Hong Linfeng quickened his pace to catch up with Li Hao, and reported with a serious look on his face: "Captain, the casualties have been counted."
"There are 1,328 remaining troops in the regiment, including cavalry battalions, reconnaissance companies, commandos, all local troops participating in the war, and supplementary troops."
"268 of them are seriously wounded and unable to march."
"The number of troops that can directly participate in the battle is less than 1,100."
Li Hao was shocked. This casualty figure far exceeded his expectation.
After being silent for a long time, he finally recovered from his grief. He looked at the soldiers walking past one after another and said with a painful look on his face: "This price is too high."
"Counting from the time when the three main battalions entered the guerrilla zone, we participated in the battle with more than 12,000 main troops, local troops, supplementary troops, guerrillas, and prisoners who were deployed to fight and replenish."
"This is equivalent to our direct loss of more than 11,000 people in this battle, and it also wiped out all the little wealth the garrison had worked hard to accumulate."
Hong Linfeng lowered his head and said nothing, but at this moment, silence is the best answer.
"Captain, good news!" Commando captain Xiao Yuan suddenly rushed over.
"The Japanese army began to retreat. After confirming that the Watanabe regiment was killed by us, we retreated directly."
Li Hao immediately became energetic, stared at Xiao Yuan and asked: "Are you sure?"
"I'm sure, I saw the Japs retreat with my own eyes. In order to prevent the Japs from attacking us, we sent people to follow them and make sure they retreated five kilometers before reporting." Xiao Yuan answered with certainty.
"good!"
Li Hao's painful face finally showed a smile.
"As long as the Japanese retreat, we will win this counter-mopping operation, and the soldiers who died on the battlefield will not have died in vain."
"Chief of Staff, order the troops to walk for another hour to find favorable terrain to camp and rest."
"Comrades are carrying too many seriously injured people. We must seize the time to treat them to avoid accidents."
"The battle is over, and we won it. We don't want any more soldiers to die, especially this kind of non-combat attrition."
At nine o'clock in the morning, under the cover of big trees, except for a few guard posts who insisted on not sleeping, all the other soldiers leaned together and fell asleep.
"Buzz buzz..."
The roar of an engine suddenly reached Li Hao's ears, faintly visible.
Li Hao's alertness was very high. Although his voice was still very weak, he still subconsciously opened his eyes.
Hong Linfeng also woke up, with a hint of worry flashing across his face.
This battle has been going on for so long, and the garrison has never had a head-to-head confrontation with a Japanese aircraft.
Now that the fighting is over, why are they sending planes here?
Could it be that in order to take revenge on the garrison, when the infantry could not enter the base area, planes were arranged to kill them and bomb the soldiers and civilians in the base area?
This was the first subconscious reaction of the two people.
If this is the case, the base area will definitely suffer heavy losses.
Today's base areas have not only emptied all weapons and ammunition from their stockpiles, but also transferred all available troops, leaving them empty of troops.
Facing the bombing by Japanese aircraft, except for local guerrillas, there was no main force that could cover the movement of the villagers.
And even if there were troops, it would be useless.
The speed of the plane is too fast and it will arrive in a blink of an eye.
If their target is really the military and civilians in the base area, the transfer speed of two legs cannot be faster than that of an airplane.
Li Hao also had a flash of worry on his face, completely unaware that the target of these planes would be him.
He frowned and replied helplessly: "The base area is too far away from us. Even if we want to control it, it is beyond our reach, and it makes no sense. So we can only pray that the soldiers and civilians in the base area will not suffer too many casualties."
"Send a telegram to the political commissar immediately and ask him to prepare for air strikes."
"Rumble..."
The roar of the engine became louder and louder, and when it was about to reach above his head, Li Hao's face suddenly turned pale and he cried out.
"No, the bombing target of these planes is us, not the base area."
"We must have been exposed. The troops immediately dispersed and moved to prepare for air strikes."
"Buzz buzz..."
The roar of airplanes has begun to sound directly above everyone's heads.
The three planes were arranged in a zigzag pattern, circling back and forth in the sky around everyone.
"Signal smoke!"
An exclamation caught Li Hao's attention. Following the exclamation, a very dazzling red smoke entered Li Hao's field of vision and rose into the sky.
"There are little Japanese scouts around, they are the ones who attracted the planes in the sky." Li Hao suddenly realized and shouted, his face turned pale.
This change came too suddenly.
No matter how fast two legs can be transferred, it cannot be faster than an airplane. This sentence applies to the soldiers and civilians in the base area, and it also applies to the troops around you, especially those seriously injured who are lying on stretchers and cannot move.
Facing air strikes, they could only stay where they were and get bombed.
Li Hao was confused, and several pictures suddenly appeared in his mind.
The bomb exploded among everyone, and the troops were blown up in pieces, causing heavy casualties...
"Captain, there are red signal smoke over there too..." another cadre exclaimed.
In the blink of an eye, four streams of red smoke had risen around the station, in four different directions, enveloping the temporary military station.
Li Hao's face turned even paler and he was very anxious. He shouted at the top of his voice: "Comrades, we are being targeted by the Japanese. Everyone, please disperse and hide!"
"Buzz buzz...wuwuwu..."
A plane began to dive bomb, and the roar became louder and louder.
A few seconds later, three heavy bombs broke away from the fuselage and crashed to the ground with a scream.
"Rumble..."
The explosion sounded behind Li Hao, deafening, and then he felt a wave of air sweeping towards his back, almost overturning Li Hao who was retreating.
Soldiers and wounded who were unable to retreat in time were blown into the sky and turned into corpses when they landed.
Or they were directly blown into pieces, with no bones left.
The explosion ended and the roar began to weaken.
But it only lasted a few seconds before a new roar sounded in the air again, getting louder and louder.
"Continue to move, the second round of Japanese bombing has begun..."
The three planes took turns bombing, and they left after a full ten minutes of arrogance.
Li Hao was lucky that no bomb found him.
By the time the plane left and returned to the base, the forest had been bombed into a mess.
Nearly twenty large and small craters are dotted around it. There are a large number of corpses lying around each crater, as well as broken limbs and broken arms scattered in it. At a glance, it is very tragic, just like hell.
At the first glance, Li Hao's face darkened.
It is certain that at least 500 people fell in front of them in the bombing just now.
"Why are you still standing there? Clean the battlefield immediately and rescue the wounded. As long as you still have breath, give me all the treatment you can!"
"Commando team, reconnaissance company, attack immediately and kill the little devils hiding around us."
"I'm going to kill them all."
"Without these little devils, we would not have exposed our target, and the bombing just now would not have happened."
"If we don't kill these little devils, the soldiers who died just now will die with their eyes open."
"Yes, leader..."
Xiao Yuan and Chen Wei shouted at the same time.
As a guard post and scout on the march of the troops, it is absolutely derelict to not notice the enemy even if they touch it right under their noses.
To put it mildly, they bear unshirkable responsibility for the hundreds of people who sacrificed their lives there.
Both of them were filled with anger. When they heard Li Hao's order, they seemed to have found an outlet and led their troops to the battlefield angrily.
"Da da da... bang bang..."
Soon, gunshots began to ring out in the forest. It was the reconnaissance company and commando team that were encircling the Japanese scouts.
"Woooooooo..."
Suddenly, a scream reached Li Hao's ears, getting closer and closer.
The soldier's sixth sense made Li Hao realize the danger and he lay on the ground subconsciously!
"Shell attack, lie down and take cover..."
"Boom boom boom..."
Before he finished speaking, three explosions rang in his ears. They were so violent that they made his ears buzz.
Li Hao frowned. He felt that he had been shot, and the wound was on his thigh.
The heartbreaking pain quickly spread throughout the body, and hot blood gushes out from the wound like a fountain, instantly soaking the military uniform around the wound.
"The regiment leader is injured. Protect him and move him immediately." Sun Jiawu, the guard battalion commander, shouted anxiously.
"Woooooooo..."
As soon as Li Hao was helped up by his subordinates, the familiar scream sounded again.
"Shell attack...protect the regiment leader, hide..."
The two soldiers knocked Li Hao down at the same time and pressed on top of him, intending to use their bodies to block the flying fragments.
"Boom boom boom..."
The shell exploded, and a shell hit right next to them.
The powerful air wave instantly overturned the two warriors, and the hot air wave swept across Li Hao's back like a fire.
The shock wave swept over him and knocked Li Hao unconscious instantly.
Hong Linfeng, who had separated from Li Hao during the transfer, happened to come over and saw with his own eyes the scene where the leader's back exploded.
He was frightened.
Li Haoshi was the backbone of the garrison. Without him, there would be no garrison today.
Looking at the entire group, anything can happen to anyone, but not him.
He looked like he was going crazy. He rushed toward the battlefield with a pair of red eyes. As he rushed, he yelled at the guards around him: "What are you doing standing still? Rescue the regiment leader at all costs. Nothing will happen to him."
Xiao Yuan, who was encircling and suppressing the Japanese scouts, was also confused.
The first round of artillery fire sounded. He determined the specific location of the enemy's artillery position. It was an area that he had not searched just now.
As soon as he led the team out of the station, he ran into the retreating Japs, and then followed them and beat them up, killing them all to vent his hatred.
I completely forgot one of the most common tactics used by the Eighth Route Army, which is to attack in the east and attack in the west.
Xiao Yuan's judgment was correct, the Japanese assassination commando team was indeed attacking in the east and in the west.
At the cost of annihilating the entire army of ordinary infantry, the artillery was given time to kill Li Hao from a distance.
Their goal was achieved.
The commandos and reconnaissance companies were all attracted to them, and then the artillery successfully opened fire.
Xiao Yuan reacted quickly. After knowing that he had been fooled, he immediately turned around and headed towards the Japanese artillery position!
