It turned out that this was the case, and Han Xing's heart breathed a sigh of relief. Zhang Weihan also smiled and said: "You have to ask Chief of Staff Han about this change of weapons, he is the director of the arsenal, and he can change guns for whoever he wants." ”

Zhang Weihan suddenly pushed the ball to Han Xing, which was also an intentional increase in Han Xing's value.

Wang Yifei looked at Han Xing's eyes like a person asking for food, and said pitifully: "Chief of Staff Han, in order to fight devils more powerfully, for the lives of our soldiers, I beg you, when can you change the gun for us!" ”

At this time, Han Xing was also embarrassed to take the candy excessively, and said, "Company Commander Wang, you guys are really good at fighting in Wharf Town. The officers and men of the whole company fought bloodily, and not a single person retreated, and a large number of devils were eliminated. According to the conditions of our gun exchange, it is enough, so I decided to replace all of you with assault rifles as soon as possible. ”

After Wang Yifei heard the good news, he jumped up happily: "Change the gun, change the gun." His soldiers were nearby, and when they heard the good news, they also cheered in unison: "Change guns, change guns, we also use the best guns like the Southern Expeditionary Army." ”

After the town of Wharf and Wuxue were occupied by the Japanese army, the fortress of Fuchikou became very dangerous.

Fuchikou is diagonally opposite the fortress of Tianjia Town, just across the Yangtze River. If Fuchikou is lost, it will be difficult for Tianjia Town to hold.

Li Yannian felt very helpless, so he quickly transferred 2 companies of 77 field artillery and 1 company of 105 light howitzers and 1 company of 75 anti-aircraft artillery to Fuchikou to strengthen the firepower of the fortress.

Although these artillery units helped the defenders of Fuchikou greatly hinder the advance of the Japanese army, they also greatly weakened the combat effectiveness of the mobile artillery of the Tianjiazhen fortress and weakened the defense capability of Tianjiazhen.

The Taiwanese brigade and regiment soldiers divided into two routes, flanking the fortress of Fuchikou from the east and south, during which they were stubbornly blocked by the 18th Division of the 54th Army.

The 18th Division originally belonged to the 18th Army, and its will to fight was very tenacious, and with the strong support of field artillery, its firepower was much closer.

From Matou Town to Fuchikou, the straight-line distance is only about 10 kilometers, but the elite brigade of the Taiwan Brigade is struggling, sometimes only able to advance less than 1 kilometer a day.

In order to cover up his shame, the commander of the Potian Brigade of the Taiwan Brigade lied that the Nationalist Army had built strong and permanent fortifications relying on natural hazards, and the progress of the Nationalist Brigade was slow.

In fact, there were only a few brief fortifications on this line, and the Nationalist army was struggling to support it under Japanese artillery fire and a large number of poison gas shells. Since the beginning of the Anqing Campaign, the Taiwan brigade has been fighting continuously for three months, and although it has repeatedly replenished a large number of troops, the whole army has been extremely exhausted, and in particular, it has become mentally numb due to the high tension of the three months.

Therefore, the fighting will of the officers and men of the Japanese front-line operations was greatly reduced, and many times they did not dare to take the risk of advancing, and had to wait for heavy weapons to repeatedly bombard the positions of the national army over and over again before attacking.

As a result, the Japanese army on the south bank of the Yangtze River made slow progress and could not achieve its goal in a short time.

In response to this, Okamura Ninji was anxious, and he ordered the Japanese army on the north bank of the Yangtze River to immediately attack on all fronts and attack Tianjia Town in two ways.

Unexpectedly, the national army released the Yangtze River embankment, and the north of Wuxue Town was completely blocked by the flooding area, and at the same time, there was a sudden heavy rain in this area from the 17th, which really made the Japanese army even worse. Not only could the Japanese army advance with heavy weapons, but even the infantry could not move an inch, so it was naturally impossible to attack.

Not only was the advance from the east affected, but the attack route of the Imamura detachment from the north was also blocked by the floodplain area, and it was forced to attack the Matsuyama position without being able to make a detour.

At the same time that the Japanese marines forcibly landed in Wuxue, the Japanese 6th Division in Guangji, north of Tianjia Town, also began a large-scale attack.

Since Guangji's 6th Division itself was also under the threat of the Nationalist troops on all sides, it was unable to draw too many troops. They formed the Imamura Detachment with the 11th Infantry Wing of Katsuharu Imamura's 13th Brigade Regiment and the 2nd Independent Mountain Artillery Wing as the backbone, supplemented by other units.

On the surface, the Imamura detachment seems to have less than 10,000 troops (more than 7,000 people), but the firepower is very strong, and that artillery wing alone has 36 mountain guns.

The commander of the Imamura Katsuji Brigade fought with the Nationalist Army no less than 100 times in the Battle of Wuhan, and he also had a certain understanding of the Nationalist Army.

In view of this operation, he changed the original transportation mode based on horse-drawn carriages to the mode of carrying a single horse to adapt to mountain warfare.

At the same time, the mountain artillery wing of the division and regiment was also brought with them to enhance the firepower of mountain operations.

Guangji is less than 25 kilometers away from Tianjia Town, and Imamura Katsuji received information that only one army of the 2nd Army of the National Army was stationed north of the Tianjia Town Fortress, with about 10,000 troops.

Katsuji Imamura believed that his strength was no less than that of the 2nd Army, and his firepower was more than double that of the 2nd Army, and with the strong cooperation of the Air Force, it was estimated that he could occupy Tianjia Town in a week at most.

In fact, Imamura Katsuji thought that it would only take 2 to 3 days at most to occupy Tianjia Town, after all, the two armies were only 25 kilometers, and with the speed of the Japanese army's offensive march, 10 kilometers a day was the most basic.

Therefore, the week set by Katsuji Imamura has left a lot of room for himself.

Under this trend of arrogance peculiar to the Japanese, Katsuharu Imamura ordered his troops to set out lightly, carrying only a week's worth of combat supplies and ammunition, leaving the surplus baggage troops in the rear to avoid being attacked by the Nationalist guerrillas.

The Imamura detachment launched the attack on the same day that the Marines attacked Wuxue, and they set out from Guangji on September 15 and quickly reached the vicinity of Tieshidun and Songshan Pass on the outskirts of Tianjia Town, only 15 kilometers from Tianjia Town.

To the north of the fortress is either a lake or a swamp, and there is only a relatively flat hill about 1.5 kilometers wide.

The outermost layer of this hill is the so-called Pine Mountain, which is actually just a series of low rolling slopes, with a maximum elevation of only 300 meters, which is not a mountain.

Matsuyama is a mountain with pine trees, and the outer position of this line is about 7 kilometers wide and is the gateway to the north. After crossing Matsuyama, the terrain is even worse, almost a few kilometers of flat land, and there is no danger to defend.

Therefore, the core of the northern defense is naturally Songshan, and the national army took the original 20 permanent fortresses as the core, and built a large number of field fortifications in Songshan, and arranged minefields.

The Imamura detachment is an elite unit of the 6th Division, which is known as the first combat effectiveness of the Japanese army, and its combat effectiveness is naturally not weak. After a day of fierce fighting on the 15th, they broke through the small force of the 9th Division of the 2nd Army on the periphery and approached the Songshan position on the whole front.

Because the enemy and us are too close and the national army is insufficient, the so-called defense in depth can only be like this, and it is impossible to build a defensive position of more than 10 kilometers or dozens of kilometers at every turn, as the Soviets did.

Li Yannian saw that the Imamura detachment led an infantry wing and a mountain artillery wing of nearly 10,000 troops directly into the northern line of Tianjia Town, and immediately ordered to mobilize troops to meet the battle.

In addition to allowing the Wuxue National Army to retreat, he also ordered the 57th Division to take over the other scattered positions of the 9th Division of the 2nd Army, so that all the troops of the 9th Division could go north to the Songshan line and fight the Japanese in a decisive battle.

It was already the night of the 15th when the Imamura detachment attacked the outskirts of Matsuyama, and it was common sense that the Japanese army would not normally conduct night raids, because the Japanese had a clear advantage in firepower. The advantage of firepower can only be played well during the day, and at night they cannot see each other clearly, the advantage of firepower is not obvious, and it is easy to be injured by mistake, so the Japanese army rarely fights at night.

However, at this time, Major General Imamura Katsuji was extremely arrogant, he believed that he had an absolute advantage, and it was not easy to defeat the 2nd Army of the National Army, so he actually attacked overnight.

Beginning on the night of September 15, the Japanese army attacked from the north of the Tianjiazhen fortress, which was also the main battlefield of the Tianjiazhen Campaign.

In the face of the fierce attack of the Imamura detachment, Li Yannian's 2nd Army and the 9th Division faced each other-for-tat, and the two sides fought hard, and the battle was extremely tragic.

Due to the fierce Japanese offensive, less than 24 hours after the two armies came into contact, three of the four regiments belonging to the 9th Division had already exchanged fire with the Japanese army, and only one regiment served as a reserve. The 50th Regiment at the forefront of the front line suffered one-third casualties in just two days of firefighting, which shows the fierceness of the Japanese firepower.

The Imamura detachment is extremely combative, there are many veterans, and the weapons are quite advanced.

The 9th Division was also a strong force that participated in the Battle of Songhu and the Battle of Xuzhou, and it was impossible to be intimidated by the daimyo of the 6th Division.

The whole position was filled with gunsmoke all day long, blood and flesh were flying, the piercing roar of airplanes in the sky, the sound of guns and cannons on the ground, and the sound of soldiers fighting with the Japanese army were connected together, resounding through the valley.

Relying on the immediate positions, the defenders of the Nationalist Army, with the effective fire support of the fortress artillery and the artillery units of the divisions, calmly responded to the battle and attacked the invading enemy head-on. Positions often change hands again and again.

Our brave officers and men fought a bloody battle with the enemy for two days and nights...... Many wounded officers and men continued to fight after being wounded. The position was destroyed by enemy artillery fire, so they used the crater as cover and continued the battle. When the ammunition is exhausted, the enemy is engaged in a white-knuckle battle with bayonets.

In the fierce hand-to-hand combat between the 53rd Regiment of the National Army and the Japanese army, Shi Kejun, the corporal squad leader of the 3rd Company of the 1st Battalion, stabbed him with a bayonet, but his rifle was knocked out by the Japanese army with good stabbing skills. Shi Kejun immediately rushed up, grabbed the Japanese soldier, threw him to the ground, and strangled him with his rifle, making him breathless, and when he saw that he was almost strangled by him, he freed his right hand and punched him in the face.

The Japanese soldier was forced to be helpless, so he had to hurriedly throw away his rifle and fight with Shi Kejun, and the two rolled back and forth on the ground!

In the fierce fight, Shi Kejun, who had more strength, pressed the Japanese army under him (Japanese soldiers were generally short in stature during World War II, with an average height of about 1.6 meters), and the Japanese soldiers saw that they couldn't beat him, so they actually tore off Shi Kejun's ear with one hand.

Shi Kejun endured severe pain and struggled to strangle the Japanese soldier to death with both hands.