When we arrived at the hiding spot, it was already broad daylight.
Most of the troops who had been busy all night were fast asleep. Li Hao was not sleepy at all and lay on the ground studying the map.
As time passed by, my brows furrowed deeper and deeper. Finally, I dropped the pencil and said helplessly.
"The option of transporting these supplies and ammunition by car is not feasible."
"It's too far from the base area. It takes several days to travel by road, even by car, and most of the roads are in the areas occupied by the Japs. If it's only a night's journey, we can also use a surprise attack to break in before the Japs are around.
He had time to react and quickly passed through the enemy-occupied area."
"It's so far away from the base area that cars can't even cover a third of the distance in one night. Once targeted by the Japanese, they will be surrounded by heavy Japanese and puppet troops, making the situation even worse."
Hong Linfeng was anxious: "What should we do? We only have three days. If we can't transport them all back to the base, we will definitely be exposed if we continue to hide here."
"Go here first!" Li Hao thought for a long time before making his decision.
Pointing to Linfen County on the map, he analyzed.
"This is Commander Chen's base. Commander Chen is famous for fighting Japanese enemies, and all the little Japanese are wary of him. The combat power of his troops is also very strong. As long as we enter his base, we will be safe."
Hong Linfeng had worked with Commander Chen and had also been to Linfen in person, so he knew Commander Chen better than Li Hao.
Immediately replied: "Commander Chen is indeed very powerful. It is the closest to here, and it is indeed the safest to go there. It is also the shortest distance and the fastest."
Li Hao continued to add: "There is another advantage to going to Commander Chen's place."
"Except for the anti-aircraft machine gun bullets and heavy mortar bullets we use ourselves, most of the rest can be left there, and let each base area send people directly to Commander Chen to collect them. If possible, half of the equipment can be left behind.
Equipment, let Commander Chen build a branch factory for the production of penicillin."
"We only need to carry heavy artillery shells, half of the equipment in the pharmaceutical factory, and a very small part of anti-aircraft machine gun bullets and heavy mortar shells back to the base area,"
"The weight has been reduced by more than two-thirds at once, and it will definitely be much easier to return to the base area."
"I will send a telegram to my superiors now, requesting Commander Chen to send troops to assist us in moving into his base area."
At ten o'clock in the morning, the troops who were searching all the way finally found Li Hao's connection point.
"Sir, we found a box in the ravine ahead. It must have rolled down during transportation and was not discovered." A company officer, Changxing, hurried over and reported.
"Let's go over and take a look..." the leader immediately ordered.
The box is hidden in a ravine, surrounded by overgrown weeds, almost one meter deep, and there are a lot of bushes growing around it. If you don't search carefully, you won't be able to find it.
The two subordinates worked together to lift the box up.
The leader just took one look at the appearance, and his eyes started to light up.
As a soldier, the boxes he sees most often are ammunition boxes. The box in front of him is so familiar to him that he can be sure that it is an ammunition box specially used to hold artillery shells.
"Open..." the leader ordered, suppressing his excitement.
The bayonet was inserted into the gap in the box lid, and with a sudden force, the box lid was pried open.
When the thatch covering it was lifted, six cannonballs appeared in the sight of the regiment leader.
"Sir, it's a large-caliber mortar shell." The subordinate reported in shock.
"This must be the contraband that Shangfeng asked us to find!" the group leader shouted, and then he couldn't help laughing.
"Large-caliber mortar shells are useless to ordinary troops, so these shells must have been prepared by pharmaceutical factories for the Eighth Route Army."
"According to intelligence, the recent appearance of a large number of heavy mortars in the Eighth Route Army must be related to this pharmaceutical factory."
"What are you still doing? Expand the search scope immediately."
"These shells certainly don't appear here for no reason."
Not long after, a battalion commander under his command rushed over: "Tuanzuo, we also found a box two hundred meters away, which contains instruments and equipment!"
"Sir, we found a damaged box three hundred meters inside the forest, as well as some traces left by the enemy's retreat. I don't know what is in the box. It should be the raw materials Shangfeng mentioned." Another subordinate rushed over.
reported.
"This is where the other party steals and exchanges materials for stones." After finding three boxes in a row, the group leader had reason to believe that he had found the connection point, and he judged with certainty.
"They also exchanged a large amount of supplies and ammunition here last night, and they must have hidden them in the mountains in front of us."
"There are a lot of things, and they won't be able to move fast. If we pursue them now, we will definitely be able to catch up."
The leader became more and more excited as he talked, as if the target he was looking for was already within his reach, he stared at the subordinates who had just come over and asked.
"Which direction is the box you found?"
"Northeast!" the company commander replied immediately.
"That's the direction to Yan'an. What we're looking for must be in that direction." The group leader thought for a moment and made a decision.
"You lead the way, and we will pursue you in that direction."
"They brought so much supplies, they will definitely leave some clues. As long as we are fast, we will be able to intercept them and get those supplies back."
In the Taiyue base area, Commander Chen is feeling worried in the headquarters.
In the first and second stages of the Hundred Regiment War, the troops achieved great results, and every participating unit made considerable gains.
But God is fair and cannot always let the Eighth Route Army take advantage.
In the third stage of the campaign, offense becomes defense.
Facing the Japanese's retaliatory counterattack, all units were under great operational pressure, especially logistical pressure.
In the first two stages, the troops have been on the offensive and consumed a large amount of ammunition, especially heavy mortar shells.
I originally thought that after suffering huge losses, the little devil would definitely have to rest first and then fight back after regaining his strength.
The Eighth Route Army could also take the opportunity to digest the results of the battle, restore its strength, and then use its strongest combat effectiveness to meet the Japanese counterattack.
Unexpectedly, the little Japanese did not follow common sense and directly launched a retaliatory counterattack, without giving the Eighth Route Army a chance to breathe.
Under this situation, although the participating units of the Eighth Route Army were very tired and lacked ammunition, they could only bite the bullet and start the third phase of the Hundred Regiment War to counter-mopping up and preserve the fruits of victory.
"Reporting to the commander, the results of each participating unit in the first two stages have been tallied, and the statistics of all captured weapons and ammunition have been completed." The deputy chief of staff came in and reported.
"Tell me first how many weapons and ammunition are there?" Commander Chen asked with a serious face, but there was a clear hint of anxiety in his words.
The deputy chief of staff did not dare to neglect and quickly replied: "There are 5,836 rifle machine guns, 41 heavy machine guns, 39 mortars, mountain artillery, infantry artillery, and field artillery that can be put into use immediately, a total of eight."
"Because we captured two arsenals, we are relatively optimistic about the ammunition seized. There are more than 1.2 million rifle bullets, 150,000 heavy machine gun bullets, and more than 1,200 artillery shells."
The serious expression on Commander Chen's face did not ease because of this good news.
1.2 million rounds of ammunition sounds like a lot, but the subordinates forgot the number of troops in the entire base area.
The main force alone has nearly 20,000 people. Excluding the light machine guns, each soldier has an average of less than fifty rounds, which cannot last long.
