Asano's howl alarmed many Japanese troops on the battlefield. The 18th Division was newly defeated. Some of the sentries on the sentry posts were already very nervous. They even slept with their machine guns in their arms at night. Now they became nervous after hearing Asano's howl.
He immediately pulled the trigger in his hand, and for a moment there was loud gunfire on the position.
"Da da da……"
"Dong dong dong..."
Type 11 light machine guns, Type 92 heavy machine guns, and even mortars were fired at their respective fronts. The entire Japanese army position was boiling, and the Japanese troops on the position were all in a state of madness.
Such a big commotion attracted the current acting division commander, Major General Ushijima Sadao. Seeing the loud gunshots on the position, Ushijima Sadao couldn't help but became furious and cursed: "Baga, what on earth is going on?"
What happened?"
Soon someone reported: "Your Excellency, the division commander, the whereabouts of the Chinese have been found ahead, and the sentries are shooting to drive them away."
Major General Ushijima Sadao was not an idiot. He could tell from the gunshots that only his own side was firing, and no one in front was fighting back. He couldn't help but cursed angrily: "Idiot, there are no Chinese people, you come right away."
Order the soldiers to cease fire, do you understand? Cease fire immediately!"
Under Ushijima Sadao's order, the gunshots that rang out on the Japanese army's position stopped for more than ten minutes.
In a rage, Ushijima Sadao originally wanted to thoroughly investigate who caused the commotion, but in the chaotic situation just now, he could no longer find out who fired the first shot, so he had no choice but to let it go...
In the night, the truck was driving hard on the bumpy road, unable to go fast. After occupying Foshan, a group of soldiers from Wu Chengfeng's regiment led the soldiers from the 657th regiment to the east along the road without stopping.
As the regiment leader, Wu Chengfeng was originally qualified to ride a jeep, but this time Wu Chengfeng did not ride in his jeep. Instead, he got into a Dodge truck and sat with the soldiers of the guard company. In his words, he was with
Soldiers feel more at ease together.
Most of the trucks currently equipped by the Three Hundred Army are Dodge KW-353/352 off-road vehicles. This is a powerful ten-wheel 2.5-ton truck. When marching, the standard equipment of the truck is to carry a squad of soldiers plus
All equipment for a squad, including machine guns, rifles, ammunition, sleeping bags, necessary dry food and radios.
But after Wu Chengfeng and his party were added to the truck, twenty-five people were crammed into the truck, but there were only twelve seats in the truck. Wu Chengfeng refused the seats offered to him by the soldiers and sat on the floor in the carriage, accompanied by
Wearing firearms and backpacks, their arms pressed against their thighs, they were huddled together in a mess.
And trucks of this era have a common problem. That is, the suspension system is very bad. Wu Chengfeng just sat on it for ten minutes and it felt like most of the day had passed. The soldiers had been fighting for several days, and no one had taken a shower.
In addition, the soldiers were sweating profusely in the darkness. The air seemed extremely thick, and the air in the compartment smelled really bad.
The soldiers were silent and listened attentively on the truck. They could hear the sound of the front group's vehicles struggling to climb the hill. Sometimes the cars behind them quietly approached, so close that they could even see the two anti-fog lights on the front of the car, as if in the fog.
of two candles.
The convoy was always shrouded in darkness. Wu Chengfeng sat in the darkness. He closed his eyes and listened to the body swaying with the rumble of the truck. In a trance, he felt as if he was a child sitting in a cradle next to his mother.
Although he closed his eyes, Wu Chengfeng was not sleepy, and his mind was constantly thinking about what to do next. He was now very close to Guangzhou, and he might come into contact with the Japanese army at any time. How should he contact him at that time?
Contact the enemy face to face. What will happen if the Japanese army encounters fierce resistance? If the Japanese artillery fire is too fierce, should they temporarily avoid the enemy in the dark? These are all issues that he, the leader of the regiment, needs to consider.
I don’t know how long it took. The convoy suddenly stopped, and all the lights in the convoy were turned off. There was also a burst of gunfire from the front, and from time to time, the whistling sound of artillery shells whizzed past.
"What happened?" The soldiers around him sat up one after another to ask.
Wu Chengfeng pricked up his ears very alertly. He heard that it was the sound of the Type 92 infantry gun, but the flying height of the artillery shell was nearly a thousand meters, so it did not pose a threat to them.
Suddenly, a soldier shouted: "Listen, it's a crooked sound."
Wu Chengfeng heard it. An 11-year-old light machine gun was firing in the distance. The gunfire was intermittent, hollow and heavy, like someone patting the carpet.
Wu Chengfeng immediately realized that he could not continue to move forward like this, and he immediately shouted, "Okay, pass my order, everyone gets out of the car, the convoy can't continue to move forward! Quick, quick, quick..."
"Wow..."
Following Wu Chengfeng's order, the soldiers sitting in the back opened the car's fender, and then everyone jumped out of the car. The communications soldier who had been following Wu Chengfeng also turned on the radio and began to notify the soldiers of each battalion to get out of the car and prepare.
Assemble.
Wu Chengfeng jumped out of the car and looked at the dark night sky in the distance and the flashes of light from time to time. He hesitated for a moment and the communications soldier next to him said: "You tell the first battalion immediately and ask him to send a company to carry out firepower on the Japanese troops ahead.
Reconnaissance, then tell the artillery company to shoot a few flares at the front! Let’s see how the Japanese react!”
"yes!"
Soon, Wu Chengfeng's order was carried out. There was a burst of machine gun fire in front of him. The sound of the gunfire was sharp and piercing in the dark night. After a while, illumination bombs rose up in the sky, not only covering the place in front.
The light was bright, even the place where Wu Chengfeng stayed was illuminated, and each other's faces could be seen clearly.
At first, everyone's face looked pale, but soon it turned blue, as if they were looking at someone in a dark room full of smoke.
As the flares were fired, news came from the first battalion at the front that there was a Japanese blocking position in front. The Japanese army had deployed many firepower points and several Type 92 infantry guns there, and asked for instructions whether to launch an attack immediately.
Wu Chengfeng thought for a while and rejected the request of the First Battalion. Now that the enemy situation was unknown, it would be unwise to launch an attack without permission. So Wu Chengfeng ordered the First Battalion to quickly use the night time to build some simple foxholes and trenches, and it would not be too late to attack again at dawn.
Then Wu Chengfeng ordered the second and third battalions to rest quickly and wait until daybreak to prepare to attack the enemy in front of them.
On this night, both the Chinese and Japanese sides tightened their minds and prepared for the upcoming battle...
Three or four hours later, fish maw and wisps of morning glow appeared from the horizon. The soldiers who were originally sizing each other up in the darkness also saw the shadow of the other side's position.
Wu Chengfeng also came to the front and raised the Zeiss telescope for observation. Here is a flat land, with a continuous hill in front of it. The Japanese army laid out a z-shaped, continuous position in front, and also set up a barbed wire fence.
.
As the sky dawned, the Japanese army also began to launch exploratory fire reconnaissance against them. Several machine guns and several Type 92 infantry cannons fired in the direction of Wu Chengfeng from time to time, trying to lure the Chinese army to fight back before making a judgment.
Seeing this, Wu Chengfeng sneered: "Little devil, if you want to play fire reconnaissance with me, you have to learn from your master's wife for a few more years. Signal Corps, pass my order, order the artillery battery to continue hiding, and then contact the Air Force.
, ask them to send a few planes to bomb the front, and then send out reconnaissance planes to locate the Japanese artillery positions."
"yes!"
Regarding Wu Chengfeng's request, the Air Force, which had been a little panicked these days, readily agreed. In less than twenty minutes, there was a low roar from behind Wu Chengfeng, and soon twelve Stukas dived
The bombers flew to the front of the position under the escort of eight Thunder fighters. Accompanying them was an F5 twin-engine reconnaissance aircraft newly added to the First Air Division.
With their arrival, it also means that the Three Hundred Army's offensive on the outskirts of Guangzhou has officially begun...
"boom……"
A 50-kilogram aerial bomb landed less than 50 meters away from Major General Ushijima Sadao, and the soil kicked up splashed all over Ushijima Sadao.
"General, be careful!" The two guards next to him threw him to the ground dutifully and protected him with their bodies.
After a while, Ushijima Sadao got up, rubbed his eyes with his hands and continued to observe the offensive situation of the Chinese army ahead.
Ushijima Sadao was originally the brigade commander of the 33rd Brigade of the 18th Division. He was also the highest-ranking officer in the 18th Division who escaped from Jiangmen. Furushuo Qianlang appointed him as the acting division of the 18th Division.
The captain is also justified. However, Ushijima Sadao would rather not be the leader of such a laborious division, because everyone knows that this is an unlucky job.
The current 18th Division has suffered heavy casualties at best, but is in name only at worst. The division that originally had more than 18,000 people now has less than 4,000 people, but it has to defend dozens of kilometers of peripheral positions.
, this is not to die. But Ushijima Sadao had no choice but to bite the bullet and accept this task.
When Ushijima Sadao saw the Chinese plane appearing in the sky, he knew that the battle that would determine the final fate of the Eighteenth Division was coming. Although he knew that this fate was probably destined long ago, he was still very unhappy.
He willingly commanded the troops to carry out a desperate resistance.
"Dangdangdang..."
There was a burst of machine gunfire from the front that was very familiar to the soldiers of the 18th Division of the Japanese Army. Major General Ushijima Sadao knew that it was the Chinese soldiers using their large-caliber heavy machine guns to suppress them with firepower... (To be continued)