Bright Sword: Construction starts from southeastern Shanxi

"Yes, this time when I was in the local area, I was finally enlightened by these guys." Wu Lin also showed a smile on his face.

Political Commissar Zhou Shi looked at the two of them, without reacting. He was confused and bewildered.

Seeing the political commissar's puzzled expression, Huang Hanjia took the initiative to explain: "During this anti-mopping-up operation, when we were organizing the evacuation of the local people, we hadn't discovered it yet."

"When we recaptured the county, we originally planned to let the main regiment lead the attack, but the leaders of these local regiments refused to do so and volunteered one after another to lead the attack."

"They say the main force ate the meat in the front, so the local troops should at least have a sip of the soup in the back."

After listening to this, Wang Zhuo suddenly had a flash of inspiration and asked, "The leaders of these local regiments are all very capable. I'm afraid they are overstaffed."

"Yes, the brigade's original plan for the local regiment was five to nine companies." Huang Hanjia nodded.

"But since we entered Shanxi, as you all know, our downsizing has been too severe."

"We'll send most of the battalion commanders out to serve as commanders of local regiments. Our communications are currently very poor. Apart from sending radios to lower-level troops on special missions, we can only contact the main regiment by phone. For the rest, we basically rely on horses."

“So every time we can only let them count and report it themselves.”

Huang Hanjia took a sip of water and continued.

"So I said at the time that your local regiment doesn't have any combat missions and isn't fully equipped. This is just adding to our casualties for no reason."

"Who knew that as soon as I finished speaking, these guys would immediately start spitting and spilling all their cash."

"Yes, what Old Huang said is right, especially the local militia in western Hebei. My goodness, their eyes are almost popping out of their heads." Liu Ming said with agreement.

After hearing what Huang Hanjia, Zhu Guosheng, and Liu Ming said, Chief of Staff Wang Zhuo became interested and asked uncertainly, "Is it almost 3,000 people?"

After listening to this, Liu Xun nodded and said, "Yes, these local groups in Jin are not bad, with no more than 2,000 people at most."

"It's really the case on the Jixi side. These guys have at least 3,000 people. This time, they surrounded and annihilated the two regiments of the 16th Division. In addition to the ones reported publicly, they also deployed others around the county town to cause trouble for the puppet army."

"For example, Ding Wei's regiment in Lincheng not only extended its reach into Baixiang, but also worked with Long Zhenwen from Zanhuang to reach Gaoyi in the north. The entire regiment consisted of more than 4,000 people."

After hearing Liu Xun's words, everyone was stunned.

Zeng Jiwen seemed to be thinking, "There are so many people in western Hebei, it's not surprising that he can mobilize so many people."

"How about the equipment? Don't recruit people without weapons." asked the political commissar.

"Although it is not as good as other main regiments, it is much better than other brother units." Liu Ming said with some emotion.

"The weapons of these regiments are quite diverse, including Hanyang rifles, Zhongzheng rifles, Type 38 rifles, and even Liao-made Type 13 rifles."

"What the regiments in Shanxi lacked was artillery, but the regiments in western Hebei had plenty. In order to seize the main attack, Long Zhenwen of the 121st Regiment and Ding Wei of the 122nd Regiment emptied out their resources."

"We've got several 70mm infantry guns, and 82mm mortars have been deployed to the battalion level."

When everyone heard what Liu Xun said, they were so surprised that they were speechless. It seemed that the local groups in western Hebei were recruiting troops very quickly.

"Then after we finish the statistics, we need to investigate below. Otherwise, it will be difficult to reorganize later. We should sort out the regiment level first, and then report to our families based on the situation. It depends on the arrangements of the headquarters and our families." Zhou Xi thought about it after understanding the situation.

After everyone finished speaking, Zhou Xi began to continue what he had just said, picked up the documents he had just sorted out, and talked about the losses in this anti-mopping-up operation.

"This counter-mopping-up operation can be said to have caused the most casualties to our 389th Brigade. However, the heaviest casualties this time came from the 782nd, 81st, 83rd, and 87th Regiments."