When the Miluo River defense war started, the general surnamed Xue was surprised to find that the strength of the Japanese army this time was really different from before.

There were actually as many as 9 divisions of Japanese troops found on the front line.

Apart from the Japanese army, the Chinese side did not know that the Japanese base camp invested 150 brigades for this Hunan-Guangxi battle, which was even 10 more than the 140 infantry brigades during the Jiangxia Battle in 1938.

In order to ensure the success of the Battle of Hunan and Guangxi, the Japanese base camp also sent Colonel Kamishima to take over as Deputy Chief of Staff of the 11th Army.

This is because the Japanese army rarely fights a large-scale battle where both sides often invest in a million troops on the European battlefield. There are very few officers who understand the combat tactics of the large corps. However, Colonel Shimakura, who was airborne the 11th Army as the second in command of the General Staff, was one of the few commanders in the Japanese army who understood this type of tactics.

If you think that just a colonel can reflect the importance of the Japanese base camp in this battle, then you really underestimate this island Kanbuki.

First of all, the Japanese generals have five levels like China. From a special level, a first level to a second level to a lieutenant general, a major general, a third level, a third level. The colonel has actually entered the general class with half his foot in the Japanese army sequence. In the Western military rank system, he is a standard brigade general and is already a senior officer.

Secondly, this "No. 1 Battle" plan was actually a tactic developed by Colonel Hattori Shiro Hattori, who was the Operations Section of the Operations Department of the Japanese General Staff Headquarters, and Takeshi Shima, who was the senior staff officer of the base camp, and the tactics of the junior staff members, and the minor staff members. Although they were all figures like Tian Junjiu, who were clamoring for the dispatched army in China, as long as the base camp signed and agreed, he could only follow the plan as the tactics formulated by these assistants.

In 1942, Takeshi Shimakan was sent from the Japanese base camp to study and inspect the German Empire and the Mao Bear. He also served as a senior staff officer for the German army on the Eastern European battlefield. He was very good at theoretical research and operation on the large-scale siege and annihilation war.

In short, the Japanese base camp sent a very reliable think tank to Yokoyama Yuki this time.

This man just took office in early April and showed his outstanding abilities and tough personality.

The principle of combat in Hunan and Guangxi originally formulated by the Japanese base camp was to "quick battle and quick decision". The first step was to quickly capture Tanzhou and Hengyang; the second step was to conquer Guilin and Liuzhou, destroy important airports of China and the Mid along the way, and then fight a decisive battle with the arrival of China's main force.

The Japanese army with a total strength of up to 250,000 will have the opportunity to compete with the main Chinese forces of more than 500,000. If it is victorious, it can use this victory to give the military and civilians across the island a severe injection of blood to facilitate the continued fierce battle with the Allies in the Pacific and Southeast Asian battlefields.

Yes, for the 'Operation 1' plan, opening up the mainland's transportation line is only one of the strategic goals, and that is only a military strategic purpose.

The most important thing is that in the case of continuous losses, both the Emperor and the Japanese base camp urgently need a victory to prove to all the citizens that the Great Japanese Empire was not German, and it also had the ability to fight independently and win in the Far East.

Yes, for the Japanese Empire, which was already in decline, the victory of a battle was already precious. Only in this way can we attract more young people from the country to join the army, and then put them into the war and become a nourishment for continuing the war.

The extremely conceited general Xue only saw the "distance of the sky is weak", but he never thought that the rabbit would bite people even if he was anxious, let alone the red-eyed gambler who had put all his old money accumulated over a hundred years on the gambling table!

After meeting with Yokoyama Yokoyama, the island of Kanbuki and Yokoyama Yokoyama, after on-site inspections and information analysis of the personality and combat characteristics of the Chinese generals in the 9th War Zone provided by Yokoyama Yokoyama and repeatedly deduced the original plan of the base camp with Yokoyama Yokoyama.

This time the empire had an absolute advantage in military strength. Although Tanzhou was strong, it was not worth worrying. On the contrary, the Chinese army along the Guangdong-Hankou Railway and the Hunan-Guangdong Railway should pay more attention to it. The Sixth War Zone in the west suffered heavy losses in the Battle of Changde last year, so there was no need to worry too much; the 9th War Zone in the east had side strikes, ambush, and tail strikes on the two wings of the Xiangjiang River were the keys to determine the outcome of this battle.

The two of them jointly judged that due to insufficient preparation, it was difficult for China to launch a side attack on the Imperial Army in the fourth Tanzhou offensive and defensive battle, and it was very likely that it would not launch until the Imperial Army attacked Hengyang in southern Hunan.

Therefore, the two decided not to follow the strategy and tactics of "quick battle and quick decision, first attack Liu Gui, and then decisive battle" formulated by the base camp. Instead, while sieging Hengyang with heavy troops, China's largest rear industrial and commercial base as bait, attracting other troops from the 9th War Zone of China to come here for a low-decisive battle, and strive to annihilate as much of the main force as possible in this stage of mobile warfare.

When the 11th Army reported this decision to the Expeditionary Army Commander, the Chinese Expeditionary Army Commander Tian Junji, who had moved his front-line command to Jiangxia, did not dare to make a decision, but reported it to the base camp. As a result, the Japanese base camp actually approved it.

Before the war came, the generals of China and Japan made completely opposite choices. One completely outlawed his most reliable think tank and distributed it, while the other was extremely trusting. Even in the context of being almost "sincerely committed to making meritorious service", he proposed to his immediate superiors to modify the established strategies and tactics. This is an extremely rare wisdom and courage in itself.

Different choices have determined the end of the fourth Tanzhou Battle!

However, the things in the world are so clever. The best senior staff officers and the most powerful generals in Hunan Province did not meet in Tanzhou, but would have met in Hengyang.

This is actually destined. Inside and outside Hengyang City, corpses will accumulate like mountains!

This chapter is not over, please click on the next page to continue reading! But now, the generals and officers and soldiers of China and Japan are all focusing on Tanzhou, the capital of Hunan Province, an ancient city with a long history of 3,000 years of history and culture, 2,400 years of city construction.

Under the command of Yokoyama Yuki and Shimakura Takeshi, the 11th Army, which was fighting in Hunan and Guangxi, was fully prepared for this Hunan-Guangxi battle.

Although some participating troops were public security divisions replaced by independent infantry brigades formed by domestic recruits and lacked sufficient practical experience, the Japanese army spent two or three months to train and formulated extremely detailed combat plans.

The plan even specifically covers the details of each battle, including the configuration of troops, combat progress, rear troop stations, security, climate, geographical environment, etc. It is perfectly in line with the old Chinese saying: "Success is reserved for those who are prepared!"

For example, the tactic of "turning roads into fields" developed by General Xue in the previous battles in Tanzhou was a simple and crude tactic that would have caused trouble to the 11th Army.

This tactic was initially in the first Tanzhou Battle in 1939. The 9th War Zone learned the lessons of the Nanchang Battle and destroyed all available roads, including railways, highways and even rural roads. More than 2,000 miles of broken roads were broken, turning the entire northern Hunan into a mud pond, making it difficult for the Japanese mechanized troops and heavy artillery to move forward, resulting in the Japanese divisions who would rather have less lethality but easier to dismantle and transport mountain artillery, infantry artillery and mortars. This also led to a sharp decline in the Japanese artillery strike capability and urban attack capabilities.

In the third battle of Tanzhou, the 9th War Zone used this "turning roads into fields" tactics to perfectly use, and basically dug hundreds of miles of Tanzhou on Yueyang Road into a ridge that only allows one person to walk on. All the roadbeds outside the ridge were dug and water was released into paddy fields.

That's all. Fang Xianjue, who participated in the third Tanzhou War, was preparing for the command of the 10th Division, not only changed the ridges of the road, but also changed the directions of the ridges, sometimes left and sometimes right, forcing the Japanese army to march serpentinely. As a result, he was ambushed by Chinese soldiers ambushing the paddy fields with both wings, and was beaten so embarrassed.

The Chinese soldiers wearing straw sandals and even shoes were swept the Japanese infantry in cowhides in the paddy fields, eighteen streets of cowhide boots.

When talking about this, I saw with my own eyes that many veterans of the 11th Japanese Army who were reluctant to take off their cowhide boots until they died were all crying.

The way the poor bully the rich is so unreasonable.

But this time, Yokoyama gave up the lieutenant general commander and went to the grassroots to listen to the suggestions of the grassroots veterans and lieutenants. The three cobblers were even more powerful than Zhuge Liang. Not to mention that so many short-legged men were thinking hard together, they finally came up with a way to deal with it.

The hills in northern Hunan are full of pine trees. The people of Hunan Province usually rely on these pine branches, pine needles to burn fire and keep warm, so they are reluctant to cut down these pine trees when breaking the road, which provides the possibility for the Japanese army to open a passage.

When the Japanese army repaired the road this time, they changed the practice of mainly restoring damaged roads in the past, but instead cut down pine trees to lay out the roadbed and opened up emergency roads. On the plain without pine forests, they did not hesitate to drag a heavy artillery weighing thousands of kilograms into the battlefield in northern Hunan.

In addition, the Japanese army also made full use of Dongting Lake and Xiangjiang River water transportation to maintain logistics, and plundered more than 2,500 civilian ships to transport heavy artillery and artillery shells in field operations.

This time, under the command and deployment of Mujima Kuma, who is good at large-scale combat, the five Japanese first-line divisions advanced side by side from 140 kilometers to 200 kilometers. The two field divisions on the outermost side were like two strong and powerful wings of an eagle, blocking the side attacks of the Chinese army on both sides. The other second-line divisions were more than 100 kilometers away from the first-line division. Once the first-line divisions stick to their opponents, they immediately followed up and formed a ladder attack.

The Japanese army used the "wide frontal, wave-like" tactical strategy, which always formed a local military advantage and maintained the depth of the battlefield.

At the same time, the competition in the sky is also in full swing.

The US Air Force and the Chinese Air Force located in airports in Gui and Liu are equipped with wildcats, hellcats and even the "Haota" attack bombers widely used in European battlefields. In terms of aircraft quality, they have surpassed the Japanese Zero fighter jets and 97 Fighter bombers.

Since the Battle of Changde at the end of last year, the Japanese army has been defeated repeatedly in air combat, and the protagonist who attacked from the air to the ground has long become a fighter jet of China and the United States.

This is also an important basis for General Xue and even Fang Xianjue to confirm that he has obtained air superiority.

But this time, the Japanese army obviously did not want to give up air supremacy. With the strong support of the base camp and the dispatching army headquarters, the Fifth Air Force invested more than 260 fighter jets and 110 bombers on the battlefield, which was a large-scale aircraft group that had never appeared since 1943.

This obviously exceeded the expectations of China and the Mid. In the first stage of the war in Tanzhou, China and the Mid-square could not control air supremacy. Instead, they suffered huge losses. On the first day of the war, they lost more than 28 fighter jets.

Although the Japanese side also lost no less than 30 fighter jets, it did not lose air supremacy. The 28 catastrophic attack bombers that were ready to go at Liuzhou Airport had to stop taking off to avoid greater losses.

In the next few days, Japan's Land Airlines continued to invest a large number of fighter jets to the battlefield. The infantry on the ground were desperately pouring out firepower, and the sky was strangling, and the fighter jets kept falling with thick smoke.

In the end, although the "catastrophe" attack bombers sent due to the urgent war also successfully bombed the infantry on the Japanese ground, four "catastrophe" and nine American pilots stayed on the position forever.

The Chinese side's idea of ​​complete control of air supremacy did not appear in the early stages of the battle.

On the ground, in the face of the Japanese crazy offensive, the troops under the 9th War Zone were unable to encircle and side attack like in the past, and they were even untenable. Instead, they were stuck in the Japanese army with absolute advantage in mobility and artillery fire, and were severely damaged by the Japanese army, which had absolute advantages in mobility and artillery fire.

On May 10, the Japanese army on the east route broke through Tongcheng in Nanyang of Hubei; on May 11, they captured Pingjiang and continued to move south. The 3rd Division attacked the northwest, the 13th Division attacked the southeast, and the two divisions attacked Liuyang, an important town near Tanzhou.

On May 13, the Japanese army on the west route captured Yuanjiang and attacked Ningxiang.

On May 14, the Japanese army on the middle route crossed the Xinqiang River, Laodao River, and Liuyang River.

On May 15, in order to severely destroy the morale of the Tanzhou defenders, the Japanese army began to bomb Tanzhou City with planes at night.

Although light controls have been implemented in Tanzhou City, with the surge in fleeing refugees, many traitors and spies sneaked into the city, lighting up lanterns or firing signal flares in the night to guide Japanese planes in the sky.

There was already panic in Tanzhou City!

On May 17, the Japanese army captured Liuyang, occupied Zhuzhou, and completed the complete encirclement of Tanzhou.

The battle in Tanzhou is inevitable.

The general surnamed Xue was still unable to stabilize the troops on the front line. Finally, in the face of a sharp deterioration, he no longer had the arrogant self-confidence of the past. He could only withdraw the war zone headquarters to Leiyang and leave his direct 4th army in Tanzhou to fight the enemy.

The 4th Army was once the ace force of the Guangdong Army. It was known as the "Iron Army" during the Northern Expedition, and almost all the famous Guangdong Army generals came from this army.

At this time, the 4th Army had actually left the Guangdong system and belonged to the Central Army. The entire army had three infantry divisions under its jurisdiction, with a total strength of 25,000. Because it was a direct unit of the general surnamed Xue, its equipment was mainly made of German equipment and rice equipment.

The 4th Army's mountain artillery battalion alone has more than 50 artillery pieces of various types, not as submachine guns or semi-automatic rifles. They are not worthy of the heavy firepower of the artillery alone.

In this battle, the 4th Army and the 3rd Brigade, the artillery directly under the theater, helped the brigade. The most awesome artillery of the brigade was not the 12 new metric 75mm mountain cannons it owned, nor the 6 105-meter 105 grenades, but 4 of the 24 150mm howitzers ordered from the Germanic Rheinmetallurgical Company.

When the third battle of Tanzhou reached its most dangerous situation, it was the four heavy artillery placed on Yuelu Mountain that kept bombarding the Japanese infantry siege.

Logically speaking, even if the only one of the 25,000 elite troops in the Chinese side defends the city, the Japanese army, which invested more than 100,000 troops, had to pay a terrible price to capture Tanzhou.

The Chinese Ministry of Military Affairs estimated that it could defend at least for more than 10 days. Other troops in the 9th War Zone could also arrive at the corresponding location to launch side attacks on the Japanese army. As long as reinforcements persist in the arrival of Jiangnan, the number of troops in Hunan Province will reach more than 400,000. With the final acquisition of air supremacy, the 4th Tanzhou Battle, which has already become somewhat corrupt, is not without the possibility of regaining victory.

In order to quickly win this ancient city with splendid civilization and long history, Yokoyama Yuki and Shimakuto Takeshi were also prepared for more than 10,000 casualties or even more.

But at this time, the Chinese command system made an extremely stupid scene that shocked the Japanese side!

Hengshan Yong couldn't even believe that it was done by the Chinese side who won three consecutive battles in Tanzhou. If that was the case, then what were Anan Weiji and two famous Imperial Army generals who commanded the first three battles?
Chapter completed!