On the Langfang front, under the leadership of the staff of the 19th Army, Chen Jun finally met Cai Tingguang, the commander of the 19th Division. At this time, Cai Tingguang's Kuomintang army major general uniform had been completely blackened by the gunsmoke, even the collar badge was covered with mud, and there was even an obvious scratch on his left cheek. With a military hat in his hand and a cigarette in his mouth, he frowned at the corpses of the wounded and soldiers who had been carried down from the position.

Just finished the battle, even these men who were still fighting bravely just now, in addition to not fainting in pain, couldn't help but moan, many people were missing one or two things, fortunately it was not a perforated head and abdomen, so it was directly explained to the position.

"Hurry up and send them to the hospital in the back." Cai Tingguang took a few steps up and helped put a seriously wounded soldier whose left leg had been cut off by shrenchel on a stretcher and sent him to the rear. They are all living men, and after a battle, there are heavy casualties.

There were also sporadic gunshots on the line of fire, and the entire sky outside Langfang was filled with monstrous gunsmoke, burning trees and buildings could be seen in many places, and the ground was devastated and devastated all over the ground, and a strong pungent smell mixed with the smell of blood, fire barbecue, and gunpowder smoke was unbearable for those who had just arrived on the battlefield.

The 19th Division had just repelled a fierce attack by the 16th Division.

A soldier of the 19th Division, who was sorting through the relics of a fallen soldier, caught Chen's attention, the dead soldier huddled in a trench, his forehead blown off by shrapnel, and a rifle and a bamboo barrel clutched tightly in his arms.

Chen Jun walked over and first saluted the warrior who had died in battle to cross political differences, and then leaned down and picked up the bamboo tube in his arms. Wipe away the blood stains on it that have not completely dried up, and there are actually two lines of words engraved on the bamboo tube.

"One day, we will fly our blue sky and white flag on the top of Mt. Fuji!!"

Shock! Extreme shock. Chen Jun closed his eyes fiercely, and the two lines of vertical writing were like a sharp knife piercing his heart. A hundred battles are dead, but they are glorious. Such a small soldier has such monstrous ambitions, I have to say that there are many iron bones in China, who dares to say that my Chinese man has no ambitions.

At this time, Cai Tingguang, Gao Feng, Dai Anlan and others also came over, and when they saw the bamboo tube in Chen Jun's hand, they were all silent, and a group of senior generals and colonels took off their military hats in unison, took a short break, and sent this warrior on his last journey with his most upright military salute.

"General Cai, I want to collect this bamboo tube for this iron-clad good man, I don't know if it's okay."

Cai Tingguang was slightly embarrassed, "After dying in the Anti-Japanese War, according to the regulations, the relics of these men who sacrificed their lives for the country should be left to their relatives to claim." ”

Chen Jun: "I think one day if I make it to the book, I will fulfill this warrior's wish." I also asked General Cai to be extra gracious, and he said that after the victory of the war, I will personally return it to the family of this warrior. ”

Cai Tingguang nodded tacitly, did you hit the book? At least with the strength of [***], I can't think about it, I just don't know" General Cai, this is Major General Chen Jun, deputy commander-in-chief of the 19th Route Army and commander of the Third Division of the United Resistance against Southwest China. This is Colonel Gao Feng, chief of staff of the Third Division, and this is Lieutenant Colonel Dai Anlan, commander of the Third Regiment of the Third Division. The staff officer gave a brief introduction to several people.

Perhaps what happened just now made Cai Tingguang have a good impression of Chen Jun, threw away the cigarette butt and shook hands with the three of them. He was a little surprised, this was the first line of fire, and these senior commanders of the Nineteenth Route Army in the southwest were not afraid of death. "Go to the back bunker and say it, otherwise a shell will come down, and the two opposing armies will lose a bunch of commanders."

Different from the indifference when they first met, Cai Tingguang was actually a more talkative person, and beckoned a few people back to the temporary command bunker at the back.

As soon as a few people got into the low anti-aircraft bunker and left the sporadic gunfire behind them, a communications staff officer came with a telegram to report to Cai Tingguang. He just glanced at it, and then he showed joy, and slapped his right fist on the telegram fiercely, "It's really good, now I don't have to be bombed by my plane every day." ”

Seeing that a few people were a little puzzled, Cai Tingguang didn't care about any military secrets, entered his temporary office room, shook the telegram and said, motioning for a few people to sit together, "It's good news, the planes of the two squadrons will come north to support." ”

In the anti-Japanese war talks of the 'May Day Cooperation', the clause on sending air forces from the southwest to participate in the war was not finally passed, and Chiang Kai-shek finally only agreed to use a limited army in the southwest to fight north. And as a supplement to the cooperation, Chiang Kai-shek promised to send his own air force north. Chen Jun was still clear about the May 1 cooperation, and Chiang Kai-shek was not ambiguous at this time, and the arrival of more than 40 planes from the two squadrons would greatly reduce the air pressure on the Tianjin-Beijing battlefield.

"With the Air Force, we still have a fighting force with the army. The 3rd Regiment under my command will arrive in Peiping tomorrow morning, and the main forces of the 3rd Division will arrive within a week. Chen Jun briefly introduced the northward movement of the Third Division.

Maybe other [***] generals will look down on a regiment of the Southwest Army, but it just so happens that Cai Tingguang knew a lot about the Southwest Army when he was in the south, and knew that one of their regiments at least had the combat effectiveness of a division of [***], so he nodded with satisfaction, "That's good, the offensive momentum of the Yue Army is too fierce, according to intelligence, the three divisions of the Yue Army have all landed, and it is very likely that the 19th Division will be annihilated in these two days." My brothers and I are not afraid of death, and it doesn't matter if we lose to the 18th Division, what matters is the land of Pingjin, and what matters is the hundreds of thousands of Northeast Army troops in Jinzhou. ”

Chen Jun still admires Cai Tingguang for having such a vision, as the commander of the Central Division, this person is not a mediocre talent, he took out his cigarette case, picked out a Chinese cigarette and handed it to him, "My third division is not a coward, if you want to die, everyone will die together, or wait for reinforcements and give me a ruthless fight." The collision of the two major nationalities, casualties are inevitable, if it can be exchanged for the peace of the country and the people, the third division will be considered dead, and our Chen army will bury them. ”

Cai Tingguang slammed his fist on the table and said hatefully, "Even if the man of my 19th Division is dead, he can't make himself feel better." Lao Tzu had long wanted to go north to resist Yue, but he didn't expect to face up to himself here. As long as it lasts two days, a first-class division in Shandong and a second-class division in Zhengding, Hebei will also rush to the aid here, and they will be able to arrive tomorrow afternoon. ”

Regarding Chiang Kai-shek's transfer of troops, Chen Jun also listened to Chen Cheng's briefing, saying that the army's three divisions and regiments were large, and the three standing divisions and regiments, each with more than 20,000 men and horses, and the offensive momentum of the three divisions and regiments was completely shaken by Chiang Kai-shek's presence in Nanjing.

Not to mention the possible follow-up troop increase plan of the Yue Army, the three divisions alone have reached the scale at the beginning of the Jinzhou Campaign in the Northeast, and nearly 10 divisions of the Northeast Army are stationed on the first line of Jinzhou, and they have suffered heavy losses even though they have strong fortifications to defend, and there is no danger to defend in the Pingjin area, and there is only a simple position.

This is very different from the size of the army that Chiang Kai-shek originally predicted would have at most only one multi-division. Afterwards, on the one hand, he dismissed the person in charge of the Central Special Branch, who was in charge of intelligence in his own direction, and on the other hand, he urgently dispatched troops and dispatched the first batch of troops from Hebei and Shandong to rush to the aid of the army and air force.

At the same time, the Central Division of another division and the First Division of the first division have been assembled and are ready to board the trains in batches and go north.

A battle is slowly brewing, provided that the Kuomintang Eighteenth Route Army and the troops arriving in the southwest can block the offensive momentum of the Yue army and ensure that Beiping is not lost for at least a month, otherwise, the significance of the battle will not be great.

Although he did not know how many troops Chiang Kai-shek was going to mobilize for this very likely battle, Chen Jun could only choose to believe in the chairman of the Nanjing Committee, after all, the southwest was too far away, and if Chiang Kai-shek passively resisted the war again, the only result would be that the three divisions and the army would be exhausted.

Cai Tingguang was quite surprised by the rapid arrival of reinforcements from the southwest, and he was relieved to hear that the southwest was using planes to transport the vanguard troops to Taiyuan and board the train to the north, because the air force in the southwest has been famous for a long time.

However, Chen Jun also briefly said that the follow-up troop transportation must not adopt this very capacity-consuming method. The Air Force will give priority to the logistical replenishment of the 3rd Division. Not to mention anything else, the semi-automatic rifles equipped by the Southwest Army used new bullets, which were completely different from the new Chinese formal rifles (Enfield rifles) used by the two central divisions of the Kuomintang. If it had not transported war supplies from Chengdu to Taiyuan north, perhaps one day the Third Division would have to use Enfield rifles or even older Hanyang-made fire sticks in the trenches to shoot at the Yue army.

Of course, because the southwest cannot transport heavy artillery to the north, the distribution of supplementary arms for some key surnames will also be increased. In order to solve the problem of transportation, the ZH-31 transport plane has already demonstrated the increase in the maximum load capacity, and although the standard load of four tons looks frightening, there is still room for improvement compared with the load of seven or eight tons of some large British planes in the early years.

The general staff of the 19th Route Army gave a brief introduction to the battle plan drawn up by the general headquarters, and as Chen Cheng and Chen Jun had verbally discussed before, the 19th Division would withdraw as a reserve after withstanding the fierce attack of tomorrow's army, and the 18th Division would make up for it, and at the same time, the second-class division in Zhengding, Hebei, which would arrive tomorrow, would be responsible for the right flank of Langfang, and the 3rd Regiment of the 3rd Division of the Southwest, which had strong combat effectiveness, would be in charge of the left flank defense line.

"The basic situation is this, the 19th Division has suffered heavy casualties, it has reached more than 3,000 casualties, and it must be withdrawn tomorrow. What Commander Chen meant was that no matter what, survive tomorrow, everything should be on defense, and after the reinforcements arrived, he would make further battle plans. ”

Chen Jun nodded, this battle plan is correct, the two divisions of the 19th Route Army are only 20,000 people, plus more than 4,000 people in the third regiment, which is only a few more people than a division of the Yue Army, and counting the more than 7,000 people of the second division in Zhengding, Hebei Province, which will arrive tomorrow, the number of people is not as good as the Yue Army.

The best way is to focus on defense and wait for reinforcements.

At about nine o'clock in the morning, the army had already shown signs of attacking, and Chen's army remained in the frontline position, ready to see how the army had changed in recent years. After all, there was too little contact between the Southwest Army and the Yue Army, and the only small battles were only skirmishes during the counterattack on the landing of the Yue Army at Fangchenggang.

Chen Jun called Chen Cheng at the front line.

"Commander Chen, the situation is a little delicate, I am always worried about whether the reinforcements from all walks of life will arrive on time, once the plan for reinforcements changes, it will be a big deal."

"Well, you have a point, so what is Deputy Commander Chen's opinion?"

"I propose to immediately open the arsenal in Beiping, recruit local veterans, and urgently expand the Tianjin security forces and the garrison troops in Beiping into divisions. In addition, we should also mobilize the power of the people to build the second line of fortifications between Langfang and Beiping in case of contingencies, and at the same time organize them to take on the role of logistics transportation and rescue of wounded soldiers. If we defend properly, we will definitely be able to hold the army back, and then the battle will enter the stage of battle. These things must be done in advance. ”

"This ...... The arsenals in Peiping are all empty, and it seems that we can only go to a few arsenals to think of a way, but this needs to be done by asking the chairman for instructions, and there should be no big problem. As for the rest, I will arrange for someone to do it immediately. Chen Cheng is not a pedantic person, the war is important, and he readily agreed to Chen Jun's proposal.

At ten o'clock in the morning, the army again launched a fierce attack on the Chinese defenders in Langfang.

Sure enough, as soon as the army came up, there were planes, artillery, and ironclad vehicles, and a whole brigade was charging in a straggler formation. Carrier-based aircraft taking off from the sea are like no man's land, and old biplane bombers are also bombing with impunity from high altitudes.

"Da Da Da ......"

"Bang...... Bang...... Bang......"

"Shh......h Rumble!!! ”

After a few days of fighting, the army no longer tried to attack as it did at the beginning, and after finding out the depth of the 19th Division, a large-scale attack began as soon as it came up. The army concentrated at least 400 artillery pieces of various calibers to carry out heavy artillery bombardment of the positions of the 19th Division. At least 150 of them are 75mm and above guns of the artillery wing of the main division.

Although there was no naval artillery support, the intensity of the artillery bombardment was still unprecedented for the Kuomintang army.

Before the reorganization, the Kuomintang division was Chiang Kai-shek's most descendant unit, and there were only twenty or thirty old guns in one division, and occasionally some new guns, and there was a serious shortage of shells and artillery accessories.

I don't know whether the existence of the southwest is a good thing or a bad thing, but for the Kuomintang, with the strong support of the three countries, the reorganization of the army has indeed seen great results. At least in recent years, more than a dozen main central divisions have been armed to a considerable level despite the huge financial resources of Nanjing's political axe.

Each division has a direct artillery regiment, all equipped with 105mm Soviet-made, British-made, and French-made artillery. The two divisions of the 18th Route Army, Chen Cheng's original 18th Division was equipped with French-made artillery, and the 19th Division was equipped with Soviet-made artillery. Although these are all old stocks cobbled together by the Three Kingdoms, they are much stronger than the Kuomintang Army Divisions that used to be bare-bones. The entire division, not counting mortars, has about 60 large and small caliber guns.

The artillery of the Yue army had just begun to shell, and the artillery of the 19 th Division did not return fire, and the battle of the previous few days had proved that as long as the artillery was fired, it would always attract air raids by the planes of the Yue army, and after losing more than a dozen artillery pieces, Cai Tingguang ordered the artillery to be transferred, hid in a vacant farmhouse, and opened fire again at a critical moment.

After the shelling, the infantry began to charge, screaming and charging in the face of the [***] position on the opposite side that was caught in a sea of fire.

"Kill and give"

The middle- and lower-level officers of the Yue Army, wielding command knives, personally led the team to launch a fierce attack on the position of the middle [***] team.

"Hit!!"

On the originally dead and silent position, a company commander with his head covered in gauze got up again, grabbed a Czech-made light machine gun on the side, shouted and hit, and suddenly opened fire on the Japanese army.

The mortar gunners of the 19th Division also picked up the mortars that were originally pressed on their bodies to protect them from the gun positions in the trenches, aimed their guns at the soldiers who were screaming and rushing over in the distance, and quickly fired a mortar shell.

For a time, the Japanese army fell under the fire of light and heavy machine guns and mortars, while the Japanese army returned fire with heavy machine guns and grenadiers, and the chaotic battlefield was full of flesh and blood.

The dense gunfire of the Chinese [***] people sounded again on the position, and at this moment, they were no longer cowardly Kuomintang troops, they were Chinese [***] people who defended their homes and the country. They are using their own battles to the death to prove that the Chinese [***] people can defend their homes and the country, even if he is a Kuomintang soldier.

The battle was fierce, the casualty toll skyrocketed, and by the time the 19th Division repelled the third attack of the Yue Army, the casualty toll had reached 2,000 that day, and the astonishing casualty rate completely shook the defense line in Langfang. Even after Cai Tingguang ordered artillery fire to return fire, it only delayed the rout of the whole line.

...... "On the second regiment!! ”

At the critical moment, Chen Cheng issued an urgent order, taking advantage of the gap between the offensive of the Japanese army, to send the new force of the 18th Division, the strength of a regiment, to the top, and the entire open battlefield, every place was carrying out an emergency battlefield change.

Chen Jun put down the binoculars, he was also shocked by the combat effectiveness of the army, just in terms of equipment, the army is much stronger than [***] in terms of aircraft and artillery, and the individual weapons are the same as [***]. It's just that [***] training still can't keep up with his own level, and the gap is staged in every part of the battlefield. Just imagine, the gap between a few soldiers will inevitably converge into a division gap, and if one more person is killed or wounded in a certain position, hundreds or thousands more will die on the entire battlefield. The disparity in individual combat effectiveness was very ruthless at this time.

Chen Jun smashed his fist on the mound fiercely, the attack of the Yue army is still the same as that of the northeast, and for these, the southwest has long been prepared, many years of professional military training, and the new equipment supplemented by the surname will give the Yue army a huge surprise.

Thinking of the equipment and the Third Regiment that would arrive in Beiping in the afternoon, he felt a sense of urgency about the battle, "The real battle will begin tomorrow, and the Third Regiment will give an indelible impression to the army." ”

Finally, it was another difficult night on the battlefield, after the 18th Division changed its defense, the encirclement and annihilation plan of the Yue army was affected, and a flank attacking brigade was miraculously repulsed by a battalion.

The next morning, three trains that had been mobilized by all means entered Beiping Station.

"The third regiment has arrived!"

Three trains overloaded the 3rd regiment and part of the equipment to Beiping.

Although the 18th Division was a brand new defense, it was still extremely difficult to face the 16th Division of the Japanese Army, which was responsible for the attack, and according to reliable battlefield intelligence, the 14th Division of the Chinese Army had already invested at least one wing, and in these two days, it was very likely that the 18th Route Army and the 3rd Regiment of the 3rd Division would have to face a joint attack by the two divisions. However, what about the remaining divisions of the army? Isn't it really going to be a flank action? Or is there another plan?

Opening a carriage, Chen Jun saw the munitions box inside, and the logistics soldier was ordered to open the box and introduced to him, "Division commander, this is a fire dragon bazooka issued urgently, and the experimental effect is very good, much stronger than the 28-year-old bazooka originally equipped." One of the carriages was equipped with a new type of infantry anti-personnel rocket, which was said to be very effective. ”

Chen Jun carried a bazooka, feeling that except for a little heavy, everything else was very good, he had seen the power of rocket artillery, the third division was originally equipped with a small number of old-fashioned bazookas, this guy shot at the enemy's ironclad car or heavy machine gun position, the effect is not to be said.

Coming to the back two carriages, there were not so many boxes in them, only a few guns covered with artillery jackets, and the logistics officer introduced again, "This is the latest 31-year-old anti-aircraft gun, which has just been pulled out of the strategic reserve warehouse, because it is difficult to transport heavy artillery, General Zhang specially approved the issuance of this new type of anti-aircraft gun." In addition to using it to work wonders against the planes of the Japanese army, it can also be flattened. ”

"Flat?" Chen Jun was a little puzzled, the anti-aircraft gun was used as a cannon after being flattened?

"Yes, the detailed manuals have been distributed to the young men of the artillery, and it will be no problem if you are a little familiar with it, the division commander, you see that this bolt is specially made, and the shells in the back compartment also use a new fuse......" The logistics officer introduced the use of this anti-aircraft gun to Chen Jun, and depicted a very exciting blueprint.

"Yes, unload the car for me at once, and in the afternoon I will see at least one gate appear on the left flank."

Chen Jun said hatefully, including other new weapons distributed, these things are simply tailor-made for the army, come, don't think that the Chinese will always lag behind you, always let you see the power.

Then the last car was opened, and the whole car inside was a new machine gun.

"zh24 machine gun?" The machine gun in front of you is an air-cooled machine gun, which is very similar to the zh24 machine gun that the troops are equipped with.

The logistics major shook his head, pried open the wooden box, lifted it up, and introduced with a smile: "This guy is more fierce than the zh24 type, especially in terms of rate of fire and lethality, compared to the zh24 style There is a great improvement, the maintenance is simple, it is easy to use, it is easy to aim, it is definitely a weapon to kill devils." ”

Chen Jun nodded with satisfaction, compared with the previous two, this new machine gun is the biggest weapon to kill the enemy, you must know that against the squadron or brigade level charge of the army, the new machine gun with group killing will have a miraculous effect. "How to solve the problem of bullets?"

"It's still the old way, in addition to train transportation, it will also take the method of leapfrog airdrop. For example, taking advantage of the large range of the new transport aircraft, the materials were directly airdropped to Zhengding, Hebei, so that the transportation to the front line was too close. ”

"That's good, fighting thousands of miles away, what I'm afraid of is logistics, since this problem can be basically solved, the battle is even more worth looking forward to." Chen Jun jumped out of the ranks with satisfaction, as if he had seen these murderous weapons in the afternoon or on the battlefield tomorrow.

After the British, the army will use countless corpses and wounded as a price to see the strength of the military industry that has been dormant in the southwest for many years.

(To be continued)