The Battle of Zhejiang-Jiangxi finally kicked off, and the Chinese and Japanese armies launched another decisive battle of life and death. At the beginning of the campaign, the Japanese offensive momentum was very fierce, because the Japanese base camp issued a death order to destroy all the airfields along the Zhejiang-Jiangxi line and eliminate the American bombers to bomb all the aircraft advance bases on the southeast coast of China on the Japanese mainland. In the face of the powerful offensive of the Japanese army, the national army had no choice but to resist and retreat step by step, and the situation facing our army on the Zhejiang-Jiangxi line was very critical.

At the height of the battle of Zhejiang-Jiangxi, Liu Yuqing, commander of the 21st Army of the Sichuan Army stationed on the Yangtze River, transferred the 146th Division to the command of the 28th Army with Shangguan Yunxiang as the commander of the group army, to assist in the defense of the Lanxi and Jinlan lines in Zhejiang Province.

After the battle officially began, the Japanese army concentrated the strength of four and a half divisions to form a powerful attack group, and they launched an attack on the positions of the Nationalist army from Fenghua and Yuhang. By the 24th, it successively conquered Wuyi, Jinhua, and Xiaoshun, and arrived in the Lanxi area, preparing to launch an attack on Lanxi.

The 146th Division of the 21st Army of the Sichuan Army was ordered to fight the Japanese army in the area of Shouchang and Xiaochangshan. Ma Guorong, commander of the 438th Regiment of the 146th Division, sent a battalion to cooperate with the independent 8th Engineer Battalion directly under the Group Army Headquarters to cross the Lanjiang River eastward to block the enemy.

The situation was urgent, and Huang Renwei, acting commander of the engineer battalion, and Yan Zemin, commander of the infantry battalion, quickly rushed to Lanxi City and came to the headquarters of the new 21st Division of the Sichuan Army, Fan Shaozeng, the unit defending the city.

Luo Juntong, commander of the new 21st Division, has already received an order to withdraw and is deploying. Seeing the two young Sichuan army officers brought in by the guards, and when he asked about the subordinates of his old friend, Luo Juntong seemed even more happy. He asked Huang Shiwei about their tasks, and after asking them clearly, he immediately called the commander of the engineer company and the chief of staff of his division, brought him the battle map, and carefully studied it with everyone.

This combat map shows in detail the minefields laid by the new 21st Division's own engineer company, which shows that the area around Lanxi City has been densely covered with mines, and only one area in the north of the city is blank, and there is not a single mine.

Huang Shiwei's eyes stared carefully at this blank area, pondered for a long time, and decided to start here.

This blank area is located one and a half kilometers north of Lanxi City. There is a three-way junction here, and a small road branches off from the avenue leading to Lanxi, leading to a small hill. Huang Shiwei looked carefully at the small hill next to the three-way road.

According to past experience, the enemy generally carefully inspected the mines on the avenues to ensure the safe passage of troops. Therefore, the mines on the avenue will definitely be swept away quite a bit by the enemy's sappers. And the enemy will not pass on the trail, and the effect of laying mines will certainly not be great.

But this trail in this area is a bit peculiar because it has to lead to the hill, which is generally a high ground on flat ground, and is a very good vantage point, and therefore often a place for enemy commanders to climb up and look into the distance. At this time, the enemy's combat group was attacking Lanxi along the Zhejiang-Jiangxi Railway, and if nothing else, there would definitely be high-ranking generals of the enemy army coming to the front to command. If an enemy commander marches here, he must climb this hill and observe the Lanxi front line in the distance.

In the past few days, it has just rained heavily, and the road is very muddy. With such weather and wet and muddy roads, it was a good time for the sappers to show their skills, because after laying mines, they were easy to camouflage and conceal, and the enemy was not easy to detect.

Everyone unanimously felt that Huang Shiwei's analysis was reasonable. Therefore, Division Commander Luo Juntong immediately ordered Huang Shiwei to lead the engineer battalion to quickly lay mines and arrange minefields.

Huang Shiwei asked the soldiers to lay a small number of mines on the main road, while he commanded the soldiers to plant 60 powerful disc-shaped mines weighing four kilograms on the trail and carefully camouflaged them. Everything was ready, Huang Shiwei led everyone to retreat quickly, and waited for the fish to take the bait.

In the early morning of 28 May, the enemy's 15th Division began to attack Lanxi.

As usual, the devils used sappers to open the way in front, and they carefully searched and cleared the road leading to Lanxi, and after continuously detecting and removing many mines, they advanced with infantry and cavalry.

Soon after, there was a loud burst of gunfire in the direction of Lanxi, and the enemy's vanguard was met with stubborn resistance from the defenders of Lanxi.

At 10:45 a.m., Lieutenant General Naoji Sakai, commander of the 15th Devil's Division, who was in the middle of the marching column, led the division headquarters to the three-way intersection.

Sure enough, as Huang Shiwei expected, because the hill in front blocked the view, the battle between the enemy and our army in front could not be seen clearly. When Sakai Naoji saw the small hill on the side of the road, he left the large army and immediately rode down the avenue and galloped towards the hillside, followed by dozens of staff officers and guards.

However, Sakai was less than half way from the hill when he heard a loud "boom" and a mine being trampled on by the Oriental horse he was riding. The unsuspecting Sakai Naoji was thrown into the air with his men and horses, and fell heavily on the wet ground. I saw that his left leg was all blown up, the flesh on his leg and stomach was blown off, the flesh was blurred, and his war horse was also lying in a pool of blood, neighing and struggling.

The chief of staff, Kawakubo, who was following behind, saw that the division commander had been blown off his horse and fell off his horse, he immediately jumped off his horse and ran to Sakai's side, immediately stopped the bleeding, and sent someone to find a military doctor.

The head of the military medical department, Hosoya Daisa, bandaged Sakai and said to Kawakubo: "As far as the current situation is concerned, there is no obvious change in the heart of the division commander, and his life may not be in danger. At this time, although Sakai was pale, he was in good spirits, and he said to Kawakubo: "Chief of Staff, I'm sorry for the trouble!" Please rest assured. Now you will take my command, lead the troops to continue to advance, and quickly launch a siege operation against Lanxi, and you must capture Lanxi!" ”

Kawakubo replied: "Please rest assured, I will never dishonor the honor of the division." ”

Subsequently, the soldiers were ordered to carry Sakai on a stretcher to a house about 200 meters ahead. At that time, there were no military doctors with him, and all the military doctors were transferred to the front line by Sakai, so they had to wait and prepare to be transferred to the rear hospital.

Suddenly, a huge explosion of mines sounded behind them, killing and wounding many Japanese officers and soldiers. The situation on the battlefield was urgent, and the chief of staff of the Japanese army, Kawakubo, came outside the house in a hurry to review the combat orders formulated by the staff officers.

But not long after, Sakai's herald ran out in a panic and shouted anxiously to Kawakubo: "Chief of staff, the division commander's situation is not good!" ”

Kawakubo hurriedly rushed to Sakai's side and shouted: "Your Excellency, Division Commander! Your Excellency, Division Commander! Sakai did not respond, and due to excessive blood loss and inability to treat him in time, he was completely unconscious.

Although Sakai was injected with emergency medicine and performed artificial respiration, Sakai Naoji, the demon who killed countless Chinese and the pioneer of the invasion of China, finally died at 14:13 that day.

The enemy's division headquarters was bombed, the Japanese troops were in a commotion, and the Japanese offensive was temporarily stopped. The scouts of the national army on the front line observed this abnormal move and immediately reported the news to the command, and the news quickly spread to Huang Shiwei.

Battalion Commander Huang Shiwei knew very well in his heart that this must have been a high-ranking officer in the enemy army who had been bombed. But who exactly blew up? Since the Japanese kept the news tightly sealed, it has not been clear! This question has always been hidden in Huang Shiwei's heart, and finally it was not until more than 40 years later in the 80s that this secret was finally solved.

On June 3, the Japanese army launched a general attack on Quzhou. On the 7th, Quzhou fell to the Japanese army.

On July 1, the 1st Division of the Dachenghu Division joined up with the troops of the 11th Anan Army advancing eastward from Nanchang and jointly captured Hengfeng. At this point, the Japanese army had opened up the Zhejiang-Jiangxi Railway, so it turned from offensive to defensive. They wreaked havoc on airfields, demolished railways, and plundered supplies.

The main force of the Third Theater was transferred to the Xianxia Pass and Wang Erdu line on the south side of the Zhejiang-Jiangxi Railway, and the rest of the troops were transferred to the area on the north side of the Zhejiang-Jiangxi Railway, constantly flanking the Japanese army, and the enemy and us entered a stage of stalemate.

At the same time as the main force of the Japanese army was advancing westward, the Japanese Xiaoxujiang Mixed Brigade, with the cooperation of part of the 1st Flying Regiment, captured Lishui from Longyou on June 24 and assembled near Lishui.

On 7 July, the Xiaojiang Brigade began sabotaging this important airfield and its traffic that had once landed US bombers.

After destroying the Lishui airport, this Japanese army entered Qingtian on the 9th and occupied Wenzhou on the 11th.

The 11th Army of Anan Weigi attacked south along the west bank of the Fu River from the vicinity of Nanchang on 31 May, and after a slight resistance from the 75th Division of the Chinese defenders, the main force moved to the established positions west of Yingtan. On the same day, the Japanese crossed the Fu River and attacked along the east bank, entering the vicinity of the city of Gaoqiao on 2 June.

Anan divided the troops into two routes here, one was the Yanyong detachment, which attacked Dongxiang along the Zhejiang-Jiangxi railway; On the other hand, the main force of the 34th Division of Ogamo, together with the Takehara detachment, attacked Sanjiangkou and Linchuan.

The Japanese continued to attack eastward. The Japanese Hirano detachment, in cooperation with the navy, landed on the east bank of Poyang Lake, captured Ruihong, and continued to advance eastward, occupying Jinxian and Dongxiang successively.

On the 8th, the Oga Division broke through the position of the Sun Du Army, and the main force went straight down to Linchuan to join the Takahashi Division.

Then, the Japanese Gaoqiao Division also turned its main force to the Zhejiang-Jiangxi Railway, and Xue Yue's Ninth Theater launched an offensive in the areas east of Dongxiang and Jinxi and south of Nanchang: Ou Zhen's army attacked Chongren and Linchuan from the north and south, and Fang Jing's army attacked Nancheng south of Linchuan from south to north. From the 15th to the 16th, the subordinate troops of Ou Zhenjun successively conquered Chongren and Yihuang, and continued to advance towards Linchuan. At this time, the main force of the Japanese Dahe Division, which was attacking eastward along the Zhejiang-Jiangxi Railway, captured Yingtan and Guixi.

From the 21st, the Chinese and Japanese armies fought fierce battles in the Nancheng, Yihuang, Chongren and Linchuan areas. On the 30th, the Japanese army again captured Yihuang and Chongren, and the two sides formed a standoff.

On 13 July, the Japanese abandoned Chongren and Yihuang, and the Chinese army was ordered to halt the offensive, and the fighting in the area south of Nanchang ceased.

In the eastern section of the Zhejiang-Jiangxi Road, since early July, the Third Theater has launched a local offensive and successively regained Xindeng, Tonglu, Jiande, Yiyang, and Hengfeng.

At this time, the Japanese army occupied more than 40 cities and an area more than 600 kilometers long and 300 kilometers wide along the Zhejiang-Jiangxi line.

On July 28, the Japanese base camp ordered Shunroku Hata to stop the Zhejiang-Jiangxi campaign and secure the occupied area near Jinhua.

The Japanese army retreated in mid-August, with the 13th Army's Dachenghu Division remaining at Jinhua, Wuyi, and Dongyang, and the Uchida Division remaining at Xinchang and Fenghua, and the rest of the troops withdrawing to their original positions on the 19th; The headquarters of the 11th Army also began to retreat from the 19th.

The Battle of Zhejiang-Jiangxi ended at this point.

The battle lasted more than three months, and the Japanese army concentrated more than nine divisions and regiments, and after a hard battle, although it paid a heavy price, it achieved its intended goal.

In the midst of the fierce battle of Zhejiang-Jiangxi, Xiao Xiong's Einsatzgruppen received a batch of supplies from the Ninth War Zone in mid-May, including five brand-new German-made sniper rifles.

The arrival of these five rifles made Xiao Xiong and the others excited, and a perfect combat operation that had been conceived for a long time could be carried out immediately.

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