The direct consequence of this bombardment, which caused heavy losses to the artillery of the Jin Sui Army, was that from then on, all artillery positions were redeployed to sheltered areas, and as long as the planes of the Fourth Route Army came, all artillery stopped shelling and covered camouflage.

The planes of the Fourth Route Army, which could not find the artillery of the Jin Sui Army, simply directly attacked the infantry of the Jin Sui Army that had been scattered and covered, especially the bombing of the Jin Sui Army at the starting point of the attack was more concentrated, although these infantry had already been scattered and covered, and it was definitely a waste to attack the scattered and covered infantry with aerial bombs, but Song Zhewu still changed his attitude when bombing Pang Bingxun's troops, and regardless of Wu Jin's heartache about his already small number of aerial bombs, he strictly ordered that each plane that attacked must consume all the ammunition before returning home.

Song Zhewu's purpose in doing this is ostensibly because Niangziguan is very important and will never allow any mistakes. But in fact, this also reflects Song Zhewu's anxiety and worry about the entire battle situation, especially Fu Zuoyi's delay in Datong, which makes him feel a great threat, and there must be no mistakes at this time.

Although the bombing effect of the artillery of the Jin Sui Army in front of Niangzi Pass is not very ideal, but the psychological pressure on the infantry of the Jin Sui Army is very great, you know, while facing the fierce air attack, while braving the blazing bullet rain to attack, it takes great courage, and the effect of such an attack can be imagined.

Therefore, although the Jin Sui army attacked violently all morning, not to mention rushing to the position of the Fourth Route Army, even the edge of the position of the Fourth Route Army was not touched.

Because Li Fuying and Fu Zuoyi were good friends, Zhang Yinwu also loved Wuwu and Wudi and had always "cared for" Li Fuying and his Fifth Army, and had always used the Fifth Army as a forward when he was in Shandong, and this time the main offensive force was none other than Li Fuying's Fifth Army.

Li Fuying's troops were the troops with the greatest casualties in Shandong, however, because the strength of the Jin Sui Army was replenished in a timely manner, the Fifth Army did not appear to be short of personnel, but there were many new soldiers, and this attack on Jingcheng only one morning, there were thousands of casualties, and most of the casualties were caused by bombing, Li Fuying suggested that it was best to conduct a night battle at night to avoid the bombing of the planes of the Fourth Route Army.

However, Zhang Yinwu told Li Fuying that regardless of whether or not he wanted to fight at night, the offensive during the day must continue in order to wear down the defensive troops of the fatigued Fourth Route Army.

For Zhang Yinwu's unfair arrangement, others don't say it, but Li Fuying's friend Li Shengda can't help but say it, but Li Shengda understands that if he directly complains about Li Fuying, it will definitely not work, and if Zhang Yinwu is in a hurry, maybe he will ask his Fourth Army to go up to the main attack.

At noon, after Li Fuying's fourth attack on the defenders of the Fourth Route Army in Jingcheng failed, Li Shengda suggested to Zhang Yinwu, "The defenders of the Fourth Route Army in Niangzi Pass are only Li Sichi's army, with only more than 30,000 troops, and they will divide their troops and fortify, and there will not be too many troops everywhere. ’

Zhang Yinwu was very annoyed that Li Fuying's attack was ineffective, he no longer had the heart to rectify Li Fuying, Fu Zuoyi's little brother, he was really disappointed that the attack was blocked, and he was even more dissatisfied with Yan Xishan's original efforts to rein in Song Zhewu.

If Song Zhewu is solved first according to his suggestion, where will there be today's situation, look at this Song Zhewu, there are dozens of planes, and the planes invested by the Central Army in the Shandong battlefield are nothing more than that, Song Zhewu has such strength, how can he join the Jin Sui Army with peace of mind?

Thinking about it, complaining about it, the current situation still has to find a way to open up as soon as possible. Li Shengda's suggestion couldn't help but make his eyes light up, because of Fu Zuoyi's matter, he has been a rat into the bellows these days, and he even holds his breath and then makes a fire, and his thinking is a little confused, Li Sichi on the opposite side only has more than 30,000 people, but he has more than 100,000 people, and he is a fool if he does not use the advantage of troops to bully Li Sichi at this time.

Therefore, Zhang Yinwu immediately ordered Li Shengda to lead the Fourth Army to the north, through Hengjian and Fengshan detours to attack Tianchang Town behind Jingcheng, and Feng Pengxi led his troops to the south to bypass Jingcheng, and the target of Xiulin was also Tianchang Town, in an attempt to take advantage of the superiority of troops to divide and surround Li Sichi's division in Jingcheng.

Li Sichi set up three lines of defense in front of Niangzi Pass, respectively in Jingcheng, Nanyu and Niangzi Pass, Li Sichi did not do this for the sake of insurance, he just wanted to use the front two lines of defense to delay the attack of the Jin Sui army as much as possible, and add time for him to guard Niangzi Pass, he believed that as long as the Northeast Army arrived, the Jin Sui Army would inevitably have to stop fighting and wait for incorporation.

Time is very tight for the Jin Sui army, otherwise, there are nearly 100 miles of areas on the front line of Niangzi Pass that need to be defended, although those areas are not suitable for large troops, but he can't stand the Jin Sui army that infiltrates without heavy weapons, and it is absolutely not enough to rely on his army alone.

At present, the Jin Sui army divided his troops to outflank his first division in Jingcheng, and his first line of defense had lost its meaning, so he immediately ordered the first division to retreat and withdraw directly to Niangzi Pass.

For the Fourth Route Army to take the initiative to abandon Jingcheng, Zhang Yinwu and the generals of the Jin Sui Army were very happy, even Yan Xishan, who was far away in Datong, who got the report, was also very excited, they thought that the Fourth Route Army's strength in Niangzi Pass was weak, and even the combat effectiveness of the Fourth Route Army was exaggerated, if it could take Niangzi Pass, it was not impossible to recover Taiyuan, "ordered Zhang Yinwu to lead all troops and accelerate the attack. ”。

Encouraged and tasted the sweetness, Zhang Yinwu decided to make full use of his superiority in troops, take advantage of the victory to expand the results of the battle, and ordered all units to quickly march to the second line of defense of the Fourth Route Army at Nanyu. However, because of the continuous bombing by the planes of the Fourth Route Army, when the Jin Sui army arrived at Nanyu, it was already ten in the evening.

At this time, Chu Xichun, who had retreated all the way from Beiping, also hurried to Nanyu with the 25th Division of the Ninth Army and a military police battalion in Beiping. He reported to Zhang Yinwu, "The Northeast Army's march is too slow, and it is not good to look at the outside world, and Zhang Xueliang is already urging the forward troops." However, he had already agreed with Mu Zhongheng, the commander of the vanguard brigade of the Northeast Army and his classmate in Baoding, that Mu Zhongheng would enter Baoding two days later, and asked Zhang Yinwu to hurry up. ”

It took two days to take the Niangzi Pass, no need for others to say, Zhang Yinwu himself didn't believe it, he knew that he had no time to take the Niangzi Pass, let alone recover Taiyuan. Despite this, he still didn't give up, and decided to make another last effort with a fluke mentality.

After the Jin Suijun had dinner, Zhang Yinwu decided not to give Li Sichi a chance to breathe, and ordered Li Fuying to still attack head-on, and Li Shengda's troops moved to the north and south, using the dark night to find a gap to drill behind Nanyu to cut off the connection between the Nanyu defenders and Niangzi Pass. The rest of the armies seized the time to rest and prepared to attack Niangzi Pass tomorrow.

Li Fuying and Li Shengda, who had been fighting for a day, saw that Zhang Yinwu wanted them to attack overnight, while the other armies were resting after seeing that they had been resting for a day, they were really angry, and after discussing it, they decided to jointly call Yan Xishan to appeal.

After the telegram was sent, Yan Xishan did not call back for a long time, and waited until more than 9 o'clock in the evening, under Zhang Yinwu's repeated severe urging, the two had no choice but to prepare to act separately.

At this moment, the telegram from Yan Xishan, which the two had been waiting for for a long time, finally arrived. Holding Yan Xishan's telegram, Zhang Yinwu felt both relaxed and extremely lost, and thought about it for a long time, before finally giving a long sigh and re-issuing the battle order.

The troops of the Fourth Route Army, since the day they entered the Taihang Mountain, have attached great importance to night combat training, have a certain amount of experience in night combat, and are not afraid of night fighting. However, although the Jin Sui Army lacked special night combat training, most of the veterans of the Jin Sui Army, especially the middle and low-level officers, joined the army before the Second Northern Expedition and had rich combat experience. In the night battle, the advantages and disadvantages of weapons have become relatively secondary, experience and tactics, as well as the quality of individual soldiers are more important, and the Jin Sui army is slightly better in night battles.

It was Li Sichi's third division that defended Nanyu, and the division commander Song Yu did not expect that the Jin Sui army would continue to fight at night regardless of fatigue, so the battle also began, and the third division was inevitably a little hurried and suffered a lot of losses.

Because Li Sichi came from the Gui department after all, he has always been cautious in the Fourth Route Army, and he will never treat the young division commanders of the former Fourth Route Army under him quietly, and he can't take care of it anymore, so he strictly ordered Song Yu to defend Nanyu and not take a step back, otherwise the military law will be engaged, and the two battalion commanders who lost their positions will be removed from their posts on the spot and handed over to the Military Justice Department for post-war treatment.

At the same time, Li Ruifang was ordered to lead the mountain division to move forward immediately, to Zhangguo Laodong and Wangjiayan, to strengthen the defense of the northern flank of Niangzi Pass, and to be ready to flank the Jin Sui army attacking Nanyu at any time.

In disregard of Song Zhewu's repeated affirmation that officers above the battalion commander level were not allowed to go to the front line to command, he and deputy division commander Wang Daguang rushed to the front line separately and personally commanded and supervised the battle.

The Jin Sui army, which occupied Xiliangwa and Zhangjiawa, was overwhelmed, and after occupying Xiliangwa and Zhangjiawa, it continued to storm the positions of the Second Division in three ways.

Because Song Yu and Wang Daguang personally went down to the regiment to command, the regimental-level officers of the two regiments could not stay in the command headquarters, and they all rushed to the front line with reinforcements, and only then did they slowly stabilize their positions.

After learning about the battle situation at Niangzi Pass, Song Zhewu was woken up from his sleep and hurried to the war room.

The atmosphere in the war room seemed a little tense, and Tao Rong and Mengxi were there. After Song Zhewu came to the war room, he came directly to the large-scale military map of Niangziguan hanging on the wall, and frowned at the dazzling blue flags in front of Niangziguan, among the many small red flags.

Meng Xi hurriedly stepped forward and reported the battle situation he had just received to Song Zhewu in detail.

(To be continued)