own front-line combat troops.
He has never seen this kind of fighting, nor has he seen such a reckless group of lunatics! The flank strength of the Tang Army going south was actually always insufficient. As a result, the front-line combat commanders of the Tang Army launched a crazy offensive with such a small number of troops.
These small numbers of troops moved all the way west and fought two encirclement battles within three days. They annihilated the 100,000 Dahua troops who were originally preparing to counterattack and occupied a large area.
Because they fought so well, all the troops originally planned for defense were pulled into the battlefield by these frontline combat troops, like a planet swallowed by a black hole.
The reserves of fuel are decreasing crazily, a large number of troops transporting ammunition are scattered and diluted, and even battalion and company-level convoys can no longer be found. Now the transportation supplies are measured in squads and platoons.
What is even more exaggerated is that in front-line war zones, supplies even rely on truck drivers to find troops to complete the final transportation work. Not only is it very dangerous, but chaos often occurs.
Some supply troops happened to bump into the defeated Dahua troops during the transportation process, and then captured more than a hundred prisoners. A dozen drivers stood next to the trucks transporting fuel with submachine guns, watching over the prisoners until the follow-up. The infantry arrived before continuing on the road.
The fragile supplies were often late at first, which was the main reason for the Tang army to stop. On the other hand, Dahua's defense forces could not stop the Tang army's attack.
The supply problem is not the most serious. The most serious problem is that the Tang army's troops were divided into countless small troops by the vast territory of the Dahua Empire.
At the beginning, the combat teams of the Tang Army were basically divisions, with a regiment-level size. An infantry battalion plus a tank battalion and an artillery battalion, plus supplies and headquarters, were comparable to a reinforced regiment.
Later, as the battle continued, these troops were divided into smaller and smaller groups by the battlefield. At the beginning, the Tang army was able to carry out large-scale annihilation battles, and was able to kill the main force of the Dahua army, which numbered more than 10,000 people in one go.
But later, the scale of the battle became smaller and smaller, and the size of the combat team gradually became smaller: a reinforced regiment composed of several battalions began to become a reinforced battalion composed of several companies.
The supply troops are not even organized. A few trucks in a truck transport company are considered "supplied" if they keep moving forward with a combat team of this size.
Because as the battle continued, the Tang Army was getting farther and farther away from the supply station, and it was true that the supplies were getting less and less, but there was also a problem on Dahua's side.
The problem with Dahua is that the command is getting more chaotic and the troops are getting worse and worse - there is no morale at all, and they are unable to organize any effective actions after being defeated all the way.
Not only is the attack unguaranteed, but even retreat is a problem. Many troops dispersed while running, and even the officers could not be found.
Under such circumstances, although the Tang army had many shortcomings, it still maintained a rapid attack. Even though the troops had been dispersed into small groups, they were still as sharp as needles piercing the flesh and blood of the Dahua Empire.
By now, the Tang Army's troops have been completely unorganized: sometimes an assault gun covering a platoon of soldiers can control a village; sometimes there are not even armored vehicles, and just an infantry platoon dares to keep walking. On the way to attack.
This is what happened to Liu Guozhu: He and the No. 115 car didn't even have infantry cover, so they just continued to move forward in a daze, without any regard for the enemy's possible counterattack.
When the troops were dispersed to this extent, Redman could not sit still. He was afraid that the enemy would suddenly launch a counterattack at a certain point, and his front, which was as thin as a piece of paper, would completely collapse.
He didn’t know whether Dahua’s troops were really that weak or what kind of counterattack plan they were brewing. He even suspected that the enemy commander was digging a big hole for him, just like the hole Tiger dug for Qian Jinhang.
Even if the commander on the Dahua side did not have a mature counterattack plan, the situation was not so optimistic: Redman was worried that if his troops ran into a large group of Dahua troops, they would be in a hard fight.
After all, this is within the territory of the opponent's country. If the troops encounter enemy reinforcements of more than 10,000 people or a group of broken troops when attacking, they may suffer losses.
Because the Tang army was too dispersed, it was actually impossible to encircle and annihilate a large number of enemy troops. Now they can only rely on continuous advances to disperse the enemy in order to ensure their own tactical advantage.
So these days he has been urging the Air Force to take off planes for reconnaissance. As long as the clouds are slightly thinner, planes from the Tang Kingdom will keep circling in Dahua.
Even though the Dahua Empire took off planes to intercept, the Tang Army's planes still used their altitude advantage to conduct continuous reconnaissance, as if they wanted to see through the entire Dahua Empire.
It’s a pity that he doesn’t have spy satellites to dispel the fog of war. The battlefield is not particularly transparent to the generals of this era, so commanding is still an art.
Redman, who has always advocated offense, was under unimaginable pressure. He only slept two or three hours a day, and his whole body became more and more haggard.
Even though he has staff to help him share the pressure, the war that determines the fate of the country has become such a child's play that Redman can only suffer in panic all day long. It’s scary to think that a battle about victory is decided in the hands of a tank, a company commander, or even a grenadier.
What made him most uncomfortable was that he was afraid of hearing news of defeats on the front line, but what he heard was one victory after another. Hearing good news one after another while waiting desperately, this is undoubtedly where Redman broke down.
But he couldn't help but be satisfied, because good news was always better than bad news. Every time he imagined his king, His Majesty Tang Mo, being defeated because of his mistakes, his whole body would tremble.
He didn't want to betray Tang Mo's trust, so even though he had dark circles under his eyes and looked like a vampire, he didn't want to take a rest.
Or maybe he couldn't sleep at all. As soon as he closed his eyes, he would subconsciously think that a telegram had been sent back from the front line. This has almost become a conditioned reflex for him, so he will ask every half hour if there is any telegram from the front line.
…
These days, Qian Jinhang has not slept well either.
His troops have been fighting in Xicong. After a fight, the Dahua army has surrounded Xicong on three sides. It can be said that this city is within easy reach for the Dahua Empire.
But Qian Jinhang actually suspended all military efforts to attack Xicong a week ago. He knew that his retreat was already very dangerous.
At the beginning, he could still receive telegrams reporting the battle situation in the rear. Feng Kezhi assured him that he only needed to stabilize the three armies and continue to maintain pressure on Xicong, and the danger in the rear would soon be relieved.
But with the fall of Wangchun City and Han Zhiyuan's death in battle, Qian Jinhang could only occasionally hear some unfavorable news about the war situation from Feng Kezhi.
Although Feng Kezhi did not deliberately conceal it, Qian Jinhang still had no way of knowing the specific battle situation: he could only rely on speculation and some fragmentary cable contents to speculate that the situation was extremely unfavorable to Dahua.
Yes, extremely disadvantageous!
This is a fact that Qian Jinhang is very clear about: he doesn't even need to see it with his own eyes. Just by looking at the amount of supplies sent from the rear, he can clearly know that the Tang army is almost approaching Tengyun City.
Although Dahua has hoarded a large amount of military supplies at Nanfengkou, as the war continued, it became inevitable to continue to transport supplies from the hinterland of Dahua to the front line.
But because the Tang army has approached Jiange City, it is definitely impossible for Dahua's supplies to be transported to the south wind outlet.
Most of the supplies originally planned to be transported to Nanfengkou will be transferred to Jiange, and some will be replenished to Tengyun City, so that the Dahua troops there can stop the Tang army's attack.
As a result, the Dahua troops near Xicong could only eat the supplies stored at Nanfengkou: so the amount of supplies transported to the front line was reduced by half. On the one hand, it was intentional deduction, and on the other hand, because the transportation capacity was indeed tight.
This is also something that can't be helped: some of the trains and cars that originally supported Dahua's offensive troops near Xicong were transferred back to transport supplies for Jiange and Tengyun, leaving less transportation capacity for Qian Jinhang's headquarters. part.
Coupled with the rainy weather in the southern region, transportation was already a bit difficult, so the front line received even less supplies.
Since Qian Jinhang couldn't get enough supplies, he couldn't launch any decent offensive. He could only let time pass by in the rain like the Tang army.
It's just that the Tang army was waiting for an encirclement to form, and Qian Jinhang might not even know what he was waiting for. He didn't get the order to retreat, so he could only wait in place, helplessly waiting for his final fate in the ruins of Xicong City, which occupied one third of the city.
“General!” An officer walked into Qian Jinhang’s headquarters. He stood at attention and saluted, and then handed over a telegram.
Qian Jinhang took the telegram, then looked at the content on it, with a smile on his face: it was a bitter smile, a helpless smile, a desperate smile.
Because the telegram was sent to him by Feng Kezhi, the order in the telegram was very clear and easy to say: "Order that the rearguard troops assigned to Qian Jinhang's command be immediately transferred to Nanfengkou, and the command authority is reassigned at the same time. Give it to General Ding Hong."
In other words, Feng Kezhi mobilized the troops attacking Xicong and transferred them back to Nanfengkou! As if to take care of His Majesty the Emperor's mood, Feng Kezhi did not order Qian Jinhang to retreat.
(End of this chapter)