Chapter 63: Fighting Gyantse Again
The Wehrmacht who retreated to the Bailang area has been on the defensive after blocking the pursuing British army, and although the British army wanted to capture Bailang at one time, they had no choice but to retreat to Gyantse because the logistics did not keep up, and they thought that they could quickly solve the Wehrmacht, but they did not expect the Wehrmacht to be so fierce.
For several days, the British army would harass the Wehrmacht, constantly attacking Blanc with a small number of British troops and a large number of servants, but they did not dare to advance too aggressively, because they found that the Wehrmacht firepower was very strong, and there were still many troops, so they did not dare to fight a decisive battle until the British troops in Myitkyina, their own reinforcements, arrived.
It was only after the rebellion of the Majia Army in the northwest that the British army's attack slowly increased, and as for the attack of the Ma Jiajun, only Cai Yi and other senior officers knew, and the soldiers below did not know about it, because Qin Yu issued a gag order, and only after the Ma Jiajun in the northwest was resolved, he was allowed to tell it.
In order to allow Qin Yu enough time to deal with the northwest, the Tibetan defense forces were very passive, and they had been enduring all kinds of harassment by the British army, although they had stronger strength than the British army.
Soon after Ma Qi changed banners, Cai Ye received Qin Yu's order to attack the British army, and Cai Ye immediately gathered a group of officers to discuss the attack and began to deploy. Cai Ye also explained the attack of the Ma family's army, and the soldiers in Sichuan were the most angry, because they were fighting against the British army on the front line, and their hometown was invaded.
The British army transferred from Myitkyina had just entered the Tibetan border, so the British army in Gyantse did not rashly attack Bai Lang under Minto's orders, and Minto was now very worried that he would fail, so he waited for reinforcements to come and attack together.
The Wehrmacht began to attack the British army under the order of Cai Yi, and the soldiers of the Wehrmacht had suppressed the harassment of the British army for a long time, but now it was finally their turn to attack, so they burst out with several times more vitality than usual, and the Wehrmacht army continued to march towards Gyantse.
Minto, who was in Gyantse, finally learned about the Wehrmacht's attack, and he couldn't imagine that the Wehrmacht, which had been on the defensive, would start attacking them so quickly, although he was not afraid of the Wehrmacht now, but if the Wehrmacht made up its mind to attack, his casualties would definitely be very large, and once the casualties reached a number, even if he won and returned home, it would not be good.
The Wehrmacht used all those airships this time, and Cai Ye didn't want too many casualties, so he used the airships as soon as he came. Seven airships carrying a large amount of explosives began to fly towards Gyantse, and the Wehrmacht on the ground also quickly rushed to Gyantse, and many British troops encountered on the way were killed, in fact, as soon as Minto heard about the Wehrmacht, the British troops on the road from Gyantse to Bailang were transferred back, and only those who did not rush back to Gyantse in time were met and solved by the Wehrmacht.
The speed of the airship is very fast, when the seven airships flew to Gyantse, the British army also found those huge airships, the British army was shocked after seeing it, they didn't expect the Wehrmacht to have this, and they don't have a weapon specifically to deal with the airship, so they are also very passive.
The Wehrmacht airship first came to the outskirts of Gyantse, and the soldiers of the airship fleet kept throwing bombs at the British position, and the British troops on the ground began to scatter and run around when they saw the airship throwing bombs, but there were still some British troops who were not dispersed in time and were blown up and smashed, as for those Indian servants, they were very shocked when they saw the airships, and then watched the bombs drop from their sky in a daze, so a large number of Indian servants were killed and wounded, and finally the British soldiers in the entire suburbs were blown up crying and shouting everywhere to avoid bombs.
The airship fleet not only bombed the soldiers, but also destroyed the military defenses that the British had built and the munitions depots that were easy to see, and after a round of bombing of the suburbs, the airship fleet flew towards the center of Gyantse.
Minto received a telegram when the suburbs were bombed, and the first time he received the news was that he thought it was fake, how could there be an airship in the stupid and backward Huaxia, but after repeated determination, Minto still had to accept this shocking news, Minto at this time immediately thought that the Germans must have sold the airship to Huaxia, and the Germans must have planned this war with Huaxia, and after thinking of this, he immediately transmitted the news back to China, He put all the blame on Germany, saying that Germany and China were colluding to entrap the Empire, and at the same time he also telegraphed the arriving Myitkyina reinforcements, hoping that they would arrive in Gyantse as soon as possible to provide urgent assistance.
When Minto found out, he immediately ordered the soldiers to avoid the bombardment of the airship as much as possible, although he told people to hide, but because it was too urgent, there were many things that were not done.
When the seven airships appeared in the sky over Gyantse together, the British troops below were very afraid, and Minto was also the first time to see airships in Asia, and these airships were bigger than their British Empire's airships, and the terrifying scenes of bombs falling from the sky made them unforgettable in this life, a large number of military buildings were blown up, ammunition depots were also blown up, and some British troops who were not well dodged were also killed.
After the bombing was carried out, the airship fleet flew away because the bombs ran out, leaving only the British troops who were still in shock and the debris all over the ground, and it was not until the airships had walked for more than ten minutes that the British army dared to come out of the hiding place.
Minto looked at the bombed-out military buildings and ammunition depots and cried, now that they didn't have enough ammunition and perfect defense, they were no match for the Wehrmacht with airships, and this time it seemed that his political career was coming to an end, and he might have to go to court martial when he returned home.
Although Minto is very decadent, but his subordinates don't want to die here, his subordinates quickly put together the army for the army to repair military buildings, as well as to guard against the Wehrmacht, they want to hold out until the arrival of reinforcements, but the bombing accuracy of the airship fleet is very high, and many military buildings are impossible to repair in a short time, so they can only retreat now.
By the time Minto agreed to retreat, the Wehrmacht had reached the outskirts of Gyantse, where the Wehrmacht had surrendered only a few rounds of artillery bombardment to the few remaining British troops in the suburbs, with as many as 3,000 British troops in the suburbs and more than 10,000 Indian servants.
Immediately after conquering the suburbs, the Wehrmacht rushed to the center of Gyantse, as the Wehrmacht received information that the British troops in Gyantse were preparing to flee. The British troops, who were packing up and preparing to flee, sped up as soon as they heard the gunfire in the suburbs, but there were still many British troops who were not prepared for the Wehrmacht, and the Wehrmacht launched a fierce attack as soon as they arrived.
When Minto saw that the Wehrmacht had entered Gyantse, he immediately asked all the remaining Indian servants to block the Wehrmacht's artillery fire, and they accelerated their escape. Those Indian servant troops were driven by the British army and were not afraid of death to carry out a counterattack on the Wehrmacht, but because the weapons of the Indian servant army were too backward, they were slaughtered by the Wehrmacht, and soon the Indian servant army also began to riot, many Indian servant troops surrendered, and some fled in all directions to avoid the attack of the Wehrmacht, and some British troops saw this situation and counterattacked the Wehrmacht, but they were quickly cleared under the fire of the Wehrmacht.
The Wehrmacht, which had just entered Gyantse, was quickly dragged into street fighting by the troops and servant troops arranged by the British, all in order to buy more time for the fleeing British. Many of the Wehrmacht, who were not very familiar with street fighting, were caught up in street fighting, and less than half of the Wehrmacht pursued the British army, but even then the British paid a great price, and a large amount of supplies were abandoned on the side of the road. Although the Wehrmacht was not very good at street fighting, relying on the advanced weapons and the superiority of numbers, the British troops who were fighting in the streets were quickly solved.
Minto took less than 20,000 British troops and 10,000 servant troops to flee while fighting back against the pursuing Wehrmacht, Minto would never have thought that he would be defeated so quickly, he was thundered to death as soon as the airship appeared, he didn't know what punishment he would receive when he returned home, and he had lost more than 30,000 British troops so far, and the people at home would tear themselves apart.
The British reinforcements who had just entered the Tibetan border received Minto's message for help and immediately accelerated their march, and when they arrived at Kangma, they encountered Minto and others who were chased like dogs, and finally the British army that could meet the British reinforcements was only more than 12,000 people and less than 5,000 servants. When the Wehrmacht's pursuing force learned that there was a 50,000-strong British army and 150,000 Indian and Myitkyina servants, they immediately stopped the pursuit and rushed back to Gyantse.