On September 5, Chengdu Shaocheng Park was crowded with people and flags fluttering. Representatives from all walks of life and ordinary people in Sichuan spontaneously came to send their soldiers out of Sichuan to resist the war.

Liu Xiang, Deng Xihou and others spoke one after another, and when it was Tang Shizun's turn to speak, he pushed away the microphone and shouted at the top of his voice: "This trip is determined to be ashamed of the country and win glory for the nation. I recently wrote a poem to express my determination to resist the war: the man is determined to go out of the pass, and he will not return the vow not to destroy the Japanese invaders. Why bury bones, there are green mountains everywhere in life! ”

"Bang bang bang!"

The applause in the park was like thunder, and tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians were enthusiastic.

Zhou Hexuan seemed to be watching a tragic burlesque, and many of the Sichuan army generals present today, although they were generous and heroic, they all had their own small calculations.

Take the poetic wise Tang Shizun as an example, this gentleman is nicknamed "Tang Plague Pig", and he is as famous as Fan Shaozeng in Sichuan. A Tang plague pig (stupid pig) and a Fan Haer (stupid pig) are connected to "the plague pig is not plague, and the hal is not ha".

Tang Shizun and Liu Xiang have been friends for nearly 20 years and are regarded as Liu Xiang's absolute supporters. But when Liu Xiang was seriously ill on the front line, he immediately colluded with Lao Jiang, wanting to squeeze out Liu Xiang's henchman Pan Wenhua and seek to seize the military command of the Sichuan army.

Tang Shi obeys this, but what about Liu Xiang?

Often when we talk about the Sichuan Army, we inevitably blame His Holiness and portray Liu Xiang's image as magnificent. In fact, Liu Xiang also made many small moves in the Anti-Japanese War, such as secretly uniting Song Zheyuan and Han Fuyu to balance Lao Jiang in order to continue to control the Sichuan army.

One of the important reasons why Han Fuyu was killed by Lao Jiang as a target was that he colluded with Liu Xiang.

At that time, because Lao Jiang's methods were too vicious, the Sichuan army from all walks of life fell apart, and Liu Xiang was forced to resist in a hurry. Liu Xiang's plan was: the Sichuan army closed the main road into Sichuan and did not let Lao Jiang lead his troops into Sichuan. Han Fuyu led his troops to retreat to Nanyang, Xiangfan, and Hanzhong, while Song Zheyuan retreated to the west of Tongguan, and the three forces jointly telegraphed to overthrow Chiang.

These were all seen by Lao Jiang, so Liu Xiang was placed under house arrest, Han Fuyu was shot, and Song Zheyuan was dismissed.

Fortunately, Liu Xiang died of illness at a critical time, otherwise the consequences would be unimaginable, and the situation of the Anti-Japanese War would inevitably fall into an even more unfavorable situation. So much so that after Liu Xiang's death, the top brass of the Central Army mourned and rejoiced at the same time. They believe that once Liu Xiang dies, the War of Resistance will be won, and Liu Xiang's life is the biggest trouble of the War of Resistance.

In the original words of Xu Yongchang, head of the Military Command Department: "Recently, Liu Xiang has become an ancient country, and it is the will of heaven that has left vitality for the people. ”

At the beginning of the Sichuan Army's Anti-Japanese War, Liu Xiang did not personally go out of Sichuan to command, he had to settle the rear first. In order to force Liu Xiang to leave his lair, Lao Jiang transferred the two group armies of the Sichuan Army out of the formation, so frightened that Liu Xiang hurriedly flew to Nanjing and asked to serve as the commander of the seventh station area.

At that time, Liu Xiang was already terminally ill, and Secretary-General Deng Hanxiang advised him to recuperate with peace of mind and not to go to the front line in person.

Liu Xiang replied like this: "In the past, after many years of civil war, his face was not very glorious, but today he has the opportunity to resist the war, and he can't help but try his best to serve the country and strive for his personal space in history." Moreover, the troops I transferred out this time accounted for more than half of all the troops. If I don't personally command, I will be eliminated by Lao Jiang in less than half a year. ”

In the historical materials about the Sichuan army, only the first half of the sentence is often mentioned, and the second half of the sentence is omitted.

Liu Xiang's difficult situation was doomed a few years ago. Because he, the "King of Sichuan", did not rely on his own strength to become the king, but Lao Jiang deliberately arranged support. Without the support of Lao Jiang, there would be no "Sichuan King" Liu Xiang.

After the 128 Incident, Chang Kaishen realized that there must be a war between China and Japan, so he planned to build a "Sichuan, Guizhou and Shaanxi War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression".

At that time, although Liu Xiang defeated Liu Wenhui, he was unable to destroy other small warlords, and he was unable to ascend to the throne of "King of Sichuan", so he could only reluctantly become a "leader of the Sichuan Army". Deng Xihou, Pan Wenhua, Wang Zhanxu, and others, although nominally under Liu Xiang's command, had their own independent defense zone and took charge of military and political affairs in the defense zone.

Sichuan's warlords, large and small, issued paper money indiscriminately in their respective defense areas, and in the words of the time, this kind of behavior "had a ten times greater impact than banditry."

Sichuan's finances collapsed as early as 1934, and Liu Xiang could only ask Lao Jiang for help.

Lao Jiang took the opportunity to intervene in Sichuan's military and political affairs, and with the support of the central government's righteousness and strong force, he broke the defense zone system of the Sichuan warlords and put Liu Xiang on the throne of "King of Sichuan". And with the central administrative order, rectify Sichuan's finances, unify Sichuan's currency system and taxation -- this is the reason why some industrial and commercial taxes in Sichuan need to be handed over to the central government.

The Sichuan army is congenitally deficient, and it can be said in one word: poor!

Poor means weak, means no supplies, no weapons, and can only be bullied.

Replaced by the wealthy Yue and Gui factions, Lao Jiang would never dare to break up their establishment easily, because the Cantonese army and the Gui army had hard guns and rough guns.

There are many factions in the Sichuan army, and Lao Jiang can help up one Sichuan king, and of course he can help up the second. Therefore, when the news of Liu Xiang's serious illness came out, some people in the front line and rear of the Sichuan army jumped back at the same time, Tang Shizun on the front line was doing trouble, and Wang Zan Xu was doing things in the rear, all thinking that he could take the position after Liu Xiang's death.

This is the warlords, this is the politics, and there is always a shadow behind the light.

What we should admire about the Sichuan warlords is that although they are fighting openly and secretly, they are by no means ambiguous in fighting devils. Most of the generals of the Sichuan army, including people like Fan Harr, tried their best to resist the Japanese, and they did not know what it was to preserve their strength, and there were very few who escaped from the battle or defected to the enemy as traitors.

Even if Liu Xiang was killed by Lao Jiang, his last words were also: "The War of Resistance to the end will be unswerving, that is, the enemy army will not withdraw from the border for a day, and the Sichuan army will not return to its hometown for a day!" ”

By this time, Liu Xiang had truly become a veritable leader of the Sichuan army and a spiritual leader collectively recognized by hundreds of thousands of Sichuan troops. Even Yang Sen, who has always been close to Lao Jiang and hostile to Liu Xiang, strongly demanded a state funeral for Liu Xiang.

These Sichuan troops were bullied miserably, and now the commander-in-chief is also dead, all of them have become motherless children, all of them have become mourning soldiers, and they must wash away the shame with the blood of the Japanese invaders. For a long time after Liu Xiang's death, the front-line Sichuan troops had to recite Liu Xiang's last words in unison every day to show their determination to resist the war to the end.

There are too many twists and turns between the central government and Sichuan, and Zhou Hexuan doesn't want to mix them, and he can't do them. After the East Road and North Road Sichuan Army swore to set off, he silently returned to Chongqing, and finally waited for the first good news after the July Seven Incident.

The machinery and equipment needed to set up a sulfonamide factory, as well as the 16 Britons who accompanied them, had arrived at the Chaotianmen Wharf in Chongqing, where they landed in Guangzhou, took the Guangdong-Hankou line, and then took a river steamer upstream.