Chapter 758: 331 Division
Kinshasa.
The 331st Division of the East African Defense Force is responsible for military operations in the region. The 331st Division of the Defense Force belongs to the Nile Military Region and is also the ace force of the military region. In the early years, the 331st Division was one of the elite forces in East Africa.
The 331st Division focuses on training in various harsh environments such as rainforests and mountains. It is stationed in the western part of the Nile Military Region. Before the expansion of the East African Army, the 331st Division was one of the five fully staffed divisions in East Africa besides the Guards Division.
The division headquarters is located in Bangui, the capital of Azande Province, so the division goes south to support Kinshasa mainly through the Ubangi River and then turns to the main road of the Congo River, which makes transportation very convenient.
The northern part of the 331st Division is the Sigmaringen royal territory, and the western part is the Belgian Congo colony. The two countries currently have good relations with East Africa, so the military pressure is relatively small, which provides conditions for the 331st Division to move south to support the Angolan battlefield.
With the start of the counter-offensive on the Western Front, the 331st Division had successfully defeated the Portuguese troops outside Kinshasa and took over the city's defenses.
With the Kinshasa crisis resolved, the 331st Division also intended to gain greater merit in the war, and attacking the heartland of the Angolan colony, that is, the Atlantic coast in western Angola, was undoubtedly the key to ending the war as quickly as possible.
Subsequently, the city of Kinshasa became the temporary command post of the 331st Division.
Lieutenant General Custer, commander of the 331st Division, is formulating a strategy against Portugal. With the expansion of the army, although the 331st Division is not as large-scale as other units, it has reached more than 13,000 people.
With the support of this powerful military force, Castells' ambitions became even greater. Although Portugal had nearly 200,000 troops in Angola, there were probably less than 10,000 of them that could be used in the north.
At this time, it can be said that the 331st Division had an absolute advantage in the north.
This led Custer to want to develop a more radical plan to achieve the goal of ending the war quickly.
Custer took a pencil and marked on the map on the table while saying to the senior officers of the 331st Division: "This is Cabinda, which is the area controlled by the Kingdom of Portugal on the north bank of the Congo River. It is one of the important strongholds in Angola. To the south across the Congo River is Soyo. These two places control the estuary of the Congo River. So if we in East Africa want to control the Congo River basin in the future, these two areas are indispensable."
"Of course, this has little to do with our war. Our army's initial goal is to directly capture the Portuguese cities of Cabinda and Soyo in the lower reaches of the Congo River, and then go south along the coastline to threaten Luanda, the capital of Portuguese Angola. Finally, if possible, we will control Benguela as well."
"In this way, the main ports of Angola will be basically controlled by our army, and the Portuguese army fighting against our army inland will collapse without a fight if they cannot obtain external resources."
Custer's strategy was to cut off the connection between Angola and mainland Portugal, but the East African Navy was weak in the South Atlantic, so this could only be accomplished by the army.
According to Custer's idea, most of Angola's material supplies come from the mainland, and the only excellent ports that Angola can use are Cabinda, Luanda and Benguela.
As long as these three ports are cut off, the Portuguese army's supply will inevitably have big problems. Food may be solved by relying on local products, but medicines, guns and other supplies will basically be cut off.
Staff Officer Hans Griffin agreed with Custer's war plan, but he also directly pointed out the difficulties of this strategy.
Hans Griffin pointed to the waterfalls marked with red lines in the downstream area and said: "After the Kinshasa section, the lower reaches of the Congo River are not navigable due to the waterfalls and the difference in terrain. This means that the rest of the journey can only be done on foot, and it is difficult for our heavy weapons to be sent to the front line to support the battlefield."
As an elite force of the East African Defense Force, the 331st Division is equipped with a large number of light and heavy weapons. Although compared with other main divisions, the 331st Division focuses more on mountain and jungle warfare, so it is no worse than ordinary troops in terms of heavy weapons.
Therefore, it would be very challenging for the 331st Division to attack the core area of Angola.
Hans Griffin went on to say: "The road conditions in Portugal and Angola can be described as a puddle of mud. The south may be better, but the north is the original indigenous country - the Kingdom of Congo. According to the black civilization level we have seen, the black civilization levels in the Swahili region, Somalia, and the Great Lakes region are the highest, but even these three civilizations are very poor in infrastructure construction, so don't have too much hope for indigenous countries like the Kingdom of Congo."
In fact, the most civilized indigenous civilization that East Africa has encountered in Africa so far is the Abyssinian Empire. However, the Abyssinian Empire, like Madagascar, is a semi-mixed race, so it cannot be compared with pure Bantu blacks.
Custer: "What you said makes sense. However, no matter what the road conditions in the former Kingdom of Congo are, they cannot hinder our progress. We should organize engineers first to deal with various factors ahead that may be unfavorable to the troops' progress."
At this point, Custer suddenly became confused. How did the Portuguese solve this problem?
He asked, “How did the Portuguese attack Kinshasa in the first place?”
"Although the Portuguese brought quite a few people, they were basically equipped with rifles and had no heavy firepower support, so they were unsuccessful in the three-month siege of Kinshasa. Moreover, their troops were obviously inefficient, otherwise Kinshasa would not have been in our hands all this time," explained Kinshasa's military commander, Coles.
"That is to say, we may not need to think too much about heavy weapons. After all, the Portuguese are also poorly equipped." Hans Griffin thought, pinching his chin.
Custer denied it, “It’s still different. If it’s Cabinda and Soyo, the Portuguese didn’t build any decent fortifications, and they might be able to easily seize control of the area without artillery support. But Luanda is different. Luanda has solid military fortresses and fortresses. The Portuguese have been operating it for hundreds of years, and it’s probably no worse than some European fortresses. So if you want to remove Luanda, you must have heavy firepower support.
Moreover, as the capital of the Portuguese colony of Angola, Luanda’s weapons and equipment and personnel composition are probably not comparable to the ragtag troops we encountered before, so we still cannot take it lightly.”
Much of Custer's intelligence came from public sources. Of course, the East African Defense Force's Military Intelligence Department did not actually put in much effort in Angola, but it basically obtained most of the intelligence on the Portuguese.
Because the Angolan Portuguese had a very poor sense of confidentiality and their troops were concentrated in a few fixed locations along the coast, this was simply an open-book exam for the Military Intelligence Department.
Therefore, the confidence that East Africa had in eliminating the Angolan colony first also came from the victory in intelligence. The more it understood the current situation of the Portuguese army, the more confident East Africa was in victory.
So far, the Portuguese have not disappointed East Africa. Their performance in the coalition is only slightly better than that of the blacks and Indians, and ranks behind the British and Boers. As for the Indian troops, their ability to slack off is indeed the best among the coalition forces.
(End of this chapter)
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