In fact, after receiving the order from Okamura Neiji to immediately abandon Jining and withdraw the entire division south to the Datong line, Lieutenant General Sadae Inoue, the commander of the 69th Division, did not want to carry out this order that he seemed to be sending his own life. After all, Lieutenant General Sadae Inoue, the division commander who was fighting on the front line, judged the battle situation and the enemy's situation very clearly.
He clearly knew that all of his men were infantry and had poor mobility. The opponents around Jining were equipped with a large number of tanks and their mobility far exceeded his own. Once he broke away from the cover of the fortified city and forced his way south, he would probably be defeated by the enemy. The army's tank group was divided and surrounded.
However, Lieutenant General Sadae Inoue's opposition had no effect on Okamura Neiji. He insisted that the 69th Division and the Jining garrison immediately withdraw southward and rush to the Datong line as quickly as possible. In Yidi, Suixi, the entire northern Shanxi has been exposed to the muzzle of the Anti-Japanese Alliance, so shrinking the number of troops and sticking to northern Shanxi was what Okamura Ningji considered at that time.
Although the commander of the First Army, Lieutenant General Yoshimoto Sadichi, also opposed the decision of General Okamura Neji and privately issued an order to Lieutenant General Inoue Sadao to act according to the circumstances, the words "act according to the circumstances" do not mean Lieutenant General Yoshimoto Sadichi will openly support him against the front army commander.
In desperation, Lieutenant General Inoue Sadae could only bite the bullet and lead his troops, preparing to break out from Sanchakou and Jining City to the south. In order to ensure that the main force of the division could safely evacuate to Datong, he had been lost in Fengzhen, and his side There are a lot of enemy tanks and mechanized troops.
In order to ensure a safe evacuation and avoid being eaten by the enemy on the way, Lieutenant General Sadao Inoue took great pains in the deployment of the breakout. He ordered the two infantry brigades at Sanchakou, plus the various strongholds on the Pingsui line to the east of his battalion. Inside, some of the troops of the third brigade were independently mixed and immediately retreated to Liangcheng in the southwest at all costs, detouring to the Shahukou line, directly retreating to the territory of Youyu, and then to Datong via Youyu.
Order the two infantry brigades in Hongshazui to immediately break through the enemy's blockade and go north to meet the main force of the division. Even if they cannot completely distract the attention of the surrounding anti-alliance forces, they must at least attract the attention of some of the anti-alliance forces and distract the surrounding Jining City. of the enemy forces, and more importantly, to confuse the surrounding anti-alliance forces.
As for the Japanese troops in Jining City, he mixed the two independent squadrons of the Third Brigade and the remaining troops of the Independent 118th Infantry Brigade into a temporary brigade, plus the three infantry brigades trapped in Jining City. A total of four infantry brigades huddled tightly together and retreated southward in a group march.
As for all the ammunition and food that could not be carried in Jining City, they were all thrown away and bombed, which would attract the attention of the enemy. He was breaking out of the encirclement and fleeing, not going on an armed tour and raid, let alone taking the initiative to attack. Being too earth-shattering will eventually make you unlucky.
Although Okamura Neji gave Inoue Sadao's order to retreat, the commander of the 69th Division never thought about retreating. From the moment he received the order, he regarded the retreat as an escape. Are you kidding me? With a large number of enemy tanks and mechanized cavalry groups watching eagerly around them, leaving the solid city defense fortifications means retreating, which means fleeing.
Although in order to maintain the dignity of the imperial army, he did not say anything in words, but in action, Lieutenant General Inoue Sadao consciously equated this retreat with an escape. Some of his actions, It is indeed a bit like an escape. A large number of wounded soldiers were simply thrown away as baggage when they could not be transported.
Before the troops left, not only the seriously wounded, but also the lightly wounded who could barely walk were thrown away. The seriously wounded were each given a grenade to be loyal to the emperor, and the lightly wounded were given a rifle each. Two hundred rounds of ammunition were left to attract the enemy's attention.
As for the Japanese expatriates in Jining City, regardless of their age, as long as the men are over fifteen years old, each of them is issued a gun with 150 rounds of ammunition. Although the number of guns is insufficient, it will make the puppet troops and puppet troops in Jining City The weapons confiscated from the hands of the pseudo-police were almost enough, and there were plenty of bullets piled up in Jining City.
Integrating these hundreds of expatriates into the army is a good thing, but it can recharge their points. The women will each have a grenade, which they can use to commit suicide. As for the large and small pseudo-military and political personnel in Jining City, they will simply throw away none of them. For those puppet military and political personnel who sent large quantities of gifts, the recipients of the gifts were kicked out.
For the sake of safety, Lieutenant General Sadae Inoue specifically set the time for the withdrawal of the main force of the division and the Hongshazui headquarters six hours after the withdrawal of the two infantry brigades at Sanchakou. In fact, the two infantry brigades at Sanchakou , he regarded it as a chess piece that was deliberately thrown out to attract the attention of the surrounding Anti-League forces.
There is no other way. If you don't divert the attention of the Anti-Japanese Alliance around you, I'm afraid that as soon as your retreat moves out of the city, the opponent will take advantage of their mobility to bite you. In that case, let alone retreat to Datong. They can't even reach Fengzhen, and once they are bitten, the Sixty-ninth Division will be doomed.
In the fierce fighting in the past few days, although the fighting in Jining City was moderate due to the insufficient offensive force of the Anti-Japanese Alliance, and the main casualties of the division were not large, whether it was the troops at Sanchakou or the two troops at Hongshazui, When the brigade moved closer to the main force of the Jining Division, it suffered considerable casualties in a fierce battle with the enemy's main force.
Lieutenant General Inoue Sadao knew very well that the two infantry brigades on the front line of Hongshazui did not match his own strength at all. The role they could play at the moment was to distract the enemy's attention, and the two on the Sanchakou front line had already been beaten. The half-disabled infantry brigade attracted the enemy troops around him to the direction of Liangcheng, which was also a helpless choice for Lieutenant General Inoue Sadao.
Although Lieutenant General Sadae Inoue blamed himself for this arrangement of using his subordinates as targets to attract enemy troops, the subsequent withdrawal of most of the anti-alliance blockade forces on the southern and eastern fronts allowed him to see success. The hope of breaking out of the encirclement, and then the little bit of self-blame, had long since been extinguished as the clever plan was thought to be successful.
It's just that the development of the situation was not actually as he judged. The enemy troops around him were really attracted by the actions in the direction of Sanchakou. His bluff did almost deceive his direct opponent Yi Liangpin, but for Yi Liangpin's superior, Chen Hanzhang, had far more experience playing this kind of tricks than he did, but his few tricks and the capital he had to sacrifice were not enough.
After receiving the first-line Japanese troops at Sanchakou, they not only stopped their previous desperate attacks to the east and tried to get closer to the main force of the division, but concentrated their forces and desperately retreated toward Liangcheng in the southwest. However, the Japanese troops in Jining City did not After any action is reported.
Chen Hanzhang, who had received Yang Zhen's request to withdraw the Jining troops from the Jining battlefield and find a way to release the 69th Division out of the city for field operations, the first thing he felt from the actions of the enemy at Sanchakou was that the 69th Division was The division is about to run, and this time the Japanese army will definitely not be bluffing.
Although they had given way to the east before, the Sixty-ninth Division refused to leave Jining Jiancheng. Even the Japanese troops at Sanchakou and Hongshazui stopped all attempts to join the main force of the division and just stayed calm. They built fortifications at Sanchakou and Hongshazui to hold on.
But now the Japanese troops on the front line of Sanchakou not only stopped advancing eastward, but also made a move to the southwest to retreat to Liangcheng. Based on this, Chen Hanzhang easily judged that the Sixty-ninth Division could not sit still. Yes, the actions of the Japanese troops at Sanchakou were a bluff to cover the main actions of his division.
Chen Hanzhang, who sensed something was wrong, immediately stopped Yi Liangpin's idea of taking the opportunity to concentrate his troops and deal with the enemy at Sanchakou first. Instead, he ordered him to immediately shrink his troops in the east and south directions of Jining City and move all the troops. The troops withdrew to the north bank of the Huangqi Sea in the southeast of Jining to hide and wait, and moved out of the way of the Red Shazui line to allow the Japanese troops there to join the main force of the 69th Division.
However, Chen Hanzhang could not yet judge whether the Sixty-ninth Division wanted to go east to join the 110th Division, or whether it wanted to go south to rescue the current crisis in Datong, so he withdrew the main force of Yi Liangpin to Dachengdian. At this strategic point east of Jining, whether Inoue Sadao retreats to the east or south, he can take advantage of his mechanization to arrive quickly.
He then dispatched two battalions of the 2nd Cavalry Brigade and most of the tank troops to follow him, and immediately moved northwestward to the Bayin Beach, half of the well line, to cut off the Japanese army's attempt to retreat through the hilly areas in the west of Jining, forcing When the Sixty-ninth Division retreated, they could only take the plain area between Huangqihai and Pingsui Railway.
He and Yi Liangpin's troops prepared to attack the main force of the 69th Division from east to west. As for the Japanese troops breaking through at Sanchakou toward Liangcheng, he sent a cavalry battalion from the Second Cavalry Brigade, plus a cavalry battalion originally deployed by Yi Liangpin in that direction. The mechanized battalion was going to deal with it. Two half-disabled infantry brigades were not worth using too many troops.
At this time, Chen Hanzhang was very confident. He had no worries in the direction of Datong. After learning that No. 1 had replaced Liu Changshun with Du Kaishan, Chen Hanzhang, who knew Du Kaishan's character, knew that his gunshot An old comrade with a thorn on his butt will definitely not sit back and watch him fight hard here.
Although this guy hasn't given me any reply yet, according to what I know about this guy's character, he will definitely cause something earth-shattering. Maybe his reinforcements are already on the way, so Chen Hanzhang , simply throw all the troops around you into the battlefield.
Follow the trend, take advantage of the favorable opportunity for the Japanese army to launch a breakout, avoid the casualties caused by the storm, and maximize the impact of the tank group to completely defeat the 69th Division in one fell swoop and avoid a war of attrition. This is what he thinks should be done most at the moment.
Just where to put this battlefield, it is somewhat difficult for Chen Hanzhang. If the main force of the Sixty-ninth Division is surrounded, it will be easier to handle. On the west bank of Yihezhuoer Lake between Jining and Xinghe, the terrain there is It is flat and has good feng shui. It is a good cemetery that can be prepared for the 69th Division.
But if the 69th Division breaks out to the south, it will make him a little worried. If it is too close to Jining City, the 69th Division, which has finally emerged, will shrink back. If it moves further south, The battle was too close to Feng Town, so I sent out all my troops. There were only two tanks left in Feng Town, plus a cavalry company.
Judging from the current battlefield situation, although it is temporarily impossible to determine the retreat direction of the main Japanese army in Jining City, Chen Hanzhang believes that since the enemies of Sanchahe are now retreating towards Liangcheng, the retreat direction of the Japanese army in Jining is likely to be We chose to go south because judging from the battlefield situation, it would be most beneficial for the 69th Division to withdraw southward.
If the battlefield is placed too far south, even if there is even a slight negligence on the battlefield, the 69th Division may break through the Fengzhen line, rush through the Great Wall from the victory entrance and enter the Datong Basin, so now the troops have been used It would be dangerous to go to the extreme Yiliangpin.