Comrade, Your Ingredients Are Too Complicated

Chapter 337 Flamethrower? Braised devil?

Facing the teasing gazes of his colleagues, Iinuma Mamoru's brain began to work at high speed.

 The old devil first eliminated many impossible options in his mind, and finally came up with an answer that he didn't quite believe.

 “It’s human power!”

“Could it be that the Eighth Route Army’s manpower has been exhausted by us! They will soon have no troops available!”

“Other than that, I really can’t think of any other reason that would prompt the enemy to voluntarily abandon their well-prepared positions.”

In Iinuma Mamoru's impression, the Eighth Route Army was best at using tactical insertions and detours flexibly.

Even in positional battles involving hard power, they can use terrain advantages to accurately attack gaps in their own deployments.

Taking the current battle of Datong as an example, once the so-called Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei Military Region finds an opportunity, the opponent can even cut in from the weakest defensive position and completely divide the three divisions to encircle and annihilate them all.

Coupled with the advantage of artillery fire, they are fully capable of fighting outside Datong City, and there is no need to fight in street battles at their own expense.

 Unless there is a problem with the strength of the Eighth Route Army.

As if seeing through Iinuma Mamoru's thoughts, Nishihara Issaku took the initiative to explain:

“Having been fighting for many years, you and I both know the difference between the Eighth Route Army and those inefficient officer corps like Guo Preserved.”

“Almost every one of their senior leaders can be called the pride of heaven. Coupled with acquired learning and a lot of actual combat, commanders at the brigade level and above are by no means just ordinary people.”

“But now, the defenders of Datong have committed a problem that even novices can avoid. It must be because the opponent’s reserve force is insufficient!”

Hearing this, the Japanese Lieutenant General nodded in agreement.

 Eliminating all possibilities, the remaining options must be true no matter how outrageous they are.

 The Eighth Route Army's war potential is indeed terrifying. If it is left unchecked, something will happen sooner or later. But potential does not mean immediate combat power. No matter how advanced the weapon is, it still needs people to control it.

 From 1940 to the present, the other side has been launching large and small battles.

 Although they once captured the entire Jin Province, they had almost no recuperation for more than a year.

 If you fight, people will die.

The senior officer named Nie is indeed very powerful in setting up base areas, but he can't just spread the beans and create an army in vain. It takes a long time to train a farmer into a qualified soldier.

“I thought about it carefully and the conclusion you said is very reasonable.”

“The Eighth Route Army has assembled tens of thousands of troops in Tianzhen and Yanggao areas. Including tens of thousands of people outside Datong City, this should be the enemy’s limit in northern Shanxi.”

 “The enemy is afraid! Everything they do is a bluff!”

As soon as these words came out, Nishihara Issei immediately clapped his hands excitedly. His eyes were full of approval, as if he was happy for his colleague's enlightenment.

Of course, as a lieutenant general who came from the grassroots and had rich combat experience, the old Japanese had not not considered the possibility of the Eighth Route Army stealing troops from Xue Boling.

However, after receiving the information from Okamura Neji, all worries disappeared.

Even if it is to lure the enemy into retreating for a decisive battle, who would use the most senior commander as bait? Unless the opponent has the strength to crush him, he will never do such a crazy move.

 But if you can crush it, why go around in circles with yourself? It can't be to protect those worthless soldiers.

 The population of the Republic of China was more than 400 million, and the most indispensable thing was people.

It's a pity that based on the old devil's growth experience and experience, he will never understand the inner meaning of "comrade" in this life. After thinking for himself again, Nishihara Issaku patted his colleague on the shoulder, and then said boldly: "We have to attack as soon as possible, time waits for no one."

“Although the troops directly under the North China Front have entangled the 129th Division, and the Army Aviation has also distracted the attention of the Eighth Route Army Air Force, the 120th Division in northwestern Shanxi may arrive at any time to support.”

“One military region plus one division is not an opponent that our three divisions and two independent mixed brigades can handle.”

 “Okay! Let’s take action now!”

  ·······

  November 23, 1941, eleven o'clock in the morning.

Although the fighting outside the city is coming to an end, there are still three mountains that are difficult to climb in front of the Japanese.

 The first one is naturally a moat ten meters wide and five meters deep.

Compared with some big cities, Datong’s moat is not very wide. But it is connected with the spring water of Leigong Mountain and the water of Shili River. It is living water, not stagnant water.

 Living water is fluid and does not freeze easily.

 This resulted in the water flow in the Datong Moat being still relatively rapid even in the cold end of November. If the Japanese want to break through the moat, they can only use boats or floating objects.

 As for the original bridge? It was blown up late last night by comrades from the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei Military Region.

 The second big mountain is the 40-meter open space between the Datong city wall and the moat.

In order to receive the Japanese who were about to attack the city, the soldiers laid countless mines in the open space, and also placed a large number of barbed wire fences, deer fences, felled trees and other obstacles.

Perhaps these defensive tools will be useless under artillery fire, but who can guarantee that there will be no unexpected gains from something with almost zero cost?

This 40-meter-long open space will inevitably become a graveyard for the Japanese.

 The third mountain is the city wall of Datong.

In terms of the defensive power of the masonry city wall, the barrel guns equipped by the three divisions of the North China Front have no effect on it. High explosive charges must be used to blow up the city wall.

　　High explosive packets need to be delivered to the city wall.

 And one or two are not enough, several must be detonated at the same time to open a large enough gap.

If the Japanese can successfully cross the moat, waiting for them will be the garrison sharpening their swords on the city wall.

On the city wall with a circumference of 7,240 meters, the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei Military Region has built many bunkers and simple fortifications of civil structures, some of which are semi-permanent fortifications of reinforced concrete.

For fear of insufficient firepower, soldiers will place a machine gun every fifty meters, mixed with a large number of small-caliber mortars.

This number could be doubled if it were not to ensure that each gun/gun has a good shooting range.

Considering that the Japs may use armored troops during the siege, army reorganization experts also asked the soldiers of the anti-aircraft artillery regiment to prepare more than a dozen Hotchkiss 25mm anti-aircraft guns.

With the three mountains mentioned above taken together, the North China Front could not even enter the city to take a look without leaving one and a half regiments behind.

  ·······

Wudingmen City Wall, the 33rd Regiment of the Shanxi-Hebei Column.

 After observing the movements of the Japs through the periscope, a regiment leader with an injury on his shoulder put down the bottle of wine in his hand with dissatisfaction.

“Hey, I don’t know when Director Huang will be able to get some individual flamethrowers. Our current method of burning Japanese soldiers is still too backward compared with the old guys!”

sleep

 (End of this chapter)