The next day, Li Junhao and his entourage crossed the river and marched in the direction of the west coast, arriving at Jagu on the 12th and going north to Delai on the 13th.

This situation made him a little helpless, and he thought that holding the northern part of Burma and finding a dock from the west coast to receive American military aid should make up for the unfavorable situation of the loss of Yangon Port, but the fact was that it gave him a blow to the head!

The reason is simple, the terrain is undulating, the road conditions are too poor, and it is simply impossible to complete the task of transporting military aid! If the Port of Delai is in slightly better condition, it is barely usable with a little effort to renovate, but there are more than 130 kilometers of road from the port to Magway, a branch station of the Yangman Railway (Yangon to Mandalay...... No, it can only be called a dirt road, which is difficult to pass in the hot season now, and in three months it will enter the rainy season, and it will be a disaster to transport supplies on it!

In other words, if you want to use Delai as a port of entry for military aid, you need to build not only the port, but also the road...... The more serious problem is that Magway is only 160 kilometers from the front line in the south and 480 kilometers from Yangon, which is too dangerous to guard against both a sneak attack by the Japanese army on the ground and a surprise attack!

In the evening, Li Junhao carefully studied the map of the west coast of Myanmar, and the more he studied, the more headaches he had, under the conditions of such terrain and infrastructure construction in Burma, large-scale transportation of materials could only rely on railways, but in any west coast port in central Myanmar, the distance from the central Yangman railway was more than one or two hundred kilometers, and large-scale transportation under the current conditions was simply unrealistic!

In the end, he even felt that instead of tossing around in central Myanmar, it would be more realistic to find a way to fight back to southern Myanmar and recapture Yangon.

Of course, there is another way, which is to use Chittagong in British India further southwest, to transport the goods by rail to Imphal, 950 kilometers away, and then use a railway branch line to cross the Indo-Burmese border to Sidang in northwestern Myanmar, and then find a way to build a railway or road of about 100 kilometers to connect to the Wendo station of the Manmi Railway (Mandalay to Myitkyina). In comparison, this solution is not a small amount of effort, but it is better than safety.

Then there is the third method, just like the "Hump Route" launched by the United States after the Yunnan-Burma Highway was cut off by the Japanese army in the previous life, the transport plane took off from Assam, India, and went east across the Himalayas, Gaoligong Mountain, Hengduan Mountain, Salween River, Nu River, Lancang River, Jinsha River, Lijiang Baisha Airport, and entered China's Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau and Sichuan Province.

This more than 500-mile air route, the terrain altitude is around 4500-5500 meters, the highest altitude is 7000 meters, the mountain peaks are undulating, like the back of a camel's peak, so it is named "Hump Route".

This is a "death route", an aerial road of blood and sacrifice! In his previous life, in three years, on this route, the US military lost more than 1,500 planes and sacrificed nearly 3,000 excellent pilots, with a loss rate of more than 80%, the price is really too great!

He really didn't want to see this route appear unless it was absolutely necessary.

After pondering about it, Li Junhao drafted an extra-long telegram on the future operational direction of the Indo-Burma Theater in the middle of the night and sent it to the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Far Eastern Theater General Headquarters in China, which pointed out:

The main strategic objectives of the United States in participating in the Burma operation should be formulated as follows: to ensure the large rear area of the Chinese theater and to ensure that the Yunnan-Burma highway is unimpeded, so that supplies for aid to China can be smoothly transported to China, so that the Chinese army will have the ability to hold back more than 2 million Japanese combat forces and reduce the pressure on the United States to launch a punitive operation against Japan in the Pacific theater in the future.

On the basis of this strategic goal, the unreasonable demands of the British side should be resolutely rejected.

Therefore, he deliberately proposed two combat plans:

The first plan was to ignore the withdrawal of British troops from Burma and rely on the strength of the Chinese Expeditionary Force to defend northern Burma; On this basis, Chittagong, which controlled British India, was used as a military aid port, using the railway on the eastern border of India to transport aid materials to China, and connecting to the Manmi Railway through Imphal, India, Sidang, Myanmar, and protecting the transportation of aid materials.

The three main points in this plan were: first, the Chinese expeditionary force to hold northern Burma, second, the United States must control the Chittagong and Eastern Railways in British India, and third, the construction of a 100-kilometer railway branch line from Sidang to Bundo.

The second plan is to concentrate military forces, counterattack southern Burma, drive the Japanese army out of Burma, recover Yangon, and restore the original transportation route to China.

The main point in this plan is to ensure the absolute command of the Indo-Burma Theater Command, and the Chinese Expeditionary Force can strictly carry out its orders without interference from external forces, which mainly refers to the interference of the Chongqing side.

In addition, in view of the need for a counteroffensive against Burma and the defense of Laos and Thailand on the eastern front, it is necessary to strengthen the military strength of the Indo-Burma theater, first, nearly 50,000 Anglo-Burmese troops remain to participate in the war, and second, to ask the Chinese expeditionary force to increase troops.

It should also be noted that even if the counteroffensive in southern Burma is successful, Rangoon will still be within the range of the Japanese air raid, and it is necessary to strengthen the air defense force, and the energy, time, and material resources invested are indispensable.

Although he did not make it clear in the telegram, in the course of his discussion there was a clear preference for the first option.

——

When Li Junhao inspected the western coast, Lieutenant General Stilwell, commander of the Indo-Burma Theater of Operations, had already issued an operational order on the plan for the battle of Tonggu:

The 200th Division of the Fifth Army of the Chinese Expeditionary Force defended Tonggu, the newly formed 22nd Division defended Beimi, and the 96th Division was transferred to the northwest of Alanmu to be stationed as a reserve of the Fifth Army;

The provisional 55th Division of the Sixth Army was stationed at Leigu on the Eastern Front, the 49th Division was stationed at Gandulong, and the 93rd Division was stationed at Mengjiu to protect the left flank of the Fifth Army;

The 66th Army moved out of Lashio, with the new 28th Division stationed in Meng Bin, the new 29th Division in Meng Paya, and the new 38th Division stationed in Meng Yang, guarding this triangle area, guarding the eastern front, covering the Fifth and Sixth Armies, and acting as a mobile force.

The plan used three armies and nine divisions of troops to more than 140,000, more than 30,000 more than in history, mainly because of the strength of the Indo-Burma Theater Command, which intercepted a large number of British equipment and materials and equipment into the Fifth and Sixth Armies of the Chinese Expeditionary Force in Burma, so that the bigwigs in the rear saw the sweetness and sent the 66th Army out in time, nearly a month earlier than in the original history.

Lieutenant General Stilwell is now full of ambition and is ready to fight a war of annihilation before Tonggu, killing and wounding a large number of Japanese living forces and cutting off the hope of the Japanese army to attack north.

The first step in the battle was for the 200th Division stationed in Tonggu to take the initiative to attack the Japanese 55th Division, which was building a defense 8 kilometers south of the city.

(End of chapter)