In the following time, Song Zhewuan steadily organized troops in Zhengzhou for high-intensity training, and of course, he was also highly concerned about the war situation.

Wang Xu's Military Intelligence Bureau, because of Song Zhewu's attention and the support of a large amount of funds, has developed rapidly since its establishment, especially because Wang Xu himself is a radio communications major, so he has done a very good job in radio detection and decipherment in the Intelligence Bureau, which is also the reason why Wang Xu personally brought people to Zhengzhou with Song Zhewu.

The first to engage the anti-Chiang coalition forces with the Central Army were the troops of the Third Front Army in Henan and the troops of Sun Dianying, Wan Xuancai, and Liu Chunrong.

Because these troops were all in Henan at that time, the Jin Sui army was relatively close to Henan and Shandong, and only part of Feng Yuxiang's Second Front Army was in the Guanzhong Plain of Shaanxi, and other troops needed to be assembled from all over the country, including from Gansu and Qinghai to rush to the battlefield, so the opening battle was basically a battle of the Central Army against small miscellaneous cards.

Wan Xuancai, Liu Maoen and others defended with the main force, sent part of the detachment to search south, and after being violently counterattacked by the Central Army, they quickly retreated back to defend it, Sun Dianying retreated to Bozhou, and Wan Xuancai retreated to Germany. The main forces of the Central Army immediately followed closely and began to engage in fierce battles with the defenders.

Among them, Chen Tiaoyuan and Ma Hongkui fought fiercely with Liu Chunrong and Shi Yousan in Luxi, Liu Zhi's 12 divisions of the main force of the Second Army Corps fought fiercely with Wan Xuancai and other divisions, Gu Zhutong, Chen Jiji, Chen Cheng and other divisions took advantage of the victory to attack, and Chiang Kai-shek personally went to Ma Muji to supervise the battle on the 15th, and besieged Guide with the first division.

At this time, the main force of Feng Yuxiang's Second Front Army was accelerating to the battlefield, and it was planned to participate in front-line operations after May 21.

However, to the great surprise of Yan Xishan and Feng Yuxiang, on May 20, Liu Zhenhua's younger brother Liu Maoen, who was very dissatisfied with Yan Xishan's appointment of Wan Xuancai as chairman of Henan Province, who was in charge of defending the Ningling area, launched a mutiny after contacting Chen Cheng, ensnared Wan Xuancai, and launched a surprise attack on Sun Chu, Yang Xiaoou, and Guan Fu'an's troops on the Longhai Line under the command of Xu Yongchang.

This caught the Jin Sui army off guard, Liu Maoen won a big victory, and Liu Maoen's troops captured 36 mountain artillery, 18 82 mortars, 36 Jin heavy machine guns, 3,000 infantry and pistols, and more than 300 mules and horses. Five or six thousand officers and soldiers of the Jin Dynasty were captured.

The troops of Yang Xiaoou and Sun Chu of the Jin Sui Army suffered relatively small losses, but the Guan Fu'an Department suffered large losses, and they had lost their combat effectiveness in a short period of time. The Central Army was the first to win the opening battle.

On the eastern front, in Shandong, in early May, Fu Zuoyi and other troops under the command of Yan Xishan began to attack. Fu Zuoyi's department searched and advanced from Dezhou to the plains and Yucheng. At that time, the Jin Sui army used 6 armies. After the defeat of the anti-Chiang coalition forces on the Longhai Road on the central front, the eastern front began a large-scale offensive in response to the Longhai Road.

The Jin army attacked south in three directions. The middle road attacked Pingyuan and Yucheng head-on along Jinpu Road; the western route attacked Dong'e and Pingyin; The East Road is advancing towards Qingcheng.

Han Fuyu ordered Xu Guilin's 59th Brigade to defend Qingcheng and Wan Guozhen's 60th Brigade to defend Dong'e; He himself, Sun Tongxuan, and Gu Liangmin led the 85th Brigade of Zhanshutang and the 87th Brigade of Rongguangxing to Yucheng to defend against the enemy.

Because Han Fuyu's troops had just been transferred to Shandong, they were exhausted from a long journey, and after the battle was unfavorable, the situation gradually became overwhelming, so he telegraphed Chiang Kai-shek to transfer the 15th Route Army north for reinforcements. Chiang Kai-shek telegraphed to Korea, allowing him to withdraw to the south bank of the Yellow River and dismantle the railroad to wait for reinforcements and prepare for a counteroffensive.

On June 2, Han Fuyu withdrew to the south bank of the Yellow River and demolished the Yellow River Iron Bridge on Jinpu Road. The Jin army crossed the Yellow River from Qingcheng and Dong'e to the east and west respectively, and drove straight into it without encountering resistance. The west road approached Tai'an and made a roundabout way towards Jinan.

On the Pinghan Line of the Western Front, after He Chengjun became the commander-in-chief of the Third Army, the troops under his command successively had 13 divisions of about 300,000 people, and even Yang Hucheng in Nanyang took the initiative to lead his garrison division of more than 20,000 people and strongly requested to join the Third Army.

In order to cooperate with the fighting on the Longhai Line and the Eastern Front, these miscellaneous armies, under the command of He Chengjun, launched a full-scale attack on the Pinghan Line on May 16.

Although the Central Army on the Western Front was a small miscellaneous brand, it was quite numerous. The anti-Chiang coalition forces in this regard included Fan Zhongxiu, Shi Zhenqing, Ren Yingqi, and Liu Guitang, including the Second Front Army, which also had a total of about 300,000 troops, and held the line from Xiaoshang Bridge south of Xuchang and Xiaoyao Town to the east of Xihua.

According to the plan, Tian Jinkai, Ni Yusheng, Zhao Fenglin, Wang Hexiang and other units of the Northwest Army drove from southern Shaanxi to Henan, that is, they were distributed in the areas of Lushan, Yexian, and Xiangcheng west of Pinghan Road, and placed the main force in the north of Xuchang, all under the command of Zhang Weixi, and sent Ruan Yingwu, who had just come over from the Central Army "anyway", as the commander-in-chief of the former enemy. Liu Ruming's troops monitored Yang Hucheng's troops in Xichuan and Nanzhao. Feng Zhi'an Army of Song Zheyuan's Ministry was controlled in Zhengzhou and the area south of it, and was under the direct control of Feng Yuxiang.

The most advanced anti-Chiang coalition on the Pinghan line was Fan Zhongxiu's Eighth Front Army. In September of the thirteenth year of the Republic of China, Sun Yat-sen was stationed in Shaoguan to prepare for the Northern Expedition. With Tan Yanjun as the commander-in-chief on the front and Fan as the commander-in-chief on the flanks, Sun Yat-sen personally awarded Fan Zhongxiu the military flag of "believing in Sanming and cooking righteousness and implementing the strategy of building the country", and appointed Fan Zhongxiu as the commander-in-chief of the Henan Army for the founding of the People's Republic of China.

After Fan Zhongxiu came out of Guangdong, he broke the strong enemy all the way, crossed the dangerous pass, fought bloody battles, and advanced concurrently, fighting more than 50 times in more than 80 days, transferred to five provinces, and trekked more than 2,500 kilometers, and arrived in southern Henan on December 19.

Sun Yat-sen sent a telegram at that time to praise: "My brother is alone in the battle, unstoppable, within three months, from Guangdong to Henan, at the same time, all the armies, beyond the reach of the dust, miraculous achievements, what a consolation." And told the left and right: "If the generals of all armies can be like Fan Zhongxiu, why do you think that the revolution will not succeed?" It can be seen from this that the combat effectiveness of Fan Zhongxiu's troops is extraordinary.

This time against Chiang, Fan Zhongxiu himself is also full of self-confidence, with the troops he can fight with the Northwest Army to deal with a bunch of small miscellaneous cards under the command of He Chengjun, he is still very confident.

But as soon as the battle began, the performance of these little miscellaneous cards surprised him, and as soon as these small miscellaneous cards changed to the "bad habit" of preserving their strength, their troops attacked very fiercely as if they were crazy, and within one day he lost several support points in the outer position of Linying, which made Fan Zhongxiu very depressed.

Through interrogating the prisoners sent back from the front, Fan Zhongxiu learned the reason why these little miscellaneous cards worked so hard.

It turned out that after He Chengjun became the commander-in-chief of the Third Army Corps, he was immediately warmly welcomed by these miscellaneous generals who had been squeezed out. He Chengjun also lived up to his high expectations, and as soon as he arrived in Henan, he set up his general headquarters in Zhumadian, and He Chengjun brought not only a large amount of ammunition, grain and grass to the Zhumadian headquarters, but also sufficient military salaries.

On the second day after he arrived at Zhumadian, He Chengjun paid off the arrears of the various troops in one lump sum, and at the same time announced, "In the future, as long as he He Chengjun is the commander-in-chief of the Third Army for one day, he will guarantee that all the troops under his command will be treated exactly the same as the Central Army, and there will never be the slightest difference." This is the greatest comfort to the generals of these miscellaneous armies, others say that they don't necessarily believe it, but they believe what He Chengjun said. He Chengjun will definitely do what he says.

What reassured them even more was that He Chengjun not only made up for their arrears, but also brought the next month's military salary, and the boxes that were piled high and filled with the ocean were placed in He Chengjun's headquarters, and even the 500,000 special fees specially granted to He Chengjun by Chiang Kai-shek were also put forward by him without pulling a penny and stacked separately in the war room of the headquarters. With these oceans, these people's hearts are more steady.

At the first military meeting he presided over, He Chengjun told the people that before he came, Chairman Chiang personally told him that as long as these people worked hard, the chairman would treat them on an equal footing with the Central Army in terms of their own promotion and the expansion of their troops.

Seeing that the reaction of the crowd was not very enthusiastic, He Chengjun threw out his killer weapon again, announcing that all casualties of these troops in the battle would be compensated according to the standards of the Central Army, and at the same time, for every person killed in battle, he would supplement two posts, and the increase in the establishment would be asked by He Chengjun and the Ministry of Military Affairs. That is to say, whoever has more battles and more casualties will have more and more troops.

At the same time, the Third Army set up a recruit training camp at Wusheng Pass, and the training camp was jointly managed by personnel from various units, and the replenishment of recruits would be carried out in strict accordance with his regulations, and he would never have any selfish motives or favor anyone.

These generals were generally not interested in Chiang Kai-shek's promise of expansion, and Chiang Kai-shek said the same when they first joined the Central Army.

However, He Chengjun is not just talking, the recruit training camp set up in Wusheng Pass is handed over to them to manage, which can explain the problem. And the most critical problem is that not only did one person die in the battle to supplement two, but He Chengjun also gave them a preparation, which is equivalent to a de facto expansion of the army. For these miscellaneous generals, only if their troops are strong, they will have more weight and will be less looked down upon.

It was precisely because of these changes that the combat effectiveness of these miscellaneous armies broke out violently, especially the troops of Xu Yuanquan of the Tenth Army and Wang Jinyu of the Ninth Army. Xu Yuanquan's unit is Zhang Zongchang's old unit, and Wang Jinyu's unit is Sun Chuanfang's old unit, and their combat effectiveness has always been not weak, but this time they are even more excited as if they had beaten chicken blood.

If He Chengjun hadn't personally rushed to the front line and repeatedly suppressed them, these people would not have even waited for the large-scale bombardment to end before ordering the troops to charge.

Due to the super combat effectiveness of the miscellaneous army commanded by He Chengjun, not only did they quickly surround Linying, but the large army also quickly advanced towards Xuchang.

After these miscellaneous armies advanced to Xuchang, not only did their attack power not weaken, on the contrary, because they were stimulated by the previous victory, as well as the ocean and the replenishment of soldiers that He Chengjun said and did, their combat effectiveness became even higher, and they launched round after round of ferocious attacks on Xuchang.

Due to the repeated shaking of the outer positions, Fan Zhongxiu had to go to the front line again and again to supervise the battle.

On 4 June, after inspecting the frontline positions, Fan Zhongxiu was unfortunately killed by a bombardment by the air force of the Central Army on his way back.

(To be continued)