On the same day that the Southern East African Military Region launched its attacks on Cape Town and Natal, the British commander-in-chief, Count Roberts, also launched a round of military operations against East Africa.

Earl Roberts concentrated nearly 50,000 troops from four divisions and launched an attack on the southeast Guards Division and the 512th Division, trying to reopen the southeast passage.

At this time, Count Roberts was fighting on his back, with the Limpopo River as the boundary, so only a small number of troops were needed to delay the offensive of the East African army in the north, and the remaining forces were mainly concentrated in the west, blocking the support of the Guards Division and the 512th Division by the Western Military Region of East Africa.

Count Roberts's plan is feasible, or the best solution in the current environment, East Africa in the west and north has more and more troops, and only the southeast direction has fewer troops, but Count Roberts underestimated the combat effectiveness of the Guards Division.

Cristiano, commander of the 1st Brigade of the Guards Division, concentrated more than 70 heavy artillery pieces and hundreds of other types of artillery to cover the Mozambican coalition forces in front of him in all directions.

At the same time, with the cooperation of machine guns, grenades and other weapons, not only firmly held the position, but also caused huge casualties to the coalition forces, and then with the cooperation of the cavalry, the Guards Division and the 512th Division launched a full-scale counteroffensive, and the battle basically ended in just one hour.

After this battle, more than 5,000 enemy troops were killed and wounded, and more than 6,000 were captured, mainly Indians, completely destroying the coalition army's ability to take the initiative to attack, and at the same time capturing a number of enemy artillery, guns and other weapons.

At the same time, the various units of the Western Military District also dealt a devastating blow to the blocking troops sent by Count Roberts, with losses of more than a third.

Count Roberts could only shrink his remaining forces, hold on to the hinterland of Shaokui Town, and no longer be able to confront East Africa, and at the same time abandon part of the outlying areas, and the defeat of more than 50,000 remnants of troops will continue to hold on to a narrow area of less than 30 square kilometers.

……

"The firepower of one division of the enemy is already almost equal to that of our entire army, which is a new situation that has almost never been encountered in the history of Britain, and more than 50,000 people were pressed and beaten by more than 20,000 East African troops, which is simply one of the greatest humiliations in the history of the British Empire!"

Count Roberts was quite indignant, and at the same time, he realized for the first time the combat effectiveness of the East African Guards Division, as a garrison force, defending the security of the first town and city and the central province, and the level of equipment was unparalleled in East Africa, and if you did not count the number of people, it could be compared with a military district in East Africa.

Not to say big things, according to the equipment level of the Guards Division, it is fully capable of competing with the elite troops of Germany and France, and this time the 1st Brigade of the Guards Division has not yet brought everything with it.

Because of the cross-sea operation, many of the larger caliber guns of the Second Brigade were not brought, otherwise Count Roberts would feel even more desperate.

Moreover, there were other units in the same situation as the Guards Division, because the front was advancing too fast during the counteroffensive, and many of the heavy weapons of the other units did not keep up with the pace of the larger forces.

Therefore, the situation facing Count Roberts will only be more difficult, and even Count Roberts may not be able to hold out when the follow-up artillery from East Africa arrives.

At this time, the Guards Division was having a headache for a large number of British prisoners and wounded, and it was enough to catch so many at once.

Cristiano: "These captives, first identify their identities, the officers are held in solitary confinement, and at the same time there are priority for the rescue of the wounded and sick, as for the soldiers, the British and Portuguese soldiers come according to our treatment, the Indians and the blacks are also on par, but they can't eat in vain, let them go to repair the fortifications, find some manual work, in short, they can't be idle, and the standard of food is according to the standards of the former East African servant army." ”

The East African Servant Army is also a black force, but until now, no black troops have been called up in East Africa to fight.

The first is that the East African military is not nervous to that extent, and the second is that the East African military is afraid that the black troops will drag their feet, just like this time the British army was completely pitted by India, and with this lesson, the threshold for the British army to integrate Indians into combat units next time may be greatly raised.

Of course, the black people of East Africa also made an important contribution to the war, mainly by maintaining the stability of domestic production in East Africa, which was the greatest guarantee for the war.

However, Cristiano clearly underestimated the enemy's discipline, and the Indians and blacks who were grabbing food with rice buckets were almost fighting, and even the standard of food for the servant army was much higher than that of the lowest soldiers of the coalition army.

Cristiano believes that if it weren't for the fact that the food in East Africa was a little "hot", these Indians would have just reached into the bowl and grabbed it to eat.

Of course, the Indians originally ate with their hands, so they couldn't use the tableware of the East African troops at all, and because there were too many prisoners this time, the tableware was not enough at all, so they could only make do with a few people to share.

And this is also the reason for the dispute between the prisoners of the coalition forces, after sharing the utensils, several people eat around a pot, you eat more, he eats less, so the contradiction happens.

And the East African cooks are also very annoyed, there is enough trouble in the first place, and these "unqualified" coalition soldiers are still adding to the chaos.

The cooks with their backs and bears on their backs began to maintain order with a large rice spoon, and the "spoon" against the troublemakers was "a spoon", with a spoon shaft nearly a meter long and a metal "spoon head", and they did not squeak one by one.

And these Indians and blacks were also frightened by the East African cooks, which made them reawaken to their captive status and regain the feeling of being dominated by "British and Portuguese armies".

Unlike these "rice buckets" who grabbed food, the British and Portuguese soldiers were treated much better, they all had separate utensils, which was also related to their small number, plus some of them themselves carried portable lunch boxes, so East Africa could still be used by them from a little more evenly.

As in East Africa, the lunch box in East Africa was uniform, and British and Portuguese soldiers also had equipment, but many of them were damaged during the war, or they were not brought with them before the war.

It can be said that the Portuguese were stained with the light of "Europeans" and were divided into the "second echelon" of prisoners, and in terms of their weapons and clothing, only individual armies in Eastern Europe could compare with them in Europe, and even worse than those worn by Indian soldiers in the British army.

Britain, as the world's first power, even if it is a "dog", it is considered "rich", in addition to wearing a big turban, even the Indian soldiers look more energetic than ordinary Portuguese soldiers, but some of them are too energetic, without the slightest consciousness of captivity, it seems very "Erha".

In contrast, the British and Portuguese soldiers were much more "quiet", and although the food of the East African soldiers did not meet the taste, and the reissued tableware was not used to it, it still tasted good, especially compared to the recent shortage of supplies for the coalition army.

These grassroots soldiers were very satisfied with their captive life, and when the meal was over, they were even more satisfied after watching the forced labor of Indians and blacks, after all, there were people who were worse than themselves, and they were much happier in comparison.

Compared with these easily satisfied soldiers, the British and Portuguese officers are the "difficult to serve" objects, and they are used to being "uncles" in the coalition army, and the "preferential treatment" in East Africa is very "shabby", of course, there are also some officers with great resentment, so they deliberately put on a face to the soldiers of the East African Guards Division.

The East African soldiers dared not speak out in anger at these "uncle" like enemy officers and prisoners, mainly because their superiors had repeatedly emphasized that "these are treasures, they cannot be beaten or scolded, and in addition to treating them as death, they can be satisfied if they do not violate the principles or conditions." ”

(End of chapter)