The news that Pleven had been captured by the Romanian army caused chaos in Sofia.

Prime Minister Radoslav, as head of government, immediately convened a meeting of high-level officials to discuss the response.

"Chief of Staff, haven't the soldiers outside the city changed their words?"

At the beginning of the meeting, Prime Minister Radoslav immediately asked Lieutenant General Ivanov, who was the chief of the General Staff.

As Lieutenant General Ivanov, who rushed back to Sofia from Thessaloniki overnight, shook his head and said. "I've just been to the barracks outside the city, and the situation is not promising. The soldiers were more emotional, and the barracks were full of proclamations of stopping the war. Even if these soldiers are reorganized, it will be difficult for them to continue fighting, and it will take a long time to reorganize. ”

Lieutenant General Ivanov's words made Prime Minister Radoslav very unwilling, and he asked without giving up. "Can you make Lieutenant General Kutinchev reorganize his army and fight again?"

Prime Minister Radoslav, fearing that Lieutenant General Ivanov would not understand, quickly stated the reasons for this. "As long as we can hold off the Romanians for five days, we will be able to get reinforcements. Reinforcements from Turkey will be able to take over the army in Thessaloniki, and General Zekov will be able to return to Sofia with his army, so that we will still have the strength to fight the Romanians. In addition, the German-Austrian troops will be able to arrive within ten days of the news from Germany, so we still have a chance. ”

In the face of Prime Minister Radoslav's agitated words, Lieutenant General Ivanov, as chief of staff, could not bear to hit him. But he had to make it clear to government officials, even though the outcome might not have been as good as they had hoped.

"Prime Minister, at present Lieutenant General Kutinchev's Sixth Army is less than half of its staff, and there is a serious shortage of weapons and equipment such as machine guns and artillery. More importantly, the Romanian army had been sending elite troops to follow the attack, leaving him with no time to reorganize his troops. Now the Sixth Army was on the verge of collapse and was really unable to hold back the strength of the Romanians. ”

Ivanov's words made Prime Minister Radoslav feel a little depressed, and he muttered in a voice that only he could hear. "How so?"

Then he asked. "Chief of Staff, is there no other way to stop the enemy's footsteps at the moment?"

Faced with the Prime Minister's inquiry, Lieutenant General Ivanov shook his head and said. "There is no other way at the moment. The only possibility now is for reinforcements from neighboring countries to arrive in Thessaloniki quickly, so that troops can be drawn back to Sofia. But in this case, it is necessary to place troops in Sofia to defend it. ”

Ivanov's words immediately caused a huge reaction.

"It's not going to work."

"It's not a good idea to hold on to Sofia."

"Can't you just change places?"

Listening to the voices of opposition, even Ivanov, who came up with the idea, knew how bad the decision was. The objection of these people is not that the defense of Sofia will destroy the capital, but that there is no hope of victory at the moment. Although Germany and Austria had defeated Russia, on the most important Western Front, the German army did not play a large role in the offensive of the British and French troops on the Western Front, and only now they had only reached the Marne line, which had advanced before.

However, compared with the last time when the German army was a little panicked, this time the French government directly announced that even if the German army took Paris, the French people would definitely not give in. This not only made Hindenburg and Ludendorff, who commanded the operation, feel a little bad, but also disappointed the Bulgarians who were hoping for it, and their desire to withdraw from the war was already in vain.

In fact, before the declaration of war in Romania, there was a consensus in Bulgaria. That is, the war hurt Bulgaria too much, so Bulgaria has always hoped that it would be able to withdraw from the war peacefully. However, it is a pity that neither Germany and Austria, which pulled it into the camp, nor Britain and France, which are opposed, are unwilling to let Bulgaria fight as their wish. Not to mention Serbia and Greece, with which he has territorial disputes.

And now in the face of Romania and the Entente, Bulgaria is divided. Among them, Prime Minister Radoslav was intent on withstanding attacks from both sides, and asked the allies to help them, pinning their hopes on the side of the Allies that they could not afford to lose casualties and German-Austrian death.

The other group was dominated by opposition parties, who proposed that Bulgaria could no longer fight and could take the lead in signing a treaty with the Entente to withdraw from the war. Because Bulgaria was the first country to withdraw from the war, then Britain and France, in order to leave room for negotiations between Germany and Austria, must not let Bulgaria lose too much.

Both groups of people have their own opinions, and neither of them is convinced by the other, so their approaches are also different in the face of this crisis.

In the barracks outside the city, soldiers who refused to fight were sitting together, and a middle-aged man dressed plainly and neatly dressed was giving a speech to the soldiers on the platform. "Soldiers, your desire to withdraw from the war is not at all excessive, and the government should not ignore your wishes. Here we need to let them know that the demands of the people must be met and that this war should not happen. Now the government has to make a decision, we can't just sit here and wait, now to let the government know what we're calling, they have to answer. ”

The atmosphere at the scene made some of the soldiers shout. "The government has to answer, we have to withdraw from the war."

After seeing the warm atmosphere, the middle-aged man who gave the speech also took the lead in chanting. "Peace and not war."

This sentence immediately detonated the scene, and everyone was chanting. "Peace and not war."

"What if the government doesn't promise us?"

"A change of government."

Slowly, the soldier's emotions were guided by the speaker, and the person who was watching from the side said to the person next to him with satisfaction. "Now that the soldiers are emotionally up, the next step will be to be dissatisfied with the government and the prime minister, and you need to cooperate more among the people. Let them sympathize with the soldiers, so that the puppet of the Germans can be removed from power, and Bulgaria can no longer remain on the broken ship of the barrel allies. ”

The speaker seemed to be very unhappy with Prime Minister Radoslav, and even used a puppet. However, his words made the people next to him agree very much, and they only heard the person next to him nod and answer.

"Rest assured, no one wants that person to remain in the prime minister's position."

It seems that there are still many people who are dissatisfied with Prime Minister Radoslav, and they can no longer suppress their inner thoughts and are desperate to let the prime minister step down.

The current situation made them think that it would not be difficult to remove the prime minister from power, and that the key to thinking about how to cease war with the Allies was the key to it. This requires them to work hard to give full play to their talents and help their motherland avoid the reckoning from Britain and France.