Quartermasters can also fight the devils

The 15th Division of the 73rd Army of the Chinese government was losing ground under the fierce attack of the 13th Division of the Japanese Army, and it seemed that it could not hold on. Even some of the new recruits had been completely dispersed under the attack of the 13th Division of the Japanese Army, and the platoon leaders and company commanders in the army could not find where these new recruits had gone.

At the same time, the Japanese 3rd Division and the Sasaki Detachment, which was assigned to the operation, began to attack the 77th Division of the 73rd Army, which was responsible for defending the Xianfeng Mountain and Longfengya positions, in the early morning of November 14.

The 77th Division is also an old unit of the 73rd Army. It has participated in many major battles, including the three Changsha Battles, the Winter Offensive, the Zhejiang-Jiangxi Battle, etc. Originally, the 77th Division had some combat effectiveness, but in the Battle of Western Hubei half a year ago, the 77th Division also suffered heavy casualties. Although smaller than those of the 15th Division, the casualties of the entire division also exceeded 50%. Now the 77th Division is also filled with a large number of new recruits.

Facing the Japanese attack, although the recruits of the 77th Division were quite brave, they were after all inferior in skills and were no match for the Japanese attacking forces. Like the recruits of the 15th Division, the shooting accuracy of these recruits of the 77th Division was very poor, and they could not even hit the Japanese charging soldiers at a distance of less than 50 meters.

The Japanese 3rd Division and Sasaki Detachment had no trouble attacking the 77th Division's position. They simply suppressed it with heavy artillery, then blocked it with heavy machine guns, and then launched a fierce infantry charge. In just a few hours, the Japanese attack force successfully broke through the 77th Division's defensive position.

After the 77th Division's outer defense positions were broken by the Japanese offensive forces, it was forced to retreat to Xin'an in the rear. Xin'an is also north of the Lishui River. Like Shimen, it is the last line of defense of the Chinese army north of the Lishui River.

According to the combat plan formulated by Commander Sun, acting commander of the Sixth War Zone of the Chinese government, and Chief of Staff Guo of the War Zone, the troops of the 73rd Army should be able to hold this line for at least two to three days, and then withdraw across the Lishui River depending on the situation and move to the positions on the opposite bank to continue defensive operations.

However, what the Chinese government's Sixth War Zone Acting Commander Sun and War Zone Chief of Staff Guo never expected was that the 73rd Army collapsed across the board just a few hours after being attacked by the Japanese 11th Army's offensive forces.

Moreover, the 77th Division of the 73rd Army should have retreated to Xin'an and continued to resist the attacking forces of the Japanese 11th Army. However, unexpectedly, due to too many new recruits in the army, the 77th Division suffered a large-scale collapse during the retreat.

In fact, sometimes recruits are not afraid of defensive battles or sniper battles, but they are afraid of retreating. If the recruits are squatting in trenches and bunkers and firing guns, it may not be difficult for them. Moreover, defensive battles generally do not continue for a long time. Either the attacking side withdraws or the defending side moves. In this way, it is relatively easy for the recruits to persevere psychologically.

Moreover, since everyone in the trenches was fighting bravely, and there were second and third line defense positions behind the general defense positions, and more importantly, there were supervision teams behind to enforce battlefield discipline, it was unlikely that the recruits would succeed even if they wanted to escape.

However, it is different when the troops are retreating. If the troops are advancing when they are victorious, they can still maintain high morale. If the troops are retreating after being defeated, they will easily collapse.

When the troops were defeated, everyone was running quickly backwards, and the Japanese attacking troops were chasing them quickly behind them. Everyone knew that if they ran slowly, they would easily lose their lives. In this way, the already very nervous recruits would fall into panic and could easily not stop running. The fear of death would make it impossible for the recruits to stop and turn back to fight, resulting in a complete defeat.

Throughout the world war, how to retreat smoothly has always been a difficult problem for the armies of all countries. On this issue, only the Japanese army did the best.

Such a situation occurred in the 77th Division of the 73rd Army. The casualties of the 77th Division in combat were not heavy, but the organization of the troops during the retreat was quite chaotic. The organizational structure of many troops was messed up during the retreat. During the retreat, the squad leaders of the 77th Division could not find their soldiers, and the platoon leaders could not find their squad leaders.

These new recruits basically followed the veterans or squad leaders in their first battle. They did whatever the veterans or squad leaders told them to do and generally did not have any opinions of their own. It was already very good for these new recruits not to wet their pants due to the Japanese attacks on the battlefield. Their heads were blank, so how could they have any opinions of their own?

Without the command of the veterans and squad leaders, the new recruits would not follow the friendly troops from other squads and platoons to continue fighting like the veterans did, but would just retreat to the rear or run away.

The troops of the 77th Division had just retreated to Xin'an, and the officers and soldiers had not even had time to move into the defensive positions, when the attacking forces of the 13th Division of the Japanese Army followed the retreating troops of the 77th Division and pursued them to Xin'an.

The officers and soldiers of the 77th Division could only barely resist the attacks of the Japanese 13th Division's offensive forces. As a result, many positions were captured by the Japanese 13th Division's offensive forces. Facing the fierce attacks from all sides of the Japanese 13th Division's offensive forces, the 77th Division's troops once again suffered considerable casualties, and the recruits in the troops could no longer support it. They began to retreat spontaneously. This was not because they could not hold on physically, but because of a complete mental breakdown.

The commander of the 77th Division, Han Jun, also saw that the new recruits in the army had no fighting spirit, and he could only grit his teeth and stamp his feet in anxiety in the division headquarters. The commander of the 77th Division, Han, knew that the new recruits could no longer be controlled, and there were no extra troops to control these new recruits. Therefore, the commander of the 77th Division, Han, could only command the old soldiers in the army to fight desperately against the attack of the Japanese 13th Division.

In order to stop the offensive of the Japanese 13th Division's attacking forces, Commander Han of the 77th Division even sent the division's special forces company to the front line to plug the gap.

However, what the 77th Division Commander Han did not expect was that the offensive force of the 13th Division of the Japanese Army was too fierce. When the special forces company had just left the 77th Division headquarters, part of the offensive force of the 13th Division of the Japanese Army attacked the 77th Division headquarters.