Time came to early November of 1647. As the gunfire on the battlefield in Central Asia subsided, and both sides subsequently stepped up their presence, the situation between Ou, Ao, and the Ming Dynasty in the entire South Asian subcontinent became increasingly clear.

In the northwest corner of the subcontinent, the Sun Chuanting Cluster, which successfully joined forces with Manchuria and Guangxi, was entrenched in Afghanistan and northern Pakistan with Khyber as its core with a strong force of more than 500,000. Due to the existence of this cluster, the Ottomans

We have completely lost contact with the EU Army, at least in the western sector.

Now, the 10 newly formed divisions of the Ottomans and the 10 Indian divisions that Wallenstein took the initiative to withdraw westward in order to avoid being attacked from the north and south, with about 300,000 people, are stationed on the west side of the Hindu Kush Mountains to prevent Sun Chuanting's group from entering.

Persia. The EU's 20 newly arrived reinforcements from the mainland, as well as the 10 Indian divisions that were originally blocked on the south side of the Khyber Pass, were forced to concentrate on Punjab because of the existence of the Sun Chuanting Cluster, and were unable to move on the Kashmir front.

. Even the 10 divisions that were originally the main force of the EU and stationed in Kanpur, Agra, and Delhi were forced to gather together to prepare for the southward movement of Sun Chuanting's cluster.

In short, Sun Chuanting was stationed in clusters on the Khyber, an important transportation road, and with more than 500,000 troops, he contained 60 divisions of the two European and Austrian divisions, with a strength of nearly 900,000.

Of course, although the European and Austrian coalition forces clearly have an advantage in terms of military strength, and have an even greater advantage in logistics, if they really want to fight, among these 60 divisions, 20 divisions of Indians must first be eliminated. In this way,

The advantage is not that big. And 40 divisions with 600,000 people coming from low-altitude plains and hilly areas to attack Sun Chuanting's cluster, which has all the advantages? Neither Philip nor Iprahim has such interest.

The situation in the northeastern corner of the subcontinent is still stable: the Boris cluster has blocked the Cao Wenzhao cluster's way into the South Asian subcontinent. The two sides have been fighting since August. In the past three months, both sides have suffered heavy casualties. But Cao Wenzhao

After all, Zhao was the attacking party, so in terms of battle loss ratio, the Ming army suffered relatively.

In the southern part of the subcontinent, Dakondai blocked the coalition forces of the vassal states under the Ming Dynasty in Andhra, and the battle line became stable.

In the north-central region of the subcontinent, the Ming Dynasty's Kaiyang Cluster of more than one million troops entered the mountainous area of ​​​​Odisha, but was easily blocked by Durenni with 300,000 troops...

In short, the current battlefield situation seems that although the European and Austrian coalition forces have been annihilated in Central Asia, at least in the battlefield of the South Asian subcontinent, the coalition forces have neutralized all the Ming Dynasty's offensives, and the entire war seems to have entered a stalemate.

stage.

If the situation continues like this, both Philip and Ibrahim will be optimistic about the next war:

In India, the Ming Dynasty was an out-and-out guest army, and it was difficult to get support from the locals. Almost all food supplies had to come from the mainland across the sea. With such consumption, even if the Ming Dynasty was strong, it would not be able to sustain it for a long time.

Too long.

More importantly, by March 1648, the coalition navy will have eleven battleships, heavy cruisers, and destroyers will also receive a large number of supplements. Even if the Ming Dynasty has battleship supplements, it is impossible to supplement four battleships at once (

The actual plan of the Ming Dynasty was to add another ship). Therefore, once the naval battle is won, the entire subcontinent, which is already in a basically balanced war situation, will quickly undergo drastic changes.

In addition to pinning their hopes on the navy, Philip and Iprahim also spared no expense in setting up an airship force. According to their vision, by March 1648, in addition to the navy being able to go to war and forming an absolute advantage over the Ming Navy, they would also send out

The huge air force with thousands of airships carried out carpet strategic bombing against the more than one million Ming army concentrated in the narrow mountains of Orissa...

So, let's just keep fighting. If the stalemate continues like this, by March next year, the Ming Dynasty will face a tragic defeat. By then, it will not be as simple as holding the South Asian subcontinent and regaining Central Asia. I am afraid that the northwest of the Ming Dynasty and the Indochina Peninsula will all be destroyed.

It must be completely lost. And once such a situation occurs, especially if the Ming Dynasty's Nanyang inner ring is broken, will the collapse of the Ming Dynasty be far away?

But it is a pity that Zhu Youdong is already preparing to launch a new campaign in November.

To defend a peninsula as large as India, of course the defenders cannot spread their forces everywhere, but can only choose a few important points to defend.

The essence of this peninsula is the Ganges Plain between the Himalayas and the Deccan Plateau. Therefore, when the EU staff arranged their troops, they deployed heavy troops here. Sixty divisions and 900,000 people were deployed along the

A long snake array was laid out along the Ganges River.

Because there is the Ganges River as a fast passage, there is no need for this long snake formation to have any problem of slow response. In the vision of Dulenni, the commander of the 900,000-strong army, the two clusters of Dhaka and Calcutta are stationed with fifteen divisions each.

In the place where the Ming army is most likely to land. Once the Ming army lands, these two clusters will rely on solid defenses to cause heavy damage to the Ming army.

After that, these two clusters will rely on the Ganges and the Hooghly River, a tributary of the Ganges, to quickly move to Patna in the middle reaches of the Ganges, join the twenty divisions there, and once again force the Ming army to fight a tough battle. After that, Kanpur, A

Gora to Delhi. If the Ming army wanted to win the Indian campaign, they had to penetrate the entire Ganges River and fight countless tough battles in the face of the coalition forces who were waiting for work and sitting in solid fortifications.

Moreover, as the war progresses, the Ming army will not only face repeated tough battles. They will also face various guerrilla warfare due to the extension of the logistic supply line.

After the Ming Dynasty eliminated the Mughal Empire, it briefly ruled India for nearly three years. During these two years, Zhu Youdong made a serious mistake: He habitually exempted newly conquered areas from taxes for three years. He sent

Wen Tiren, the governor-general of India, also adopted a gentle ruling method - but this method is very useful in East Asia and Southeast Asia. Only in this magical place of India, people do not appreciate it! Instead, it is because the Chinese rule is too gentle

, whose skin is not white enough and is despised by the locals in India.

The EU has ruled here for nearly nine years. For more than eight years, the EU has been very cruel to India. The living standards of local Indians have dropped significantly compared to before. However, the people here actually feel very comfortable.

! I feel it is an honor to be a slave for Mr. Baipi: Whether it is Hinduism or Buddhism, they are both religions that cultivate the afterlife. The suffering in this life is for the happiness of the next life. Therefore, the Ming Dynasty allows everyone to live a good life, which will make people happy to some extent.

Feeling scared and uneasy!

To carry out guerrilla warfare, one of the most fundamental conditions is that you must have the support of the local people, or at least be neutral with good intentions. Otherwise, you cannot fight guerrilla warfare!

Therefore, if the two sides are fighting along the Ganges River, then as the Ming army slowly advances from the lower reaches of the Ganges to the middle reaches and even the upper reaches, it is entirely possible that the EU's guerrilla warfare will pose a major threat to the Ming army's logistical supplies. On the contrary

, even if the Ming army sent special forces deep behind enemy lines, facing the vast number of three brothers who were determined to follow Mr. Baipi, this guerrilla war would probably not last long.

Zhu Youdong always felt that he did not have the talent to be a famous general, so he always endured and endured in tactical command. But he himself did not notice that as a man who had been taught by Xiong Tingbi and Yuan Keli for many years, and who had personally held the power of a country for decades.

Emperor. In terms of strategy, he was already one of the top people in the Ming Dynasty.

Therefore, facing the heavy troop groups in Dhaka and Calcutta, he overcame all objections and allowed the main force of the Ming army to land in Orissa. This seemed like a helpless move, but it was actually a clever move: if the EU coalition forces did not come,

By blocking the exit from Orissa, the Ming army could go north from Orissa and penetrate directly into the middle reaches of the Ganges, completely leaving behind the heavy coalition forces in Dhaka and Calcutta.

So the helpless Durenni had no choice but to bring twenty divisions originally deployed in Patna, a transportation node in the middle reaches of the Ganges, to block the mountain pass. But as soon as he made a move, the long snake formation deployed by the EU coalition forces was gone.

Got it!

Now, on this straight line of less than 600 kilometers, from Dhaka to Calcutta and then to Gujjapuri and Raulkhola in the north of Orissa, there are 50 divisions of the European Union coalition forces and 750,000 people.

.Especially now that the 20 divisions blocked at Gujaipuri and Raul Kela in the north of Orissa have completely broken away from the waterways and entered the mountains. Therefore, Zhu Youdong feels that the time is ripe for a decisive battle.

Already.

In short, the above analysis can be summarized as this conversation.

Duleni: I have set up a big formation. Please knock on the fortresses slowly one by one. If you don't kill a million people, it won't take a year or two, and my surname is not Du. By then, our navy will have been restored.

, then your sea transportation was cut off, your army suffered heavy casualties, and the logistics transportation on the Ganges River was repeatedly disrupted by my guerrilla warfare. Your army of more than one million people must have been completely annihilated.

Zhu Youdong: No, I will land from another place and hit you within seven inches of the snake formation.

Duleni: I have blocked the exit of your new landing place. Please go back obediently and knock on the fort along the Ganges.

Zhu Youdong: Haha, you blocked the intersection, but you also directly exposed the seven inches you had hidden a thousand kilometers away in front of me. I will take this opportunity to swallow up all your soldiers.

…

On November 10, 1647, the expeditionary force headquarters in Rangoon issued a new battle plan.

Battle name: Battle of West Bengal.

The codename of the battle plan is: Kunyang Chixiao (this is the Chinese way of saying Meteor and Fire Rain, and Kunyang is where the Great Magister Liu Xiu summoned the Meteor Rain).

The Ming Dynasty’s troops participating in the war:

The number of troops directly participating in the war is 81 divisions currently concentrated in Orissa, with 1.22 million people (including one special forces division and five Marine Corps divisions). The second batch of domestic troops that have just arrived in Yangon,

Twenty divisions, 300,000 people. A total of 101 divisions, 1.52 million people. As well as transportation and escort of the naval fleet.

Indirectly participating troops: three clusters in the northwest, northeast, and south of the South Asian subcontinent cooperate to fight.

The campaign goal is to annihilate the enemy's three heavy army groups of 750,000 people entrenched in Bangladesh and nearby Dhaka, Calcutta, and Orissa. That is, in this battle, the primary goal is to eliminate a large number of the enemy's effective forces, and the gains and losses of strategic points are secondary.

Location.

Distribution of forces:

All 101 divisions of the Army and Marine Corps are divided into five clusters.

The first group, commander General Liu Zhaosun, has 20 divisions under his command. The main task: regardless of casualties, storm Gujaipuri and Raul Kela in the north of Orissa.

The second group, commander Lieutenant General Luo Xiong, has 20 divisions. Main mission: With the help of the navy, withdraw from Orissa, attack from the sea, land at Chittagong south of Dhaka, and make

The tactical feint of threatening the Boris cluster from the southern flank attracted the EU troops in Dhaka to come out to fight.

The third group, commander Lieutenant General Huang Degong, has 35 divisions. The main task is to withdraw from Odisha with the help of the navy, attack from the sea, and land at one of the locations between Calcutta and Dhaka.

.Take the land route and advance quickly with light troops to cut off the connection between Calcutta and Dhaka.

The fourth group, commander Lieutenant General Zhang Hong, has 5 marine divisions under its command. The main task is to withdraw from Orissa with the help of the navy, launch an attack on the sea, and attack in Dika, 30 kilometers west of Kolkata.

Landing at the village (the coastline here can only allow such a force to land), and then heading north to cut off the connection between Gujjapuri and Calcutta.

The fifth cluster, commander Zhenyuan Hou Lieutenant General Gu Dali - in fact, the real commander is Zhu Youdong himself. The strength is the 20 divisions that have just arrived in Yangon. This is the total reserve for the entire campaign. Which cluster of the first four clusters appears

Fighters, this fifth cluster will all enter the scene, and together with the friendly forces, annihilate all the enemy forces there!

In addition, a special forces division led by Major General Zuo Mengeng fought alone. Its combat mission was to cross the Eastern Ghats Mountains and cut off the connection between the two strongholds of Gujaipuri and Raul Kela of the Durrani Corps.
Chapter completed!