Mercenary I am the king

Chapter 1296 An Unspoken "Understanding"

Late at night after the first day of Operation Balance Beam, in the 1515 underground command post located in eastern Celia.

Omar, the top leader of the Iligo sector, has just ended another tense phone call with Ahmed, the commander of the Titrick front.

Due to the relentless bombing and attacks by the US air force, the defensive line formed by 1515 suffered greater losses than expected, but it barely withstood the first wave and even shot down a Black Hawk and damaged an Apache attack helicopter, which boosted morale somewhat.

However, the heavy anti-tank weapons and more anti-aircraft missiles he requested are still in short supply.

"How's the passage through Anbar?" he asked the coordinator.

"The first batch should already be on their way, taking the old road south of Mosul. Our people there bribed an officer at one of the checkpoints; he accepted a 'gift' and promised an eight-hour window. But what happened next..."

Omar rubbed his aching temples.

Such supply lines, obtained through bribery, are fragile and unreliable.

He had to make headquarters and higher-ups understand Titrick's importance and invest more resources in him.

He needed to contact the "Caliph" directly.

This thought filled him with both awe and apprehension.

Ibrahim Awad al-Badri al-Samarai, better known as Abu Bakr al-Bakdadi, was a self-proclaimed "Caliph" in 1515. To most lower-ranking commanders, he was a mysterious and distant spiritual figure rather than an everyday military leader.

However, Omar's "Northern Command" holds a special position, giving him direct access to information in case of emergencies.

After layers of encryption and transfers, nearly an hour later, a calm, deep, and slightly hoarse voice came through Omar's satellite phone.

There was no unnecessary small talk.

"A brief report on Titrick's situation."

Omar took a deep breath and described the battle situation in the most concise language.

The US-led coalition is applying pressure head-on, and its flank airborne operations have been thwarted, but the threat remains. While its own losses have been significant, morale is still high. The key lies in resupply and sustained troop deployment, especially weapons that can disrupt US air superiority.

There was silence on the other end of the phone for a moment.

Then, Bakdadi's voice rang out again, carrying an unquestionable authority:

“Titrik must become the graveyard of the Crusaders. It is not just a city, it is a banner, a testament. Wear them down, tie them down, and let the whole world see their incompetence and our resolve.”

“I understand, Caliph. But our supply lines, especially the route from Anbar through Mosul…”

"The passage will be clear."

Bakdadi interrupted him: “Continue to send warriors and deliver weapons. By all means. If necessary, use hidden reserves and mobilize all believers who can take up arms. Victory belongs to the patient and the reverent.”

call ended.

Omar put down the phone, feeling a surge of excitement, but also a vague sense of unease.

The Caliph said, "The passage will be open," his tone so certain that it seemed he had foreseen it all along.

Is it because they have confidence in the coercion and enticement of a fence-sitter like Samir?

still is……

Are there other, deeper reasons?
He shook his head, trying to dispel his distracting thoughts.

The will of the Caliph is the command.

He turned and issued a series of more radical instructions to the leaders who had been waiting behind him for orders—

Accelerate mobilization, expand recruitment, inventory and transport all stockpiled heavy weapons to the front lines, and bring out all the best and most valuable equipment, especially the Russian-made Kornet anti-tank missiles and the limited number of Igla anti-aircraft missiles that were originally reluctant to be used.

The flames of war in Titrick will burn even more fiercely because of a single sentence from beneath Raqqa.

The following day, on the outskirts of Titrick.

Colonel Kurt was forced to change his attack strategy.

The cost of a frontal assault and a flanking attack was too high, so he turned to a "strangulation" tactic: using absolute air superiority and artillery fire to launch continuous, high-precision strikes against the identified 1515 armed positions, assembly points, and supply routes on the outskirts of Titrick.

Meanwhile, ground troops shifted to defense, consolidating their positions, with the Kold's forces bearing the brunt of the frontal pressure, while Thunder Defence's elite squads were responsible for hunting down and counter-harassing.

The sky is almost never clear.

F-16s roared past, dropping precision-guided bombs that reduced suspected strongholds to rubble.

The A-10 "Warthog" attack aircraft, with its terrifying loiter time and its chilling 30mm GAU-8 cannon, swept away any vehicles and people that appeared in the open.

Like a patient falcon, the Apache attack helicopter hovers on the edge of air defense threats, using Hellfire missiles to target high-value targets.

From the air, the coalition forces appeared to have an overwhelming advantage.

New plumes of smoke continued to rise on the outskirts of the city, greatly suppressing the open activities of the 1515 armed group.

But on the ground, it's a completely different story.

The positions held by the Kold's forces were under immense psychological pressure.

Unlike regular troops, they lacked strong discipline and the will to fight continuously.

The 1515 armed group employed typical "sticky" tactics, never engaging in open battles, but instead using urban ruins, tunnel networks, and complex streets to carry out endless harassment.

For two days after the start of the war, sniping and artillery fire continued unabated in the Titrick region.

Snipers target officers, radio operators, and machine gunners.

Improvised explosive devices (IEDs) were cleverly placed at the entrance to the ruins, at road corners, and even under corpses.

Small groups of armed militants infiltrate and approach under cover of darkness or during sandstorms, launch brief attacks, and then quickly disappear into the rubble.

Those modified "truck-mounted cannons" were even more elusive, firing a few shots and then running away. Although their accuracy was questionable, they kept the Kold's soldiers in a constant state of tension, making it difficult for them to get a real rest.

Even more deadly is the threat to air defense.

The 1515 armed forces dispersed their limited man-portable air defense systems (MANPADS) and anti-aircraft machine guns into smaller, concealed deployments on the top floors of key buildings, inside partially collapsed buildings, and even on moving trucks.

They were highly disciplined and would never easily turn on their weapons to expose themselves, only firing briefly when they were highly confident of success.

This severely restricted the activities of coalition helicopters, drastically reduced the efficiency of transporting supplies and evacuating the wounded, and made aerial reconnaissance much more cautious.

The casualty figures for the Kolds began to rise sharply, and morale plummeted at a visible rate.

Many soldiers' faces were etched with exhaustion and fear, and they began to show signs of aversion to fighting.

The officers' reprimands and even the execution of deserters could not stop this trend of collapse.

In contrast, Thunder Defense's mercenaries demonstrated a high degree of professionalism.

Most of these mercenaries had served in the U.S. military. They occupied fortified buildings, constructed crossfire points, and used precise sniping, anti-tank missiles, and mortars to inflict heavy casualties on the attackers.

Their equipment was superior; night vision goggles and thermal imagers gave them a decisive advantage at night. However, their numbers were limited, making them more like isolated thorns embedded in the crumbling Kold's defenses.

The fighting continued into the second night. The 1515 militia launched a medium-sized night raid.

More than 600 militants, supported by a small number of pickup trucks, took advantage of the darkness and familiar terrain to silently infiltrate deep into Kold's position.

A brutal close-quarters battle broke out simultaneously in several city blocks.

The command post of one of Kold's battalions was attacked, and the battalion commander and chief of staff were killed on the spot, causing chaos and partial collapse of the battalion.

It wasn't until Thunder Defense's night combat team was urgently dispatched and used its thermal imaging advantage to clear out infiltrators house by house that the infiltrators were barely repelled and the battle line was stabilized, but at the cost of more than eighty casualties.

In the command center, Kurt frowned as he looked at the casualty reports and the ever-shrinking Kold's Line markings on the screen.

The air superiority did not translate into a decisive ground advantage; instead, it was like using an expensive drill to grind up an endless expanse of sand.

Meanwhile, in the direction of Mosul.

Samir's promised "eight-hour window" has long since passed, but the infiltration has not stopped.

The way the 1515 armed forces infiltrated Ilig across the border became more covert—vehicles no longer traveled in convoys, but were disguised as ordinary trucks transporting agricultural products, fuel, or building materials, in groups of two or three, taking advantage of loopholes in the "inspection schedule" provided by Samir's men, or simply taking detours along more remote desert trails.

The armed escorts also changed into civilian clothes and hid their weapons under the cargo.

Small groups of reinforcements, dozens or even hundreds of men, carrying rocket launchers, machine guns, and various anti-aircraft munitions, flowed into Titrick like tiny streams, continuously merging into the boiling pool of blood.

Most of them were directly thrown into brutal urban warfare, but some of their experienced veterans and technical equipment strengthened Ahmed's resilience at crucial moments.

By the afternoon of the third day, the fighting in the Titrick direction was still raging.

Meanwhile, in the direction of Baiji, a peaceful scene remains.

In the command center, Song Heping was closely monitoring the military operation organized by Colonel Kurt.

For a PMC company owner, this kind of campaign-level operation is the best model for military research.

Once thoroughly analyzed, one can not only study the common tactics and characteristics of the 1515 armed forces, but also gain a deeper understanding of the command patterns of the US military.

This was an extremely rare opportunity, a once-in-a-lifetime learning opportunity, and Song Heping certainly wouldn't miss it.

As the moment approached, he rubbed his sore eyes, glanced one last time at the situation diagram on the screen, and then calmly began recording into the voice recorder:
"On the third day, the coalition's air strikes remained intense, but the ground advance nearly stalled. The 1515 militia employed typical flexible defense and attrition tactics, with the following key points: First, trading space for time, disregarding the gains and losses of forward positions; second, using low-cost personnel and improvised explosive devices to wear down the coalition's high-cost ammunition and elite soldiers' patience; and third, utilizing urban terrain to greatly weaken the coalition's technological advantage, especially the effectiveness of armor and air support."

He picked up some photos taken by a drone that had just been delivered to the table. The images showed a street that had just been strafed by an A-10, with several pickup truck wrecks still burning, but new figures were soon moving behind the windows of the surrounding buildings.

"The key variable lies in the limits of the Kold's forces. Their fighting spirit is rapidly waning, and their organization is declining. Once their defenses suffer a structural collapse, Thunder Defense's flanks will be completely exposed, and the balance of the battle could be reversed instantly."

He paused, his gaze sweeping across the more distant western border region, towards Mosul.

"Furthermore, continuous surveillance and reconnaissance have revealed that the 1515 armed group is still carrying out the transport of troops and supplies. If this continues, it will fundamentally shake the expected attrition rate of the campaign..."

At the same time, in a highly secluded safe house somewhere in Celia
Bakdadi sat behind a simple wooden chair, with a military map of the Middle East spread out in front of him.

He wore a plain black robe and a turban, his thick beard was neatly trimmed, and his deep eyes calmly gazed at the location of Titrick on the map.

Besides him, the only people in the room were his two most trusted advisors—military advisor Abu Abdul and Abu Hayan, who was in charge of intelligence and external liaison.

Are reinforcements still continuing to enter Titrick?

Bakdadi's voice wasn't loud, but it seemed to make the air in the room freeze for a moment.

“Yes, Caliph,” Abu Abdul replied. “Over the past three days, another four to five thousand fighters, along with a batch of anti-tank weapons and anti-aircraft ammunition, have infiltrated the area controlled by Samir.”

Bakdadi's fingers were interlocked, and he tapped the table lightly, making a clicking sound.

“Samir… I feel like our infiltration and support of Titrick have been going too smoothly these past few days…”

This was the doubt in his mind.

Based on his understanding of Song Heping, his subordinates couldn't be so incompetent as to allow such a large-scale reinforcement to continuously enter northwestern Iligo and into Titrick...

It's hard to believe that they obtained the passage by successfully bribing some officers within the "Liberation Forces".

Why have I never been able to successfully bribe them before?

Just as he was racking his brains trying to figure it out, Abu Hayan stepped forward and whispered:
“Caliph, our intelligence personnel also find this somewhat…unusual. They report that Samir seems to be deliberately letting us in.”

"Intentionally opened the door..."

Bakdadi muttered to himself, a thoughtful glint in his eyes.

After a long silence, he looked up at his two advisors and asked, "What are your thoughts?"

Abu Khayan lowered his voice and said, "Caliph, we've analyzed the American commander of this operation, Kotter, and the Thunder Defense they hired. They undoubtedly want to win, to take Titrick quickly. But Song Heping's ideas are probably not that simple..."

He walked up to the map and pointed it out:

"Tetrix is ​​a tough nut to crack. What will happen if the Americans take it too easily? They will regain control of the Northwest region, and might even drive Song Heping out. That's probably not a consequence Song Heping wants to see..."

“You mean,” Bakdadi said slowly, “that someone wants the battle at Titrick to be more intense, longer, and more costly? Including… costing the Americans their own resources and prestige?”

"This is just speculation, Caliph. But unusually smooth infiltration on the battlefield often indicates complex games played outside the battlefield."

Abu Hayan said, "If their allies have differing interests, or even if some want to use us to weaken certain opponents or increase their bargaining power in future negotiations... then turning a blind eye to the situation in the Mosul direction, or even secretly letting things slide, is not entirely impossible. After all, for some bystanders, it might be the ideal outcome to see our soldiers and the American elite bleeding at Titrick."

Bakdadi remained silent for a long time.

This analysis resonated with a certain vague intuition deep within him.

He recalled countless examples in the history of warfare of how external powers exploited local conflicts to achieve their own strategic goals.

“So,” he finally concluded, “if this is a play, a play where some people want us and the Americans to both suffer losses, then what should we do?”

A glint of fanaticism flashed in Abu Abdul's eyes:
“Caliph, we can turn the tables on them! Since they might be deliberately holding back, hoping we'll commit more and escalate the war, then we'll grant their wish! But not according to their script, but according to ours! We'll commit enough forces not only to hold Titrick, but also to inflict a crushing defeat on the Americans there! This will be a fatal blow to the morale of the New Crusade, and a golden opportunity to demonstrate our strength and resolve to the world! The risk is great, but if successful, the rewards will be unprecedented!”

Bakdadi's gaze fell once again on Titrick on the map.

That city, at this moment, is not only a strategic location, but also a gambling table full of symbolic significance.

“How much reserve force do we have available in Anbar and Nineveh?” he asked.

"If we mobilize all our forces and disregard the temporary weakening of other fronts, we can gather another 8,000 to 10,000 soldiers within three days and squeeze out a considerable amount of weapons and ammunition," Abu Abdul estimated.

“Three days is too long. Titrick’s brother can’t wait three days.”

Bakdadi shook his head. "The first batch, I want at least three thousand experienced soldiers, carrying as many anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons as possible, to enter Titrick through every possible channel tomorrow! Tell Ahmed to hold it at all costs, reinforcements are on their way!"

“Then,” he turned around, his gaze piercing,

"Call upon all believers who can hear our voice to march toward Titrick! Tell them that a crucial battle is taking place there, one that will determine the future of their faith! We must send not only warriors, but also the will and determination of martyrs!"

"As for the road to Mosul..."

He paused. "Keep using it. Increase the delivery rate. If it really is a gap left intentionally by someone, then we'll turn that gap into a channel to pierce their hearts!"

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(End of this chapter)