Sakai Hoji nodded and said in a deep voice, "Yo Xi, what Kawabe-kun said makes a lot of sense. In fact, His Excellency the Commander attaches great importance to this Tuba Road, and in just two months, he was able to break through the county town heavily defended by the Imperial Army twice in a row, and at the same time form a reinforced brigade of the Imperial Army to annihilate the Imperial Army, such an enemy should definitely not be underestimated. ”

Speaking of which, Sakai Hoji looked around at the officers in front of him, and then continued: "Any soldier of the Imperial Army is an elite cultivated by spending a lot of resources in the empire, and they must not fight hard against the enemy's strong fortifications, so we must revise the previous battle plan!" ”

After saying that, Sakai Hoji turned his gaze to Kawabe Nakasa and motioned for him to continue.

Nakasa stood up and pointed to the map and said, "Although Hades Mountain is well fortified and easy to defend and difficult to attack, such terrain is extremely bad for the imperial army, which will make our heavy equipment useless, especially the chariot troops, and they can't even drive here." But again, this terrain is not entirely favorable for the Chinese people. If we had enough time, we could have trapped them here. I think that the daily supply of thousands of people will be an astronomical amount, and there is no complete logistics support, at most they will run down the mountain by themselves in a month, and it will not be easy to destroy them when the time comes. ”

Sakai Hoji said: "Hebian-kun, the commander only gave us a week's time, and later our first brigade will move to Baotou, and this will be taken over by the North China Front!" ”

Kawabe Nakasa continued: "In this case, we must contact the threat of those fortifications to the soldiers before we can attack, but when I checked the terrain just now, I found that most of the bunkers on the Dirt Eight Road are semi-underground concrete structures, and ordinary artillery has little effect on such fortifications, even the Type 90 field artillery equipped by the Imperial Army. Therefore, it is recommended to ask the aviation for reinforcements, and only the kind of heavy aerial bombs that fall from high altitudes can pose a threat to the bunker. ”

Sakai Hoji frowned and said: "The aviation regiment is now subordinate to the North China Front, and it will be very troublesome if you want to mobilize it, and you have to ask for aviation reinforcements to deal with a Tubalu, I'm afraid Your Excellency the commander will not agree, but for the safety of the lives of my soldiers, I will still give it a try, but please don't report too many expectations." ”

Kawabe Nakasa said again: "If we can't request air reinforcements, we can also use the method of earth work to carry out geotechnical excavation from the mountain pass, as long as the trench is dug to within fifty meters of the bunker in China, then those fortifications will be less than half of the threat to the imperial army, and the casualties will probably be much smaller at that time!" ”

"Yo Xi, Hebian-kun is worthy of being a rare tactician in the imperial army! Okay, tomorrow we will fight according to the way you say, and the meeting will be dismissed! Sakai Hoji said loudly.

"Hay!"

There was nothing to do all night, the Japanese army did not move, and the Eighth Route Army did not come down the mountain to attack.

At five o'clock in the morning of the next day, Major General Sakai ordered all troops to immediately boil the pot and cook. After eating, Kawabe Nakasa led the 2nd Infantry Brigade and the Independent Field Artillery Brigade as the main attack force, while Kojima Nakasa's 3rd Infantry Brigade served as a reserve.

They set up a formation at the riverside outside the mountain pass, first opened the way with artillery, and blew up the land near the mountain pass with the intention of demining. This was followed by 12 90 field guns of the Independent Field Artillery Brigade firing at the same time, and huge shells flew towards the pillbox of the Eighth Route Army in the mountain pass with a long tail in tow. At the same time, a squadron of infantry received an order to immediately launch an attack on the fortifications of the Eighth Route Army entering the mountain pass.

"Boom" "Boom" "Boom"

Violent explosions continued to sound overhead, but the soldiers in the bunker were not afraid at all, they all knew the fortification of the bunker, in the words of the detachment leader, unless the Japanese army brought heavy artillery, at most the dirt and sleepers on it would be blown away, and not to hurt the bunker.

After the shelling, the soldiers saw that more than a hundred little devils were rushing towards the forward position, and after the little devils entered the effective firing range, after the starting gun was fired, all the bright and dark forts opened fire at the same time. More than a dozen heavy machine guns opened fire at the same time, sealing the road into the mountain, and the attacking Japanese troops were immediately knocked down in large areas, suffering heavy casualties.

The purpose of the test had been achieved, and the firepower of the Shina people was really fierce, and Kawabe Nakasa, who was in charge of the front line command, immediately ordered the attacking infantry squadron to withdraw immediately.

At the same time, Major General Sakai and others, who were watching the battle not far away, were secretly afraid, they all saw it when the Eighth Route Army opened fire just now, so many light and heavy machine guns formed by the fire points almost blocked the road into the mountain, even if the riverside brigade was all thrown into battle, the result would not change in any way, and the commander would only increase casualties.

Moreover, the effect of the artillery bombardment was also very unsatisfactory, the caliber of the Type 90 field gun was only 75mm, and the lethality of the pillboxes hidden on the hill by the Shina people was very small. Since the bombardment failed to destroy any of them for more than ten minutes, Sakai Hoji was even more dissatisfied with the Type 90 gun.

In fact, not many people in the Japanese invasion of China have a good impression of this type of field artillery, the Japanese Army used to use the suppressive artillery for the Type 38 field gun, but this kind of artillery produced in Germany was designed in 1888, in 1905 the Japanese Army spent 4 million yen to buy back from the German Krupp company, because that year happened to be Meiji 38, so it was named Type 38 field gun.

Although the performance of the Type 38 field gun is good, after all, it is a product of half a century ago, so as early as 1920, the Japanese Army began to plan a new type of field artillery. However, at that time, because of the 88th Fleet, the Japanese Army was very poorly paid, and later the Kwantung earthquake and economic depression, for the development of new artillery technology, the Japanese army at that time still considered relying on foreign technology, and sent a foreign inspection delegation, and finally focused on Schneider Company.

In 1928, Schneider began to design a new gun, and in 1930, after several rounds of revision, the prototype gun was completed, and in 31 the design was finalized, and in 32 it began to be produced at the Osaka Arsenal and named the Type 90 field gun.

However, the Type 90 field gun was 300 kilograms heavier than the Type 38 field artillery, and the department in charge of operations at the General Staff Headquarters was very dissatisfied with the excessive weight of the new artillery, but the new artillery was carried by the 2nd Division to participate in the actual combat after 918, and the feedback believed that the extra firing range was more cost-effective than the extra weight, which made the Type 90 artillery officially enter production, but the output was not high, only 200 guns, and the first brigade of the independent mixed group of Sakai Hoji was the first batch to be equipped with the Type 90 field artillery.

In fact, how could Sakai Hoji know that the reason for the poor shelling effect was not because of their artillery, but because Ma Zheng used some methods of later generations for the design of the pillbox.

First of all, Ma Zheng added some seized steel bars to the concrete to increase the strength of the concrete. The second is that the angle is designed, so that the Japanese shells will bounce off the other side when they hit it, and they will not be able to exert the maximum attack effect. In the end, he ordered a large number of thick sleepers to be added to the front and rear of the pillbox, and covered with a thick layer of wet soil, as a result, the power of the Japanese artillery was greatly weakened.

The artillery bombardment was ineffective, the infantry attack was blocked, and the requested aviation was delayed, so Sakai Hoji could only hope for earthwork work in Nakasa on the riverside.