When the first explosion sounded, Major General Seki Kameji, the commander of the Japanese mixed second brigade, was sitting in an armored vehicle with his eyes closed to relax. The violent explosion caused the entire marching column to stop, and the armored vehicle jerked violently. , also stopped. Guan Guizhi couldn't stand it anymore, and his upper body leaned forward with inertia, and his head almost hit the deck in front. He was shocked and immediately shouted loudly: "What's going on? Hurry, open the door."
A major adjutant opened the door for him, and two guards quickly jumped out of the car to guard the door. He stepped out of the car, looked towards the front of the team, and couldn't help but take a breath.
On the side of Qiu Shan facing the highway, among the green grass and trees, hundreds of flames sprayed bullets. In the face of such a dense rain of bullets, the brigade in front of the headquarters had been tightly suppressed. Among them , the dozen trucks running at the front were burning blazingly at the moment, with corpses scattered on the ground beside them. On the trucks behind, soldiers were jumping down in a steady stream at the moment, but the only thing they saw after they got down to the ground was All he could do was lie down, not daring to raise his head and fire the gun, because when he picked up the telescope to see more clearly, in the lens of his telescope, a soldier had just exposed his head. Before I could set up the gun, my head suddenly burst into flames.
He immediately realized: "The enemy has a sniper." He looked through the telescope toward the mountain, feeling vaguely uneasy in his heart.
This was a long-planned ambush by the Chinese. The number should be no less than 2,000. This was the establishment of two regiments. Thinking of the superior enemy's attack in Lijia Village, Guan Guizhi was a little confused. Before the war, when the commander introduced the deployment of the Chinese troops in North China, didn't he say that the only thing that could really hinder the Imperial Army's North China strategy was the approximately three divisions of the Xuebing Army? But why did this group of soldiers seem to be fighting more and more of that group? Woolen cloth,,
While he was deep in thought, soldiers wearing cadet army uniforms began to charge down the mountain. They were densely packed with camouflage-colored steel helmets and hundreds of guns spitting flames. The Chinese firepower was quite ferocious. Ah, taking advantage of their opportunity to attack, a small group of soldiers who stood out of the bunker and wanted to counterattack only had time to hastily shoot out the bullets in their guns before being thrown to the ground. The worst part of them was that their chest and abdomen were almost broken by bullets. ,
The Chinese were coming with great force. If they could not be contained and were driven out of the mountainous area, then if they wanted to get close to the mountain, they would have to pay a higher price. Guan Guizhi had a gloomy face and made a quick decision. Resolutely blocking the charge of the Chinese, this position must not be lost. He said to the adjutant beside him: "Let Daxiong also hide for me to resist. Where is the artillery? Pull the mountain cannon over."
Faced with such intensive firepower from the Chinese, only artillery could break up their formation. Almost instinctively, Guan Guizhi thought of the most effective way to deal with the intensive formation, which was shelling.
The larger-caliber cannons of the second brigade have all been defeated by Xiangyue Qingji. Now, the entire brigade still retains six 75mm-caliber mountain cannons, and some mortars.
Since the Japanese army went to war, there are two parts of the army that are the most depressing, the tank troops and the artillery troops. In the first battle of the Great Wall, the Japanese army's tank troops and artillery troops stole the show, especially the artillery troops, which are the most exaggerated. At that time, as soon as the cannons fired from the compartment, the national army on the opposite side began to retreat.
Perhaps it was precisely because of their previous brilliant performance that before the expedition, the Japanese artillerymen had considerable expectations for the upcoming battle. However, the greater the expectations, the greater the disappointment, which is an eternal law. No matter what happened at Xifengkou, The contact battle was still a head-to-head battle at Tiemenguan. The Japanese artillery force did not get any benefit at all. Then when they arrived at Wangjiawei, the air force of the Xuebing Army came on stage. Well, the bombs were thrown down, and the next During the battle, I was surprised that there was nothing wrong with the artillery.
Perhaps it was because he was so depressed that once the opportunity to fight was given, the Japs' artillerymen were so active. In less than ten minutes, they pushed six mountain cannons from the back of the team to the center of the position, and then , measure the distance, calculate the shooting points, and soon start firing the cannon with a "rumbling" sound.
Gu Zhang asked his troops to charge, not as Guan Guizhi had guessed, to drive the Japanese troops out of the mountainous area in order to prepare for the next sniper battle. Their purpose of doing this was entirely to obtain more results and to prepare for the next sniper battle. There may be a long and arduous sniper battle later to accumulate morale and capital.
Gu Mingchang and Zhang Yantian did not charge with the army. They saw clearly the Japanese army's response through the telescope. After discovering that six small cannons were pushed up, Gu Mingchang decisively asked the bugler to blow the retreat order. Then, Zhang Yantian stayed behind to supervise the battle, while Gu Mingchang withdrew to Bagua Pass with a few guards.
As requested in Ouyang Yun's telegram, Gu and Zhang also knew that with only the current small number of troops, the ambush was just a prelude to a small fight. The real fierce battle would still take place in Bagua Pass. Gu Mingchang This is the time to rush back to Bagua Pass for general pre-war deployment. The reason why Zhang Yantian wants to stay is to ensure that the step-by-step retreat strategy can be truly implemented. This is the combat strategy they formulated before the war, that is, to Let the little Japs pay a bloody price for every step forward. We must beat the Japs hard before the big troops arrive, and even drive them crazy.
Gu and Zhang's retreat order was issued very timely, which allowed the Japanese army's rumbling artillery bombardment to hit the soldiers on the way back. It did not cause a large number of enemy casualties as Guan Guiji had hoped. Such a situation The result was naturally not what Guan Guizhi wanted to see. However, looking at the enemy troops running faster than rabbits, he could only curse the "sick man of East Asia" bitterly to relieve his evil spirits, and then gave the order helplessly. Stop the shelling, and instead ask the soldiers behind to rescue the wounded and dredge the road quickly, because at this moment, troops from other divisions have come up one after another, and soon formed a congestion at their suffix troops.
After Kozuki Kiyoshi and Hashimoto Gun were dismissed, the command of the First Army was taken back by Juichi Terauchi. This directly caused the disunity of military orders among the various divisions of the Japanese army. Subsequently, conflicts arose.
The Japanese army is a traditional army that pays great attention to seniority. Within the large group of the First Army, each unit is divided into senior groups according to the depth of seniority. Among them, the top 20 divisions are the standing divisions in the country and have the oldest qualifications. , has always looked down on miscellaneous armies such as the independent first and second brigade and the 108th Division. This is also when the 9th Division and the 108th Division jointly perform a mission, although the 9th Division The division suffered heavy casualties, and the main reason why Shimomoto Kumaomi still had to look up to Yoshizhu Ryosuke to breathe,
When Terauchi Shouichi resolutely carried out the order from the base camp and dismissed Kōgetsu Kiyoshi and Hashimoto Group, he never thought that this would pave the way for the overall defeat of the First Army at Bagua Pass.
The Second Mixed Brigade was ambushed. Logically speaking, other divisions and brigades of the First Army should provide sympathy and strategic support. Several division commanders, led by the assistant, also attributed the failure of the First Army so far to the independent mixed First and Second Brigades. They believed that it was precisely because of the poor performance of these two Pheasant Feather Brigades. The performance dragged down the entire First Army and even the North China Front Army, and cited facts to support it. If the Huncheng 1st Brigade had not been defeated at Tiemenguan, and the Huncheng 2nd Brigade had indeed fulfilled its duty of support, Tiemenguan would have remained the same. If Chengde Airport is firmly under control, it will be impossible for the Xuebing Army to send troops to Rehe, forcing the base camp to close Chengde Airport. If Chengde Airport is not closed, then the empire's fighter planes can use this airport to compete with the Xuebing Army's air force. male and female, and the North China Front Army would not be able to lose key air supremacy, resulting in the current situation of being passively beaten everywhere.
Following closely behind the 2nd Mixed Brigade was the 16th Division. Division Commander Nakajima Kongo saw Seki Kameji's troops in chaos and looked like they were defeated. He sent out the gendarmerie troops and asked them to deal with the officers and soldiers of the second brigade the same way they dealt with deserters, saying: Anyone who blocks the march of the large army will be killed without mercy.
Nakajima Kongo's measure is necessary from the perspective of resolutely carrying out the order of General Touichi Terauchi. Of course, from another perspective, such as from the perspective of Seki Kameji's subordinates, this order is very practical. It's so inhumane,
There is a strict hierarchy among Japanese officers and soldiers, and among them, the military police are a special entity. If in normal times, once the military police appear to enforce discipline, then unless someone is clever, no one will dare to provoke them, even junior officers. I don’t have the courage, but today is destined to have an accident. First of all, the mixed second brigade did not commit any battlefield discipline such as cowardice or defeat. Secondly, they are not affiliated with the 16th Division.
The ambush battle just now caused heavy casualties to the second mixed brigade. In just over 20 minutes of fighting, nearly a brigade was killed or injured, and the proportion of injuries caused by rollovers and gravel was quite heavy. The survivors must spend energy and time to clean up and sort out. The recruitment areas of each unit of the Japanese army are fixed, which makes the proportion of fellow villagers or even relatives in the same unit quite high. If a fellow villager or relative is injured, the remaining people will be injured. Naturally, it is human nature to help them more wholeheartedly. However, due to the brutal law enforcement of the 16th Division Military Police, the officers and soldiers of the Huncheng Second Brigade rose up to resist, directly triggering large-scale riots (quote Huncheng Second Brigade) Sentences from "Confessions of World War II" written by Major Seiichi Hirohei, a prisoner of the brigade),
In the initial stage of the riot, there were only some less intense pushing and shoving actions between the two parties. The reason why the two parties did not fight with each other at the beginning was, according to Hirohei Seiichi's recollection, the strict self-discipline of the middle and lower-level officers of the Huncheng 2nd Brigade. (They obviously lacked confidence), and as a military policeman of the 16th Division directly shot and killed a sergeant, the riot changed qualitatively, and the scale gradually got out of control.