On July 2, Zhang Yunshan learned that Cai Yi did not negotiate with him and asked him to surrender unconditionally, he was angry, and immediately led the army to attack Xu Chongzhi's department, concentrating superior forces to attack Xu Chongzhi's weak part, and wanted to break through, but Xu Chongzhi got Cai Yi's warning, thinking that Zhang Yunshan might jump over the wall in a hurry, so he made sufficient deployments, Zhang Yunshan led his troops to fight fiercely for a day and night and could not move forward, and for a time the officers and soldiers of Zhang Yunshan's department who were surrounded by heavy troops were panicked, and their morale fell directly to the bottom. +Top Novel,www.

On the evening of July 3, Wan Bingnan, the commander of the Third Regiment of the First Division, who had an old evil with Zhang Yunshan, led his troops to rebel, and the rebels rushed into Zhang Yunshan's headquarters to slaughter Zhang Yunshan and the personnel of the headquarters, and collected Zhang Yunshan's other troops overnight, and surrendered to the Northern Expeditionary Army early the next morning.

After capturing Hanzhong and Ankang, Cai Yi wanted to arrange for the Western Route Army to continue to attack Xi'an in the north, and there was no time to deal with the local political affairs of Hanzhong and Ankang, so he sent a telegram to the General Headquarters of the Northern Expeditionary Army in Nanjing to explain the situation, hoping that the Nanjing General Headquarters would send officials to take over the government affairs.

After Xiao Zhenlei received Cai Yi's telegram, he sighed to Jiang Baili, Song Shijie and others: "If it were someone else, it would be estimated that he would have arranged his own people to take over the government affairs of Hanzhong and Ankang a long time ago. ”

Song Shijie hesitated: "Then we? ”

Xiao Zhenlei said in a resolute tone: "Immediately send the officials of the Iron Blood Party to take over the government affairs, how can you rest assured that these things will be handed over to those local warlords?" Since you want to compete with Yuan Shikai for the world, you must have the anger to swallow mountains and rivers. In handling government affairs, we Predators must believe that we are better than others. Have the confidence and ability to let the people live a good life! ”

"Understood!"

Ankang, the headquarters of the Western Route Army.

The capture of Hanzhong and Ankang was not long after. Cai Ye moved the headquarters from Guangyuan to Ankang, and soon the headquarters will be moved to Zhen'an, which is the last military meeting held in Ankang.

The generals of all armies were seated on both sides of the conference table, and as soon as Cai Ye took his seat, Zhu Peide walked in and leaned over and whispered a few words in his ear, Cai Yi frowned when he heard it, and asked, "Is the news true?" ”

Zhu Peide said: "This is the telegram I just received from the General Headquarters of the Northern Expeditionary Army in Nanjing!" As he spoke, he took out a telegram from his folder and handed it to Cai Yi, who took the telegram and looked at it, and then waved Zhu Peide to go down.

Li Gengen asked, "Commander." What happened? ”

The other generals all looked at Cai Yi, Cai Yi shook the telegram in his hand and said: "I just said that I am afraid that it will not be so smooth to take Xi'an, Yuan Shikai will not be indifferent to the shape of Xi'an, I just received a telegram from the General Headquarters of the Northern Expeditionary Army in Nanjing, Yuan Shikai has sent troops to reinforce Xi'an, and the reinforcements have passed through Tongguan, from Tongguan to Xi'an, the terrain is flat and the road is smooth, and we have to attack the counties along the way." In terms of time, it must be that Yuan Shikai's reinforcements arrived in Xi'an before us! ”

This situation made the senior officers present feel quite tricky, and Li Gengen asked: "Commander, who did Yuan Shikai send over this time, and how many soldiers and horses did he have?" What about armament? ”

Cai Yi glanced at the telegram: "Military commander Cao Kun." It has jurisdiction over the 7th Division, the 10th Division, the 17th Division, the 7th Division Commander Liu Hongkui, the 17th Division Commander Wu Peifu, and the 10th Division Commander Lu Yongxiang. The total number of troops is nearly 40,000! ”

The crowd didn't think anything at first, but when they heard that there were 40,000 people. I couldn't help but gasp. Neither of them spoke for a minute.

Soon Liu Cunhou spoke first: "Cao Kun turned out to be the commander of the third town in Beiyang, and Liu Hongkui and Lu Yongxiang were both his generals. I know this, but who is this Wu Peifu? I don't think I've heard of it! ”

Cai Yi said: "This Wu Peifu is not a powerful character, I saw him in Jingshi in the early years, this person can be literate and martial, he is a rare general, you must not take it lightly when you encounter him on the battlefield in the future!" ”

At this time, Zhu Peide took two steps forward and said: "Wu Peifu was previously the third artillery standard commander of the Sixth Association of the Third Town of Beiyang, and last year he was directly promoted from the commander of the artillery regiment to the commander of the 17th Division!" ”

When everyone heard this, they couldn't help but slander in their hearts, and secretly said that Wu Peifu's promotion was too fast, according to Yuan Shikai's current establishment of the Beiyang Army is divisions, brigades, regiments, and battalions, and there is still a brigade commander between the regiment commander and the division commander, but this Wu Peifu directly crossed the brigade commander to become the division commander! If this Wu Peifu is not Yuan Shikai's relative, it means that he really has real talent and hard work.

Seeing that everyone was showing a somewhat timid expression, Cai Ye immediately said in a deep voice: "What are you afraid of? Although they have 40,000 people, but we are not a lot, in terms of strength we are not much different from Cao Kun, if he brings his third division, I have to be particularly cautious, after all, the third division is the old Beiyang Army, the combat effectiveness is not blown, but the 7th, 10th, and 17th divisions have only begun to be formed this year, in the military quality of officers and soldiers, our troops are not inferior to them, our only shortcoming is the lack of heavy firepower, but don't worry, I have already sent a telegram to the General Headquarters of the Northern Expeditionary Army in Nanjing, Commander-in-Chief Xiao promised to send someone to bring us twenty mountain artillery, after having these artillery, we will not lose to Cao Kun in artillery, the rest of the matter is to see who can fight, now that the battle has not yet begun, are you already timid? ”

Li Gengen blushed and said, "Who said that?" Commander, I'm the first to deal with Wu Peifu, I really don't believe that he Wu Peifu has three heads and six arms! ”

When the others saw Li Gengen asking for war, they were not to be outdone, after all, no one wanted to be looked down upon, so they all stood up and asked for battle, Cai Yi waved his hand and said: "Don't worry, it's all about fighting, even if you don't want to fight, you can't do it, sit down!" Now we have to think about how to play next? ”

After all, these people are basically from military academies, and they are still very good at fighting, Xu Chongzhi said: "Since according to the time, Cao Kun will come to Xi'an before us, then we might as well take the two big cities of Shangluo and Baoji first, and then wait for the opportunity to approach Xi'an as much as possible." In this way, we don't have to worry about being attacked in the back when we attack Xi'an again! ”

When everyone heard this, they followed Cai Ye to the map and looked at the map. After a long time, Cai Ye asked, "How is the construction of a master Xu?" ”

"I think it's doable. After taking Baoji and Shangluo, our army can form a three-sided attack on Xi'an, Cao Kun thought of blocking us, it is necessary to divide troops to defend, we can take the strategy of confusing the enemy, only leaving a small number of troops on two sides to contain it, and concentrate superior forces to attack all the way! ”

It was Zhu Peide who saw that no one was talking next to him, so he mustered up the courage to say what he thought.

Cai Yi's eyes lit up when he heard this, and the other generals couldn't help but glance at Zhu Peide when they heard this. However, at this time, Xiong Kewu raised a question, and he said: "What if the other party discovers that our troops are very small and attack with a small number of troops to contain us?" ”

Everyone looked at Zhu Peide and wanted to hear what he had to say, Zhu Peide said confidently: "It's very simple, if the other party attacks, we will retreat quickly, and if they chase us, we will flee." When they don't chase anymore, we will return to bite, in short, don't let the other side have a good time, at this time we have an absolute advantage in the army, this way to break through the opponent's defense and take Xi'an as quickly as possible. It is impossible for the other side to carry a large amount of grain, grass and ammunition with us when marching and fighting, and the grain, grass and ammunition depot must be located in the city of Xi'an, as long as we take Xi'an. Cao Kun's troops are facing the crisis of running out of ammunition and food, and even if he has the advantage in troops, he will only be defeated! ”

"Good!" Cai Ye couldn't help but praise when he heard it. He added: "I think Yizhi's style of play is good, what do you think?" ”

Everyone agreed. It's just that this is only a rough plan, and the specific combat plan still needs to be perfected in detail, so Cai immediately ordered Zhu Peide to participate in the improvement of the combat plan.

In terms of troops, Cai Ge's side has Li Gengen's department, Liu Cunhou's department, Xiong Kewu's department, Xu Chongzhi's department, plus Zhang Yiqian's department and the remnants of Wan Bingnan's surrendered army, there are more than 33,000 people in total, only a few thousand people less than Cao Kun, but in terms of weapons and equipment, Cao Kun's department must be much stronger than Cai Kun's side, the equipment is more unified, and the logistics supply is more convenient, and the army on Cai's side comes from the provinces, as well as the army that rebelled and surrendered, the composition is more complex, and there are too many weapons and equipment tricks. These factors all affect combat capability, but Cai Yi has advantages that Cao Kun does not have: first, the momentum is like a rainbow, and several consecutive loud battles have made the Western Route Army up to the generals and down to the soldiers have strong confidence; Second, to occupy the name of righteousness, the Northern Expeditionary Army is a division of justice, supported by all parties, supported by the people, and occupied people, which is also the reason why Cai Yi is not afraid of Cao Kun.

On July 5, Liu Cunhou's troops were ordered to attack Shangluo, and Li Gengen's troops were ordered to attack Baoji, and the two troops set off overnight to advance to their respective goals, hoping to take the two big cities before Cao Kun's troops arrived in Xi'an, thus forming a situation of besieging Xi'an on three sides.

On July 10, after four days of marching, Li Gengen and Liu Cunhou took Baoji and Shangluo successively, at this time Cao Kun, who had already seen Cai Yi's strategic intentions, had already ordered Wu Peifu's department to rush to Xi'an first, and drove in the direction of Shangluo for several days, but Wu Peifu's department still came late, and when he arrived, Liu Cunhou had already captured Shangluo for two days.

After the remnants of Wan Bingnan surrendered and Zhang Yiqian rebelled on the battlefield, there was not much left of the Shaanxi Army, and there were not many troops left in the two big cities of Shangluo and Baoji, and they could not withstand the attack of Liu Cunhou and Li Gengen's two divisions, the reason why these two divisions took five days to succeed was because they spent four days on the road, you must know that the road into Shaanxi is not very easy to walk, they can go so fast because there is no heavy firepower, if there is a lot of heavy firepower, I am afraid it will be much slower.

The day after Cai Ye received the news that Liu Cunhou had seized Shangluo, he received the news that Wu Peifu sent by Liu Cunhou had arrived in Lantian, but because Wu Peifu already knew that the Northern Expeditionary Army had occupied Shangluo, he stopped continuing to advance, which was also because Liu Cunhou had sent a battalion to be stationed on the mountains on both sides of the Wangsun Mountain Gorge Road, the only way from Lantian to Shangluo, and Wu Peifu had ordered the troops to build fortifications in Jiujianfang.

At this time, there was no tunnel from Xi'an to Shangluoke to cross the valley directly, only to take the Lantian road, and it had to pass through nine rooms, so Wu Peifu stationed heavy troops here and began to dig fortifications to prevent the Northern Expeditionary Army from continuing north.

Li Gengen's capture of Baoji was also relatively smooth, but due to the long march time of the troops and frequent battles, the soldiers were a little physically and mentally exhausted, and their morale was also a little low.

Soon, there was news that Cao Kun had arrived in Xi'an with most of his men, and Cao Kun sent a brigade of the 10th Division to the area of Fufeng and Meixian, leaving Lu Yongxiang's 10th Division in Xi'an, and Liu Hongkui's 7th Division to deploy defenses in Madang Town and the Fenghe River area south of Xi'an.

Cao Kun thought that the Northern Expeditionary Army occupied Baoji, which was equivalent to cutting off the connection between Tianshui and Xi'an, and the taste of being attacked on three sides was quite uncomfortable, and according to the reconnaissance, the Northern Expeditionary Army in Baoji had a lot of troops, and he didn't know whether the strength of a brigade in Fufeng and Meixian could be stopped, after thinking about it for two days, Cao Kun decided to concentrate his forces to eliminate the Northern Expeditionary Army in Baoji first, so he ordered Lu Yongxiang to leave a regiment of troops in Xi'an, and lead other troops to Meixian to attack Chencang, and strive to take Baoji as much as possible.

Cao Kun deployed like this, Cai Yi was not idle, he ordered Liu Cunhou and Zhang Yiqian's troops to storm nine rooms, and the onslaught for a week had caused great pressure on Wu Peifu, who commanded the defense while reporting the battle situation to Cao Kun.

At this time, it was Lu Yongxiang who led his troops to the direction of Baoji, and after Cao Kun received Wu Peifu's battle report, he immediately wanted to order Lu Yongxiang to stop and lead his troops to support Wu Peifu, but he quickly thought that this was Cai Yi's plan, otherwise how could it be coincidental? Why did he suddenly strengthen his offensive against Lantian when he ordered Lu Yongxiang to lead his troops to attack Li Gengen in the direction of Baoji? Is there something strange about this? By the way, there is no news from Liu Hongkui's department in the south, doesn't Cai Yi plan to attack from the south? Although the mountain roads in the south are rugged, and each road is not very easy to march, there are many roads leading to Xi'an, which is not very difficult to defend, but it is precisely because there are too many roads to garrison that it feels threatening.

Thinking about it, Cao Kun still thinks that the Northern Expeditionary Army in the direction of Baoji will be solved first, Wu Peifu can withstand it in nine rooms for the time being, there should be no problem, Liu Hongkui's troops guard various mountain roads and occupy favorable terrain, and there should not be too much problem, but there is no danger to defend the front line from Baoji to Xi'an, if the Northern Expeditionary Army concentrates superior forces in Baoji, Xi'an will be in danger. (To be continued......) R527