Chapter 563: Landing Battle

  Chapter 551 – Landing Battle

After the war, the city of Ava was in total disarray. The Austrian bombardment was targeted, and apart from the military facilities, the ones that got bombed were mostly landmarks.

Whatever targets were conspicuous, they were bombed. On the contrary, the inconspicuous civilian areas suffered relatively little damage, and most of the buildings were only affected and did not suffer devastating damage.

The fires brought about by the bombardment were quickly extinguished, and the cries continued to resonate throughout the city. Order had broken down in the city, and the mongrels who had taken advantage of the fires were letting loose.

Many of the Ottoman soldiers, who were supposed to maintain order, also joined in the looting, and the ugliness of human nature was completely revealed, and tonight Ava was crying.

If one were to count, one would realize that not as many people died in the bombing as in the chaos.

Faced with the chaos, Akjol’s master and disciples were also afraid to go out. Just a short while ago, there were a few punks who tried to take advantage of the fire, and were expelled by Master and Disciple Akjol with shotguns in hand.

The shotgun was the collection of the owner of the blacksmith store, and was said to have been passed down from his ancestors; perhaps time was too tight, or perhaps it was too stressful, and the shotgun was left behind.

The son of Royal Mangalaga asked, “Master, will they come back again?”

Family members know their own affairs, these as a collection of shotguns, are not known what age passed down, take out to scare people okay, really if you rely on it to kill people, the chances of killing themselves is not much lower than the chances of killing the enemy.

Akjol replied uncertainly: ”It shouldn’t be, we are the blacksmith store, all of them have been requisitioned by the officials, except for a pile of iron materials and swords, there is not much oil and water to be salvaged at all.

We still have guns in our hands, and these people will figure it out soon enough, as long as they aren’t fools.”

In another point in time, iron and swords would be wealth. But not now, the officials would simply confiscate them. The cold weapons that had been built were meant to be distributed to civilians to die in battle after the city had broken down.

The great Sultan has given a deadly order: “When the city is here, the people are here, when the city is gone, the people are gone”. If we don’t fight to the end, how can we call it “jihad”?

Whether or not the people will fight to the end with the enemy is not in the scope of consideration of the officials, and if the Ava region is lost, the officers of the garrison will also follow the bad luck.

Who cares if the populace will fight to the death when everyone is left to fend for themselves? Being able to mobilize one counts as one, luring the enemy into the city and then launching an attack, and deterring the enemy even if we can’t win.

……

At the Ava garrison headquarters, Major General Özgür is worried about the threat above his head. If we don’t solve this problem, the enemy will drop bombs from the sky and chaos will reign below.

There may be armies that can face the enemy bombardment without a change of color, but this does not include the Ottoman army. During the bombing period, there were a lot of ignorant people screaming “God’s punishment” and kneeling on the ground begging for ****’s forgiveness.

“The enemy’s airships are too powerful, what is everyone’s response?”

After saying that, Özgürr cast an expectant gaze at Saltus. Airships were first invented by the French, and it had been 90 years since then, and the technology had been updated several times.

It was still rarely seen in Ottoman, but in the developed countries of Europe, there were already people utilizing it in their lives. There were even airship transportation companies, but of course this kind of over-the-top business usually didn’t have very good days.

Expecting a group of bumpkins who don’t even know what airships are to think of a solution, Özgür also knew that it was unrealistic, and just put his hopes on Saltus, a high achiever.

In this era, the Ottoman Empire did not send out many foreign students, and a large part of them were influenced by Western ideas and returned to join the revolution, and there were not many honest people like Saltus.

Özgür labeled Saltus an “honest man”, but if he had learned to be a smooth talker, he would not have been sent to Ava.

Anyone with any military knowledge knows that the Ava region is close to the Bosphorus and could become a front line at any time.

The enemy was Russia and Austria, and the Ottoman Empire’s chances of victory were very low, including the Sultan’s government, which was only seeking an honorable end to the war.

Almost doomed to lose the war, officers on the front line had to face danger in addition to the fear of being scapegoated after the war.

Otherwise Ava this kind of military importance, also not Özgür a major general sitting in the town, at least under the command of two divisions of troops, how also should be a lieutenant will come to command.

Basically, the present is the Ottoman army in the unattractive, or the background relationship is not hard enough, only to be put on the front line.

Fiddling with his arm that was wrapped in gauze, Saltus slowly said: ”General, the actual bombing of airships is the first time in military history, and all countries do not have effective countermeasures.

However, when I was studying in France, some of my classmates had done a blimp bombing scenario. Trying to bring down a blimp is very difficult.

Bullets were not powerful enough, and unless they hit vital areas, it was difficult to pose a fatal threat even if they hit the blimp. The best option was artillery, but unfortunately the elevation angle of artillery was not enough to attack in the air.

With the current situation, we can’t mount an effective counterattack against the enemy. The only thing we can do is to use rifle harassment attacks to force the enemy into the air, thus reducing their hit rate.”

There was no solution to the problem, and Major General Özgür was somewhat disappointed. Rifles had a limited range, and the vast majority of them had an effective killing power of only a few hundred meters, which meant that as long as the enemy was bombing at a thousand meters, there was nothing they could do.

Major General Özgür continued, “Do others have different ideas?”

A middle-aged officer stood up, “Your Excellency General, we can’t attack the enemy airships, but we can dodge the bombardment, right?

If the enemy is bombing at a height of a thousand meters, then getting some cover, for example: camouflaged as weeds and bushes, to interfere with their vision, might be able to reduce casualties.”

Head over heels from a blade of grass, or a nest of shrubs, this kind of low-tech bunker, has already appeared in the military, except that it is not used for air defense, but to fight ambushes in the field.

Lt. Col. Saltus objected, “No, it may work in jungle areas, but inside the Savoy harbor, the presence of some mess is not creating a target for the enemy!”

The middle-aged officer’s face sank, and he sneered back, “Whether it’s effective or not, we’ll have to try it out to find out. We can artificially expose some fake targets to attract enemy airships to bombard them, and these small changes aren’t that easy to notice.”

Major General Özgür rubbed his forehead, he was happy to see conflicts among his men, only when his men fought could his authority be perfectly secured, but that was non-war time.

Now that the enemy could hit at any time, internal conflicts would be terrifying, and one bad move could bring about doom.

……

Soldiers are quick, and since the decision was made to land from the Ava region, naturally the enemy would not be left time to prepare. On the third day after the bombardment, the allied forces were ready to land.

On April 18, 1874, under the cover of Austrian airships and warships, 50,000 Russian troops launched a landing operation in the Ava region.

The booming guns sounded and the airships roared in. Smoke once again filled Ava, and the cries of blood and fire seemed to vent the sorrow of the land.

The binoculars picked up by Colonel Jules over the airship looked down on the earth, which was his favorite. The sound of roaring artillery, explosions, in his opinion it was the most beautiful music.

The Austrian Airship Bombardment Brigade had been in existence for more than ten years, with no shortages of supplies, but without a single outstanding war record, and with heavy pressure on the shoulders of every airshipman, they were desperate to prove themselves.

As the only unit under the jurisdiction of the General Staff, they were outside of the army and navy, and were often brought up in the annual battle for military funding.

With the passage of time, the call for the abolition of the airship unit grew louder and louder in the Austrian army, and if it were not for the support of His Majesty the Emperor, this unit would have disappeared from the Austrian army.

Lack of battle records and failure to prove their worth, this was the biggest shortcoming of the airship unit. The army is the world of the strong, and the talk of battle results is more effective than anything else.

With the outbreak of the Second Near East War, the airship unit finally had a use. After the Ava bombing, the Austrian military was shaken.

For the first time, everyone realized the threat overhead, and the argument for canceling the airship force went up in smoke overnight. Especially the navy who witnessed the bombing scene, the first time to report to the country, requesting to be equipped with anti-aircraft weapons.

It didn’t matter if they were there or not, weapons development was also based on demand. The navy realized the threat from the sky and wanted to be equipped with anti-aircraft weapons, and the arsenal naturally went about developing them.

As the commander of this dirigible bombing brigade Jules had always had a dream of turning the dirigible force into an air force, alongside the army and navy.

This was very difficult, and it was almost impossible to realize this without a winning war record. Both the Army and the Navy would strongly oppose it, and no one wanted an additional competitor for military spending.

Future wars will require air support, there is no relation to them getting land and sea aviation, it’s just a short period of time now, people haven’t reacted yet, it won’t be long before it’s brought up.

Crisis awareness, so that Jules is extraordinarily attentive to this combat. Want to get the support of the government’s senior management, take the war record to speak, more convincing than any reason.

Intense gunfire rang out, and even at a height of several hundred meters, Colonel Jules could hear it. Through the binoculars he also saw a small dot that flashed by a few meters away.

Instantly Colonel Jules reacted and hurriedly ordered, “Order the fleet to lift off and fly at twelve hundred meters for a high altitude bombardment.”

By this time, there were already two blimps that had been hit, but fortunately these rifles were limited in power, as long as they didn’t hit the vital parts, this little damage wouldn’t kill them.

The airship bombing brigade lifted off, and the Ottoman army below breathed a sigh of relief. There had been a number of accidents during the brief period of firing into the air.

There was no way around it, not just any rifle could be discharged directly into the sky. The designers hadn’t even considered the threat from the sky during the design process.

The height of twelve hundred meters had exceeded the effective range of most breechloading rifles. Not only is the hit rate greatly reduced at this distance, but the bullet’s lethality is also reduced, or it simply can’t be hit at all.

As a price, the hit rate of the bombardment is also drastically reduced. Often it is only a gamble on the luck of the draw, and it is best to bomb low to ensure a hit.

Obviously, the enemy was prepared, 10,000 guns firing into the air, Colonel Jules can not dare to go down to take the risk.

In case of bad luck, was hit by the vitals of a zeppelin will be reimbursed. This kind of luxury, the entire Austrian army only a few dozen, he can not afford to lose.

Even in the high altitude harassment is enough, the last bombardment has destroyed most of the shore defense fortifications, this is not just two or three days, can not be repaired.

Now another airship bombardment, and ship artillery attack, passive Ottoman army how can have a good day?

It was not yet known whether the casualties were heavy or not, but the Russians had already begun the beach landing anyway. From the airship, Colonel Jules could still see through his binoculars that the Russian soldiers had been attacked by the Ottoman soldiers in the bunker after they had landed.

The Gatling emerging from the corner galloped into the sand, and for a while the Russians suffered heavy casualties. But it was hard to beat the hairy bears, who soon set up their artillery for a counterattack.

From the moment the Russians succeeded in landing which moment, this landing battle is no suspense, only to pay the size of casualties.

Seeing that the situation has been settled Colonel Jules revealed a delighted smile, “Order the troops to bombard freely, stay away from the harbor area and don’t accidentally injure friendly troops.”

For the entire landing battle, the allied forces have now gained the upper hand, and it can be said that the big picture has been decided. But for the Russian soldiers who were fighting bitterly below, the trouble had just begun.

The Ottomans were not so untouchable, and many of the hidden fortifications were only exposed at this time, bringing heavy casualties to the Russian army.

“Attack” horn has blown, countless Russian soldiers ……

(End of chapter)