Chapter 715: Krypton Gold Battle
At nightfall, the Kuwaiti defenders' counterattack still did not stop. On the northern front, the 21st Division of the British Indian Corps had begun fighting with the counterattack forces of the 26th Army. Since the 21st Division had been retreating from the beginning, it did not immediately organize an attack. This gave John Connor and his men time. The 26th Army seized the hard-won time, reinforced the originally simple defensive positions, and laid barbed wire and trenches that they had not had time to set up.
Defense was not the purpose of this counterattack. The purpose of the entire Eighth Army was still to attack, but the counterattack was not smooth sailing. Similarly, the purpose of the British Indian Army was not to retreat. The enemy also pursued the initiative on the battlefield.
The current situation remains grim. The opponents that John Connor's counterattack force is facing now have changed from the 17th Division of the British Indian Corps that faced Kuwait directly to the 21st and 17th Divisions. These are also the reserve forces at the rear of the British Indian Corps. If the 26th Army in Kuwait's counterattack is not careful, it will be surrounded and wiped out.
Fortunately, due to the lack of artillery fire support, the British Indian Army deployed its battle formation about 500 meters away. The first to lead the charge was the 79th Regiment of the 21st Indian Division, which had always led the charge. As soon as they received the news, they were in a state of hasty response. To some extent, the 29th Army was lucky.
The 21st Division of the British Indian Corps, Acres was slowly coming from the rear. After learning that the 79th Regiment was preparing to attack, he personally sent a telegram to the 79th Regiment under his command: "Once the battle begins, you must attack with the greatest offensive force and not give the enemy any chance to breathe. The reinforcements from behind will arrive soon and will take over your troops. At that time, we will launch a siege on the enemy together with the 17th Division."
In the evening, Andre Thomas, divisional adviser of the 26th Corps of the Ottoman Eighth Army, led his troops in a powerful attack. The 17th Division of the Republican Army of the British Indian Corps, which had been prepared, was greatly encouraged by the knowledge that reinforcements had arrived, and finally withstood the attack with huge casualties. However, this attack drained the last of the 17th Division's energy. When the attacking troops slowly retreated, all the soldiers were exhausted and lay on the battlefield.
Looking at the desolate battlefield and the corpses of his subordinates, Andre Thomas felt very distressed. He called John Connor's command center and said self-reproachfully, "I'm sorry, I failed to take down the British Indian Corps' defense line."
John Connor replied by telegram: "Andre, this is not your fault. The failure was mainly due to my mistake. Now, you retreat."
John Connor had just given his reply when his staff officer came in hurriedly from outside and said, "The 27th Army has already engaged in a battle with the 21st Division of the British Indian Corps on the southwest front."
"What's the situation now?" asked John Connor.
The staff officer said worriedly, "The situation is still good now. With strong support, there is no problem with the defense line facing the enemy's counterattack. However, according to the report of the investigators, the commander of the 21st Division, Alex, and all the officers and soldiers have arrived at the designated location. The defense line of the Third Battalion is under great pressure. I am afraid they can't hold on for long. After all, they are facing a division of troops."
"Hiss..." John Connor did not expect the situation to have deteriorated to this point. He immediately walked quickly to the front of the map. Looking at the map, John Connor was shocked to find that the closest distance between the 17th Division and the 21st Division was less than seven kilometers. In other words, the counterattack force, in a sense, had been trapped in a battlefield with a depth of only seven kilometers. Listening to the rumbling of artillery coming from afar, John Connor said, "The British Indian Corps has more than 200,000 troops attacking Kuwait. It is normal to have two troops with high combat effectiveness, but from the overall composition, there will not be too many such troops. I believe that temporary setbacks are not normal, and our 29th Army from Basra and the landing troops drawn from various armies on board the port have already set off. Let the attacking troops not be confused by the opponent's short-term counterattack. The damaged troops on the front line will temporarily retreat."
"Okay!" The staff officer immediately began to send telegrams to the attacking forces.
When Andre Thomas received the order, the first thing he thought of was not retreat, but artillery fire. The British Indian Army soldiers had just repelled the attack of the 26th Army, and before they could take a nap, they heard the artillery fire that frightened them from the opposite position again. He couldn't help but shout: "Are these bastards made of iron? Don't they know how to get tired?"
Just as they curiously came out of the trenches to see what was going on, cannons roared in and came into close contact with these curious guests, rumbling...
Rumbling sounds continued to ring out, shells were fired like they were free, shells selflessly covered every inch of land like raindrops, huge craters appeared on the battlefield one after another, and every shell took the lives of many people.
Andre Thomas looked at this magnificent scene and finally suppressed the thought of launching another attack. He said to his battalion and company advisers, "We must make the show more realistic. Brothers, who will make a feint attack?"
As a battle that John Connor valued so much, it turned out like this. Andre Thomas felt indescribable bitterness in his heart. Thinking of this, he stepped down from the tank and looked at the scenery in the oasis. "It's really a rare hilly area in the Middle East. Hills?" Thinking of this, Andre Thomas couldn't help but fall into deep thought, "What if I set up an encirclement and ambush the British Indian Army during the retreat?"
"What do you think of Andre's idea?" John Connor, who received the telegram, said to Brown, "These people who graduated from domestic military academies are still very thoughtful."
"It looks good. We should give it firm support." Brown agreed immediately. "The British and Indian troops on the other side won't think of it now."
When Brown heard John Connor's idea, he was very interested. After reading it, he felt that there was nothing wrong with it, so he agreed with John Connor's idea.
Afterwards, John Connor secretly divided the 26th Army into two parts and deployed them on the left and right sides respectively, forming an eight-kilometer front line, but an anti-Eight-shaped defense line that became tighter as it went inward. Only by shrinking the pocket at that time could the enemy be completely wiped out. Hundreds of Maxim machine guns became part of the dense firepower network of this anti-Eight-shaped defense line.
Finally, John Connor and Brown ordered the troops that had blocked the counterattack of the 21st Division of the British Indian Corps to retreat, and led Alex's 21st Division and Bolton's 17th Division into the encirclement. The 3rd Battalion had been fighting repeatedly with the 21st Division of the Republican Army for a day, and the battlefield was already filled with smoke. After defeating the Republican Army's seven attempts to enter the palace, they received John Connor's order to retreat.
The 26th Army immediately organized a counter-charge, stopped the fierce attack of the 21st Division, and immediately retreated to the oasis. Alex reacted immediately and held on to the retreating 26th Army. Only now did Bolton realize that there were no enemies on the opposite position. In anger, he ordered the 21st Division to join forces to pursue this enemy.
Bolton and Alex vowed to teach John Connor a lesson. At the same time, Andre Thomas was watching their movements like a wolf in the oasis. Both sides were dissatisfied with the results of the past two days and were ready to make a big bet in another fight.
At 6 pm, Alex and Bolton led five regiments of more than 8,000 people into the prepared anti-eight-shaped defense line. After a two-hour rest, the 26th Army immediately began to block the British Indian Army layer by layer. The further the British Indian Army advanced, the heavier the losses. The machine gun bullets were like a storm, leaving no place to hide.
The British Indian Corps now had to fight against the darkness of the night and the layers of firepower deployed by the 26th Army. Seeing that the battle could not be ended quickly, Alex ordered three regiments outside the oasis to join the battle and advance again.
Soon the 26th Army's defense lines were breached one after another, and the withdrawn troops gathered towards the anti-eight-shaped defense lines on both wings. The battle had been going on for four hours. Just when Alex thought victory was certain, the 26th Army's adviser Andre Tolas ordered the assault group to attack from the two outer wings and surrounded Alex and Bolton's troops in the oasis.
Only then did they wake up from their dream and realize that the enemy was just as unwilling as they were and was also plotting against them. Alex and Bolton tried their best to stop the troops from fighting back, but the chaotic troops trampled on each other and had lost any chance of turning defeat into victory.
After defeating the British division, John Connor believed that the war would go much more smoothly. These colonial armies were all like this. It was not that they were incapable of fighting, but without the deterrence and guidance of their mother country, their combat effectiveness would be greatly reduced.
At midnight, seventy kilometers south of the battle between the Eighth Army and the British Indian Corps, a violent and harsh friction sound was heard on the coastline, which was annoying to hear.
Sheffield always joked that if the British wanted to defeat the Germans, they should find a way to drive their battleships onto land. Today, an armed force finally did this. Countless soldiers were landing on the stranded freighter, using a method that would make any rich man's eggs bleed, and they carried out a successful amphibious landing operation.
If the British were willing to take risks, how could the landing battle in the Dardanelles have ended so poorly? At the same time, the 29th Army of the Eighth Army, which was carrying out a motorized march, had a clear marching route in the desert, which could be seen from the motorcycles and trucks that were constantly abandoned along the way.
Sheffield said he didn't care how much of his personal belongings he lost, but he was just saying that. The problem is that several of the heads of the Black Gold Company really dared to do so.
"If we lose all the ships and vehicles but still fail to win, will the boss hang us? Hang us from a tree like he did to the niggers?" John Connor suddenly realized and said to Brown, "This seems very likely."
(End of this chapter)
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