In the sky, the machine guns on the wings were spraying fire. Occasionally, one or two aircraft burst out into clouds of fire, burned and died.
In the sky, everything returned to silence.
At this moment, the ground started to get lively again.
"Commander! Not good! Commander!" A soldier from the Chongqing Garrison Headquarters hurriedly ran in.
"What's wrong? The Japanese planes were all shot away, what else is wrong?" A middle-aged general with a big belly yelled loudly. This person was the commander-in-chief of the Chongqing Garrison, Liu Zhi.
"Commander, many people died over there in the big tunnel."
"What's the meaning?"
"There were too many people, and there wasn't enough air inside. They all died."
Liu Zhi was stunned. He seemed to understand what it meant. There were too many people in the air raid tunnel and there was insufficient oxygen. Many people suffocated to death.
"Commander, these people died due to lack of oxygen. Some people can actually be saved. People should be sent to move these people out of the air-raid shelter immediately! To a place with fresh air! For example, Chaotianmen River Dam!" someone suggested.
"You're right, you're right!" Liu Zhi nodded, feeling that it made sense, "You, bring someone to do this immediately!"
"yes!"
…
The soldiers, special agents, protection team members, and service members who participated in the rescue regarded people's lives as child's play. They dragged the corpses out of the cave door. Some of them were still alive, but they were dragged to death; some had their limbs broken; some still had a breath.
However, they were crushed to death because there were corpses piled up on the ground. What's more, some rescue workers, instead of trying their best to save people, took advantage of the situation and robbed them, collecting jewelry, money and belongings from the corpses, and stripping off their clothes, which caused a huge outcry among the crowd.
indignation.
Among the dead bodies transported to the Chaotianmen River Dam, a few were resurrected by breathing fresh air. But after they woke up,
After discovering that all the belongings he had brought with him had been looted, he felt that he would not be able to make a living in the future, so he burst into tears in despair. There were numerous dead bodies in the river dam area, and the cries were loud, and the condition was very miserable.
…
On the 6th, Chongqing was in an uproar, and the world was in an uproar.
The incident of the tunnel tragedy quickly spread to the outside world, and Chongqing citizens could not stop crying.
Zhou Weiguo was stunned when he received the news, and then he remembered that the Chongqing Tunnel Massacre was one of the three major tragedies during the Republic of China, excluding the Huayuankou Incident and the Changsha Fire.
Zhou Weiguo fell silent. For more than a month, Independent has been constantly checking the previous intelligence and stepping up defenses in various places. After checking, it was found that Suning's intelligence was half-true and half-false, and the Japanese did give a false estimate of their troop strength.
deployment, but the defense map obtained by Suning was also fake.
Zhou Weiguo couldn't understand the Japanese mentality. This was purely a waste of time. But in the eyes of the Japanese, it was a victory for them to waste the independent division's time.
As a result, the silence of the independent division seemed to swell the Japanese.
“What were the casualties in the tunnel tragedy?”
Liu Yuan shook his head, "It's hard to say. The Chongqing Air Defense Headquarters said that 461 people died and 291 were seriously injured."
Zhou Weiguo looked grim, and then he remembered that regarding the number of people involved in the tragedy, there were hundreds, thousands, and ten thousand. Both the hundred and thousand were announced by relevant agencies of the Chongqing government, while the thousand
It is said by the survivors. But in later generations, most historians mostly adopted the theory of tens of thousands of people.
Zhou Weiguo exhaled, perhaps the credibility of the Chongqing government has been exhausted over and over again in this way.
"Now public opinion is angry and public resentment is boiling! Chongqing citizens demand severe punishment of the murderer!" Liu Yuan shook his head, "I'm afraid, this will only make some people resign."
Zhou Weiguo thought for a while, and indeed, the relevant personnel must have been fired by Chiang Kai-shek. But the culprits of this case, to put it bluntly, are the Japanese. If it were not the Japanese, the people would not hide in the air-raid shelters, causing such a situation
as a result of.
"Damn it, they are still Japanese. Of course, those in charge of the garrison should also die!" Zhou Weiguo sighed, "I'm afraid, this time, it will be difficult to calm the people's complaints."
…
Under the strong demand of public opinion, Chairman Chiang ordered Wu Tiecheng, Secretary-General of the Central Party Committee of the Kuomintang, Zhang Boqin, Chairman of the National Political Consultative Conference, and Kang Xinru, Speaker of the Provisional Senate of Chongqing, to form the "Large Tunnel Suffocation Tragedy Review Committee" to investigate the tragedy. Since then, he has accompanied the capital
The Air Raid Rescue Committee stated that the registration number of the death toll never exceeded 650. On June 10, in addition to rescuing more than 1,000 uninjured people, a total of 827 people died and 165 were seriously injured. It said that the large tunnel tragedy "992 people died,
151 people were seriously injured."
As soon as this data came out, public opinion became even more heated.
After symbolically punishing those responsible, the Nationalist government tightened its control over news and reporting, especially covering up the truth about the number of casualties. According to Chen Liyuan, a reporter from Xinmin Daily who went to the scene shortly after the tragedy, said: "Just
I personally visited the area where the corpses were piled up and learned about the situation from nearby residents, and I deeply felt that the ministry was inevitably engaging in the behavior of 'repaying too much for too little'."
…
In Chongqing, Chiang Kai-shek's face was ugly, and the tunnel tragedy made it difficult for the authorities to deal with.
"How many casualties are there?" Old Jiang looked at Dai Li.
Dai Li was silent for a while. How should he report this number at this time? Then he sighed inwardly. When he got to the chairman of the committee, he should report the real data, "About several thousand people."
"Thousands of people? How many people are thousands of people?" Old Jiang was also angry. Liu Zhi was his right-hand man and served as the commander-in-chief of Chongqing's garrison and commander-in-chief of air defense. If something like this happened, Liu Zhi's position would definitely not be preserved.
"It was ordered that Liu Zhi be removed from the post of Chongqing Air Defense Commander, which was concurrently held by Chongqing Gendarmerie Commander He Guoguang; Chongqing Deputy Commander of Air Defense Hu Bohan was removed and retained in office, Director of the Tunnel Engineering Department Wu Guobing was removed, and Deputy Director Xie Yuanmo recorded two serious offenses
;Chongqing Mayor Wu Guojian was removed from office and remained in office.”
"Yes!" Dai Li breathed a sigh of relief. In this way, he had an explanation to the people.
Then when I thought about it, Liu Zhi was still the Commander-in-Chief of the Chongqing Garrison, but he just moved the position of Commander-in-Chief of Air Defense.
…
"Well done! These people should all be dismissed from their posts and shot!" Faced with Chiang Kai-shek's treatment, the people's anger finally subsided.
"It's not enough, these people should be shot!"
"For these official fans, removing their officials should be more uncomfortable than killing them!"
"Isn't the commander-in-chief of the garrison also Liu Zhi?"
"The Generalissimo only removed his position as Air Defense Commander?"
"Isn't this a case of selling sheep's meat to dogs? Are you deceiving us?"
"That's right!"
…
Jinan, Liu Yuan looked at the telegram and felt sad in his heart, "Is this the end of the disposal?"
Zhou Weiguo nodded, "Otherwise, what else can we do?"
Liu Yuan was silent. Yes, what else can be done? He is not the chairman of the committee, so of course he feels it is not enough.
Zhou Weiguo sighed, there is really nothing that can be done about this matter. The Chongqing authorities want to cover it up and hide their shame. Naturally, they have to cover it up from top to bottom. He remembered that he had seen information about ventilation equipment at Jiaochangkou.
The electric ventilator was installed in the large tunnel in mid-April. It was put into trial operation on June 3, 1941. It was agreed that the acceptance would be from 14:00 to 17:00 on June 5. However, the factory did not wait until half an hour before the alarm was issued. Xie Yuanmo of the Air Defense Department
Xie Yuanmo also did not show up. Xie Yuanmo explained: "Because I am not an expert in electrical appliances, I originally agreed that the engineer from the electric lighting factory would come with me for acceptance inspection. Since that person did not arrive, I did not go for acceptance inspection." But the real reason was that the Ministry of Air Defense did not bribe the Ministry of Military and Political Affairs, and the Ministry of Military and Political Affairs refused.
After inspection, the machine dared not be used and was left idle. Another reason for quality defects in air-raid shelters is insufficient funds and misappropriation.
In short, there are huge problems in all aspects.
Such an authority, Zhou Weiguo sighed, really cannot be established unless it is broken.