said that he would leave immediately, but it was still delayed for a few hours, mainly because the airport was not prepared, and the military plane that sent Ding Zhennan over needed to take some time to carry out the necessary inspections, and the pilot also had to rest, after all, it took about 10 hours to fly back to the imperial capital before.

Before the special plane took off, Ding Zhennan received a call from Shi Zhiliang from the residence of the first assistant.

The meeting has ended, and at the insistence of the first assistant, the strategic plan for the southwest has been adopted, but it is only temporary, and after half a year, it will be decided whether to adjust the strategic plan in the light of the actual situation, especially the results achieved in the ground offensive.

In other words, if Ding Zhennan fails to open up the situation within half a year, he will shift his strategic focus to the northwest.

Because the time was in a hurry, and it was not very convenient to talk on the phone, Shi Zhiliang didn't make his words clear, but just asked Ding Zhennan not to carry the burden of thoughts.

Actually, it didn't last long.

When Ding Zhennan returned to the front-line headquarters in the port city in the southern part of Pakistan, the army headquarters had already sent the battle order and battle plan.

The combat order is relatively simple, to be precise, an authorization.

Zhou Yongtao has officially appointed Ding Zhennan as the commander-in-chief of the southwest front, with full responsibility for the combat operations of the coalition forces. Because of his own qualifications and the fact that he was fighting away, Ding Zhennan's position in the coalition army was still the chief of staff, and the commander-in-chief of the coalition army was held by the chief of staff of the three armies of Pakistan and Railway.

Of course, the real power is in the hands of Ding Zhennan.

In addition, the mandate also divided the southern subcontinent into four theaters, namely the northwest theater dominated by the Pakistani army, the southwest theater with the imperial army as the main force, the eastern theater with the imperial army alone, and the southern theater temporarily entrusted to the imperial navy.

Nominally, the Northwest Battlefield is dominant.

This is also completely understandable, because the capital of Pakistan is right here!

From the border to the capital of Pakistan, the straight-line distance is less than 30 kilometers, and the distance is only about 50 kilometers, and the armored troops can reach it with a charge.

In the Second Southern Subcontinent War, the main force of the Pakistani Railway Army fought bloodily here, and finally stopped the advance of the Van Roe Army Heavy Regiments at the tragic cost of nearly 100,000 casualties. At the most dangerous time, the armored reconnaissance unit of the Van Rowe Army has advanced to the outskirts of Pakistan's capital. If it weren't for the timely arrival of the reserves and the holding of the defensive line, the Pakistani railway authorities would definitely move the capital.

In the decades that followed, Pakistan Railways spent a great deal of resources to strengthen the outer defenses of the capital, Iborg.

But the problem is that no amount of resources can solve the fundamental problem.

Lack of the necessary depth for defense!

It is only a few tens of kilometers, not to mention the information age, even in the mechanization era, it is not worth mentioning.

As such, the Pakistani Army has been focusing on the northern region, with three of the five elite armoured brigades deployed near Iborg. Counting the infantry units that act as "meat shields", the strength of the Gongwei Iburg accounts for 4% of the total strength of the Pakistani Army. Counting the reserves deployed in the rear, near Pasir Ris Rass, the Pakistani Railways Army has placed two-thirds of its standing strength in the northern part of the mainland.

Under the normal establishment, there are almost 400,000 officers and soldiers!

And that's not even counting the reserves and militias.

Deployed at the front, especially in the disputed Buk region, where there are hundreds of thousands of militias controlled by tribes and local governments alone.

All things considered, the total number of troops in this direction exceeds 1 million.

According to the calculation of troops, the Pakistani railway army is definitely the main force.

It's just that it's hard to say how strong the combat effectiveness of the Pakistani railway army is.

The key point is that it is actually the Northwest Garrison of the Empire's home theater that plays a decisive role in this direction, or can have an impact on the strategic balance.

Although among the five major theaters of the empire, the home theater has the smallest number of troops and the smallest jurisdiction, and it is all Category B and C troops, after all, the main force is not needed for the local defense, but compared with the surrounding countries, the combat effectiveness of the native garrison is not bad, especially in several main directions.

There is no doubt that the Northwest Defense Zone is the main direction of defense.

In peacetime, the Northwest Defense Region has only one Category B Infantry Division and two Category C Infantry Divisions, with less than 50,000 officers and men, and its main task is to patrol the border.

Of course, after the outbreak of the war, all three divisions were mobilized, and according to the pre-war arrangement, the necessary expansion was carried out, and the number of officers and men in the establishment increased to 70,000.

In addition, reserves and militias were mobilized to form three infantry divisions.

Of these 6 divisions, 2 are deployed near the border with Van Luo, and they are all main divisions, including the only infantry division in the defense area.

Strictly speaking, the unit, the 54th Mechanized Infantry Division, was not really a mechanized infantry unit.

In terms of equipment, the 54th Mechanized Infantry Division is more like a strengthened mountain force equipped with a large number of light tanks and wheeled armored vehicles.

To put it mildly, the three main divisions of the Northwest Defense Region are all mountain divisions, but the main battle equipment is different.

Among them, the infantry division is dominated by armored forces, and the infantry division is dominated by infantry. However, compared with other mechanized units, in order to adapt to a more complex combat environment, mountain troops like the 54th Mechanized Infantry Division are very special.

Of course, the 54th Mechanized Infantry Division was the main force.

After being strengthened according to wartime standards, the combat effectiveness of the 54th Mechanized Infantry Division should definitely not be underestimated.

Among other things, the division's 541st armored brigade was armed with about 300 tanks.

Although all of them are light tanks with a combat weight of less than 40 tons, and their protective performance is not as good as that of the main battle tank, their firepower is no worse than that of the main battle tank, and their mobility is even better. Even if it goes head-to-head with the main battle tanks of the Van Rowe Army, it will not be left behind.

However, the trump card of the 54th Mechanized Infantry Division was not the 541st Armored Brigade, but the 545th Artillery Brigade.

The brigade is the only brigade-sized long-range artillery unit in the Northwest Defense Zone.

The main combat equipment of the brigade is 180 long-range rocket launchers, and the range of ordinary rockets reaches 200 kilometers, and with long-range rockets it can reach 400 kilometers.

In other words, even if these rockets were deployed north of the border, that is, within the empire, they would pose a threat to the capital of the Van Luo Kingdom. If you don't take into account the cost, the logistics are not a problem, and 180 rocket launchers can turn the capital of Van Luo into a sea of fire in a matter of days.

This is a real strategic threat!

Of course, even if long-range rockets are too expensive to be used on a large scale, and delivering ammunition to front-line artillery positions surrounded by mountains is a very cumbersome and even difficult task, it is possible to destroy military targets within range with limited ammunition.

After the destruction of the military base in the rear, what will Van Luo use to attack?

What's more, there are still several armored brigades and mechanized infantry brigades eyeing the plateau to the north.

The flanks are threatened, and attacking is tantamount to death.

From a military point of view, after the end of the Second Southern Subcontinent War, the peace situation was able to be maintained for several decades without the outbreak of large-scale wars, and a large part of the reason was that the empire deployed heavy troops in the northwest, which posed a strategic threat to the northwest core area of the Van Luo Kingdom, thus forming a delicate strategic balance.

In fact, this in itself is the basic defensive strategy of the Eastern Bloc on this battlefield.

After the outbreak of war, the Pakistani Army had only one task: to hold the border line from Ibau to Lal, to try to demoralize Van Roe's army in defensive operations, and to force the enemy to increase troops to the front, preferably with strategic reserves in advance. When the time is ripe, the Imperial Army will launch a surprise attack from the north, attack the flank of Van Luo's army, go around to the rear of Van Luo's army, and encircle and annihilate the heavy group of Van Luo's army.

According to the deduction, it would only take a few days to crush the offensive operations of Van Roe's army and achieve a decisive victory.

Of course, whether to march into the country of Van Luo, such as attacking the capital of the country of Van Luo, has to be another matter.

In general, in the Northwest Theater, the Pakistani Iron Army was a chopping block, while several units of the Imperial Army's Northwest Defense Zone acted as bayonets for counterattacks.

In terms of importance, the Pakistani Railway Army and the Imperial Army are at least on par.

Because it is based on Pakistan and Railway, it is necessary to hold Iborg, so in terms of command, the General Staff of the three armies of Pakistan and Railway has always been the most important.

As for the other three battlefields, they were all played by the Imperial Army.

Relatively speaking, in terms of ground operations, the eastern theater is basically negligible.

Although the Empire had invested a lot of money in the construction of the Southwestern Railroad and the military deployment of the Southeast Peninsula before the First Global War, with the Empire's defeat in the First Global War, almost all investment in this direction was lost.

Even after the Second World War, when global hegemony and shipping routes became more unimpeded, the imperial authorities did not continue to expend resources on the Southwestern Railroad, and largely abandoned inland lines of communication in favor of port construction.

Here, too, there is a non-military issue involved.

The northeastern part of the Southern Subcontinent, especially the Yunwu River estuary delta, is simply overpopulated. For example, Bangladesh, which has a land area of less than 150,000 square kilometers, has about 200 million people, while the northeastern part of Van Luo has almost 200 million people, and Myanmar has about 100 million people in the east. There are 500 million people in this area of hundreds of thousands of square kilometers, and almost all of them are poor people struggling to survive.

According to statistics conducted by international agencies, this is the poorest and most backward place in the world.

Obviously, this is the main reason why the empire is reluctant to invest in the region.

Not to mention the matter of returns, but how to deal with these hundreds of millions of aborigines of the destitute class is a difficult test for the imperial authorities.

Among other things, more than 1 million illegal immigrants enter the empire from this region every year, and almost all of them are concentrated in the southwest of the empire, especially in the three border provinces. It is precisely for this reason that the social situation in the southwest of the empire has not been very stable. What's worse is that illegal immigrants play a very important role in the drug network, and they are also the key reason for the drug epidemic.

The Empire's war on drugs is primarily aimed at drug lords entrenched in the region.

To this end, the empire has to invest billions of gold dollars every year, sacrificing hundreds of anti-narcotics police, but it still has not been able to stop the drug problem.

It is not difficult to see from this that the northeastern region of the Southern Subcontinent is not very attractive, at least in terms of the upper echelons of the empire.

From a military point of view, there is also no need to commit heavy troops on the eastern battlefield.

To put it bluntly, a large corps is not the best choice to fight in an area of the river network where infrastructure is scarce and natural conditions are extremely harsh.

The point is, logistics may not be able to keep up!

Without railways, not even roads, how to deliver war materiel to the front?

Of course, with the experience of the Imperial Army in the Polish-Iranian War, helicopters can solve some of the problems, but they certainly cannot replace other means of transport.

This alone determines that the number of troops invested will not be too much.

In addition, the armored forces are not suitable for fighting in the area of the net, since the main battle tanks weighing several tens of tons are basically unable to quickly maneuver in places with dense rivers.

Without the ability to assault, the armored forces lose their existential value.

If anything, the Marine Corps is more suited to fight in such an environment.

It was precisely in this way that the main force in the eastern theater was the three light infantry divisions of the Imperial Army, to be precise, the amphibious forces fighting in the coastal area.

Because the Marine Corps was upgraded to an independent service, the Imperial Army abolished the amphibious forces after World War II.

However, the Marine Corps is nominally subordinate to the Navy and is subject to naval control, so it is not able to undertake corresponding combat missions at any time.

In other words, the Imperial Army had the need to fight in the Primordial area.

It was in this way that the amphibious forces were reorganized under the name of light infantry divisions.

Strictly speaking, several light infantry divisions of the Imperial Army, which were mainly engaged in amphibious operations, mainly faced the southeastern region and the northeastern region of the southern subcontinent.

It's just that these light infantry divisions are all C-level troops.

Even if it was expanded after the outbreak of the war, it did not reach a complete state, and there was a serious lack of main battle equipment such as amphibious armored vehicles, and its combat effectiveness was not strong.

It is under the influence of this that on the eastern battlefield, we can only focus on defense, and at least in the early stage, we must strengthen the defense of key areas.

According to the deployment of the army command, the three light infantry divisions that serve as the main force will be strengthened, mainly by adding a transport aviation brigade.

At normal strength, the Transport Aviation Brigade has 240 assault transport helicopters and is capable of delivering a fully formed infantry battalion and at least three days of combat materiel to any point within 150 kilometres at a time, or providing logistical support to three infantry battalions on an ongoing basis.

If anything, the transport aviation brigade is the wings of the light infantry unit, and only after the acquisition of the transport aviation brigade will the light infantry unit have a real battlefield assault capability.

It's just that there is no guarantee when the three reinforced transport aviation brigades will be in place.

The reason is simple, there are not so many helicopters, especially the most versatile general-purpose transport helicopters.

Even if several helicopter manufacturers have united, shared intellectual property rights, and planned production according to orders issued by the Ministry of Defense, the production capacity still cannot keep up with the rate of consumption, and the helicopters produced need to be given priority to the main combat units.

Of course, this is not necessarily a bad thing.

Because of the temporary defense in the eastern battlefield, the army command did not distract Ding Zhenna and sent a major general as the interim commander.

According to the intention of the army command, after the troops are ready, let Ding Zhennan take over.

Of course, whether it is necessary or not depends on the actual situation.

The current focus is still on the side of the southwest battlefield!