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At this time, the decline in the morale of the soldiers and the collapse of the defense line is not something that Liu Jinbiao and several cronies can maintain, the Chinese army showed a different courage from the legend, they not only have an overwhelming firepower advantage, but also have outstanding individual combat ability, and dare to fight in close combat, this is not the group of young master soldiers ridiculed by the officers before the war, they didn't even dare to charge under the care of the artillery mother, on the contrary, they were braver than themselves!

After the Chinese army captured the first line of defense, the soldiers of the Beiyang Army who retreated to the second line of defense did not stop and continued to retreat, which led the soldiers on the second line of defense to retreat at the same time. Fear and panic instantly spread to the entire line of defense, Liu Jinjai shot and killed a fleeing soldier, and then did not dare to shoot at his own soldiers, because after shooting a soldier, the rest of the people looked at him with the wrong eyes, including some middle and lower-ranking officers, clenched the weapons in their hands, and a feeling of eagerness to try made people's scalps tingle - this was a precursor to a rebellion on the battlefield!

Once Liu Jinbiao continued to forcibly put pressure on the soldiers, it was very likely that he would die at their hands, and the retreating soldiers in momentum overwhelmed Liu Jinbiao and other officers. As a result, the men of the entire 20th Division passed through Houhuzhuang from the front line and all fled to the rear, and the entire front collapsed. Liu Jinbiao, who did not move, showed the unique tragedy of the Orientals, after he dismissed all the soldiers and officers around him, he aimed the muzzle of the pistol at his forehead, and the slightest temperature could be transmitted on the muzzle, he did not hesitate much, and the close-range shooting brought huge kinetic energy, and the bullet passed through the skull. Drilled out of the back of the head, taking away a piece of blood and brain.

The two regiments of the Chinese army completely broke the defense line of the Beiyang Army with a strong charge, but before that, there were a series of foreshadowings such as harassment, artillery bombardment, artillery destruction, and persuasion to surrender. Few of the scattered Beiyang Army escaped from the pursuit and interception of the Chinese army, and the soldiers of the Beiyang Army wisely chose to surrender when there were Chinese troops in front of them and behind them.

This battle made the commander of the first division, Lu Feng, sigh, in the case of excessive strength and superior firepower. The Chinese army still paid the price of more than 200 casualties to take the Beiyang Army. It was later discovered that the military headquarters of the Third Army of the Beiyang Army, including the army commander, had escaped, and the commander of the 20th Division, Cao Kun, had already gone to Zhengzhou, and the deputy division commander Liu Jinbiao was the commander of the 20th Division, who finally committed suicide. Lu Feng also had to admit that this was a fierce general with a tough style, which was very suitable for the appetite of the Chinese army. It's just that he is blindly loyal to Yuan Shikai, and he doesn't know the difference between personal benevolence and national righteousness at all. As a soldier, he is qualified, but as a Chinese, his actions are terrible.

The 20th Division of the Beiyang Army suffered 4,763 casualties and more than 8,900 prisoners. In the north, Yuan Shikai's Beiyang Group integrated more than 200,000 troops and recruited more than 200,000 soldiers, and with the support of the Western powers, it was eyeing China. Perhaps it was the so-called "anti-Chinese alliance" that gave him confidence. thought that Hua Guo would definitely fail, so he faced Hua Guo's Northern Expedition with a tough attitude. It's just that. It is China itself that suffers in this way.

After solving the main force of the Beiyang Third Army, the military presence of the Beiyang Army in Henan was reduced to the freezing point, and Wu Changchun, Cao Kun and others who fled to Zhengzhou had only a few thousand troops in their hands.

The Sixth Army did not delay. Continuing to advance northward as fast as possible, the forward units of the 2nd Division reached the southern outskirts of Zhengzhou on 28 May, encountering no enemy along the way. After the troops began to prepare for the siege, they found that white flags had been erected in the city, and several had just cut off their braids. The old man who walked out of the city trembling shouted loudly: "The Beiyang Army has run out, we surrender!" ”

When the troops entered the city, they found that the streets were lined with welcoming citizens, and all of them had their braids cut. After the retreat of the Manchu government and the Beiyang Army, the people of Zhengzhou completed the work of braiding overnight, and the low-level officials who had previously served in the government were the most active group of people, and even cutting off the braids was encouraged by them.

After the Battle of Henan, Yuan Shikai simply withdrew the troops from northern Jiangsu and Anhui to Shandong, and organized defenses in the areas of Xuzhou and Linyi. The Chinese Army also cooperated with the goodwill of the Beiyang Army and sent the Fifth Army to advance north from the Nanjing and Hefei fronts, and the Seventh Army to advance north from the Yancheng and Huai'an fronts, advancing the overall front to Lianyungang and the vicinity of the Yellow River south of Xuzhou. The Beiyang Army on the front line of Henan gathered heavy troops to rely on the defense of the Yellow River to block the advance of the Chinese army north of the Yellow River.

Yuan Shikai's voluntary abandonment allowed the Chinese army to occupy a large area north of the Yangtze River and south of the Yellow River in May, Henan is Yuan Shikai's hometown, and it is also a large grain-producing province and a large population province, Anhui connects the east and west, and Jiangsu is economically developed, and without these places, there is no northeast, and Yuan Shikai's Beiyang group only occupies Shandong, Hebei, Shanxi, Shaanxi, and Mongolia, and other regions, and with the resources and economic conditions of these areas, it is impossible to support nearly 500,000 troops. Although most of the Allied supplies were transported from overseas, the supplies that could be obtained locally, such as grain, were raised by the Beiyang group, so that the grain and grass of the Japanese and Russian armies were also solved by the Beiyang, and these pressures were counted on the civilians of the northern provinces.

The logistics officer was sad about this, but Yuan Shikai turned a blind eye to this, and instead of being saddened by the defeat of Henan and the loss of Anhui and Jiangsu, he looked elated. In his opinion, the Chinese army will be defeated, and what it has lost will be regained sooner or later, including the rich areas south of the Yangtze River. He had the same plan as Liu Jinbiao, that is, after the war, he would not fulfill the agreements signed with Britain and France and other anti-China allies, and relying on China's economic and industrial base, he could easily arm a million-strong army, instead of the 500,000 or so that China is now a small family.

Now that the anti-China alliance has spent huge resources to deal with China, and I heard that the British have even delayed the construction of a few warships for this reason, do they still have the energy to fight another war after they break the agreement?

For more than a month, a steady stream of arms and ammunition transport ships have been docking from Tianjin and equipping the allies one by one. Yuan Shikai relied on the interests of the landlord to leave the best of the materials to his army, and the rest was distributed to the Japanese and Russian armies. Now that the Allied commander and Japanese Marshal Kodama Gentaro had not yet arrived, the protests of the Japanese and Russians were ignored by Yuan Shikai.

This is the reason why Yuan Shikai is elated, he is also a person who has seen the world, what can make him so out of shape is the weapons and equipment that can arm an army of 500,000. Because of this, the 200,000 people he newly formed not only quickly completed the recruitment because of abundant funds, but also had an advanced rifle, and the Makqin, field artillery, and mountain artillery were all equipped according to the standards of the First Army, that is, there was less ammunition, and the recruits had not yet undergone several live-fire training.

The emboldened Yuan Shikai did not even punish Wu Changchun and Cao Kun, the two favorite generals, but put them in charge of the Yellow River defense line north of Zhengzhou. As the Japanese and Russian armies entered the Guannai one after another, Yuan Shikai asked the Japanese and Russian troops to go to the defensive areas north of Zhengzhou and Xuzhou on the grounds that the area near Beijing was small and could not support too many troops. Departing from Tokyo, Gentaro Kodama was still at sea and after consulting with Yuan Shikai, he asked the two armies to be stationed in Handan, Hebei Province and Jinan, Shandong Province, respectively.

Gentaro Kodama had just departed from Tokyo, and had been standing on the deck muttering to himself since he got on the ship, and the guards and retinue around him did not dare to get too close to the prestige of the marshal. It's just that the old body looks even weaker in the floating ship, and it seems that it will fall in the next second.

In fact, Kodama Gentaro was just 54 years old, in his prime, and the perennial conquest made him very weak, from the Fall War, the Sino-Japanese War, the War of Taiwan, the Russo-Japanese War and a series of wars, known as the first wise general of the Japanese Army.

The sea breeze blew, and Kodama Gentaro seemed to be a little shaky, but he was held up, and Kodama Gentaro glanced back and showed a knowing smile.

"Marshal, your body is closely related to the fate of the empire, you must pay attention!" He was supported by Gentaro Kodama's deputy, General Genjiro Akashi, known as the genius agent king of Japan, who financed the Russian Revolution of 1905 during the Russo-Japanese War and turned Russia's hinterland upside down. And behind the actions of the Black Dragon Society in Huaguo before, there was also the figure of Akashi Motojiro.

Gentaro Kodama nodded and said, "Help me back to the cabin!" ”

Finally sitting back on the sofa in the cabin, Gentaro Kodama sighed, took a sip of tea and said, "The body is not forgiving, I really want to see the Japanese Empire rise again!" ”

"Generalissimo commanded the anti-Chinese allies, and the defeat of China was just around the corner, after which Japan could share the fruits of victory, not only to get back all that was lost in the war, but also to obtain rich rewards. Your Excellency Marshal will definitely see this day coming! Akashi Genjiro said firmly, in Japan, and Akashi Genjiro is as optimistic as the vast majority, and the Sino-Russian war after the defeat of the desperate mood shrouded in Japan, dozens of people commit suicide by caesarean section every day, the achievements since the Restoration are ruined, what hope does Japan have?

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