The Rise of Australia - Chapter 994

c974 The Russian army was defeated again

It is very difficult to break through the Daugava River head-on. Although there are not many German troops south of the river, the attackers will inevitably suffer more casualties than the defenders.

Australasia has more options and will naturally not waste limited manpower in such places.

There are currently two ways to bypass the Daugava River defense line. One is to take an airborne attack on Kaunas in Lithuania, Vilno and Morodechino controlled by Germany, and reversely cut off the German army’s retreat route.

However, this requires high requirements for airborne troops. After all, they need to go deep into the enemy’s belly, and they may also face encirclement by German troops from Minsk and Bialystok.

But the benefits are also obvious. Whether it is the occupation of Kaunas Vilno or Morodechino, the Germans’ retreat route can be cut off, causing the Germans’ hard-built Daugava River defense line to collapse instantly.

Another option is to land on the coastline of East Prussia and Lithuania by sea landing. Doing so can mobilize more troops to participate in the landing battle, but the bad news is that it also needs to face more German troops, and the speed is definitely not as effective as airborne.

But the advantage of sea landing is safety. The British and Australasian fleets have completely mastered the Baltic Sea. The Australasian landing fleet assembled on the Lithuanian border does not have to worry about the threat from the German Navy.

Moreover, Australasian also controls the air superiority advantage, and the safety of the landing operation can be guaranteed, which is obviously more secure.

These two methods have their own advantages and disadvantages, but overall it is definitely more cost-effective than a frontal breakthrough.

However, compared with the current situation on the battlefield in Eastern Europe, Arthur considers more about the combat situation of Germany and Russia.

If the Australasian army captures Lithuania too early or even enters Poland, will Germany withdraw a large number of troops from the Ukrainian region to deploy defenses in Poland and East Prussia?

This is actually certain. Because compared with Russia, which has not yet threatened Poland, Australasian, which is already close at hand and can even have an impact on East Prussia, is obviously the more threatening one.

If this situation occurs, it will not be so cost-effective for Arthur.

After all, being the fisherman who benefits from the German-Russian War is in line with Arthur’s plan. It is not a cost-effective deal to confront the Germans head-on.

The good news is that the Russian army quickly ended the encirclement.

Yes, the 1.5 million Russian troops who were surrounded chose to surrender after paying hundreds of thousands of casualties.

In fact, this is not the fault of these Russian troops. It was precisely because of the order from the Russian High Command that these Russian troops hurriedly walked out of their positions after winning the Battle of Stalingrad and followed closely behind the fleeing German army.

This resulted in more than 1.5 million Russian troops not having sufficient food supplies and corresponding logistical supplies.

Originally, according to the plan of the Russian government, after regaining Ukraine, Ukraine could provide these troops with sufficient food supplies.

Even the defeated German army could provide some weapons, equipment and ammunition to the Russian army, which was also the reason why the Russian army acted in a hurry and did not prepare food and supplies.

But the Russian government did not expect that the Germans would deploy such a huge encirclement around Kiev. 1.5 million troops rushed into the encirclement like a fool, and were intercepted by the Germans in the salient area in front of Kiev.

Now, the Russian army, which did not carry sufficient food and ammunition supplies, was completely dumbfounded.

Although there are large tracts of farmland in the besieged area, it is not the time to harvest crops. Before the German army formed this encirclement, or even when it occupied Ukraine, it had already collected a large amount of food from here.

This also means that the Russian army cannot obtain food supply in this area unless they are willing to plunder all Ukrainian people in this area.

At the beginning, the Russian army still had some rationality. On the one hand, they resisted the German army’s action of shrinking the encirclement, and on the other hand, they tried to find a breakthrough in the entire encirclement.

At the same time, the Russian army also contacted the Ukrainian people around the farmland, trying to obtain food supplies from the Ukrainian people in various ways.

But soon, the Russian army was desperate.

The nearby Ukrainian people may have a certain amount of food reserves, but they can definitely not support the entire 1.5 million Russian army.

Even if this number is reduced tenfold, it is impossible to do so, because the Germans have already collected several waves of food from all Ukrainian people in a semi-inducing and semi-forced way.

As the Germans gradually tightened the encirclement, the situation of the Russian army became more and more critical.

In the end, some Russian troops could not bear it anymore. They forcibly took food from the nearby Ukrainian people to fill their stomachs that had not been full for several days.

But setting such a precedent is not a good thing for the 1.5 million Russian troops.

Ukraine is different from Russia, and the two places have long formed different national consciousness.

Although they belong to the same Eastern Slavs and even look similar, the people in the Ukrainian region still insist that they are Ukrainians.

Faced with such open robbery by the Russian army, it naturally caused dissatisfaction among many Ukrainian people.

The Germans were also happy to see this. Not only did they not block the Russians from getting food from the Ukrainian people, but they also relaxed the relevant restrictions to ensure that the Russian army could continuously grab food from the Ukrainians.

It was nothing to grab food on a small scale once or twice, but when the Russian army grabbed food from the Ukrainian people on a large scale, the crisis of the Russian army came.

The Ukrainian people began to cooperate with Germany spontaneously, and the whereabouts of the 1.5 million surrounded Russian troops were exposed to the German army.

With the extensive reports of the German media, the people near Kiev and even the entire Ukrainian region expressed dissatisfaction with the Russian army. Some Ukrainian political parties even said that these Russian troops were the enemies of Ukraine.

After the Russian army grabbed food several times, it also found that the Ukrainian people in this area had no remaining food for the Russian army to eat.

In the absence of ammunition supplies and food, the Russian army only persisted for half a month, and was eventually encircled by the German army step by step, and defeated the entire Russian army more than 100 kilometers east of Kiev.

The 1.5 million Russian troops suffered more than 600,000 casualties, nearly 900,000 Russian soldiers were captured, and more than 10,000 Russian soldiers were missing on the battlefield.

If it were according to the situation before the war, these missing Russian soldiers would be well hidden in the Kiev area. With the hostility of the people near Kiev to the Germans, the Germans would not know the whereabouts of these Russian soldiers at all.

But after the Russian army completely offended the residents near Kiev, the whereabouts of these Russian soldiers became transparent.

A few days after the Russian army was defeated, people near Kiev spontaneously reported the presence of Russian soldiers they had found.