After receiving Xu Fang's telegram, Song Zhewu did not hesitate much, and immediately called back to order Xu Fang to retreat to Pingyao, Fenyang, and Luliang to deploy defenses, so as to ensure that the Fourth Route Army effectively controlled the northwest region of Shanxi, and after Gao Zongbao's Second Army arrived, Xu Fang would hand over defense to the Second Army.

Although Song Zhewu also wanted to take Jiexiu in his heart, he took the opportunity to push the defense line under Linfen City, and then control the Linfen Basin, the big granary of Shanxi. However, considering that even if he pays the price to take Jiexiu and advance the defense line to Linfen, it will inevitably lead to a crazy counterattack by the Jin Sui army, and when the Central Plains War can be regarded as over, let him pay a big price for casualties, which Song Zhewu absolutely does not want to see.

Moreover, it is definitely not a good idea to put the battlefield in Linfen, where the terrain is flat, not to mention that it is still in the extraordinary period when the Fourth Route Army is being attacked on several sides.

In fact, Song Zhewu was unwilling to take Jiexiu and advance to Linfen, and there was another reason that he could not say, that is, a few years later, the Red Army after a 25,000-mile long march would reach northern Shaanxi, and their subsequent eastward expedition was the happiest in southern Jinnan, at that time, as far south as Houma and east as Gaoping, the Red Army turned the entire southern Jinnan region upside down.

If he entered the Linfen Basin at this time, the attack of the Red Army would have to be completely borne by him Song Zhewu, and Song Zhewu had not come up with a good way to deal with the Red Army until now.

Because Zhengtai Road was bombed, Zhang Yinwu couldn't catch up with Jingcheng for a while. Fu Zuoyi, who had already arrived in Datong, did not move for a long time. Although Xu Yongchang has also arrived in Jinnan, Xu Yongchang is very practical, and does not have any illusions about recovering Taiyuan, he is just stepping up the deployment of defense everywhere, and has not launched any attack on the Fourth Route Army.

Therefore, for a time, although the situation in Shanxi was very tense, except for some small-scale tentative firefights, there was no major battle between the Fourth Route Army and the hostile two sides dominated by the Jin Sui Army.

However, in the past few days, there has been quite a lot of commotion between the Northwest Army and the Central Army in Henan, and the situation there has changed so rapidly that it is simply dazzling and dizzying.

After Zhang Xueliang sent a telegram to mediate through the customs, although Feng Yuxiang successively sent Pang Bingxun and Zhang Zizhong north to pursue Song Zhewu, deep down he still hoped that Yan Xishan would send powerful troops to Henan and continue to fight with the Central Army by relying on the south and northwest of Jin. In his opinion, although Zhang Xueliang raised troops to enter the pass, the strength of the Northwest Army still exists, and as long as Yan Xishan can hold on to the end, even if it is a three-sided battle, the situation can still be reversed.

So, on the one hand, Feng Yuxiang sent a telegram to Deng Zhexi in Beiping, asking him to try his best to appease Wang Jingwei, who was still in Beiping, and ask him to calm down and stabilize the situation; On the other hand, he sent Zhang Yunrong to Tianjin urgently to intercept Yan Xishan, who was retreating north, and Chen said the reason for continuing to fight.

However, at this time, Wang Jingwei and Yan Xishan had already lost the confidence to persevere to the end. When Yan Xishan met Zhang Yunrong, his attitude was extremely depressed, and he even said: "It's not easy to do, it's not easy to do, the battle can't be fought anymore, you go back and tell Huanzhang that there is still a glimmer of hope if you go back to Shanxi with Meng and drive away Song Zhewu." ”

Zhang Yunrong repeatedly persuaded him to no avail, so he had to ask Yan Xishan again for his opinion on the current situation, and Yan Xishan did not express his opinion, but just said again and again with a depressed attitude: "Let's retreat to Shanxi." ”

Because Feng Yuxiang had a strong surname and was very subjective in his view of the problem, at this time, although the development of the situation was already in an extremely unfavorable position militarily and politically against the Chiang coalition army, he was still extremely confident in the combat effectiveness of his Northwest Army, and he was still fantasizing about using the method of borrowing one from the city to fight a decisive battle with the Central Army near Zhengzhou, Henan, and win the battle in one battle, recovering the military decline in one fell swoop.

Therefore, when Song Zheyuan proposed that he strengthen the garrison of the western section of the Longhai Road from Zhengzhou to Luoyang, be ready to retreat to the northwest at any time, and wait for the opportunity to make a comeback, Feng Yuxiang was always hesitant. It was only at the repeated requests of Song Zheyuan, Lu Junlin and others that he sent Song Zheyuan with Ge Yunlong and Zhao Dengyu to garrison in the Luoyang area to ensure the safety of the communication line from Zhengzhou to Tongguan. He was still ready to mobilize most of his troops to be deployed on the periphery of Zhengzhou, intending to fight a decisive battle.

But when Zhang Yunrong came back from Tianjin and reported to him about the situation of meeting Yan Xishan, Feng Yuxiang knew that the general trend had gone. Since the battle can't go on, it's time to consider a way out. It was not Feng Yuxiang's willingness to go to Shanxi, there was a strong enemy of Song Zhewu, and he thought that it would be more beneficial and safer for him to return to Shaanxi.

Just when Feng Yuxiang wanted to transfer the main force to the west section of Longhai Road and prepare to retreat to Shaanxi, Yang Hucheng, who suddenly appeared out of nowhere, completely disrupted his deployment, and suddenly appeared in Yang Hucheng in Longmen, Luoyang, and beat Song Zheyuan, who was weak in troops, was caught off guard. At this point, the possibility of the Northwest Army's westward retreat is already very small, unless Feng Yuxiang can immediately repel Yang Hucheng, there is only one way to retreat to Jinnan.

At this time, Wang Diange's division stationed in Tuocheng, Wang Lingyun's division stationed in Yiyang, Fan Longzhang's division stationed in Linru, Zhao Guanying's division stationed in Yichuan, Song Tiancai's army stationed near Xuchang, Li Wanlin's division stationed in Xuchang, Wang Zhenjun stationed in Yanling, Li Wanru's division stationed in Dengfeng, and Li Xuezheng's regiment stationed in Lingbao, as well as Lu Xiuwen, Li Xiaoting, Gao Ziju and other troops successively telegraphed to Jiang, and the various units of the Northwest Army and the miscellaneous army attached to Feng Yuxiang were in chaos for a while.

It was only at this time that Feng Yuxiang completely understood why, after the Central Army launched an attack, his Northwest Army and many miscellaneous armies did not resist, and those who should fight did not fight, and let the Central Army go around his defense line freely.

However, this is the case, Feng Yuxiang, who is surnamed Ge, still did not give up the last bit of hope, he still fantasized about bringing the remnants of the Northwest Army back to Shaanxi, preparing to send the main force west to seize Longmen.

It was only the subsequent drastic change in the situation that made Feng Yuxiang completely lose the last little faith he had left.

The troops of the Central Army, headed by the First Division led by Hu Zongnan, made a roundabout way from eastern Henan to Germany to the southwest, passing through Zhecheng, Luyi, Huaiyang, and Shangshui, and reached the Yuncheng and Xuchang lines on the Pinghan Railway Line, and then went north along the Pinghan Railway Line to reach the areas of Xinzheng and Mixian.

At the same time, the troops of He Chengjun's corps, with Chen Cheng and Xia Douyin's divisions as the vanguard, slammed into the north from the middle areas of Xihua, Yanling, Linying, and Xuchang.

Xia Douyin's division was blocked in Wunudian, Chen Cheng did not join Xia Douyin to attack the Northwest Army of Wunudian who dared to resist stubbornly, but made a detour to attack Shixiang Town, and after occupying Shixiang Town, he attacked the monk bridge at night and drilled into Dongjiadian, interspersed all the way with a depth of 70 miles, not only receiving Xia Douyin, but also blocking the troops of Ji Hongchang and others. forced Ji Hongchang and other ministries who were still hesitating to electrify to Jiang, and Ren Yingqi was forced to accept the disarming. Then, Chen Cheng led his troops to continue to drill near Weichuan, dividing the Northwest Army's outlying positions in Zhengzhou to pieces.

At this time, Chen Cheng received an investigation report saying that the troops of the Northwest Army in Zhengzhou were likely to be withdrawn immediately, and if he could win Zhengzhou without a fight and achieve the first credit, then he would be the army commander, how could Chen Cheng let go of such a good opportunity. At this time, Xinzheng was still in the hands of the Northwest Army, and Xia Douyin thought that this news should not be trusted, and once the intelligence was wrong, they would fall into the siege of the Northwest Army on all sides in the field. After carefully studying and judging the enemy situation in front of him, Chen Cheng believed that the intelligence was extremely accurate, and insisted on commanding the troops to surpass Xinzheng and advance to Zhengzhou.

In order to seize the first credit for occupying Zhengzhou and report the victory to Chiang Kai-shek first, Chen Cheng had already prepared a draft telegram in advance, and for the sake of insurance, Chen Cheng sent his adjutant Shi Xinzhi to follow up with Xiao Qian's avant-garde regiment. After Xiao's regiment defeated the covering force of the Northwest Army at Erligang, it found that Zhengzhou was an empty city, so they ran into the city through the south gate of Zhengzhou.

At this time, it was almost dusk, and Shi Xinzhi saw that the occupation of Zhengzhou was a foregone conclusion, so he galloped back to the division headquarters to report to Chen Cheng. Chen Cheng Chen Cheng immediately filled in the time on the draft of the telegram and immediately sent a telegram of victory.

In fact, before Xiao Qian's avant-garde regiment arrived at the south gate of Zhengzhou, the plainclothes team of Shangguan Yunxiang's 46th Division also searched for Zhengzhou East Station, because they were worried about encountering the Northwest Army, so they did not dare to enter the city, and missed the first achievement in occupying Zhengzhou. made Shangguan Yunxiang regret it.

Chiang Kai-shek was extremely happy after receiving the telegram that the 11th Division occupied Zhengzhou, and praised Chen Cheng repeatedly, saying: "Zimu set up the end of victory, Qufu saved the dying situation, and Zhengzhou bore the fruit of victory. A bonus of 200,000 yuan was immediately issued, an order was issued to form the 18th Army, and Chen Cheng was officially appointed as the commander of the 18th Army.

In order to show that he was "not meritorious, not greedy for money", he called Chiang Kai-shek back and said: "The vocational division can occupy Zhengzhou first, and the upper Lai Junzuo has a good command, and the lower relies on the strength of the officers and soldiers to use their lives and the assistance of friendly troops, and the bounty does not dare to be taken alone, and it is planned to give half to the 46th division of Shangguan Yunxiang." ”

Chen Cheng gave 2 yuan to each officer and soldier of the 100,000 yuan he earned, about 40,000 yuan, and the rest was collected as a provident fund. Later, Chen Cheng used the money to establish the "Eighteenth Army Nantong Disabled Soldiers Factory" and "Ji'an Farm" to house disabled soldiers and old and weak soldiers. In this way, it not only pulled Shangguan Yunxiang along, but also won the trust of Chiang Kai-shek and the support of the 18th officers and soldiers.

Chen Cheng's 11th Division invaded Zhengzhou, and Yang Hucheng's troops took advantage of the situation to capture Luoyang, causing the entire Northwest Army to be shaken, and defectors at all levels occurred one after another.

(To be continued)