Nanyang Storm 1864

The U.S. military unit reacted quickly. The two lead troop transport ships docked at the wooden pier of the fishing village, and the large number of U.S. soldiers on board immediately filed out and crossed the gangway onto the pier.

The nine troop transport ships following closely behind all beached themselves in a T-shape, then threw their gangplanks into waist-deep water, preparing to organize the evacuation of American soldiers first.

The sooner we leave the troop transport ship, the sooner we'll be out of danger.

Unexpected
The bomber squadron of the Great Chu Empire arrived so quickly that after several fighter jets flew low over the fishing village, they fired signal flares, which landed in the direction of the village.

The buzzing sound of a formation of aircraft came from afar, and a large number of female bombers swooped down like vultures, quickly establishing a bombing route and arriving suddenly with a sharp whistling sound.

To the American soldiers, it sounded like the sneer of death.

Many American soldiers on the troop transport ships did not have time to get into the water from the gangplank. In the face of great panic, they jumped into the water from the sides of the ship to avoid the terrible bombing coming from the sky.

Bombs rained down, exploding in the water and on the ships. A series of huge cargo ships shattered their steel plates, sending limbs and debris flying into the air before scattering them back down.

Screams, the roar of machine guns, and the deafening explosions transformed the dock into a living hell in the blink of an eye, engulfing it in the torment of blood and fire...

This is the cruelty of war, devoid of any compassion.

The batch of bombers that arrived consisted of about 120 aircraft. The highly experienced bombers formed small squadrons of four, and they continuously dove down to drop bombs, strafed the enemy, and then pulled up.

After taking off into the sky, regroup and wait for the right moment to swoop down again, unleashing a frenzied barrage of attacks on all moving targets on the ground until they run out of ammunition.

Finally, they left the battlefield in order and flew back to the field airfield where they had come from.

Round after round of bombing and strafing turned this unnamed fishing village bay blood red. All 11 troop transport ships that were bombed were reduced to wreckage, and in the midst of the raging fire, they exploded and sank halfway to the shore of the lake.

This is because the ammunition carried by the US task force was detonated, and a large number of heavy weapons such as artillery and heavy machine guns could not be transported ashore in time and were all reduced to scrap metal in the bombing.

The American soldiers who managed to escape scattered in all directions, most of them fleeing into the forest not far from the fishing village. Their faces were filled with shock and anger at surviving a disaster, as well as an undisguised look of misery.

These troop transport ships are steam cargo ships of two to three thousand tons, suitable for navigating the shallow waterways of the Great Lakes region, with a draft of 4 to 5 meters, which is not considered too deep.

After directly navigating the shallows, even if American soldiers jumped into the river from either side of the ship, they only needed to swim a dozen meters to reach the shallows.

After taking stock of all the remaining officers and soldiers, U.S. Army Commander Major General Scott felt a deep sense of despair.

This group of U.S. military personnel numbered approximately 1.3, roughly equivalent to a thousand or so personnel per ship. However, there are only about seven or eight thousand of them in total, and many of them are carrying minor or serious injuries.

The recent aerial bombardment and strafing resulted in nearly 5,000 casualties, with over a thousand soldiers drowning in the icy lake alone. The losses were devastating.

All heavy firepower equipment was lost, and food supplies were also burned to ashes, leaving only the dry rations carried by the soldiers, which would not last more than a few days.

From afar
In this bay filled with blood and fire, a large number of American soldiers' corpses float on the cold water, densely packed and chilling, bobbing up and down in the blood-red lake.

The 11 destroyed troop transport ships were overturned and sprawled, with flames and thick black smoke rising into the sky from the intense fire. Violent explosions could be heard from time to time, blasting the hulls into pieces.

So cruel!

Fortunately, U.S. Army Commander Major General Scott evacuated the troops in time; otherwise, the entire army could have been wiped out.

This was the serious consequence of Green Bay falling into enemy hands. After capturing Green Bay, the Third Army of the Chu Kingdom's Royal Expeditionary Force immediately relocated its forward field airfield. This allowed bombers taking off from near Green Bay to patrol the entire northern lake area of ​​Michigan.

The 106th Infantry Division of the Chu State occupied Green Bay. Its total strength was between 1.85 and 2 men. It was equipped with a small number of armored trucks but no tanks.

According to reports from the retreating US forces
It seems that there were also some white militia units in the 106th Infantry Division of Chu. The two sides encountered each other in close combat and suffered varying degrees of damage.

The total strength of this U.S. task force was about 33,600. Of these, about 7,000 to 8,000 survived the bombing, and about 20 troop transport ships are still scattering across the lake, which still look like nearly 20,000 U.S. military personnel.

However, given the threat of Chu's bomber formations, it's hard to say how many will escape alive.

They agreed to meet at the fishing port after dark, but how many troop transport ships would arrive later was entirely unknown.

U.S. Army Major General Scott could only rally his spirits and order the two regiments, which were still in good order, to expand their perimeter and be ready for battle at any time.

The other American soldiers first built a campfire to dry their damp uniforms.

Despite the danger of another bomber strike, there was no time to worry about that now; they had to start a fire for warmth, otherwise many American soldiers would not be able to withstand it.

In the afternoon, with temperatures ranging from three to five degrees Celsius, many American soldiers, their uniforms soaked with sweat, were chilled by the cold wind, their faces turning pale, their limbs stiffening, and they could barely hold their rifles.

About thirty or forty minutes later, a second group of Chu bombers flew over the fishing village again. Compared to the first group, there were only about fifty or sixty bombers.

It is estimated that the other Chu bombers should be dispersed and organized into squadrons of 12 to search the vast surface of Lake Michigan for any remaining bombers to strike from the air.

When the Chu bomber group was spotted flying over again, the American soldiers quickly extinguished the campfire with snow to avoid revealing their position in the woods.

Although the measures were well implemented, there were bound to be some oversights.

The dozen or so plumes of smoke rising from the woods caught the attention of the Chu bomber squadron, which then circled down and dropped a barrage of bombs, creating a deafening inferno.

The fierce bombers roared back and forth, even lowering the fighter jets to the height of treetops, repeatedly strafing and bombing suspicious targets with heavy machine guns.

Some American soldiers couldn't resist and concentrated seven or eight heavy machine guns to strafe the air, shooting down one H-2 bomber and damaging two others.

This was like stirring up a hornet's nest.

The area surrounding that unit was heavily bombed. The rain of bombs turned the forest within a radius of two or three kilometers into a mess, and the bodies of American soldiers lay scattered in the mountains. The number of casualties was as high as three or four hundred.

This infuriated Major General Scott, the U.S. military commander, who cursed loudly but was powerless to do anything about it.

Although he repeatedly and strictly ordered that the target not be exposed, these Chu bombers were just too hateful.

Taking advantage of the fact that the US military did not have many heavy weapons, they recklessly lowered their altitude to just above the treetops and fired wildly at suspicious targets in the woods, causing considerable casualties.

How could an American cowboy stand this?

When you're caught up in the heat of the moment, you naturally don't care about anything else; you just want to shoot down a few fighter jets first.

Before evening
The Chu bomber group flew over the fishing village for the third time, but this time there were fewer bombers, only a mere twenty or so. Their mission was to conduct supplementary bombing raids and strike possible American targets; the other bombers obviously had more important tasks to complete.

Thinking of this, Major General Scott, the U.S. military commander, felt a chill in his heart and silently prayed for the troop transport ships on the lake.

There was nothing else he could do.

Before setting off

This U.S. Army task force heading north was given the important mission of retaking Green Bay and holding it firmly like a nail.

The rail line from Milwaukee to Minneapolis has now been destroyed and will take at least two to three months to repair. This prevents the main U.S. forces stationed in Milwaukee from moving north to provide support and retake this key northern location.

The disastrous defeat at the Battle of Minneapolis made the U.S. military headquarters in Chicago even more aware of the cunning of the East, and their vigilance deepened.

The Chu army completely bypassed the heavily fortified frontal defenses and captured Minneapolis through a flanking maneuver, encircling up to 15 American troops, cutting off their logistics, and forcing them to surrender.

This devastating defeat was a profound blow to the top command of the U.S. military, and remains a vivid memory to this day.

However, there were few available options, and strategically they were constantly being led by the nose by the Chu expeditionary force.

Because the Battle of Chicago covered a vast area, stretching over 1460 kilometers from south to north and 800-900 kilometers from east to west, the entire theater of operations spanned over 1.2 million square kilometers.

What is this concept?
This is 2.4 times the total area of ​​France and more than six times the size of the Western Front in Europe.

With such a vast area, and in this chilly spring season, the ground was frozen solid, making it virtually impossible to carry out large-scale trenching operations.

The sheer scale of the project wasn't just a couple hundred kilometers, but thousands of kilometers long. Even if it were excavated, there wouldn't be enough troops to fill the trenches.

The U.S. military claimed to have more than 4.5 million troops. This was the total number of U.S. troops recruited after six wars of total mobilization, based on the loss of more than 2.6 million troops. Sixty percent of them were deployed to the Chicago front.

If a large number of troops are withdrawn, what will happen to the densely populated and economically prosperous coastal cities of eastern North America?

The United States is now facing a shortage of military manpower. After repeated defeats in war, the Republic of Texas and the Republic of Louisiana have gained independence, resulting in the separation of 4.3 to 4.4 million people.

Adding the nine western states with a population of 4.3 to 4.4 million, and the seven central states centered around Colorado with a population of over 1.6 million, the total number exceeds 10 million.

Subtracting the approximately 2.6 million North American young adults who were killed or wounded in the war, the current total population of the United States has fallen below the trillion mark, to around 87 million.

The current U.S. military has more than 450 million personnel, meaning it has already emptied its coffers.

In the current severe situation

The United States must guard against the possibility of a surprise attack by the State of Chu, which could land in coastal cities or the south of North America.

After annihilating the main force of the US Navy, the Royal Navy Expeditionary Fleet of the Great Chu Empire gained control of the North American side of the Atlantic Ocean, enabling it to cover the landing of army troops in any city on the east coast of North America.

This is like a sharp blade pressed against your back; the United States doesn't know where the next blow will strike.

The only option is to deploy heavy troops along the thousands of miles of coastline and passively respond; there is no other good way.

Major General Scott was a veteran officer who had served in World War I. He was born on a white family farm in North Carolina. His grandfather's generation immigrated from France to the American South and died in the Civil War.

Major General Scott had his own unique perspective on the current war situation, believing that the United States had no chance of winning.

The unique monarchical authoritarian state system of the Chu Kingdom, much like the German Junker aristocracy who were passionate about war for generations, was well-organized and highly trained, making the entire country seem like a massive war machine.

The German Empire under Wilhelm II was also an authoritarian monarchy with a terrifying military mobilization capacity; it could be described as a killing machine.

The entire Great Chu Empire possessed a well-developed military reserve system, strategic storage system, military academy education and research system, as well as a joint weapons industry, heavy industry, and financial industry guided by national capital, forming one of the massive organs that constituted the war behemoth.

In contrast, free-market capitalist systems like those in the United States and the United Kingdom, while capable of stimulating full competition in society, are far inferior in the military field.

Without real demand, no one in the United States is researching new variants of fighter jets and bombers, nor is anyone researching large weapons systems such as tanks, armored vehicles, submarines, and new aircraft carriers, resulting in serious shortcomings in many important areas.

By the time war breaks out and people try to prepare at the last minute, it's too late.

U.S. troops on the front lines are paying a heavy price for the shortcomings of the government system, and the disadvantages in the air and ground battlefields can only be compensated for by the lives of a massive number of officers and soldiers.

The most tragic thing is
Many insightful Americans can see this, such as the top leaders of the Democratic Party, yet no one can change it.

This is because it is a system of checks and balances established by the founding fathers of the United States. Its core purpose is to eliminate the possibility of the emergence of military and authoritarian governments through checks and balances, thus fully embodying the founding ideals of democracy, freedom, and justice.

In such a social environment, it is impossible for a powerful military state to emerge.

As a participant in World War I, Major General Scott was acutely aware of the disregard shown by military powers such as Britain and France towards the American army, treating American soldiers merely as cannon fodder.

When a fully-fledged American division arrived on the Western Front, it would quickly be broken down into battalions or even companies and then thrown into the trench lines, where it would be silently and insignificantly consumed.

This is due to both the weakness of the US military and the underestimation of its capabilities by countries such as Britain and France.

This was clearly demonstrated at the subsequent Paris Peace Conference, where the US president encountered setbacks at every turn, and there's no need to go into the details of these infuriating incidents.

Taking all factors into account
The State of Chu was like a seasoned warrior from the East, wielding sharp swords and clad in sturdy armor and shields.

The United States, on the other hand, is like a sleepy North American cowboy who has just gotten up, with at most a pitchfork in his hand; the difference in strength between the two sides is obvious.

The chances of the United States ultimately winning this war are extremely slim; unless a miracle occurs, it will most likely end in defeat.

There was something else that was causing Major General Scott great inner turmoil.

If North Carolina were to secede along with the other Southern states, would one choose to leave the Union Army and join the newly independent nation, or continue serving in the military?

Many American soldiers have already provided the answer: American officers from Texas and Louisiana have answered the call of their homeland, leaving the U.S. military to join the army of the new independent republic.

this means
These officers would henceforth stand on the opposing side of the US military, facing both victory and defeat, life and death on the battlefield—a truly tragic situation. (End of Chapter)