Ceylon, June 8.

The first battle between the Naval Resistance Army and the Japanese army took place around five o'clock in the afternoon. At this time, it had been a full seventeen hours since the start of the Japanese landing.

It was only in the early morning that the Naval Resistance Army received the news that the Japanese army had landed, and the first troops began to attack in full gear.

From 5 o'clock to 5 o'clock in the afternoon, a field battalion of the Naval Resistance Army ran 120 kilometers in 12 hours, and the speed was fast enough.

There are roads in Ceylon, but the concept of this road is completely different from that of later generations, except that some dirt and stone roads, and most of the bridges along the way are small wooden bridges. After a month-long tropical rainstorm, the journey was admirably difficult.

Even so, the Naval Resistance Force did not reach its original destination. It is not that the fighters of the Naval Resistance Army are dragging their feet, but that the situation has changed.

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In the early morning, Bao Gang, commander of the Tanggang garrison of the Maritime Resistance Army, was awakened by the rapid ringing of the telephone in the early morning.

In the past few months, the three army commanders of the Naval Resistance Army: Su Qing were ordered to be stationed in Myitkyina, Myanmar, and became famous in the first battle. Yang Weiwu conquered Madagascar and expanded the territory of the Haitang Kingdom. The most elite unit of the Maritime Resistance Army led by Bao Gang was in Ceylon.

To say that Li Guang doesn't pay attention to Bao Gang is complete nonsense. Among the three regiment commanders, Li Guang attached the most importance to Bao Gang. Although Li Guang is not sure whether his military thinking is correct, Bao Gang, a veteran of a hundred battles, is also the one with the lowest degree of Chinese among the three regiment commanders, but is the closest to Li Guang's military thinking.

If there is no opportunity to fight, the middle and lower-level officers and men may still complain, but Bao Gang, as the commander of the Tanggang garrison of the Naval Resistance Army, is well aware of the importance of his task.

Before Li Guang sent troops to the Pacific, the order he left for Bao Gang was simple: take care of his family.

What is home? Home is the shore of the warm nest, the anchor of the boat. More important is the harbor of the soul.

In the Haitang Kingdom, in the Maritime Resistance Army. No one calls Statues Island home. It's just a base. No one calls Uruguay home, and so far it has been a foreign country. And Ceylon Tang Port, this is the closest place to home in the minds of the Maritime Resistance Army.

It is not because the Maritime Resistance Army has invested here, not because the Naval Resistance Army is stationed here, but because it is the closest to China, this is the key node where the Maritime Resistance Army can get in touch with China, and this is the frontier of the Maritime Resistance Army's resistance against Japan.

Special. This order meant that Bao Gang was the most important of the three army commanders of the Navy. Feeling a great responsibility, Bao Gang simply lived in the headquarters during these months.

When Bao just got up, the staff officer on duty was already answering the phone. It's in English.

Bao Gang asked, "What's the matter?" ”

"The little devil has landed, in Baidecro."

The Staff Officers are still in contact with the British. Bao Gang had already given the first order, "sound the air defense alarm."

It was raining heavily last night, but now it's clear skies. Bao Gang looked out the window.

Soon, the air defense sirens were sounded in various departments of the Tang port.

In these tens of seconds. Bao Gang had already given three or four orders.

The big war is coming, and Bao Gang seems confident. Orders are given in an orderly manner.

The place where the Japanese army landed. Badycro, Bao Gang is very clear. This port is between the British military port of Trincomalee and the military port of the Maritime Resistance Army, Tang Port, which is more than 100 kilometers away from Trincomalee in the north and about 200 kilometers away from Tang Port in the south.

In this area of more than 300 kilometers, the British army had only two battalions of British regular troops. The British infantry battalion has more than 1,000 people, consisting of 4 infantry companies (company headquarters and 3 platoons) and 1 battalion headquarters company with 6 platoons. The rest of the armed forces consisted mainly of about four battalions of Anglo-Indian troops.

The General Staff of the Naval Resistance Army is now in Madagascar. However, many combat plans have been made, and if it is to deal with the Japanese landing at Baidiclo, the naval resistance army has a fairly complete response plan. And these programs can be described as comprehensive. And after many exercises on the map.

As the supreme commander, Bao Gang has been on the battlefield for a long time and knows one thing very well: no matter how complete the combat plan is, it is impossible to deal with unexpected situations on the battlefield.

At the first time, Bao Gang sent the first field battalion and advanced north. As for the position to advance, Bao Gang did not have a final decision for the time being, but for the landing battle of the Japanese army, whether it was to block the Japanese attack on the beach or strengthen the defense of Tanggang, it was necessary for the Naval Resistance Army to send troops to the north.

If it was the level of communications of the Chinese army in China, Bao Gang would never dare to directly send troops without a specific target. However, a field battalion of the Naval Resistance Army is not only equipped with telegraphs, but also high-power radios and battlefield wireless telephones, which can adjust the direction of movement of troops at the headquarters at any time.

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Before five o'clock, as soon as the sky was brightened, the first wave of Japanese air raids flew over Tang Harbor. After a wild bombardment, four fighters flew away.

Under the tight defense of the air defense units that the Naval Resistance Army had been waiting for for a long time, this wave of Japanese air raids caused losses to the Naval Resistance Army, and as for the attack on the airfield of the Naval Resistance Army, nothing was found, and the planes of the Naval Resistance Army had already taken off for more than half an hour, and the airfield was empty.

Before six o'clock, several planes of the Maritime Resistance Army searching along the coastline discovered three Japanese landing troops one after another. To the frustration of the air force pilots, the Navy's anti-Japanese forces had only six fighters in total, and there were only two of them, whether they were water reconnaissance planes, fighters, or dive bombers. Only a few casualties inflicted on the Japanese did not prevent the forced landing of the Japanese army.

At this time, the Japanese army had already begun to land for six hours, and the British army only knew the first landing place of the Japanese army by this time.

The three landing sites were marked on the sand table of the headquarters one after another, and Bao Gang immediately felt the crisis.

The Japanese army actually landed in three ways.

The British reported that the Badicro was the most northerly unit. The main force is Chinkorodi, more than 30 kilometers south of Baidicoro.

The closest landing site for the Japanese army to the Naval Resistance Army was more than 100 kilometers north of Tang Port, a bay called Arugam Bay.

Bao Gang's sense of crisis comes precisely from the division of troops by the Japanese army, not to mention that the Japanese army is arrogant, arrogance has arrogant capital. Now the Japanese army has all begun to land, and all of them are very smooth, which is enough to show that its preparations are sufficient and its strength is strong. It should be said that the amphibious landing of the Japanese army was successful. Neither the Naval Resistance Army nor the British Army could prevent the Japanese landing.

On the land side, it was clear that the British forces at the three landing sites had been completely annihilated. For reinforcements to reach the seashore, it is absolutely too late for a few hours.

As for the air force, the British army now has less than 30 planes in the whole of Ceylon, and the Japanese army is afraid that they have already attacked the British airfield. Although the Naval Resistance Army was not destroyed by the Japanese army, there were only six of them, and the strength was too weak.

On the naval side, the British had only a few pitiful small patrol boats, one or two destroyers. And the Naval Resistance Forces did not even have a single destroyer in Tang Port. Zheng Xuechang's naval forces are now assisting Yang Weiwu's army in Madagascar.

As soon as the war began, it fell into passivity. Bao Gang couldn't figure out what was going on with the British army. It was silently touched to the shore by the Japanese army. There was no time to complain, Bao Gang immediately buried his head in the sand table and thought about how to deal with it.

There are two routes from Arugam Bay to Tang Harbour, one along the coastline, but less than half of this route is by road. The other half is through a tropical rainforest that is more than 10 kilometers from north to south and 20 or 30 kilometers from east to west.

Another route. It is thirty or forty kilometers inland from Arugam Bay. Then head south. The road is arch-shaped and has a total length of more than 150 kilometers, but it is completely accessible by road.

Bao Gang fought with the Japanese army many times and was extremely familiar with the Japanese fighting style.

After a little thought, the order was given again. The field battalion, which set out early in the morning, had a clear goal - to follow the second line, that is, to take the bow route. Go to stop the Japanese army.

For a route along the coastline, Bao Gang was also not careless, and he sent two jungle companies.

The staff of the Naval Resistance Army, except for a limited number of officers, has combat experience. It's mostly on paper. Although it is not possible to really command the battle, it is quite thorough in the study of the geography of Ceylon, almost all the roads have been surveyed on the spot, and not only the operational maps have been drawn, but also the blocking or offensive positions have been designed for various strategic points.

The layout of these positions was all tested in a confrontation with the officers of the combat units.

The work of the General Staff of the Naval Resistance Force not only provides officers at all levels with opportunities to temper their command, but also provides commanders with a wealth of tactical options.

Under Li Guang's long-term nurturing, the combat mode of the Naval Resistance Army and the Army has become very different from that of the Chinese Army in China. Almost all of the reconnaissance work of the Chinese army in China relied on infantry, while the air force was responsible for a considerable proportion of the land reconnaissance work of the naval resistance army.

Bao Gang did not use the only six planes to block the Japanese landing, but divided two water reconnaissance planes to reconnoiter the enemy's situation along the road and escort the field battalion. The remaining four fighters and dive bombers were responsible for pumping out the cold to sneak up on the Japanese landing ships or landing forces. Bao Gang had a clear order that the four fighters must hit and run, and they were absolutely not allowed to engage with Japanese fighters, and they were not even allowed to use machine guns to strafe Japanese troops on the ground, so as to prevent them from being entangled by Japanese fighters. If there is danger, you can abandon the fight. In a word, it is unrealistic how much threat the four fighters want to pose to the Japanese brigade, and it is important to preserve the strength, and the only six planes of the Naval Resistance Army in Ceylon are a crucial part of the future battles.

The field battalion marching along the bowback route, the leader of the battalion was Qi Ruixuan. Among the several alternative blocking positions listed by the General Staff of the Naval Resistance Army, from north to south, there are Monal Mountain, Butel Mountain, and Katar Mountain.

The best place to fight a blocking battle should be Monar Hill, and this is the most dangerous of the two routes from the Japanese landing site. A road runs through the valley of the Monales, and with the addition of a mountain bypass, it is a full fifteen kilometers.

It can be said that if a blocking position is set up on the Monal Hills, it will be difficult for the Japanese army to break through the blocking of a field battalion even if it is a division. What's more, Monal Hill is also garrisoned by a battalion of British troops. In Bao Gang's plan, as long as they could hold this place, the British army could calmly transfer troops from Colombo.

Although the Japanese army still had a bowstring route along the coast to take, that line was densely forested, rivers and lakes crisscrossed the line, and the distance of more than 100 kilometers was difficult for the Japanese army to pass through even if it took ten days. Moreover, it can only be passed by individual soldiers, and it is simply impossible for heavy weapons to pass. What's more, the two well-trained jungle companies of the Naval Resistance Army are simply like fish in water there, and the Japanese army does not pay a heavy price, and it is simply a dream to pass.

The combat capability of the jungle troops of the Naval Resistance Army has been vividly demonstrated in Myanmar. According to Su Qing's battle report, the casualty ratio between the jungle battalion and the Japanese army reached more than one to two. Remember that this is the casualty ratio, you must know that the jungle soldiers of the Naval Resistance Army were basically rescued, while the Japanese soldiers were injured in the jungle, and those who could not find a large army in three or five days could only feed the ants and poisonous insects in the mountains.

The importance of Monal Hill lies in the fact that there is a road into the mountain from the west of Monal Hill (which can attack Colombo), and although it is difficult to pass tanks or other heavy weapons, there is no problem for mules and horses to pass. And the Monale Hill is guarded, and there are a total of four mountain roads leading to Colombo in the south, all of which can be safe.

It was precisely because of the strategic location of Mount Monale that the British stationed a battalion of troops here when the British were undermanned.

For the Naval Resistance Army, holding Monale Hill not only helped the British army block the Japanese army moving south, but also ensured the flank of Colombo, the capital of Ceylon, so as to prevent the Japanese army from attacking Colombo from the mountain path.

Of course, for the Naval Resistance Army, it was also blocking the route of the Japanese army to the south, and the northern defense line of Tanggang could ensure that it was not lost. In this regard, the interests of the Naval Resistance Army and the British Army are identical. Therefore, Bao Gang did not hesitate to give the order. (To be continued......)