"Captain, the city is so quiet that it's a bit scary. Why don't you take out a platoon and test it out first to find out what's going on inside and what conspiracy the kid is hiding?" the instructor reminded, his face full of worry.
Huang Sheng thought for a moment and refused: "If the little Japs set up pocket formations in front of us and only killed one platoon, it would be no different from a sheep entering a tiger's mouth. We can't do such stupid things and risk dozens of lives."
."
"Contact the heavy artillery unit, cross the city head and launch a two-minute artillery fire attack on the street in front of us, and use the artillery shells to bring out the little devil's conspiracy."
The artillery liaison officers and observation posts were in the middle of the team, and they immediately reported the news and shooting coordinates to the artillery positions.
Huang Sheng waited for less than five minutes when the high-pitched scream of "Woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooofts"
"Rumble..."
The shell roared over everyone's heads, fell from the sky, and exploded in the yard more than two hundred meters away from the city wall. The moment fire and smoke rose from the ground, houses less than five meters apart collapsed, leaving only a few ruins.
Standing still.
"The shell missed." Huang Sheng frowned and shouted.
The artillery observation post did not panic. He calmly stretched out his right hand, gave a thumbs up, and squinted his eyes to measure the distance between the bullet's impact point and the artillery target.
It was done in less than half a minute. I picked up the microphone and started reporting.
"The shooting distance remains unchanged, the direction is two hundred meters to the left, each gun fires rapidly for two minutes, and the gun is fired immediately..."
"Woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ..." The piercing scream sounded again. This time it was obviously more piercing than before. A total of six heavy artillery shells hit at the same time.
"Rumble..."
The explosion soon sounded in the city, and because the impact point was too close, the city walls underfoot trembled slightly from the explosion.
A total of sixty shells fell. The yards and houses on both sides of the street that were scattered in a patchwork just now were now in ruins. The wood of many houses was set on fire, and black smoke was rising.
"The first company will attack along the front of the street, the second company, and the third company will cover the attack with left and right wings. The three companies will advance together and eliminate the remaining little Japs in the ruins for me." Huang Sheng seized the opportunity and ordered decisively.
"The artillery and thunder artillery platoons are at the rear, providing fire cover for the attacking troops at any time and killing the firepower points of the Japanese and puppet troops that appear on the offensive road."
At the Japanese temporary headquarters, panic has spread here.
Only more than 100 of the more than 300-strong Guards escaped from the artillery fire. Less than half of the headquarters staff, communications troops, and radio operators...were all busy setting up a temporary headquarters...
I finally got in touch with several infantry brigades, but all I got was the bad news that more than half of the troops had been killed or injured.
Immediately afterwards, news came that the four walls of Laiyuan City had been breached one after another.
The command headquarters gave the Imperial Army a dead order to stay on the city wall. Without an order, no one could take a step back to buy time for the Imperial Army to enter the street fighting fortifications.
Now that the city is broken, there is only one possibility: the more than 2,000 Imperial Army troops who defended the city are gone.
Minus the losses of four infantry brigades in the artillery raid.
The huge Laiyuan City lost more than 4,000 people in one fell swoop, with only over 2,000 people left to continue fighting.
The garrison regiment launched a burst of artillery fire and attacked, killing more than 4,000 defenders of Laiyuan City in less than two hours.
There are still seven or eight hours before dawn. Can the remaining two thousand people withstand their attack and hold on until dawn?
Everyone in the headquarters had a big question mark in their minds, and they were not optimistic about this battle.
"I swear to live and die with Laiyuan City!" the brigade leader suddenly shouted with a stern face.
Then he ordered with murderous intent: "Contact all the defending troops, we have no way out."
"Only by defending Laiyuan City will everyone have a way to survive. If we cannot defend it, everyone will die here, so everyone must be prepared to sacrifice their lives for His Majesty the Emperor at any time tonight."
"However, before dying in battle, everyone must kill an Eighth Route Army soldier and bury him with him."
"In Chinese words, kill one to protect your capital, kill two to earn one."
"Even if our mixed brigade is completely wiped out here tonight, we will still pull up the garrison to help the empire solve this serious problem."
"Rumble..."
The sudden sound of artillery not far away interrupted the brigade commander's words. After a while, an officer was seen rushing over, breathing heavily, and reported in a panic.
"Sir, the Eighth Route Army has begun to attack our troops in the city."
"And they used heavy artillery bombardment when they came up. They first destroyed the houses and fortifications where the warriors were hiding, and then launched an attack."
"Many brave men were buried in the ruins before they even saw the shadow of the Eighth Route Army's attacking troops. They died in such a cruel way."
Not long after, violent explosions were heard from the east, west and north of the city?
There is no doubt that the garrison groups in these directions are also attacking themselves in the same way...
Just now, his determined expression of looking forward to death and dying with the enemy has now been replaced by gloom.
Heavy artillery opened the way, destroyed the street fighting fortifications that the troops had worked hard to build, and exploded the battlefield into chaos.
This street fight will turn into a free-for-all.
The limited troops of the garrison were concentrated on the offensive force, like a clenched fist.
But the imperial army was scattered throughout Laiyuan City, everywhere.
In each of the four attack directions of the garrison, only a small part of the imperial army faced them head-on.
Therefore, on the four local battlefields, the advantage in strength and firepower lies with the garrison.
Before the street fighting fortifications are destroyed, the terrain advantage is still on the Imperial Army's side. The Imperial Army can use the terrain advantage to consume the strength of the attacking troops bit by bit. This is also a very important purpose for choosing to fight street fighting with the garrison.
Now that the fortifications have been destroyed and street fighting has turned into chaos, this goal will definitely not be achieved.
Thinking of this, the brigade commander knew that his carefully planned street battle had been broken by the garrison, and his chances of surviving tonight would definitely be even slimmer.
At this time, the brigade leader was not as nervous as before.
Maybe because he knew that he would die tonight, he became completely careless.
"Order all the imperial troops who have not yet been attacked to leave their street fighting fortifications, use infantry squads as units, freely choose battlefields to attack the Eighth Route Army's attacking troops, and fight the enemy to the death."
No one from the brigade headquarters was left behind, including me, and all of them went to the battlefield."
"Tell all the soldiers that I am with them. As long as there is one person alive in the brigade, we will fight to the end."
By this time, everyone knew that the brigade commander was ready to die in battle.
Even the brigade commander was prepared to die, and his subordinates had no chance of survival.
Everyone became murderous. They raised their weapons and shouted loudly: "Fight to the death!"