Although Jiang Baili was very strange why Yan Guang wanted to aim at Mesopotamia, and even more strange why Yan Guang, who had listened to different opinions in the past, would act arbitrarily this time, but since it had come down like this, as the commander-in-chief of the coalition forces, Jiang Baili could only follow the order.

"Mesopotamia..."

Although the target has become Mesopotamia, Jiang Baili still listened to the intelligence about the Turkish army on the Western Front, after all, the Turks on the Western Front are also a big threat. If, while they were marching into Mesopotamia, the Turks suddenly attacked from the flank, then ―――――― things would not have been so good... However, fortunately, perhaps because winter is coming, and the coalition forces have not moved, so the Turks have no intention of acting until now, so they have given Jiang Baili time to prepare calmly.

And if you wait for a while, a new infantry division will be coming... It was also taking advantage of this opportunity that Jiang Baili reviewed the information about Mesopotamia, after all, the main battlefield for a period of time in the future will be there..."Mesopotamia..."

Mesopotamia, in fact, is later Iraq, and there is no need to introduce the human history there, after all, few people will be interested in the history of Iraq.

Here is the situation in Iraq after the outbreak of the European war.

As early as the early stage of Turkey's entry into the war, the British had sent troops to Bahrain on October 23, 1914 to protect the local oil refinery, and later sent troops to invade southern Mesopotamia, and the local Turkish defenders were repulsed during the invasion.

By 23 November, the British, who had repelled the Turkish defenders, had occupied Basra.

By January 1915, the British force in the Tigris Valley of Lower Mesopotamia had grown to two infantry divisions, one cavalry brigade, and a number of heavy artillery, under the command of General Sir J.E. Nixon, whose headquarters was located in Basra.

On April 12-14, the Turkish army attacked the fortified outpost of the British army in Khulna, west of Basra, but was repulsed. On 24 April, the Turkish army attacked an outlying defensive position of the British army in Akhwaz, about 80 kilometres north of Basra, which was also repulsed. Ordered to march to Baghdad as much as possible, Nixon sent Rear Admiral C.V.F. Townsend with one reinforced division and a small fleet up the Tigris. On May 31, near Khulna, the British launched an amphibious assault to smash an outpost of the Turkish army. Subsequently, the British army continued north to attack Amara, and on June 3, captured the city.

This Amara is a city in southeastern Iraq, located on the back of a low hill on the banks of the Tigris River. It was an important river port, a trading center for agricultural products and livestock, wool and leather, and was famous for its weaving and silverware manufacturing. However, the population is not much, only 80,000 in the 21st century, and it is still a provincial capital.

And by this time, the British army was already only 304 kilometers away from Baghdad ... By 24 July, Major General G.F. Golinch had led a small expedition up the Euphrates to attack a Turkish defensive position in Nasiriya to protect the flanks and lines of communication of the Townsend Army. The Turkish resistance was stubborn, and it took a month for the British to conquer Nasiriya. The British suffered 533 casualties in the battle, and the Turkish casualties are unknown, but they left 1,000 prisoners and 17 artillery pieces.

By August and September, Townsend's forces had been strengthened and ordered to capture Kut-Amara in the Tigris and Shet-Hay river valleys. By 16 September, his attacking forces had been massed on the south bank of the Tigris River near Sanneyat, which was located in close proximity to Kut, in the area downstream of it. The lines of communication of the British army were long and fragile. Navigation along the meandering Tigris River, which is almost 483 kilometres long, does not meet its needs. He had 2 divisions, but had to disperse 1 division along the river to protect the transport line. The commander of the Turkish army in the area, Nur Uded-Din Pasha, commanded 10,000 men and was armed with 38 artillery pieces, and built trench defensive positions in the lower Kut area, across the banks of the Tigris River. Townsend had 11000 men and 28 guns.

At this time, the British army was already 150 kilometers away from Baghdad ... And in November, some time earlier, Townsend began to march, and he temporarily recruited a number of camel and donkey vehicles to supplement his lack of river vessels. When he arrived at Ctesiphon, he found that the Turkish army had built a massive defensive position, reinforced with 18,000 regular troops and Arabs, armed with 45 artillery pieces. Townsend drew 1 brigade to protect the lines of communication, mobilizing about 10,000 infantry, 1,000 cavalry, and 30 artillery pieces. In addition, he has a flying squadron of 7 aircraft. This was the first time that an aircraft was used on this battlefield.

Ctesiphon is a small town in the south of Baghdad, only 32 kilometers away from Baghdad..."Is it 32 kilometers..."Looking at the information displayed on the intelligence, Jiang Baili muttered. "The British are making rapid progress..."

If you look at it this way, it is not impossible to go directly to Baghdad.

It's just that... Was the British offensive really so smooth?

―――――――――― in the small town of Ctesiphon, only 32 kilometers from Baghdad, a reinforced division led by British Major General C.V.F. Townsend was storming the left flank of the Turkish army.

However, because he relied too heavily on this operation and did not retain reserves, the first line of Turkish positions was captured, but then the Turks continued to counterattack, and Townsend was unable to strengthen the attack.

After the battle lasted for three days, the Turks had more and more reinforcements, but Townsend had fewer and fewer troops..."Alas..."

Seeing that with the development of the situation, the British and Turkish armies on the battlefield have reversed the offensive and defensive, and Townsend really hates the British High Command..."If the bastards in the Command can give me more troops, and those damn Indians..." (The British army operating in Mesopotamia is mainly composed of Indian troops) It's just that it's too late to say anything, after all, it is the territory of the Turks, and the British Army is neither as strong as the Germans in terms of combat effectiveness, but also has the ability to fight against ten, and is not as strong as the Germans, Seeing that the Turks were already sending more and more reinforcements, if they didn't want to be wiped out at this time, Townsend would have to retreat as a way to choose..."Are the wounded all gone..."

Hearing Townsend's words, Townsend's adjutant hurriedly replied.

"Your Excellency, please rest assured that all the wounded have been sent away."

Townsend nodded.

"That's fine."

Indeed, there is the Tigris River, not to mention anything else, at least it is quite simple to transport the wounded, after all, this time with Townsend marched to Baghdad, and there is a small fleet ... And it is clear that, although the Turks have a clear advantage in terms of troops, it is always the British who have the upper hand at sea, or on the river..."Since the wounded have been withdrawn, let us also retreat..."

"Yes!"

By the second day, the fourth day of the Battle of Ctesiphon, in the face of more and more Turkish troops, the British commander C.V.F. Townsend could only lead the remaining British troops to retreat in the direction of Coot after all the wounded had been evacuated by water.

The British lost 4,600 men at the Battle of Ctesiphon and the Turkish army 6,200.

After the end of the battle, the Turkish army was not actively pursued, and it was not until 1 December that the British rearguard engaged the pursuers at um and Bale. When the British arrived at Coote on December 3, Townsend thought that the infantry was too tired to continue the retreat, so in addition to ordering the cavalry to continue the retreat, he waited for reinforcements at Coote, and he still had more than two months of food supplies.

However, after July 17, the British army in Kut soon fell into the siege of the Turkish army... (Historically, the British sent 2 Indian divisions in 16 years to prepare to relieve the siege of Townsend, but we all know the combat effectiveness of the Indians, so in the end, ......... Townsend, who failed to break through and failed, had to surrender with more than 2,000 British troops and more than 6,000 Indians) Jiang Baili, who thought that the British were making good progress and had already begun to arrange for an expeditionary force to march to Mesopotamia, was also very surprised when he learned that a British division was besieged by the Turks at Kut.

It was at this time that Jiang Baili found that he could no longer stop his march into Mesopotamia.

Because at this time, the British were able to take it out, and the only way to relieve Townsend's troops was the Indian troops, who were not very combat-ready. Therefore, the British urgently needed Jiang Baili's coalition troops to move south to relieve Townsend's forces―――――― if they could not break the siege, then it would be good to attract some Turkish troops for Townsend.

In fact, the British did not put all their hopes on Jiang Baili, and the British had prepared two Indian divisions for the British general F.J. Elmer, because although the combat effectiveness of the coalition forces was much higher than that of these mainly Indian troops, but for the Sino-Russian coalition forces, not to mention Kut, even from Baghdad was not a small distance.

At such a long distance, it was not easy to reach Coote before Townsend's troops ran out of ammunition and food, so the British only hoped that Jiang Baili would be able to attract more Turkish troops, so that Elmer could successfully rescue Townsend...―――――――――― "I thought the British were very powerful, but I didn't expect to be surrounded by the Turks..."

In the headquarters of the coalition forces, looking at the information that the British had just passed out, Zhang Shao sneered on the side.

Obviously, after several battles with the Turks, Zhang Shaozeng has completely ignored the Turks. And this attitude of his was obviously endorsed by other Chinese and Russian generals.

However, after listening to Zhang Shaozeng's words, Jiang Baili shook his head and said.

"Don't underestimate the British, this time the British will be like this, mainly because they have too few troops, and they are too deep into the enemy's hinterland, and the most important thing is that in the troops of the general named Townsend, the vast majority of them are Indians drawn from the colonies, and these Indians are not very strong in combat, and there are too few British soldiers left who have combat effectiveness, which is why Townsend will fail..."

Indeed, if the combat effectiveness of the British is really good, otherwise they would not have fought the Germans with the French on the Western Front for so long, then the British Indian colonial army in India is really some... If the British were strong enough, then the Indians were somewhat ......... It can only be said that the Turks are already weak enough in combat, and those Indians are weaker than the Turks.

In the beginning, of course, there were no such things, after all, there were still a few thousand Britons in the reinforcement division led by Townsend. Moreover, in the beginning, there were not many Turks, and many times they were not even as numerous as the reinforced division led by Townshend. So in the beginning, this shortcoming was not exposed.

But when the Turks poured in, in the face of the Turks, who had the advantage of military strength, the special surname that the Indians could not fight was exposed... (Incidentally, in Mesopotamia was the 73-year-old German veteran K. von der Gorz...) "Commander, the question now is, how many troops should we send south? ”

Meng Enyuan did not participate in the cynicism of Zhang Shaozeng and some Chinese and Russian generals against the British, but asked about this matter... And after hearing Meng Enyuan's question, Jiang Baili also fell into deep thought.

At this time, the Sino-Russian coalition army, after Grand Duke Nikolai and Yudenrich and others took away part of the Russian army, counting all the more than 80,000 expeditionary forces that had arrived in the Caucasus, there were only 160,000 people.

And the Turks on the Western Front at this time had almost 300,000 troops... 160,000 against 300,000, if it was only for defense, Jiang Baili was fully confident that he would hold Armenia and not let a single soldier of the Turks enter the Caucasus. But if you want to divide part of your army and go south to Armenia... The Turkish army in Armenia was not very large, but there was also a regiment of about 90,000 people.

Although the Turkish Legion in Armenia had lost some of its losses in the wars, it was unlikely that it would be less than 30,000 men to go south to deal with all the problems... In other words, if you go south, you will need at least two infantry divisions. However, if you subtract 30,000 people, then the coalition army, which has only 160,000 people left, will be even more inferior in terms of strength... As a result, it is obviously much more difficult to move on to Chiang Baili in Armenia.

After all, in any case, if there is too much difference in strength, even a defensive battle will be very difficult to fight. What's more, the combat effectiveness of the expeditionary force is inferior to that of the Germans, and the Turks will not be as stupid in command as the Russians were on the Eastern Front―――――― anyway the Turks also have the help of the Germans ... So..."When will the 39th Division arrive?" ”

Turning sideways, Jiang Baili asked his adjutant.

"It's going to take another week..."

"What about the 51st Division?"

"This—" The adjutant hesitated. If the fifty-first division is to go, I'm afraid it will take another month to arrive..."

The 39th and 51st Divisions of the Jiang Baili issue were all reinforcements that had just been transported from China via the Trans-Siberian Railway. In fact, ever since China began to implement a plan to transport one division per month, the Trans-Siberian Railway has not stopped busy.

And the 39th and 51st Divisions, the first and second units of this plan..."Is it another week..."

Jiang Baili shook his head, although a week is not a very long time, but the situation on Kute's side is very urgent. You know, there are only more than two months left in the supply of ammunition to the British army in Kut..."In fact, it is no wonder that the British are in such a hurry, after all, if the siege cannot be relieved, this British army will become the first British army to surrender in Mesopotamia......... Although the main composition of this force is some Indians. ”

Indeed, the capture of an entire army, and the fact that it was still by the Turks, was not something that the good-looking British could easily accept.

"I will send a telegram to the British, informing them that we will march to Baghdad in a week's preparations, and by the way relieve the poor Major General Townsend..."

"Yes!"

After receiving the telegram from Jiang Baili, the British hoped that Jiang Baili could be faster, because Townsend was really not in a good situation at Coot. However, the British also knew very well that it was not a realistic thing to let the coalition forces in Armenia go south in a hurry, not to mention that the coalition forces now also have the problem of scarcity of troops in Armenia, and they have to face the threat of nearly 300,000 Turkish troops on the Western Front.

Therefore, the British only wrote in the telegram they replied that they hoped that Jiang Baili would be able to do it as soon as possible, and then they did not urge again... Because the British also know very well that the ultimate hope can only be pinned on themselves, and it is a very foolish thing to pin all their hopes on others. Therefore, after replying to the telegram to Chiang Baili, the British only used the fastest speed to prepare the strength of two Indian divisions, and then prepared to transport them to Coot to relieve the siege of Townsend there.

It's a pity that even if the British were fast, it would take until January to send these two Indian divisions to the vicinity of Kut... And until then...", we can only pray that God will bless Townsend..."

Standing on the bow of the ship, looking at the Indian soldiers standing beside him, F.J. Aylmer said to the British [***] officers beside him who were also frowning... Looking at these unserviceable Indian soldiers, F.J. Elmer already had a premonition about the mission of his trip, not a very good premonition...

(To be continued)