With the arrival of the two officers who had finished the mobilization meeting there, except for the two commanders of the 12th Division and the 101st Division who were unable to arrive, the main personnel of the frontline headquarters of the Shanxi East Counterattack were basically present.
The main tone of this game about the Japanese army gathering heavy troops to counter-invade Jindong's army took less than one minute to completely set the tone.
It's still the point of view expressed by Tang Dao and Commander Liu before. No matter from a strategic or tactical perspective, in this battle, 75,000 Chinese soldiers cannot retreat! There is no way to retreat!
If you can't retreat, you can only fight!
After the 12th Division and the 101st Division received the order from the frontline headquarters to fight to the death, they each sent messages 30 minutes later.
Obviously, they did not follow blindly, but after some ideological struggle, they even immediately convened a short meeting with the main members of each division.
Those two people also lived up to history's evaluation of them. They made a great choice!
In this world, when faced with a life-or-death decision, most people will choose the former. Only those who are the most brave and fearless and have certain ideals will make choices that go against human nature.
These people are undoubtedly the best people in China during this period.
Fortunately, China has never lacked such outstanding people in its thousands of years of history. This may be one of the reasons why Chinese civilization has survived for thousands of years!
The hour-long meeting behind the frontline headquarters discussed how to fight. Except for Tang Dao, a young man in his early 20s, who was here but not a veteran who had been in the army for twenty years?
But Tang Dao is still young, and many of the battlefields he has experienced have not been encountered by many 20-year veterans. Whether it is the defense of Sihang Warehouse or the defense of Songjiang when faced with the siege of 100,000 Japanese troops, they are almost all
Battle of the Jedi.
Therefore, given that Tang Dao had experience in this area, in the end, 90% of the question of how to deploy the defense line in this mountain defense battle was based on Tang Dao's opinion.
Tang Dao may not be as experienced in mountain defense battles as these veterans, but Tang Dao has a vision that surpasses this era for nearly a hundred years. In the tactical 'database' in his mind, there are these seniors who have spent their lives and
Battlefield experiences of success or failure that were exchanged for blood.
For example, the Chinese army fought a fierce battle with powerful enemies on the northern ice sheet for three years. They used the mountains to fight one after another in blocking battles, tunnel battles, interspersed battles, and breakthrough battles that stunned the younger generations!
In Songgu Peak, in the Five Sacred Mountains, in Changjin Lake, in Cheoyuan, in Hwachuan... every battle that took place on those familiar place names is enough to be selected as a classic battle teaching in the top military academies.
The advice given by Tang Dao was exactly the model of the Huachuan Blockade, which is known as one of the two most classic blocking battles on the ice sheet.
It is known in history as “Cheorwon lies in the west and Hwachuan lies in the east”!
It was also the victory in the blocking battle that was hailed as 'can only win but not lose, the American Cowboys are closest to defeating China', which basically laid the foundation for the final tie in the Icefield Battle.
If this battle is defeated, not only will the elite of a heavily surrounded infantry division be eaten by American cowboys, the connection between the eastern front and the central and western fronts will also be cut off, and a corps of 100,000 troops that is actively retreating north will also be outflanked by the American army.
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Tang Dao will always remember the excitement he felt when listening to the white-haired professor explaining this classic sniper war at the military academy, which brought tears to his eyes!
Tang Dao, who was still studying in the military academy at that time, was still very young. He was almost completely immersed in the amazing tactical examples of his predecessors. It was not until a long time ago that he learned that the white-haired old man's father, two uncles and a cousin
, all died in the 13-day blocking battle.
Since then, he is the only boy under three years old left in the family!
No matter how brilliant the tactics are, they cannot be realized without sufficient determination and sacrifice. China spent the lives of 400,000 Chinese soldiers to win that war.
Now, the lives of 75,000 Chinese soldiers are placed in this vast mountain in eastern Shanxi. If the Japanese want it, come and take it!
First of all, the big aspect is that the Japanese army will come from three directions, so attack them in three directions!
On the frontal battlefield from east to west, except for a few mountain roads that are only passable by pedestrians, the only way for the army to enter the towering Taihang is Niangzi Pass!
If you want to attack Niangzi Pass, apart from the front, Wulu Ridge is the place you must defend!
There will be an extremely critical line of defense at these two places. It is expected that the incoming enemy will not be less than one complete division. If Commander Zhao of the 17th Division is willing to fight again at Fululing, then the 17th Division will defend the distance.
Guan 8 kilometers of Fulu Ridge area.
After all, Commander Li of the 104th Division never managed to grab Tang Dao. In fact, when Tang Dao completely displayed his four-line regiment's artillery and weapons, they had 12 mountain cannons, 12 150-meter heavy guns, 24 machine guns, and 24 12.7mm anti-aircraft machine guns.
After the air defense strength, whether it is the 104th Division, the 17th Division or the 921st Division, they can only take the lead.
It is conceivable that the Japanese army will definitely use aircraft and heavy artillery to bombard and shell the main position of Niangziguan day and night! Except for the Si Xing Regiment, no one has the strength to say that they will be able to defend this line of defense, which is a life-or-death matter for the entire army.
Once the Japanese army breaks through Niangzi Pass, the hinterland of the Taihang Mountains will be opened, and the Japanese army can penetrate the other two lines of defense. Then they can really be like ants carrying bread------ gnaw away piece by piece.
As a result, the defense line of more than ten kilometers in the Niangziguan area was handed over to the Sixth Regiment and the 17th Division!
From south to east, the Japanese 18th Division is eyeing them, and there are even parts of the 20th Division and even part of the 108th Division. With just five infantry regiments of the 921st Division, it is necessary to deploy a defense line of more than 20 kilometers, which is obviously extremely difficult.
Therefore, Commander Li, who had not captured the Tang Dao at Niangzi Pass, decided to defend this line of defense with the 921st Division.
But this journey is also not very optimistic. The strength of the Japanese army is not yet clear at this time, but it is estimated that it will be no less than 30,000, or even more.
"I'm afraid of being picked on by others. The worst they can do is spread nails. If the Japanese want to break through my defense, I'll have to swallow them one nail at a time." Mr. Li bit his back molars, veins popping up on his forehead.
He expressed his determination with an almost ferocious expression.
The 'Starfall Tactics' was taught to him by Tang Dao and used in the last battle in southeastern Shanxi. It took six days to completely polish the spirit of the Second Mixed Brigade, laying the foundation for the final destruction of the Second Mixed Brigade.
A solid foundation was laid.
However, his own casualties were also extremely heavy!
After that battle, only half of the nearly eight infantry companies were left. If the timeline was extended further, he didn't know if the troops could hold on any longer.
"This time! You don't have to fight hard with them. If you really can't hold on, just retreat, wait until night, and then counterattack. Commander Li, don't forget, you also have mountain cannons and shells in your hands now!
We are afraid of the enemy's artillery shells, but why aren't the enemy afraid of our artillery shells?" Tang Dao said with a smile.
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"Hey! What kind of evil idea do you have, don't hide it, tell me now!" Mr. Li immediately became interested.
That's not because of blind optimism about Tang Dao, but because it contains China's unique wisdom of 'retreating to advance'.
What Tang Dao said about "losing the position and then counterattacking to regain it" is a typical fighting method in the ice field battle. It is not terrible to lose the position on the surface of the mountain. Every night, it relies on counterattack to regain it. In the night battle, without the support of fighter planes, the American cowboys have almost no
If you don't run away, you will either be blown up by artillery fire organized by the Chinese, or killed by countless counterattack forces in units of infantry squads.
In the end, the American army did not dare to send too many troops to the high ground they had just seized in order to preserve their strength. However, this had a negative effect. The fewer the troops, the easier they were to lose! The attack was reorganized the next day, and a new attack was launched.
A round of attrition war continues.
When fighting in the mountains, if you don't seize the high ground, your attack will be useless!
Of course, this was due to the disparity in equipment between the two sides at the time. The firepower of the American cowboys during the day was too fierce. Five-hundred-pound aerial bombs were thrown away as if they were free, and the 150-caliber howitzer was not stopped during the day.
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The Chinese army can only take such measures of "retreating in order to advance" to prevent soldiers from being completely exposed to heavy firepower.
The firepower of the Japanese is nothing compared to the American cowboys! But it is much more ferocious than the Chinese army. This combat model can be used as a reference.
Although the heavy firepower of the 104th Division and the 921st Division is still not as good as that of the Japanese army, the 104th Division currently has 8 mountain cannons, which can be regarded as a mountain artillery battalion. Each infantry regiment has 6 82 mortars, and 7 37 cannons that can break armor fortifications.
millimeter anti-aircraft artillery; for this expedition of the 921st Division, the Eightyth Army allocated a reinforced artillery battalion with 16 mountain guns to them. Not only did the 683rd Brigade also have a Liao-made 150-heavy mortar battalion equipped with Tang Dao,
, coupled with a bunch of Oerlikon 20mm machine guns that have been eliminated by the Four Row Regiment, and focus the fire on a few hills, the Japanese will be blown up and cry!
Of course, there is no need to go into too much detail about Tang Dao. Veterans such as Lao Li, Commander Liu and Brigadier Cheng who have much more battlefield experience than Tang Dao can immediately draw inferences and make adjustments according to the battlefield situation.
As long as the defense line is not completely broken through and the Japanese army is not allowed to form an interspersed, divided and surrounded situation, it is not terrible to occupy one, two or even ten highlands. It will be difficult to seize them again. With Brigadier Cheng who invented the genius tunnel tactics
, and also played some other new tricks, which were beyond Tang Dao's prediction.
This thing is like writing a novel. The articles are innate and come by chance. Wonderful sentences or chapters are rarely conceived in advance. They just come out as they are written.
The same is true on the battlefield. There has never been a general who said that I had already planned to fight this way, but the enemy will not fight according to your thoughts, right? It was a fight back and forth between you and me. Due to the commander's flash of inspiration,
Even due to the stunning battle of a unit or a soldier, a wonderful tactic is completed inadvertently.
In addition to these two lines of defense, another important line of defense is of course the Shandong rear wing.
The 12th Division and the 101st Division are currently no more than 10 kilometers apart, and they are only 15 kilometers away from the rear flank. In addition, the strength of the enemy who came before is unknown, but it is most likely a part of the Fifth Division.
Commander Liu's original intention was to use one of the divisions as a counterbalance and draw the other division as a reserve to provide support to the other three lines of defense.
This kind of thinking is perfectly normal. In any battle, the commander will leave a reserve force, which can not only replenish the troops that have suffered heavy losses on the front line, but also rotate the troops that have stayed on the front line for too long.
The battlefield is in a state of high tension. Not to mention combat time during the day, even at night, in order to prevent the enemy from sneak attacks at night, even if there are sentries, the officers and soldiers on the position would like to turn a blind eye when sleeping. That kind of huge spirit
The pressure is difficult for ordinary people to understand.
No one knows how many days this battle will take. Soldiers are human beings, not iron. Rotating the soldiers down for repairs, even if they eat hot meals and sleep soundly, is a way to maintain continuous combat effectiveness.
But Tang Dao objected!
If it is the fifth division, it will be very difficult for one infantry division and four infantry regiments to resist with ten thousand people. Instead of waiting for them to suffer heavy losses and then dispatching reserves to replace them, it is better to put them on the defensive line from the beginning.
At least, firepower points and various fortifications can be deployed in advance.
The reason why Tang Dao finally convinced Commander Liu was that since the Fifth Division entered the Chinese battlefield, except for the Battle of Taierzhuang, where the Fifth War Zone lured the enemy deep and then gathered heavy troops to surround and kill nearly ten thousand people, it had not suffered a single defeat in the other battlefields.
, from their division commander Itagaki Shiro to a small private, their nostrils were pointed upward, and they were very arrogant.
They are most likely to choose to use one infantry regiment and artillery to confront the Chinese army on the defense line, and then use another regiment to circle behind the enemy's rear and look for fighter planes.
Jindong's rear flank defense line not only needs to be wide enough, but also needs to be deep enough, which requires sufficient troops to complete the deployment.
Only two infantry divisions with more than 20,000 troops can complete this important task.
The Japanese army is fierce and its strength is definitely greater than that of the Jindong army, so the entire army must be mobilized to give them a head-on attack first!
As for the reserve force, the division, brigade, and regiment level commanders of each defense line will formulate their own plans based on the battlefield situation.
In the end, both Commander Liu and the Chief of Staff agreed to Tang Dao's plan!
The next step is for the frontline headquarters to send power to each division headquarters, informing the frontline headquarters staff department of the decision to stipulate the defense areas of each division, and then each division will allocate highlands to its brigades, regiments, battalions, and companies, and formulate highland markings to the frontline
Headquarters preparation.
At the same time, the frontline headquarters also sent a message to the general headquarters in the rear to report its decision. The communications company staff became the busiest group of people at this time, and radio waves continued to be sent out from this humble mountain village.
More than 75,000 soldiers from the First Regiment of the Fifth Jindong Division quickly took action. According to the areas planned by the frontline headquarters and divisions, brigades, regiments, and battalions, they occupied high ground, frantically built fortifications, set up firepower points, and dug tunnels.
Yes, digging reverse slope tunnels was originally a necessity for the Four Lines Regiment's mountain warfare. Later, Brigadier Cheng "stole the master" and learned it, and then it was passed on to the 17th Division and the 104th Division. Commander Liu did not hide it, either.
The telegram ordered the 101st Division and the 12th Division to invest manpower and material resources to build tunnels that could avoid Japanese heavy artillery and aerial bombs.
Even if we can't build a tunnel that's deep underground due to time constraints, we can always build a trench that's deeper behind the mountain ridge!
The reverse slope tunnel that has been used in countless actual battles is the most suitable tactic for reducing shelling casualties, no one!
The time the Japanese army left for everyone may have been less than two days!
The news that nearly 100,000 Japanese troops would be surrounded completely stimulated all the participating troops, from the army colonels to the privates, to participate in the vigorous construction of fortifications.
After receiving the news, the officers and soldiers of the Four Elements Regiment who were sweating profusely and building like crazy couldn't help but secretly rejoiced that they had pretty good habits, which gave them at least four more hours.
The officers and soldiers of the 921st Division over there also began to rejoice at the wisdom of their commanders. They had dug up a lot of railways in front of them. Not to mention taking away the rails, the commanders of each regiment and battalion also asked them to take a lot of hard work with them.
"We are walking on the sleepers, one of which can weigh tens of kilograms or even hundreds of kilograms. It is tiring to cut firewood and burn it, but many people secretly complained that the leaders did not care about the lives of those below.
It’s great now. Although there is no shortage of trees in the Taihang Mountains, you have to cut them down now, right? Besides, not all wood is suitable for fortification. Some wood is too soft and bullets can penetrate it as soon as it is hit. When the cannonball blast comes, it will directly
They were all blown away, so I had to waste time looking for them.
The sleepers that are placed on the gravel to cushion the train are different. The sleepers need to be flexible and elastic enough. They are usually made of pine wood and have been treated with anti-corrosion. They are equipped with sandbags and use those rails as bones. One can
The semi-sunken fortifications for anti-infantry guns will not take long to complete.
After the war, many commentators on war history were concerned about the contribution of the 921st Division in the forced defensive battle in eastern Shanxi. They even preferred to ignore its wonderful tactics of interspersing counterattacks during the defensive battle, but also focused on the military force it carried.
More than 1,000 sleepers and nearly 20 tons of rails were predicted in advance.
It was as if the 921st Division had foreseen the difficulties they would encounter in this counterattack in advance, and actually turned the division's more than 10,000 people, more than 200 war horses, and more than 800 pack horses into a large "baggage team."
It was this batch of important materials that allowed them to build an 18-kilometer-long steel defense line in the mountains in two days, with 130 underground tunnels and 260 semi-sunk bunkers, which allowed at least thousands of Chinese officers and soldiers to
Avoid death from artillery fire and Japanese bombings!
Of course, that’s all for later!
After attending this important military meeting, Tang Dao didn't even eat dinner, so he took Niu Er and others who had been waiting outside the small courtyard to say goodbye to several officers.
Everyone in the Si Xing Regiment was still eagerly awaiting his return. The deployment of each battalion and company, although Lei Xiong and Ye Chenghuan should have also been deployed, he, the chief officer, had to make further considerations based on the terrain and geography.
After all, he was the one who knew best the personalities and characteristics of the battalion, company and platoon leaders of the Fourth Army Regiment. Lei Xiong, who had always had a loose and careless personality, did not pay attention to these.
Several officers also knew that Tang Dao was eager to return to the team, so they did not force him to stay. Although they were all very busy, they still sent Tang Dao out of the small courtyard together.
Tang Dao got on the horse and was just about to pinch the horse's belly to urge the horse to move.
"Brother Tang, wait!" Following the shout, Brigadier Cheng, who had disappeared for a while, hurried over from the other side of the village.
"I knew you were going to leave in a hurry. Fortunately, I asked the cooking team to prepare meat buns for you in advance!" Brigadier Cheng said with a smile as he came closer.
Behind them were a few soldiers carrying baskets. The baskets contained steaming steamed buns. They were called Roujiamo, but they were not as exquisite as later generations of Roujiamo. The meat was not only fat but also lean, and was chopped into pieces.
Rou min is a big piece of fat meat stuffed into a steamed bun.
But in this kind of wartime, it is a rare delicacy!
"You don't have to dismount. I'll get it for you right away. It's getting dark soon, isn't it?" Brigadier Cheng saw that Tang Dao and others were about to dismount, so he quickly stopped them.
With a wave of his hand, several soldiers gave each of them three, stuffed them into their clothes, and if they wanted to eat, just take them out and nibble them.
The elite members of the Four Elements Regiment, who fought their way out of an army of millions without washing their faces or brushing their teeth for half a month, are not that particular!
Brigadier Cheng, who personally delivered meat buns to the officers and soldiers of the Fourth Army Regiment, was busy all the time, not like a general, but like an elder brother who was sending off his brothers on a long journey.
This is just a farewell, I wonder if we will see each other again!
So, no goodbye!
"Brother Cheng, I'm leaving, take care of yourself!" Tang Dao's nose was slightly sore, and he sat on his horse and gave a military salute to Brigadier Cheng!
"Sir, take care!" Niu and others raised their hands and saluted!
With the sound of Tang Dao's "drive", the thunderous hoofbeats of more than twenty war horses resounded throughout the valley!
"Brother, take care!" Brigadier Cheng returned the salute and waved goodbye to the cavalry that was already running forward.
At this time, the sun is about to set, and the sky is filled with red clouds!
