Of course, Shunroku Hata knew that it would not be so easy to capture Hijo, let alone so fast.

But this is not a press conference, it's nothing more than a mouthpiece, and you don't need to be responsible, right?

Besides, one of the additional purposes of his press conference was to put pressure on the Nationalist Government and Chairman Chiang through these Western media, so of course the situation in Feicheng would go as smoothly as possible, and it would be best to scare Chairman Chiang and directly give up the siege of the northbound cluster, but he also knew that this was impossible.

"Uh-oh?" The female reporter of the Associated Press asked in great surprise, "Your Excellency General, do you mean that the Japanese army will soon be able to occupy Feicheng and capture Xu Rui alive?" ”

Shunroku Hata said lightly: "You can understand it like this. ”

The female reporter then asked: "Your Excellency, I would like to know where your confidence comes from?" As far as I know, your army seems to have not won a single victory in the repeated confrontations with Xu Rui, how can Your Excellency conclude that in this battle of Feicheng, your army will definitely be able to win the final victory, and you can still capture Xu Rui alive? ”

Hearing this, Shunroku Hatata's face became gloomy, and he was already very unhappy.

Shunroku Hata spent so much money to hold this press conference, not to satisfy the curiosity of these Western journalists, let alone to write a biographical novel about the dispute between Xu Rui and Shunroku Hatata, but to eliminate the negative influence and restore the reputation of the Imperial Japanese Army in the world.

Shozo Kawabe had already seen Shunroku Hata unhappy, and immediately said, "The next question." ”

The beautiful female reporter of the Associated Press wanted to ask again, but Kawabe Shozo didn't give her a chance at all, what kind of thing, singing praises for the Chinese, don't forget that this is in Fanghuayuan, in the headquarters of their Japanese army in Central China, not in Feicheng, let alone in the Dameishan base area.

(Dividing Line)

Let's not talk about the press conference in Nanjing, let's talk about the battle in Feicheng first.

Xu Rui actually spread a smoke bomb in his radio speech in the evening, and he said on the radio that the independent regiment had suffered heavy losses in the Japanese bombardment and daytime battles, and now there were less than 1,000 soldiers left to fight, which was an outright lie, and things were not like that at all.

In fact, after a day of fierce fighting today, the independent regiment did suffer heavy casualties, especially the independent battalion of He Shuya, which was almost completely exhausted, but the losses of the three main battalions were relatively light.

The remaining three main battalions of the independent regiment now add up to almost two thousand people.

In addition, there are more than 500 seriously wounded in the regiment headquarters, and at the last moment, these more than 500 seriously wounded can also go to the battlefield to kill the enemy.

Before the start of the war, the task assigned by the Third Theater Commander's Department to the Anhui Central Advance Brigade was to hold Feicheng for at least ten days, and now six days have passed, and there are still four days left, and it is still certain to hold Feicheng for at least four days with 2,000 remnants, after all, the remaining 2,000 remnants are no longer the previous recruits.

When these recruits first arrived in Feicheng, they were all honest farmers, not to mention letting them kill, it was difficult to let them kill a chicken, but now, after all kinds of tempering, especially after the baptism of extremely cruel war, they have grown up rapidly and grown into a qualified veteran.

With the remaining more than 2,000 remnants, Xu Rui was still confident that he would hold Feicheng for at least four days.

However, if you want to hold Feicheng for four days, blindly passive defense will definitely not work, blindly passive defense, blindly passive beating, will not only seriously dampen the morale of your own soldiers, but also boost the arrogance of the devil, if it is a large-scale field battle, you can also use this strategy to paralyze the enemy, lure the enemy deep, but street fighting, to take this strategy is suicide!

The main reason why the Soviet Red Army was able to hold out for nearly two years in the Battle of Leningrad was that the Soviet Red Army was at an extreme disadvantage, but it never stopped attacking, and they kept attacking, attacking, and attacking again, forming a cruel balance with the German army through stubborn attacks.

In the same way, the independent regiment must combine offense and defense, and cannot blindly defend itself.

During the day, because the Japanese army has air and artillery superiority, the independent regiment can take the initiative to retreat, but at night, the independent regiment must take the initiative to attack, and must go all out to recapture the positions lost during the day, so as to leave enough room for the contraction during the next day, otherwise, by the next day, the independent regiment will face a situation where there is no way to retreat.

Therefore, it is necessary to launch a powerful assault tonight, not to recover all positions, but at least some of them, to leave room for tomorrow's active contraction.

Now, Xu Rui is preparing for a counterattack at night.

Xu Rui summoned officers above the battalion level to his regimental headquarters.

Although the situation was bad, although three-quarters of the area of Feicheng had fallen to the enemy, and although they had fallen into the siege of devils, the senior officers of the independent regiment did not show pessimism, on the contrary, the expressions on the faces of He Guangming, Wan Chongshan and others were still very relaxed, and they also talked and laughed when they entered the regiment headquarters.

A veteran is a veteran, and veterans have their own unique criteria for judging the situation on the battlefield.

In the eyes of He Guangming, Wan Chongshan and other veterans of a hundred battles, the current independent regiment is far from reaching the end of the mountain, and today it lost so much of the urban area during the day, not so much that the devil is too powerful, but that their independent regiment is not stubbornly defending, and the independent regiment is simply taking the initiative to shrink, and it is simply secretly accumulating potential energy.

It's like a bow, if you want to shoot farther, if you want to get more powerful kinetic energy, you must compress it as much as possible, accumulate all the power at one point, and then burst out violently.

When everyone arrived, Xu Rui snorted at He Shuya.

He Shuya strode to the sand table that the youth team had just made up, and said: "From the daytime battle, it can be basically judged that the little devil has deployed heavy troops in the east of the city, and there is at least one wing or more in the south of the city, and only the troops in the west and north of the city are relatively weak. ”

"Combined with the situation collected from all sides, it can be basically judged that the devil defenders in the north and west of the city are at best an infantry brigade, and if we concentrate more than two battalions of troops, it is certain that we can raid the devils in the north or west of the city at night and defeat the enemy in front of us."

Yang Ba Nan frowned and said, "Fight back? Make no mistake, now we're on the defensive. ”

"Chief of Staff Yang, can't the defense fight back? Haven't you heard of defensive counterattacks? He Guangming said abruptly, "It is said that all the cadets who came out of your Central Military Academy are brainless, I didn't believe it before, but today I can't help but believe it, you Central Military Principals, are really brainless." ”

The rest of the battalion commanders were also dumbfounded, and here Yang Ba is a student of the Central Military Academy.

Yang Bagan was ridiculed by He Guangming so that his face was flushed, and he said that the staff officer did not have a commander and did not make a sound, but he Yang Bagan was obviously the chief of staff of the Independent Regiment, but how could he feel that he was not even as good as a staff officer? There was no way, because Xu Rui, the head of the regiment, didn't want to see him, so few people in the whole group were willing to look at him.

"That's not what I meant." "Of course I know about the defensive counterattack, but I mean that at the moment our independent regiment has a limited number of troops, but it still has to defend for at least four days, so I think that we should not waste our precious forces on a dispensable counterattack, but should go all out to strengthen the defense." ”

"You belong to the one-sided theory of absolute defense!" Xu Rui didn't taunt Yang Bayan like He Guangming, but the tone of his voice was equally unkind, "But what I want to tell you is that in this world, there is no fortress that cannot be attacked, let alone a line of defense that cannot be penetrated. ”

Several battalion commanders immediately pricked up their ears and began to listen carefully.

Although Xu Rui is much younger than them, after getting along for a long time, they must admit that Xu Rui is much stronger than them in terms of tactical command ability and military theory level, so every time Xu Rui explains military theory, these battalion commanders and company commanders of the independent regiment will listen carefully.

Xu Rui continued: "Only by attacking in defense, in defense in attack, can we better defend the position, this is like two football teams playing football, if you blindly shrink your own half, and refuse to invest any offensive force in the front court, then the opponent will be more and more confident, the more aggressive you play, then in the end your goal will be broken by the opponent, you only invest appropriate strength in the front court, coldly play counterattack, give the opponent some trouble, create a certain threat, The other party will not dare to unscrupulously devote all his forces to the attack, so that your pressure will be less. ”

Yang Bagan had a moment of apprehension, at first glance Xu Rui's words were very shallow, but after thinking about it carefully, he found that Xu Rui's shallow words contained deep military theories, although fighting a war is not playing football, but it is undeniable that modern competitive sports evolved from ancient military affairs, and the two have great commonality.

Could it be that the military theories taught at the Central Military Academy are really outdated?

For the first time, Yang had doubts about the teaching of the Central Military Academy.

Xu Rui didn't have the heart to take into account the impact of his words just now on others, and said: "Shuya has made it very clear just now that it is completely certain to concentrate more than two battalions of troops and defeat the devils in the north or west of the city in one fell swoop, so the question now is, the devils in the north of the city or the west of the city?" ”

He Shuya said: "Regiment leader, I suggest attacking the north of the city. ”

"Why?" Xu Rui said, "Tell me your reasons." ”

He Shuya said: "Because the north of the city is a slum area, the streets and alleys are denser, and the terrain is more complicated, after the battle starts, we can attack from multiple directions at the same time. ”