British reinforcements had just arrived in the Balkans, and before they could take over all the defensive areas, the Bulgarian partisans launched a full-scale counterattack, and this time the Russians were also very cooperative, suppressing the coalition forces on the front line.

It turned out that Plovdiv was indeed a decoy set by the British, ready to encircle and annihilate the main forces of the Bulgarian partisans here, but they only controlled the beginning, but not the end.

As soon as the battle began, the situation changed, and more than a dozen cities, including Plovdiv, were simultaneously attacked by partisans.

Most of this was a feint, but this messy attack, the arrangement that the British had not yet completed, was exposed.

There is no way, although the Greeks are not strong, the timing of their choice is too good, who knows if they will fight all the way to Constantinople? For the sake of security, the Ottomans had to send troops to contain them.

The number of troops defending the city is insufficient, and there are still leading parties in the city, and a feint attack may also break the city, if these places are lost, the coalition forces in the Sofia area will be encircled, and the British army can only send reinforcements.

The firepower of the Bulgarian partisans was too weak, and it was okay to bully the second-line troops of the Ottomans, but on the frontal battlefield it was just as good as the British.

Just because you can't beat it doesn't mean there's no way to fight. The British troops, who had just arrived at the front, did not fight them, and the arrogant British commander treated them directly as natives of the colony.

This understanding is not wrong, theoretically speaking, Bulgaria can also be considered a colony of the Ottoman Empire, but directly under it.

In terms of strength, this gap is huge, and the Bulgarian partisans have also been trained by Russian and Austrian instructors, and with their high morale, their fighting strength is not weak.

With a "boom", the British troops on the march were again attacked by the guerrillas, and after a moment the gunfire stopped abruptly, and it was clear that the guerrillas had retreated.

A young officer said with a pale face: "General, the front is attacked by the enemy, two soldiers are killed and seven soldiers are wounded!" ”

"How many times have we been attacked by the enemy?" Major General Oliver asked

"Eighteenth!" The young officer replied in a low voice

"What's the nonsense then, hurry up and send someone to chase me!" Major General Oliver ordered

The Bulgarian partisans inflicted few casualties on them, but the number of attacks was frequent, which slowed down their march, not to mention that the key was to damage the morale of the troops.

Major General Oliver is not the master who will not fight back after suffering a loss, of course he will fight back.

Since they had no experience in fighting with the guerrillas, most of the time they chased the enemy halfway through and disappeared, and if they were unlucky, there were more traps waiting for them along the way.

In this round of confrontation, the British army did not take advantage, not to mention, the key is that the best fighters were delayed. By the time they reached their destination, the main force of the guerrillas had long since disappeared.

Everyone knew that the base camp of the Bulgarian partisans was in the Balkans, and the task of Major General Oliver was to encircle and suppress the guerrillas.

But when you enter the Balkan Mountains, you attack the enemy's strengths with your own shortcomings. Large forces were difficult to move, artillery was ineffective, and the casualty ratio of both sides was almost 1:1 in this environment.

Swapping a British soldier for a partisan, Major General Oliver is not mad, and if he dares to do so, the day of court-martials is not far off.

Major General Oliver commanded the troops for the first time, otherwise he would not have taken on this unfortunate task as a gilded relation.

The British generals who had been in the Balkans for a long time would rather fight the Russians on the front line than go into the mountains to encircle and suppress the guerrillas.

As the former enemy can see, the British army also has a slight upper hand in combat effectiveness, and as long as it is not besieged by several times the enemy, the risk is controllable; On the surface, the latter did not seem to be a big risk, and the guerrillas would certainly not be able to defeat the regular army, but it would be different after entering the mountains.

Major General Oliver, believing himself in a plan, laid a decoy to lure the Bulgarian partisans into falling for it.

Now the result is obvious, the enemy was deceived, but it is a pity that he overestimated the speed of the British army's march, and under the enemy's sneak attack, they could not close the pocket formation in time.

……

Plovdiv, a strategic place that has fallen for the most part, is still stubbornly resisting the defenders. Attacking fortifications is not the strong point of the guerrillas, and even if there is a combination of inside and outside in the city, they have not been able to take the city in one go.

The guerrilla commander Edimir ordered: "Order the troops to stop the offensive, collect as many strategic supplies as possible, take away what they can take, and burn what they can't take away, and not leave it to the enemy." ”

The middle-aged officer reluctantly said, "Commander, isn't it a pity that so many treasures have been burned." If we organize the people to rush to transport, we can still transport it out. ”

Edimir glared and said, "Don't talk nonsense, with so many supplies, are we still running?" If we are bitten by the British, even if our forces are increased tenfold, we will not be their opponents! ”

To be able to destroy this part of the materiel, Edimir was already satisfied. Although it is a pity that they did not take the whole of Plovdiv, politically they can declare that they have captured this place and fight for a better position with the Russians.

The Russians were very realistic, and at first the treatment of the Bulgarian partisans was not to starve people to death. Ever since they tore through the Sardinian defenses head-on and broke through to the rear of the enemy, the treatment of the partisans has been on par with that of the Russians.

The logistical supplies were not available to them for the time being, but the Russians still issued them a batch of weapons and equipment, which were transported through the Balkan mountain trail.

Many partisan officers, including Edimir, received official military ranks in the Russian army, and they are now also staffed.

Fitzroy Somerset also promised that anyone who was willing to join the army after the war could receive an official Russian military number and be stationed in Bulgaria; If you want to retire, you can also enter the government department to get matching treatment.

"Independent"? Don't dream, the Russians are not here to do charity, fortunately they have been fighting for so long, just to make the Bulgarians independent.

Now the Bulgarians are not so demanding either, and autonomy is their highest goal. Most also wanted the Russians to protect them from Ottoman enslavement.

Religious personnel, in particular, were standard Russophiles, and had very high expectations for Bulgaria to join the Russian Empire.

The future of Bulgaria will be nothing more than a province, an autonomous province, or a joint Russian-state in the name of an autonomous principality, depending on the decision of the tsarist government.

The premise is that the Russians win the war, and if they lose everything, the loser will not be entitled to the spoils.

……

Sofia

The coalition command, Lieutenant General Montes has already greeted all the relatives of Major General Oliver in his heart, and the pit teammates don't treat them like this, let alone pit their own people?

If it weren't for the fact that he delayed the time to take over the defense in order to arrange the so-called pocket formation, the Bulgarian partisans would not have been able to take advantage of the situation and conquer three and a half cities in just one week.

The city is all Ottomans, and even if Montes is conquered, they don't care, the problem is that the supplies hoarded in the city are theirs.

Even if the British Empire has a great cause and doesn't care about such a small loss, it still has to consider the political impact?

The immediate consequence now is that Montes will not be able to hold his head up in front of the French. The deeper effect was that Bulgaria became more unstable, and more and more people saw hope of escaping Ottoman rule and turned to support the partisans.

"Give Major General Oliver an order to immediately regain the lost territory and ensure the smooth flow of our army's logistics and transportation lines." Montes ordered

The matter of encircling and suppressing the guerrillas, let's talk about it later, if it really doesn't work, it's better to leave it to the Ottomans, anyway, this is not the territory of the British Empire, and Montes doesn't care so much.

"Yes!" The attendant replied

At the time of this order, Montes had not yet noticed that danger was approaching, and that Fitzroy Somerset was already planning Armageddon.

At the beginning, the battlefield in Sofia was 73,000 Russian + 20,000 Bulgarian partisans VS 50,000 British troops + 20,000 Sardinian troops + 30,000 Ottoman troops, and the strength of the two sides was equal.

Now that the Russian army has been replenished, the total strength is still more than 70,000 people, while the Ottoman army in the coalition army is less than 10,000, and only 35,000 of the remaining 42,000 British troops are on the front line, and the Sardinian army still has 19,000 left.

It has to be said that the Italians are good at saving lives, and they have the lowest casualty rate among the warring parties, and the battlefield survival manual tossed by Franz back then is now deeply rooted in the hearts of the Sardinian army.

This means that when the reinforcements of the coalition forces were pinned down by the Bulgarian partisans, the Russian army already had an absolute advantage on the battlefield.

The Ottoman army had been crippled, the Sardinian army was paddling all over the field, and the remaining British army, no matter how strong its combat strength was, could not withstand twice the Russian army.

On December 27, 1852, the Russian army, under the leadership of Fitzroy Somerset, launched a fierce attack in the Sofia area.

Unlike the previous offensive, this was a smashing of the Sardinian line, and since the Bulgarian partisans had been fighting from here, Fitzroy Somerse had realized that this was the weak point of the Allied line.

It's just that the opportunity was missed at that time, in order to prevent the British from plugging this loophole, it became the object of the Russian army's feint attack in the later period.

The Sardinian army on the opposite side was also very cooperative, and it was common to fire guns into the sky, and the two sides made a very fierce fight.

Montes was fooled, really thinking that the line had been torn apart by the Bulgarian partisans, who had just arrived in an unfamiliar environment and had been broken through by the partisans.

Coupled with the strain of troops, the Sardinians seemed to be working hard again, fighting well on the battlefield, withstanding the Russian attack, and he did not let the British army defend with them.

In the long run, Montes is doing the right thing. If the British army and the Sardinian army were to defend together, it is estimated that this elite British army would not be abandoned for a long time.

Mantua is not a good general, but he must be a good boss. In order to reduce the casualty rate of soldiers, he repeatedly emphasized safety first, and was deeply loved by soldiers.

In the eyes of the Sardinian soldiers, this was not their war, they went to war to earn that salary. So they've always been able to paddle, but they're absolutely not going to make a difference.

All this, General Mantua, who is well aware of human nature, is very clear, this army is his political capital for his future return to the Kingdom of Sardinia, and it is necessary to buy the hearts of the army.

He can't lead everyone to win the battle, snatch the spoils of war and make a fortune. Then only the generals who lead everyone to save their lives and value the lives of soldiers will be welcomed.

Now it's a big trouble, and the Russians on the opposite side actually don't cooperate, and Mantua has a headache. Give up the line of defense and run away, just think about it, if he really does, the angry British will definitely kill him directly.

And what about the allies? Could it be that the Kingdom of Sardinia could do anything to the British except to protest?

A middle-aged officer suggested: "General, why don't we make a hole at the junction with the British line and let the Russians pass, even if the British find fault after the war, we can put the blame on them." ”

Reprimanded by the British every day, the Sardinians also have tempers, and the disparity in treatment exacerbates this dissatisfaction.

Nominally, everyone's supplies are the same, but when they arrive at the place, the British can always get some supplies such as fruits, vegetables, potatoes, and bread.

Due to the limited number, the British could only obtain it by officers, so naturally they did not have their share.

Even a general like Mantua was not much better treated, and if he wanted to improve his food, he had to pay bribes to the British quartermaster.

It was not that they did not protest to the British, but the British bureaucrats took out the contract signed between the two countries, which clearly stated: the British Empire provided logistics for 20,000 Sardinian soldiers.

Since it is said that it is "soldiers", then they can only enjoy the treatment of soldiers. In the eyes of the Sardinian officers, it was no longer a matter of mere treatment to equate them with soldiers, but also to insult their dignity.

In this case, even the commander of the coalition forces, Lieutenant General Montes, could not do anything.

The bureaucrats in London are not something he can afford to provoke, they all do things according to the rules, in full compliance with British law, and it is useless to appeal to the country.

There is no way on the London side, can you ask the Ottomans to provide some?

Obviously, this is impossible, just look at the situation of the Ottoman army, in addition to the high-level officers' salaries, the low-level soldiers also need British troops.

If it weren't for the machinery of the bureaucrats in London, who had been distributing supplies according to the standard number at the time of departure, Montes had distributed the extra beef jerky and biscuits to the Ottoman army, and the Ottoman soldiers on the front line would now be fighting hungry.

Mantua shook his head and said, "We can't do this, if we find it down afterwards, we won't be able to escape it." ”

It's okay to pit teammates, but you have to be skillful, and if you don't do it well, you can put it in. This kind of thing that has no technical content and directly lets go of the defense line, Mantua will not do.

"What then? The Russians are attacking so fiercely that our losses are very heavy, and I am afraid that we will not be able to withstand it for long. An officer said with a wry smile

Mantua frowned, lowered his voice and said, "This war can't go on, there is no need for us to stay and die for the Ottomans."

Ordered the troops to abandon the most advanced positions, and by the way, forgot the information on the deployment of British troops on the battlefield, and marked it more clearly.

Remember to use Bulgarian, the Russians can understand it anyway, this pot can only be used by the Ottomans, and it is very normal for them to have Russian spies in their army.

As soon as the line of defense was broken, we reduced our forces and moved into Kosovo and then returned to Thrace from Macedonia. ”

Obviously, he had been prepared for a long time, and even the escape route had been planned. If the British are awesome and block the attack of the Russians, then it is easy to do it, check the Russian spies in the coalition forces!

The first object of suspicion was the Ottoman army, which theoretically both the British and Sardinian armies were outsiders, and the Russians simply did not have time to infiltrate.