"...As of January 16, all British Indian Army units under the 9th Army Group of the Army have surrendered to the Chinese forces. The 9th Army now has no route of retreat. If the command does not issue direct orders, the 9th Army will determine its subsequent actions independently."

General Montgomery, Commander-in-Chief of the British Indian Command, finished reading the telegram, his hand trembling involuntarily. He set the telegram down, looking as if he wanted to speak but stopping himself. The adjutant beside him had already read the content and was ready to receive orders at any moment. Instead, he saw General Montgomery stand up and walk out of the command post with his hands behind his back, his expression blank.

The adjutant looked again at the message Montgomery had left on the table, his heart filled with dread. The war had reached a point where the massive British forces in India—once boasting 2.3 million troops, including 800,000 from the British mainland—were disintegrating. This was a situation the adjutant could never have imagined.

Take the 9th Army Group responsible for defending eastern India. It commanded eight British infantry divisions, approximately 150,000 men, and twenty British Indian Army divisions totaling about 400,000 men. At its peak, its total strength was over 550,000. However, as the Muslim and Sikh regions of British India declared independence, the British Indian Army troops under the 9th Army Group would surrender immediately upon making contact with the Chinese forces, claiming to be "surrounded." According to combat reports, these British Indian troops offered no resistance at all. When facing the Chinese army, they simply fired their guns into the air. As soon as Chinese armored vehicles approached, they ceased firing and raised their hands in surrender.

With the rapid surrender of the Indian units, the eight British infantry divisions holding the nodes of the defense line had absolutely no time to adjust their deployment. In the blink of an eye, they became isolated strongpoints. The armored torrent of the Chinese army surged through the massive gaps left by the British Indian Army, thrusting deep into the rear and swiftly dividing and encircling the purely British units of the 9th Army Group.

The 9th Army Group was not the only one facing such a terrifying situation. The 4th Army Group defending the west and the 6th Army Group defending the north sent continuous telegrams reporting massive instability within their Indian units. To ensure reliability, the 4th and 6th Army Groups had been forced to disarm certain obviously wavering Muslim and Sikh units and place them under temporary guard.

Although the British Indian Command could not say so openly, privately everyone was extremely pessimistic. Temporarily sidelining Muslim and Sikh officers and soldiers could indeed lower the risk of battlefield defections. However, it also drastically weakened the combat power of the British Indian Army. While these troops might have had negligible combat effectiveness compared to the Chinese army, they were at least useful for manning the lines. Without these troops, the number of purely British troops was insufficient to maintain a layered defense line.

Thinking of the most likely future, the adjutant suddenly felt an impulse. Perhaps he should just leave—leave India and return to Britain. Even facing trial for desertion back home would be more dignified than being captured in a war that seemed destined for defeat.

But the adjutant quickly remembered military discipline; desertion could lead straight to the gallows. The thought of death finally allowed him to overcome the impulse to flee. He sat down exhaustedly, his mind empty, unable to form a single thought.

The adjutant had no expectations of his superior, General Montgomery. As he had anticipated, General Montgomery's mind was equally void of any ideas for the next step.

In the already concluded Bengal Campaign, General Montgomery had organized the 5th Army Group to confront the Chinese army in the Bengal region. The 5th Army Group had 300,000 troops. Of these, 10,000 were British, and the remaining 150,000 [sic] were British Indian Army troops composed of Gurkha infantry battalions and the most loyal elite brigades of British India.

The 5th Army Group adopted a mixed formation model, where every unit was composed of half British troops and half elite British Indian troops. Perhaps aware of the strength of the 5th Army Group holding the line, the Chinese forces used armored units to probe for British hardpoints and then began continuous bombardment.

During the seven-day battle, the British Indian Command estimated that the Chinese Air Force dropped approximately 150,000 aerial bombs and rockets—averaging one round for every two British soldiers. Chinese artillery fired over 600,000 shells. Although the fire density was not up to the level of the Western Front in World War I, the British artillery had already been destroyed by the Chinese Air Force. With the Chinese Air Force also providing artillery spotting, the British forces were on the receiving end of a one-sided bombardment, resulting in immense losses.

After five days of despairing and helpless combat, the British 5th Army Group collapsed and was immediately encircled and annihilated by Chinese armored units.

During the battle, the British organized several rescue attempts. These brave British troops were subjected to fierce bombing by countless Chinese aircraft while on the march. A regiment of reinforcements often covered less than six kilometers in a day, spending the vast majority of their time dodging Chinese air raids. Less than one-tenth of the British reinforcements managed to reach their destination, and when these heroic troops finally linked up with the 5th Army Group, less than a third of their strength remained. As for the vehicles transporting ammunition and supplies, not a single one reached the destination; all were destroyed on the road.

In such brutal combat, the British were not entirely without gains; they captured a total of six Chinese Air Force pilots. Montgomery personally interrogated them. When he asked about the rationale behind the Chinese Air Force's tactical arrangements, the captured pilots all gave the same answer: "It takes only a few days to produce an aerial bomb, but it takes at least sixteen years for a person to grow from birth into a soldier capable of fighting. Even if we use ten aerial bombs to eliminate one British soldier, it is very cost-effective."

Montgomery originally had many questions, but after hearing this answer from the Chinese pilots, he stood up in silence and left the interrogation room. General Montgomery did not know what else he could ask.

In the Battle of the Marne during World War I, the French army alone fired 240,000 shells per day. Turning steel and gunpowder into shells was indeed expensive. However, the time required to train a soldier was far greater than the time required to produce the military equipment needed to kill one.

If ten aerial bombs could kill one Briton, killing the entire British population of over 40 million would only require something over 400 million bombs. It was said that China could produce 100 million tons of steel annually; at most, half a year's production would be enough to kill everyone in Britain.

General Montgomery could find no way to counter such a massive industrial disparity. Nor could he think of any effective way to use indigenous Indian soldiers to consume Chinese ammunition. Moreover, even if Montgomery possessed the miracle of making over 400 million Indians willing to die for Britain, killing 400 million Indians would only take 4 billion aerial bombs. Give China two years, and they could produce them.

In reality, the Indians were obviously unwilling to die for Britain; they chose to surrender decisively.

After walking for a while, General Montgomery's mood, numb from pain, finally improved slightly. Having recovered some ability to think, he realized that his only viable option now was to command the remaining British Army forces that had not yet been annihilated to withdraw from India. Although the British forces lacked the capacity to retreat back to Europe, they could at least withdraw to Britain's colonies in the Middle East.

Thinking of his own future, General Montgomery touched the pistol at his waist. At worst, suicide. having fought such a battle, a bullet entering his temple would indeed be a rather gentle choice.

***

In contrast to General Montgomery, his opponent, General Yu Cen, Commander of the Asian Coalition Forces India Theater, was quite relaxed. At the military conference before the campaign began, General Yu Cen had accepted He Rui's characterization of this campaign: "This is a political battle—70% politics, 30% military."

The development of the campaign to this point had gone exactly as He Rui predicted. As long as the people of the British Indian colonies realized that Britain was bound to lose, they immediately lost the will to continue fighting for Britain.

When the song adapted from the late Ming Dynasty—"Eat he-mom, wear he-mom, when China comes there's no grain tax (there is grain)"—was sung across the vast regions of India in various languages, British rule in India began to disintegrate directly.

While shocked by the practical effect of politics in war, General Yu Cen's only small regret was that in this campaign, he did not have the opportunity to demonstrate the tactical ability expected of an outstanding general.

Although "a great general has no illustrious merit," the British forces, having lost the support of the Indian people, were as fragile as dew, quickly drying up under the blazing sun of colonial liberation. The Chinese army did not need to display exquisite armored and infantry tactics; they simply used their industrial advantage to crush the British forces with air superiority.

It wasn't that the Chinese army fought poorly; on the contrary, destroying the British army with minimal casualties required the Chinese army to have extremely excellent battlefield organization and logistics capabilities. However, as a soldier, General Yu Cen still looked forward to that kind of life-and-death struggle, the fierce battle where the victor could not be fully determined until the very last minute. Although he knew this incurable soldier's personality was inhumane, General Yu Cen couldn't help but look forward to it. However, the General would never voice this little thought.

"Report, Commander. The British forces in Delhi have already placed Sikh officers and soldiers under control. The Staff Department has calculated that our forces are sufficient to implement a complete pincer encirclement of the British 6th Army Group, which has already begun to contract its defense line..."

"Report, Commander. Telegram from the Military Commission. Our negotiations with the King of Nepal have concluded. The King of Nepal states that they agree with our righteous action to liberate the colonies and will send envoys to the Gurkha officers and soldiers in the British army. The Military Commission orders us to transport Gurkha POWs to the Nepal region and to select a portion of the officers to be sent to the Nepalese capital first."

Hearing this news, Yu Cen couldn't help but sigh. "Sigh... this really is a political battle."

The staff officers in the command post heard Yu Cen's words and were also filled with emotion. Originally, everyone thought that liberating such a large colony as India would inevitably result in millions of casualties. However, outstanding political work had drastically reduced battlefield casualties. Based on current intelligence, casualties in the campaign to liberate India would be around one million. But the majority of these one million casualties were British people fighting in India. The casualties among the local Indian people had dropped from a projected 2 million to probably less than 400,000—a reduction of over 1.6 million. The Chinese soldiers were very happy to see such a situation.

"Report, Commander. Intelligence from Chandra Bose. The Indian National Army he leads is ready to launch an uprising in Mumbai. He requests full air support from our army for the uprising."

The new intelligence gave Yu Cen a burst of surprise. Chandra Bose was an Indian radical who had always advocated for India to gain independence through violent revolution. After independence succeeded, India must implement policies similar to China's to thoroughly solve India's poverty problem.

Politically, Chandra Bose was quite to Yu Cen's liking. However, Chandra Bose advocated for India to become a unified country, an ideal that conflicted with the Civilization Party's strategy of restoring India to its historical norm. Yu Cen had never had any exchanges with Chandra Bose on this aspect, but naturally paid attention to him in his heart.

Yu Cen quickly suppressed the wariness stemming from politics and prioritized considering the military changes Chandra Bose's uprising in Mumbai would trigger. China had committed nearly a million troops to the India Theater; with excellent political work, the campaign objective was naturally to annihilate the British mainland forces in India.

If Chandra Bose could successfully occupy Mumbai, it would block the important port for the British army to withdraw from India by sea. Although the distance between India and the Arabian Peninsula was far greater than the narrow English Channel, the capability Britain displayed in the Dunkirk evacuation made the India Theater Command somewhat apprehensive. Naturally, after liberating India, China would liberate the Arabian Peninsula from colonial rule.

This was not only political work but also involved critical economic points. The Middle East was rich in oil. After the war broke out, the joint oil venture between the Chinese government and the American Rockefeller Foundation in Saudi Arabia had been confiscated by the British. Although oil from the Arabian Peninsula was not indispensable for China at present—domestic oil production plus the oil already secured in Southeast Asia could fully meet war needs—seizing the Arabian Peninsula would increase China's oil imports while cutting off Europe's channel for obtaining oil from the Middle East. This was very advantageous for China. Once the British were allowed to withdraw their mainland troops from India to the Arabian Peninsula, it would have a significant negative impact on the next phase of the war.

Yu Cen asked the Chief of Staff, "Does the Air Force have a targeted plan?"

The Chief of Staff answered immediately, "There is a corresponding plan. With the range of the J-9, departing from airfields on the Deccan Plateau, they can support Mumbai at any time."

Yu Cen replied with satisfaction, "Then tell Chandra Bose we can support him at any time. Let him proceed freely!"

Just as the Chief of Staff accepted the order, Yu Cen added, "Telegraph the Military Commission. Request the Navy to enter the Indian Ocean on a large scale as soon as possible to engage the British forces."