"Your Excellency, General!" Kono Shinta replied respectfully, "Can I ask a question?"
"Kono-kun, please speak!" Okamura Neiji pretended to be generous and said: "You and I hit it off as soon as we met, so there is no need to be too polite!"
Kono Shinta said: "If the general seizes air supremacy, what are you going to do next?"
"After that..." Neji Okamura thought for a while and said: "If we have air superiority, our army can capture Yuncheng. Once Yuncheng is lost, the Eighth Route Army will lose the foundation for development!"
Shinta Kono asked again: "What then?"
Only then did Neji Okamura react. He thought about it for a while, and then nodded slowly: "Kono-kun is right, to seize air supremacy, at most we can only recapture Yuncheng and limit the development speed of the Eighth Route Army, and we cannot even eliminate it."
The Eighth Route Army’s aviation force… we have been wasting our troops needlessly!”
What Okamura Neji said is what Kono Shinta wanted to say.
The Eighth Route Army has been fighting guerrilla warfare against the imperial army from beginning to end, which means that the main body is ground troops.
The appearance of the Eighth Route Army Air Force was just an accident, and it was not the director of the Eighth Route Army.
To go into detail, the Eighth Route Army Air Force has many shortcomings that make it difficult to fundamentally shake the foundation of the Imperial Air Force.
For example, the "Hawk 81" combat radius problem, and the Eighth Route Army's lack of bombers and reconnaissance aircraft, and the Eighth Route Army's lack of radar.
Although these may seem inconspicuous, in actual combat each of them may be fatal.
For example, the combat radius of "Hawker 81" is insufficient, so the Imperial Army can securely defend the defense line 100 kilometers outside the airport. As long as the Eighth Route Army Air Force dares to enter this range to fight, it is basically seeking death, even if it has x1.
Another example is the Eighth Route Army's lack of coordination between bombers and reconnaissance aircraft.
Not having reconnaissance planes is not a bad thing. The Eighth Route Army can use intelligence personnel instead. At most, the intelligence lags behind or is not so comprehensive, which has an impact but not much.
The lack of bombers is a big problem... Even if the Eighth Route Army has complete air superiority, if there are no bombers, will it use fighter machine guns to straf targets?
What if you want to blow up a bridge or a warehouse?
It is true that the Eighth Route Army can replace bombers with fighters equipped with jet-loaded bombs.
But if it is equipped with a spray-injection bomb, it will definitely not be the opponent of "Zero War", and the Eighth Route Army has only more than fifty fighter planes in total. Once one is equipped with a spray-injection bomb and used as a bomber, there will be fewer fighters loaded with x1 for air combat.
One.
Therefore, Shinta Kono came to the conclusion: "Your Excellency, General, I believe that the current situation of the Eighth Route Army Air Force is insufficient in defense and insufficient in attack. In the final analysis, it is the Eighth Route Army that uses the Eighth Route Army to disperse the empire's 'zero war' to alleviate the Pacific battlefield.
pressure. In this case, if our army blindly competes with the Eighth Route Army for air supremacy, wouldn’t it fall into a trap set by the enemy?”
These words made Okamura Neji feel ashamed.
Because what Kono Shinta said were strategic issues, and Okamura Neji thought he was an excellent strategist, but he didn't expect to make this mistake.
However, this cannot actually be considered a mistake.
Because air supremacy is also of great strategic significance, what has always troubled Okamura Neji is that once the air supremacy is lost, it may shake the foundation of the empire in China, including the control of the puppet army.
However, from the perspective of attacking the Eighth Route Army, Shinta Kono was right. If he struggled with the Eighth Route Army on air supremacy, he would only fall into an endless black hole from which he could not get out.
The reason is...
1: The Eighth Route Army's fighter planes are either hidden in tunnels or underground fortifications. Even if the empire regains air supremacy, it cannot kill the Eighth Route Army's aviation fleet.
Two: The Eighth Route Army Air Force is actually not the Eighth Route Army Air Force. The person standing behind him is Yingjiang.
In order to attract the empire's "zero war" and disperse the empire's combat effectiveness, Yingjiang will definitely be willing to continue to provide "Hawk 81" to the Eighth Route Army.
In this case, if the Empire has been fighting with the Eighth Route Army in the air, trying to eliminate the Eighth Route Army Air Force... then when will it end?
You must know that what the empire has to face is a war machine called Eagle Sauce. Not to mention a hundred "Hawker 81s", he can afford even a thousand or ten thousand.
And can the empire's "zero war" withstand such consumption?
Thinking of this, cold sweat dripped from Okamura Neji's forehead.
He didn't expect that he would be led astray in the strategic direction without knowing it. This is the so-called fan of the authorities!
At this time, Okamura Neji actually knew what to do, but he still asked: "So, what Kono-kun means..."
Shinta Kono replied: "I wonder if your Excellency, General, has ever heard of 'Blitzkrieg'?"
Okamura Neiji nodded, secretly thinking that this Kono was really knowledgeable, and what he said was exactly what he thought. If he wanted to attack the Eighth Route Army, he would eventually have to return to the ground to fight, and he had to do it quickly.
Therefore, Hans' "Blitzkrieg" is the best choice.
Shinta Kono took out a map from his pocket and spread it out on the table, while moving his numb legs...
Although Kono Shinta's movement was small, Okamura Neji noticed it and hurriedly said: "Kono-kun, why don't we go to the headquarters to continue the discussion! There is a more detailed map there!"
Kono Shinta is naturally a dream come true.
The map of the headquarters is indeed a little different. Not only the map, but also a sand table made to scale. The sand table is filled with small flags, indicating the deployment and location of enemy and friendly troops, even down to the serial numbers.
Shinta Kono pointed at Yuncheng on the sand table and said: "Your Excellency, General, the main forces of the Eighth Route Army are all deployed on the front line of Yuncheng to form a line of defense. There is also a road from Yuncheng that leads directly to the west bank of the Yellow River, and the two airports of the Eighth Route Army are in Wan County.
The airport and Wangxing Airport are both located on the west bank of the Yellow River... If we want to completely eliminate the Eighth Route Army's aviation fleet, I think we should organize two mechanized forces, break through the enemy's defense line, and go deep into its hinterland to directly seize the two airports."
After a pause, Shinta Kono added: "I think that because the Eighth Route Army's two airports are in its hinterland and on the west bank of the Yellow River, they did not expect that our army would dare to penetrate so deeply. Therefore, they focused on ground defense.
It should be very weak..."
After saying that, Shinta Kono turned his attention to Okamura Neji, and Neji Okamura nodded and agreed with Shinta Kono's statement.
According to his intelligence, the ground defense of the two Eighth Route Army airports was indeed very weak, especially Wangxing Airport, which was not only undefendable but did not even have a decent line of defense.
However, it is more than a hundred kilometers long, and there are Luliang Mountain and Zhongtiao Mountain on both sides, so reinforcements cannot enter at all.
What if we were surrounded by the Eighth Route Army...