November 7th can definitely be called a disaster day for the Kunisaki detachment.
The planned siege battle has not even started yet! The Kunisaki detachment has killed more than 1,200 officers and soldiers and injured more than 900. Almost two infantry brigades can be removed from the detachment sequence.
And how many infantrymen does the Kunozaki Detachment have in total? Putting aside the auxiliary arms such as cavalry, artillery, engineering, and supplies, including the two infantry squadrons directly under the Kunozaki Detachment Headquarters, there are only 6 infantry brigades with a total of 7,000 people.
This nearly 30% casualty ratio in an ordinary army basically means that this army has lost its combat effectiveness and can be repaired and replenished.
Not to mention that Kunizaki, who finally watched the statistics of the casualties from each infantry regiment and did not speak for a long time, even the division commander of the 114th Division, Suematsu Shigeharu, did not speak for a long time.
Good guy! The attack on Johto hasn't even started yet! The Kunisaki detachment has been completely defeated. When the whole army actually attacks the city, the intelligence says that Matsue Castle has an infantry force, what kind of impact will it bring to the Imperial Army?
What about harm?
Suematsu Shigeharu gets hairy all over just thinking about it.
Yanagawa Heisuke, who was at the headquarters of the Tenth Army located on the south bank of the Huangpu River, couldn't help but feel his head hurt when he saw this number.
He is the commander-in-chief of an army of nearly 100,000 people. The seemingly mighty army has frightened the 500,000 Chinese troops in the west of Shanghai. They are trying their best to escape, but this does not mean that they can be ruined by these prodigal sons.
!
The 114th Division plus the Kunisaki Detachment had lost nearly 5,000 men, nearly two infantry regiments, in just two days. If it continued like this for a few more days, I'm afraid he wouldn't have to worry about huge losses.
Because the army base camp might have told him to pack up and get out.
Perhaps, after Hisao Tani, who is located in the two southwest cities, saw the battle report from the Kunisaki detachment, he was not frightened by the strength of the Chinese, nor did he have a headache. Instead, he dropped a sentence with disdain: "So-called
The Steel Army is just mediocre!"
Hisao Tani is certainly qualified to express contempt for the Kunizaki detachment.
When encountering an enemy fortress, a determined attack is an essential quality for a strong army. The Kunisaki detachment's execution in this regard is like a so-called "steel army".
However, even after paying a terrible number of casualties, but still unable to make an inch of progress, that means the combat effectiveness is no longer good.
You must know that for a position with a radius of only tens of thousands of meters, the Tenth Army assembled dozens of artillery to support it. Even Lieutenant Generals like Yanagawa Heisuke, the commander of the army, gave it to the Colonel-class ship stationed in the center of the Huangpu River.
Chang sent a call to express his gratitude, and thus received the support of 6 127mm naval guns.
Not counting the artillery shells thrown last night, during this day alone, dozens of artillery fired 3,000 artillery shells at the not-so-large position. That is the density of a shell with a lethality radius of more than ten meters in 20 square meters.
.
With such terrifying fire support, let alone a small position surrounded by city walls, even Songjiang City should have been captured!
As a result, the Kunisaki detachment got scared and chose to call a truce to wait for the arrival of the heavy artillery brigade. How could such generals and soldiers have the qualifications to be called the 'Steel Army'?
Sitting in his field headquarters 1,500 meters away from Matsue Castle, Hisao Tani looked with cold eyes at the sand table on the table that the staff had spent half a day building.
There was a lively fight in the West City, and the Sixth Division, as the main force in the siege, naturally did not do anything.
During this half-day, the two infantry brigades responsible for the two city walls took turns dispatching 10 infantry squadrons of nearly 2,000 infantrymen to continuously test the firepower points appearing on the two city walls.
The staff officers of each infantry regiment, who arrived at the trenches only 300 meters away from the city wall, marked the light and heavy firepower points buried in and on the city wall one by one.
Hisao Tani is not tall, he is lean and lean, and he does not have the civilized beard that the Japanese upper class wears in order to appear "fashionable". He wears a pair of glasses, and looks ordinary from the outside.
Like a teacher.
But only those who know him well will know that beneath this ordinary appearance, there is an extremely tough and vicious heart hidden.
He is said to be tough because he came from a poor background and had no background, but he spent more than 30 years to be promoted from an ordinary second lieutenant to an army lieutenant general. He served as a casualty several times, but he came back from adversity several times to serve as the chief of staff of the division.
, brigade commander and many other important positions, until he took on the important position of commander of the Sixth Division two years ago.
Without a tenacious personality, it is difficult to achieve this level of determination.
He is said to be ruthless because when he served as an instructor at the Army University, he publicized his tactical thoughts countless times: plundering, banditry, and bow-fighting during combat are important means of maintaining morale. Ordinary people only think of them as being used to gain a position.
However, when he led his troops to the North China battlefield, everyone knew that he really thought so and did so.
If Seishiro Itagaki, who wantonly deprived his enemies of their lives to frighten them, was a butcher and a devil, then this ordinary-looking teacher was probably a hell dog, who despised life even more than butchers and devils.
Hisao Tani has a cruelty that Chinese people cannot imagine, but that does not mean that he is reckless and stupid. He has served as an instructor at the Army University and is a typical academic, with a meticulous mind and rigorous military management methods.
He would not fight an unprepared battle. Even if the commander of the Tenth Army, Yanagawa Heisuke, had given him the order to attack, he did not rashly drive his more than 20,000 men to attack the west and south walls for military glory.
attack.
The thirty-meter-wide moat and the five- to six-meter-high city wall allowed him to judge that without the assistance of the heavy artillery brigade, he would have to pay thousands of casualties to conquer the Chinese position.
Therefore, he is waiting and constantly testing, just like a pack of wolves discovering a herd of bison in the wilderness, constantly looking for weaknesses in the herd, waiting for the opportunity to attack the prey.
Once attacked, it is fatal. The wolves will not stop attacking until the prey falls and is torn to pieces.
To the relatively calm Hisao Tani and the 6th Division, the Kunisaki Detachment and the 114th Division, which had a bloody encounter at the Cangcheng and Block positions, did appear to be in a low position.
Lieutenant General Hisao Tani expressed his contempt for the two of them because of this, which was enough confidence.
Of course, the Kunisaki detachment that made such a huge sacrifice finally gained something.
First, not long after noon, they captured Cangcheng.
However, it was not that they completely wiped out the Cangcheng defenders, but that the Cangcheng defenders evacuated on their own initiative.
Half an hour after discovering that the Kunisaki detachment had stopped attacking, Tang Dao judged that the Japanese army was probably not really cowed and afraid to attack, but they were just waiting for support because of too many casualties.
The armies of the three divisions have already reached the city. They still need to wait for support, which is only their army aviation or heavy artillery brigade.
The aerial bombs hanging on the plane weigh hundreds or even hundreds of pounds. Once those things are dropped in Cangcheng, the underground bunkers that can withstand 75 or even 105 howitzers will become a tragedy.
And the 200-caliber and above heavy artillery of the heavy artillery brigade that will definitely appear in Tang Dao's memory cannot be resisted by a hastily dug bullet shelter.
Rather than waiting to be buried by the Japanese aerial bombs and heavy artillery, it is better to preserve our vitality for the time being.
Although the defense battle of Cangcheng did not complete the combat mission of being a nail between the east and west cities as originally expected, it also gave the Japanese army a head-on blow and put a damper on the arrogance of the Japanese army.
At the same time, it also annihilated a large number of effective forces of the Japanese army. Although its own losses were also considerable, any commander would be happy to see this battle based on the ratio of losses between the two warring parties.
War is about industrial strength and wealth.
But on the battlefield, there is only exchange.
Exchange lives.
Regardless of whether it is bearable or not, making the opponent pay a greater price at the smallest possible cost is what commanders on the battlefield have to do.
Therefore, Tang Dao, who assessed the situation, sent a message to the Songjiang headquarters and requested to withdraw from Cangcheng.
Several generals in the Songjiang headquarters also breathed a sigh of relief. Finally, the Cangcheng defenders were not completely wiped out.
For these generals who have experienced countless battles, they are not afraid of heavy losses.
No matter how great the losses of the troops are, as long as China still exists, they can replenish their troops and rebuild.
But if any army wants to rebuild, it must have seeds. If there are seeds, it will still have energy and spirit, and it can continue its combat effectiveness. If even the seeds are gone, the infantry battalion of the 677th Regiment, the guard company of the colonel commander, and
One-fifth of the troops of the 43rd Army who came here are gone.
However, it is not that easy to retreat.
Kunizaki, who was beaten all over, was stunned but kept his eyes fixed on Cangcheng. If there was any abnormal movement, it would be either guns or cannons, and he would never let the defenders escape easily.
"I need all the artillery in the army to obey my command!" Tang Dao made such an excessive request.
There is only one person with that kind of power, not even Lieutenant General Guo as deputy commander-in-chief.
But Lieutenant General Wu fought hard to get Tang Dao and others back to the city. Without hesitation, he issued a military order that all artillery positions in the army should be under the command of Tang Dao.
Then, Tang Dao, who became a scout again, gave all the Japanese infantrymen who were watching the Cangcheng defenders eagerly near Cangcheng a taste of what artillery superiority meant.
The coordinates in the city were continuously sent back, allowing several artillery groups to accurately throw their shells at the direction of the Japanese infantry, as if they had eyes, causing them to flee in panic.
Tang Dao divided the remnants of Cangcheng with less than 200 people into several batches. Each batch carried some seriously wounded people and all wore Japanese military uniforms. When the artillery fire started to cover the Japanese army, they retreated according to the long-planned plan.
Route retreat.
The panicked Japanese soldiers may have seen a few khaki figures wandering around the streets, but at that time everyone was panicking to avoid artillery fire, so why would they pay more attention to others?
By the time the Japanese army figured out something was wrong and no longer used artillery fire to counter-suppress the Chinese artillery positions in the city with little purpose, but instead implemented artillery fire blockade on the residential areas behind Cangcheng, the Cangcheng defenders had already withdrawn.
about there.
Tang Dao led Peng Chong and more than 20 guards from the company and were the last group to evacuate. The Japanese troops who realized something was wrong risked being shelled and pursued aggressively, but Tang Dao and others, all armed with submachine guns, beat them hard in the neighborhood.
A lesson, what is real street fighting?
The two Japanese infantry squads that were pursuing them were almost defeated by the submachine guns. The 32-round burst of firepower was much more powerful than the 20-shot shell gun of the security group.
The fierce man Tang Dao alone took the lives of more than a dozen Japanese soldiers during the counterattack during the retreat.
Zhao Daqiang, who was lurking in the neighborhood and was planning to help him, was immediately confused.
