This is related to the training level of the Japanese artillery. The artillery regiment to which Anda 23 belongs has fought against the stubborn army and the Eighth Route Army for many years, and has rich combat experience and very high quality.
On the other hand, Anda Twenty-three had always maintained the necessary caution against the Eighth Route Army's attack on Yuncheng, so he ordered the artillery to be ready as soon as the battle started.
The artillery regiment of the 37th Division of the Anda 23rd has three full artillery brigades.
This is not common in the Japanese's B-level divisions (usually only A-level divisions are fully equipped with artillery, while other divisions only have two or even one artillery brigade due to a severe lack of equipment).
It's just that Anda 23 made a mistake. He assigned the artillery brigade to three directions: west, north, and east.
This allocation should not be regarded as a "mistake", it can even be said to be a common sense, because the west, north, and east sides may be the enemy's main attack directions, while the south is the Salt Lake, where there is no need for many artillery, or
Said mortars would solve the problem.
At the beginning of the war, several Japanese artillery brigades aimed their artillery in the direction of the city gates they were responsible for and were ready to provide reinforcements when the enemy was discovered on the front line.
Lieutenant Colonel Masayoshi Hironaka, the commander of the artillery regiment, is a calm and thoughtful guy, and is very good at estimating the enemy's artillery position.
When the battle started, Guangzhong Zhengyi was at the headquarters rehearsing tactics with his adjutant to deal with the Eighth Route Army's "spray bombs."
But over and over again, Masayoshi Hironaka discovered that it was always difficult for conventional artillery to deal with such hit-and-run "spray bombs."
"They move much faster than us!" Guangzhong Zhengyi said to the adjutant: "This means that when we fight against them, we are always in a passive state of being beaten."
"But their accuracy is not as good as our artillery!" the adjutant said unwillingly.
"What does accuracy mean?" Masayoshi Hironaka said helplessly: "We do have accuracy, but we are not sure of the enemy's position, or we know the enemy's position, but when we fired the shells, they had already moved.
Do you know what this means? Our accuracy is almost zero, Matsumoto-kun, while the enemy at least has accuracy! This is the main reason why our artillery units will be at a disadvantage against them!"
Then, Guangzhong Zhengyi added: "And there is almost no solution to this advantage!"
The adjutant quickly realized that what the lieutenant colonel said was right. If artillery could not determine the enemy's position, or it would be useless to know the enemy's position at any time, it would be almost useless.
After a moment of silence, Guangzhong Zhengyi said: "If our army's artillery wants to survive the enemy's tactics, there is only one way, that is, after firing the artillery shells, they must move within the shortest possible time, otherwise they will be attacked.
Enemy 'spray' coverage."
Just as he was talking, the phone rang, and then a staff officer shouted to Guangzhong Zhengyi: "Battle order, target Salt Lake!"
"Salt Lake?" Guangzhong Zhengyi was stunned. This was a direction they were not prepared for.
But the importance of artillery is speed. He immediately took the map and measured it with a ruler. Then he estimated the distance between the two artillery positions and the salt lake based on the proportion, and then issued the order to Zhu Yuan.
In less than three minutes, the shells started pouring towards the Salt Lake with a roar.
Guangzhong Zhengyi's estimation was very accurate. He aimed at the edge of the Salt Lake.
Although from the beginning to the end, Colonel Uetake never mentioned the location of the enemy when requesting artillery support, let alone what the situation was or what the enemy was, Hironaka only got one piece of information, and that was "Salt Lake".
However, for a smart person like Guangzhong, just knowing these two words is enough.
Because the Salt Lake is a gap in Yuncheng's defense, requesting artillery reinforcements from this direction at this time means a sneak attack by the enemy.
At the same time, artillery reinforcements were so urgent that there was no time to describe the situation, which meant that the enemy was already very close.
In this case, it is certainly correct to target the shore of the Salt Lake and near the south gate.
So the artillery shells were fired towards the Salt Lake one after another. The two brigades had more than thirty cannons, and each gun fired three rounds rapidly, which was more than a hundred artillery shells.
There was a chaotic "boom" sound, and the shells exploded in the salt lake, sending water pillars into the sky.
One landing ship was directly hit by a shell and burst into flames, and two landing ships were overturned by the water column. The entire ship turned over and turned into a tank in the water, and then slowly sank to the bottom of the lake.
The command ship where Wang Xuexin was on was also rocking back and forth on the churning water. The surroundings were filled with mist caused by shells and searchlights that swept over. The lights glowed in the water vapor with seven colors like a rainbow ship. It was beautiful and rugged, but
It also contains the blood and lives of the soldiers.
"Keep going!" Wang Xuexin shouted.
In fact, no one could hear what he was saying at this time, not even Gangzi who was very close at hand.
Wang Xuexin just yelled to release the fear in his heart... Although he was already a veteran, although he was already a battalion commander, although he had fought many battles and experienced life and death, it would still be the same no matter how many battles he fought, because every battle
Fighting is a test of life and death, which can make people feel chilly in their hearts.
At this moment, there was another strange "whooshing" roar in the air, and Wang Xuexin knew that the Eighth Route Army's rocket launchers had begun to counterattack.
The rocket launcher was commanded by Laojiu, and there were a total of thirteen rocket launcher vehicles.
This was all the rocket launcher vehicles that could be found in Zhongtiao Mountain within three days... Some rocket launcher vehicles were either too far away to arrive in time, or they had insufficient ammunition and were useless. In the end, thirteen vehicles were collected.
But thirteen cars seem to be enough.
Because they were hiding in the dark waiting for the Japanese artillery to open fire.
This time was different from last time. When we went to Yuncheng last time, we were afraid that there were many people in Yuncheng and the accuracy of the rocket launchers was not high, so we didn’t dare to fire with confidence.
But this time, all the people in Yuncheng were driven out by the Japs, leaving it almost an empty city, so they had no worries about fighting.
As soon as the Japanese artillery opened fire, the artillery observers placed high up immediately calculated its position through the muzzle fire. Two minutes later, more than a hundred rockets flew towards Yuncheng.
Just hearing a burst of "boom", Yuncheng was immediately blown into flames.
Some of these rockets were incendiary bombs. At this time, most of the houses in Yuncheng were wooden houses, which immediately caused a raging fire in the city.
Guangzhong Zhengyi cursed: "Asshole, I should have known they were prepared!"
Knowing it is one thing, but using it on the battlefield is another. After this bombing, the two artillery brigades of Guangzhong Zhengyi lost at least a dozen of their thirty-odd artillery pieces.
More importantly, the artillery had to move its position, otherwise it was likely to be bombed again.
So, it’s time for the landing force to show off...