Despite all the difficulties, on the last day of the 150th year of the new calendar, the Imperial Marines launched a combat operation to march into Gal.

On the same day, Ding Zhennan, with the assistance of the Military Intelligence Agency, held a very special meeting in Port Diamond.

With the exception of Ding Zhennan and the intelligence officers sent by the Military Intelligence Bureau, all the people who came to the meeting were Van Luo people, to be precise, civilian representatives of West Bang State.

Of course, this is the official title.

To put it more bluntly, local officials and tribal leaders who have a say in the area.

There is no doubt that these folk representatives are all large landowners, or spokesmen of large landowners, and many families have a history dating back 1,000 years.

Strictly speaking, they are the rulers of the kingdom of Van Luo.

In the words of a few respected tribal leaders, it was through them that both the Cripples and the Westerners had to rule the land.

In other words, the Liangxia Empire is the same.

However, they also admit that the current ruler is the Liangxia Empire, to be precise, the coalition army representing the empire.

It is precisely like this that Ding Zhennan is not polite to these people.

Saying that it is a meeting is more like giving an ultimatum.

There is only one key: the Eastern Coalition forces distribute staple food to the people in the occupied areas according to the standard of 20 kilograms per person per month, the default ratio is 10 kilograms of rice and 10 kilograms of flour, but it can be adjusted according to demand, and the grain is distributed to the local governments or tribal institutions in the occupied areas; Reciprocity is that local governments and tribal leaders are accountable for their jurisdictions, including the restoration of social order.

If the local government or tribal leader does not feel that it is capable of doing so, the occupying forces will find another alternative.

The key to this is that local self-government or tribal institutions will distribute the relief food provided by the occupying forces on a very considerable scale.

That's 20 kilograms per person per month, which is not low at all!

It is no exaggeration to say that it is equivalent to raising the Van Luo people in the occupied area.

Let's not forget that even in peacetime, in grain-producing areas like West Bang, the poor at the bottom do not consume 20 kilograms of staple food per month.

So, what is the reason to refuse?

As such, hundreds of tribal leaders who came to the meeting immediately agreed, but some other tribal leaders made other requests.

The main requirement is to maintain the local armed forces, that is, the militias loyal to the clans.

In this regard, Ding Zhennan did not give a positive reply, but only mentioned that out of the necessity of maintaining social order, the local armed forces directly led by the tribe will not be banned for the time being.

In addition, local governments controlled by the occupying forces are allowed to form paramilitary forces responsible for policing.

Obviously, when it comes to dealing with the militia, Ding Zhennan is actually a bit of a bogeyman.

Ideally, the local armed forces would have to be disbanded.

It's just that, from a realistic point of view, it can't be done at all.

The first thing to do in disbanding local armed forces is to collect weapons, especially firearms and other light weapons that have been dispersed from the army during the war.

It is a pity that it is a fool's dream to collect weapons in wartime.

If nothing else, no one knows how many weapons there are in the country, especially the old guns that have been eliminated from the army.

According to the information provided by the Military Intelligence Agency, there are between 3 million and 8 million firearms in Van Roe.

Obviously, this estimate is very unreliable.

The minimum estimate of 3 million is mainly based on the size of the regular and paramilitary forces of Van Roe, i.e. only firearms in equipment and use condition are considered. And the maximum valuation of 8 million is to include the guns that were used in the past, that is, they have been decommissioned and should have been disposed of.

However, this is still very conservative.

The key point is that the Military Intelligence Bureau only counted the firearms produced and purchased after the independence of the Van Luo Kingdom, and did not count the firearms before independence.

In addition, during the two wars of the southern subcontinent, the Van Luo Kingdom imported a lot of light weapons through secret channels, and there is no way to count them. Many of these light weapons were dispersed during the two southern subcontinents, and even if some of them have been scrapped, most of them have been preserved.

If anything, the number of guns in the country is likely to be around 10 million, and most of them are in the hands of local tribes.

The main thing, of course, is a variety of semi-automatic rifles produced during the Second World War, and even some are bolt-action rifles from a hundred years ago.

Although these firearms are very backward, not to mention the performance, many of them cannot even be used normally, but in the hands of local armed forces such as the militia, there is still a huge threat. On the other hand, local governments and tribal leaders are certainly reluctant to surrender their weapons in order to protect their own interests.

It is precisely because of this that Ding Zhennan did not force it.

Crucially, Ding Zhennan personally came forward to meet with local self-government and tribal leaders in order to solve the most serious problems of the moment.

It must be said that this is also where Ding Zhennan is smart.

Buying off local forces with food that was originally planned to be used to help the hungry and allowing them to maintain order was tantamount to rescuing the coalition forces from the war of law and order.

Most importantly, there is no need for the coalition to play the villain.

Obviously, a maximum of 200,000 tons of grain per month will be provided to buy and buy the tribes of West Beng, so that the 100 million Van Roe will no longer be enemies of the coalition army.

This price is completely acceptable.

In fact, according to Zhou Yongtao's arrangement, as long as the annual grain consumption in the occupied areas did not exceed 5 million tons, there was no need to ask the imperial authorities for instructions.

Whether the grain can be distributed to the hungry people, Ding Zhennan can't guarantee it, and the latter said that there is nothing he can do.

As for the effect of implementation, it is difficult to say.

Relatively speaking, combat operations on the front line have nothing to worry about.

According to Ding Zhennan's deployment, the marines were divided into two routes.

The 5th Marine Division moved north from Port Diamond and, with the support of the 12th Marine Division, advanced toward Garden Ridge with a predominantly rapid assault force.

The city is south of Garr and is actually a satellite city of Garr.

In addition, the international airport in Gal is just outside of Garden Ridge.

Although Ding Zhennan did not count on airlift, after all, the main force of the air force is placed in the west, and Li Tianling is in charge, he must go all out to support the 24th Aircraft Infantry Division in battle, but after taking the Gard International Airport, he will be able to use the civil aviation forces that have been mobilized.

To say that, the 30,000 civil airliners and nearly 10,000 civilian transport planes have always been the strategic reserve of the imperial military aviation.

All along, the empire attached great importance to civil aviation, and it was also related to war!

More than 30 years ago, after the birth of the first generation of jet airliners, the two houses of parliament passed a very targeted bill in the name of "safety", requiring airlines to retain 20% of the spare aircraft, to be precise, to ensure that the fleet has 20% redundancy.

The bill is still in effect, with some necessary changes, such as targeting large passenger aircraft with a range of more than 5,000 kilometers, a take-off weight of more than 100 tons, and a passenger capacity of more than 150 passengers, as well as lowering the standards for some smaller, less profitable airlines.

Fundamentally, the Reich authorities have always regarded civil aviation as a strategic reserve.

Of course, civil aviation does have a strong military value.

Among other things, any civilian airliner can be used to transport combat personnel, and all of them can use the cargo hold to transport individual weapons and equipment. In the case of large cargo planes, standard-sized pallets can be transported directly, and military pallets can be transported with simple preparation.

Crucially, the cost of use and maintenance of civilian aircraft is much lower than that of military transport aircraft.

Of course, the number of holdings is still very huge.

Relatively speaking, the biggest problem of large civil aircraft, that is, the high requirements for take-off and landing sites, can generally only take off and land at regular airports.

For this reason, combat use has been severely limited.

In addition, the massive requisition of civil airliners will inevitably have an impact on the domestic shipping market, which in turn will have an impact on the working life of the people of the empire, and even on the social economy. As a result, in the absence of all-out war mobilization, the imperial authorities were generally reluctant to requisition civilian forces on a large scale, especially civil airliners, infrastructure that was closely related to the daily life and socio-economic operation of the population.

To put it bluntly, it's not there yet.

It is precisely for a few months after the outbreak of the Great War that the imperial authorities have not ordered a mobilization in the civil aviation system, let alone a large-scale requisition of civil airliners.

Prior to this, more than 1,000 passenger planes were requisitioned to transport combat personnel to the front line in response to the needs of the mainland battlefield.

Relatively speaking, the objects of requisition are mainly civilian transport aircraft.

On the continental battlefield alone, there were about 1,500 large civilian transport planes requisitioned by the Air Force to deliver war materiel to the front, or to be more precise, to rear airfields close to the front, and the number of civilian transport planes put into military use continued to grow as the Reich made adjustments within the Empire.

Of course, this is also related to the increase in the production capacity of civil transport aircraft.

Relatively speaking, the impact of the requisition of civil transport aircraft is much smaller than that of the requisition of civil passenger aircraft, after all, air transport accounts for a very small proportion of the total social logistics.

It is precisely because of this that in the plan drawn up by Ding Zhennan, air transportation accounts for a large proportion.

Of course, it must be dominated by civilian transport aircraft.

In fact, this is also the reason why Gadenridge must be captured.

Only by taking the Gard International Airport can civilian transport aircraft be used.

Before that, all that could be used were a few hundred tactical transport planes provided by the Air Force.

Due to the limitations of field airfields, the capacity that these tactical transport planes deployed in Silan can provide is limited even if they are fully mobilized.

Besides, the Marine Corps rushed to repair the field airfield not for the sake of air transportation.

According to the operational deployment, in fact, after the Marine Corps takes control of the port, it is used to deploy front-line aviation as a substitute for carrier-based aviation.

As for air freight, it still has to rely on the airport.

It is precisely because of this that in all the battle plans, the main task of the 5th Marine Division is to attack Garden Ridge and ensure that the Gard International Airport can be taken in one fell swoop.

On the other hand, the 13th Marine Division departed from Canning Harbor.

According to Ding Zhennan's arrangement, the 13th Marine Division will go straight to Garr. However, the initial task was to cover the Fifth Marine Division's attack on Garden Ridge.

It's not just about Gard International Airport.

Because the 5th Marine Division was the first to land in Port Diamond, and it was a few days late to attack Port Canning, the Van army guarding Gal had already adjusted, that is, focusing on Gardenridge to meet the coalition forces from Port Diamond, and the number of troops guarding Gal was not much.

As a result, when the Marines took Port Canning, the Van army suddenly reacted.

However, in the next few days, because of the high-intensity bombardment, the Vatican army did not actively adjust its defensive deployment, and the main force was still southwest of Gard.

It was for this reason that the 13th Marine Division was needed to move north from Port Canning.

Although the Vatican army may not be in trouble for the 5th Marine Division in concrete terms, at the command level, extreme situations must be taken into account. That is, it is very likely that the Vatican army will destroy the airport if it cannot be defended, and even plant mines in the airport.

In fact, it is enough to completely destroy the runway.

Obviously, even if an air assault is launched, it may not be able to take the airport before the Van army makes a move, but it may provoke the Van army to destroy the airport.

Then, you can only try to deceive the Vatican.

This was the main reason why the 13th Marine Division went directly north to attack Gard.

To put it simply, that is, to pretend to be the main force, to convince the Vatican army that the coalition forces rely on the port of Canning to fight and do not need to seize the international airport, or that the main purpose of seizing the international airport will not be. Even if there is no way to force the Vatican army to adjust its deployment, it will definitely be able to distract the Vatican army.

In this way, the 5th Marine Division had a chance to take the international airport.

To say that, the 13th Marine Division does have the capital to act as the main force.

As mentioned earlier, the main combat equipment of the 13th Marine Division is all from China, including several hundred ZT-99BLs that do not even have the 5th Marine Division.

Of course, it's not just equipment.

In terms of troops, there were more than 13,000 officers and men heading north from Port Canning, only 1,000 on the Port Diamond side, and about 6,000 officers and men from the 12th Marine Division. Strictly speaking, the 5th Marine Division sent only one reinforced regiment, which served as the vanguard of the assault forces.

It can be seen that whether it is the main battle equipment or the scale of troops, the 13th Marine Division is more like the main force.

It's a bit of a superfluous move, though.

Let's not talk about whether the Vatican army will be fooled, with the reconnaissance methods of the Vatican army, it is impossible to grasp the specific situation of the two assault forces in time.

Of course, even if it is mastered, the Vatican army may not be actively acting.

Based on the previous engagements, the most likely scenario is that the Vatican army will not move. To be precise, it's actually a renunciation of resistance.

The same is true of the situation.

In the early morning of January 1, 151 AH, the vanguard of the 13th Marine Division reached the outskirts of Gard.

Although it was blocked by the Van army, the battle was not fierce. After crushing the Van counterattack, the 13th Marine Division remained outside the city for the time being.

As in previous siege operations, it is necessary to control the communication arteries outside the city before attacking the city, and complete the blockade and siege of the city.

It's just that for a megacity like Garr, blockade and encirclement are definitely not an easy task.

About a few hours later, the 5th Marine Division reached the outskirts of Garden Ridge.

After the encirclement and blockade were completed, it was precisely until the combat units of the 12th Marine Division could catch up, and the vanguard of the 5th Marine Division began to advance towards the airfield.

By the evening of the same day, the 5th Marine Division had reached the vicinity of the Gard International Airport.

As predicted, the Vatican troops guarding the airfield did not put up active resistance at all, disarming and surrendering after the Marines attacked.

As a result, in the evening of the same day, the first civilian transport planes flew over.

In addition, the combat operation against the Gard also began that night.