1novels #384 - Surrender and lose half (two-in-one update)
#384 - Surrender and lose half (two-in-one update)
The defense line of the Rogue Eagle Allied Forces, under the relentless, storm-like attack of the Volunteer Army, instantly became precarious, as if it would collapse and disintegrate at any moment. As the brigade commander's order for a general offensive resounded through the sky, the two iron-blooded torrents of the 40th and 42nd Armies, like fierce tigers descending the mountain, pounced towards the enemy along the path of death carved out by the 16th Army with blood. They merged with the steel torrent of the 63rd Army, forming an invincible force of destruction, vowing to completely crush the first line of defense of the Rogue Eagle Allied Forces.
On this battlefield filled with smoke, artillery fire filled the sky, deafening the ears. The Volunteer Army's artillery fire poured down like a violent storm, blasting the enemy's positions to pieces. The armored units charged forward with the force of thunder, crushing all enemies blocking their path into powder. The infantry of the Rogue Eagle Allied Forces, under such a fierce offensive, could only resist in despair, but their defense lines were like paper, being torn apart and destroyed one after another.
On the battlefield, the sounds of shouting, killing, explosions, and gunfire intertwined, forming a thrilling symphony. On this land baptized by war, every inch was filled with bloodshed and slaughter. The Volunteer Army soldiers, with their fearless courage and firm belief, launched a final charge against the enemy, constantly planting the flag of victory on the enemy's positions!
At the negotiating table.
The Rogue Eagle representative slammed the table excitedly and roared, "No, what you are doing is unethical, and completely disregards the ceasefire agreement signed by both sides! I want to accuse you! I'm going to the United Nations to accuse you of this kind of—"
Looking at the Volunteer Army representative with a faint smile on his face, the Rogue Eagle representative suddenly stopped.
Because he felt like a clown, and the other side was just watching a show.
"Mr. Fleming, if we haven't reached a real ceasefire agreement today, then by tonight, I'm afraid the second line of defense will be gone," the Volunteer Army representative said leisurely. "If we still can't reach an agreement tomorrow, I'm afraid your third line of defense will be gone too."
"So, Mr. Fleming, instead of raging ineffectually, why don't we sit down and talk seriously? There's a saying in my hometown, 'Half your losses are saved by surrendering.' Now, if we discard those unrealistic ideas, we believe we can reach an agreement under fair and just conditions."
After listening to the translation, Mr. Fleming, the representative of the Rogue Eagle side, glanced around, then turned to whisper to his colleagues. Although he didn't quite understand the Volunteer Army representative's saying about 'half your losses are saved by surrendering,' it seemed right according to the literal meaning.
"Mr. Deng, we can talk seriously," Mr. Fleming turned his head and said seriously to the Volunteer Army representative. "However, we hope that both sides will cease fire immediately, and we will negotiate in the current state of control of each other's controlled areas."
"No, no, no, Mr. Fleming, I think you misunderstood what I meant. The only decent way out for the Allied forces surrounded by us now is to surrender. Only then can we guarantee their safety, and at the same time accept such a real ceasefire!" The Volunteer Army representative shook his head. He joked, "The meat is already in our bowl, and you want to run away? Do we look like people who are so easily fooled?"
"We will not accept any ceasefire plan other than this, and we will not stop our military operations if the negotiations do not yield results."
"Countless of my comrades have already fallen forever on this land because of this war that shouldn't have happened. Now their comrades have a reason to wipe out those responsible for launching this war. We will not, and have no reason to, fail the victory that countless martyrs have fought for."
The Volunteer Army representative fearlessly expressed his emotions.
Now, the pressure was not on his side, so he could sit here with ease and chat nonsense with the Rogue Eagle's negotiating representatives.
However, for Alexander, the Rogue Eagle's negotiating representative, the enormous pressure was entirely on the Rogue Eagle's shoulders. Every second of hesitation could mean the casualties of dozens, or even hundreds, of soldiers for the Rogue Eagle!
After their retreat was cut off and they were surrounded, the Volunteer Army had cut off the Rogue Eagle's logistics supply. Now, the remaining three lines of defense of the Rogue Eagle Allied Forces would become more and more difficult and bloody as the battle progressed!
When the ammunition was exhausted, if they did not surrender, they would have to go out of the tunnels and engage in close combat. Unfortunately, the Volunteer Army would never give them such a chance. The Volunteer Army, which had secured its logistics supply, now had plenty of ammunition for every battle, with plenty of surplus for each campaign!
They were fighting a rich man's war that the brigade commander could not have imagined before!
There was no such predicament as in another historical time and space, where logistics support was extremely difficult, and even the soldiers' winter clothing was not guaranteed.
Fleming was very helpless. The situation on the battlefield was completely unfavorable to them, so he had to turn around and have tense consultations with his partners again.
Obviously, this was a difficult decision. If he agreed to it, he would face tremendous pressure when he returned.
However, at the negotiating table, there was also an intelligence officer maintaining a hotline with the General Headquarters, constantly reporting the received battlefield information.
For the current communications, even if the positions were cut off into separate pieces, the Rogue Eagle Allied Forces could still maintain close communication links from the battalion and company level to the headquarters, so the headquarters was fully aware of everything that was happening on the front line.
General Clark, the commander-in-chief of the Rogue Eagle Allied Forces, was almost collapsing.
He had never imagined that his troops would lose so miserably.
The huge forward defensive positions had no power to fight back at all, and were directly rubbed on the ground!
The armored units that had been hoped for were also directly crushed by a very strange armored unit of the Volunteer Army!
Although they did not have many armored vehicles, their strength was as overwhelmingly advantageous as the J-5A in the air.
It was because of the awe of the J-5A that the Allied Forces Headquarters had not sent air force support to this battle, because everyone knew that even the most elite jet fighters would be difficult to match.
It was purely a stupid act of giving away heads.
Now, even the ground armored forces were being beaten!
This information was passed to the negotiating table almost without reservation.
So Fleming knew very well how fast the Rogue Eagle youths were disappearing on the front line for every minute he delayed here!
"Okay, Mr. Deng, we choose to surrender and lose half," after a fierce internal measure, Mr. Fleming finally gritted his teeth and accepted the latest ceasefire conditions.
With this sentence of his, at least nearly 100,000 Allied officers and soldiers would become prisoners of war, and countless weapons and ammunition would be lost. These things would become the spoils of the opponent and strengthen their power.
However, compared to becoming more than 100,000 corpses sent back home, this was already a blessing in disguise.
The movement at the negotiating table was quickly fed back to the front line.
So as soon as the negotiation result came out, the Volunteer Army temporarily stopped the attack, waiting for the next action of the Allied Forces, but heavy weapons such as tanks and artillery did not mean to be withdrawn at all.
This time, the knife was directly on the head of the Rogue Eagle Allied Forces, and they naturally did not dare to engage in any conspiracy, and honestly ordered the surrounded Rogue Eagle Allied Forces to surrender.
Making the Fifth Campaign a perfect curtain call.
This made Li Yunlong feel a little regretful.
He had just fought a battle that was a bit tough, and the several combined brigades under his command had stumbled and stumbled and managed to integrate their combat effectiveness on the battlefield.
Although the tank units were battered and bruised, with the continuous upgrades to their damaged composite armor, they were still ready for a fight!
The special operations brigade also tested its skills this time, seizing a bridge on the southern front using its airborne advantage. It was considered a practical training exercise for the airborne tricycle special operations battalion, but many subjects were not even started before the Rogue Eagle conceded and surrendered.
This made Li Yunlong very unhappy.
Currently, his combined arms brigade had only completed the 'frontal assault' subject in training. Advanced tactics such as long-distance raids and large-scale penetrations had not been used.
Many tactics from the booklets were still just theoretical, which left Li Yunlong feeling unsatisfied.
The real peace talks, however, were conducted secretly outside the peninsula.
First, there were point-to-point secret contacts and negotiations between Dongda and the Rogue Eagle.
That was a comprehensive and difficult bargaining process that could not be resolved in just a few words.
Regarding the outcome of this war, the pragmatists, represented by Ren Zhong, had few demands but formed the bottom line of the negotiations: such as mutual opening of foreign trade, mutual protection of intellectual property rights, and mutual recognition of legal provisions for patents and patent transfers.
Although many people now cannot understand what these have to do with the future, as the person behind the scenes of technology, no one dares to ignore this person's opinion.
Therefore, these conditions were important conditions that could not be conceded.
However, for the Rogue Eagle, these were not big problems.
After evaluating these clauses, they confirmed that there were no traps behind them and basically had no major objections.
However, in order to protect the interests of their farmers, they proposed a clause on agricultural product exports, requiring a minimum of no less than 10 million tons and a maximum of no more than 30 million tons of wheat trade.
Some people above strongly opposed this clause, believing that it would have a huge impact on the country's nascent agriculture. The Rogue Eagle's farmers, due to their higher level of mechanization and technology in farming, had significantly lower wheat costs than our current agricultural product prices under the small-scale farming economy.
If it were opened up, it would indeed have a relatively large impact on domestic agricultural production. Tens of millions of tons of wheat could affect the livelihoods of tens of millions of farmers.
However, after seeing this clause, Ren Zhong said that he fully accepted the requirements of this clause and could use large-scale exports of clothing products to earn the foreign exchange to purchase wheat.
Although he didn't know if he would encounter such extreme weather again in this space-time, Ren Zhong would rather make more preparations and keep enough reserve grain to cope with possible agricultural production difficulties.
Although the current agricultural infrastructure conditions are much stronger than in that historical space-time, with the construction of reservoirs and canals several times greater than in the original space-time, especially in the northern regions where liberation came earlier, the water conservancy facilities are more complete.
However, in the face of extreme weather, much cannot be salvaged by human power. Moreover, the production of hybrid rice, hybrid corn, and hybrid wheat has only taken a big step forward and has not yet completely developed high-yield varieties with yields of 700 to 800 kilograms per mu, solving the country's own food problem once and for all.
Under the stable life after the war, the population has rebounded significantly, and the supply of food is still very sensitive. Although we can barely achieve self-sufficiency, this output is still too low, and the stock of grain is insufficient. The current national production has just exceeded 130 million tons, even though it is nearly 20% higher than in the original space-time, it is still a little too little for the current population of 670 million.
The per capita amount is less than 400 jin, which is not safe enough for most people who are still big eaters at this stage, with just over a jin a day, let alone using grain to raise more livestock such as pigs, cattle, and sheep to improve people's living standards.
If there could be an additional 20 million tons or even 30 million tons each year, then the room for maneuver would be much greater. This grain could be kept as reserve grain. If 50 to 60 million tons of grain were reserved, then even in the event of a major disaster year, it could be overcome calmly, and there would be no need to worry about everyone going hungry.
For Ren Zhong, who has studied history, this is of course a major event, but most people may not have thought that the disasters and difficulties that may be faced next will exceed everyone's imagination.
Most of them, from the perspective of local production, see the harm of opening up agriculture, but do not see the benefits of disaster prevention.
The current price of wheat from the Rogue Eagle is about $1 per bushel (1 bushel equals 27.216 kilograms), which is about the same as buying a 46-jin bag of imported flour for two oceans domestically. It's not too expensive, but it's not cheap either.
If it is imported in large quantities, it may be possible to lower the price and negotiate the import price to just over $30 per ton, then 10 million tons of wheat would be more than $300 million. According to the current foreign exchange surplus, this burden is not too great.
Penicillin has earned Ren Zhong a lot of dollars before. Due to the limited things being imported, Ren Zhong wanted to buy, but the Rogue Eagle and others were unwilling to buy. That is, the purchase of two destroyers and a large number of transport aircraft cost a lot of money. In other aspects, there is really nothing to spend a lot of money on.
Ren Zhong calculated and found that this deal was not a loss.
The shelf life of wheat is also good. Under normal temperature, wheat can generally be stored for 3 to 5 years, and if stored under low temperature (15°C) conditions, its shelf life can be extended to 5 to 8 years. These shelf lives are based on the situation that the edible quality of wheat does not change significantly.
In this way, following a 3-year cycle to replace the old with the new, ensuring a wheat inventory of 50 million tons at a cost of $1.5 billion is not expensive at all for the supply security of the entire domestic grain.
Due to the pragmatic requirements put forward by the Volunteer Army, without excessive demands, the Rogue Eagle side quickly reached a consensus, greatly promoting the progress of the negotiations. The negotiations, which originally required a protracted period, were not so tortuous this time. After all, the Volunteer Army had more than 100,000 prisoners in its hands, which was enough to nip any adventurous ideas of the Rogue Eagle allied forces in the bud.
(End of chapter)