Seeing Luo Ronghuan pondering on the map, Cai Zhong said: "Division commander, in fact, we have a lot of choices now, because the army doesn't know that the main force of our army is waiting in the southeast of Shandong, central and southern Lu and the mountainous areas of Taiyi, we are equivalent to a tiger hiding in the shadows waiting for an opportunity to exert force, and the little devil doesn't know where we will kill." In addition to going north to eliminate the enemy on the Jiaoji Road and the enemy in Tai'an to the west, I considered that I could also go south to destroy the 114th Division and the puppet Manchurian Defense Army in the direction of Xuzhou. I calculated that in addition to the 114th Division, the Xuzhou army also had the Xuzhou garrison, with a total strength of about 30,000 people, and the puppet Manchurian Defense Army, with a total of about 60,000 people. During this period, our army vigorously carried out the campaign of cold guns and cold artillery, and the puppet army suffered heavy casualties, and even if the puppet army could be replenished quickly, those puppet Manchurian defense forces had nowhere to replenish them, and their number should be reduced a little more, so that the total number of puppet troops should be about 56,000. Our army can adopt the method of division and annihilation, first attack the puppet Manchuria, and then attack the army, and fight continuously, and the chance of victory in the attack is greater. Moreover, attacking Xuzhou can quickly disrupt the offensive of the Japanese army on the front line of Wuhan and Zhengzhou, and effectively support the battle of Wuhan. ”

Liu Yimin didn't speak, Luo Ronghuan, who was pondering, suddenly answered: "What Director Cai said is not appropriate, it is easy to let the little devils in Xuzhou stick to the help if you fight the puppet army first, although our army has strong firepower, but the casualties of the urban attack are too large, a division of the army plus the Xuzhou garrison is stuck in Xuzhou, if our army wants to take it, the casualties will inevitably greatly exceed that of the army, and the loss of our army's main force may reach one-fifth or even one-quarter, it is too terrible, and the central government will definitely not approve it." Moreover, when our army takes Xuzhou, it must rest and replenish, at this time, it is possible for the army to pick up the cheap and fight with us again with Xuzhou as the center, and [***] after the battle of Wuhan is damaged, it is impossible to support strongly, then we will be completely dangerous, and it is likely that we will have to abandon the Shandong base again and implement breakthrough tactics. I don't agree! ”

Perhaps thinking that the words were too harsh, Luo Ronghuan stood up, paced twice on the ground, and then said: "Actually, whether it is an offensive on Jiaoji Road or an offensive in Tai'an, it can also disrupt the deployment of the army. From this point of view, the enemy of Jiaoji Road is obviously more clever. ”

Liu Yimin was not surprised at all by what Luo Ronghuan said, the founding marshal, naturally, he was a military and political worker, and he must have his superiority in strategy and tactics, otherwise he would not be the founding father.

Liu Yimin said with a smile: "That's right, that's the truth." Think about it, if we capture Xuzhou, it is equivalent to cutting off the back road of the Zhengzhou front-line troops and the troops at the northern foot of Dabie Mountain, and the little devil would rather not Wuhan and Guangzhou, but have to return to the division and fight with us. No matter how correct our strategy and how high our tactical level is, it cannot be the opponent of all the army, and it will definitely be dumplings made by little devils when the time comes. Besides, Xuzhou is a fortified city, a transportation hub, and a large-scale supply base for the army, and no matter what method we take, it is impossible for us to transfer out the army that undertook the task of garrisoning Xuzhou, and they cannot afford to lose Xuzhou. In addition, the little devils have air superiority, even if we wipe out all the puppet troops, a 114th Division and a Xuzhou garrison are enough to hold on to Xuzhou for a while. No matter how strong our firepower is, it will never be possible to dump ammunition on Xuzhou City. In this way, it is bound to attack the city for a long time, and the third- and fourth-rate troops that were originally little devils will also give full play to the combat effectiveness of the first-class troops in the case of desperate stubbornness, and the battle will be fought into a sea of corpses and blood. This is not my Liu Yimin's combat style, nor is it the combat style of our instructor. As the old saying goes, the instructor fights by his brain, and he wants to fight skillfully and with small casualties and large captures, and never fight with any enemy. And when we attacked the enemy on Jiaoji Road, the little devils basically stuck to the county seat and market town, and none of them had the same strategic position as Xuzhou, and it was easy to mobilize the devils. In addition, our army has deliberately paralyzed the devils in recent times, and the little devils on Jiaoji Road have repaired the railways unharmed, and compared with the devils in Xuzhou, their vigilance is relatively worse, which is convenient for our army to sneak attack and ambush. Moreover, Jiaoji Road is too far away from Wuhan and Zhengzhou, and the elite field division of the Yue Army has no time to rescue, except for air support, the little devil has no other way. I expected that as long as we started fighting on Jiaoji Road, the garrison divisions in Shandong and Pingjin were afraid of being annihilated, and no one dared to reinforce them, so they could only watch us eat the 108th Division and the 33rd Division. ”

Liu Yimin has made the truth clear, Cai Zhongna is also a Red Army general who has experienced a hundred battles, where can he not figure it out! Not to mention Luo Ronghuan, he has already figured it out. Therefore, Liu Yimin called Zhu Zhexiao, deputy director of the General Staff Office, and asked him to immediately draft a telegram to the Central Committee and the General Headquarters, requesting approval to launch the Jiaoji Road Campaign, to find and annihilate the 108th Division and the 33rd Division of the Yue Army, and to thoroughly restore the Qinghe, Luzhong, Jiaolai, and Jiaodong base areas.

The content of the telegram was not long, it was just a battle idea, and Zhu Zhexiao quickly wrote it. After Liu Yimin read it, he added the secret transfer of the Fifth Division of the Yue Army and his judgment on the possible sneak attack of the Yue Army in Guangzhou, and then handed it to Luo Ronghuan.

After Luo Ronghuan read it, he immediately climbed to Liu Yimin's desk and wrote down his analysis of Liu Yimin's judgment that the army was about to attack Guangzhou, and then signed it for Zhu Zhexiao to take it and send it away.

As soon as Zhu Zhexiao left, Luo Yan, chief of the reconnaissance section of the staff office and commander of the reconnaissance battalion, came, and Liu Yimin inquired in detail about the deployment of the 108th Division and the 33rd Division of the Jiaoji Road Army.

After the main force of the instructor returned to Shandong, the reconnaissance battalion was ordered by Liu Yimin to reconnoiter the troops on the Jiaoji Road, Jinpu Road, and the eastern section of the Longhai Road.

According to Luo Yan's report, after the main force of the Jiaoji Army pursued the main force of the instructor to the south, the Yue Army on Jiaoji Road also changed its tactics, mainly to protect Jiaoji Road and build roads, and most of the troops were used to blockade and sweep the Jiaodong area, and at the same time organize part of the troops to strengthen the rule of the occupied area. After the main force of our army in Jiaodong jumped out of the encirclement, it went to Jiaolai and Qinghe to carry out a cold gun and cold artillery movement, and restored the base area, leaving only a regiment of the Jiaodong Garrison Brigade to fight guerrilla warfare with the devils. The strategy of the devil was quickly adjusted, and the 108th Division withdrew from Jiaodong and withdrew to the Jiaoji Railway and the Jiqing Highway, and the division headquarters was stationed in Weixian County, commanding the garrison of the Jiaoji Railway to maintain the safety of the communication line. There is now only one 33rd Division in the entire Jiaodong that is responsible for public security and clearance in Jiaodong, and the division headquarters is stationed in Laiyang. The Qingdao garrison of the army is responsible for the Qingdao garrison and the garrison of several surrounding counties. In Jiaodong, Qinghe, Jiaolai, and Qingdao, the army also cobbled together a part of the puppet army to assist in the garrison. But the number of puppet troops is not large, mainly because the Eighth Route Army fought well in Shandong, and no one wants to be a puppet army. The vast majority of these puppet armies were coerced by devils and Han annihilation, and basically had no combat effectiveness.

After the general situation report was completed, Luo Yan took out a detailed map of the distribution of the troops of the Jiaoji Road Army drawn by the Investigation Section, and pointed to the map to report to Liu Yimin in detail on the deployment of the troops.

Liu Yimin left a map of the distribution of the troops of the Yue army brought by Luo Yan, and asked him to divide the reconnaissance battalion that was scattered to reconnoiter and monitor the Yue army into five reconnaissance teams, closely monitor the movement of the Yue army in the direction of Xuzhou, Qingdao, Jinan, Tai'an, and Jiaodong, and report the enemy situation at any time.

When Luo Yan left, Liu Yimin told him that the big war was imminent, so let the investigators keep their eyes open and not let go of any clues.

After Luo Yan left, Liu Yimin immediately ordered the Wang Laohu's special operations formation in the direction of Tai'an to quickly withdraw, and ordered the 1st Brigade, the 3rd Brigade, the 4th Brigade, the 6th Brigade, the 8th Brigade, the Cavalry Brigade, the Artillery Brigade, the Air Defense Brigade, the Heavy Machine Gun Regiment, the Engineer Brigade, the Baggage Regiment, and the Training Headquarters to immediately mobilize, replenish the ammunition base, and wait for the order to attack. The southeastern Lu detachment was ordered to immediately take over the defense line of the Eighth Brigade and the Cavalry Brigade and assume the task of garrisoning the army in the direction of Xuzhou.

In the afternoon, Liu Yimin received a telegram from the chairman.

In his telegram, the chairman said: Based on the intelligence from all quarters, the battle of Wuhan has reached the late stage, and the armies of the Chinese army have attacked the periphery of Wuhan one after another, and although our army has resolutely resisted in the periphery of Wuhan, it still cannot completely stop the pace of the offensive of the Chinese army. If the army really attacked Guangzhou, the national political axe would be in chaos, and Wuhan would be in danger! If no miracle happens, the army will surely capture Wuhan. The battle in the direction of Zhengzhou is also not optimistic, once Wuhan is lost, the Zhengzhou defense line will inevitably be shaken, and the army is likely to go straight to Luoyang, and then attack Tongguan to the west or attack Xiangyang through Nanyang or cross the river to hit the defenders of Tiaoshan, and the battle situation will inevitably be further eroded. At this time, it is a great opportunity for our Eighth Route Army to make a decisive attack to save the country and the people, and we must plan carefully, formulate a detailed and feasible operational plan, and concentrate all the forces that can be concentrated, not only to destroy the 108th Division and the 33rd Division of the Chinese Army in a war, but also to decide the fate of Shandong in a war. Because after our army wiped out the two divisions and regiments of the Chinese army, Jinan and Qingdao were all exposed in front of our army, and our army could attack them at any time. At that time, the Tai'an army will inevitably shrink, and if the enemy dares to shrink to Jinan, our army can attack it halfway, and the situation will be better. If the enemy shrinks to southern Hebei, then our army can calmly besiege Jinan with a part of its forces, concentrate the main force and quickly go north to the border of Hebei and central Hebei, strive to annihilate a part of the enemy, and force the enemy to shrink to Pingjin, and our army can take advantage of the situation to attack the enemy in western and southern Hebei, force the enemy to shrink to the Pinghan Road, and restore the base areas of Hebei and Lubian in one fell swoop. After that, he returned to the south and restored the Taixi base area, the Lunan base area, and the southwestern Lu base area.

When Liu Yimin saw this, his heart tightened, what the chairman advocated in history after the Battle of Wuhan was to carry out mountain guerrilla warfare with independent reading ability, how did it change so much that it made the instructor fight a war of annihilation? And I want to recover the whole of Shandong in one war, this idea is too grand!

Shaking his head, he continued to look down, only to see the chairman say again: "Of course, this is only the best idea, and it is likely that it will not be realized." Because the army is different from the Kuomintang troops, the will to fight is tenacious, and it will not automatically retreat easily. Therefore, this battle can also be fought according to the second type of deployment, that is, to destroy the effective forces of the army, to win by ambush warfare and movement warfare, and to destroy the enemy in the course of movement. It would be better if the enemy's 108th Division and 33rd Division could be completely annihilated, and if the enemy contracted too quickly, only one division of the Japanese Army could be annihilated, and the 108th Division of the Chinese Army should be the first choice, forcing the enemy's 33rd Division to shrink to Qingdao. Taking into account such factors as the army's well-trained, powerful firepower, and air superiority, our army should avoid attacking fortified positions in vain, so as to avoid excessive losses among the troops. At the same time, considering that the Yue army might retaliate against the heavy troops to encircle and suppress them, our army could not attack the heavily fortified cities of Jinan, Tai'an, Yanzhou, Qingdao, Xuzhou, and other cities, but it was necessary to recover the small-scale county towns and vast rural areas around the above cities and force the enemy to retreat to the cities. Even if this is the case, the purpose of restoring the base areas and supporting the operations in Wuhan and Zhengzhou has also been achieved. ”

Finally, the chairman said in a telegram: "The instructor is the strategic group with the best equipment and the strongest firepower in our army, and it has created miracles since its formation. Invincible, invincible. Liu and Luo must not only be neither arrogant nor rash, but also decisive and strategic, dare to make up their minds at critical moments, and all of them are aimed at eliminating the living force of the devils and establishing a solid base area in Shandong. There is no need to look ahead and look backwards, both want to achieve great results and fear of heavy casualties among the troops, where in the world is there such a good thing! ”

After reading the telegram, Liu Yimin was silent, twisting his eyebrows and pacing back and forth in the room.

After reading the telegram, Luo Ronghuan said to Liu Yimin: "Send a telegram to the chairman, explain it clearly, and explain that our army is mainly to destroy the enemy's living forces in this battle, and cannot fight a battle for urban fortifications. The capture of the city is still based on surprise attacks. With the current comparison of forces between us and the enemy, our army will not be able to hold on to a city like Jinan even if it is not afraid of casualties. It's not that the city defense battle can't be defended, but that the army's planes will blow up the city recovered by our army into ruins. This is especially true of Qingdao, if our army is determined to storm and hold on, the naval fleet of the little devils will wipe Qingdao off the map. That's more than worth the loss. Don't you always say be realistic? Then analyze realistically, report realistically, and deploy operations in a realistic manner. Otherwise, you will have to suffer a big loss! ”

Liu Yimin now completely admires Luo Ronghuan's character, knowing that this old man is honest and honest on the outside, but he is full of splendid and loyal on the inside. Having such a person as a partner can be regarded as a blessing from the older generations.

Without further ado, or hesitation, Liu Yimin immediately sat down and drafted a telegram to the chairman. It shows that the main purpose of this battle was to eliminate the 108th Division and the 33rd Division of the Chinese Army and restore the base areas in Shandong. However, it is not necessary to carry out urban fortifications to avoid excessive casualties among the troops. Because this battle may be able to prevent the Yue army from capturing Wuhan, Guangzhou, and Luoyang, but it cannot be ruled out that the Yue army will forcibly occupy Wuhan and Guangzhou with one heart. But whether or not the Yue army captured Wuhan and Guangzhou, they would not sit idly by and watch the Eighth Route Army recover Jinan, Qingdao or Xuzhou. The next battle will be even more difficult, and if it is not good, it will be another situation in which the army concentrates its forces to clear Shandong, and then there will be problems.

At the end of the telegram, Liu Yimin wrote earnestly: "It is not terrible for the army to capture Wuhan and Guangzhou, but the longer the battle line is extended, the more dispersed the forces of the army will be, and the more opportunities our army will have." According to the captured documents, there were differences within the army on the direction of the next move, and one faction advocated concentrating on expanding the war of aggression against China and forcing Chiang Kai-shek to surrender. The other faction advocated concentrating forces north and going to war with the Soviet Union. If our army wants to recover all of Shandong, it will prompt the strategic direction of the army to shift, and it is very likely that the army will concentrate on the North China Front, the Central China Dispatch Army, and the main force of the Kwantung Army to encircle and suppress our army. At that time, the situation in Shandong will be reversed, and our army will have to abandon the Shandong base area again. In view of this reason, this operation must not only be fought ruthlessly and accurately, but also control the scope of attack, as long as the 108th Division and the 33rd Division can be eliminated and the army can be forced to hold the Jinpu Road, the goal of the campaign will be achieved. As for how to expand the results of the battle in the next step, it depends on the changes in the enemy's situation. It is too early to plan how to recover the border of Hebei, central Hebei, and southern Hebei. ”

After sending the telegram, Liu Yimin ate two steamed buns at the division headquarters, drank a bowl of boiling water, and sat down in front of the map to think.

In the evening, the chairman's call back finally arrived. This time, the chairman's instructions were succinct: "Agree to launch the Jiaoji Road Campaign." The objective of the operation was to destroy the 108th Division, the 33rd Division, and the Jiaoji Railway Garrison. The camera expanded the results of the war and restored the base areas in Shandong. Liu and Luo were in charge of the command of the campaign, and Liu and Luo made a decision on when and where to launch an attack. ”

Liu Yimin was relieved at this time, and strictly ordered the southeastern Lu detachment to go south in the starry night, and exchanged guards with the Eighth Brigade and the Cavalry Brigade, and the Eighth Brigade and the Cavalry Brigade rushed back to Dadian at night at the latest, and set off with the division headquarters. The Tai'an detachment was ordered to closely monitor the movement of the Tai'an army, and was tasked with pinning down the Tai'an army. The Fifth Brigade was ordered to monitor the movements of the Yanzhou defenders in the direction of Lunan. Hong Chaoyuan, commander of the Fifth Brigade, and Guo Zihua, political commissar of the Southeast Lu Detachment, were ordered to command the Fifth Brigade, the Tai'an Detachment, and the Southeast Lu Detachment to ensure the smooth completion of the operation on the northern front.

After issuing the order, Liu Yimin took out the battle plan he had secretly drawn up and handed it over to Cai Zhong to notify all units to secretly implement it in accordance with the battle plan.

After doing all this, Liu Yimin left the division office and went home to rest.

Back at home, Tang Xingying asked him if the army was going to fight a big battle?

Liu Yimin wondered how Tang Xingying had such a keen sense of smell, and the orders were all top secret, and she couldn't have known it. As a result, when she asked Tang Xingying, she knew that she didn't know whether the troops were going to fight at all, but just now when she saw Huang Wenhu and Li Xiaoshuai were replenishing ammunition, she thought that she might have to fight.

Liu Yimin told Tang Xingying that the army had taken action and asked her and her children to stay here and work with peace of mind.

Tang Xingying stopped doing this, saying that the nursery had been built, and He'er could be sent to the nursery, and she took Ping'er to act with Liu Yimin. This time, she must capture an officer with her own hands! If she doesn't fight again, other comrades will think that she is just Liu Yimin's wife, and forget that she is a Red Army hero who has walked the Long March!

(To be continued)