Spy Wars: I have space, but I choose to work alone

Once the Japanese army occupied this core main position, they would be able to use heavy machine guns, artillery and infantry to attack other small positions from a dominant position. The remaining small positions would definitely not be able to hold out for 4 hours, and the entire Lawu defense would completely collapse.

"Brothers, follow me! If we have to die, we'd rather die on the battlefield! Even if we die, it will be glorious, and we'll get two hundred dollars! If a deserter is executed by the military court, your whole family will be ashamed! You won't get a penny!"

Li Longting is worthy of being a brave general who has fought against the Japanese. He is extremely decisive and dares to fight to the death at critical moments.

He knew that for his army, which was composed of a large number of new recruits, senior officers must take the lead in the charge at this moment in order to stabilize the front line.

He grabbed the Thompson submachine gun from the guard next to him, fired a short burst of shots into the air, and then led his personal guards to charge towards the position where the explosion was still continuing.

When the fleeing soldiers saw their division commander leading the charge, they gritted their teeth and shouted:

"Damn it, let's fight!"

"Fight!"

··········

All the deserters turned around and followed Li Longting towards the position.

Seeing that all the deserters had returned to their positions, Ma Liang and others breathed a sigh of relief. Shooting deserters who were frightened by the brutal war was not a pleasant thing.

"Order the transport team to bring all the food, drinking water, and ammunition up to the troops, and also bring all the wounded down. Tell the doctors at the field hospital not to be stingy with the medicines. All the imported medicines in the warehouse are open for them to use. Make sure every soldier is saved!"

With the division commander Li Longting taking the lead, although hand-to-hand combat broke out at one point in the originally shaky main position defense line, the position was finally held by dark.

At night, inside the headquarters, the chief of staff of the new 28th Division was reporting on casualties:

"This afternoon, the Japanese army dispatched three waves of bomber groups, cooperating with armored units to launch three rounds of assaults on our core main position. After our army fought back desperately, the position is still in our hands, but we also paid a huge price."

"The 28st Regiment of the New th Division, responsible for defending the main position, suffered half casualties, and the rd Regiment of the Reserve, which was rotated in, suffered one-third casualties. If it weren't for Director Zheng's timely interception of the deserters and Division Commander Li personally leading the charge, the position might have been lost in the first round of the Japanese attack."

"Also, according to Director Zheng's scouts, the main force of the Japanese 56th Division arrived before dark today. Also arriving was a battalion equipped with 56 12mm heavy artillery pieces, which was reinforced by the Japanese army and assigned to the 105th Division. Together with the 56th Division's 105mm heavy artillery battalion, there are two heavy artillery battalions totaling 24 105mm howitzers."

Li Longting, injured and with one arm hanging on his chest, looked at Ma Liang with confusion, and then added:

"I'd like to thank Director Zheng first. He defied all odds and didn't try to fool the foreign journalists by using mud inside and cement outside. Instead, he built high-standard reinforced concrete fortifications. His construction was extremely scientific and practical. He also organized grassroots officers to conduct position attack and defense drills, which played a significant role this time."

"It saved us a lot of unnecessary casualties, especially at those sturdy permanent firepower points. Many times, the Japanese infantry rushed to the positions, but they couldn't do anything about our permanent firepower points. This gave me time to organize the reserve troops to retake the front line."

Hearing what Li Longting said, all the senior military officers looked at Ma Liang in confusion.

Isn’t this too much of a coincidence?

Could it be that Director Zheng was the one who planned this?

Ma Liang felt uncomfortable seeing this, but fortunately he was wearing sunglasses, so others couldn't notice the changes in his eyes.

After just a few glances at Ma Liang, everyone looked away.

I just think it's a coincidence. After all, this battle concerns the safety of the 100,000 most elite expeditionary forces of the entire Celestial Empire. Such a strategic gamble could never be planned by a Military Intelligence Bureau spy. It's too unreasonable.

After everyone withdrew their suspicious gazes, Li Longting continued his analysis:

"I personally commanded the battle on the battlefield. The reason we suffered so many casualties was because there were too many new recruits running around and looking around, the officers' poor command skills, and the chaotic mobilization of troops. In fact, the Japanese artillery could not penetrate our fortifications. The damage caused by Japanese bombers to our permanent fortifications was not that great, only destroying two. The remaining 28 permanent firepower points were well preserved, backed by Lawu, and had sufficient ammunition. After being tested in actual combat, the officers and soldiers who survived are also growing rapidly."

"Our casualties won't be that great. The most formidable challenge right now is the Japanese army's 24 105mm heavy artillery pieces!"

After hearing the report, the senior officers in the command center were smoking violently.

On just the first day of the official war, one-third of the two main regiments suffered casualties and almost lost their positions.

It would take another two days before the first batch of expeditionary force reinforcements arrived, but now the main force of the Japanese 56th Division had arrived, and the heavy equipment of the 56th Division had also arrived.

The heavy artillery battalion of 12 Type 105 mm howitzers, which was originally equipped only by the elite divisions of the Japanese army, was already a huge threat to the Lawu defenders, and now an additional battalion was equipped.

You must know that heavy artillery is no different from bombers. Its accuracy far exceeds that of bombers, and it can provide fire suppression at any time.

It looks impressive when a bomber drops unguided iron bombs, but the actual hit rate is very low.

Basically, accuracy is compensated by quantity!

There is another life-threatening way, which is to lower the altitude, carry out dive bombing, and drop bombs within the reach of enemy light weapons.

This is how various dive bombers from different countries came about!

Especially since they are living in poverty, their high-horsepower aircraft engines are of low quality, their bomber aiming systems are also not up to standard, and their bombing accuracy is at the bottom among the mainstream powers in the entire S2.

Therefore, the bomb load of ordinary bombers is extremely impressive, with a maximum of only 1 ton, which is equivalent to 4 250-kilogram bombs.

Faced with the dense automatic firepower of the Lawu defenders, the Japanese bombers that flew hundreds of kilometers could only drop bombs from high altitude and rely on blindly hitting them. After dropping all the bombs, they could only fly back hundreds of kilometers to drop four more bombs.

Instead of dive bombing and aiming at permanent firepower points, the bombing efficiency will naturally not be very high.

The bomb load of various bombers equipped by the Japanese army

(This comparison may not be obvious. For example, the highest level of bombers in other countries is that the American B29 has a bomb load of 9 tons, the Russian Tu-2 bomber has a bomb load of 3 tons, the Hans HE177 has a bomb load of 6 tons, and the Japanese have a bomb load of ton.)