Just as the Western Route Army's offensive was once again blocked, the Eastern Route Army also encountered its first heavy test since its march into the Indian mainland.

When Zeng Guofan led his troops to attack Abdullah Province, he encountered 800,000 Anglo-Indian troops who rushed to Abdullah to help Abdullah when he heard the news, and was frantically resisted by them.

The 800,000 coalition troops, including 100,000 British troops and 700,000 allied Indian colonial troops, after a fierce exchange of fire, confronted each other at the border between the provinces of Achar and Abdullah.

A big war between the two sides was on the verge of breaking out.

Zeng Guofan knew the severity of the situation, so he telegraphed the emergency military situation here to Huang Xu, who was still in the rear.

And after Huang Xu received the report, he was also quite surprised, he didn't expect that this army would encounter such a heavy challenge not long after entering India, which was indeed something they did not expect.

But because of this, they must fight this battle well, and they can't let the Anglo-Indian coalition army steal the limelight, if this battle can't be won, the morale of the soldiers will be lost, then it will be a little difficult to start over again.

Therefore, in this battle, the Taiping army must win.

However, in such a large corps battle, the only way to win is to win strategically, so the Taiping army still has to use strategy in this battle.

After careful analysis and calculation, although the Anglo-Indian coalition army claims to have 800,000 people, the real elite is the 200,000 Indian troops equipped with full British weapons and carefully trained by the British army, plus the 100,000 people of the British army, that is to say, among the Anglo-Indian coalition forces, the number of people who really have strong combat effectiveness is around 300,000.

The Taiping army needs to make a fuss about these 300,000 people, as long as these 300,000 people are done, then the Anglo-Indian alliance will be finished. Therefore, it is imperative that we devise a surprise plan to control these 300,000 elite divisions.

And further analysis, in fact, among the 300,000 elite divisions, the core is the 30,000 cavalry of the British army. These 30,000 cavalry are all composed of Scottish highlanders, and the war horses they use are all trained by special methods, whether in terms of physique, explosiveness, endurance, etc., all of them are higher than the war horses of the Taiping army.

Moreover, these cavalry of the British army were all trained in the most advanced and brutal way.

So, if you talk about combat effectiveness. These 30,000 British iron cavalry can completely defeat the 300,000 Indian army head-on, and if it is a sneak attack or a surprise victory, then the role of these 30,000 British iron cavalry is even greater.

Therefore, if the Taiping army can annihilate these 30,000 iron cavalry, it will be equivalent to breaking the backbone of the Anglo-Indian coalition army, and then it will be much easier to deal with the 300,000 elites of the Anglo-Indian coalition army.

Therefore, the Taiping army fought in three steps.

Step 1. Defeat the 30,000 iron cavalry of the British army with a plan.

The second step is to annihilate the 300,000 elite divisions of the Anglo-Indian coalition army.

Step 3. Defeat or even annihilate the remaining Anglo-Indian forces.

In this way, this battle is easier to fight.

After formulating the strategy, Zeng Guofan handed over the task of defeating the 30,000 iron cavalry of the British army to Li Zongtang.

After careful study, Li Zongtang felt that the mobility of the British army's 30,000 iron cavalry was too strong, and if he wanted to annihilate them from the front, it would be too difficult. And the danger is also very great, if you can't get these cavalry at once, if they start crazy, the Taiping army will definitely suffer great losses.

So, the pit must be dug well. Let it jump on its own, then kill it in the pit.

In that case, the next question is digging a pit.

However, how to dig this pit and where to dig it are all very delicate questions.

Probably the only way to do this is to release useful bait and lure it into the pit.

So, what counts as attractive bait?

In the eyes of the cavalry, perhaps the most attractive can only be regarded as the cavalry of the other side, if there is a chance to annihilate the cavalry of the Taiping army, the 30,000 iron cavalry of the British army will definitely be very interested.

Since this is the case, then use the cavalry of the Taiping army as bait to catch the iron cavalry of the British army.

After the decision was made, the light cavalry of the Taiping army was dispatched, and they were exposed everywhere, from time to time to provoke some explosive news, and create some stimulating effects, such as unexpectedly attacking the Anglo-Indian defense line, attacking the food routes of the Anglo-Indian army, etc., in short, disturbing the peace of the Anglo-Indian army.

They wanted to create such an effect, so as to lure the British iron cavalry to attack.

In the end, it turned out that their method worked, and finally provoked the Anglo-Indian alliance to intervene.

In the course of an attack on the grain route of the Anglo-Indian army, the light cavalry of the Taiping army encountered 10,000 iron cavalry of the British army.

The British army was also careful, and did not dispatch a total of 30,000 iron cavalry, but only used 10,000 iron cavalry to deal with the Taiping army's 50,000 light cavalry, maybe in their minds, to deal with the Taiping army's light cavalry, maybe 10,000 British iron cavalry was enough.

As a result, the light cavalry of the 50,000 Taiping army faced the iron cavalry of the 10,000 British army.

The light cavalry of the Taiping army was commanded by Zeng San.

The British Iron Cavalry was personally commanded by Harry, the commander of the British cavalry.

Both men were crazy cavalry commanders, both hoping to find a worthy opponent, and here, they were up against each other.

After a confrontation, a loud shout erupted in the cavalry formations of both sides at the same time, and then the earth began to tremble violently, and the cavalry between the two sides began to charge selflessly.

The war horse neighed, shouting to kill the heavens, and the two torrents were like two flames, and after a short period of movement, they finally collided together.

I heard a bang, and immediately people turned on their backs.

The steel knives in the hands of the British army mercilessly slashed through the throats of the Taiping cavalry, blood splattered everywhere, and the Taiping cavalry kept falling from their horses and then falling to the ground and dying.

Of course, the British cavalry was no better, and they were constantly being cut off by the Taipings.

However, on the whole, the iron cavalry of the British army was still stronger than the light cavalry of the Taiping army.

After fighting between the two sides for about half an hour, the casualties of the Taiping army had reached about 5,000, but the British army had less than 1,000 casualties, and the battle loss ratio was 5:1.

This is something that the Taiping Army has never experienced before.

The British army was simply too strong.

Zeng San also discovered this gap, but he was very strong, he was unwilling to admit defeat, when did the Taiping army suffer such a wretch, the number was several times more than the British army, but the proportion of battle losses was several times that of the British army.

Zeng San couldn't accept it.

So, he had to get this one back.

He ordered the Taiping light cavalry to continue the charge, and even if it cost a great price, they must keep the 10,000 iron cavalry of the British army.

An even more ferocious fight began.

But the difference in strength is obvious, which needs to be smoothed out with life, when the Taiping army's light cavalry casualties were close to 20,000, the British army was killed and wounded less than 5,000 people, this is still the Taiping army's many soldiers with their own super perseverance in exchange, otherwise, there may be more deaths.

And if this situation continues, these Taiping light cavalry here today may be exhausted.

But Zeng San has also made up his mind, even if he fights everyone, he will keep these 10,000 British iron horsemen here today.

This is also Zeng Guofan's determination.

Because, the destructive power that these 10,000 British iron cavalry could cause was too great. (To be continued......)