Lieutenant General Nishio Toshizo, commander of the Second Army, was woken up in his sleep.

After reading the telegram of Major General Morita Masaho, the eyebrows of the old devil Nishio Shouzo kept shaking. This damn Morita Masaho, if you want to commit suicide by caesarean section, you should have disemboweled it earlier, why do you have to pull so many soldiers again? This is also known as the brave general of the Kwantung Army, fart!

The 13th Brigade is known as the elite brigade of the Kwantung Army, but I can't imagine that it is so vulnerable, it simply throws people into the depths of the Pacific Ocean! I don't think it's an elite brigade, but it's called a stupid brigade. Repeatedly stressed that the enemy should not be pursued at night and that vigilance should be strengthened, but these guys just didn't listen, they were brave and brave, and they didn't even know the enemy's number, so they dared to go out of the nest to pursue, unlucky, right?

These stupid guys are dead, and they shouldn't have messed up the defense of Tai'an City. Now is the time of the big war, if there is a problem in Tai'an, then the Jinpu Road will be completely interrupted, and the 10th Division of the southern front will bear the brunt of the lone army, and there will be a shortage of food and ammunition, which is very dangerous!

It's too late to say anything now, the key is which unit to transfer to defend Tai'an, not to mention the 5th Division, 10th Division, and 16th Division, which are permanent divisions and are to be used for the offensive. The 108th Division could not be transferred at will, it was the only division and regiment at hand that was used as a reserve, and it was responsible for the task of going north and south to support operations at any time. The only thing that can be used is a few Reading Power Mixed Brigades, and close to the railway line is naturally the Reading Power Mixed Tenth Brigade stationed in Dexian County. However, after the transfer of the 10th Brigade of Reading Power Mix, troops must be sent to replace them immediately, Luxi and Southern Hebei are locked up with a tiger, once the defense line is slightly loosened, then Liu Yimin's instructor will not immediately go out of the tiger? It seems that an order should be given immediately, and the 10th Brigade should be mixed into Reading Power to quickly move south to Tai'an, and the Reading Power Mixed Seventh Brigade stationed in Huimin should move to Dexian County, and Huimin had no choice but to give up.

The chief of staff, Major General Suzuki, saw that the commander's eyebrows and hands were shaking, no, it should be that his whole body was shaking, so he said with concern: "Commander, do you need to drink a glass of water to calm down?" ”

Lieutenant General Nishio Shouzo was anxious and uncomfortable at this time, and when he heard Suzuki say this, he thought that this guy was laughing at his old age and incompetence, and he lost consecutive battles, and his anger immediately shifted to Suzuki Shumichi. However, Nishio Shouzo was different from Terauchi Shouichi, he didn't slap him easily, took a sip of the water brought by the guards, and then said: "Suzuki-kun, record the order: 1. The 10th Brigade of the Reading Force Mixed in De County immediately assembled urgently, transported Tai'an, and served as the garrison of Tai'an. 2. The 7th Brigade of the Reading Power Mixed Brigade, which lived in Huimin, immediately gave up Huimin and rushed back to Dexian overnight to take over the defense, and served as the railway and highway defense of the section from Dexian to Jinan. 3. After the above two Reading Mixed Brigade Regiments are replaced, the 13th Reading Mixed Brigade and the 83rd Wing and Baggage Wing of the original 21st Division will be withdrawn to Jinan for retraining and will be combined into the Jinan Garrison Force, and the specific number will be announced after the approval of the base camp. 4. An investigation team led by Major General Suzuki, chief of staff of the Second Army, immediately went to Taean to investigate the attack on the first station of the Jieshou Station and the cause of the defeat of the 13th Brigade of the Reading Force, and the main task was to trace the whereabouts of the Chinese military police and eliminate them. ”

Suzuki was recording orders, the first three were clearly remembered, and when he wrote the fourth, his mind was confused, he didn't understand why the commander would give such an order, and asked him to track down the Chinese military police who didn't know if they really existed, wasn't that embarrassing him?

Although Suzuki didn't know what he had offended the commander, he knew in his heart that the commander was deliberately manipulating him. Fortunately, the military hierarchy is strict, and the military order cannot be violated, Suzuki still pinched his nose and drank this pot, "snapped" upright, and said loudly: "Thank you, commander, for cultivating and ensuring that you complete the task and live up to the trust!" With that, he went to send a telegram.

Looking at Suzuki's back, a sneer appeared on the corner of Lieutenant General Nishio Shouzo's mouth, and he turned around and began to think about how to send a telegram of apology to the base camp and the North China Front.

Morita Masahomi didn't know how he got over that night. I couldn't wait until dawn, climbed the tower of Tai'an and looked around with a telescope, and found no signs of the [***] team besieging Tai'an, so my heart relaxed a little.

After returning to the brigade headquarters to sit down, Morita Masafumi received a telegram from the 10th Brigade of the Yomiri, saying that the unit had been urgently assembled last night on the orders of Lieutenant General Nishio Toshizo, commander of the Second Army, and was now heading south by car, and was expected to arrive in Tai'an at 11 a.m. The 13th Brigade of Reading Power Mixed Brigade should strengthen vigilance to ensure the safety of Tai'an City before the 10th Brigade of Reading Power Mixed Brigade took over.

After reading the telegram, Morita Masahomi scolded "the villain has a will" and asked the chief of staff to prepare for the defense handover.

Thinking that he was about to leave Tae'an, so many soldiers were still lying on the land of Beijipo and Jieshou, Morita Masahomi wanted to find out what kind of troops beat him so badly no matter what, and he had to lose to understand it, and he couldn't just commit suicide by disembowelment for no reason, right?

When this thought came together, Morita Masahomi couldn't sit still. After going back and forth in the office a few times, I decided to check on the battlefield before leaving, otherwise I won't be blind!

Morita Masamumi's idea was soon realized, as Major General Suzuki, chief of staff of the Second Army, led a team of investigators to arrive in a hurry from Jinan. After a little together, the two of them felt that it should be safe in broad daylight, so they took the gendarmerie stationed in Tai'an and the two infantry brigades of the 56th and 58th Infantry Brigades, which were incomplete, and went to Jieshou Station first.

When I went to Jieshou Station, I saw that the corpses on the platform were either torn into pieces by shells, or the bodies were completely damaged by bullets from the North Machine Gun. The carriage was even worse, and it was no longer possible to tell whose arms and legs belonged to. Major General Suzuki spit out first. When he vomited, the accompanying gendarmes and infantry all vomited, making the first station of the boundary extremely smelly.

After investigating the scene, the gendarmes quickly came to the conclusion that the attackers had attacked the garrison guarding the station, and that 299 of the 300 men had been stabbed to death, and that one had been pierced in the back with a cone-shaped sharp weapon, suspected to be caused by an outdated bow and arrow. Judging from this situation, the sneak attackers are a group of well-trained soldiers who know martial arts. Then, the attackers planted powerful explosive packets under the rails and blew up the columns. Judging from the casualties of the soldiers on the train, those who fell out of the car were stabbed to death with bayonets, and the soldiers in the carriage were all killed by grenades, indicating that it was a regular unit that did it. Later, the sneak attackers used the anti-aircraft fire on the military train to attack the ironclad train that came to reinforce it, as evidenced by artillery shells. The 56th Infantry Brigade and the 58th Infantry Brigade can be explained clearly in the future, and there is no need for detailed investigation.

Based on the above situation, it can be concluded that there is indeed a small unit called the "Chinese Military Police", which is well-trained and powerful, and that it is an elite unit in the regular army that cooperates with them.

After inspecting the situation at Jieshou Station, Major General Morita Masatomi ordered the remnants of the 56th Reading Infantry Brigade to stay behind and dispose of the remains of the dead soldiers, and he and Suzuki led the way to Kitajipo with the military police and the 58th Reading Infantry Brigade.

Last night, Major General Morita Masaho was afraid that the [***] team would take advantage of the situation to capture Taean, and fled the battlefield in a hurry, although he knew that his three infantry brigades and one cavalry brigade were collectively shattered, but he did not know that they all died so miserably, except for the 59th Infantry Brigade of Reading Force, which was killed by rifles during the pursuit, almost all the others died from the shell bombardment. Especially in the center of the battlefield, the soldiers were blown up in a blur of flesh and blood.

After seeing the battlefield, a squadron leader of the 58th Infantry Brigade who accompanied him suddenly went insane, pulled out his knife and committed suicide by disembowelment. This caused a chain reaction, and dozens of soldiers all looked wooden, shouting "Mommy, Mommy", and scrambled to stab their bayonets into their chests.

Morita Masahomi looked at his soldiers in pain, knowing that they had completely collapsed from spirit to will to ** and could no longer go to the battlefield, so he ordered the captain of the 58th Brigade to take the troops away from the battlefield to rest, leaving the gendarmes to investigate carefully.

The battlefield was so clean that not even a single shell casing could be found, and the gendarmes searched and found several mimeographed leaflets, on which were written a letter from General Tang Enbo, commander of the 20th Army Corps of the Chinese National Army, to the people of Shandong.

Suzuki's Chinese is good, and he doesn't need to translate, so he directly takes it and reads it: "Shandong people, Shandong compatriots, Shandong fathers and villagers:

Since the invasion of China, he has killed my people, occupied my land, plundered my assets, humiliated my women, and committed many crimes. On the order of Chairman Chiang, he led the elite of the 20th Army Corps to attack thousands of miles, cut off the Jinpu Road, and took the head of Kou to sacrifice my dead compatriots. Although Kou is strong, he is also flesh and blood, and he will naturally be wiped out under the fire. The knife chops and the axe splits, and the same death. I hope that my compatriots, unite as one, rise up to fight, and turn the land of Qilu into the grave of Yukou. Those who kill the Emperor are martyrs of the Anti-Japanese War; Those who destroyed military facilities, annihilated Han annihilation, and captured spies were also martyrs of the Anti-Japanese War; Those who did not cooperate with the puppet regime and actively supported the War of Resistance were also martyrs of the War of Resistance. Killing a devil is a thousand years old, and the door is full of glory. Ember is willing to encourage his compatriots! ”

After reading it, Suzuki suddenly realized: "It turned out that the most elite 20th Army Corps of the Chinese Political Axe Army did it, and they are the only ones with such powerful artillery fire, which also explains why the Chinese military police, Chiang Kai-shek's mysterious guard, appeared here." ”

The captain of the gendarmerie was afraid that this was a suspicious trick by the squadron, so he went to arrest some civilians and asked what troops were fighting here last night. These ordinary people were very uncooperative, and under the whip of the gendarmes, they took out the letter of the 20th Army Corps to the people of Shandong from their bosoms, and said that this army had gone south at night, and the railroad was also picked up by them, and they were all loaded onto the car and transported away.

Now the situation is completely clear, it is the 20th Army Corps of the regular army of China rushing to Jinpu Road, accompanied by the Chinese military police of the Guards trained by the Germans for Chiang Kai-shek. Now the 20th Army Corps is secretly moving south along the Jinpu Road, and the intention is very clear, that is, to copy the rear road of the 10th Division. As for why the 20th Army did not take advantage of the situation to capture Tai'an, Suzuki's explanation was that after discovering that all the Reading Artillery Brigade had withdrawn to Tai'an City, the 20th Army Corps thought that the defenders of Tai'an City had been prepared and it was not easy to sneak attack.

The situation was clarified, the report was also available, Major General Suzuki was proud, and secretly scolded Lieutenant General Nishio Shouzo for exhausting the organs, but he was lucky enough to figure out the problem at once, so that he couldn't do anything if he wanted to. As for the pursuit and elimination of the Chinese military police, it is better to say, with the protection of the 20th Army Corps, how can Suzuki lead the way to pursue? Just inform the 10th and 16th Divisions and ask them to be more vigilant.

After returning to Taean, a telegram was sent to Lieutenant General Nishio Toshizo, and the 10th Brigade of Yomito Mixed Brigades arrived.

Morita Masanori pulled Suzuki and Yomitsu to have a farewell banquet for the officers above the captain of the 10th Brigade. During the banquet, Morita Masahomi was sad, wept bitterly, and choked up: "Since the Manchurian Incident, I have been serving in the army, invincible, and I have never regarded the Chinese army as an opponent. Yesterday's battle opened my eyes, and the meticulous deployment of the Chinese army and the ferocity of its firepower exceeded my common sense. His Majesty the Emperor's strategic goal of occupying China is in jeopardy! ”

Major General Suzuki led the way to see Morita Masatomi crying sadly, so he persuaded him to want to open a point, this is still met Tang Enbo's 20th Army, if he meets Liu Yimin's instructor, I am afraid that not only Tai'an City has now changed hands, I am afraid that when the 10th Brigade comes to reinforce, there must be at least 6 or more aircraft escort along the way, otherwise, it will be difficult to reach Tai'an.

Suzuki said this, and the officers of the 10th Brigade were not interested in eating, and their eyes became glazed. The brigade commander can't see that it's not a solution, so he can't mess up his position without going into battle, right? He staggered to his feet, picked up a glass of sake, drank it all, pretended to be arrogant, and said very angrily: "Gentlemen, don't grow the ambition of others to destroy your own prestige, and say that this army is invincible in the world." The reason why the 13th Brigade was defeated this time was because of the unclear situation and the reckless and blind actions of the commander, which caused thousands of imperial warriors to stain the battlefield with blood. As long as we act in accordance with the instructions of General Nei Shouyi of the North China Front Army, and firmly guard the defensive line, whether it is Liu Yimin or Tang Enbo, come and kill one by one, kill two and kill a pair, and discipline them if they come and go! ”

Major General Morita Masahomi was reluctant to say this, and immediately stood up and said that it was not allowed to insult the heroic souls who died in the 13th Brigade of the Reading Force. The two of them quarreled at the wine table, and in the end they simply scuffled together. Fortunately, the chief of staff of the Second Army, Major General Suzuki, led the way to persuade the fight, and the officers of the two armies did not dare to make a mistake. Otherwise, there is likely to be a firefight.

The banquet naturally broke up unhappily, and Major General Morita Masaho, who had long regarded Tai'an as a sad place, was unwilling to stay in Tai'an for a while, so he quickly handled the move, took the broken team, pulled a few car urns, and returned to Jinan with Major General Suzuki.

After receiving the telegram sent back by Suzuki, Nishio Shouzo was a little unconvinced, and sent a telegram to ask the 10th, 16th, and 5th Divisions if they had found the 20th Army Corps of the [***] team of Tang Enbo. As a result, all three divisions reported that they had not fought with Yube for the time being. At this time, Nishio Shouzao panicked, and hurriedly reported to General Terauchi Shouichi about the battle between Jieshou and Beijipo, and also reported on his own adjustment of the defense of the troops. Then, without waiting for General Terauchi Shouyi to call back, Lieutenant General Nishio Shouzo ordered the 10th Division to suspend the attack in the direction of Fuji County, defend on the spot, and strictly prevent a sneak attack by the 20th Army Corps of China. The reason was that the 20th Army Corps attacked the Jinpu Road in the Tai'an section, causing the railway to be interrupted and severely damaging the 13th Brigade of the Reading Force. At the same time, Lieutenant General Nishio Toshizo strictly ordered the 5th and 16th Divisions to quickly defeat the enemy in front of them, move closer to the 10th Division, and be ready to reinforce the 10th Division at any time.

After sending the telegram, feeling that the troops were still insufficient, Nishio Shouzo sent a telegram to the 114th Division, urging them to speed up, transport Yanzhou by car as soon as possible, and assume the defense of Yanzhou. At the same time, he sent a telegram to the base camp, requesting that the remnants of the 13th Brigade and the 83rd Wing of the former 21st Division be mixed together, and the Jinan garrison force should be set up, and the 108th Division should be vacated to be used as a reserve for the Second Army.

In his telegram to the base camp, Lieutenant General Nishio Shouzo also suggested that if he did not agree to mix the two troops, he should ask the base camp to send at least three more mixed brigades of reading power, because the branch was too big, and there were only a few mixed brigades of reading force on the huge ground in Shandong to serve as garrison tasks, and there were gaps everywhere, and it was impossible to prevent the unscrupulous sneak attack of the [***] team.

As a result, the base camp replied by replying that while agreeing to merge the two units into the Jinan Reading Garrison, it severely reprimanded Lieutenant General Nishio Shouzo for sitting on a large army and fighting ineffectively, resulting in repeated losses to the imperial army, and its prestige fell to the ground, becoming an international laughing stock. In particular, the base camp pointed out that due to the slow movement of Nishio Shouzo's Second Army, the Chinese defenders' defensive line in the southern section of the Tsupu Road had been consolidated, and if the Second Army did not make any further achievements, he asked Lieutenant General Nishio Shouzo to return to China to report to His Majesty the Emperor and report on the problem of the Second Army's waste of money and food and dragging down the economy of the Great Army.

After reading the telegram, Nishio Shouzao was furious, and scolded Daben for nourishing a group of fools, and there was a row of bright water spirit bubbles on the corner of his mouth while scolding, which looked very eye-catching.

After scolding, Nishio Shouzo strictly ordered the railway department to repair the Jinpu Road as soon as possible, ensure the supply of arms and materials on the front line, and enable the 10th Division to quickly resume the offensive.

The battle that took place on Jinpu Road became a public case many years later due to the reluctance of the Yue Army and the Eighth Route Army to publicize it. As the other party to the war history recorded Tang Enbo's 20th Army Corps and the Chinese military police, Tang Enbo, due to various reasons, also had vague language, neither said that he fought this battle, nor did he say that he did not fight, but always emphasized that the Jinpu Road battle in a broad sense, the 20th Army Corps was of course the main force, and it was fighting with the Yue Army every day, eliminating countless devils. Then he talked about the pain of being pursued all the way by the elite divisions of the Yue Army. Although the history of the Eighth Route Army was written down in detail and the general results, it was studied and studied by scholars who wanted to restore the historical truth, and the final result was that the army did not have the habit of exaggerating its achievements and that the study of the historical facts of the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression should refer to and learn from the records of the war history.

(To be continued)