If it was possible, Wang Jue really didn't want to force a breakthrough of the rebels' defense line from the Liuhe line, and if he had been following the Liuhe River to the north, crossing Zhangwu County, and bypassing the Liuhe River through Mongolia, it might be better than the current situation. However, this is only a possibility, and after repeated calculations, the logistics department and the general staff department feel that forcing the Liuhe River is the most correct direction of attack.

If there is a detour, such a huge logistical supply of the new army will be more than doubled, and the replenishment and transportation of fuel and ammunition will be a big problem. Another reason that made Wang Jue decide to force a crossing in the Liuhe area was that if he made a detour to Zhangwu County, it would give the rebels enough time to react.

When Wang Jue's new army advanced all the way south to Xinmin, the rebels may have outnumbered the new army, and even if they broke through the rebel defense line at that time, it was possible that the new army would fall into a dangerous situation of being encircled.

Therefore, the new army chose to break through the Liuhe defense line, rather than take a long detour that would not work at all. But in order to take this shortcut, they have to pay the price of blood and thousands of lives. Although the Liuhe defense line is not the main defense line of the Jin Kingdom, it is really a defense line, and it is not easy to rely on flesh and blood to open a small gap in this defense line.

In the upper reaches of the pontoon area of the Liuhe River, the movement caused by the Praetorian Guards crossing the river was no less than that of the pontoon area, and with an order, these soldiers who had sworn an oath on the dragon banner of the Ming Empire shouted slogans and pushed the boat into the water of the Liuhe River.

"Long live His Majesty the Emperor!" Waist-high in the river, soldiers in Praetorian Guard uniforms shouted the slogan of death, and then pushed the boat deeper into the river with all their might. They didn't care that their beautiful clothes were soaked by the river, and they didn't seem to care about the bullets coming from the other side.

"For His Majesty the Emperor! Advance! In the midst of the hail of bullets, the Praetorian Guard officers waved their arms and urged the soldiers who were staggering through the river to continue their planned mission.

The Praetorian Guards, who were already in the dinghy, began to paddle the oars in their hands vigorously, trying to make the boat rush to the other side of the river faster. The machine guns in the bow of the ships were also firing wildly, trying to suppress all kinds of fire coming from the opposite bank, and behind these boats, the Praetorian Guard soldiers who had not yet returned to the shore were knocked down by bullets one after another, and the river was flooded with blood-red spray.

The cannonballs soon fell in the river, stirring up huge columns of water, splashing the clothes of the Praetorian Guard soldiers on the boats and making the waters even more dangerous. Not far behind these Janissaries, soldiers on the riverbank were braving a dense hail of bullets and scrambling to build a new pontoon bridge.

The bullet struck the chest of a sapper who was fixing the plank, and the Praetorian Guard soldier shuddered for a moment, then shook and fell headlong, and because of the bad angle, he fell straight into the river, and then disappeared into the rushing river, never to be seen again.

Soon, there were sappers carrying tools on top of his position, and more soldiers behind him rushed to the pontoon bridge with wooden planks, and after placing the materials in their hands, they returned in the rain of bullets and bullets, and continued to run towards the bridge with wooden planks and other materials.

Thanks to the almost frantic efforts of these desperate Praetorian Guard soldiers, the pontoon bridge was built at an astonishing speed. These soldiers of the Praetorian Guard of the Ming Empire were so brave that they were almost reckless, and they fought to the death despite the huge sacrifices, which also caused great pressure on the rebel soldiers on the opposite side.

The battle entered a white-hot stage from the beginning, every minute and every second soldiers were shot and fell, the Ming army achieved its combat goal little by little under the huge casualties, and the rebels were using the most stubborn resistance to prevent the Ming army from continuing to cross the river.

"If possible, special river crossing equipment should be built for armored units." Hearing the heart-wrenching words from the mouths of the officers who came to report the casualty figures again and again, Wang Jue's mind was thinking about how to prepare to reduce the casualties of the troops before the next battle came.

"There is still about 100 meters to go, and the pontoon bridge is completed." Zhang Jianjun nervously looked at the river in the distance, which had been completely covered in smoke, grabbed the phone and reported the news just passed by the engineer headquarters to the commander-in-chief Wang Jue.

As the commander of the New 1st Army, he finally couldn't sit still anxiously in the face of such huge casualties. According to the current situation, his 2nd Division would be crippled near the river beach before it had even crossed the Liuhe River. Now he really wanted to take people up and repair the pontoon bridge as quickly as possible, so that the tank troops could cross the river as soon as possible.

The main reason for thinking this way is that he pinned almost all his hopes of tearing apart the enemy's positions on the tank troops. It didn't even occur to him how he would have ended the battle if the tank troops had not broken through the enemy's defenses after crossing the river.

Of course, not only Zhang Jianjun, but also Wang Jue did not think about what this battle would become if the new weapon failed. Because the moment Wang Jue decided to raid Liuhe, he pressed his hole card on the new weapon "tank", which was also the fundamental reason why the new army launched this battle to cross the river.

Now it is clear to everyone that they have only erected three unfinished pontoon bridges on the Liuhe River at the same time, and built a bridgehead on a narrow river beach of several tens of meters. This is still a distance of 108,000 miles away from breaking through the entire Liuhe defense line, and they have not even touched the edge of the rebels' core position now.

Even at this stage, the rebels still did not press their reserves to the defensive line, which also proved that the Liuhe defensive line was far from dangerous in their eyes. In fact, after nearly 1,000 casualties, the gains of the new army were not greater.

In order to maintain the palm-sized bridgehead on the opposite bank, the Ming army filled in the lives of soldiers every moment. A boatload of soldiers who finally reached the opposite shore would be killed in a matter of minutes, followed by another boatload of soldiers, whose clothes were still wet, and who had to go to the front to buy a few minutes for the soldiers who came ashore behind.