The Japanese launched a full-scale attack around 1 p.m. that day.
Originally Wang Xuexin thought that this "all-out attack" was just an attack on Yuncheng to cooperate with the Japanese attack south of Zhongtiao Mountain, but he learned that this was not the case when he received the intelligence.
"Battal Commander!" Chen Songyong reported: "The Japanese launched a simultaneous attack on our Luliang Mountain defense line."
Then another correspondent reported: "Batalion Commander, the Japanese have launched a large-scale raid on our base areas in Yizhong, Yidong and so on!"
Xie Baoqing couldn't help but gasped as he listened and said: "Are the Japanese crazy? They are fighting in all directions!"
Later, Wang Xuexin learned that not only the Eighth Route Army base areas, but also the middle areas defined by them as "quasi-security areas" were also launched by the Japanese.
According to common sense, the Japanese are currently waging war in various countries around the world, and there should be as little movement as possible in China. But now they are uncharacteristically waging war...
Then Wang Xuexin figured out that the Japanese were not going to war, but hoping to support war with war, that is, to plunder more materials from the people to support their war against the Eighth Route Army.
The fact is indeed what Wang Xuexin thought.
Okamura Neiji's North China Front army was almost unable to receive supplies because of the imperial army's fighting in various places.
But Okamura Neiji was not worried about this. He said to Shinozuka Yoshio: "As for supplies, we can get them from the Chinese people! Send out the 'Peaceful National Founding Army', as well as the military police brigade and the independent brigade.
...The war against the Chinese people will not consume much ammunition, but can also harvest a lot of supplies!"
"Yes!" Yoshio Shinozuka responded and passed on the order.
In fact, Okamura Neji had other purposes besides plundering supplies:
First, the Eighth Route Army's base areas were attacked everywhere, making it impossible for all forces of the Eighth Route Army to reinforce Zhongtiao Mountain.
Second, most of the Eighth Route Army's supplies came from the common people. If the imperial army could plunder the common people first, it would mean that the Eighth Route Army's supplies would also be in difficulty.
Third, winter will soon enter. Once this battle becomes protracted, insufficient supplies will cause a fatal blow to the Eighth Route Army.
Of course, the chief at the headquarters also guessed Okamura Neiji's intention. He asked the chief of staff: "How much food have we stored?"
The chief of staff replied: "Thanks to Xiao Dongbei's foresight, he exchanged all the US$10 million loan for food. Now our food reserves are enough for the entire army to survive the winter, and there are still more than six million US dollars of food that are not in place!"
The leader ordered without thinking: "Speed up and continue transporting food!"
"yes!"
The commander is not worried that the stubborn army will refuse to provide food.
After all, these grains were not "given" by Nianjun, but were loans from Yingjiang. If Nianjun wanted to tie the Eighth Route Army's neck at this time, I'm afraid Yingjiang would not agree to it, either from the perspective of the loan or from the perspective of its own interests.
Yingjiang didn't agree, so the stubborn army had to transport food even if it didn't want to.
The leader was worried that if the war situation went against the Eighth Route Army, for example, if the communication between Luliang Mountain and Zhongtiao Mountain and Xi'an was cut off by the Japanese, even if they wanted to transport food, they would not be able to transport it.
The battle in Yuncheng became intense from the beginning. The Japanese concentrated two heavy artillery brigades to bombard Yuncheng indiscriminately. Planes continued to roar over Yuncheng and dropped incendiary bombs. For a while, Yuncheng was blazing with flames and smoke billowing into the sky.
The northern wing of Yuncheng was also violently attacked by a Japanese regiment. Chu Yunfei and his 358th Regiment held on to their position without retreating even half a step...Chu Yunfei knew that whether the northern wing was safe was directly related to whether Yuncheng could be defended, so
Don't dare to retreat easily.
However, the soldiers of the 358th Regiment also suffered heavy casualties under the Japanese's superior artillery fire and aircraft bombing. In less than two hours, more than a thousand people were killed or injured.
Chu Yunlong looked at the map on the table expressionlessly in his frontline headquarters, unmoved even as the Japanese artillery shells whizzed overhead.
"Regiment seat!" Fang Ligong ran in through the thick smoke of the trench and reported: "This battle is a bit evil. The Japanese are concentrating their forces to attack us instead of the Eighth Route Army!"
Chu Yunfei nodded, he had seen this a long time ago.
To be precise, this is the situation on the North Line of Zhongtiao Mountain.
The last time the Japanese attacked Zhongtiao Mountain, they adopted the strategy of attacking Zhongtiao Mountain first and then surrounding Yuncheng... Yuncheng is a fortified city with blockhouses and blockhouses everywhere on the outside. Everyone knows that it is a tough nut to crack.
In contrast, although Zhongtiao Mountain also occupies a geographical advantage, the Japanese at least still have room to display... After the special forces penetrated into Zhongtiao Mountain, they attacked from both inside and outside.
Hence the defeat last time.
Therefore, this time, both Yan Laoxi and Chu Yunfei thought that the Japanese would attack Zhongtiao Mountain first like last time.
They also wanted to see the good show of the Eighth Route Army first.
In the end, the truth was exactly the opposite. The Japanese launched an overwhelming offensive against Yuncheng as soon as they came up, but there was no movement at all in the direction of Zhongtiao Mountain.
After thinking about it, Chu Yunfei sighed: "Neji Okamura is indeed a terrible opponent. He is trying to alienate you!"
"A plan to alienate?" Fang Ligong was a little confused: "What Tuanzuo means is... to alienate our army and the Eighth Route Army?"
Chu Yunfei nodded: "Only attacking our army and not the Eighth Route Army is to make us think that the Eighth Route Army is unreliable or that this battle is not worth fighting... We are fighting the Japanese to death in the front, but the Eighth Route Army is on the mountain.
Watching a show..."
Fang Ligong said "Oh". He didn't expect this. Now that he heard Chu Yunfei say this, he found that it was true.
This alienation tactic might not be effective if used on the Eighth Route Army.
Because the Eighth Route Army has always fought against the Japanese without any complaints, they do not think that fighting against the Japanese is a loss. On the contrary, they often think that not being allowed to fight against the Japanese is a loss. Li Yunlong of the independent regiment compares fighting against the Japanese to "eating meat" all day long.
.
Under such circumstances, if the Japanese attacked the Eighth Route Army first, they would not have the effect of "driving discord".
But the Jinsui Army was different.
A considerable part of the soldiers of the Jinsui Army are living off their lives with military pay. Even Chu Yunfei's 358th Regiment has many such soldiers.
Under such circumstances, they avoided war whenever they could, and only faced the Japanese on the battlefield when they couldn't.
Now the Japanese only attack the Jinsui Army and not the Eighth Route Army, which will inevitably make them psychologically unbalanced.
Sure enough, after a while, the communications soldier came to report: "Regiment seat, the commander of the third battalion wants to see you!"
Chu Yunfei glanced at Fang Ligong. Both of them knew that this was the enemy's alienation plan, and the battalion commander immediately came to complain.
Fang Ligong asked: "Tuan Zuo, see you or not?"
"See you!" Chu Yunfei said without thinking: "Not only do we want to see the third battalion commander, we also call the other battalion commanders!"