Chapter 851 The British Empire (Continued)
News of the rocket attack on London naturally reached Washington. Roosevelt was frightened and anxious. In his view, Great Britain must be saved now, otherwise he would lose a powerful bargaining chip in negotiations with Germany, so he did not bother to pursue the attack. Krank, who was hanging around Brazil, directly ordered Nimitz to take the fleet north to Great Britain for rescue. Originally, he wanted the TF44 fleet to return as well, but Admiral Jin and Li Hai dissuaded him.
"President, although I think the facts I painted may be a bit pessimistic, we must be prepared." Li Hai said, "The possibility of the British Empire surrendering is getting bigger and bigger. We cannot put all our chips on it. Once it collapses, we will lose everything." The Pacific direction is also over, we must leave ourselves some room.”
After careful consideration, Roosevelt agreed to the request of the two men. The telegram he sent to Spruance was to see if he could attack the German fleet in the short term. If not, he could simply go back to South Africa to complete the replenishment and then go to Australia.
At this moment, Britain sent another telegram that Churchill hoped that the American fleet would escort a force of 30 ships, 2 British divisions and 4 escort aircraft carriers to India. Roosevelt instinctively wanted to refuse, and now he was desperate. How could the British continue to waste time and troops in India? However, Admiral Kim believed that the request could be granted, and the reason was also focused on the future.
"First, the British Empire can surrender, but only in the mainland. The four major autonomous territories must be taken over by us. It is best if there is no British native division in South Africa left, so that Bradley can firmly control the situation in the future; second, the Indian war situation Although Japan has the upper hand, it does not mean that we have no chance of fighting. The northwest corner of India is still in the hands of the British. If reinforcements and supplies are sent in, it can completely sustain it. It would also be good to contain more Japanese strength; thirdly At present, the main force of the Axis Navy is concentrated in the Pacific or North Atlantic. There is no powerful fleet in the Indian Ocean. We can seize the opportunity to harass them, destroy the routes between Japan and Germany, cut off their trade exchanges, and even have the opportunity to destroy some Japanese and German strongholds. If we can It would be better to force the main force of the Japanese and German fleets to return for reinforcements. "Admiral Jin concluded, "We can no longer confront the enemy head-on. We must find the opponent's weak points and attack them. I don't believe that the world is so big, and the Japanese and Germans are all there. An invulnerable monster has no flaws?"
Roosevelt thought about it and thought it was reasonable, but didn't insist anymore - even the British themselves didn't insist on letting Spruance return for reinforcements. Otherwise, what would Churchill have done by sending native divisions to India to support them? These two local divisions are very important to the situation in India. During the heyday of the Indian Allied Forces, the British-Indian Army, the US Army, and the Chinese Army in India were nearly 400,000 strong. After more than half a year of fighting, they either left, retreated, died, or were captured. Either flee, leaving only 120,000 troops. However, the strength cannot be simply regarded as 30% of the previous one, because most of the casualties were Indian natives - they were either defeated on the battlefield, or were attracted by Bose's Indian government and transformed into the National Army, the basic base of the British ——The losses of local troops and relevant officers were not too great.
The remaining British-Indian troops were highly trained and loyal, and several Gorkha brigades also followed loyally. It was a process of eliminating the rough and retaining the best. Due to the reduction in the number of people, the equipment has not decreased that much. The level of mechanized heavy equipment of the British army has increased instead of falling, and supplies can better meet needs. After retreating to New Delhi and the interior of India, the British front was shortened and the Japanese supply line was extended, which was conducive to continued operations on the inner front.
On the other hand, after the arrival of a large number of reinforcements on the Japanese side, Yamashita Tomofumi found that his demand for supplies and arms was increasing, and the occupied area became wider and more difficult to manage. Although Japan occupied most of India, except for the island of Ceylon, which was actually in the hands of the navy, the rest of the area could not be taken care of by just the 300,000 Japanese troops spreading pepper. Most of the time, they could only rely on the Bose government and local governments. The princes maintained order, and a country (equivalent to a provincial-level administrative district in China) could only station a few thousand Japanese troops. A place as big as a county seat could only have a dozen or dozens of Japanese soldiers. He sincerely understands the feeling that the China Expeditionary Force was unable to cope with its original capabilities. The theater he is now responsible for is almost as large as the Chinese Expeditionary Force's combat range (India + Myanmar), and the number of troops is slightly smaller.
By mid-March, taking advantage of the opportunity for the troops to rest and recuperate, Yamashita sent a telegram to Tokyo for the third time asking for additional troops. The number should not be less than 5 divisions, and it would be better if 7 were given. This request shocked the base camp. After intense discussion, Ishihara Kanji decided to continue withdrawing troops from mainland China. The scale of China's dispatched troops was reduced to about 300,000 and 2 divisions were transferred to India. Then 1 division was transferred from the Kwantung Army. division, split one division in the mainland and expanded it into two security divisions (3-unit system, relatively poor combat effectiveness), and then added a flying division, which barely met the minimum requirements of India.
As a result, the commander of the Chinese Expeditionary Forces, Okamura Neiji, quit, believing that he had too few troops and too much territory to take care of. Ishihara Wan'er gritted his teeth and proposed that based on the Ping-Han Line, all the territory to the west should be abandoned. Even big cities such as Taiyuan, Yichang, Luoyang, and Xiangyang were prepared to follow the example of Nanchang and abandon them. He planned to develop these big cities separately. Sell: Taiyuan was sold to Yan Xishan, Yichang and Xiangyang were sold to Chongqing, and Luoyang was sold to the Communist Party. He even hinted that Chongqing would be able to negotiate with Wuhan if someone from Chiang could offer a big price.
Other small and medium-sized cities and counties outside the four major cities were sold off more quickly. The territories controlled by the Shanxi faction, the Central faction, and the Communist Party all expanded. Especially for the Communist Party, many bases were directly connected into a piece, similar to the Central Base - including half of Shaanxi, almost the entire Shanxi (except for medium and large cities and railways in the hands of Yan Xishan), one-third of Henan (in the west), and one-fifth of Hubei (in the northwest). Such giants covering nearly one million square kilometers and a population of over 30 million began to appear.
Even with such blood-selling and kidney-selling support, it only increased the Indian army from about 300,000 to 400,000, which was far from the ideal force requirement of Yamashita Tomoyuki. He believed that in order to achieve a tight control, the number of troops should be at least more than that of the Kwantung Army + the Korean Army, and the latter two had nearly 800,000 troops. The headquarters really couldn't spare any troops and supplies for him, so they could only bite the bullet and continue to mobilize, planning to form 15 three-unit security divisions; on the other hand, they asked the navy for help, hoping that the navy could provide some funding. It happened that the results of Kakuta and Nishimura's anti-trade were delivered to Truk, and half of them were distributed to the army before they were warm.
In this situation, it would be a fantasy to continue to talk about going north (to eat the Far East and Siberia) and going south (to eat Australia and New Zealand). Although a group of arrogant Showa staff clamored for the army to continue to expand the army by 1 million, Ishihara Kanji and Hori Teikichi thought it was impossible. It is easy to gather the heads for expanding the army by 1 million, but how to solve the equipment problem? If the army's military expenditure squeezes out the navy's share and causes the navy's strength to fail, Japan will be in an extremely dangerous situation-once the Combined Fleet is defeated, all the troops stationed outside will be dead chess!
Although the people in the Joint Chiefs of Staff were not aware of Japan's internal predicament, they instinctively sensed the opponent's weakness from Japan's ever-expanding territory - too much territory, too long lines, and it was difficult to defend!
The last topic discussed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff that night was rockets. Roosevelt was obviously very interested in this high-speed, long-range weapon, and even foresaw that this weapon could be used to launch the "big bomb" developed by the Manhattan Project in the United States. After thinking for a long time, he said: "Gentlemen, no matter what method you use, we must build this thing. I will give you $2 billion first, and you can find a way."
In his opinion, he had never heard of the situation report on rockets, and estimated that the level of American rockets was very poor. This time there was no British technology reference, and the Americans had to study independently, so they bid 2 billion in one go - equivalent to the price of 20 Essex-class ships.
"In fact, we did research, and we were even better than the Germans at the time, but we were delayed by ourselves." Marshall smiled awkwardly, "We found an authority in this field, and he was willing to report to us in person and introduce rockets."
Marshall was not bragging. The person he found was Robert Goddard, who began researching liquid rockets in 1920 and successfully launched the world's first liquid rocket at Ward Farm in Massachusetts on March 16, 1926. In 1930, the rocket he studied reached a flight speed of 800 kilometers per hour, and in the launch test the following year, he first adopted the program control system that is still used in modern rockets. At this time, Germany's first rocket had just been tested, and Braun, who currently ranks first in German rocket technology, had not even finished college.
After introducing his research experience and academic progress, Goddard said: "President and generals, I regret to point out that our country was 2-3 years ahead of the Germans in this field. The Great Depression and the system in which our government did not attach importance to national defense science and technology and focused on budget balance destroyed the research process. If the performance of the German rocket you dropped in London is true, I estimate that the gap with the Germans will be 3-5 years, and it will take at least three years to see results, and I am afraid I will not see this day."
"Why?"
"The doctor diagnosed me with laryngeal cancer and I may have about a year to live."
"Oh, God, this is too unfortunate." Everyone exclaimed.
"I will work hard in the remaining year." Goddard smiled, "In addition, I will recommend someone else. I think he is capable of taking over from me and doing the follow-up work well."
"Who?"
"Professor von Karman and his Chinese students."