The expeditionary force began to dominate Southeast Asia by recruiting defeated soldiers

At the same time, far away in Mandalay, at the headquarters of the 15th Army of Fuso.

To manage the food, drink, defecation and urination of an army of nearly 100,000 people, in addition to commanders and combat staff at all levels, the military building also has a large number of clerical staff responsible for processing various documents and reports.

Now these Japanese staff who are not responsible for combat have discovered that today's situation is somewhat unusual.

They saw staff officers frequently running in and out of the office of the army commander, Lieutenant General Shojiro Iida, all of them walking hurriedly, with beads of sweat on their foreheads and their faces looking disturbingly nervous.

"What's going on now? Didn't the Battle of Pegu end a long time ago? Looking at them, it seems as if the war has started again." A young logistics clerk looked at the staff officer who was hurriedly passing by in the corridor and asked the person next to him in a low voice, his heart full of doubts.

"I heard that there was a report from Xinpingyang that the enemy seemed to have launched an attack." Another clerk responded hurriedly, his voice filled with anxiety.

In the commander's office, Shojiro Iida sat quietly at his desk, flipping through reports from various places, his brows furrowed, silently sorting out the information in his mind.

Not long ago, he received a report from the 33rd Division that the Xinpingyang airport was attacked by the main force of the enemy.

The report mentioned that the enemy was not only equipped with a large number of machine guns and artillery, but also had dozens of tanks involved in the attack.

"What on earth is going on?" He was full of doubts.

Whether it is the Sindhu border in the northwest or the Qian State border in the northeast, the garrisons reported that everything is normal.

He really couldn't understand how such a large-scale main force could cross the border and move to the vicinity of the airport so quietly.

That independent group composed of Qian people?

Previously, intelligence leaked by the Johns described this force as a regimental-level guerrilla force with simple equipment and only a small amount of weapons from the John inventory.

Therefore, due to the lack of aerial reconnaissance during the rainy season, Shoji Iida identified them based on intelligence as a mountain guerrilla force similar to those belonging to the Eighth Route Army in the north of Qian Country, which was short of supplies and was like beggars.

"Could it be that the enemy has mastered the secret passage?" A thought flashed through Shojiro Iida's mind.

He stared at the map and after careful consideration, he finally came to the conclusion that the Allies might send mechanized troops from the border mountains into Pegu through a secret mountain passage, intending to eliminate the Fuso front-line airport.

"This is a surprise attack like General Guderian's 110-kilometer-long Ardennes valley, bypassing the Maginot Line. It must be like this!"

Thinking he had made the right judgment, Shojiro Iida immediately became confident.

"Someone come!" He suddenly raised his head, his voice becoming firm. "Send a telegram to the 18th, 33rd, 55th, and 56th Divisions, ordering them to send troops to patrol the border and search for possible cross-border routes. Also, send a telegram to Lieutenant General Shozo Sakurai of the 33rd Division, instructing him to send troops to intercept and surround the mechanized force that attacked the airport. Don't let them escape!"

"Yes!" After writing down the request in a notebook, a staff officer immediately ran to carry out the order, with the tension on his face being particularly obvious.

Iida Shojiro sat back in his chair, a sneer curling up at the corner of his mouth. "Hehe, an airport and dozens of planes in exchange for an elite mechanized assault force of the Allies. It's not a loss at all."

He was secretly pleased with himself and tried to avoid any loss, as if everything was already under his control.

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As radio waves came from the 15th Army Headquarters, several Japanese divisions on the border quickly went into action.

Although the order from Army Commander Shojiro Iida was only to conduct a patrol, the tradition of "rebellion" and "acting alone" in the Fuso Army led several division commanders who were originally ordered to stop and rest during the rainy season to misinterpret this order as "fire reconnaissance."

So, contrary to their usual practice, they began to send a large number of troops in small groups to patrol and check the mountainous areas across the border. When John's colonial army stationed on the Sindhu border discovered this situation, they immediately opened fire in retaliation and the conflict soon broke out.

On the other side, the Japanese 18th Division, which was confronting the Qian Guo Army across the Nujiang River, also launched a tentative attack on the 96th Division across the Nujiang River after the artillery bombardment.

Thus, the attack on the airport initiated by Zhang Chi quickly turned into a full-scale conflict. The northern border of Pegu, which had been quiet for over a month, quickly erupted into fighting.

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At the same time, at the edge of the airport, the two squadrons of Japanese troops that came back to support had already collapsed under the fierce attack of four LVT-A1 tanks and hundreds of soldiers from the 1st Battalion, and had completely lost their combat effectiveness.

The four 37mm anti-tank guns of the Aowu Battalion were all deployed in the permanent fortifications on the west side of the airport, and those bunkers were all facing the western border line.

The Japanese infantry had no time to drag the anti-tank gun out of the bunker in such a hurry, let alone turn the gun to fire at the oncoming tanks of the independent regiment.

So the Japs could only try to use the "human bomb tactic".

A group of crazy devils shouted "It's black, load up!", holding explosives, and tried to rush to the tank to blow it up.

However, the infantrymen of the independent regiment accompanying Zhang Chi's tanks were no pushovers either. They used their fierce firepower to quickly suppress the charging Japanese soldiers and mercilessly killed them on the way.

In the end, the explosive packs exploded with a loud "boom!", but only blew the Japanese corpses into pieces.

In this way, the remaining Japanese soldiers, lacking anti-tank means, were defeated. With low morale, they could only launch sporadic resistance with the bolt-action rifles and light machine guns in their hands.

Although the four LVT-A1 tanks led by Zhang Chi had only 12mm of frontal armor, they still protected the infantry as they charged left and right, making it difficult for the Japanese to even maintain their positions.

However, Zhang Chi in the tank also knew that the light armor would not be able to show its power among the Japanese infantry for long.

Soon the Japanese headquarters will develop the Type 3 anti-tank grenade, the Type 4 anti-tank mine "Bafenbao" and equip the Type 90 75mm field gun with armor-piercing grenades. These weapons will pose a huge threat to the thinly armored LVT-A1 tank.

However, he believed that by then his main tank should also be upgraded to M4 Sherman.

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"Quick! Put out the fire!"

Inside the hangar, several Japanese ground crew members hurriedly carried buckets of water and tried to put out the burning plane. However, the fire caused by the Molotov cocktails filled with gasoline and sugar could not be put out with water.

Soon, several shouting Japanese ground crew members attracted Ma Qiu's attention.

He was already crazy with killing, his eyes were red, and he picked up the carbine and pulled the trigger repeatedly at the ground crew.

"Quick, burn a few more."

When all the devils fell in a pool of blood, Ma Qiu shouted excitedly, turned around and waved his hand to lead the guard platoon to rush towards another hangar where several intact Nakajima Type 1 fighter planes were parked.

Then, several soldiers behind Ma Qiu followed him and quickly rushed into the hangar.

As soon as they entered the hangar, they looked up and saw a Japanese pilot climbing onto a Nakajima Type 1 fighter with the propeller already started.

Lu Daniu was quick-eyed and quick-handed. He got into a horse stance, picked up the Bren light machine gun and started firing from the hip.

"Bang, bang, bang!" After a round of rapid-fire shooting, the Japanese pilot fell in the cockpit, half of his body hanging outside the plane, deader than dead.

"I told you to fly, but you turned into a sieve. Why do you fly again?" Lu Daniu was still not satisfied and cursed in a low voice.

If we were to say who hated these Japanese pilots the most, it would definitely be veterans of the National Army like Lu Daniu who had been strafed and bombed by the Japanese planes on the ground for many years of the War of Resistance.

Ma Qiu was also busy. He directed everyone to light the cotton on the head of the incendiary bomb, and then smashed the incendiary bomb hard under the wing of the Japanese plane.

Soon, the flames spread rapidly to the wings of all the planes in the hangar, and the flames quickly jumped up the fuselage. In the firelight, these Japanese planes made sharp explosions.