The Invasion of India: the tiger is partitioned by the bear and the Chinese dragon
While most of the British Socialist Republics had been occupied before the fall of London, India had remained free from occupation, and the Axis powers had realized that. Relations between the Communational and the Axis were never high, at most reaching opportunism level. Fascism and Communism, as enemy ideologies, were bound to fight one another eventually. After the fall of the English Socialist Republic, however, Stalin realized nothing could stop him to invade India. Most importantly, India could have been used as a staging point for an invasion of Russia in the South. The Chinese Nationalist government realized that too, and a force for the occupation of India was immediately sent. Operation Nikitin, named after Russian explorer Afanasy Nikitin, had begun.
Indian troops marching into captivity
The British high commands, in the aftermath of the armistice with the Allies/Central Powers, had issued instructions for commanders and troops about the behaviour that should have been held in case of a withdrawal from the war and possible Russian aggressions; these orders were the No. 111 Order issued by the Staff of the British Army on 10 August, the OP 44 Memorandum issued on 16 August by General Percy Hobart (on John Aldam Aizlewood's orders) to the major peripheral commands (only twelve copies), and the No. 1 and No. 2 Memorandums issued on 19 August by the Supreme Command to the Staffs of the three armed forces, containing indications about the deployment of the forces in the different theaters.
These were however general guidelines, lacking details and nearly inapplicable (also due to excessive secrecy measures); they were ineffective and they contributed, along with the vagueness of the new British administration's message on the evening of 18 August, to confuse the peripheral commands of the British forces about the unexpected news of the change of sides and the aggressiveness of the Russian forces, thus resulting in insecurity and indecision among those commands. The situation of the Indian/British armed forces was worsened by the contradictory instructions issued by Aizlewood in the evening of 18 August, which restricted any initiative to mere defensive measures in case of Russian attacks, and by Hobart in the night of 19 August, who especially demanded to avoid turmoil and ‘seditions’ among the troops.
Faced with the efficiency of the Russian units, which immediately demanded surrender or collaboration with threats and intimidations, most of the British commanders, also fearful of the impressive reputation of military capacity of the Nasist Army and many times tired by an unliked long lasting war, soon abandoned any intent of resistance; with a few exceptions, the troops, left with neither orders nor leaders, often dispersed.
The situation of the Russian forces in India was actually a difficult one; Andrei Getman, with his Army Group B, had the easier task of occupying the northern regions and neutralizing any resistance by British forces in that area, but Iosif Gusakovsky, in command of Army Group C, was in great difficulty after August 18: after the bombing of Khairpur, he barely managed to receive the communication of the coded word "Nikitin".
The Stavka considered the possibility of the loss of the eight Rusian divisions in Southern India; Semyon Budyonny, however, showed great capability, and his forces fought with ability and effectiveness.
In order to defend the political and military leadership and to resist to a possible Russian attack, the British commands had concentrated a considerable number of troops in the area around New Delhi; the main force consisted in the Indian Armored Battallion of General Hobart, composed of the 79th Armoured Division, the 42nd Armoured Division, the 10th Armoured Division and the 20th Infantry Division. Other units tasked with the defense of New Delhi were the 254th Indian Tank Brigade, the 14th Indian Infantry Division and some battalions of the 11th Infantry Division and 7th Indian Infantry Division; overall, there were about 55,000 men and 200 armored fighting vehicles, with a numerical superiority on the Russian forces in the area.
The Russian forces near New Delhi consisted in the 11th Airborne Corps of General Vasily Polikarpovich Ivanov, headquartered in Rohtak; the Corps comprised the 111th Guards Airborne Regiment (General Fyodor Tolbukhin), ready for action south of New Delhi, and the 1185th Guards Artillery Regiment, reinforced by an armored battalion of the 26th Tankovy Division, stationed between Sonipat and Meerut, north of New Delhi. These units comprised about 26,000 men and some hundreds armored fighting vehicles, and were ordered to attack the city by Gusakovsky in the evening of 18 August: already at 20:30 they attacked Khekra, and the Russian paratroopers immediately started advancing south, overcoming sporadic resistance by the 254th Indian Tank Brigade in Farrukhnagar, Gurgaon, and Faridabad.
Then, the 2nd Parachutist Division overpowered some units of the 254th Indian Tank Brigade and 7th Indian Infantry Division and after half an hour, advancing in the centre of the city. Meanwhile, the 1185th Guards Artillery Regiment supported the 3rd Tankovy Division allowing it to advanced from north, but was halted near Ghaziabad by the 79th Armoured Division (General Miles Dempsey) and suspended its advance after some negotiations. The paratroopers, instead, went ahead with their action; fierce fighting erupted at Lajpat Nagar between the Russian forces and the 7th Indian Infantry Division, supported by armored units of the 79th Armoured Division, but at 02:00 on 19 August the city was under Russian controll.
Meanwhile British forces in Burma and Nord-Eastern India amounted to over 30 divisions and 500,000 soldiers, who had been engaged from the start of the war against Siamese forces. British forces in the area now consisted of the 2nd Army (General Kenneth Anderson), of the 9th Army (General William Holmes), stationed in the border with Nepal and under the control of Army Group East of General Henry Maitland Wilson, and of the 11th Army (General George Giffard).
British troops in the area were exhausted after years of fighting Siamese/Japanese troops and were mixed with numerous Chinese divisions (over 20 divisions of Army Group F of Field Marshal Sun Yuanliang, and of Army Group E of General Du Yuming) whom, on 19 August, immediately severed all ties with Britain and joined Russia in the fight against the former "ally". With confusing and vague orders, and confused by the Chinese attack on Nepal and Tiber, units quickly disintegrated and many soldiers were disarmed, captured and deported to China. However, British soldiers in this area fought with more determination than the units left in Western India, suffering heavy casualties and harsh reprisals by the Chinese units.
Some units managed to escape capture and joined Siamese forces, subsequently fighting alongside them. Chinese forces, less numerous but more mobile, determined and well-led, and enjoying complete air supremacy, quickly prevailed, brutally crushing British resistance, often summarily executing British officers, and occupying all the region of Western India; 393,000 British soldiers were captured and deported, about 29,000 joined the Axis, 20,000 joined the Siamese formations, and 57,000 dispersed or hid and tried to survive.
The 5th, 11th and 18th Corps which formed the 2nd Army, were attacked by five Chinese divisions; General Hubert Gough, commander of the 11th Corps, started negotiations in Katmandu and then abandoned his troops on 24 August, leaving them to be captured; Patna also fell without resistance. On 21 August the divisions stationed in Vishakhapatnam were ordered to avoid any resistance, but the subordinate units refused, and started fighting against the Chinese. The 15th (Scottish) Infantry Division, 23rd (Northumbrian) Division and 80th Infantry (Reserve) Division were dissolved, whereas the 56th (London) Infantry Division and the 54th (East Anglian) Infantry Division resisted in Vizianagaram and Srikakulam; the 59th (Staffordshire) Infantry Division surrendered on 20 August and its commanders were deported, while in Malkangiri the 18th Infantry Division made an agreement with Indian revolutionaries and defended the town till 07 September against the 7th Mountain Division; after surrender, three British generals and 46 officers were executed. The 1st Cavalry Division, stationed in the Indian coast, was dispersed.
Chinese troops raise the Chinese flag in Bangalore
Already on 20 August, the Chinese high command and Stavka command issued a first communiqué announcing the annihilation of the British military apparatus. While many British units would fight on for days or weeks in the interior of India, and many troops managed to escape reaching Siam, the major units of the British Army had effectively dissolved in the space of some days suffering widespread desertions.
With the success of "Nikitin" and its secondary operations, the Nasist Army and the National Revolutionary Army achieved an important strategic success by securing the most important strategic positions in South East Asia and overcoming great operative difficulties; it also captured large quantities of weapons, equipment and resources that turned useful in integrating the depleting resources of Russia and China. Over 20,000 British soldiers were killed in battle and nearly 800,000 were captured; over 13,000 of them were not recognized prisoner of war status and were instead classified as "British Military Internees" and exploited for forced labour in Russia and China's war industry. Up to 50,000 of them died in Sino-Russian captivity.
The Allies/Central Powers, whose objectives in India were rather limited (to push British forces out of threatening positions in Siam and keep them occupied) and whose strategic planning presented heavy conflicts between Siamese/Japanese and Americans, were not able to exploit the Indian collapse ad for a long time India remained occupied. Also, the Russians and Chinese, however, had to divert a considerable number of mobile and skilled units to India, troops that would have been more useful on the main Eastern, Siberian and Chinese fronts, but that allowed them to keep war away from the southern regions of Russia, to protect rich industrial regions of high importance in weapons production and to achieve political and propaganda objective of creating an Imperial Commissariat in India for Russia and an Indian fascist government for China.
The sudden and complete collapse of the Indian forces was mainly caused by the mistakes made by the political and military leadership, the unrealism of their initiatives, misunderstanding about the real consistence and objectives of the Allies/Central Powers by the decision of the British leadership to surrender to the Allies/Central Powers, but not to fight the Axis. The lack of clear orders to the subordinate commands, the importance given to the personal safety of the leadership and its institutional continuity, even to the detriment of the capability of resistance of the armed forces, led to the disintegration of the units, abandoned without a leader to the Axis attacks and reprisals despite some instances of valour and fighting spirit.
I hope you guys like this new update! Be sure to like(if you like it), comment(please comment so I can learn what your opinion is) and.....follow I guess.
While most of the British Socialist Republics had been occupied before the fall of London, India had remained free from occupation, and the Axis powers had realized that. Relations between the Communational and the Axis were never high, at most reaching opportunism level. Fascism and Communism, as enemy ideologies, were bound to fight one another eventually. After the fall of the English Socialist Republic, however, Stalin realized nothing could stop him to invade India. Most importantly, India could have been used as a staging point for an invasion of Russia in the South. The Chinese Nationalist government realized that too, and a force for the occupation of India was immediately sent. Operation Nikitin, named after Russian explorer Afanasy Nikitin, had begun.
Indian troops marching into captivity
The British high commands, in the aftermath of the armistice with the Allies/Central Powers, had issued instructions for commanders and troops about the behaviour that should have been held in case of a withdrawal from the war and possible Russian aggressions; these orders were the No. 111 Order issued by the Staff of the British Army on 10 August, the OP 44 Memorandum issued on 16 August by General Percy Hobart (on John Aldam Aizlewood's orders) to the major peripheral commands (only twelve copies), and the No. 1 and No. 2 Memorandums issued on 19 August by the Supreme Command to the Staffs of the three armed forces, containing indications about the deployment of the forces in the different theaters.
These were however general guidelines, lacking details and nearly inapplicable (also due to excessive secrecy measures); they were ineffective and they contributed, along with the vagueness of the new British administration's message on the evening of 18 August, to confuse the peripheral commands of the British forces about the unexpected news of the change of sides and the aggressiveness of the Russian forces, thus resulting in insecurity and indecision among those commands. The situation of the Indian/British armed forces was worsened by the contradictory instructions issued by Aizlewood in the evening of 18 August, which restricted any initiative to mere defensive measures in case of Russian attacks, and by Hobart in the night of 19 August, who especially demanded to avoid turmoil and ‘seditions’ among the troops.
Faced with the efficiency of the Russian units, which immediately demanded surrender or collaboration with threats and intimidations, most of the British commanders, also fearful of the impressive reputation of military capacity of the Nasist Army and many times tired by an unliked long lasting war, soon abandoned any intent of resistance; with a few exceptions, the troops, left with neither orders nor leaders, often dispersed.
The situation of the Russian forces in India was actually a difficult one; Andrei Getman, with his Army Group B, had the easier task of occupying the northern regions and neutralizing any resistance by British forces in that area, but Iosif Gusakovsky, in command of Army Group C, was in great difficulty after August 18: after the bombing of Khairpur, he barely managed to receive the communication of the coded word "Nikitin".
The Stavka considered the possibility of the loss of the eight Rusian divisions in Southern India; Semyon Budyonny, however, showed great capability, and his forces fought with ability and effectiveness.
In order to defend the political and military leadership and to resist to a possible Russian attack, the British commands had concentrated a considerable number of troops in the area around New Delhi; the main force consisted in the Indian Armored Battallion of General Hobart, composed of the 79th Armoured Division, the 42nd Armoured Division, the 10th Armoured Division and the 20th Infantry Division. Other units tasked with the defense of New Delhi were the 254th Indian Tank Brigade, the 14th Indian Infantry Division and some battalions of the 11th Infantry Division and 7th Indian Infantry Division; overall, there were about 55,000 men and 200 armored fighting vehicles, with a numerical superiority on the Russian forces in the area.
The Russian forces near New Delhi consisted in the 11th Airborne Corps of General Vasily Polikarpovich Ivanov, headquartered in Rohtak; the Corps comprised the 111th Guards Airborne Regiment (General Fyodor Tolbukhin), ready for action south of New Delhi, and the 1185th Guards Artillery Regiment, reinforced by an armored battalion of the 26th Tankovy Division, stationed between Sonipat and Meerut, north of New Delhi. These units comprised about 26,000 men and some hundreds armored fighting vehicles, and were ordered to attack the city by Gusakovsky in the evening of 18 August: already at 20:30 they attacked Khekra, and the Russian paratroopers immediately started advancing south, overcoming sporadic resistance by the 254th Indian Tank Brigade in Farrukhnagar, Gurgaon, and Faridabad.
Then, the 2nd Parachutist Division overpowered some units of the 254th Indian Tank Brigade and 7th Indian Infantry Division and after half an hour, advancing in the centre of the city. Meanwhile, the 1185th Guards Artillery Regiment supported the 3rd Tankovy Division allowing it to advanced from north, but was halted near Ghaziabad by the 79th Armoured Division (General Miles Dempsey) and suspended its advance after some negotiations. The paratroopers, instead, went ahead with their action; fierce fighting erupted at Lajpat Nagar between the Russian forces and the 7th Indian Infantry Division, supported by armored units of the 79th Armoured Division, but at 02:00 on 19 August the city was under Russian controll.
Meanwhile British forces in Burma and Nord-Eastern India amounted to over 30 divisions and 500,000 soldiers, who had been engaged from the start of the war against Siamese forces. British forces in the area now consisted of the 2nd Army (General Kenneth Anderson), of the 9th Army (General William Holmes), stationed in the border with Nepal and under the control of Army Group East of General Henry Maitland Wilson, and of the 11th Army (General George Giffard).
British troops in the area were exhausted after years of fighting Siamese/Japanese troops and were mixed with numerous Chinese divisions (over 20 divisions of Army Group F of Field Marshal Sun Yuanliang, and of Army Group E of General Du Yuming) whom, on 19 August, immediately severed all ties with Britain and joined Russia in the fight against the former "ally". With confusing and vague orders, and confused by the Chinese attack on Nepal and Tiber, units quickly disintegrated and many soldiers were disarmed, captured and deported to China. However, British soldiers in this area fought with more determination than the units left in Western India, suffering heavy casualties and harsh reprisals by the Chinese units.
Some units managed to escape capture and joined Siamese forces, subsequently fighting alongside them. Chinese forces, less numerous but more mobile, determined and well-led, and enjoying complete air supremacy, quickly prevailed, brutally crushing British resistance, often summarily executing British officers, and occupying all the region of Western India; 393,000 British soldiers were captured and deported, about 29,000 joined the Axis, 20,000 joined the Siamese formations, and 57,000 dispersed or hid and tried to survive.
The 5th, 11th and 18th Corps which formed the 2nd Army, were attacked by five Chinese divisions; General Hubert Gough, commander of the 11th Corps, started negotiations in Katmandu and then abandoned his troops on 24 August, leaving them to be captured; Patna also fell without resistance. On 21 August the divisions stationed in Vishakhapatnam were ordered to avoid any resistance, but the subordinate units refused, and started fighting against the Chinese. The 15th (Scottish) Infantry Division, 23rd (Northumbrian) Division and 80th Infantry (Reserve) Division were dissolved, whereas the 56th (London) Infantry Division and the 54th (East Anglian) Infantry Division resisted in Vizianagaram and Srikakulam; the 59th (Staffordshire) Infantry Division surrendered on 20 August and its commanders were deported, while in Malkangiri the 18th Infantry Division made an agreement with Indian revolutionaries and defended the town till 07 September against the 7th Mountain Division; after surrender, three British generals and 46 officers were executed. The 1st Cavalry Division, stationed in the Indian coast, was dispersed.
Chinese troops raise the Chinese flag in Bangalore
Already on 20 August, the Chinese high command and Stavka command issued a first communiqué announcing the annihilation of the British military apparatus. While many British units would fight on for days or weeks in the interior of India, and many troops managed to escape reaching Siam, the major units of the British Army had effectively dissolved in the space of some days suffering widespread desertions.
With the success of "Nikitin" and its secondary operations, the Nasist Army and the National Revolutionary Army achieved an important strategic success by securing the most important strategic positions in South East Asia and overcoming great operative difficulties; it also captured large quantities of weapons, equipment and resources that turned useful in integrating the depleting resources of Russia and China. Over 20,000 British soldiers were killed in battle and nearly 800,000 were captured; over 13,000 of them were not recognized prisoner of war status and were instead classified as "British Military Internees" and exploited for forced labour in Russia and China's war industry. Up to 50,000 of them died in Sino-Russian captivity.
The Allies/Central Powers, whose objectives in India were rather limited (to push British forces out of threatening positions in Siam and keep them occupied) and whose strategic planning presented heavy conflicts between Siamese/Japanese and Americans, were not able to exploit the Indian collapse ad for a long time India remained occupied. Also, the Russians and Chinese, however, had to divert a considerable number of mobile and skilled units to India, troops that would have been more useful on the main Eastern, Siberian and Chinese fronts, but that allowed them to keep war away from the southern regions of Russia, to protect rich industrial regions of high importance in weapons production and to achieve political and propaganda objective of creating an Imperial Commissariat in India for Russia and an Indian fascist government for China.
The sudden and complete collapse of the Indian forces was mainly caused by the mistakes made by the political and military leadership, the unrealism of their initiatives, misunderstanding about the real consistence and objectives of the Allies/Central Powers by the decision of the British leadership to surrender to the Allies/Central Powers, but not to fight the Axis. The lack of clear orders to the subordinate commands, the importance given to the personal safety of the leadership and its institutional continuity, even to the detriment of the capability of resistance of the armed forces, led to the disintegration of the units, abandoned without a leader to the Axis attacks and reprisals despite some instances of valour and fighting spirit.
I hope you guys like this new update! Be sure to like(if you like it), comment(please comment so I can learn what your opinion is) and.....follow I guess.