Before leaving, the two bigwigs Li Zongren and Bai Chongxi left satisfied, and before leaving, the two carried the huge military expenses given by Li Tie to the two of them, as well as the approval slip that they could go to Chongqing Huaxing Industrial City to receive a large number of weapons and equipment.

The two of them left Vietnam happily after Li Tie personally signed the approval slip. At the moment of entering China, the two suddenly remembered that Li Tie had rented so many Guangxi soldiers from them, and he didn't use them inland, what did he want to do?

Do you want to occupy the wild place of Vietnam and become a land king? But when he thought that Li Tie's net worth was enough for him to spend a few lifetimes in the world, there was really no need for him to lease so many Guijun soldiers.

However, as long as Li Tie does not participate in the competition of the national government, they are eternal allies, and the two have already thought about it, this time to return to Guangxi, and then with Li Tie's military aid, they can recruit more Guangxi children to join the army.

Just when Li Zongren and Bai Chongxi entered Guangxi and began secret conscription. The Japanese army was preparing for the battle of Nanchang, Jiangxi, although the Japanese army had only one division when the attack began, Nanchang still quickly fell into the hands of the Japanese.

On 10 March, when the 101st Division of the Japanese Army had just assembled in the vicinity of Nanchang, Jiangxi, Commander Chiang, commander-in-chief of the Nationalist Army, in the spirit of preemptive strike, forcibly ordered Xue Yue to lead his troops to take the initiative to attack the Japanese army.

However, because the Chinese army was not ready for a full-scale attack at this time, and the logistics could not keep up, and the coordination ability between the armies was greatly insufficient, it caused a serious disconnect between the attacking troops at the beginning of the war.

And the most incredible thing is that when the attacking troops had just begun, Commander Chiang made another fatal mistake of more than one day, because the intelligence department of the Nationalist Government learned that the Japanese 101st Division had just completed the full mechanized rearmament. Not only do they have hundreds of tanks to help, but they also have thousands of vehicles that can quickly maneuver throughout the battlefield.

Therefore, Commander Chiang, who was afraid that the troops would be divided and surrounded by the Japanese army, once again ordered all the troops to retreat to Nanchang City with all their strength, and make every effort to prepare for the Japanese attack.

But at this time, the vanguard of the Japanese army had caught Xue Yue's tail.

In just 10 days from the Battle of Nanchang on 17 March to the fall of Nanchang on 27 March, the 101st Division took advantage of the Japanese army's advantages of flexibility, powerful firepower, and air support to divide and encircle the advancing Chinese troops. After repeated bombardment by aircraft and artillery, they finally easily defeated the Chinese defenders of Nanchang and occupied the city of Nanchang.

After the Japanese army occupied Nanchang, it began to carry out a brutal and inhumane collective massacre of the people of Nanchang, although many Nanchang citizens had left Nanchang at the beginning of the war, but there were still tens of thousands of Nanchang people killed by the Japanese army.

Although Nanchang fell, the Battle of Nanchang had just begun, because Commander Chiang, who was unwilling to lose, once again mobilized 200,000 heavy troops to start a counterattack on Nanchang.

In order to preserve the fruits of victory, the Japanese army had to send reinforcements from all over Shanghai again. Soon the 106th Division, the 6th Division, and the 116th Division also arrived near Nanchang one after another, and the Chinese and Japanese sides once again fought a strangulation battle in the surrounding area of Nanchang for more than a month.

Although more than 200,000 Chinese soldiers fought desperately and hard, due to the differences in tactical guidance, equipment and training between the generals of the two sides, and the fact that the generals of the Nationalist Army always made small mistakes of one kind or another at critical times, until early May, the Chinese army in the Nanchang area had suffered heavy losses, with nearly half of the troops suffering more than 100,000 casualties, while the Japanese army suffered only more than 10,000 casualties.

Seeing that there was no possibility of victory in another battle, Commander Chiang could only order the entire army to retreat, and thus the Battle of Nanchang once again ended in the defeat of the Chinese army.

However, after winning the Battle of Nanchang, the Japanese army immediately adopted the practice of comprehensively shrinking its defenses, and did not take advantage of the victory to pursue as before.

This puzzled the Nationalist Army, which had withdrawn from the border of Jiangxi and had set up heavy defenses in Hunan, because now even the Chinese soldiers at the bottom knew that Hunan was the last line of defense of the Nationalist Government.

Because once Hunan is lost, the Japanese army can drive straight into Sichuan, and directly threaten Chongqing, the capital of the Republic of China government.

In order to resist the pursuit of the Japanese army, Commander Chiang in Hunan at this time had already deployed hundreds of thousands of troops again, including Changsha, Hunan, the only way to attack Chongqing, was entrusted by Commander Chiang with heavy troops, and the entire Changsha City was even more united by the army and the people, building countless pillboxes and fortifications.

Seeing the inhumane killing of the people of Jiangxi by the Japanese army, the soldiers and civilians of Changsha were ready to fight with the Japanese army to the last man, vowing to live and die with Changsha.

However, due to the rush of time, there were very few permanent fortifications in Changsha at this time, and if the Japanese army launched a large number of air raids, Changsha could not be defended for a long time.

However, to the surprise of all the Nationalist troops, after occupying Nanchang, the Japanese army, which had the upper hand, did not launch a military operation to attack Changsha, but rested on the spot.

At the same time, a large number of Japanese troops began to move to Hubei and other places, and almost all the Japanese occupied areas in Jiangxi, Guangdong, Hubei, Jiangsu and other places were building fortifications in an all-round way, and the Japanese troops in these occupied areas seemed to be preparing for the counterattack of the Chinese army.

Although the generals of the Nationalist Army could not understand the true intentions of the Japanese army, it was rare for the Japanese army not to take the initiative to attack, so it was naturally a burst of joy.

So the soldiers and civilians of Changsha on the one hand are actively monitoring the movements of the Japanese army, and on the other hand, they began to race against time to build permanent fortifications, and the current situation is that every night and day of the Japanese attack, the fortifications in Changsha will be built more, better, and stronger.

Seeing such a strange performance of the Japanese army, Commander Chiang, who was dispatching troops in Chongqing, was also very strange, and Commander Chiang called the national bigwigs, party, government, and military officials around him together, and everyone discussed together why the Japanese did not take advantage of the victory to pursue and attack Changsha. Why did they watch the Nationalist Army calmly deploy defenses in Changsha, what kind of conspiracy did they have?

However, the repeated arguments of more than a dozen senior officers did not find out the real reason for the stagnation of the Japanese army.

In the end, when Commander Jiang repeatedly scratched his bare scalp, he suddenly found that Dai Li, who was standing behind the crowd, seemed to be thoughtful, so he named Dai Li, the head of the intelligence department of the major general, and said what he thought.

Seeing Commander Jiang and more than a dozen party, government, and military officials of the Nationalist Government looking at him with an earnest face, Dai Li stiffened his head and said cautiously: "Principal, just ten days ago, Li Tie from Hainan sent me a telegram, saying that in order to buy us some defense time in Hunan, he was going to the northeast to find some trouble for the Japanese. ”

"What are you kidding, he's a small businessman, and he dares to talk about trouble with the Japanese. Who does he think he is? Kong Xiangxi said disdainfully.

"You can't say that, who doesn't know that the Li Tie brothers are rich and righteous, and besides, their Hainan Guards have just defeated the Japanese 21st Army a few months ago.

The Hainan Escort Army is a strong army with hundreds of planes and dozens of submarines, which is like our national army, where the warlords of various departments are in their own ways, and everyone is not in agreement, and when they meet the Japanese, they are like a plate of scattered sand, otherwise how would we have suffered a heavy defeat to the Japanese in Nanchang. Song Ziwen said dissatisfied.

"Can that compare? The 21st Army attacking Hainan was a second-rate army in Japan, but if you look at what we are facing now, we are facing either the 6th Division or the 101st and 106th Divisions.

They were all first-class and super-first-class Japanese divisions. The combat effectiveness is comparable to that of a second-rate division like the 21st Army. Kong Xiangxi saw that Song Ziwen was contradicting himself, and he couldn't lose his temper with Song Ziwen, so he could only argue with reason.

"Besides, even if he has some strength in Hainan and tens of thousands of horses, why did he go to the northeast to make trouble for the Japanese army. Who doesn't know that there are only tens of thousands of anti-Japanese coalition troops in the northeast now, and it is not a climate at all.

And Ma Zhanshan, the only one who could make some trouble for the Japanese, went to the territory of the Russians and became a big landlord. Now how can there be a decent team in the whole northeast that can make trouble for the Japanese, unless Li Tie brings his 50,000 Hainan escorts to the northeast.

But now that nearly half of China's land is under the control of the Japanese army, and the Northeast is even more of a Japanese world, Li Tie can't say that he will lead 50,000 people to the Northeast, even 5,000 people can't take it. This Li Tie just loves to brag. "Kong Xiangxi has suffered Li Tie's loss, so it is rare to have a stumbling block for Li Tie, and he really spares no effort.

But hearing the argument between Kong Xiangxi and Song Ziwen did not make everyone understand what Li Tie was doing in the Northeast, everyone looked at Dai Li, and all the bigwigs present knew that Dai Li and Li Tie had always had a good personal relationship.

Although I don't understand that Dai Li has never praised Li Tie for more than a year, everyone believes that he must have gotten a secret that others don't know, so everyone looks at Dai Li, hoping that Dai Li will give everyone a clear explanation.

"I don't know what Li Tie did, but I received a telegram from him ten days ago, saying that the Battle of Nanchang may be over in a few days, and there is no need to worry about the Japanese army marching straight into Hunan after it is over.

He told us to do a good job in the defense of Hunan, and he went to the northeast to find trouble with the Japanese army, and he didn't dare to say anything else, at least he could buy us three to four months to organize the defense. Dai replied in a whisper.

Hearing such a clear news from Dai Li, Commander Jiang and a group of bigwigs came to the Sino-Japanese enemy-to-us situation map hanging on the wall, looked at the map of China's Chinese mainland forces, and then looked at the deserted northeast, and they really couldn't understand what tricks Li Tie could toss in the northeast.

Just when everyone was puzzled, suddenly the door of the conference room was opened, and the military attache in the attendant room brought a telegram with a surprised face and handed it to Commander Chiang.

Commander Jiang took the telegram in confusion, quickly glanced at the telegram in his hand, and shouted in surprise: "What? The Japanese fought the Russians in Manchuria. ”