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The battle inexplicably entered a white-hot stage without any complicated strategy. Due to the terrain restrictions from Pu County to Linfen, both the Pu County defenders and the attacking Japanese 6th Division and 21st Division coalition forces could only fight from the front.

The situation was one-sided. With the cooperation of the 1st Independent Regiment and the 2nd Artillery Regiment, the Japanese first attacked in an orderly manner, then advanced in a planned alternating cover, then retreated in an organized manner, and finally turned into a rout.

Although Naofuku Mikuni did not send many troops to participate in the 6th Division's offensive from beginning to end, the number of Japanese devils who directly and indirectly participated in the battle reached more than 2.

Since the beginning of war in human history, it is rare for the attacking side to launch a main attack with great momentum, but end up in a rout in a short period of time.

You should know that although the Pu County garrison was an independent 1st Regiment, there were only two battalions of troops deployed in the Linfen direction, and the other battalion was scattered in some important fortifications west of Pu County.

The Independent 2000st Regiment, with a defensive force of only about 1 people, defeated the Japanese army of 2 and forced it to flee.

The battle lasted until the second half of the night when the Japanese withdrew from the battle. Along the way were corpses and weapons that the Japanese did not take away. This was the biggest loss suffered by the 6th Division since entering Datang to participate in the war.

At first, an infantry regiment under the 6th Division was able to chase and fight against tens of thousands of Jin troops. Now attacking and defending have become easy. This battle completely overturned Kanda Masatane's cognition.

In addition to the artillery regiment being almost completely wiped out, only less than 500 people escaped from one of its infantry regiments, and several other infantry regiments were also damaged to varying degrees, and their combat effectiveness was directly reduced by half.

The cunning Naofu Mikuni was much better off. Although he also took up the artillery regiment of his 21st Division, he only deployed two infantry battalions on the front battlefield, and they were responsible for the flank guard of the 6th Division, and the casualties were no more than 200.

I don’t know if it was because the 2nd Artillery Regiment preferred to fire large-caliber artillery, but the 21st Division’s small-caliber artillery regiment suffered less losses than the 6th Division, and more than 10 complete mountain artillery pieces were withdrawn.

The 21st Division will be able to reorganize an artillery battalion in the future, but the 6th Division will probably be downgraded. It will either have to wait for new recruits to arrive from the organization site and transfer artillery from the Japanese military headquarters, or it may be dispersed to other divisions.

If it was a garrison division, it wouldn't be a big deal if it had fewer people and weaker firepower.

But the 6th Division is a permanent division and the mainstay of the Japanese army. If it loses its proper role, the Japanese will not allow it to occupy this position.

.....

Kanda Masatane's goal was to ignite a fire behind the 176th Division in order to alleviate the plight of Yan County and other places.

However, its purpose was obviously not achieved.

And at the same time as the Pu County battle ended, the headquarters of the 176th Division received the victory report from the 666th Regiment.

After the armored regiment first disrupted the enemy's positions and opened several gaps, the 666th and 664th Regiments completely occupied Yan County after a day of fighting and captured more than 2000 enemy soldiers.

The armored regiment simply replenished its ammunition and fuel, and then took advantage of the night to advance at full speed towards Fenxi, with the 667th Regiment and the 4th Independent Regiment following closely behind.

Because of the experience from the previous battle, the troops were familiar with the surrounding terrain and marched much faster.

The Independent 2nd Regiment and the Independent 3rd Regiment that arrived later headed towards Shuitou Town from Yan County and Yonghe respectively.

In the early morning, when it was a little light, the 666th Regiment and the artillery battalion of the independent 4th Regiment, which had moved overnight from Heijiaxinzhuang to the east of Yan County, cooperated with the 1st Artillery Regiment to start the bombardment.

The targets of the L118 howitzers and Type 54-1 howitzers were the hidden field heavy artillery positions of the Japanese in Fenxi, while the Bofors mountain guns served as supporting firepower for the ground offensive forces.

But the situation changed. Although the ground troops encountered Japanese sniper attacks, their firepower was very small, and many of them were puppet troops.

The artillery fire lasted for more than 10 minutes, but the Japanese did not retaliate with artillery fire. Only sporadic mortar explosions occurred in the front-line positions.

"What's going on? Something's wrong in Fenxi! Lao Jiang, should we order the troops to temporarily suspend the offensive in case the Japs are trying to trick us?"

At the Meidongshan headquarters, Wang Dafu stayed up all night and asked Jiang Feng with concern.

He wandered between the communications office and the operations room all night, keeping an eye on changes on the front line and making changes from time to time.

Although this operation was nominally under the unified command of Jiang Feng, Jiang Feng did not intervene much. Instead, he gave the command to Wang Dafu.

Xu Le naturally understood Jiang Feng’s intention!

Today's 176th Division is developing too fast and is facing a serious problem, which is the lack of experienced and courageous commanders.

Jiang Feng is a qualified military commander, but apart from him, only Fang Yue, the chief of staff of the 388th Brigade, has some ability. Apart from him, there are no other senior commanders who can be regarded as capable.

Jiang Feng is training Wang Dafu!

Although Liu Quanhua's qualifications are also sufficient, his personality is only suitable for being a front-line commander, and not suitable for sitting at the headquarters to command a large army!

Xu Le was also very optimistic about Wang Dafu, so he also did not interfere in the battle command.

At this moment he also looked at Jiang Feng, wanting to hear what the other party thought.

As if he didn't sleep well last night, Jiang Feng yawned and said, "You worry too much. Think about it, why did the Japs try so hard to reinforce us before?"

Wang Dafu's brain worked quickly. After Jiang Feng's prompt, he thought about it and then said in surprise:

"It was the test base that the young marshal blew up. That was an inhumane practice and could not be made public. The Japanese spent a lot of effort to reinforce it just to keep this secret.

But the base was gone, and they had lost their target to protect. In addition, our troops’ offensive was fierce, so the Japs had no need to hold on!

Therefore, Fenxi City has actually been abandoned by the devils, and the main force has already withdrawn! "

Jiang Feng nodded: "Yes, I expected this. But I can't guarantee it, so I still let the artillery unit bombard the enemy's position. It's better to be safe than sorry!

But judging from the current situation, we can capture Fenxi and Majiazhai within today!"

.....

While they were discussing, a radio operator came in to report: "Report, the First Artillery Regiment sent an urgent telegram!"

Xu Le took the telegram and read it, then handed it to Wang Dafu and said, "Take a look, it's from the First Artillery Regiment. Their scouts once again checked the positions of the Japanese heavy artillery, but found that the heavy artillery was gone."

Wang Dafu took the telegram and read it word by word. Then he was overjoyed. He did not ask Jiang Feng and Xu Le for permission and shouted directly to the communicator:

"Send a message to the front line, and have the 667th Regiment and other units speed up their advance. Take Fenxi and Majiazhai today!"

"At the same time, order the 664th Regiment to stop resting and rush to Fenxi immediately. After the 666th Regiment takes Fenxi, establish a defensive position within 15 kilometers east of Fenxi!"

"Order the 2nd and 3rd Independent Regiments to rush to Shuitou Town at full speed. Similarly, they must capture Shuitou Town within today!"