Chapter 774 Opening up the Second Battlefield?

Putting aside Kornilov's other arrangements for the time being, the morale and morale of the coalition fell to the bottom after repeated setbacks. At this time, even the generals who despised the Russian army did not dare to say that they could conquer Telegraph Hill casually.

As a result, what lies before the coalition forces becomes a dead end.

If you can't even do anything about Telegraph Hill, let alone Sevastopol. However, they lost tens of thousands of people on the defense line on Telegraph Hill, but they were unable to move forward. According to this loss rate, how many troops must be invested to capture this damn mountain?

Anyway, there is a consensus among the coalition forces that it is meaningless to continue attacking Telegraph Hill. Unless the country is willing to fill this hill with hundreds of thousands of lives, it is best to find another way.

As for what other options to think of, it would be to take a detour. Since Telegraph Mountain is impassable, let’s find another way! If the mountain doesn't come, then Muhammad will be there. If Muhammad goes, then the mountain will be there!

People move living things and trees move dead. We don’t need to be so stupid. All roads can lead to the harbor of victory. Why bother hitting the wall on a damn telegraph mountain?

There are many people who hold this idea among the coalition forces, but there is only one problem. The shortest way to Sevastopol is to cross the Alma River and go south through Telegraph Mountain, unless you like to take a detour to Simferopo. Or go to Bakhchisaray and make a big detour and then go south.

So can we go that way? Of course, the coalition can even modify its strategic goal and simply capture Simferopol, the capital of Crimea. That way, after landing at Kalamita Bay, they can just go straight east and there is no need to go south at all.

But the problem is that the strategic significance of Simferopol, the capital, is not as great as that of Sevastopol. Even if Simferopol is captured, it will not be able to shake the foundation of the Russian army in Crimea. As long as Sevastopol remains and as long as the Black Sea Fleet can still rely on this seaport, then as long as the coalition forces leave, the Russian army will Can make a comeback immediately.

It is impossible for Britain and France to seize Crimea. They really don't have the ability. The only thing they can do is to weaken Russia's strength as much as possible and keep Russia trapped in the Black Sea.

Therefore, if the effective strength of the Russian army is eliminated as much as possible, their goal is to disintegrate the Russian army's military advantage in the Black Sea region.

Therefore, it is meaningless to divert the troops to attack Simferopol. As for heading south via Simferopol or Bakhchisaray, this method also has problems. Not to mention Bakhchisarai, Simferopol is the capital and big city of Crimea. How many troops and how long does it take to attack such a big city?

What's more, if the coalition forces attack Simferopol, will they expose their fragile supply lines to Russian troops on Telegraph Hill and Sevastopol in the south, as well as possible Russian reinforcements in the direction of Ukraine in the north?

Once the coalition forces, which completely rely on sea transportation for supplies, are cut off from their supply lines, the consequences are needless to say, right?

What's more, the Russian troops from these three directions can completely surround the coalition forces. At that time, the entire army may be annihilated!

Anyway, Raglan, who was cautious by nature, did not dare to take such a gamble. He strongly opposed taking the other way to attack Sevastopol, thinking that it was too risky and could easily be taken back.

As a result, it seems that the coalition forces can only make one decision to attack Telegraph Mountain?

Not necessarily. After a series of quarrels, Raglan made concessions. He agreed that it was pointless to continue attacking Telegraph Hill, but the coalition forces could not be trapped here in Telegraph Hill.

So the only way is to find another way!

How to find another way?

The top leaders of the coalition quickly thought of their own maritime superiority, because the Black Sea Fleet voluntarily gave up its sea control and huddled in the Sea of ​​Azov. The coalition forces in the Black Sea can almost be said to have unimpeded access. They can go wherever they want and there is no force that can stop or threaten them.

Since the landing at Kalamita Bay was not successful, we should correct this mistake and directly find a place south of Sevastopol to land again. This way we can avoid the difficult Telegraph Hill and go straight to Sevastopol. You defend the "weak" Nangang!

To be honest, it is difficult for the coalition forces to think of such a non-solution. But no one with a right mind would ever come up with such an idea.

The reason is very simple, that is, why the coalition generals didn't think about it carefully. They couldn't handle Telegraph Mountain and the Alma River, whose strategic position and terrain were not dangerous enough. How could Sevastopol, which has an extremely important strategic position and has been operated by the Russian army for decades, be easier to win?

What if they hit a wall again in Sevastopol? Can I log in again to solve the problem?

The first problem that the coalition forces need to solve now is the lack of attack capabilities and the miscalculation of the strength of the Russian army. If these two problems are not solved, even if they successfully land south of Sevastopol, the result will still be the same, and there is a possibility that the coalition forces will He was made even more embarrassed.

However, the leaders of the coalition forces could not care so much at this time. They decided that landing in the area south of Sevastopol and attacking the South Port of Sevastopol was the best way. So I immediately made up my mind to do it.

However, there was a little trouble during the period, that is, the coalition forces fell into a new debate, that is, whether to retain part of the force to stay in the area north of the Alma River to threaten the Russian army.

Some people may think that this is not a problem. Since we are going to land again, we must concentrate all our efforts to get over there. Why leave a tail north of the Alma River? What is the use of this?

Don't tell me, in theory it is really useful. Sevastopol is located at the southernmost tip of Crimea, which means that the supplies and reinforcements Sevastopol needs rely on supplies from the hinterland of Crimea and Ukraine to the north.

Keeping a force on the Alma River can harass the Russian supply lines in Sevastopol, which is still very meaningful for siege warfare.

The key to the quarrel between the coalition forces is not whether to stay, but how much to stay. The French army led by Saint Arnaud believed that leaving a small force of up to 10,000 men was enough. However, the cautious Raglan disagreed with him. He believed that tens of thousands of people were of little use at all, and if such a small number of people were reinforced by the main force of the Russian army, they would be in danger of being surrounded and annihilated.

Raglan believed that at least 20,000 people should be left in the Alma River area, and preferably 30,000.

Good guy, the coalition forces only have a total of tens of thousands of troops now? If 30,000 were really left, the number of troops that could be used to attack Sevastopol would probably be around 30,000. What can such a small number of people do?