Chapter 420, Turning the Tide of War
To join the Seven Horses Pact, one has to be forced to a certain extent. To join the alliance, those governors would definitely not consider it now.
The Seven Horsemen's Agreement is still a military agreement plus a trade agreement. As for the imperial taxes, whoever collects them will collect them anyway, so the governors don't have to worry about it. If there are any problems, the Empire can go to the Alliance.
But if they want to join the alliance... they have also heard about the Tianma Star Region. Although there are still planetary governors under the alliance, after all, this is a position under the jurisdiction of the empire, and the alliance cannot cancel it. However, the planetary governors of the alliance are either appointed by the leader of the alliance, Gu Hang, or by a senior leader of the alliance, or by the original ruler. Anyway, it is a symbolic position.
Within the Alliance, the position of planetary governor has evolved into an honorary position that does not involve the management of any planet. Even the governor himself may not stay on the planet that nominally belongs to him for a long time.
For example, the two governors with the surname Fachers are now living happily every day in the beautiful environment of Feiyi Star.
Not only the governors of Mist Horse, but also the governors of Hippogriff have not thought of giving up their own world.
The alliance does not force it.
Don't rush, take your time.
There will be plenty of opportunities for them to choose freely in the future.
…
Several worlds in the Misty Horse Sector have joined the Seven Horses Pact, but as the Alliance’s diplomats have frankly stated, the main force of the Alliance cannot come over for the time being.
In fact, even if we solve the problem in the Eagle Horse sector, it would be a side job.
The main force of the alliance was still rushing to Steel Wing Star. They passed by Hippogriff III, Hippogriff VI, Hippogriff II, and Brock II along the way. Since they all passed by, they naturally solved the problem.
If it's not on the way, we can only send a small branch fleet, and we have to be careful, especially since there are soldiers on the transport ship. Losing a ship will result in huge losses.
Forget about the worlds that are not on the way and are very marginal, such as Hippogriff IV, Hippogriff V, and Feather Star. However, the problems of these worlds are not particularly serious. There are not many greenskins, and the defense forces can still hold up.
The situation on the Steel Wing Star battlefield had deteriorated. Tillemans was already somewhat dissatisfied with Gu Hang's slow march and the time wasted on the road, so he wrote to urge him.
The so-called worsening of the war situation was not due to any major changes in the battlefield. The most important thing was that Yuan Chengchuan was a little overwhelmed on the ground battlefield.
The main force in his hands was the planetary defense force of Steel Wing Star, as well as the planetary defense forces mobilized from all over the Eagle Horse Star Region during the war preparation period. The total number was about 50 million.
The green-skinned orcs continued to deploy troops to the surface.
The number of crew members on the greenskin warships is much higher than that on human ships.
In fact, generally, there is no need for so many people. After all, to run the ship, operate the guns, and run all the work on the ship smoothly, only so many people are needed. However, the greenskins often like to put three or four times the number of human navy into the ship, and the extra part is used as "marines" to engage in boarding battles and so on.
The green-skinned transport ships are more similar to human transport ships. A small transport ship like the Flying Pig class can transport 100,000 people at a time; a Whale class transport ship can carry 2-3 million people; a large transport ship like the Giant Belly is nearly 30 kilometers long, and can easily carry 15 million people.
This is still the normal transportation capacity. If it is a little more crowded, a little more extreme, and the distance is shorter, and there is no need to carry so many life supplies, it is possible for this transportation volume to triple or quadruple.
No one knows how many greenskin guys are stuffed into the greenskin main fleet that invaded the Hippogriff star zone.
For the ground offensive on Steel Wing Star, they dropped 20 million of them in the first large-scale landing. Tens of thousands of airdrop pods were continuously released, and even though more than half of them did not land in the end, there were still tens of millions that landed, dragging the entire northern continent of Steel Wing Star into the flames of war.
Afterwards, not counting the small-scale drops of a few or a dozen rock airdrop pods thrown out of the blue, large-scale landings similar to the first one were carried out twice.
At present, the total number of Iron-Tooth Orcs who are constantly waaaghing on Steel Wing Star is estimated to have exceeded 35 million.
Yuan Chengchuan's defense forces were able to hold out at first by relying on their numerical advantage and the defense facilities scattered across the planet. But as the numbers of both sides narrowed significantly, the problems of the planetary defense forces' inadequate quality and the old and dilapidated fortresses on Steel Wing Star were exposed one by one.
The strategies he had originally adhered to failed one by one and could no longer be implemented.
The idea of annihilating the green-skinned orcs' manpower in an organized manner was no longer a consideration after the second large-scale landing.
After a large number of areas were lost, it was basically up to fate to prevent the greenskins from establishing an ecosystem. If the Pegasus fleet in space had time to help with a few shots, then so be it, since the ground forces couldn't cooperate at all anyway.
After the third large-scale landing, even Yuan Chengchuan's strategic bottom line, that is, the task of defending those precious anti-orbital gun fortresses, has become extremely difficult to accomplish.
Often when a railgun fortress is invaded by greenskins, the surrounding human armies try their best to dispatch troops and generals to defend it. After a bloody battle and heavy casualties, the fortress is finally conquered.
Before retreating, the human army will not destroy the orbital cannon at first, thinking that they can take it back and use it again if there is a chance later.
However, after a period of development, they discovered that the green-skinned orcs had inexplicably mastered the ability to transform humans' orbital guns, and then the few orbital guns taken away by the orcs became the firepower to shoot down the Pegasus fleet into the sky.
That's really uncomfortable.
So far, this situation has not happened often, so it can still be resisted. The Pegasus Fleet can just destroy the few captured rail guns.
But this situation cannot happen too often.
If most of the orbital guns were occupied and used by the greenskins, then Steel Wing Star would probably not be a strong defensive position, and the Pegasus fleet would be caught in the middle and attacked from both sides.
Later, if the human army on the ground is really forced to do so and cannot defend the orbital gun fortress, they will often choose to destroy the orbital gun before retreating.
It was a very reluctant choice, but I had no choice but to do it.
But even if it is destroyed, the situation will be bad. At most, it will not be as bad as being occupied and exploited.
In short, if this situation continues, the Pegasus fleet will not be able to hold on.
No wonder Tillemans was anxious and angry.
He also heard the news that the Alliance Army was advancing rapidly after entering the Eagle Horse Star Region. He was extremely surprised by the fighting power displayed by the Alliance Army. When he first left the Pegasus Star Region to go out to fight, he didn't know that the Alliance was so powerful.
A lot of things have changed over the years.
This is of course a good thing. The more powerful the alliance is, the better it will be. But... Boss Gu Hang, stop kidding. If you want to come, come quickly! We can't hold on any longer here!
After Gu Hang led the main force to arrive, he quickly deployed the fleet to a position close to the Steel Wing Star.
During this process, the fleets of both sides also established contact and at one point wanted to complete a pincer attack on the greenskin fleet in the orbit of Steel Wing Star.
If they could clamp the green-skinned ships in orbit and attack them, with the help of the orbital defense system, they would even be confident that they could turn all of the green-skinned ships into space junk in one wave.
It’s a pity that it didn’t work out.
The greenskin fleet commander is not stupid. No matter how reckless he is, he will not put himself in such a dangerous position to fight a powerful enemy.
When Gu Hang's fleet passed through the star tunnel and entered the star system, the greenskin fleet naturally observed it.
In fact, the Alliance fleet was quite active along the way, and when it beat up many of their detachments, they were actually able to know where the Alliance fleet was all the way.
However, during that process, the Greenskin fleet commander, who was also the commander of the main Greenskin force, One-Tooth Ghost, decided to take down Steel Wing Star before the main force of the Alliance arrived.
It was with this decision that they successfully deployed 35 million greenskins to the surface of Steel Wing Star, but 30 million also died in the process.
It was a rash, irrational decision, but very green.
Obviously, humans are holding on now.
At this stage, no matter how irrational he is, he has to let go.
His ships withdrew from the orbit of Steel Wing Star.
He even tried to find the main force of Gu Hang's fleet heading to Steel Wing Star after leaving its orbit and fight a decisive battle with them. He wanted to eliminate Gu Hang first and then turn around to continue besieging Steel Wing Star.
But then his choice went bankrupt.
Gu Hang wouldn't fight with him.
It was true that he had 200 warships, and the greenskins probably only had 350. However, most of the 200 warships in Gu Hang's hands were armed merchant ships, so his chances of winning a bloody battle with the greenskins were low.
Even if Gu Hang's fleet joined forces with the Pegasus fleet and started a war with the main force of the greenskins, even so, the chances of winning would only be 50-50.
Even if there is a 50% chance of winning, Gu Hang still doesn't want to fight.
The probability is still low.
He was not willing to use all his assets to gamble with a 50% chance of winning.
If there is a more reliable method, then we should definitely use it.
Gu Hang avoided the greenskins' main fleet, and the Pegasus fleet also chased out. The two sides exchanged several shots at a very long distance in the void of space. They chased each other for two days. In the end, both sides lost two small boats, and the human fleet returned to the orbital defense system of the Steel Wing Star.
Then, the nightmare of the greenskin ground forces began.
First there was intensive and fierce orbital bombardment.
Since the greenskin fleet temporarily stopped suppressing the human fleet, they took half a day to launch a fierce fire bombardment on the greenskin ground forces.
The greenskins have very little anti-orbital firepower and means, and they are the attackers.
In the fierce bombing, all the offensive actions of the greenskins came to a standstill. Incidentally, the ecological system that the greenskins had worked so hard to build also suffered a devastating blow.
A large number of green-skinned orcs died in this wave of bombing.
Fortunately, their previous attack was relatively dispersed, with more than 30 million people distributed throughout the northern hemisphere of the planet. After being bombed, the survivors learned to disperse as much as possible and flee everywhere. In addition, during the orbital bombing, it was not easy for ground troops to encircle and suppress them, so the number of greenskins who were actually killed was not that high.
However, there is no doubt that all their offensive postures were completely disintegrated during this half-day bombing. A large amount of heavy equipment that was difficult to move and disperse was eventually destroyed in the bombing.
This is an extremely serious blow.
The orbital bombardment of the human fleet did not end until the fleet led by the One-Toothed Ghost hurriedly returned and launched a new repressive attack on human ships.
But in this process, tens of millions of Star Army troops have been deployed to the surface.
The Angry Bear Legion and the Dragon Eagle Legion all went down, along with an Alliance Army of around 20 million men.
With the Ork army dizzy and suffering heavy casualties from orbital bombardment, the nearly 50 million elite human army will be an opponent that the greenskins cannot resist.
Moreover, the situation of space warfare has also changed.
The greenskin fleet can no longer defeat the human naval force.
After the two human fleets merged, the chances of both sides winning the naval battle in the void were only 50-50, not to mention that the battlefield was now around the orbit of Steel Wing Star.
Although one-third of the ground-based orbital guns were destroyed, the remaining two-thirds, combined with star fortresses, star ports, and armed space stations, could still provide great help to human ships.
The greenskin fleet took the initiative to attack and tried to suppress human ships, but was soon beaten black and blue.
Several attacks were repelled, with cumulative losses of more than twenty ships.
Even if they are just small boats, it still hurts.
The key point is that there are so many losses, but there is a lack of results.
The humans only had four or five ordinary warships at most, which were damaged to the point where they could no longer fight. The key point was that they could hide in the starport and maybe repair it and sail it out again; if they couldn't repair it, they could dismantle the usable parts and put them on other ships, which was also a means of urgently restoring combat effectiveness during wartime.
The green ship exploded, it really exploded.
Although they did prevent human ships from continuing to provide fire support to the ground, the price they paid was too high.
However, regardless?
What about ground combat?
There are at least 20 million green-skinned guys still alive, and they can't withdraw.
Including the guys who were lost in the previous airdrop, he had thrown more than 70 million troops in. Even for the green-skinned orcs, this was a number that could not be ignored.
It would be very bad if Chief Titus knew that he had paid such a huge price but achieved no results.
The one-toothed ghost was caught in a dilemma.
But Gu Hang was so 'considerate' that he didn't let him be in this dilemma for too long.
The human fleet seized the opportunity and launched a counterattack.
(End of this chapter)
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