African Entrepreneurship Record

”This is our observation map of the entire Shao Kui terrain over these days. Although Count Roberts attempted to rely on the Limpopo River to resist, yesterday’s battle inflicted a fatal blow on the Allies, and in a situation where manpower was already insufficient, the defensive system planned by Count Roberts has also shown a great flaw, especially in the western region of Shao Kui. The river bay here, initially Count Roberts was sure to utilize it, but now he can only retreat to the narrow area in the east, so the west is the weak point of the Allies now, we should concentrate artillery and manpower for a strong attack, which should soon annihilate Count Roberts’s forces.”

The commander-in-chief of the Western Military District, Lidun, spoke to the crowd, with Merk heading south to command the operations against Cape Town and Natal, Lidun is now the highest military commander of East Africa in Mozambique.

And the Western Military District is now the main force against the Mozambique army, especially after the main force in western Mozambique was surrounded by the Western Military District in the Saint George area.

Now Mozambique has become a coveted piece of meat for East Africa, and the quickest way to solve the Mozambique problem is to resolve the Allies’ headquarters led by Count Roberts and the Mozambique government, then induce the surrender of the western Mozambique Allies’ main forces.

If this still does not achieve the goal, then after eliminating Count Roberts’s forces, the East African Army will advance westwards to cooperate with four divisions surrounding the main force of the Allies and annihilate all the enemies in Saint George.

Of course, the most important thing now is to conquer Shao Kui, the terrain of Shao Kui is very conducive to defense, the only pity is that the Allies have not been operating here long enough, so the flaws are very large, especially at the bend of the Limpopo River in the west.

Originally, according to the Allies’ plan, they would use the natural river channel here as part of Shao Kui’s city defense, but unfortunately, due to lack of personnel and materials, the construction of Shao Kui was not fully completed.

With the progression of the war, the grassroots order in Mozambique has long collapsed, so even conscription is not possible here. The colony of Mozambique was originally sparsely populated, and with many jungles, mountains, and valleys. After the war broke out, many natives hid, so it was impossible for the Portuguese to delve into these regions and drag them out.

And the lack of labor ultimately led to the failure of Count Roberts’s plan, but under such circumstances, Count Roberts can still leverage the old town of Shao Kui to maneuver with East Africa.

December 25, 1888.

The East African Defense Army’s various units, major military districts, and Guard Division launched a large-scale counterattack on Shao Kui under the temporary authorization of Delaine as the battlefield commander by the general staff.

The eastern military district troops, western military district troops, guard division, and others as the main force for firepower output focused thousands of various artillery pieces on a half-day-long bombardment of Shao Kui’s ammunition depots.

The eastern military district is separated from Shao Kui by only one river. This is not a good place to attack Shao Kui from the land but allows more leisurely deployment of artillery units for precision shelling of Shao Kui’s core areas across the river.

The forces of Count Roberts, shrinking in Shao Kui, were not able to cross the Limpopo River to counterattack the East African forces in the east and north, so they could only passively endure the strikes, and this time to prevent the attacks from the east and south directions by the East African main forces.

Count Roberts had to concentrate his remaining artillery, mostly to deal with the artillery from the Guard Divisions of the western military district, whereas the East and north East African forces had to be left unattended and wait until there was a sign of crossing the river by the East African forces to strike back.

Until then, the defenders of Shao Kui could only huddle under defensive works to evade the bombardment from the eastern and northern military district of East Africa.

The daily training of the East African artillery is very strict, so the artillery accuracy is very high and can basically target large targets across the river with precision.

Under the artillery bombing, the temporarily constructed defenses on the opposite bank of the Limpopo River in Shao Kui were vulnerable, because due to the rush of time, some defensive works of Shao Kui still relied heavily on rammed earth, which became the harbingers of doom in the war.

The British and Portuguese hid in trenches, dust erupted around them, and the roar of shell explosions made the Allied soldiers very uncomfortable. Though not at the level of rivers of blood, the battlefield was filled with the stench of smoke and fresh blood, occasionally showing severed limbs, whole corpses, the entire line seemed like hell on earth.

Meanwhile, in the south and west of Shao Kui, the Allies faced even tougher challenges, the artillery of the Guard Division and western military district was several times more than those of the eastern and northern military district.

The defensive works of Shao Kui were almost completely destroyed under such intensive artillery bombardment, leaving only scorched earth.

At eight o’clock in the evening.

Under the bugle of East African charge, the general attack on Shao Kui city officially began, and under the cover of artillery and machine guns, East African infantry advanced step by step towards Shao Kui’s positions and fortress.

By this time, most areas of Shao Kui had already been bombed to ruins, East African infantry climbed onto these ruins and engaged in firefights with enemies popping out from unknown niches.

The enemy was very tenacious, yet these were the minority, most enemies surrendered as soon as they saw the East African flag, by this time the opportunity was completely gone.

It’s understandable with the British and Black units, but the Portuguese soldiers and Indians seemed as if they were seeing their own parents, utterly beseeching the East African soldiers for mercy.

And this discordant situation completely tore apart the resistance of the Allies. After all, no matter how hard you fight, with incompetent allies present, how can this battle be fought?

The ”demonstration” by the Portuguese and Indians eventually propagated to all Allied forces, basically surrendering in the periphery, and those who tried to fight to the death were sent to hell prematurely by the East African soldiers.

By this time, Count Roberts had less than three thousand reservists left at his command, Count Roberts watched the East African forces like a tide, his face pale like water, his cracked lips slightly parted, his eyes lifeless, with a dull gaze.

”Surrender!”

At this time a voice came from behind Count Roberts, it was Mozambique’s Governor Bugival, who also appeared very depressed, he gloomily looked at Roberts and said.

”Surrender, huh?” At this time, Count Roberts muttered, but still in the previous wretched state as if he hadn’t snapped out of it.

”Your Excellency, Count, wake up! We have no chance, we can’t let these young lives die in vain any more, resisting further is only adding cold numbers to East Africans’ ledger, we have failed, utterly failed.”

Almost using a broken, angry roar to finish this sentence, Bugival’s spirit and energy were drained, collapsing to the ground.

Count Roberts’s fists clenched, old skin forming creases full of aged vibes on the back of his hands.

”Alas!”

...

At 9 PM East Africa time, the sky had already turned gray, but still faint shadows could be seen as several prominent white flags slowly rose at the fortress of the inner city of Shao Kui.

With the surrender of Count Roberts and the Governor’s Mansion of Mozambique colony, East Africa formally conquered Shao Kui, and another colonial flag of the Portuguese Kingdom in Africa quietly fell.

The glory of the Portuguese Kingdom was also completely buried by the East African Kingdom in the historical dust of the late 19th century, the 19th century saw many such century wars, but for the Portuguese people, this was their last chance.

Without territory and population as a base, it is basically impossible for Portugal to rise again in the future unless their descendants, like the ancestors, stand at the forefront of the wind and accomplish new feats, but that is practically impossible, just like Ernst learned in his past life, the two failures on the Iberian Peninsula have always been in a state of decline.