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Chapter 221 Lessons

The third phase of the combat operation, also known as the "Third Battle", ended on March 15th. The nearly 600,000 US-Australian coalition forces gathered in Toowoomba were all annihilated. In addition, the 150,000 US-Australian coalition forces that were sporadically annihilated during the battle, and in the end only about 50,000 US-Australian officers and soldiers escaped from the encirclement. These include a US military advisor stationed in Mitchell and an Australian advisor, with about 30,000 officers and soldiers.

From the perspective of the development of the battle, it was Mitchell's defenders who suddenly retreated that the two troops of Charlville and Toowoba failed to break through successfully. If Mitchell's defenders persisted for a few days, even if they retreated on the last day of February, Charlville and Toowoba's breakthrough troops would move towards Mitchell and break through the blockade of the Chinese Marines from here. By this time, Pang Yuelong had no reserve team in his hands and could not have blocked the millions of troops breaking through. Even if the Marines suppressed artillery fire, hundreds of thousands of soldiers would definitely break through successfully.

You should know that preserving viable forces is the first element of breaking through operations.

However, after the third battle, Mu Haoyang asked Pang Yuelong to stop the attack, rectify the front line, and at the same time let the front line troops take a short rest.

Mu Haoyang's call to stop the attack has basically nothing to do with rest.

Although it has been fighting for a month and has fought two large-scale ground battles in a row, the mental state of the Marine Corps officers and soldiers is very ideal, and victory gives officers and soldiers great hope. More importantly, except for the heavy casualties when attacking Brisbane, the casualties in other battles are minimal. By the end of the third battle, the total number of casualties in the Marine Corps was less than 60,000, of which less than 20,000 were killed. Compared with the number of enemies annihilated and the bloody battle in the Solomon Islands, the casualties ratio was already very low.

The real reason is that the Marines are advancing too fast.

You should know that according to the combat plan formulated, the third battle should end at the end of March or early April, and then the fourth battle should be launched in mid-April. More importantly, the fourth battle would not be captured in the plan, and the target of the third battle was Rockhampton. In other words, the speed of the Marines' advance was one and a half months faster than the most ideal situation in the plan.

In such a large-scale combat operation, it is definitely not a good thing to attack too quickly, because it means that there will definitely be problems with logistics supply, and it is difficult for the support forces in the rear to be deployed in place, the front line troops are too tired, and the inability to inflict enough damage to the enemy, etc.

Interestingly, these problems are actually problems with traditional offensive tactics, and it is still unknown whether these problems exist in the new offensive tactics adopted by the Marine Corps.

Of course, from a post-event perspective, Mu Haoyang's worries are a bit redundant.

It is undeniable that there must have been some problems at that time. The most prominent one was that the support forces were not deployed in place, which reduced the support obtained by the Marine Corps. The most obvious one was that the tactical aviation team did not complete the deployment, resulting in the very limited air support obtained by the Marine Corps during attack.

At the end of the third battle, there were only 1,200 tactical fighter jets deployed to Australia, and according to the plan, it should be more than 2,000, and when the Fourth Battle was launched, it would reach 3,000. Even if Pang Yuelong postponed the launch of the Fourth Battle until early April, there would not be more than 2,000 tactical fighter jets deployed at the front-line airports, and it would not be more than 2,000 until mid-April. Don't forget that the current fourth battle is equivalent to the planned fifth battle, and the launch time should be in May. In other words, it would only be more than 3,000 tactical fighter jets deployed to the front-line to meet the planned standards.

The problem is that the rapid advancement speed of the Marines actually reduces the combat pressure of the tactical aviation.

The reason is very simple. The rapid offensive put great pressure on the US-Australia coalition, forcing the US-Australia coalition to retreat the defense line as a whole, thus disrupting the defensive deployment of the US-Australia coalition. The most prominent point is that the US-Australia coalition does not know how far the Chinese Marine Corps will push the front line next time, so when deploying front-line aviation, they can only press back as much as possible, resulting in a significant reduction in combat efficiency of tactical aviation.

At the end of the third battle, Hris even believed that the Chinese Marines would advance the front line to Sydney and Canberra, that is, the central and southern New South Wales during the next attack. Therefore, under his arrangement, the tactical aviation of the US-Australia coalition began to transfer to Adelaide and Tasmania, and mainly to Tasmania, so as not to be hit in the next attack of the Chinese Marines.

You should know that if the Chinese Marine Corps pushes the front line near Canberra, long-range artillery with a range of 400 kilometers can cover the entire southeastern region.

It can be seen that as the air strength of the US-Australia coalition forces weakens, the Marines' requirements for air support have also been reduced.

In fact, at that time, only sufficient ammunition supply was needed to ensure that the Marines' long-range artillery could exert their power, and artillery strikes were able to perform 90% fire support tasks. Obviously, logistics supply was definitely not a problem, and the Marines also had enough field airport prefabricated parts.

As for other issues that Mu Haoyang is worried about, they actually do not exist.

After the war, many people believed that if Mu Haoyang did not stop but asked Pang Yuelong to fight, the Australian Battle would definitely end in May.

It can be said that this is definitely an amazing miracle.

It can even be said that the major victory achieved by the Chinese military in Australia is enough to allow the United States to consider whether it should take the initiative to propose a ceasefire negotiation in 2055.

You know, conquering a continent in three months, even the smallest continent is definitely a miracle in military history.

More importantly, if the Chinese army can conquer Australia in three months in cross-sea combat, then in one year, or two years, it will definitely be able to conquer North America in half a year in cross-sea combat, and at most one year, the United States can only choose to surrender in this case.

However, the responsibility was definitely not on Mu Haoyang, because no one knew what problems there were in the new offensive tactics at that time.

In fact, when they marched into the North American continent, the Chinese army learned from the experience and lessons of the Battle of Australia and did not make the same mistake again, laying a solid foundation for defeating the United States. However, in early 2055, anyone who changed their position as the Minister of War would have the same concerns.

Interestingly, even Qi Kaiwei and Wei Chenglong issued a warning at that time, believing that the Marines were advancing too fast.

Of course, the suspension of the attack after capturing Brisbane is also written in the plan, because Brisbane is the only deep-water port in the northeast of the Australian continent, the deep-water port closest to the Coral Sea, and the transportation hub center in the northeastern region of the Australian continent.

That is to say, making full use of Brisbane Port will be of great help to the next attack.

Not to mention, if the materials are sent to Brisbane by sea and then transported by transport planes to the front battlefield, the transportation efficiency will be several times higher than relying entirely on air freight. The reason is very simple, shortening the air freight distance can greatly improve the transportation efficiency of the transport planes.

Unfortunately, the Port of Brisbane has been completely destroyed by the US-Australia coalition forces.

At that time, the US-Australia coalition not only sank hundreds of ships in the port, but also used all the more than 10,000 mines stored in the arsenal, some buried in the harbor, and some buried on the waterway. It can be said that the Port of Brisbane had lost its value for use during the war. It was not until three years after the end of the war that the troops of many countries cleared the mines laid down by the US-Australia coalition and made the Port of Brisbane navigate.

The inability to use the port does not reduce the importance of Brisbane.

Although the US-Australia coalition also destroyed Brisbane's transportation infrastructure, the US military used thousands of tons of explosives that had not been used to blow the Brisbane Railway Station into the sky, leaving a huge bomb crater with a diameter of more than 300 meters and a depth of more than 50 meters, making it almost impossible to repair the railway. However, compared with removing mines, it is much easier to restore ground traffic. There is no railway station to rebuild one, and the railway is blown off and can be repaired, and even if it cannot be repaired, it can be redirected and rebuilt. Obviously, the US-Australia coalition cannot destroy all railways and roads with a radius of hundreds of kilometers.

As a result, the Marines built a temporary port near the Port of Brisbane.

In order to make the temporary port work, the Marine Corps also paved hundreds of kilometers of roads with prefabricated parts to connect to 36 nearby field airports, and then used tens of thousands of large heavy-load trucks to deliver supplies from the port to the airport, and then transported to the front line by transport planes.

Later, as many as 2,000 transport aircraft were deployed near Brisbane.

Relying on the port, Brisbane soon became the largest material transfer center for the Chinese Marine Corps on the Australian battlefield. The combat materials were sent from here, first by large electric transport planes to field airports on the main battlefield, then by tactical transport planes to field airports in various places, or directly to front-line troops.

In other words, the Chinese Marine Corps has established an air transport network covering the eastern part of the Australian continent with Brisbane as the center.

This huge air transport network is the pillar of the Marines' conquest to the Australian continent.

In order to complete these huge military projects, the Marines stayed in Brisbane for a month, and did not basically complete the offensive preparations until mid-April.

Obviously, this time the preparation exceeded the actual needs.

The result was that when the Chinese Marines launched another attack, they suddenly realized that the propulsion distance they could maintain was much further than the actual propulsion distance.

Of course, there is nothing strange about this.

The new offensive tactics are still in the exploration stage, and many of the most basic problems have not been solved. The frontline troops have also summarized their experiences and lessons in actual combat. It is not surprising that some low-level mistakes are made, and they will not have an impact on the final result. Importantly, the Chinese army is familiar with the new offensive tactics through exploration on the Australian battlefield, and has summarized a lot of useful experiences and learned lessons.

As a mature army, it is very normal to grow and grow in actual combat.

Chapter 221 Lessons
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