the world is at stake

In order to repay his kindness, this person specifically asked the Ministry of National Defense to allow Duan Qirui, who is in Guangdong, to also study at the National Defense University.And he is willing to hand over the position of teacher to be a regiment leader.

Yuan Shikai has collapsed, and the Beiyang Department has been dismantled.

Even Yang Du became more and more enjoyable as the governor of Heilongjiang, and a nerd like Liang Qichao was educated by reality to become more and more mature.

The central government kindly recalled Duan Qirui and Feng Guozhang and other outstanding Beiyang generals to receive training in "modern warfare" at the National Defense University.

Duan Qirui, who is currently in command in Dalian, is the rebuilt Duan Qirui. The Japanese Sixth Division on the opposite side also returned to North Korea to rest after losing 7000 people, and was replaced by the Fourth Division.

Compared with the stupid Sixth Division, the Osaka-based Fourth Division is much more slick, but more difficult to deal with.Duan Qirui's understanding of modern warfare is not enough, and he needs guidance from the Ministry of Defense from time to time.

Both sides are very cautious.

On the front line of Wafangdian, more than a dozen fighter planes are fighting each other in the sky.The red fighter planes try to maintain a two-plane formation as much as possible, and their skills and tactics are obviously higher than those of their opponents.

"Don't worry, our pilots have more training hours than the little devils, and they have also received special confrontation drills. They will definitely win." The non-commissioned officer on the ground held his breath and taught the rookie recruits under him.

"I heard that the little devil pilots are trained by the Americans, and they are also very good." A recruit asked in a low voice, "Are the ones used as decoys more dangerous?"

"Of course." The sergeant said in a low voice, "War is a fight to survive. You can take any mission assigned by your superiors, and you have no choice. If everyone picks and chooses, there is no need to fight this battle."

The voice sounded full of momentum.But a soldier next to him suddenly shouted: "Oops, one of us was shot down."

At an altitude of several hundred meters, a red fighter plane was emitting black smoke for no reason, and one wing was missing.The pilot was thrown out of the cabin, and the parachute opened a moment later.

"It's troublesome." The sergeant whispered, "The pilot is going to land on the enemy's side."

After a while, the company sent someone over and shouted, "Hu Dayan, the company commander asked you to lead a rescue team to form a rescue team and set off immediately to rescue the pilot. You need to see people in life, and you need to see corpses in death."

The Air Force, now officially known as the 'Army Air Corps', is the umbrella for the infantry.Pilots are currently the most valuable branch of the army, each one is carefully selected, and no loss is allowed.

Hu Dayan was still saying just now that 'the superiors don't have to choose any tasks'.When he heard that he was going to the enemy's position to ask for pilots, he exclaimed: "Let me go rescue people in one squad. This meat bun beats a dog and never returns."

The orderly said: "Don't worry, the company commander said, let the armored platoon cover you for an assault."

Before the words fell, three tracked combat vehicles were dispatched from the rear, with ring-shaped turrets on the roof, the kind that burned coal suddenly.

Hu Dayan immediately scolded: "Fucking hell, it's such a swindler again. Is it covering me, or am I covering it? Can't we have a decent chariot?"

Chapter 78 Steam Chariot

Xu Shuzheng's regiment headquarters was at the foot of a hill to the north of Pulandian. More than a dozen command tents with camouflage nets were set up on the hillside, and seven or eight radio antennas were disguised as tree trunks and hung on the top of the hill.

The guard company set up machine guns on the surrounding hills, with three layers of sentry posts inside and outside, to be alert to the surrounding movement - the Japanese army has occupied the Liaodong Peninsula for several years, and they are familiar with the geographical environment, so they should not take it lightly.

Last month, a lurking Japanese reconnaissance team pretended to be old farmers and found the regiment headquarters in broad daylight. The murdered regiment headquarters was bombarded by little devils, killing and wounding five or six staff officers, and almost caused Xu Shuzheng to ascend to heaven early.

For this matter, the Ministry of National Defense sent a circular to criticize the 24th Division throughout the army, and even Duan Qirui was scolded for being careless, lacking battlefield discipline, and lacking understanding of modern warfare.This is irresponsible to the great cause of national rejuvenation.

With this big hat off, Duan Qirui's face was also dull.

Xu Shuzheng was even injured in the shelling, with his arms hanging and his forehead strapped, staring at the map with a sullen face.

He is a proud person. When he served as the Liaodong garrison commander, his work of suppressing bandits was praised by the State Council, but he found that he was still far from being a qualified senior officer when he was studying at the National Defense University.

After the short training, 'Xiao Xu' actually went to the battlefield and was planning to try his hand. The little devil came to show his power-the quality and command ability of the Japanese fourth division on the opposite side can be called a strong army, not a weak one.

Outside the tent, the K16 heavy artillery was bombarding the Japanese positions under the guidance of the artillery observation plane, and every sound of the artillery was earth-shattering.

Zhang Xiaozhun, chief of staff of the regiment, came in from outside and cursed badly: "The fourth division of the Japanese army is really a ghost. Wu Luzhen and Lan Tianwei led the team to ambush the enemy's transportation line, but they were ambushed instead."

Xu Shuzheng hummed, and asked, "How many casualties?"

The garrison commanders of the three northeastern provinces are all from the Japanese 'Lu Shi', even Zhang Xiaozhun.Now the Liaodong Peninsula battlefield is completely a "Lu Shi civil war".

Xu Shuzheng was inexperienced, and neither were the others. They were all rebuilt, and then downgraded to the team leader for actual combat training—it can be said that everyone's level is not very good, and the tuition fees are not less.

Zhang Xiaozhun grabbed the teapot in the command tent, gulped down a stomach full of water, took a breath, and said, "After being shot, more than a hundred people were killed or injured, and they retreated.

Our infantry training is stronger than in the past, but the infantry coordination is out of touch, and the officers are really not as good as the little devils in execution.If we had not sealed the sea and had the advantage of artillery fire, this battle would be even more difficult to fight. "

How hard is it to fight?It will definitely be reversed.

The Ministry of National Defense requires front-line commanders to boldly use air-ground coordination, infantry coordination, and play the role of armored forces in assaulting the enemy's front, so as to push the little devil into the sea as soon as possible.

These styles of play are easy to say, but they require good cooperation between different arms. If you are not careful, you will be self-defeating and be used by your opponent.

The sound of cannons outside was also mixed with the chug sound of steam tractor boilers, and the crawler tracks creaked over the ground full of bomb craters, traveling at a speed not much faster than ordinary people walking.

Xu Shuzheng grabbed the binoculars, walked out of the tent, and climbed up the nearby hillside. He saw a line of chariots rushing forward in the forefront of the position, followed by about a company to attack the enemy's position.

"A pilot landed on the side of the Japanese, and I ordered to rescue him." Zhang Xiaozhun said.

At the beginning, the Wehrmacht only had some trucks and off-road vehicles, so they thought about mounting artillery and machine guns on the vehicles.However, after several battles, it was found that the current wheeled chassis has extremely poor passing ability under complex terrain.

When the large-scale steam tractor and vehicle factories were obtained from the United States, Tangshan Locomotive Works was ordered to refit the real armored combat vehicles - "Multi-riveted steamed steel", which accounted for at least three items.

Steam tractors are huge in size, front powered, and extremely cumbersome. As for 'Tangshan', its power is installed at the rear, with [-]mm inclined steel plates on the front, and only [-]mm and [-]mm on the side and rear.

It can't be thicker, otherwise the chassis can't stand it and can't run.

After being converted into a chariot, the main weapon is a captured Japanese-made Type 150 heavy gun with a caliber of [-] mm.The barrel is short and thick, hydraulic spring return.After removing the gun wheel gun mount, the weight of the gun body dropped to five or six hundred kilograms.

Although it is a waste utilization, it is a direct-pointing artillery, and it is powerful enough.

The secondary weapons are two MG08 machine guns, one behind the front armor plate and the other on the roof, with [-] rounds of ammunition.

The steam chariot looks majestic, black smoke is emitted when it is started, and the steam engine that boils water is whirring, requiring a special fireman to add coal to the boiler in the turret.

Due to technical limitations, the turret can only be rotated [-] degrees, and in order to prevent the seven crew members from being suffocated inside, it has no top cover, and uses grilles to block grenades and the like.

A senior officer of the Ministry of National Defense covered his face and burst into tears after seeing it. What kind of bullshit is this?It's just too ugly.After it was transported to the front line of Liaodong by train, the officers and soldiers were frightened by its height of more than four meters.

During the drill, the track of the tractor ran over the potholed field ditches, and bombarded the enemy's firepower point hundreds of meters away. The soldiers cheered happily.

But does it actually work...

Three steam chariots appeared on the Pulandian battlefield at walking speed, and with the cover of the low-lying land, they advanced towards the opposite Japanese position.The commander wearing a helmet has half of his body on the top of the turret, always paying attention to whether there are bullet craters in the direction of advancement.

Discovering the steam chariot with a distance of [-] meters, the Japanese army on the opposite side shouted and hurriedly reported to their superiors that the Chinese drove out the 'heavy tracked steam armored vehicle' again.

The Japanese army officers did not expect the rifle and machine gun to block this thing, and hurriedly brought in the 37mm anti-aircraft gun and the 57mm recoilless gun.

Hu Dayan led a squad to follow behind the steam chariot.There are 12 people in the class, and the core of the firepower is an air-cooled MG08/18 machine gun.As a non-commissioned officer who has fought for a year, he is far more alert than recruits. He keeps his waist down all the time while running, and never stays in one place for too long.

"Squad deputy, suppress the pit 300 meters ahead on the left, I bet there is a little devil's machine gun hiding there."

"Where did the 60-year-old people die? Damn, when you ask them to help, they disappear."

"Second son, go and call Tie Wangba and tell them to stop, the little devil's anti-aircraft guns are in place, don't rush forward in a daze."

"Everyone, keep your eyes open, this iron bastard is blind. Without us to see the way, it won't be long before it will become scrap iron."

The squad deputy ran seven or eight meters with the machine gun team, and all of them jumped into a bomb crater about one meter deep.

The machine gunner first set up the MG08/18 on the floating soil, and the rest of the soldiers took out their shovels, dug deep and wide the bomb crater, and raised the floating soil outside the bomb crater.

At this time, every second is precious, and the canned beef that has been eaten has turned into the energy of breastfeeding. The bunker must be repaired within 3 minutes to ensure that the mortar lobs from the Japanese army's position cannot kill the entire machine gun team in one shot.

At one minute and 30 seconds, there was movement in a pit 300 meters away. Several planks and gravel were pushed away, revealing a gap in the ground.A gun barrel stuck out, and a bunker lay beneath.

The machine gunner fired a few shots at the bunker in a sudden burst, to ensure that the Japanese machine guns could not fire at himself.As soon as the machine gun fired, the soldiers who dug the pit became more anxious.

Less than 50 meters behind the machine gun, a '60 mortar' group was also trimming the ground, and several shovels clattered the soil firmly.

The bottom plate, gun barrel, and gun mount were quickly assembled, and finally a gunner installed the scope he carried on the gun body.He lowered his head, adjusted the steering gear and the altitude gear with both hands, and aimed at the bunker that was being suppressed by the machine gun.

"360 meters, zero charge, one grenade." A gunner shouted.

The second gunner took the shells from the third gunner and loaded them into the barrel.As soon as everyone lowered their heads, the projectile fell in the barrel and shot out with a muffled bang.

A little bit off, a gunner fine-tuned the gun body and continued to order the shells to be loaded.Their task is to deal with the enemy's firepower, but they are not effective against protected bunkers and can only serve as harassment.

The '60 Mortar' artillery group fired four or five rounds but failed to deal with the opponent, one by one anxiously said: "Where did the '82 Wu' people die? This kind of shelled firepower needs to be dealt with by them."

The direct-pointing armor-piercing shells of light recoilless guns are very effective against bunkers, but the '82 Wu' battery attached to the attack is unknown.On the contrary, Hu Dayan had the foresight and asked the soldiers to contact the steam chariot in advance.

A chariot of almost [-] tons has only [-] horsepower, and the power is weak, so it can only 'walk' on the battlefield.

A soldier ran to the rear of the tank, opened the phone box on the frame for internal and external communication, and shouted to the crew in the turret: "Stop, there are anti-aircraft guns ahead of you."

In the semi-open open turret, in order to avoid the increasingly dense bullets and shrapnel, the commander no longer dared to lean out of the turret, and his vision became very narrow.

Receiving a call from accompanying infantrymen, the commander gave the order to stop.The gunner and driver finally don't have to be dizzy by the bumpy ground, and instead have a better focus on understanding the outside situation through the observation hole.

Seeing the chariot stop, Hu Dayan took out the flare gun from his purse, aimed at the camouflaged bunker about 300 meters away, and fired a red flare.

The soldiers standing behind the vehicle immediately notified the position of the signal flare, and the turret of the tank turned immediately, and quickly found the target they wanted to destroy.The gunner muttered while aiming: "This is not a battle anti-aircraft gun, this is a small bunker."

Boom... The 150mm caliber short-barreled howitzer made a deafening sound.

All the members in the turret were wearing protective helmets and earphones, and they were still uncomfortable from the shock of the shelling.The soldier standing outside the car to report clearly covered his ears, his eyes went dark from the shock, and he fainted on the spot.

The Japanese bunker more than 300 meters away suffered a [-]-kilogram grenade.The top cover covered with pine wood and soil was lifted, and the Japanese machine gun team hiding inside was blown up to the sky and completely shattered.

At the same time, a Japanese American-made 37mm anti-aircraft gun opened fire on the steam tank from 500 meters away.

The steel projectile flew at a speed of 700 meters per second, and hit the front of the chariot with a clang.It shattered the sandbags piled up on the front armor of the vehicle, punched a crater in the thirty millimeter hardened slanted armor, and was immediately ejected.

The shock caused by the projectile terrified the entire crew, and the commander ventured to poke his head out of the gun bore to see where the enemy was.The two loaders cooperated to complete the ejection of the chamber, and then worked hard to take out the heavy grenade from the ammunition rack and stuff it into it.

When firing, everyone wished that their gun barrels were as thick as possible.When it comes time to reload, everyone wishes they were using a bolt-action rifle.

The communication soldier in the car who also served as the machine gunner discovered the anti-aircraft artillery 500 meters away, and manipulated the machine gun on the front of the vehicle to fire at the opponent, shouting at the same time: "500 meters ahead, the Japanese anti-aircraft artillery."

The bullets hit the mantlet of the 37mm anti-aircraft gun, making only a clanging sound.

The Japanese gunner easily pulled the bolt and stuffed another small shell into the barrel.The commander shouted: "For the sake of the emperor, destroy the armored vehicles, onboard!"

Bang... The anti-aircraft gun fired a second round and hit the opposite steam chariot again.The ricochet appeared again, still failing to penetrate its sloped armor.It's just that the shell shock made the crew go crazy, desperately urging the two loaders.

When the Japanese gunner loaded the third round, two bright red biplane fighters swooped down in the sky, and the four 12.7mm machine guns on their noses burst into fire, making continuous lines of mud spots on the ground.

The anti-aircraft artillery was crossed by one of the firing paths, raising blood mist.

Chapter 79 Breakthrough

When the 150mm heavy artillery knocked open the hidden Japanese bunker, the infantry cheered loudly.

As a light armed force, what they are most afraid of is this kind of solid firepower that suddenly appears.In the absence of artillery support, it would take an unknown number of deaths to completely destroy it with dynamite packs or blasting barrels.

The small-caliber artillery has less charge, and the effect on this kind of firepower is not good. The barrel must be thick enough to achieve the final effect.

The 300-meter bunker was lifted into the sky, and several Japanese soldiers' corpses could be seen tearing away from the flesh and blood in the blast.This kind of corpse looks strange after falling to the ground, and it is not the same.

Hu Dayan laughed happily.He beckoned and signaled the machine gun team controlled by the squad officer to suppress it, while he led the team to follow behind a steam chariot, leaping forward step by step.

"What's wrong with the second son? Is the shock uncomfortable?" The soldier who had contacted the chariot before was found back with a slight concussion. "This chariot is good for everything, but it can't get too close."

The steam chariot drove 200 meters and was stopped by a trench.Hu Dayan glanced forward, and led the team to crawl forward on the battlefield where shrapnel was flying, preparing to turn over into the trench.

When they were more than ten meters away from the trench, seven or eight soldiers lay down on the ground, listened to the order of the squad leader, took out the grenade they carried with them, pulled the safety ring and held it in the palm of their hand.

"Wang Changlegs, are you ready? After the grenade blows up, you have to rush into the trench for me. I bet there must be little devils in the trench who want to blow up our chariot."

Hu Dayan shouted, and a tall and thin soldier beside him answered heavily.He held a short-barreled pump-action shotgun with five rounds in the barrel, three rounds stuck in the handguard, and two rounds on each side of the helmet.

"Get ready, vote!"

Seven grenades arced and fell into the opposite ditch, and there were screams and screams.Two or three seconds later, explosions followed one after another, kicking up dust.

After the sound of the explosion, the tall and thin Wang Changlegs climbed up, ran over the obstacles along the way at a very fast pace, and jumped into the trench.The moment it fell, the shotgun in his hand rang.

Two Japanese soldiers rushed towards him like rats, and were hit head-on by 12-gauge shells, causing their skulls to rupture.The pump action bolt clicked, clicked, clicked.

In order to avoid excessive damage caused by heavy artillery or bombs in the trenches, the regular army has always built S-shaped trenches.There is no straight line exceeding five meters in the ditch reinforced with rough wood, and long rifles such as the Mauser 98 are not easy to use in such places.

The little devil hiding in the ditch had just been blasted by a grenade, and before he could recover, he was sprayed with a shotgun at close range, and his flesh and blood flew from the beating within seconds.

After Wang Changleg fired five rounds from the bullet tube, there was another Japanese soldier on the opposite side with his face covered in blood, and rushed towards him with an engineering shovel.The distance between the two parties is no more than two or three meters, and they can see miniatures in each other's pupils.

The muzzle of the shotgun didn't move, Wang Changleg took half a step back and at the same time pulled a round from the handguard of the shotgun as fast as he could and stuffed it into the chamber, almost firing a shot into the enemy's chest.

The moment the gun rang, the little devil's body stopped after being beaten.But the engineer shovel in his hand was thrown out, and the sharp edge of the shovel smashed into Wang Changleg's shoulder.

When Hu Dayan led the team to jump into the ditch, Wang Changlegs leaned against the ditch wall, ignoring the engineer shovel stuck on his shoulder, busy filling his own barrel with ammunition.

"Hygienist, bandage the long legs." Hu Dayan didn't say that he would send the injured brother back when the soldiers were in danger. "Are the idiots of the company blind? We won the first trench, but they didn't see them sending people." Come support."

As soon as this was said, more than a dozen soldiers of the National Defense Forces turned into the trench, but the leader was a foreign devil wearing the rank of second lieutenant.The man was happy seeing Hu Dayan, and shouted in Henan dialect: "How are you, fellow!"

"Haoman, who did you learn this Chinese from?" Hu Dayan sneered.But he knew it was useless to scold the foreign devil.Because the other party can only say hello in Chinese, the rest must be translated.

The yellow-haired Haumann in his early twenties came from the Wehrmacht.Out of mutual trust in the military between China and Germany, the two sides sent a large number of officers of different ranks to serve in the other side's army.

Most of the Chinese soldiers who went to Germany were trained, while the German soldiers who came to China were tested in actual combat.

The Ministry of National Defense has German guys who are engaged in modernization of the armed forces. The 24th Division has a German staff officer, and a German lieutenant and second lieutenant are also commanding the troops on the front line.