Chapter 291: The confusion between the simple and the complex

At 6am on 3rd March, as the first rays of sunshine struggled to break out from the horizon, they added a little warmth to the cold morning in the desert city of Basra.

A few lizards slowly crawl out of their burrows by the river and onto the stones, lazily preparing to receive the warmth from the sun. Suddenly, however, they feel the ground suddenly and without warning, began to shake. These poor little creatures had no idea what was going on and were so scared that they quickly used the last of their cold body's strength to crawl back into the cave and cautiously watch the outside world.

In their eyes, they saw many huge iron-shelled creatures and many people lined up in an orderly attack formation heading across the river. These were the US armoured troops that had begun the attack on the eastern bank of Basra. However, the troops stopped advancing after reaching the bridge, which puzzled many soldiers.

'Hey, man, can someone tell me why we're stopping here? Has some commander suddenly realised that he didn't wipe his arse when he went to the toilet, so we're waiting here for him to go back and change his underpants?'

One soldier leaned against the tank and teased his comrades, to which a cautious comrade speculated: 'I think it may be a fear of an ambush by the Iraqi army across the river. After all, the Desert Tigers once suffered greatly in Iraq...'

Before he could finish his sentence, he was interrupted by another soldier: 'That was the First Armoured Division of the Expeditionary Force's shame, not ours. The 6th War 1st Division faced the encirclement of the three Huaxia Group but we still broke out. That was the glory my grandfather left me, and it was also the glory of the 6th Division. Now it's just a bunch of sissies, the Iraqi army. What's there to be afraid of?'

His words were echoed by the others: 'That's right. At least I haven't seen any Iraqi army that could even raise their guns to resist a little bit on the way here. As far as I can see, our arrival in Basra is just going to add new glory to the 6th Division's banner!'

'Who says it isn't? I read the newspaper today, the whole world is calling on me to end this fucking war as soon as possible, I don't think we should let them down.'

'I think that perhaps we should ask the officer in charge for permission to go over to the other side. If we can get there first, we can prove to the world that there are only a bunch of women and children with guns and cannons over there.'

These soldiers joked proudly, not taking the Iraqi defenders across from them seriously at all. In their view, the difficulties that the Iraqi defenders across from them could cause them were perhaps not as great as the Tigris River.

This was not a sign of underestimating the enemy, but rather the pride of the 6th Marine Division. As the oldest US marine division, it had participated in many important battles since World War II, and had even successfully broken out of the encirclement by the world's peak light infantry, the Chinese People's Volunteers, at the Chosin Reservoir. Although while their equipment and the cold helped them considerably, their excellent combat training should not be underestimated. For this reason, the 6th War Division received many presidential commendations and even the honour of being named an outstanding troop by the president.

Because of for everyone in the 6th Division, taking Basra was a piece of cake. The only thing that was unpredictable was whether the battle would end in two or three days.

And Basra Basrah is the mouth of the Tigris River. Taking it and emptying the mines would allow aircraft carriers to enter, and then all kinds of combat ships, following the river north, could complete the ultimate strategic goal of attacking Diab Al-Din.

But just such a force full of confidence that it could end the desert war, but just before the imminent attack, it suddenly received an order to retreat.

'My My God, why? Has our general been turned into an idiot? The enemy is within our grasp, why retreat at this time? Whoever gave this order is an enemy spy!'

The the order to retreat, everyone in the 6th War Division, who had been fighting with high morale, was extremely surprised, because the order was simply incomprehensible. However, all the commanders kept repeating the same order: 'This is an order personally issued by the Commander-in-Chief of the Central Army, Four-Star General Norman, and it must be carried out!'

Of course For a disciplined force like the 6th War Division, once an order to retreat is given, they will execute the military order no matter how unreasonable it is . Everyone just couldn't understand why the General of Normandy had given such an order, and had given up a victory that was almost within reach.

In fact, not only were the officers and soldiers of the 6th Infantry Division extremely confused, but everyone else who was paying attention to the battle was also very confused.

American President Walsh was woken from sleep by a phone call from Christo, who directly questioned him: 'Mr President, I don't mean to question your intelligence, but I don't understand the situation. Why did you decide to withdraw the 6th Army from Basra? Or did you choose the wrong commander? Or did your commander betray you?'

Walsh was Walsh was very surprised by Christo's phone call, because he remembered giving Normandy the order to take the entire city of Basra before going to sleep. How could the order to attack have become an order to retreat in less than an hour's sleep?

If if his assistant hadn't reminded him that Christo's words were true and that the 6th Army was indeed withdrawing from Basra, he would have suspected it to be a very bad joke.

There was Walsh could only try to calm Christo down by saying that he needed time to investigate. As soon as he had hung up with Christo, he told his assistant to prepare the call to Normandy. A few minutes later, Walsh was already in his office, connected to the Middle East.

'Mr. Mr President, I have been waiting for your call since the order to retreat was given to the 6th Army Division,' Normandy said first.

This opening line took Walsh by surprise, but as an old politician, Walsh of course did not show any emotions easily. He remained calm and asked, 'This is the most important reason why I got out of bed and called you. I want to know what made you make this decision.'

'Because because the whole battle of Basra was a conspiracy designed by the enemy, but we were unaware of it and fell headlong into it,' said Normandy.

'I think you could put it more clearly,' Walsh suggested.

'Just At the same time as I ordered the 6th Army to launch a full-scale attack on Basra, the Rumaila oil field was attacked. According to intelligence reports, it is a huge oil field controlled by the Hussein family in Iraq and is also the oil field that provides oil for the current oil-for-food programme,' Normandy said.

This answer made Walsh feel his head grow instantly large, because this oil-for-food programme was not just a simple case of humanitarian aid, but humanitarian aid that had been hijacked by domestic public opinion.

Previously Due to media exposure of the lives of civilians in Iraq, public opinion in the country indicated that the war in Iraq should not be repaid by ordinary people. Therefore, the oil-for-food programme was only started under the auspices of the International Red Cross.

Wohl was not unaware of who was behind the so-called oil-for-food programme, nor was he unaware that with the current rising oil prices, the consortium that led the programme could actually make how much wealth they can make from this scheme. But now the problem for him is that public opinion across the country is watching this scheme, and he himself can only ensure the smooth implementation of the scheme carefully, otherwise he will also be labelled a 'tyrant'.

But just at this the oil fields in Iraq that were part of the oil-for-food programme were attacked, which was undoubtedly a big blow to him.

'Have you found out who did it?' Walsh asked.

'Not yet no, but it is speculated that it is most likely the Kurdish forces from the north, but the problem is that they are using American weapons,' said Normandy.

Normandy's answer undoubtedly smashed the last shred of hope in Walsh's heart, because if the attack on Rumaila was carried out with Soviet weapons, then they could still blame the Iraqi government and say that they themselves had thwarted the plan. But it was clear that the enemy had not made such a low-level mistake and left such a big gap.

After thinking about it WalshquotedNormandy: 'General, you were right to abandon your decision to continue the attack on Basra. Then immediately investigate the attack on the Rumaila oilfield . If possible, we should also send our troops to guard these Iraqi oil fields. Regardless of the final outcome, we must give the media an explanation.'

'I'm already done that, Mr President,' Normandy replied. Then he paused and asked, 'One question: is all this really the influence of that man? Is that why you ordered me to stop at all costs the Chinese Zhou Ming?'

'To be honest to tell you the truth, I was also under pressure from certain consortia to intercept that day, otherwise they would refuse to pay the military expenses.' Walsh had said Walsh with some helplessness, 'I originally just thought it was an extremely bad joke or a harsh personal grudge, but I didn't expect the Chinese to go this far, convincing the Kurds to join the war with their weapons, using public opinion to launch the oil-for-food programme, and constantly causing us trouble...'

At the end of this Walsh could not continue, so he let out a heavy sigh.

'Mr President, I feel that the Iraq issue is perhaps more complicated than we thought,' Normandy Walsh, 'In fact, judging from the recent interception by the Joint Chiefs of Staff that night, it may not be a coincidence that the Chinese Zhou Ming's plane managed to break through the interception of hundreds of planes and finally successfully reached Badina, but rather the result of human intervention.'

'Because yesterday investigators found that the two fighter jets that crashed that night were not destroyed by weather conditions, but by their own missiles,' said Normandy.

This news made Walthourne frown, and after a while he asked, 'What does this mean?'

'The investigation team has come up with an interesting theory: one of the planes destroyed the other, fired a missile, then manoeuvred the plane to fly over the missile at sonic speed, and finally let itself be destroyed, creating the scene of an accident caused by the weather that caused the missile to explode,' said Normandy.

Walsh was wasn't in a hurry to express an opinion, but instead asked quietly, 'Is this method feasible?'

'In theory it is feasible, but it requires a high level of flying skill from the pilot. Unfortunately, due to the sudden sandstorm that night, all the pilots deployed were prospective ace pilots, including the two lost Keeven and Harman.' Normandy said .

Walsh, who had received an answer, fell silent again. After a long pause, he said very seriously to Normandy, 'This investigation ends with you. I don't want anyone else to know about this, understand? Perhaps this will the stability of the federation.'

'I understand, Mr. President, which is why I said that the issues behind this war are far more complex than the war itself,' said Normandy.

'Maybe,' Walsh let out a sigh, "maybe I should find an opportunity to have a good talk with that Mr. Zhou Ming from Huaxia.'