Chapter 307： Target Cluj (2)

On November 21, the Southern Army and the Austro-Hungarian Tenth Army fought in Deva. Four days later, on November 25, the Austro-Hungarian Ninth Army intercepted the Northern Army near Sonat, and the two sides immediately fought for this.

For a time, two battles of hundreds of thousands of people attracted everyone's attention. As the King of Romania, Edel was of course very concerned about this. Not to mention that the current situation of the Romanian army has become very delicate, so at this time the Chief of Staff, who is mainly in charge of the battle, was recruited into the palace.

"My Chief of Staff, how is the battle now?"

After Puleshan rushed to the palace to greet him, Edel asked directly.

Facing the king’s question, he explained. "Your Majesty, the current situation is still within the expectations of our General Staff. The reason for this situation now is also within our expectations."

Edel can only believe the explanation of the Chief of Staff, but he still raised his concerns about this situation. "But the casualties of fighting the troops like this will not be small. Now the losses are all the elite soldiers we have trained for many years. I am afraid that then the combat effectiveness of the troops will decline too fast."

Mainly because the elite of Principal Jiang during World War II suffered heavy casualties at the beginning of the War of Resistance Against Japan, the image that almost collapsed later was too profound. So Edel has some concerns about this, and the Romanian army has not yet faced the Germans on the eastern front. He is a little afraid that the casualties will be too large and will not withstand the German attack in the next battle.

Faced with Edel's question, Preshank certainly knew the reason. The main reason is that the Romanian follow-up mobilization force has not followed up, but the active standing army has moved too fast, causing the Romanian army to fight more with less in Transylvania.

In fact, the deep-seated reason is that the military is anxious about the enemy on all sides, and this has a lot to do with the Romanian army’s combat thinking. The mainstream thinking now is to defend against the enemy outside the country, and of course Romania is no exception. Therefore, when making plans, they always try to keep the enemy close to the border. Romania joined the war and faced the situation of enemies all around, which led the army to use its strength to the limit in the execution of operations. This has a lot to do with the lack of domestic strength.

In the face of the more than three million troops of Austria-Hungary, the Germans have more than one million troops on the eastern front, and Bulgaria's 600,000 troops, Romania's current mobilization of troops is only a little over one million. If you don’t use your troops to the limit, you will probably not be able to hold it. By then, Romania’s more than ten years of construction will be destroyed, which will make it unacceptable for the army with the sword of the kingdom. Therefore, whether it is staff officers who make plans or front-line commanders, they will be used to thinking about achieving the greatest results with a small amount of force. However, it seems that the elites trained for many years can still support the plans of the staff and commanders.

As the executor of the army, Prieshan certainly knew these reasons, and could only tell the truth when faced with the king's questioning. "Your Majesty, the current battle of Solat is part of our plan."

Hearing what Preeshan said, Edel spoke with interest. "Go on."

"The whole plan is like this. At first, we planned to gather the northern and central armies to attack the Austro-Hungarian Ninth Army in order to capture Cluj. Later we learned that the enemy, the Ninth Army, has 200,000 people, and our two armies merge Later, there were only 250,000 people, and the military advantage was not large. The enemy was in defensive operations, and there were more fortifications around Cluj. If our elite soldiers captured it, the casualties would not be small. Moreover, Cluj has a railway connection to Hungary. , But not being able to capture it quickly is likely to be a war of attrition, which is what we don’t want to see.”

Edel nodded when he heard this, and with 250,000 troops against the 200,000 troops of the Austro-Hungarian army, even if it did not perform well on the eastern front, it was not so good to defeat the opponent. Not to mention that there are railways connecting to the rear. If it can't be quickly won, the Romanian soldiers can't afford it at all.

After seeing Edel nodding his head in recognition, Puleshan continued. "Later, Lieutenant General Fereit proposed a plan."

After being promoted, Edel immediately appeared in the image of a determined officer who focused on officer training and other things, and was taciturn in military conferences.

"Lieutenant General Feleit believes that we will have heavy casualties if we directly join the two armies to attack Cluj. Moreover, if there are follow-up reinforcements from Austria-Hungary, it is very likely to cause failure, so he believes that the enemy needs to be deployed. So after discussing with Lieutenant General Andrew, he used his Northern Army as a decoy to lure the Ninth Army into attack. Then the Central Army fought Luzh and took advantage of its emptiness to seize it. The current battle situation seems to be Fellerit. The Lieutenant General’s plan has been half successful.

The words of Pule Shan, listened to His Majesty the King's heart full of admiration. But there are some concerns that Edel, who knows a little about military affairs, pointed out. "The Central Army, with a huge military strength of 100,000 people, cannot be ignored by the enemy. Moreover, as long as the enemy notices it, it is very possible to send troops to delay the Central Army's pace and then leave the battle."

Puleshan smiled and explained Edel's analysis. "We have anticipated this, so our response is to let the Central Army deploy elite troops to march towards Cluj in a secret posture, and the rest of the troops will continue to reinforce Sonat."

Speaking of this, Puleshan gave a new news. "Our intelligence personnel in Cluj discovered that the enemy had only one division left to defend. This shows that our plan was successful. Now only the Central Army needs to send troops straight into Cluj, where we can capture it."

The news from Preshan gave Edel hopeful, so he asked. "In this way, we will be able to capture Cluj soon?"

Edel's words made Prieshan a little embarrassed. "There is still a small problem that needs to be resolved."

"what is the problem?"

"Yesterday, Lieutenant General Andrew sent a telegram that Austro-Hungarian planes are scouting over them every day, which makes him unable to divide his forces for the time being."

Preshan's words made Edel anxious. "Didn't you think of a solution?"

Prieshan replied We plan to send a plane to drive away these Austro-Hungarian flies, but the front-line airport is not ready yet. "

Preshan's words made Edel cared. "What caused the airport to be unavailable?"

"The field airport runway and fuel have been prepared, mainly aircraft parts and maintenance ground crews are still on the way."

Hearing the question that bothered Puleshan, Edel thought of a way for later generations. "It's completely possible to let the plane take it directly, the fighters take two people, and the bombers carry their accessories. We need to make sure that the sky does not have Austrian-Hungarian eyes."

Edel’s suggestion, after Pleshan returned to the General Staff, immediately arranged the waiting Romanian Army Aviation Third Wing to implement Edel’s suggestion. Hundreds of planes immediately took ground handling and accessories for transfer, and the field airport that had received the order immediately arranged for these planes to park.

When the Austro-Hungarian plane came to investigate again the next day, it was immediately intercepted and driven off by the Romanian fleet. After a disproportionate exchange of fire, the Romanian fighters firmly controlled the sky. Next, we need to see the performance of the Central Army.