Chapter 752: Soft Persimmon
East Africa’s actions in the west are bottoming out, but at this time, Earl Roberts, who is far away in Mozambique, has not yet received the news.
The command between the coalition forces was divided into three parts in East Africa. When the Boer Republic was defeated, the results of the war could be sent to Mozambique in time through the communication line in Cape Town.
Angola does not have this opportunity at all. After all, without the consent of East Africa, the land telegraph line cannot be built at all, and the coast has to pass through the Skeleton Coast of Southwest Africa, and laying such a telegraph line is destined to lose money, so there is no capital willing to build it. Invest here.
The reason why Mozambique is special is entirely due to the needs of the British army before the war. There is only a small city of New Hamburg between the Natal colony and Mozambique, and the distance is not long.
Therefore, the incoherence in intelligence further gave East Africa an advantage in the war.
……
The first town.
The intelligence returned from various fronts made Ernst feel a lot happier. At present, except for the Boer Republic, where the Boers are still resisting stubbornly, the counterattack in the other two key places can be said to be very smooth.
In comparison, the Portuguese performed the “worst”, which is very consistent with Ernst’s impression of the Portuguese army. Portugal’s combat effectiveness, like its national destiny, has been in a state of decline, so you Never know the Portuguese's bottom line.
At this time, von der Leyen suggested to the Crown Prince: "The current situation shows that the situation has developed in a good direction, so we should participate more proactively and resolve the negative impact of the war on East Africa as soon as possible."
The war did bring some troubles to East Africa. In summary, there are pros and cons. On the one hand, the military industry in East Africa was integrated and further optimized during the war. At the same time, the railway, communication systems, and logistics systems were tested. At the same time, the war also brought In response to the increase in demand, the production capacity of various factories in East Africa has more than doubled compared to before the war.
Of course, various factories in East Africa had already begun to increase production capacity before the war began. After all, this war was the result of the two-way march of East African and coalition forces, and everyone was prepared before the war.
However, this kind of demand during the war was only short-term. The main difficulty for the East African economy is foreign economic exchanges. Nowadays, the merchant ships flying the East African flag no longer exist, and they can only sail in the ocean under the banner of various countries. Go upstream.
At the same time, the war is uncertain. Now that the strength of the coalition has been determined, it is not suitable to delay it any longer. The longer the time goes, the more likely things will happen.
At the same time, the battlefield requires death. Although the current population in East Africa is not as scarce as it was before, it is still a precious asset, especially the young and strong labor force joining the army, which is relatively scarce.
Sweite also thinks so. He said: "The current situation on the battlefield is developing in our favor, especially with the end of reserve training. We can now replenish or even expand the frontline troops to take advantage of force in one fell swoop Win the war.”
Of course, Sweet’s superior strength does not only refer to quantity, but also quality. Since the war began, East Africa has been dealing with the three countries with only half the strength of the coalition. The reservists receive military training at the rear.
Now East Africa is not only stronger than the coalition forces in terms of quality, but also in quantity. Although it may not be able to mobilize as many troops as the coalition forces, the gap between the two sides should not be too big. At this time, another 200,000 will be invested in East Africa. It's still within the tolerance range.
Ernst asked: "Does the staff have a detailed plan?"
Sweet said: "We plan to invest 50,000 troops on the Western Front. The Portuguese's combat effectiveness is the weakest among the three countries, so it is easiest to deal with the Portuguese army in Angola first. As long as the Portuguese army in Angola is dealt with, we can also threaten "At the same time, the Nile Military District will also cooperate with the operations of the Western Military District. At present, Belgium should not participate in the South African battlefield. In this case, we can let the troops of the Nile Military District in the northwest, along the The Ubangui River flows south to support Kinshasa and pose a threat to northeastern Angola."
"In this way, we can launch a large-scale battle of 100,000 people in the west and annihilate it in one fell swoop. The Portuguese colony of Angola relieved the military pressure in the western region, and the new soldiers on the battlefield, after being tempered by the Portuguese, can be re-entered into the main battlefield in the east. Coupled with our current geographical advantages, we can further reduce the enemy's living space."
Picking the weak first, this is the plan of the East African National Defense Force. Based on the current war data held by the National Defense Force, the Portuguese have lived up to expectations and become the "weakest link" of the coalition.
As for the Boers, although they were defeated by East Africa on the front line, their fighting will and ability to resist exceeded East Africa's expectations.
During the civil war, various facilities established for the war between the Transvaal and the Orange came into play, effectively delaying the march of the East African army and causing considerable trouble to East Africa.
So much so that the current main force of the Wehrmacht in the south is unable to escape and is forced to play "clearance and counter-suppression" with the Transvaal people.
In order to ensure that no accidents occurred, Ernst did not order the Wehrmacht to reduce its manpower and support the eastern battlefield. Instead, he ordered the troops to fight steadily and eliminate the Boer resistance step by step.
Of course, this is related to East Africa's national policy of annexing the Boer Republic. East Africa's demand is to "want the land but not the people." After all, the Boers and East Africa are now feuding.
Not to mention the Transvaal people, even the Orange people have a strong resistance mentality, so to keep this land in East Africa, all hidden dangers must be eliminated.
War is a very effective method. The Boers went north to escape the British. Now East Africa is just doing what the British did again.
This requires a huge amount of energy and time, and if there are fewer people, it may overturn. East Africa's application of 50,000 main troops to the Boer Republic with a population of only more than 300,000 is already a test of the strength of this small country. a kind of recognition.
“In the Boer Republic, according to your request, Crown Prince, we focus on consumption, and we carry out decentralized processing of the Boers. At present, we have moved more than 4,000 people from the Boer Republic, plus 20,000 captives. There are many people, which is almost one-fortieth of the Boer population, and a large number of Boers fled towards Cape Town to avoid the war."
"The soil on which the enemy relies on to carry out guerrilla tactics is also being destroyed. Rapidly compressed, at this pace, the Boers may only exist in the UK in the future.”
The purpose of targeting the Boers is mainly to deal with the Transvaal guerrillas, this time in the Transvaal. Unlike last time, the people were unprepared. After being heavily armed by the British, they had many years of sufficient war experience and were familiar with the terrain and other advantages.
The frontline soldiers in East Africa suffered a lot, and the effective way to deal with them in East Africa was to physically exterminate the local population.
Of course, East Africa is not going to engage in mass murder. On the one hand, it plunders the Boer population, and on the other hand, it destroys the Boer villages and forces them to migrate.
With this two-pronged approach, the Boer guerrillas lost the ground for resistance. Of course, if the British can provide effective support, the Boer's plight should be solved.
But it is a pity that Britain has now fallen into a situation where it sweeps the snow in front of itself and does not care about the frost on other people's tiles.
(End of this chapter)