The War Court and Lap Pillow, Austria's Mandate of Heaven

Chapter 1125 Conquering Albania (Part )
Neither the Albanians nor the Ottomans expected the war to end so hastily.

The main battle turned into a one-sided beating. In fact, they overlooked some problems. The Albanian mountain people were not good at battles. They were good at guerrilla warfare. What destroyed them in the end was not a battle, but an ambush.

Outdated equipment, insufficient training, outdated tactics, loose organization, wrong intelligence, almost no supplies, and an impatient mentality.
Before the war, the Albanian mountain people had almost all the factors that were unfavorable to them. On the contrary, the Austrian army was well-rested and it was not surprising that they won by crushing the enemy in the end.

However, the Ottoman envoy was not panicked at this time. On the contrary, he became more excited, because such a tragic defeat would surely arouse the bloodiness of the mountain people, and then they would start a fight for revenge.

The facts were similar to what the Ottoman envoys thought. The courage of the mountain people was worthy of recognition. They were not frightened by the disastrous defeat, but instead prepared to take revenge on the Austrian Empire.

However, this time they did not form a coalition, but each tribe fought on its own. Although the scale became smaller, the organizational efficiency was greatly improved.

They began to destroy roads and bridges, burn villages, hide the elderly, the weak, women and children in the mountains, and then set up ambush points on both sides of the road to prepare to resist the Austrian attack with all their strength.

However, the Austrian army did not continue the attack, but retreated to the border area.

The behavior of the Austrian Empire seemed extremely unreasonable, because in the eyes of the Ottomans and the southern Albanian tribes, the Austrians should be very anxious and should want to quickly attack the heartland of the Ottoman Empire through the southern mountains.

So they were wrong from the beginning. Franz never thought of sending troops from Albania.

Even if the tribes in the southern mountains supported the Austrian Empire, the Austrian army would not be able to guarantee its supply lines if troops were sent from Albania.

There are no railways along the long mountain roads, so transportation can only rely on mules, horses and manpower.

If Franz sent out an army of 100,000 men, then in order to maintain this supply line in the mountains, a supply team of at least 300,000 men would be needed.

Three hundred thousand people may sound like a lot, but when you spread them out among the mountains, they are nothing.

At this time, the total population of the Austrian Empire in Albania was only a few hundred thousand people.

If they really wanted to send 400,000 or 500,000 people and the corresponding supplies to Albania, it would probably become a seriously unprofitable deal and a severe test for the entire Austrian Empire.

Even if we take a step back, it is hard to say that there will be no accidents if the mountain people, who are short of supplies but armed with weapons, watch herds of fat sheep passing by their doorsteps all day long.

Franz was not a warmongerer. He just skipped those useless stages and went straight to the last step.

Franz deployed troops in Albania only to support the Greeks and give them a helping hand at a critical moment.

Although the Greeks were united from top to bottom, the Ottomans could not deal with Austria, Russia, or Egypt. So could they not deal with just a tiny Greece?
After a period of waiting, it was the Albanians who became impatient first, because the expected large-scale attack did not occur, but the elite troops of the Austrian Empire never stopped their targeted attacks on hostile tribes.

The forts in the mountains have always been holy places in the hearts of the mountain people. These medieval fortresses built with huge stones in dangerous areas have withstood hundreds of years of wind and rain without ever falling. They are a symbol of the invincibility of the mountain people.

The mountain roads were narrow and rugged, and heavy artillery could not be transported at all. Light artillery could hardly cause enough damage, and the forts were often built in dangerous locations. Therefore, as long as the mountain people escaped into the forts, they would no longer be afraid of any powerful enemies.

However, times have changed. The holy land in the hearts of the mountain people is vulnerable to rockets. The corner ambush tactics that have been effective for thousands of years are no different from seeking death in the face of grenades. The southern mountains used to be their greatest support, but now the poor communication between them has become their biggest disadvantage.

As one fort after another was breached, civilians released by the Austrian army spread fear throughout the southern mountains.

Because they didn't know when the Austrian army would come, and who would be the next to come, the tribes in the southern mountains began to feel insecure.

Some tribes have begun to send people to contact the Austrian Empire privately, hoping to get the captives back, but they have still been flatly rejected by the Austrian side.

In fact, Franz had sent the prisoners to the mountains in northern Albania with the aim of continuing to dig a channel connecting to the Austrian Empire.

The project started in 1846, but according to the most optimistic estimates, it would not be completed until early 1851. Building a railway here would require another two to three years.

It's not that there are no roads in northern Albania, but most of them are in disrepair and too narrow to withstand the heavy traffic pressure.

At the same time, the location of some roads was problematic and not conducive to the future unified planning of the Austrian Empire, so these roads had to be rebuilt.

The road construction team now mainly consists of prisoners of war and criminals, as well as some conscripted civilians from northern Albania. In the future, Albanians will probably become the main force.

Although the road construction work was hard and often dangerous, the Austrian government's supply of supplies was not bad. At least they didn't have to worry about going hungry or having a full meal, and they could even eat meat occasionally.

However, the issue of meat caused a lot of trouble. Many local people did not eat pork for religious reasons, but the officials in charge of supplies ignored this point. Fierce conflicts broke out between the two sides, and even a riot was triggered.

A large number of casualties were caused during the period, and the officials were eventually dismissed and investigated.

The two main sources of meat for the Austrian Empire at the time were pork, beef, chicken, and duck. However, beef and duck meat was too expensive. Even the Austrian regular army could not afford it, let alone these prisoners.

The newly appointed Austrian officials once visited the colony of Tranquility, where the local Indians could not eat meat due to religious reasons.

But food without meat is not tasty, so the clever Indian chefs came up with a solution, which is to make the food into paste.

By adding some strong-flavored seasonings, it would be impossible to distinguish between the raw materials and the taste, thus solving the workers' food problem.

(The so-called seasoning here is not the usual spices, but anything that can change the original taste, including but not limited to horse urine, sheep dung, rotten fruits and vegetables, wild vegetables with strong flavors, insects, fish heads, and fish bones.)

This road is necessary if you want to conquer Albania. After solving the problem in southern Albania, you also need to build a road to connect with the Austrian Empire. Only in this way can it be possible.

There were more and more surrenderists among the southern tribes of Albania, a situation that Reshid Pasha did not want to see, so he offered a large reward.

Finally, one of the tribes proposed to take the initiative to attack again, and the tribes that had been frustrated in the negotiations all agreed.

The Southern Coalition was reorganized and the battle returned to the battlefield that the Austrians were most familiar with. As expected, the Albanian revenge army once again ran headlong into the Austrian encirclement, and the number of road construction teams increased again.