The weather in May was unbearably hot, and scorching waves of explosive air repeatedly swept across the battlefield. The brothers nestled in the dirty trenches felt as if they were trapped in a steamer, feeling uncomfortable and aggrieved.
When the brothers set out from Hubei, their helmets were shiny and they were a mighty force with a neat military appearance. However, after fighting for several days in Dangshan Mountain, the brothers were covered in blood and dirty and looked like men.
Although the Japanese attack force launched several attacks every day, Yang Ling's position was impregnable. They allowed the Japanese to bomb them indiscriminately and charge as a group. This position was like nails, blocking the way of the Japanese.
Although the 74th Army is not as elite as the German Armed Forces, it is, after all, a direct line of the Central Army and can be considered the main force on the battlefield. Now that they are well-equipped, the Japanese troops who have been fighting for several months are really helpless.
"boom!"
Dull gunshots rang out on the battlefield, and the head of a Japanese soldier who was looking at Yang Ling's position with a telescope exploded like a broken watermelon, and blood-red paste splashed everywhere in his head.
"Pah! Pah!"
"Da da da - da da da -"
This dull sound of gunfire triggered a new round of gunfire on the position. Various weapons fired one after another, and whizzing bullets kept passing over the trenches, hitting some unlucky guy or smashing sandbags.
Wang Zikun, a student soldier who joined the army during the Battle of Nanjing, heard the intense gunfire like exploding beans, rubbed his sore calves with a smile, and sat down with his back against the trench.
The shot just now was exactly the target that he had been quietly waiting for half an hour to find. Fortunately, he did not miss it in the end, which made Wang Zikun very happy.
He took out a delicate knife from his arms and carved a heavy stroke on the Chinese character on the birch stock. This was the fifth Japanese he killed after entering the sniper platoon in the camp.
Yang Ling and his 301st Regiment engaged in a tug-of-war in the trenches with the Japanese army. On this battlefield with a radius of dozens of miles, the various units of the 74th Army and the Japanese army were anxiously together, and cold gunfire became the norm.
Yang Ling originally selected brothers with good marksmanship during winter training to form a sniper platoon, with the purpose of laying the foundation for cultivating a special team.
But I didn't expect that this sniper platoon would shine on this battlefield, killing many Japanese soldiers, so that the arrogant Japanese soldiers had to be on guard all the time, fearing that their brothers in the sniper platoon would have their heads blown off.
Although Wang Zikun was still a new recruit in Nanjing, he was able to endure hardships and was crazy about training. Since he was promoted to squad leader, his motivation has become even more intense, and he has joined the sniper platoon composed mainly of veterans, and has become a
A sharpshooter that everyone respects.
The intensive gunfire caused by his gunshots had stopped. He put away his delicate knife and ran to the heavy machine gun bunker more than ten meters away. His dirty hands reached into the wooden bucket filled with water.
Wow - the cool water refreshed Wang Zikun, and the stains on his face were washed away, revealing fair skin, as if he had returned to his student appearance.
"College students, save some water, this machine gun will also eat." The veteran reminded Wang Zikun while smoking when he saw Wang Zikun washing his face with the machine gun's cooling water.
Wang Zikun chuckled: "I'll bring you two more buckets later."
"How many have been shot today?" the machine gunner asked from the side.
Wang Zikun replied: "I missed two and knocked on one."
The heavy machine gunner said: "That's not bad. We didn't catch any today. This little devil is getting better and better. He hides in the trenches without showing his head. I'm afraid he will become a bastard."
Hearing the complaints of the machine gunners, there was a burst of laughter in the trenches. The direction of Huilongji they were guarding was no longer the main direction of the Japanese army. The fighting in the east had been fierce in the past two days, but there was nothing happening on their side, which made their hands numb.
It became itchy.
The blocking battlefield in Dangshan made it difficult for the Japanese army to advance. They met their powerful opponents. The 74th Army and General Song Xilian's 7th Army were both hard-core troops. They fought side by side, which caused the Japanese army to suffer a lot.
The brothers nestled in the trenches and fought the Japanese army into a tug-of-war. At the temporary regiment headquarters in Huilongji, the disgraced deputy regiment leader Yang Ling and the haggard regiment commander Zhang Handuo also received new battlefield briefings.
These battlefield briefings are messages from each unit received by the 74th Army Headquarters, which are then transcribed by staff officers and sent to regiment-level commanders to facilitate commanders at all levels to understand battlefield conditions.
"This little devil has a huge appetite. He has mobilized hundreds of thousands of elites to eat my main force in Xuzhou in one go, without fear of breaking their teeth." The regiment leader Zhang Handuo couldn't help complaining as he looked at the new battlefield briefing.
.
The Japanese army deployed countless elite divisions and divided their troops into seven groups to attack the Xuzhou area in a concentric attack, attempting to eat up the main 600,000 Chinese troops in the Xuzhou Fifth Theater.
The Japanese army has always been extremely arrogant. On the Chinese battlefield, they always like to strike more with less, but they succeed one after another. This is why they become more arrogant and unscrupulous.
Yang Ling was not worried: "As long as our 74th Army is firmly anchored in Dangshan, the Japanese army will not be able to complete the encirclement, and our main force in Xuzhou will be safe."
The commander of the fifth theater is General Li Zongren. The battle of Taierzhuang he commanded in the early stage wiped out more than 10,000 Japanese troops in one battle, which greatly increased the prestige of the Chinese army and dampened the arrogance of the Japanese army. With such a general in charge, Yang Ling felt confident
.
The leader of the regiment, Zhang Handuo, was not as optimistic as Yang Ling. He frowned and said, "I heard that the 9th and 13th Japanese Divisions have already come from the south. Once the opening to the south is sealed, our main force of 600,000 in Xuzhou will become
A tiger in a cage..."
Zhang Handuo's worries are not groundless. After all, anyone with a discerning eye can see the Japanese army's combat intentions. The Japanese army is using conspiracy. Both the theater staff and the commander are well aware of this. However, no one wants to give up the good situation since the victory of Taierzhuang.
Take the initiative to abandon the Xuzhou area.
However, if the Xuzhou area is not abandoned, the main force of the 600,000-strong army of the fifth theater in the Xuzhou area will be in danger of being destroyed. This is a difficult multiple-choice question that requires the commander of the theater to make a decision.
Yang Ling's worries did not last long. General Li Zongren, the commander of the Fifth War Zone, quickly made up his mind to evacuate. After all, he still understood the principle that people and land would both survive.
Surrounded by hundreds of thousands of elite Japanese troops, the 600,000 miscellaneous troops commanded by General Li Zongren began to cover and evacuate the Xuzhou area alternately.
In order to avoid repeating the mistakes of the great defeat in the Battle of Shanghai, General Li Zongren specially stipulated the order and time for the evacuation of each army group and each unit, and everything was carried out in an orderly manner.
The East Henan Corps where Yang Ling and others belong is responsible for continuing to fight in the East Henan region to cover the main force of the fifth theater of war in evacuating Xuzhou.
This was an unprecedented evacuation operation on the Chinese battlefield. Although there was a bloody battle in Teng County and a great victory in Taierzhuang in the early stages of the Battle of Xuzhou, in the face of the powerful Japanese offensive, the neutralizing troops had to take the initiative to move.
The 600,000 evacuated troops and millions of people gathered together into a long gray dragon. If the broadcast propaganda is as it is, this is a strategic retreat, not a failure!
The withdrawal of the Chinese troops on the Xuzhou battlefield made the Japanese army angry. The attacking divisions accelerated the pace of their attacks in an attempt to capture the retreating Chinese troops.
Among them, the main force of Doihara Kenji's 14th Division went on a rampage. The lone army rushed to the foot of Lanfeng City in an attempt to penetrate to the west of Xuzhou and cut off the Longhai Railway line.
At this moment, General Xue Yue, commander of the Eastern Henan Corps, who was covering the evacuation of the main force of the fifth theater in the eastern Henan area, saw the wild wolf rushing towards him and smelled a hint of a fighter opportunity.
General Xue Yue has always been nicknamed "Tiger Cub". Now that the battle of Xuzhou has come to an end, facing the Japanese 14th Division rushing all the way to him, he does not want to let it go.
"Annihilate the Japanese 14th Division in the area between Neihuang, Yifeng, and Minquan! All units will immediately go to the designated areas on time! Violators will be punished under military law!"
In the end, the commander of the East Henan Corps, General Xue Yue, decided to annihilate the Japanese 14th Division in one go and achieve another great victory like Taierzhuang!
The reason why General Xue Yue has such confidence is because the East Henan Corps under his command are all elite troops of the Central Army, whether it is the 74th Army and General Song Xilian's 7th Army, or Gui Yongqing's 27th Army, Li Hanhun
The 64th Army is a unit with the highest combat effectiveness, so it is possible to completely annihilate the 14th Division.
"Advance with all your strength to Neihuang! Attack forward!"
The combat order was quickly sent to the 301st Regiment Headquarters. Regiment leaders Zhang Handuo and Yang Ling looked at each other and saw the excitement on each other's faces.