Last night's victory gave Major General Kawasaki confidence in tonight's raid.
He decided to have a good sleep tonight and wait until tomorrow morning to listen to the results summarized by the chief of staff. That would be more direct and he would not have to feel nervous and worried like last night.
I slept so peacefully that I didn't walk into the war room until nine o'clock the next morning.
I thought that the troops had won the battle and the atmosphere in the war room should be very good. However, what I saw was completely opposite to what I imagined.
The chief of staff, top center left, studied the sand table with a sullen face. Several combat staff members were discussing something around the sand table with very serious expressions. Even the telephone soldiers answered the phone in a much quieter voice than usual. There was no sign of the victory after the battle. of joy.
"Did something go wrong in last night's travel battle?" A bad premonition flashed through Major General Kawasaki's mind, and he walked faster and faster, asking hurriedly before Zhongzuo could speak.
"Chief of Staff, the raid failed last night?"
Cun Shang Zhong Zuo seemed to have encountered something unspeakable. He hesitated for a while before speaking: "It's not a failure...it's just..."
"What does not count as failure?" Major General Kawasaki was not satisfied with this ambiguous answer and continued to ask.
"If you win, you win, if you lose, you lose. There is nothing bad to say."
"Winning and losing are each half..." Cun Shang Zhongzuo replied bravely.
"Nani?" Major General Kawasaki still didn't understand.
Cun Shangzhongzuo could only take out the statistics of the battle results and continue to report: "Last night we attacked six Eighth Route Army stations."
"The two commandos achieved a complete victory, annihilating one main company of the Eighth Route Army and severely damaging another main company."
"Three of the other four commando teams returned without success and lost many soldiers. Although one commando team did not complete the raid mission, they temporarily changed the target of the raid and captured a village located in the Eighth Route Army base area. Not only did they eliminate three More than a dozen guerrillas and local armed forces also killed more than 300 rioters who supported the Eighth Route Army, which severely shocked the local people and severely damaged the morale of the Eighth Route Army's people and military."
"In addition, the Eighth Route Army also dispatched several troops to raid the areas occupied by the Imperial Army. They captured a total of three of our strongholds, losing three reinforcement teams, three companies of the Imperial Alliance Army, and a large amount of weapons, ammunition and supplies."
"Including the losses of various commandos, we crushed a total of 346 imperial troops last night, and killed 418 puppet troops."
"But we also wiped out more than 300 Eighth Route Army and guerrillas, so I am humble enough to say that we win and lose equally."
Seeing that Major General Kawasaki's face suddenly darkened and became increasingly uglier, Cun Shang Zhongzuo quickly added: "But I have readjusted the raid plan based on the reasons for last night's failure to ensure that there will be no accidents in tonight's operation."
Major General Kawasaki's bad mood did not improve with this assurance. He thought with a sullen face for a while before speaking: "There is an old saying in China: Guan Gong plays with a big sword in front of him. I wonder if Mr. Cun Shang has ever heard of it."
"Hai..." Cun Shang Zhongzuo seemed to have guessed what Major General Kawasaki wanted to say, and answered with his head lowered.
Major General Kawasaki continued: "Then do you think our use of guerrilla warfare to attack the Eighth Route Army in Yizhong is considered a trick in front of Guan Gong..."
"This..." Cun Shang Zhongzuo hesitated, not knowing how to answer this question.
The strategy of using guerrilla warfare to assault the Eighth Route Army in the wing was formulated by Okamura Neiji. If he agreed with what the brigade commander said, it would mean that the commander's decision was wrong from the beginning.
The brigade commander has the rank of major general and is qualified to question the orders of His Excellency the Commander.
He is just a center-left chief of staff who rashly questions the commander's military orders. If the news reaches his ears and angers him, he may ruin his military career that he has worked hard for half his life by just wearing small shoes.
Major General Kawasaki saw the chief of staff's concerns and did not continue to ask this question. He said bluntly: "It is not impossible to use guerrilla warfare to deal with the Eighth Route Army, but we cannot blindly copy it."
"The Eighth Route Army has been engaged in guerrilla warfare for several years. If we copy it unchanged, we will definitely suffer big losses."
"My idea is to combine guerrilla warfare with our advantages, sum up a set of guerrilla warfare of our own, and continue to raid the Eighth Route Army's garrison. We will definitely achieve some unexpected results."
"Order……"
…………
That night, the six commandos sent by Major General Kawasaki did not attack on time. It was not until 8 o'clock the next morning that they penetrated directly into the base area under the cover of aircraft.
It was daytime now, and there were aircraft cover overhead. The Japanese and puppet troops were marching at least 30% faster than at night.
Although the guerrillas monitoring the stronghold returned to the base area to report the situation as soon as possible, they only arrived an hour or two earlier than the Japanese and puppet troops.
Time was tight, and the troops would definitely not have time to set up an ambush on the only way the Japanese and puppet troops would pass. The several main companies selected as assault targets by the Japanese and puppet troops could only cover the people's hasty retreat.
This is where the problem comes.
Usually, the Eighth Route Army mingles with the common people, making it difficult for aircraft to locate attack targets.
Now that the troops have left the village with the people, they have become a target for aircraft.
"Buzz buzz..."
The roar of the plane slowly reached the ears of the retreating troops on the ground from far away.
The orderly team just now became chaotic, and the people were like a group of frightened sheep, scurrying around.
The soldiers protecting them tried desperately to stop the chaos, calling everyone to spread out and get down. But the common people are different from the troops, and their psychological quality is not as good as that of the troops. No matter how hard the soldiers try, the ground is still a mess.
"Buzz buzz...wuwuwu..."
The roar became louder and louder. When I looked up, I saw the Little Japanese plane diagonally tilting down towards the ground. When it was still a hundred or two hundred meters away from the ground, the aerial bomb slumped away from the fuselage and whizzed down, hitting the middle of the crowd.
"Rumble..."
Thunderous explosions resounded on the ground, fire splashed, and thick smoke billowed. Countless soldiers and civilians were blown away in the explosion, knocked over, and fell screaming in a pool of blood.
"Buzz buzz..."
The planes returned to high altitudes and joined the battle again. This time they did not continue bombing, but stayed close to the ground. Two rows of aviation bullets were shot out as if they were free, plowing two bloody paths on the ground.
After shooting back and forth three times, the Little Japanese plane shook its wings and left the battlefield in a show of glory, leaving corpses and broken limbs on the ground.
…………
At the Duer Regiment Headquarters, Kong Jie only learned at 12 noon that the base area had been jointly attacked by Japanese commandos and aviation.
A pair of eyes suddenly turned red with anger.
The loss is too great.
Five main companies were severely damaged in the air raid, with nearly 400 people killed and dozens of seriously wounded.
More than 1,800 people from five villages were killed, more than 700 were killed, and nearly 200 were seriously injured.
Since Kong Jie took charge of the Duer Regiment, this is the first time that the people in the Yizhong base have suffered such heavy casualties.
If this incident spreads, the support of the people in the base area for the Eighth Route Army will definitely be greatly reduced. Maybe they would hide from the Eighth Route Army and ask the Eighth Route Army to leave their homes to prevent the Japanese from making them targets for venting their anger.
The Eighth Route Army is an army of ordinary people. Without the support of the local people, the army cannot gain a foothold, and the so-called establishment of base areas becomes a joke.
Chief of Staff Liu Sen obviously saw this, and before Kong Jie could speak, he hurriedly said: "Commander, we must find a way to break the situation as soon as possible. We can't let the little devils invade our base like they are strolling in the back garden, otherwise we will lose more." will increase, and the base area will also fall into turmoil."
Kong Jie replied solemnly: "The base area is too big, the troops have limited strength, and there are still many troops that have not formed combat effectiveness. There are defense loopholes everywhere around the base area. It will definitely be impossible to defend with a hard defense."
"We can only find a way to take the initiative to force the Japs commandos back into the occupied area, and then find a way to gather them together to annihilate them. At the very least, we must inflict heavy damage on them."
After saying that, he turned his attention to Huang Yu: "Xiao Huang, you have a lot of clever ideas. Think about whether there is any way to prevent the Japanese commandos from going deep into our base."
"Without the cooperation of the infantry, our troops would not have to leave the village, and there would be no need to move under the nose of Japanese aircraft. Even if Okamura Neji wanted to bomb us with planes, we could not find the target."
Huang Yu was also frightened by the massacre launched by the Japanese.
If the sacrifices were all Eighth Route Army soldiers, he wouldn't be so angry.
But the little devil killed a group of unarmed people, including many old, weak, women and children. He opened fire on them, which was like a beast.
He clenched his fists and replied with a murderous look on his face: "Captain, there is nothing to say. We must find a way to kill all the little devils who invade our base area."
"Not only can we avenge those people who sacrificed their lives, stabilize the morale of the military and the people, and prevent the base areas from falling into turmoil. We can also wait for work and completely dispel the idea of the Japanese and puppet troops using guerrilla warfare to sneak attack our base areas."
"If we just repel the Japanese and puppet commandos and seek temporary stability, the little devils who took advantage will definitely send troops to raid the base again and continue to harass us."
"The Baoding Mixed Brigade only has so many troops. If we take the opportunity to eat up the two infantry brigades they formed to form six commandos, the Japanese army will fall into a passive state of shortage of troops."
"It will take a lot of time just to replenish the losses and restore strength, let alone assemble troops again to sweep our base area."
"We will also have more time to train our troops and develop our base areas."
"The little Japs don't move at night. During the day, they raid our base area under the cover of aircraft, wreak havoc everywhere, and threaten the safety of the soldiers and civilians in the base area. Then we will attack at night, gather heavy troops to attack the strongholds stationed by the Japanese and puppet commandos, and annihilate them."
"The garrison is not yet strong enough to eat up the Japanese infantry brigade in one go. The Japanese divided their troops into commandos, which gave us a good chance to defeat them individually."
"I just did the math. Each Japanese commando team has 500 people. It has a reinforced squadron, a mountain artillery team or an infantry artillery team, and one to two companies of Japanese soldiers."
"After several days of fighting, the total strength of these commandos should be reduced to less than 400 people. Including the stronghold garrison, it will only be more than 500 people."
"The garrison regiment has its own artillery and mortar companies. If we bring all these heavy weapons to the battlefield, it will definitely be no problem for one regiment to take out all the commandos."
