Chapter 1256: WW1: Fall of London and Lisbon (3)
The fall of Lisbon was extremely fast. The events that occurred leading to the fall might seem long and complicated, but in reality, from when the tanks landed on the beach to when the city defences formed by the Lisbon Defence Guard were breached, it only took two days, not more, not less.
As for other places, they were not faring any better either. With the Atlantic Navy of the European Union not yet recovered, and the navy that could barely be called one, since most of its ships were merchant ships installed with medium-sized cannons destroyed, Western Europe had nothing to protect its port cities, and, caught off guard by everything happening so suddenly, the Europeans could not mobilise the Mediterranean Navy either.
Not to mention, even if they had the time and were prepared to mobilise the newly built navy that was halfway completed, due to the fear of being caught off guard in case the Bharatiya Empire took advantage of the situation and launched a raid from within the depths of the Mediterranean Sea through the Suez Canal, they might not have done anything and probably would have endured it.
Kingdom of Britain
Portsmouth, a port city of the British Kingdom, was located at the southern tip of the British Isles, and this city was the one that was targeted by the Bharatiya Empire. Unfortunately, due to the absence of the Atlantic Fleet, Portsmouth, which was right at the edge of the coast, sitting right at the Atlantic Ocean, could not resist the violent offensive of the Bharatiya Navy.
Rear Admiral Puri Vadivelu did quite a bit of damage to the port, so much so that the marines were not required at all. The military transporter vessels directly approached the harbour and opened the hatches straight away, letting out the biggest weapon of the Bharatiya Empire, the Agni Ratha tanks.
The port defence infrastructure was mostly obliterated, but there were still some enemy combatants hidden within the rubble of the city, one group laying an ambush, another planning a guerrilla attack. But unfortunately for the English, they could not defeat the Bharatiya Empire even when they had the advantage in numbers. Now that they did not even have that, they did not last for too long at all.
The only thing they did have was the advantage of geography, but sadly, on this occasion, the superiority in numbers, as well as the skill brought by the Bharatiya troops, who were trained explicitly to handle every type of guerrilla warfare situation, meant the advantage of the opponent was reduced to barely becoming a discomfort to the Bharatiya Empire.
The cleaning up of the remnants took only a day, and Puri Vadivelu, like his counterpart Pulikesh Roy, handed over the command of the military to Lieutenant General Akash Bogle.
Akash Bogle did not think of wasting time at all. In that respect, he was very similar to his counterpart, who had taken Lisbon, Sitapati Yadav. He directly mobilised the entire army and planned to set off to London, the heart and soul of the British Kingdom.
The journey was a long one since, even though the English could not build up their railway lines for logistics purposes within a year and a half, they were still able to complete them partially. Southampton, a city very close to Portsmouth, was directly connected to London, so the resistance they encountered to moving even a step forward was immense. The intelligence was a little lacking as the opponent hid it quite well, but apparently, there were already over 50 to 60 thousand troops waiting for them when they landed.
And more importantly, according to the new intelligence relayed by His Highness Agni, England had gone into full mobilisation mode, with King Stewart asking every able-bodied man in the kingdom to take up arms.
Akash was not scared of this situation. For one, actually succeeding in mobilising people at such a scale was next to impossible, and two, even if they were able to achieve it, the battle effectiveness would not be too high. Instead, it might cause a situation where internal disputes were magnified, and the kingdom disintegrated from within. But still, if given enough time, so many people could pose a significant risk to his troops.
So he decided he had to end the battle quickly, and the way he did that was by immediately stopping marching towards London, which was around 100 kilometres away, and he led a significant part of his force to Southampton and launched a decisive raid before the enemy could fully mobilise instead.
On that day, the British saw the horror of the tanks, moving artillery pieces, the spawn of destruction. The ground trembled beneath their advance, the deafening roar of engines and the thunder of tracks crushing everything in their path echoing across the battlefield. Smoke and dust filled the air as shells tore through defensive positions one after another. The concrete defences they had in Southampton, which once stood as symbols of strength and preparation, looked as flimsy as a paper wall in front of the relentless onslaught of over 100 tanks, crumbling within moments under the sheer force and precision of the assault.
With the destruction of the defences, taking over the city was not a difficult task. It ended in a day. Now, with the railway line in Southampton under the control of the Bharatiya Empire, Akash had gained the most valuable commodity that he was currently in shortage of, time.
Just because he had taken Southampton did not mean the rest of the journey would be peaceful, because he had just received another intelligence report stating that after the english figured out that the south side of the kingdom was lost, they pulled back all the forces on the south side and started to fortify the capital, London, along with gathering all the troops for a defensive battle.
Akash was once again put in a situation where he had to act quickly, or he would have to face at least a million combatants. Granted, more than 90% of them would not know how to fight, they would have no discipline, they would not have firearms, and probably even a cold weapon like a sword would be rare, but sometimes quantity does overwhelm quality. He did have superior weapon systems and a reaper of life like the Agni Ratha tank, but he did not know if he had more than three million bullets.
In order to avoid unforeseen changes and to minimise the risk as much as possible, he once again decided to take a gamble. Luckily, right as they attacked Southampton a few days ago, a locomotive had just arrived with artillery pieces and ammunition, so without hesitation, he loaded as many troops as possible onto the locomotive and set off straight to London.
There was a certain risk in this plan, because what if the British laid an ambush or what if the railway track was destroyed, but he still chose to take the risk. After all, the entire troop did not necessarily have to make it to London at the same time. It would be enough if a few thousand troops made it to London and kept the British busy, not letting them completely consolidate and integrate the troops before the entire army arrived.
As expected, the journey was arduous. There were indeed some places where the rails had been damaged, and entire sections had their rails removed, but thankfully, the locomotive contained an entire cart with spare rails, which came in handy, and without any surprise, several ambush attacks were launched and many Bharatiya troops died, but the larger number and dexterity of sharpshooters meant the troops on the train survived again and again.
The most dangerous time was when someone actually placed a mine right in the path of the train. If not for the light that the mine reflected with a metallic sheen under the sun, the locomotive would have been severely damaged, leaving the rest of the troops stranded and forcing them to advance the rest of the journey on their own.
If it were simply marching, the journey from Southampton to London was quite long; it was around 105 or 106 kilometres, but since the travel was through the locomotive without a stop, it was only about half a day’s trip.
Once the skyline of London, embraced by thick dark clouds, appeared, the Bharatiya troops who survived did not hesitate and readily took up various attack positions as they started shooting anyone and everyone they could see wearing a red military uniform.
As expected, the British were trying to turn London into an impenetrable bastion, even taking things so far as to completely block off the River Thames by stationing security at the shore at all times.
The Empire’s plan was a success. Bharatiya troops who arrived near London using the locomotive and started to disrupt the situation to a great degree, due to which the mobilisation could not be completed properly. The villagers who were coming from various territories turned their backs and ran away as soon as they witnessed the absolute slaughter that was going on right at the gates of London.
Honestly, the Bharatiya troops were put in a very dangerous situation. Thankfully, they only had to hold on for a day and a half. After that time ended, the rumbling of the tanks resounded at the southern outskirts of London near Kingston upon Thames.
Once the defence forces of London understood that the Bharatiya troops were at their doorstep, they took a completely different route from that of the Lisbon Defence Forces.
Instead of forming another temporary defence in the inner circle of the city, seemingly not confident in their half-baked defence line resisting the onslaught of the Bharatiya Army, they disintegrated the defence line under construction, voluntarily threw away their recognisable red military uniforms, and mingled amongst the civilians, using the terrain to their advantage and launching guerrilla attacks whenever possible.
Truth be told, Akash knew well that this was the most annoying situation he could deal with; it was simply a pain in the ass. But despite his complaints, he was left with no other choice but to take more aggressive measures.
He directly mobilised the army and had them bombard every palace and castle in London, along with the manors of the nobles. The only places that were left untouched were the churches, homes, and civilian establishments.
At every riot spot, he took strong-handed measures, directly using the incinerator squadron to burn anyone who stood up first to a crisp. When armed riots happened, he directly mobilised the tanks and blasted those who came forward into minced meat.
In such a way, the main roads as well as important streets had been brought under control. As for the nooks and alleys that had become the new battlefield between the Bharatiya Empire and the British, with the British troops running around like rats, Akash took several measures.
One measure was to take the assistance of the slaves and the lowest class of society, enticing them with promises of freedom and wealth, turning their desperation into a weapon against the very society that oppressed them. They were used as informants, guides, and sometimes even bait, exploiting their familiarity with the streets, hidden paths, and the daily movements within the city.
The other was to mobilise the intelligence networks of the empire, the Bharatiya External Pragya, to directly infiltrate the enemy, who was weak and recruiting men everywhere without checking their backgrounds as long as they could pick up a knife. Taking advantage of this negligence, agents blended in seamlessly, posing as fresh recruits and desperate civilians, slowly gaining access to inner circles, supply points, and temporary command posts, and leaking the coordinates and locations to the army with precision.
Akash was not impatient. He did not immediately take action after getting the location of the enemy. Instead, he came up with a plan. With the fall of the defence forces and the brutal and bloody suppression of rioters by the tanks, the communication networks had been severely broken down, and now that the guerrilla groups entrenched within the nooks and crannies of the city also consisted of people from External Pragya, he got the idea of having the Bharatiya External Pragya manipulate the enemy from within the inner circles, pushing them to join other enemy groups and re-establish an order once again, so that they could strike together at their common enemy, the Bharatiya Empire, in a more organised way. The aim was not to disrupt them immediately, but to let them gather, grow in confidence, and consolidate their scattered forces into larger, more visible clusters.
In such a way, when the time of the attack finally came, instead of the Bharatiya troops being caught off guard, the Bharatiya Empire cast a wide net and captured a huge majority of the rebels in a single coordinated sweep, dismantling multiple resistance groups at once.
After a month-long struggle, the jewel of Britain, London, had fallen.
