The War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression Begins in Songhu

Chapter 98 A tortured day

Captain Huang was very proactive. After eating rice noodles, he asked the chief of staff and the deputy captain to withstand the Japanese counterattack on the front line.

I will personally start the task of destroying the Japanese heavy artillery position tonight.

On the one hand, he sent out several signalmen to several neighboring Gui army units to contact them about taking action together at night.

Because the remaining strength of the 1020th Regiment is not enough to accomplish this feat that night.

On the other hand, he was working with a group of staff to formulate an action plan for tonight.

Although he had made up his mind not to participate in the Gui army's counterattack plan, he wanted to wait until the Battle of Shanghai when the National Army retreated, so that he could take advantage of the chaos and escape.

When Captain Huang and his team were discussing in front of the Buddha statue, Hu Biao and the other seven also came over, hoping to help with some ideas and increase the chances of success.

It is precisely because of this that I have learned more about the latest battlefield situation.

The unknown heavy artillery position of the Japanese is located about four kilometers in front of the Dunwu Temple. To destroy them, we need to face the following difficulties:
First, the Japanese are currently fighting against the Gui army, and they will definitely not allow the Gui army to attack their heavy artillery positions.

Once a battle breaks out with these Japanese attacking forces, their motives will certainly be discovered in advance by the heavy artillery positions; this involves an almost unsolvable problem: what if the Japanese heavy artillery opens fire on them?
If the shell really hits, an entire company will be completely wiped out, and even if it is affected, there will be huge casualties.

Second, the Japanese are not stupid. How could there be no defensive force at all in such an important artillery unit?

According to the intelligence that Captain Huang and his men learned last night, after defeating the Japanese attacking forces, they still had to face two squadrons of defensive forces outside the heavy artillery position.

One of the squadrons of Japanese soldiers should be the direct defense force of this mysterious heavy artillery; the other squadron of Japanese soldiers should be the attached operation force of the hot air balloon.

These two squadrons had never participated in combat before, and now both have a full staff of around 200 people.

They had built a complete defensive fortification and had been gathering strength. It could be said that a fully-strength regiment of the Gui army would not be able to break through their positions in a short time.

I believe that after a while, more reinforcements from the Japanese will appear.

The only good news was that perhaps because there were huge cannons with a caliber of more than 300 mm on the position, these two Japanese squadrons were not equipped with any other artillery, not even Type 92 infantry guns.

Regarding the above situation, Hu Biao and his team thought about it privately for a long time and did not think that Captain Huang and his team had any chance of success.

But when they looked at Captain Huang's bloodshot eyes, they wisely gave up the idea of ​​trying to persuade him, because such persuasion would definitely not have any effect.

We can only hope that they will be smarter by then, and retreat earlier when they see that things are hopeless, so that fewer brothers will die.

In short, the day of the 22nd was another extremely torturous day for Hu Biao and his colleagues.

Although they knew that Captain Huang and his men were committing suicide, they were unable to stop them. Moreover, on the battlefield along the entire Yunzaobang line, more Kuomintang brothers were dying in battle, even more than at night.

Because in daytime battles, all the Japanese planes can be deployed.

During the attack of the Gui army brothers, in addition to facing the Japanese firepower network and threats such as artillery, tanks, and naval guns, they also had to face the crazy strafing and bombing from planes overhead.

However, the brothers of the Gui army had almost no experience in dealing with air raids, and they still attacked the Japanese in dense formations with bayonets in hand.

Often, after a plane dives, the machine gun will directly create a bloody alley in the crowd, or a large number of people will be knocked down at once by a high-powered bomb.

*****
Of course, facing the crazy attack of the Gui army, the Japanese have suffered heavy casualties and they are also hurt.

For example, at this moment, in the headquarters of the 3rd Division, the old Japanese soldier Fujita Chika was looking at a report in front of him with an expression of disbelief on his face.

Why? Because facing the counterattack of the Gui army, he did not order his men to defend on the spot, but also launched an offensive.

The reason for him to issue such an order is simple.
He knew that the war in the Magic City, which had lasted for more than two months, had reached its most critical moment.

As long as they defeated the Gui army, this fresh force, the Chinese side's defeat in the battlefield of the Magic City would be a sure thing. So now, they could consider the next step, a battle plan more important than the Magic City: to capture the Chinese capital of Nanjing and force the Chinese to completely surrender.

Based on this point, we must use a powerful offensive method to eliminate this new force of the Gui army in this battle.

Break all the morale and bones of the national army and establish the image of the imperial warriors as invincible.

This will make them filled with fear whenever they encounter the imperial army in the future; and make the battle to capture Nanjing easier.

What he didn't expect was that despite being completely behind in tactics and firepower, the enemy still caused terrible casualties to their Third Division.

According to the latest report in his hand, the situation of the front-line combat troops was so severe that it made his scalp tingle.

Many squadrons have only about twenty people left at this point. Even if all the surviving members of each battalion were organized together, they would not be able to fill up even a squadron.

Almost all the officers at the grassroots level, such as squadron leaders and team leaders, were killed in the battle.

The more crucial point is that the Gui army's offensive is still quite fierce, and it is far from the time to decide the outcome.
If the battle continued like this, he knew that even if they eliminated the Gui army, their Third Division would be completely crippled, so he had to do something.

After pondering for a while, Fujita Chika came up with an idea.

He began to explain to a staff officer behind him: "Tell Commander Matsui Ishige that in order to achieve the predetermined strategic goal, the 3rd Division needs reinforcements, including more air force and heavy artillery support.

Especially the support of the 'Special 24 Howitzers', this core firepower is the key to withstanding the counterattack of the Gui army on the Dunwu Temple and Chenjiaxing front."

Such a plea was passed through the radio and soon arrived at Matsui Ishige's desk.

Knowing that this battle could not be lost, the old devils quickly signed a series of orders.

The main content included asking Shigeto's detachment to immediately support the 3rd Division, and ordering the Air Force, artillery units, and even the fleet to increase support without considering reserves and consumption.

Based on this content, a related order was received at the heavy artillery position that Captain Huang planned to destroy tonight.

It should be noted that this heavy mortar unit came from the Japanese Far East Dongning Fortress.

It was the size of a squadron and was equipped with two Type 305 long-barreled mm heavy mortars, which were considered to be relatively advanced heavy artillery at the time.

In the future, when the Russians attacked the Kwantung Army, they suffered a great loss because of this thing.

In the Battle of Nanjing shortly afterwards, this thing also caused great trouble to the national army.

Its total weight is 97 tons, and with the mobile base it reaches 122 tons. The barrel is 7 meters long, and the elevation range is from -5 degrees to 73 degrees, and the range can be adjusted 360 degrees.

The maximum range is 14.8 kilometers, and the weight of a shell reaches 400 kilograms.

Such a big thing requires nine heavy transport vehicles to load one door and be pulled by a crawler tractor. It will be assembled after arriving at the destination, and it takes more than 9 hours to complete the assembly.

Anyway, although this thing is quite troublesome to transport, assemble and use, there is no doubt about its power.

The only thing that currently affects this Japanese heavy artillery unit's full-scale firing is the wear and tear on the artillery and the consumption of shells during continuous firing.

Just after seeing the newly received order, a high-ranking Japanese major commander.

He issued an order to his men that the Gui army absolutely did not want to hear:
"Commander Matsui has ordered the urgent transportation of replacement barrels and ammunition reserves. So from now on, increase the frequency of firing~"

Under such circumstances, the Gui army discovered that the deadly and terrifying artillery shells were becoming more and more dense...

(End of this chapter)