Hao Dabao knew very well that the cavalry must not slow down at such a time.

Because once the speed drops, the only advantage will be lost, and the entire cavalry company will inevitably face the end of total annihilation.

Therefore, when he saw that some soldiers wanted to rush towards the puppet soldiers who were hiding on both sides and shooting, Hao Dabao immediately shouted:

"Straight from both sides! Don't stop! ”

The cavalry company immediately split into two and rushed to the left and right fronts.

Bullets rained down on the soldiers of the cavalry company, but none of them were cowardly to dodge.

It seems that everyone has only one goal in mind, which is to kill the enemy!

In this case, both recruits and veterans have entered a state of almost madness.

Those recruits have even forgotten that they are on the battlefield for the first time, and that they are facing a hail of bullets for the first time.

At the last moment of his life, every soldier who was shot and fell off his horse would pull the safety pin of the grenade and choose to die with the enemy who surrounded him.

The cavalry company ran wildly, with nothing but blood splattered and corpses strewn all over the ground......

Twenty minutes later, Hao Dabao returned to the position of the independent battalion with the cavalry company.

There were nearly 400 people when they went, but only about 80 people came back alive.

At the cost of more than 300 lives, the result was that the 7th Regiment suffered more than 1,000 casualties and lost the ability to continue the attack on the positions of the independent battalion.

The news was transmitted back to Lin Guozhong and Zhou Zuopeng's temporary command post, and the two were stunned for a long time before they reacted.

A regiment of 16,700 people was crippled by the opponent's cavalry of less than 400 people, and Lin Guozhong couldn't accept it for a while.

Although the 7th Regiment almost annihilated all the cavalry, the casualty ratio of the two sides was too different, and the 7th Regiment was defeated.

On top of that, even the regiment commander Nie Zhenhai had one of his arms cut off and is still unconscious.

Seeing this, Zhou Zuopeng immediately said:

"I'll send a regiment to make up for it!"

"No need!" Lin Guozhong raised his hand to stop Zhou Zuopeng with a dejected face:

"Let's withdraw first, and then fight tomorrow."

Zhou Zuopeng frowned when he heard this:

"Seeing that you are about to break through the opponent's defense, how can you withdraw at this time?"

Lin Guozhong smiled bitterly and shook his head:

"We were able to advance to that distance by borrowing the light of the night, and if we continued to advance, our casualties would be greater, so it was better to wait for dawn before relaunching the attack."

Before they could finish speaking, the two of them saw a red flare rising from behind them almost simultaneously.

A few seconds later, an exploding fire lit up again in the distance.

Zhou Zuopeng looked at Lin Guozhong with a gloomy face:

"It's over, it must be another group of artillery positions that have been blown up by the other side."

Sure enough, a few minutes later, the rear reported to the two through walkie-talkies that an artillery position had been attacked by the enemy's artillery, three of the four 75-millimeter mountain guns had been blown up, and more than 100 shells had been detonated.

At this point, only five of the twelve 75-mm mountain guns brought by Lin Guozhong and Zhou Zuopeng remained; And this battle has just begun.

On Phoenix Mountain, Liu Cheng felt that the opponent's artillery fire had once again weakened significantly, and his confidence in winning this battle had also increased.

Soon he received the news that the attack of the two divisions had stopped, and that the enemy who had pushed up had withdrawn.

However, Hao Dabao's cavalry company suffered heavy losses, and almost all of the remaining more than 80 people were wounded.

After the 18th Division stopped attacking, Liu Cheng immediately asked people to roughly count the casualties.

From about 2 p.m. when the two sides began to attack each other with artillery fire, the independent battalion has lost a total of more than 500 people.

After the casualty statistics of the 18th and 39th Divisions came out, they really startled Lin Guozhong and Zhou Zuopeng.

The life of Nie Dahai, the commander of the Seventh Regiment, was saved for the time being, but it was impossible to go to the battlefield again to command the battle.

The 7th Regiment counted the casualties of the artillery bombardment before the attack and the casualties inflicted by Hao Dabao's cavalry company, including the wounded, and there were less than 500 men left.

Coupled with the total casualties of the 11th and 24th Regiments, more than 400 people, the casualties of the 18th Division alone have exceeded 1,800, which is equivalent to the loss of more than one regiment.

Counting the casualties of the 39th Division under artillery bombardment, the total casualties of the two divisions were about 2,300, equivalent to more than one-sixth of the total strength.

And so far, this battle has only been fought for ten hours, and it can only be regarded as just beginning.

Of course, the main reason why the 18th and 39th Divisions suffered such a level of casualties was that the accuracy of the artillery attacks on the side of the independent battalion far exceeded the predictions of Lin Guozhong and Zhou Zuopeng.

However, now that the battle has entered a positional battle, the casualty rate will also drop after that.

After Lin Guozhong ordered the attack to be stopped, he immediately discussed with Zhou Zuopeng to let the 18th Division withdraw and rest first, and replace the 39th Division to build bunkers and fortifications overnight.

Zhou Zuopeng did not hesitate at all, and immediately agreed.

The Eighteenth Division folded a regiment like this, how could he, Zhou Zuopeng, not even agree to such a request?

Moreover, he has been friends with Lin Guozhong for many years, and he knows Lin Guozhong's personality very well, so he naturally will not question whether Lin Guozhong has ulterior motives in doing this.

Zhang Haipeng did not clearly specify who was responsible for this mission, Lin Guozhong pushed the 18th Division up from the beginning of the battle, just because he didn't want Zhou Zuopeng to feel unbalanced.

Lin Guozhong is very depressed now.

In the face of an anti-Japanese armed force composed of ordinary people, there was no regiment as soon as the battle was fought, and it was impossible to say that there was no fire.

Lin Guozhong graduated from the Baoding Military Academy, and since the day he walked out of the school gate and became a platoon commander, he has never fought such a battle.

At that time, Zhang Haipeng did not explain the firepower of this team when he gave him and Zhou Zuopeng the task, so that they suffered such a big loss as soon as they came up, and Lin Guozhong was very dissatisfied with this.

In fact, Zhang Haipeng is really not to blame for this, he doesn't know what the real strength of the independent battalion is, but he only makes inferences based on the only circumstances.

To be honest, if there is no Zang Hao, it is really difficult to say what the current war situation is.

Especially when the scouts discovered the second artillery stronghold of the puppet army, because Duan Jinghe was busy directing mortars to attack the 11th and 24th regiments at that time, he missed the best opportunity to judge the direction.

By the time he saw the flare, it had risen to its highest point, and he couldn't accurately judge the distance.

If Zang Hao hadn't been staring intently, this opportunity would have been missed.

Compared with the puppet soldiers of those two divisions, the artillery attack was obviously a greater threat to the defense line of the independent battalion.

After Lin Guozhong and Zhou Zuopeng's side stopped attacking, the independent battalion finally had a chance to take a breath......