Chapter 171 The 48th Independent Brigade is looking for help
It was pitch dark late at night, I couldn't see my fingers when I stretched my legs, and everything was quiet.
Along the Zhengtai Railway, a large number of troops approached one after another, and as the time came to ten o'clock in the morning.
The cadres directing the operations immediately issued the order to attack the enemy, and immediately a large number of Eighth Route Army troops began to attack the predetermined targets.
Two breakout combat units on the left and right sides of the 129th Division immediately went into action, and a fierce battle began.
Strings of flames sprayed out, and dense bullets were shot out.
The grenades were fired one after another, targeting the bunkers and gun towers with precision.
The infantry opened fire, and the engineers carried explosive packages and quickly advanced to the east of the cover.
For a time, there were battlefields everywhere along the Zhengtai Railway, and troops from both sides were involved in fierce fighting.
The Zhengtai Railway is a railway from Shanxi Province to Zhengding in Hebei Province. It crosses the Taihang Mountains and connects the Tongpu Railway and the Pinghan Railway.
The North China Front regarded the railway as a vital lifeline and dispatched a certain number of troops to defend it.
The main request is that the defense forces can be independently combined into the 8th Brigade, and a part of the 9th Brigade can be independently combined into the far-reaching areas of Shanxi Province to assist in defense.
As for Ji Province, there are no troops directly under the front army, the 110th Division, to be responsible for the defense of that section of the railway in Hebei Province.
"Old Ding, he's such a good boy, our new second regiment is amazing."
"Every squad has a light machine gun, every platoon has a grenade launcher, and every battalion has a fucking heavy machine gun."
"No wonder Brigadier Chen specially equipped our regiment with two mountain cannons. Our weapons and equipment are too powerful."
"The regiment directly has four 90MM mortars. He looked at the old main regiments and they don't have the weapons configuration like our regiment."
"I said we are not a grassroots group. Which grassroots group can have mortars and heavy machine guns."
At this time, in the eastern Shanxi area, the right wing attacked the combat troops.
Whether the New Second Regiment directly participated in the battle as the main force of the right-wing attack force, Ding Wei directly came to the front line to command.
More than a thousand troops were protected by mountain artillery and quickly advanced towards the Moon Army's gun tower stronghold.
As the entire New Second Regiment launched combat operations, the nearby brother troops were completely dumbfounded.
Not long after, several turrets and bunkers were easily captured by the New Second Regiment.
The leader of a brother unit found the leader Ding Wei and said with envy on his face.
At first, they knew that the New Second Group was a grassroots group, and they were confused as to how Hong made such an arrangement.
In such a demanding battle, the main force must be asked to participate in the battle.
It turns out that now that the battle is going on, the powerful firepower unleashed by the new second regiment will stun them.
The leaders of the two main regiments who were working together finally understood why Hong had such an arrangement.
"I'm not bragging, the regiment is directly under the control of four 90MM mortars, three infantry battalions, each infantry battalion has three infantry companies and one machine gun company."
"Each infantry company has nine light machine guns and three grenades, and the machine gun company has four heavy machine guns. If the rifle is not a formal rifle, it is not a Type 38."
"We should try to find out how many of the main regiments have the weapons and equipment of his new second regiment."
"Don't say we were dumbfounded, otherwise the Yue puppet troops in the gun tower stronghold would have been dumbfounded."
"Brigadier Chen assigned them two mountain cannons that time. What do you call them? It's called a tiger with added power."
"Don't talk about attacking those gun towers and fortresses, if you don't attack the damn county town, I can even attack the east."
Ding Wei saw the rapid progress of his troops and said with a proud expression on his face.
The commanders of the nearby brother troops looked at Ding Wei with envy.
Although they are not the same as the main regiment and have more troops than the New Second Regiment, in terms of weapons and equipment, they are far behind.
The attack continued, and fierce gunfire continued.
The independent mixed eighth brigade responsible for the regional defense of Shanxi Province on the Zhengtai Railway was completely deceived.
Their five independent infantry brigades in the East were attacked at the same time, and communication with each other was completely cut off for a while.
The brigade headquarters wanted to contact them via radio, but even their brigade headquarters began to be shelled.
Brigadier Chen, could you please ask Li Yunlong for the artillery? Now his brigade headquarters has an artillery battalion directly under it.
The artillery battalion is equipped with mountain artillery, field artillery, and infantry artillery, and the amount of ammunition is quite sufficient.
Of course, those artillery pieces are currently distributed to each regiment to strengthen their operations. With those artillery reinforcements, each unit will fight more bravely.
They fought very tenaciously and had a great impact on the Moon Army in a short period of time.
The headquarters of the First Army, which was too far away, did not receive news one after another until around six o'clock on August 21st.
Chief of Staff Hideyoshi Kusuyama was initially reported to by the Chief of the Second Section, but he didn't pay much attention to it.
As more and more news came through, Kusuyama Hideyoshi's face showed a solemn expression.
He did not dare to delay at all, and quickly found the army commander Yoshio Shinozuka to report.
At this time, the First Army launched a large-scale raid against the Eighth Route Army, and it was completely uninformed.
Yoshio Shinozuka was checking the location of the Yangcun area, thinking about the attack that the independent mixed fourth brigade was about to launch against Chu Yunfei's troops.
"Commander Ge Dong, the second section will report based on all aspects of the situation, and the independent mixed 8th brigade and the independent mixed 3rd brigade will be attacked."
"In addition, in the occupied areas of southern Shanxi, a large number of Eighth Route troops also participated in the war."
"The Eighth Route Army launched a large-scale operation, destroying their strongholds, gun towers, and bunkers, while also destroying railways and highways."
"The scale of their operation that time was beyond imagination. According to the second lesson report, the northern section of the Zhengtai Railway and the Tongpu Railway were almost completely hit."
Kusuyama Hideyoshi walked over quickly and said with a solemn expression on his face.
Upon hearing the news, Yoshio Shinozuka's eyes widened with an expression of disbelief.
He glanced at the map and murmured to himself: "Why didn't they get any report? Is the news true?"
According to common sense, if they were hit to such a degree, the Japanese troops would definitely want to report it as soon as possible.
The current combat situation was completely unexpected by the Japs. They wanted to ask for a report, and some brigade and regiment headquarters were hit.
Some brigade and regiment headquarters are quickly establishing contact with the eastern troops and hurriedly commanding the troops to fight without having time to contact the army headquarters.
The 129th Division will attack the Shanxi Province area of the Zhengtai-Taiwan Railway, and the 120th Division will attack the northern section of the Tongpu Railway.
Those two divisions should be organized into troops normally. The two independent mixed brigades of the little devils can completely cope with the situation.
But those two divisions can no longer be described as reinforced divisions.
For example, the 386th Brigade under the Eastern Division of the 129th Division has seven regiments of troops, not counting local troops!
A division with dozens of regiments is hardly considered a local army.
And for such a force to launch an offensive operation with all its strength, there is no way that a mixed brigade of little devils can do anything wrong.
Even though most of those troops were poorly equipped with weapons and equipment, they fought very tenaciously and their fierce attacks were not something that the Moon Army could withstand.
Not to mention the report, the little devil can now maintain his position, which is already pretty good.
During the initial period of the large-scale battle, the Eighth Route Army units attacked fiercely, and the gains were not huge.
Can you tell me about the commanding ability? Is Bu Shen the deputy commander-in-chief or Commander Liu? Which one is a capable person who can easily command hundreds of thousands of troops in combat?
"Commander Ge Dong, based on the intelligence team, they monitored the radio, deciphered the code, determined the radio location, etc. and checked repeatedly."
"At present, almost all the railways and highways they control have been hit to varying degrees. The Eighth Route Army has dispatched large corps that they could not imagine to fight."
"They don't know what the frontline combat situation is like, but they can be sure that they have been hit to an unprecedented degree."
"Almost all of their eastern troops were attacked, especially the third brigade and the eighth brigade."
The captain of the second class stood aside, reporting with a serious expression on his face.
Yoshio Shinozuka frowned, now he had to believe whether that was true.
"Find a way to contact the frontline troops and ask them for detailed information."
"At the same time, we quickly contacted the aviation force and dispatched staff members to take a reconnaissance plane to check the situation of the Zhengtai-Taiwan Railway."
"In addition, quickly contact the front army headquarters and report the problems they encountered there."
"The Independent Mixed Fourth Brigade, Yamamoto Special Forces and other units canceled the Choke War Plan."
"The Yamamoto special agent team quickly returned to the Taiyuan Army Headquarters and was on standby, and the independent mixed fourth brigade was on standby."
After pondering for a while, Shinozuka Yoshio immediately gave the order with a serious expression on his face.
"Hi, Commander, Hideyoshi." Kusuyama Hideyoshi immediately agreed to come.
The First Army Headquarters made a series of arrangements and deployments, but frontline operations continued.
Did the Moon Army respond a little slowly, and they were unable to deploy effectively?
After all, they still don't know the specific situation and have no way to make arrangements.
Until noon, the Little Japanese Army headquarters was still not fully aware of the situation.
At one o'clock in the morning, the staff of the Little Japanese Army Headquarters began to take off the reconnaissance plane to check the battlefield situation.
A puppet Mongolian cavalry division that was originally prepared to strengthen the independent mixed fourth brigade was intercepted directly in the Yuanpingcheng area.
They were directly mixed into the third brigade to stay in the east, so as to assist in operations.
Arrive at the headquarters of the 48th Independent Brigade at two o'clock in the morning.
After Chu Yunfei received the relevant news, he immediately held a combat meeting.
"Then...that's not possible, Mr. Traveler, is the news true?"
"With just the few broken guns on the Eighth Route Army, they dared to launch a large-scale offensive against the Moon Army."
"Even if it's just their main force, they don't have many heavy weapons."
"Yangcun Li Yunlong's new regiment does have a lot of heavy weapons, but what effect can their one regiment have?"
After Chu Yunfei announced the news about the Eighth Route Army operations, the officers started talking a lot.
They thought that was incredible. After all, the impression given to them by the Eighth Route Army was that the weapons and equipment were very poor.
Let alone fighting a tough battle, if we let the Eighth Route Army fight a positional battle, it would be difficult to gain an advantage.
"Based on the information they have received so far, we can see whether they have indeed launched a large-scale operation."
"And they directly launched an attack on the Moon Army. So far, they have achieved certain results."
"Now that various units of the Yuan Army are under attack, they cannot support each other. This is the best chance for them to encircle and annihilate the independent mixed fourth brigade in Xin County."
"According to the report of the cavalry company, eight groups attacked Xin County, but they were attacked by the independent mixed fourth brigade and failed to achieve any results."
"They can take advantage of that opportunity to form an independent fourth brigade to carry out encirclement and annihilation operations."
Chu Yunfei came to the map, pointed at the location of Xin County, and said with a serious expression on his face.
"Brigade, if they attack now, wouldn't that mean they are assisting the Eighth Route Army in fighting?"
"The commander-in-chief has repeatedly issued orders to cooperate with them in the battle. Do I need a written order from the commander-in-chief?"
"Now the attitude of the commander's department and the general headquarters is unclear. If they attack without authorization, they are violating orders."
"Once the senior officials and the general headquarters investigate after the incident, I'm afraid it will be difficult for them to take responsibility."
As soon as Chu Yunfei finished speaking, Qian Bojun immediately stood up and counterattacked.
After his words faded, some officers were still whispering among themselves.
But Chu Yunfei knocked on the table with a serious expression on his face.
"They have applied to the General Headquarters before, and the commander's department also agreed that they can choose the opportunity to carry out combat operations against the independent mixed fourth brigade."
"Now is the best opportunity. As for assisting the Eighth Route Army in fighting, they fight theirs, they fight theirs, it has nothing to do with each other."
"The Fourth Independent Mixed Brigade has been massacring people one after another. Now we have such a good opportunity. It would be a shame to miss it."
"He has made up his mind, we don't need to say more!"
Chu Yunfei had a firm expression on his face and looked towards the officers.
"He will obey the order of the traveler."
Chen Ziyun stood up immediately and was the first to make a statement.
Wu Ziqiang, Shi Yujian, Liang Guoping and the four battalion commanders of the 358th Regiment also quickly stood up and expressed their stance.
Qian Bojun and Zhang Furun looked at each other, then slowly stood up to express their support.
Chief of Staff Fang Ligong began to read out the combat order, and this time all the 48th Independent Brigade went into action.
Chen Ziyun prepared the 11th Regiment to advance towards Zhuangmo Town, Baizi Mountain and Wohu Mountain south of Xin County.
Baizi Mountain and Wohu Mountain are located on the west side of Tongpu Railway, which is a high ground.
Starting from Xin County, you can go to the southeast and pass through Yangqu. After passing Yangqu, it is not too far away from the capital of Shanxi Province.
When Chen Ziyun's troops arrive there, they will naturally prevent the independent fourth brigade from retreating too far.
Qian Bojun's 358th Regiment will advance towards Qicun Town in the northwest of Xin County and the hilly area to the east.
There, Chen Ziyun once commanded the troops to engage in a fierce battle with the Harada detachment. The 358th Regiment could not grasp the terrain advantage if it advanced there.
When they stationed there, could they cut off the independent mixed fourth brigade to the north and approach the original Pingcheng area?
As for the cavalry companies, guard companies, and field artillery companies directly under the brigade headquarters, they will be commanded by Lin Zhiqiang, the chief of staff.
They advanced to Hesuo Town, south of Qicun Town, and paid close attention to the movements of the Yue army in Xin County to the east.
Whether Chu Yunfei and Fang Ligong were capable or not, they immediately made accurate judgments based on the information they received.
The overall strength of the independent mixed fourth brigade is very strong. They are gathered in Xin County and have not been threatened at all for the time being.
As for the First Army Headquarters, it is very likely that they will arrange for them to go to other areas for support.
The railway is the lifeline that the Moon Army needs, and all their actions depend on the railway.
The two independent regiments of the 48th Brigade, one in the south and one in the north, guard the commanding heights, which can naturally effectively contain the independent mixed fourth brigade to support operations.
Moreover, they control the favorable terrain and are likely to bring unexpected combat blows to the Moon Army troops.
(End of chapter)
This chapter has been completed!