Looking at the telegram in his hand, Tanaka Shin was silent for half the day, with only a wry smile in his expression, a bitter smile with infinite despair. Pen % fun % Pavilion www.biquge.info

The current strength of Wan Town is only an independent garrison wing, less than 4,000 people, plus the cavalry wing, baggage wing, artillery wing, communications team, field hospital, and so on directly under the military department, all of which are counted as combatants, and they are all less than 10,000 people.

He knows too well about the special operations division Tanaka Shinichi, although he has not confronted them head-on, but he has witnessed the destruction of the 116th Division, the Ninth Division, and the Sixth Division, and the three divisions were completely wiped out in the battle to attack the 331 base, including two permanent divisions, and even the Sixth Division, which is known as the first in the Japanese Army.

"Huh??"

Shinichi Tanaka let out a long sigh, took out a pack of Sakura brand cigarettes from his pocket, took out one and lit it, and smoked it vigorously, his originally nervous expression seemed to suddenly relax.

He already understood that the Southern Army Command was already at a loss at this time, and giving such an order would be tantamount to abandoning their 16th Army.

In fact, the troops have run out of food ten days ago, and the occasional airdrop can not solve the problem at all, fortunately, northern Myanmar is also a high-yield area of rice, although it has not yet reached the time when the rice is ripe, but the pulp has been formed, and hundreds of thousands of soldiers have relied on harvesting these rice that has not yet matured, and have supported it until now, now Songshan has been lost, the entire defense line has collapsed, and the war has been fully ignited. The combat effectiveness can be imagined. Lashio could not be attacked for a long time, the six divisions had no food and grass in front of them, and there were no rescuers in the back, and the future and fate of hundreds of thousands of locust warriors made Tanaka Shinichi see no hope, and an unprecedented sadness arose in his heart.

"Tanaka-kun, a telegram from Lieutenant General Tada of the Sixteenth Army has arrived." Just when Shinichi Tanaka was thinking about it, Major General Sawada Masatoshi, chief of staff of the 15th Army of the Japanese Army, walked in with a telegram.

Looking at Sawada Masatoshi's gloomy expression, Tanaka Shinichi felt a throbbing in his heart, knowing that he was afraid that it was not good news, and he didn't even have the courage to take the message handed over by Sawada Masatoshi, and said in a deep voice: "Let's talk about it, what's the situation." ”

Sawada Masatoshi sighed and said, "The 16th Army is immediately facing the dilemma of running out of ammunition and food, and if there is not enough supplies to transport in, there is absolutely no possibility of taking Lashio within three days." ”

"Huh??" Tanaka Shin opened his mouth and asked in disbelief: "Didn't the navy just send them a batch of supplies, why did they run out of ammunition and food?" ”

Sawada Masatoshi smiled bitterly: "Yes, the navy did transport a batch of supplies to them, which is several hundred tons, and replenished a batch of troops, but this was already five days ago, and the 16th Army continued to attack Lashio for several days, and the consumption of ammunition was really too great." ”

"Isn't there an airdrop at the headquarters? Didn't continue to transport supplies with the Navy? ”

"Airdrops have always been there, otherwise they wouldn't have been able to sustain it for a long time, as for shipping? The expeditionary force blockaded the Inovady River, and the east bank was covered with artillery fire, light and heavy machine guns, and the shameful man dropped a large number of drifting mines on the Inouwady River, because the locust army could only control one side of the river, and could not even pull up the interception net, so the ships and ships could not cross at all. ”

With a "snap", Tanaka Shinichi punched the table one by one, and a few words popped out from between his teeth, "Eight grid tooth road!" Then he asked, "Tada-kun, do you have any suggestions?" ”

"General Tada told us to defend Sister Mu no matter what."

"Sister Mu?" Tanaka Shinichi looked suspicious, got up and walked to the combat sand table.

Eighty kilometers south from Wan Town is Sister Mu, and another hundred kilometers to Lashio, Tanaka Shinichi looked at the sand table and was distracted.

Sawada Masatoshi pointed to the sand table fox and said suspiciously: "Sister Mu is the only way for the army to go to Lashio, and it is not a dangerous place, even if we pour all our troops into Wan Town, we can't hold Sister Mu, what does General Tada mean by this?" ”

Tanaka Shinichi pondered for a while, waved his hand and said: "No, no, I think what Tada-kun means is that after the Chuzhong Heavenly Department of the Zhina Army passed Sister Mu, all the troops of our Sixteenth Army moved closer to Sister Mu and tried their best to block the Western Yunnan troops of the Zhina Army. ”

"Does that mean anything?"

Tanaka Shinichi looked sad and was silent for a long time before muttering: "Tada-kun doesn't have the confidence to fight this battle anymore, he is seeking a way out for the fifteenth and sixteenth armies of the Locust Army." ”

Sawada Masatoshi stared at the name of Sister Mu for a long time, but he still didn't understand the point, and asked, "Where is the way to live?" ”

Shinichi Tanaka waved his command pole and drew a circle in the area east of Sister Mu, and said, "Here?" ”

"Shan State Plateau?" Sawada Masatoshi let out an exclamation.

From the Shan State Plateau to the east straight is Siam (Thailand), but here you have to go through at least 500 kilometers of primeval forest, halfway through two rivers, mountains overlap, forests like the sea, the highest altitude is more than 2,000 meters, and the jungle swamps are continuous, the river valleys are dense with mountains, jackals and beasts are rampant, miasma malaria spreads, mosquitoes, poisonous snakes, miasma, people are unguardable, and every blow is a fatal wound.

Especially now that the rainy season has just passed, the gnats and leeches in the forest are very active, and once they bite them, all kinds of forest diseases, such as relapsing fever, malaria, tetanus, sepsis, etc., will spread rapidly. So, if you want to cross the Shan State Plateau, the danger is simply immeasurable, and it is no wonder that Sawada Masatoshi is so nervous.

Tanaka Shinichi sighed and said: "I'm afraid there is no better way now, the Sixteenth Army is unable to defeat Lashio now, and after the special operations division of that army passes, it will be even more impossible, if they don't retreat decisively, I am afraid that they will be beaten to pieces by the special operations division immediately." To the north, the western Yunnan army is so strong, there is no food and grass in front of the army of more than 100,000 and no rescue soldiers in the back, except for entering the Shan Plateau, there is really no second way to go. ”

A look of pain flashed in Sawada Masatoshi's eyes, and then he said a little lonely: "Then are we still blocking the special operations division in front of us?" ”

"The blocking is definitely going to be blocked, let's do our best, I hope there will be a turnaround in the battle, because the 1st Guards Division south of Lashio has not given up, as long as they can annihilate Jiang Haoran's troops within two days and defeat Lashio, then it is entirely possible for the imperial army to turn around."

At about 4 o'clock in the afternoon of the same day, on the highway from Longling to Wan Town, the special operations division was running wildly.

From noon to now, they have run more than 50 kilometers, according to this speed, in the evening can reach Wan Town, the rear of the Japanese army is not much, several checkpoints are also because of the large force killed, the Japanese army directly gave up, so basically there is no blocking force, the only delay is that the Japanese army planted some mines along the way, otherwise the speed will be faster, this is also thanks to the Japanese rear did not have a large army, the number of mines buried is not much.

After a rapid march of dozens of kilometers, the marching speed did not feel much slower than at the beginning, and cross-country with heavy loads was the strong point of the special operations division, and the sweat of dozens of kilometers of training every day was not in vain.

Of course, they are not completely without rest, when the Japanese aircraft group appears in the sky, they will go into the jungle to drink water and eat to replenish their strength, and as soon as the plane leaves, they immediately get out of the jungle and continue to move forward.

The Japanese originally thought that the planes could bring certain casualties to the special operations division and delay their marching speed, but they did not expect that on the brain sub-peak of Gaoligong Mountain, there was a huge radar station working quietly under camouflage, but whenever any flying object approached within 100 kilometers, it would be able to provide accurate information to the Baoshan base, and the base could quickly respond according to the radar information, and if there was a large-scale flight formation of the enemy coming, the base would immediately notify the special operations division and let them evade it urgently. It is impossible for the Japanese aircraft group to hover in the sky for too long.

If it were only a reconnaissance plane, the Mustang fighters at the base would quickly rise into the air and annihilate the invading enemy, and they would never have had the opportunity to reveal the whereabouts of the special operations division.

So, several hours have passed, and the Japanese aviation has not seen any trace of the special operations division at all.

At about six o'clock in the evening, the troops were only about ten kilometers away from Wan Town, Chu Zhongtian stopped the troops, ordered the troops to rest in place, and sent scouts to touch the bottom of the Japanese army, not that he was worried that the Japanese army would have any heavy troops in ambush, the most important thing was that Chu Zhongtian hoped to find the location of the Japanese army's transport convoy, and focus on keeping those cars when attacking.

There are still 180 kilometers to go to Lashio, and if the whole journey is carried on two legs, I am afraid that it will take more than two to three days at the earliest, and if there is a delay on the road for one more day, Lashio will be one more day of danger, and if you can get 100 cars, you will be able to reach Lashio tomorrow.

The five-way scouts set off quickly, and the soldiers who had been running for hours could finally get a good night's sleep, and within a few minutes, there was a thunderous snoring sound in the jungle, and they ran wildly for dozens of miles with dozens of pounds of equipment on their backs, and it was false to say that they were not tired.

More than two hours later, the scouts came back to report that the Japanese army had set up a defensive line outside the city of Wanmachi, and it seemed that they were ready to resist stubbornly, and the number of troops was not much, about five or six thousand, and in the southwest of the town in the direction of Bamo, there was a convoy that was ready to go, and the number of cars and armored vehicles was about 100, and it seemed that they were ready to retreat, and if the battle was unfavorable, they could run away at any time.

Chu Zhongtian was overjoyed, and immediately dispatched two regiments and ordered them to detour to the southwest to surprise the Japanese automobile wing.