The Ottoman province of Baghdad was now enveloped in an aura of slaughter. Stamp

The Ottoman Empire's rule over Iraq was unstable, and in order to exercise its rule, the empire established three main provincial jurisdictions: Baghdad, Mosul, and Basra.

Baghdad, Mosul, and Basra were the capitals of the empire in Iraq, but in the early stages of the war, the Xia army, with the assistance of their Mushasha client states, conquered the capital city of Basra, the capital of Basra province, leading to the complete collapse of the province and the leaderless state.

When the news reached Baghdad, Pasha Mustafa Gulju of Baghdad was very sad that the fall of Basra was directly equivalent to the loss of control of the empire in southern Iraq, and in order to prevent the Xia army from advancing north, he had to set up a defensive line in southern Baghdad in advance.

However, the two river basins in which Baghdad is located are flat and rich plains, and their only recourse is to hold the important towns of southern Baghdad in Wasit and Semawi, and cut off the road to the north of the Xia army.

And the Pasha did the same.

The Ottoman Empire's rule over the remote frontiers of Iraq was not stable, and it mainly relied on a strong military force on the border to maintain the defense and security of the empire, so the Pasha in Iraq were heavily armed, and Mustafa was about to deploy most of the troops at his disposal in Wasit and Semawi, forming a tight defensive line with the border city of Kazaniye.

The commander of the Xia army that conquered Basra was Liu Zhidu, the commander of the 1st Brigade who served as the vanguard, and he was joined by the 5th and 6th Cavalry Brigades and the servant army provided by Mushashasheikh. Stamp

After conquering Basra, the Xia army left only the necessary troops to garrison, and then marched north along the Tigris and Euphrates, with the 5th and 6th Cavalry Brigades as the vanguard, and wherever they went, the local army surrendered to the Xia army without much resistance.

In this way, all the way to Vasit, the southern gateway to Baghdad, in a village called Isaac more than two hundred miles south of Vaset, the Xia cavalry finally encountered stubborn resistance from the local Ottoman army.

Bang bang bang –

"Shoot! Shoot!"

In the shouts of the Ottoman soldiers, the guns continued, the Ottoman soldiers used the fence as a barrier, set up a simple horse outside the fence, and shot at the charging Xia cavalry, in the gunfire, from time to time the Xia cavalry was shot and fell off the horse, but the Xia cavalry did not charge directly against the rejected horse, but followed the spear and fired at the enemy.

The projectile flew over the open space between the two sides, either grazing the soldier's body and flying past, or hitting the fence as a barrier, or hitting the war horse, splashing a blood flower, and the war horse was frightened and fled.

Seeing that the Cossack cavalry had lost many horses in the exchange of fire, an officer rode up to Ma Jinzhong, the commander of the 5th Cavalry Brigade who was supervising the battle behind, and he clenched his fists and said, "My lord, in order to avoid the loss of horses, please withdraw the brothers and attack on foot." Stamp

Ma Jinzhong looked at the horses that appeared from time to time and were wounded by bullets, nodded, and ordered the cavalry to be withdrawn, after the cavalry withdrew, he ignored the persuasion of his own soldiers, turned over and dismounted, personally picked up a Type II rifle, and shouted to his subordinates: "Brothers, we have fought so far in the north and south, what kind of enemy has not been killed, how can it be blocked by a small village here? Kill me in!"

After that, Ma Jinzhong personally led the infantry Cossack cavalry to attack the village, and the Cossack cavalry were armed with cavalry carbines, so that even if they fought on foot, they were able to use the same line tactics as their infantry colleagues.

Ma Jinzhong ordered some people to attack from the front, and he led another part to attack from the side, but the Ottomans used a large number of fences, barrels and other obstacles to block the road into the village, and the Xia army attacked several times to try to destroy the obstacles, but they were all shot by the Ottoman infantry hiding in the village and had to retreat.

After dropping dozens of corpses, Ma Jinzhong looked at the Ottoman troops in the village, and his heart was ruthless, and he decided to directly set fire to the barrier and trap them all inside.

Fortunately, the Xia cavalry carried part of the fire oil, so under the order of Ma Jinzhong, the foot cavalry attacked again, and they approached the obstacle in the face of the Ottoman fire, poured fire oil on the barrier, and then

Shoot at the fire oil.

The projectile was shot into the fire oil and ignited the flames in an instant, and the terrible flames spread rapidly, engulfing the wooden barrier, and the Ottoman soldiers realized that something was wrong, and they screamed to extinguish the fire, but the Xia cavalry had already raised their carbines and fired as soon as someone appeared with a bucket.

After more than an hour, the flames gradually extinguished, and the foot cavalry, led by Ma Jinzhong, stepped on the charcoal that still carried the residual warmth and slaughtered into the village, and engaged in a fierce battle with the remaining Ottoman soldiers, how did the Ottoman soldiers, who were inferior in numbers and were shaken by the fire, beat the Cossack cavalry full of revenge, and after a fierce battle, all the enemy troops in the village were cleared, and Ma Jinzhong only left a few people as prisoners to take back for interrogation. Stamp

Through the interrogation of the captives, the Xia army finally learned of the deployment of the Ottomans, and Liu Zhidu couldn't help but sneer disdainfully after knowing that the Ottomans were trying to block them by the defensive line south of Baghdad, but after learning about the Ottoman military strength, his face quickly became serious.

As mentioned earlier, the empire in Iraq mainly relied on a strong military force on the border to maintain the defense and security of the empire, so the Pasha had a strong army, and the empire sent a large number of troops to the east to strengthen the defense, so the Ottoman Empire's troops in the eastern border were more than 100,000.

Under the deployment of Pasha in Baghdad, the Ottoman army deployed at least 40,000 soldiers on the Semawi-Wasit-Kazanniye line, although the troops were mainly deployed on the Kazaniye border, but if the Xia army wanted to break through from this line of defense and conquer Baghdad, it was far from enough to rely on Liu Zhidu's vanguard troops.

Therefore, Liu Zhidu chose to shake people.

He immediately reported this information to Mu Tianbo, who decided to focus the attack on the plain terrain of the two river basins, and he sent more than 20,000 regular troops of the Xia army to the second and third brigades in Basra, with the eldest son Mu Zhongxian as the commander and the second son Mu Zhongliang as the deputy general.

He himself commanded the Fourth Brigade and the attached cavalry brigade, as well as 30,000 Persian servants, and the armies of the various client states to confront the Ottoman border army, both to resist the Ottomans' active attack and to prevent them from sending troops south for reinforcements.

At the same time, Mu Tianbo also sent messengers north one after another, hoping to get assistance from the Xihai Protectorate, and he was pleased that the army led by Daniel Zhang had arrived in the Caucasus and was trying to cross the mountains and attack the Ottoman territory on the other side. Stamp