Chapter 123: Annihilation Of The Tripartite Coalition Forces
Three days after Lelouch captured Lviv, May 23, 1915.
Berlin, Potsdam Palace.
Chief of Staff General Falkenhayn’s hands were trembling as he held a front-line battle report and hurriedly went to pay respects to the Emperor.
“Your Majesty! Great victory on the Galicia and Hungary fronts! One of our regiments smoothly air-dropped behind enemy lines, assaulted Lviv, rescued 80,000 friendly forces, and destroyed the Southwestern Front’s main logistics base. Marshal Leopold has led the 10th Army Group, advancing rapidly in three days, capturing Rzeszów and Przemysl Fortress, pushing forward over a hundred kilometers, all the way connecting to Lviv.
Now, all of Galicia has been restored. Except for Brusilov breaking out with five divisions of enemies, all other units of the Southwestern Front have been annihilated or encircled by our army in the Carpathian Mountains and the Hungarian Basin to the south!
The enemies in the encirclement include the entire 3rd Army Group, the entire 11th Army Group, and several divisions of the 8th Army Group under the Southwestern Front. Plus Serbian Army and Romanian Army.
Duke Rupprecht, stationed in Budapest, has already led our 6th Army Group into counterattack, beginning to envelop and encircle the Serbian Army and Romanian Army south of Budapest. And with the Austrian 3rd and 5th Army Groups continuing to maintain the encirclement of Southwestern Front Commander Yudovich.
In this battle, the Southwestern Front committed a total of 49 divisions and 710,000 men, the Serbian Army committed 24 divisions and 330,000 men, the Romanian Army committed 8 divisions and 110,000 men, totaling 81 divisions and 1.15 million men from the three-nation allied forces.
Except for the five divisions of about 60,000 who have already escaped, out of the remaining 1.09 million, at least 200,000 to 300,000 have already been lost to casualties. And about 800,000 are either pinned down by our army or already encircled by our army!”
“Hiss… You mean, this one battle might really… annihilate a million enemies?!”
Emperor Wilhelm couldn’t help but feel his adrenaline surging wildly, dopamine secreting frantically, his face visibly turning red.
Theoretical maximum possible enemy annihilation: 1.09 million!
Premise is truly finishing off the dumplings completely, not letting a single one escape back.
In human history, has there ever been such a brilliant great victory? Annihilating a million enemies!
Emperor Wilhelm suddenly stood up, pacing quickly back and forth in the hall. When he rose, he even banged the side of his thigh near the knee on the desk due to excessive force, but he felt no pain at all.
“Truly heaven blesses the Empire! The key to everything was indeed swiftly capturing Przemysl Fortress and Lviv on the Northern Front! I have decided: if the campaign ends smoothly without letting the remnants break out, I will award Marshal Leopold the Grand Iron Cross Medal!”
When Falkenhayn heard this reward, he couldn’t help but feel intensely envious.
Grand Iron Cross Medal!
This has only been awarded 14 times in a hundred years since its establishment, all given to generals or marshals who made great merits.
When the Grand Iron Cross Medal was first established a hundred years ago, only four marshals like Blücher who made great contributions in the war against Napoleon, plus one foreign marshal Bernadotte, totaling five people received it. （Bernadotte was originally a marshal under Napoleon. Napoleon made him King of Sweden, then he turned around and fought Napoleon with the anti-French alliance, earning the Grand Iron Cross.）
Later, after 60 years, during the Franco-Prussian War, Chief of Staff Moltke the Elder and nine others also received the Grand Iron Cross Medal.
Since the start of this World War, the Empire has not yet awarded the Grand Iron Cross Medal. If awarded this time, it would be the first of this war and the 15th in a hundred years.
Falkenhayn felt somewhat unwilling inside: I am the Chief of Staff! I also have merit in planning the victory on the southern wing of the Eastern Front… Unfortunately, the performance on other fronts is poor, so I as Chief of Staff probably won’t get the Grand Iron Cross.
Afterward, the Emperor asked about the main contributors to the air-drop on Lviv and the previous Gorlice breakthrough, especially the front-line combat generals.
Falkenhayn reported some more names, sneakily including his own recommendations: Colonel Fedor von Bock who first led several assault battalions to break through the enemy defense line at Gorlice, and Colonel Lelouch von Hunter, the direct commander of the Lviv air-drop.
And a bunch of others, like the commanders of the units that sealed off Dukla Pass.
The Emperor verbally commended them all one by one; specifics would have to wait until the campaign ended.
However, upon hearing that the merit earner for the Lviv air-drop was only 25 years old （lied about age upward）, and moreover a foreign commoner, he slightly quelled the idea of directly promoting him.
“Too young, but the merit is indeed significant. Let the Baria Royal Family reward him first. For someone with low nobility title, having too high a military rank at a young age is hard to convince the crowd. But he can be given a more important position.”
The Emperor finally commented thus.
Falkenhayn secretly noted it down, so when chatting with the Baria Faction marshals later, he could hint at it.
Germania’s current system is ultimately somewhat more rigid and inflexible than countries like Frankish. There are young generals, but they are all noble-born with noble bloodlines. If a prince becomes a general at around 20, people would still be convinced. But a commoner becoming a general at 25 is a bit too heaven-defying; the Empire’s history has no precedent.
Since that’s the case, the Emperor hopes the Baria Faction first builds up merits through ennoblement.
At the end of Falkenhayn’s report, the Emperor noticed a name: Major Peter Strauser.
The reason this person was placed at the end of the report was, of course, because his military rank was low; all those listed before him outranked him.
But precisely because even a major was specially pulled out for reporting, it piqued the Emperor’s curiosity. Emperor Wilhelm couldn’t help but follow up:
“What specific feats does this Major Peter Strauser have?”
Falkenhayn: “Major Peter Strauser is the commander of a bomber airship formation. During the Lviv air-drop campaign, the ground assault troops lacked heavy firepower and called for air support to bomb the Lviv train station ammunition depot.
To avoid cloud cover and precisely bomb, Major Strauser lowered altitude below the clouds, was damaged by collision with a Lusha combat reconnaissance aircraft. At the last moment, Major Strauser led his unit to maneuver the airship into the Lviv train station ammunition depot, killing enemies within one kilometer nearby, and shattering the enemy’s plot to destroy all supplies before retreating. This helped the ground friendly forces breach Lviv city.”
Emperor Wilhelm then felt a slight reverence: “So he died for the country, indeed heroic. Posthumously award him the third class, treat his family with major general bereavement benefits. The officers and soldiers who died with him should also all be given three-level promotions in bereavement benefits for their families.”
Directly promoting three levels is impossible for living people. But for the dead, posthumous awards are just honor and money, no real power, so it’s reasonable.
Falkenhayn immediately said he would handle it, and to properly publicize more heroic deeds to boost morale.
……
Some rejoice, some worry.
While Emperor Wilhelm was immensely excited at Potsdam Palace, on the Hungary battlefield, the Lusha Army and Serbo-Romanian allied forces were facing a hellish endgame.
On the northern side of the Hungarian theater, Southwestern Front Commander General Yudovich had been leading his over 300,000 troops these past few days, charging mercilessly at the Austrian 3rd and 5th Army Group defense lines, regardless of cost or casualties.
But the Austrian Army, once despised by him, was now full of vigor, relying on layered trench defense lines and heavy cannons reinforced by Germanics, holding firm.
Yudovich couldn’t advance even 1 kilometer without paying the price of tens of thousands.
By the 23rd, the Lusha Army’s average shells per cannon remaining was less than 5.
By the 26th, all shells were completely exhausted. There were still some bullets, so Yudovich could only have the last 200,000-plus Lusha troops charge directly at the defense line without artillery cover.
Hundreds and thousands of heavy machine guns controlled the battlefield, sweeping waves of Lusha soldiers to the ground. Later, the German machine gun units reinforcing the Austrians had to ask the Austrians to clear the enemy corpse piles on the front lines during combat lulls to avoid blocking the machine gun positions’ fields of fire.
（Note: Similar situations actually occurred on Earth’s 1915 Polish battlefield, where Marshal Hindenburg’s troops had to clear enemy corpse piles during combat lulls because the bodies piled up blocking heavy machine gun fields of fire.
Historically, in the 1915 Polish Great Retreat, the Russian Army was also annihilated 1.5 million. But the Eastern Front is not emphasized in history and rarely mentioned, with influence far less than Verdun. In terms of total WWI casualties, Lusha far exceeded the sum of Britannia and France.）
Ultimately, the Lusha Army fought until May 31, when mutiny finally occurred. Of the last surviving 260,000, large-scale front-line defection happened, but a few tens of thousands remained loyal to the Tsar and the commander. Thus, the Lushans even had brutal infighting, with 40,000 dead.
Finally, the remaining 220,000 surrendered intact to the encircling Austrian 3rd and 5th Army Groups.
Southwestern Front Commander General Yudovich was also killed in the chaos. The generals who defected to the enemy, to gain better treatment, chopped off General Yudovich’s head from his corpse and fawningly presented it to the acceptors.
They did this not purely for personal glory and wealth, but also out of hatred for Yudovich’s “one incompetent general dooms three armies.” They felt that if not for this guy acting as the Tsar’s dog, blindly advancing without daring to disobey orders, the entire front wouldn’t have been wiped out.
General Yudovich originally brought 540,000 south; only 220,000 surrendered in the end, showing that 320,000 died in the continuous slaughter and meat grinder, or from severe wounds, illness, lack of medicine.
While the Lusha Southwestern Front was encircled and annihilated on the Northern Front, on the southern side of the Hungarian battlefield, Duke Rupprecht chose to breakthrough the Romanian Army head-on and fully encircle the Serbian Army.
Using three corps of the German 6th Army Group to focus attack on the Romanian Army with no combat experience.
The Romanian Army of 8 divisions and 110,000 men had never fought a hard battle; they were let in northward earlier simply because the enemy let water through, making them overconfident.
Now that the enemy was serious, the Romanian Army collapsed almost at first contact—especially as the enemy precisely seized an attack-defense transition opportunity, making it even more inevitable.
Before this, the Romanian Army had been in offensive status, continuously attacking north those days.
Their troops had no defense lines set up, no depth, equivalent to suddenly encountering enemy counterattack mid-offensive, needle to wheat awn, no cover available.
The Germanics suddenly fired several fire preparations, artillery fire extended, bombing swathes of Romanians into chaos.
The subsequent ground charges focused on breakthroughs, not seeking to collapse the entire line.
The Romanians lacking hard battle experience soon had morale collapse, and were pierced in just one day of fierce assault.
110,000 Romanians suffered about 20,000 casualties, inflicting only just over 1,000 casualties on the Germanics, exchange ratio up to over ten times.
After being pierced, the easternmost three Romanian divisions directly collapsed and withdrew, preparing to retreat home. The western three divisions, together with the Serbian Army, were subsequently infiltrated and encircled by the Germanics.
This era had no tanks, troop mobility was poor, long-distance infiltration encirclement of enemies was very difficult. But the Hungarian Campaign was a Germanic “hold flanks, retreat center” “battle from rear” decision.
In the previous multi-day Serbo-Romanian offensive, they had already formed a deep salient into enemy territory, with main supply lines on the Danube River banks.
What the Germanics now had to do was suddenly switch from defense to offense, cut off the base of this salient, greatly reducing required mobility.
There were quite a few brilliant operations during the process, but all done by Duke Rupprecht himself and other 6th Army Group senior generals.
Lelouch himself, being at the Lviv front line expanding results and plugging gaps at the time, had no time to personally participate.
Moreover, this kind of conventional warfare wasn’t Lelouch’s specialty; he had no places to help leadership optimize, specialization matters.
In summary, Duke Rupprecht and others ultimately relied on their true hard strength, without transmigrator cheats, to complete the subsequent envelopment operations themselves.
The 330,000 Serbian Army, before the Germanic counterattack, already down to over 200,000. After days of fierce assault infiltration, further weakened to only 210,000 left.
About five divisions of over 60,000 Serbs ran fast, foreseeing trouble, fleeing downstream along the Danube.
Another 150,000 Serbs were ultimately completely encircled by the German 6th Army Group in a stretch of Danube River banks plain in southern Hungary.
The Serbian Army’s will to fight was even stronger than the Lusha Army’s, plus they were just encircled, supplies still ample, ammunition enough for another ten days or half a month. So the Serbian Army didn’t surrender immediately, but chose stubborn resistance and multiple breakout attempts.
This was mainly because the Serbian Army and Austria had deep hatred, having fought each other long, both believing Austria wouldn’t let them go.
However, as the war dragged to late May, such resistance gradually became meaningless.
Because by then the Northern Front’s Lusha Southwestern Front had been completely annihilated, Austrian 3rd and 5th Army Group cavalry troops were first freed up.
Austrian Army’s five cavalry divisions turned south, helping the German 6th Army Group join the encirclement of the Serbian Army.
By June 3, several infantry divisions of the Austrian 3rd Army Group also arrived at the battlefield; the allied forces outside the encirclement grew thicker, and the battle lasted until June 7, ending with the Serbian Army completely annihilated by the German-Austrian Allied Forces.
Serbian Army total commander Marshal Putnik was ultimately also killed in the Austrian-Serbian border city of Subotica.
……
After the German-Austrian Allied Forces annihilated the Serbian Army main force, in early June they took the opportunity to counterattack south.
Before this campaign, Serbia’s total army personnel was only about 430,000; 330,000 were sent to cooperate with the Lusha Army.
Now those 330,000 only had 60,000 escape back, combining with the 100,000 guarding home, totaling only 160,000 combat troops. Moreover, the 60,000 just withdrawn had lost most supplies and heavy cannons, combat effectiveness sharply reduced.
Serbia of course also urgently mobilized many previously untrained civilians into the army, starting emergency training from late May. When the German-Austrian Allied Forces counterattacked into the border, these new batches of soldiers had only trained two weeks, weapons not fully equipped, several recruits sharing one rifle.
Relying on these troops to hold off the German 6th Army Group’s offensive was almost a pipe dream.
The Serbian Army unwilling to abandon the border, on June 8 clashed fiercely with the German-Austrian Allied Forces near the original national border line on the Danube River banks, attempting to stop the enemy at the gates—
The reason for such delusion was also because Serbia’s total commander, old Marshal Putnik was dead; the new ones weren’t steady enough, swept up by military and public opinion, had to be tough. Couldn’t just not try at all and directly abandon the border, right?
The young generals’ hot-bloodedness soon paid the price.
This kind of border combat on plains perfectly suited the German-Austrian Allied Forces. Over 40,000 originally home-guarding, well-conditioned veterans from three reorganized divisions were routed by the German-Austrian Allied Forces in two days.
Plus over 100,000 cannon fodder just militarily trained half a month were also wasted.
After the border was breached, the Serbian Army sobered up a bit, didn’t dare section-by-section resist anymore.
But when the German-Austrian Allied Forces reached near Belgrade, they still couldn’t bear to directly abandon the capital, finally fighting another siege battle with the allies.
Belgrade held for over a month in the end, but paid another 70,000 regular troops and hundreds of thousands of newly drafted laborers.
Moreover, the Germanics didn’t go all-out on the siege; seeing many defending the city, they split two corps to encircle the city, later having some Austrian Army follow up for the siege.
The German 6th Army Group main force hurried to bypass Belgrade, continue downstream along the Danube to recover Romania—because even before this campaign, when Duke Rupprecht discussed strategic guidelines with Lelouch, Lelouch had mentioned to him:
Future Empire operations would rely more on petroleum; half-track tractors, and future other armored combat vehicles, tracked vehicles, would all need petroleum.
So, since Romania entered the war, seizing Romania’s oil fields opportunely became very important.
Rupprecht just split forces to besiege Belgrade; the remaining Army Group main force continued fiercely attacking Romania.
Inside Romania, originally only a dozen divisions of troops, and Romania had no deep hatred with other countries, no great mobilization effort.
After two divisions annihilated, three divisions encircled and surrendered, three divisions escaped back from the Hungarian battlefield. By June 1915, Romania’s troops available for home defense were only 6~7 divisions left.
Duke Rupprecht wanting to sequentially wipe out Romania wasn’t difficult; the key difference was whether they could safely seize Romania’s Ploiești oil fields—
In Earth’s history, Romania had a Britannia military advisory group. Before Romania fell in 1916, the Britannia advisory group, disregarding Romanian people’s lives and interests, destroyed the oil fields, fearing they would fall to the Germanics.
Of course, this world with the prescient transmigrator Lelouch helping plug gaps, such minor issues were negligible.
And Lelouch’s solution was very simple:
One side from Lviv along the railway on the east foothills of the Carpathians south, using captured Lusha wide-gauge locomotives and cars, slightly occupying some edge areas of the Kievan Rus Black Soil Plain. Then through the Kievan Rus region into Romania, attacking from Romania’s northeast corner.
At the same time, he knew directly assaulting Romania proper wouldn’t work; in the end, the Britannia advisory group would still blow the oil fields.
So, supplement with another hand: use paratroopers one last time. When ground troops were at least 200 kilometers from Ploiești oil fields, preemptively use airships to fly over the Carpathian Mountains, air-drop troops at Ploiești, then quickly assault the oil field area.
（Note: The following figure is the route map of the main counterattack directions of the German-Austrian Allied Forces during the entire Carpathian-Hungarian Campaign. Red is the actual control line at campaign start, outer yellow is the final actual control line at campaign end. The area between red and yellow lines is the new territory seized during this campaign.）
When Lelouch proposed paratrooper air-drop, many prudent officers around him hoped he wouldn’t take risks. Because they had just used paratroopers once to seize Lviv; how could the enemy not be prepared?
But Lelouch still overruled objections, pointing out two key points: “The enemy will be prepared, but there’s time difference and information difference. For Britannia or Lushans, they are direct losers with airplanes, of course they’ll guard tightly.
But what are Romanians? They’ve already been heavily defeated by our army during active cross-border combat, shrunk back home with just those few divisions, either dead-guarding Bucharest or defending along the current control line.
Maybe those die-hard warmongers are just controlled by Britannians; ordinary people have no will to fight. Romanians have no air force; in this case, once we air-drop, what truly needs quick extermination is just the Britannia military advisory group—this is just a decapitation strike.”
Lelouch’s suggestion ultimately convinced the opponents; he even specially flew to the Army Group commander to request approval from the Duke, who agreed.
Finally, in late June, Lelouch picked a reasonably suitable timing to execute his air-drop plan.
By then, several divisions of the 10th Army Group had already passed through the edge of the Kievan Rus Great Plain from the north, entering northern Romanian border.
Several divisions of the 6th Army Group also bypassed Belgrade, went downstream along the Danube, arriving at the Iron Gates near the Serbo-Romanian border.
The last Romanian forces attempting resistance wanted to dead-guard the Iron Gates a bit; the country’s remaining few regular army divisions had two drawn here, two left in capital Bucharest, one defending the north.
Under this situation, on June 22, Lelouch air-dropped Ploiești oil fields on the south slope of the Carpathians, dropping right over the oil fields in early morning.
He completely disregarded the ground Britannia advisory group—especially since quite a few in the advisory group weren’t even regular soldiers, some petroleum technicians, some civilian coordinators.
The moment gods descended from heaven, the Britannians were all dumbfounded. In the end, Lelouch not only easily took the oil fields, but had spare capacity to pursue and capture the entire Britannia advisory group.
For these beasts who came to other countries to stir discord, even disregarding allied nations’ people’s lives and interests, Lelouch of course wouldn’t go soft.
These guys secretly sabotaging other countries already violated international law first, not protected by any international treaties, nor deserving POW treatment.
Lelouch grabbed local Romanian civilian officials, handed over evidence that “these Britannians, for Britannia’s interests, attempted to destroy Romania’s oil fields when Romania falls or switches sides,” to the local Romanian civilian officials.
Then, Lelouch borrowed some guns to the local Romanian law enforcement, and through formal process, executed the entire Britannia advisory group by firing squad, none left.
As for handling the bodies, up to the local Romanian civilian officials.
Even if they wanted to learn Romanian traditional culture, learning Grand Duke Vlad III （prototype of vampire Dracula Count）, Lelouch wouldn’t oppose.
……
Ultimately, after Lelouch air-dropped Ploiești oil fields and completely annihilated one Romanian regular army regiment guarding the oil fields and one Britannia advisory group.
Romanian high-level finally received a huge shock.
At this point, Romania considered they had no great deep hatred with German-Austrians; it was just the current king pushed up by pro-Britannia and pro-Lusha factions, leading to pro-Britannia pro-Lusha civil and military officials rising, creating this situation.
After these pro-Britannia pro-Lusha factions suffered heavy losses and were killed on battlefields, Romania’s original pro-German-Austrian faction naturally rose.
Thus, in late June inside Bucharest, a change occurred.
Current King Ferdinand I’s elder brother, Prince Wilhelm who as a child in 1886 had renounced Romanian throne succession, surprisingly was enthroned by those two divisions in Bucharest.
This Prince Wilhelm, and his father Prince Leopold, early on renounced throne succession because Romania’s parliament demanded “the king must swear to abandon pro-German stance, be friendly with Lusha.” They were unwilling, so renounced in 1880 and 1886 respectively.
Ferdinand I was willing to swear pro-Lusha, so he overtook father and brother to become crown prince, and ascended last year.
Now, because of pro-Lusha pro-Britannia issues, Romania faced national extinction danger; the army of course had to solve from the root.
Especially since Prince Wilhelm originally held military post, he was the division commander of the Bucharest garrison division, and was yellow-robed by his own officers and soldiers.
Officers and soldiers bitterly pleaded: “The country has reached this state; if Your Majesty doesn’t step forward, Romania can’t be saved. For the nation’s survival, please Your Majesty reluctantly take this mess.”
What could Prince Wilhelm do? Had to sigh long and accept: “You know it’s a mess now? You’ve really harmed me badly!”
After Prince Wilhelm urgently ascended, he immediately executed a few corrupt officials who took Britannia pounds and rubles, then used this as pledge of allegiance, requesting peace restoration with German-Austrians, willing to accept German-Austrian wartime takeover of Romania’s oil fields, ports, railways. Other conditions could be negotiated slowly later.
Such matters weren’t for Duke Rupprecht or Marshal Leopold to decide; they had to relay the situation to the diplomacy-handling departments.
Ultimately, Germania side accepted the conditions, and required all Romanian army to lay down weapons for reorganization, and accept military passage rights.
Germania allowed Romania to restore neutrality, not declare war on Britannia or Lusha. But Romania must promise to firmly counterattack if Britannia or Lusha invade or attempt transit.
As for territory swaps punishment, to be discussed slowly later.
Through this battle, Romania’s oil fields were secured.
——
PS: These small countries have no suspense, fighting them isn’t satisfying plot-wise, so fast-forwarded.
Today’s second update will also quickly gloss over battle results; tomorrow starts major power games, rhythm will normalize.
This counts as appropriate detail level.
