In just one night, Astrakhan's outer defense line was broken by the enemy, which exceeded everyone's expectations.

Fortunately, the situation is not as bad as it does.

In order to break through this defense line, Xilu Group also paid an extremely heavy price.

After dawn, the Air Force dispatched reconnaissance planes to conduct a full-range reconnaissance on the eastern bank of the Volga River.

The Western Land Group not only mobilized three armored brigades, but also dispatched one military artillery brigade, one rocket artillery battalion and at least three battalion-level low-altitude assault troops.

The total number of troops participating in the war exceeded 18,000, and countless types of main combat weapons were used.

Among them, there were more than 500 main battle tanks.

Just near the main position at the eastern end of the defense line, there are nearly 100 T-series main battle tanks, and near the main position at the western end, there are more wreckage of tanks and tanks.

The three armored brigades invested by the Western Land Group have basically lost their combat capabilities.

So far, just on the offensive route from Volgograd to Astrakhan, the Western Land Group lost almost 1,000 main battle tanks.

The key is here.

In this direction, the Western Land Group has only three division-level armored troops. Even if other troops are included, the main battle tanks that can be used are only between 1,500 and 1,800. The key is that hundreds of tanks have been lost in the previous battles.

In other words, the Western Land Group lost about two-thirds of its main battle tanks in this direction.

This means that the ground troops of the Western Land Group have basically lost their assault capabilities. Even if they can still launch an attack, they are still at the end of their strength.

Now, there are only two options in front of Xilu Group.

First, attack Astrakhan without being fully prepared, and fight to the death with the defenders of the Oriental Group that will never surrender in this city that has become a fortress.

Perhaps being able to defeat Astrakhan may also encounter strategic failure here.

The second is to temporarily stop the offense and wait until the reserve team follows up before attacking Astrakhan.

Obviously, commanders with a little bit of brain will choose the latter.

But the question is, when will the reserve team keep up?

Although the Western Mainland Army has made breakthroughs in all directions, the losses have been considerable and the reserve team has been used in advance.

For example, in the Novorossiysk side, the reserve team has replaced the main force.

If there is only one direction, there is nothing to worry about.

There are hierarchical differences in reserves. In the early stage of the offensive, the one who follows the assault troops is actually a battle-level reserve team, that is, a group-level reserve team. The main task is to provide support to the main force in battle-level battles to ensure the achievement of the battle goals.

Going up, there is also a strategic reserve team.

In the Xiluosha Army, the Strategic Reserve is the 9th Army.

The army was deployed in the west of Volgograd, with a 60% entrant rate during peacetime, and was able to complete mobilization within 72 hours and reach full entrant status.

The key is that the army has a complete set of main combat equipment and can go to the battlefield after completing the mobilization.

Before the outbreak of the war, the group army had completed mobilization, with a total force of 150,000, and its main force was 1 armored division and 3 mechanic divisions.

Here, the three mechanic divisions are light armored units.

In fact, this is also a characteristic of the reserve team. It has strong strategic mobility and can appear in key locations at critical moments.

But the problem is that there is only one army.

In the combat plan of the Xiluosha Army, the number one task undertaken by the 9th Army was to assist the 1st Army in front to attack Astrakhan, or to continue to assault eastward before the 1st Army took Astrakhan after the 1st Army captured Astrakhan.

When there is a problem in all directions, relying on only one army will definitely be a drop in the bucket.

Besides, the 9th Army itself is not strong.

Among the five main armies in Xiluosha, the strongest one is definitely the 1st Army. Not only does the total force of the entire unit reach an astonishing 350,000, but the in-commission rate during peacetime is as high as 95%. It can be put into battle almost at any time, and there is no problem of spending time mobilization.

The other three main armies have a total force of between 250,000 and 300,000, and the intra-commissioning rate is no less than 90%.

It can be seen that the 9th Army is the weakest.

Now, it is obviously difficult to rely on the 9th Army to plug all the loopholes.

What's even more terrible is that in the first phase of the strategic offensive, the number one mission of the Xiluosha Army was not to take down Astrakhan in the north of the Kuohai Sea, but to march into Novorossiysk, seize this port located in the northeast of the Meso Sea, and cut off the sea route between the Liangxia Empire and Dongluosha.

The ultimate goal is to sweep away the shackles and bridges, attack and occupy the Baku oil fields.

In order to achieve its goal, the Western Land Group not only invested two main armies, namely the 3rd and 7th armies, but also invested nearly half of the supplies. Even the 9th Army sent a mechanic division to guard the logistics supply line.

In addition, the offensive operation on the side of the Shackle Land Bridge occupied too much transportation power.

The result was that when the operation to enter Astrakhan was in trouble, the Western Land Group did not have enough capacity to send the reserve team.

Of course, there are not enough reserves available.

If you want to say it, it is the Imperial Air Force's credit.

In the previous few days, the Imperial Air Force's tactical aviation forces mainly blocked bombing.

Although he suffered extremely heavy losses, hundreds of multi-purpose fighter jets were shot down, and a large warning command aircraft that was launched forward was lost due to sneak attacks. Nearly 1,000 pilots were killed and missing, but the results were also outstanding. About two-thirds of the locomotives within a range of 1,500 kilometers were destroyed, and countless train cars were destroyed. Moreover, by bombing bridges and tunnels, the railway transportation volume from the Xiluosha hinterland to the front line was directly reduced by 60%, and it was difficult to recover within a period of time.

Relying on road transportation is just better than nothing.

Although armored troops mainly rely on highways to advance, in large-scale wars, they mainly rely on railways, with highways as auxiliary properties.

This is also the basic situation on the mainland battlefield.

On both sides of the Volga River, transportation is based on railways as the axis, connected to highways by stations along the way, and then connected to various places through highways.

Whether it is the offensive side or the defensive side, they are highly dependent on railways.

The reason is also very simple. In the hinterland of mainland China, where sea transportation and inland shipping are unreliable, only railways can undertake massive transportation tasks.

Of course, there is also the issue of military strength.

In the current situation, Xiluosha can send up at most two divisions of the 9th Army, which will take at least 3 days, and it is not possible to guarantee that these two divisions can obtain sufficient supplies. Based on the performance of the previous few days, such as the combat loss rate, the two divisions will definitely be useless.

To maintain the offensive momentum, we must rely on other countries of the Western Continental Group, especially the Triman Empire.

According to the information obtained by the Military Intelligence Bureau, members of the Western Land Group such as the Taoman Empire made a commitment to Xiluosha and promised to send ground troops to participate in the war after the war began.

The key is how many troops to send to the war.

According to a more reliable statement, the Tyman Empire would invest at least one army of troops, while the other major member states, namely the Kingdom of Raleigh, Rock, Sban and Bran, would not invest less than one division, and many second-rate allies would also invest more troops above the brigade level.

If we count this way, the allies provide about 2 troops.

In fact, most of these troops were occupied by Xiluosha, and only the troops of the Rock Kingdom and the Kingdom of Bran were not deployed in Xiluosha.

The two armies are not small, not to mention that they are all elite troops deployed on the front line for a long time.

But the problem is that the combat troops of these allies are actually strategic reserves and will not participate in the first round of assault missions in the plan.

The reason is that the allies' army needs more time to complete the pre-war mobilization.

Even the Tsuman garrison, which has high daily combat readiness, will take a week to complete the mobilization work, and then it will take a few more days to go to the front line.

For this reason, the time when the Allies of the Western Mainland Group participated in the war was actually half a month after the war began.

To be honest, the Xiluosha Army also made combat preparations according to this standard, that is, the first round of assault time is 15 days, and the minimum target captures Astrakhan.

Only after taking the city can you stop and wait for the arrival of reinforcements from your allies.

The problem now is that the Xiluosha army will not be able to capture Astrakhan within 15 days in any case, and it will be impossible for the combat mission to be completed as planned.

Wait until the reinforcements of allies arrive before launching an attack?

Obviously, this is very unrealistic.

There is only one key point. Oriental Group will never sit still and wait for death. In addition to using this time to strengthen defense deployment, it may also launch a counterattack.

If the Oriental Group launches a smooth counterattack, the consequences will be unimaginable.

At that time, even if we withstand the counterattack of the Oriental Group, we can only give up the offensive action and turn it into strategic defense in advance.

Unfortunately, this is also the result that the Xiluosha authorities are most reluctant to accept.

Perhaps, the Tauman Empire wanted to use this war to eliminate internal conflicts among the Western Mainland Group and consolidate its own position, thereby maintaining its hegemony.

However, what the Xiluosha authorities want to obtain must be to re-enable unification.

Not only did they want to conquer Astrakhan, they also wanted to occupy the entire Dongluosha.

If you turn to defense in advance, then Xiluosha will get nothing.

Between continuing the attack and stopping moving forward, the Xiluosha authorities must choose the former, even though they know that they will lose the opportunity to achieve greater victory.

Combined with the battlefield information obtained by the Air Force, it is not difficult to judge that the enemy will stay for at most one day, and may launch a new attack in half a day.

However, the number of troops invested will not be too much.

The Oriental Group was unable to invest enough troops to withstand the enemy's attack.

That's right, on the morning of the 13th, after returning to Atlau, Lian Mingyang received a message from Zheng Zhishuang that they had half a day to adjust their status.

Don’t think about the lost armed helicopter for the time being.

Not to mention "Zhi-10A", there is not even "Zhi-7W". It will be as early as the end of the month before you can get a supplementary armed helicopter.

However, there are enough transport helicopters and lack of pilots.
To be continued...