"Even the tomahawk tanks were powerless to some ground fortifications of the Japanese army, but this kind of self-propelled artillery could destroy some simple fortifications and pave the way for infantry's attack."

"Okay, how is the output of this kind of self-propelled artillery?" Jiang Li asked, looking at the low-faced self-propelled artillery.

"Due to the slight decline in tonnage and the turret design was cancelled, the process and cost were reduced a lot. The cost and working hours of a self-propelled cannon are only about half of that of a Tomahawk tank. The factory technician named this tank the sword self-propelled cannon." The test officer said.

"In other words, the effort and cost of building a tomahawk can build two such self-propelled artillery." At this time, everyone present had their eyes lit up.

"The self-propelled artillery is not enough to show its reputation, so it is called a sword assault gun." Jiang Li smiled when he heard the performance and cost of this self-propelled artillery. At this time, when the 57mm tank guns of various countries were considered large caliber, the Northwest had taken the lead in installing its own tanks with 75mm guns.

"Assault gun? It sounds much louder." The officers and others who were testing nodded when they heard this. Then they introduced the performance of some sword assault guns. The speed of 36 kilometers per hour can run more than 150 kilometers with fuel. Compared with their physique, the overall performance is already good.

"Although there is no turret and no rotary fire cannons, the advantages of assault guns are visible. The safety is no lower than that of tomahawks, and the installed cannons are large enough. More importantly, the cost is cheap. In other words, with the same investment, our armor strength can be doubled. The advantage of quantity is enough to smooth out other shortcomings. Commander, I, Lao Yang, have never been convinced in life, and this time I am completely convinced."

Yang Hucheng looked at this new type of assault gun with his eyes glowing, and Jiang Li was completely convinced. While the local army, in order to expand its troops, and to buy ammunition, Jiang Li had already surpassed everyone, made these and even surpassed the many weapons of the great powers to some extent. At least, he had surpassed the Japanese army at this time. If it weren't for experiencing these in person, Yang Hucheng would not even dare to imagine it. Whether it was the Feng 918 semi-automatic rifle, the fire tongue general machine gun, the self-produced German heavy artillery produced in the northwest, the tanks in front of him, the planes on his head, and even the poisonous gas that the Japanese army was afraid of.

If he were asked to come, he wouldn't even know where to start. When he was in Shaanxi, he would have stayed in the northwest for a longer time than Jiang Li stayed in the northwest. He would have understood more clearly than anyone else about the poverty in the northwest. If it weren't for the things brought by Jiang Li, the Japanese army would have long attacked the Central Plains and captured Wuhan. Yang Hucheng walked all the way from the late Qing Dynasty, from a passionate young man to a military tycoon today, and had seen too many generations of heroes, but these people were eventually silent in the long river of history. In addition to gaining a reputation for a while, they did not have much impact on the current situation, nor could they change the current situation. In a sense, these people even aggravated the turmoil in the Republic of China.

In the Republic of China, the Northwest can have the current situation, which is simply a miracle, and it was Jiang Li's miracle hands that created this miracle.

"Yes, the cost is so low, expanding production can replace the current status of Tomahawk tanks. Although we have some foundation in the northwest, we can't stand the swing. We can use this sword assault gun as the main force in the future." Zhang Zhibang nodded repeatedly.

"Although there are many advantages, if we really use the tomahawk, we will probably suffer the loss. The performance of the tomahawk tank is more flexible than that of this assault gun. Nowadays, the conditions do not allow, so we can make more of this assault gun to replace the status of the tank. That is because the assault guns we manufacture are not inferior to the Japanese tanks. But in the future, tanks should still be our main force."

Jiang Li said that after such a long time of hard work, the Northwest successfully developed assault guns from the chassis of the Avengers tank. However, the assault guns canceled the turret, which was not Jiang Li's ideal main armored force. The sword assault gun in front of him was equipped with 24 times 75mm guns in advance than the Tomahawk tank. It was also because the cost of the sword assault guns was lower. Large-scale production was only an emergency measure, after all, the sword assault guns were enough to solve the demand for armored troops in the Northwest at this time. The biggest enemy of the Northwest Army was not the Japanese, but the Soviet Union in the north. At that time, with the development of Northwest Industry, a large number of tanks could compete with the Soviet army.

However, it is enough to deal with the Japanese tanks. The best performance is not necessarily the most suitable. At least for now, the sword assault can replace the status of the tomahawk to fight against the Japanese armored forces.

According to the current production capacity of the tank factory, if a certain number of tanks are produced and such assault guns are added, with the current combat intensity, the expansion of Sun Liren and Zhang Chujiu units will be further completed next year while the two units of Sun Liren and Zhang Chujiu will be further raised next year. After the Japanese army launched the Pacific War, it will not be too late for the Northwest Army to launch another attack.

After all, although the Northwest accumulated a certain amount of strength at this time, the Japanese army still had only one million troops fighting in the pass during the continuous increase in troops. During the entire World War II, the Japanese army was known to be more than 6 million. After the Japanese army advanced south in history, a large number of elite Japanese troops were transferred to the Pacific battlefield. In fact, since the Pacific War exploded, the Republic of China mainland was no longer the main battlefield of the Japanese army. Although the Northwest also accumulated a certain amount of strength at this time, relatively speaking, if the Republic of China alone challenged the entire Japanese army, it would still be difficult to catch it. For the Republic of China and the Northwest at this time, dragging the outbreak of the Pacific War would be a victory.

According to the current situation, Jiang Li is not worried that the Japanese army will not go south. After all, the urgently needed oil has always been heavily dependent on imports to white countries. Once this channel is cut off, the Japanese army's huge war machine will face the danger of collapse, and even the local Japanese industry will lose the momentum to continue moving forward.

As a big country, especially a country like Japan with great ambitions, it will never allow its lifeline to be held by Britain and the United States. The output of Borneo oil fields is almost irresistible for Japan at this time, and it is also the only large oil field that Japan may control at this time. At this time, Europe was drastic, Britain and France declared war on Germany. The situation was just like more than 20 years ago. Britain and France did not have enough energy to take into account the situation in Asia. They did not have the ability to compete with the Japanese army in Asia. For such a large oil field that seems to be within reach and does not have to spend too much money to redeem it, and completely solve the needs of the Japanese army for more than ten years. If the Japanese army can hold it back, it is really a ghost.

The situation generally develops within the grasp of the leader and Jiang Li, but some aspects are not diverted by personal will.

Once the official order of the Japanese Navy and the Republic of China fleet to cooperate with the army to occupy the vicinity of Anqing was issued. The Hatan Detachment, under the escort of the 11th Mine Team, was from Zhenjiang Port, Jiangsu Province. The naval tracing troops set out from Nanjing, and the two were in the Huihe River in Wuhu and advanced westward. The Japanese fleet advanced to Tieppanzhou, about 20 kilometers southeast of Anqing, and the area around the General Temple. On the same day, the Hatan Detachment landed on the north bank and advanced down the river to Anqing. There was no strong resistance along the way. Following the Hatan Detachment, the Japanese special marines landed on the south bank. After a short battle, they occupied the upper vacant ditch fort. In the evening, the Hatan Detachment occupied the airport.

Because the main force was dispersed, Yang Sen's unit of the Sichuan Army lost command. At this time, he was in an unfavorable situation of being attacked from both sides, so he gave up Anqing and retreated to Qianshan and Taihu Lake.

So, the Japanese army occupied Anqing on August 16. A regiment of the 6th Division of the Japanese army also occupied Tongcheng on the same day.

The fall of Tongcheng and Anqing allowed the Japanese army to use the Hefei to Anqing highway to obtain a more favorable position to attack Wuhan. Although the defenders had 9 divisions in Huainan and had more than 100,000 troops, their troops were more than scattered and their respective subordinates were not in charge, and they lacked strong command. The troops' fighting will declined severely under the continuous attacks of the Japanese army. In just over ten days, hundreds of miles were lost.

The Japanese army had long wanted to occupy Anqing. The original Japanese army used Guangde and Wuhu as bases. Whenever their bombers or attack aircraft attacked Wuhan, the air combat time of the escorted fighter over Wuhan could only be compressed within 15 minutes due to the endurance of the escort. Due to insufficient escort, the Japanese planes were lost by Soviet volunteer fighters and Central Air Force interceptors in Wuhan, which was greatly damaged.

After the Japanese army occupied the airport in Anqing, the Japanese aviation army obtained an excellent entry into the airport to attack the central air bases in Wuhan and other places, which made the Central Army's Madang blockade line directly exposed to the Japanese attack. The difficulty of river defense was further increased.

However, some troops were weak in combat, but most of the troops were extremely tenacious in combat. In the Jiangnan region, dense rivers and mountains became good defense lines to block the Japanese army. A large number of Japanese troops could not break the defenders' positions even under superior firepower, so they used poison gas to fight. The Japanese army's Immortal Jae-in not only issued an order to use sneeze poison gas in the Republic of China, but once the order reached the Japanese army, it would always be a little distorted. The Japanese army quickly increased the use of more than 50,000 suffocating poison gas. In the Wuhan Battle, the military and civilians of the National Army who were directly injured and injured due to poison gas reached an astonishing 50,000 people.

Three months later, when Wuhan's peripheral positions were almost lost, in order to retain certain strength and avoid suffering as much as when the Battle of Songhu, Chairman Jiang ordered the abandonment of Wuhan after persisting for September. He brought the last batch of machinery to Changsha, Hengyang and other places one after another.

The Japanese army lost more than 200 aircraft and nearly 100 tanks, and directly killed more than 46,000 people. The total casualties totaled nearly 200,000 people, and took the waterway traffic hub in Wuhan that covered the throat of the Yangtze River.

As the Japanese army encountered major setbacks in the battle of Xuzhou, Chairman Chiang won the extra months to arrange the Wuhan defense line. These relatively sufficient preparations, and the National Army entered the late stage, with an astonishing number of nearly 900,000 troops fighting back. The casualties of the Japanese army also lost a large number of living troops in hundreds or thousands of battles.

In view of the fall of Wuhan, Jiang Li canceled the early combat plan in eastern Henan based on the situation. At the same time, in order to avoid the long-term front line, which was not conducive to the later tight defense. He only launched a certain degree of counterattack in northern Henan, but soon encountered a stronger counterattack from the Japanese army. Almost all the positions of the Northwest Army in Yunbei were destroyed. Since 38 years, more than 500 aircraft and wreckage of more than 200 tanks have been accumulated on the front line of both sides. There is almost no too much in the position.

With the situation of relying on it, Jiang Li ordered Wang Tiehan to retreat southward in the Battle of Northern Henan. At this point, Anyang and other places that had been in control for more than a year, fell into the control of the Japanese army. Although the Japanese army lost more than 10,000 troops less than the Battle of Wuhan in more than a year of combat in northern Henan, the number of aircraft, tanks and quality of the damaged aircraft and tanks were much stronger than those in the Battle of Wuhan. If the losses in the Battle of Eastern Henan were included, they would actually exceed the data of the Battle of Wuhan.

Although the Northwest armored forces were greatly strengthened at this time, after the sword assault gun was put into production, the total number of various tanks and assault guns from the tank factory in the northwest reached 53 in one month, and the Snow Leopard armored vehicles also reached more than 100 tanks other than armored vehicles of the Mechanized Brigade and the Third Brigade were added to more than 100 tanks in the war, each with more than 40 Snow Leopard armored vehicles. Moreover, after Tian Jianlong, as the pioneer of the Northwest Army armored army, stepped down as the head of the Armor Department of the Northwest Military Academy, the Northwest Armored Division formed also completed a half of the reorganization.

But Jiang Li still shrank the fronts in eastern Henan and northern Henan inwards. He drew his troops to the second line of the Central Plains defense circles such as Xinxiang, Kaifeng, Zhoukou, Zhumadian, etc.

At this time, large cities and strategic areas such as the eastern coast of the Republic of China, northeastern, south Guangzhou, and central Wuhan were all under the control of the Japanese army. Although they suffered casualties far exceeding historical losses, the Japanese army finally achieved its established strategic goals and forced Wuhan into the Changsha area of ​​Hunan. In the eastern and central regions of the Republic of China, most of the large and medium-sized cities in the central region fell into the hands of the Japanese army.

After occupying the Sudetenland region, the German army once again occupied Czechoslovakia and separated Poland from the Soviet Union. After Britain and France declared war on Germany, there was no movement and it was dubbed a strange sit-in battle by the current situation. Poland was attacked by two top military powers in the world, and millions of troops were wiped out in one month.
Chapter completed!