On the night of 8 June, the second submarine team of the Maritime Resistance Army. A small submarine of the Fox class sank two Japanese transport ships under the tight protection of the Japanese fleet. Due to its location in shallow offshore waters, it was sunk by a Japanese destroyer dropping depth charges, and the Maritime Resistance Army lost its first submarine in World War II. All 37 fighters of the Naval Resistance Army were killed. The 21st Division of the Japanese Army lost nearly 1,000 troops and nearly 1,000 tons of supplies and ammunition.

In fact, this was the only submarine of the Maritime Resistance Army near Ceylon, and the Japanese landing was indeed sudden enough, and the navy of the Naval Resistance Army could not do everything due to insufficient troops.

Ren Tianyang's Second Submarine Team is currently the unit with the largest number of submarines in the Maritime Resistance Force, with a total of seven Lixi-class submarines and one supply submarine of the subordinate-class submarine. Although the strength is not weak, it simply cannot withstand such consumption. Therefore, Bao Gang made adjustments to the tasks of the Second Submarine Squadron, and in addition to the reconnaissance mission, Ren Tianyang's Second Submarine Squadron was still the Japanese army's logistical supply fleet, and if it was not sure, it was not allowed to attack the Japanese fleet, so as to avoid submarine losses as much as possible.

This is not that the submarine force is avoiding war, but that the naval resistance force has already calculated the economic account, and although the submarine attack on the warship has achieved brilliant results, it is extremely uneconomical compared with the attack on the merchant ship.

In addition, it is difficult to replenish the strength of the naval resistance forces, especially the submarine forces and the air force. With the launch of newly built submarines, the proportion of new recruits increases, the combat experience is insufficient, the combat effectiveness decreases, and the attack on Japanese warships, or the transport fleet, which is closely protected by the fleet, will outweigh the losses.

For the Maritime Resistance Force, every submarine and every submarine crew is an extremely valuable combat power, and if the fighters are given time, the combat effectiveness of a submarine will be doubled.

Cutler Hill on June 9 was peaceful and quiet.

Ten kilometers away, the Naval Resistance Army is stepping up the construction of fortifications. The Japanese army rested at Monal Hill.

The Japanese did not attack, not because of insufficient troops. The main force led by Shinichi Hirai almost all reached Monale Hill.

An infantry wing of the Japanese army had three infantry brigades, and the subordinate units generally consisted of four auxiliary brigades or squadrons and four divisions.

For example, the Hirai Wing has four auxiliary brigades or squadrons, including chariots (some units are configured as cavalry), artillery, engineers, and baggage and baggage, with the number ranging from 200 to 800. The four ministries are: communications, sanitation, and weapons maintenance. Four departments, including epidemic prevention and water supply, have a total strength of nearly 4,000 troops.

With so many troops, the strength cannot be considered insufficient, but Hirai Shinichi Nakasa said lightly, "The soldiers are too tired." "The offense was suspended.

Saburo Takeshita was very angry by this sentence, and his troops were even more tired yesterday. But he was urged by Shinichi Hirai to fight hard again and again, and as a result, he suffered heavy losses.

Shinichi Hirai simply ignored Saburo Takeshita's dissatisfaction. The official level crushed people to death. Whether it is the government or the military, whether it is China or a foreign country, this principle is universal.

Shinichi Hirai, who was promoted by connections, is not completely incapable of fighting, and after carefully studying what happened to Saburo Takeshita yesterday, Hirai Nakasa believes that the current forces cannot occupy Mt. Cutler. Saburo Takeshita's offensive deployment was also carefully studied, and finally he came to a conclusion. The opponent's weapons and equipment are very strong, and if there is no heavy artillery support, there is no air support, and he Shinichi Hirai also has no tricks at all with the opposite position.

Saburo Takeshita had difficulty calling in for support from naval aviation. He, Shinichi Hirai, can still do this. However, the Navy said that the focus of the operation on the 9th was to support another wing of the 21st Brigade led by Rear Admiral Chestnut Blossom in Shanxi, with the aim of capturing Trincomalee from behind.

Trincomalee has the main force of the British army, so the ground forces also need more air support. However, the navy promised that on the 10th, it would draw air power to support Shinichi Hirai's operation.

It's not like the Japanese devils can't fight without planes, but Shinichi Hirai doesn't want to consume his two infantry wings on Cutler Hill like this. At noon, an independent field artillery brigade assigned to Shinichi Hirai arrived at the battlefield.

At this time, Shinichi Hirai already had nearly 5,000 troops. Shinichi Hirai still ordered the troops to take a break for the time being.

It should be said that Shinichi Hirai Nakasa has a bit of a non-traditional Japanese officer's flavor.

There is a widely circulated story in the Japanese Army: what should the commander do if a military school has an exam question and finds that there is an enemy in front of him?

Different people have different answers. Some think that it is necessary to reconnoitre, and some think that it is necessary to mobilize troops.

However, the correct answer is - offense.

In the Japanese Army, offense was the tactic of choice in any situation.

At five o'clock in the afternoon, news came from the direction of Trincomalee. After a day of hard fighting, the 21st Brigade, the brigade commander, Major General Chestnut Flower, made a decisive breakthrough.

With the 21st Division, the main force of the Japanese army, not yet fully landed, it single-handedly defeated the British defenders in Trincomalee with the strength of an infantry wing. By five o'clock, the city of Trincomalee had been invaded, and it was expected that the remnants of the enemy would be cleared out that night and Trincomalee would be completely occupied.

When Shinichi Hirai and his subordinates got the news, they were all stimulated. Officers at all levels immediately became in a state of chicken blood. Among them, the most enthusiastic is Saburo Takeshita.

The Hirai Wing is the main brigade of the two infantry wings that are independently mixed into the 21st Division. This time, the two infantry wings were divided into two wings, and the brigade commander, Major General Yama Pepper and Flower, personally led the other infantry wing, and the fundamental reason was that he was not at ease. However, Major General Yamaguchi Chestnut Peanut allowed the Hirai Wing to fight independently, which was to put it bluntly, a recognition of Hirai Shinichi's command talent. In addition, Major General Yama Chestnut Blossom believes that there are excellent officers such as Saburo Takeshita in the Hirai Wing. In short, he has considerable confidence in the independent operation of the Hirai Wing, Major General Yama Chestnut Flower.

When the news came that Major General Chestnut Blossom was about to take Trincomalee, it immediately stimulated all the officers of the Hirai Wing.

Although Saburo Takeshita took Mount Monal, his achievements were not small. But the capture of Monal Hill was entirely the exploit of Saburo Takeshita. The other two infantry battalions of the Hirai Wing did not have the slightest credit.

From the point of view of military exploits, even if the Hirai wing took Mount Cutler, it was not as brilliant as the other infantry wing that won Trincomalee. You must know that in the eyes of the Japanese army, there are only three places in Ceylon that are the most important. At the top of the list is Colombo, the capital of Ceylon, then the Trincomalee military port, and then the Don port. In terms of infrastructure, the Trincomalee military port was operated by the British for hundreds of years. Tang Port simply cannot be compared. Moreover, by occupying Trincomalee, the Japanese Navy had a supply base, which played an extremely important role in the war in Ceylon.

The subordinates are begging for battle, and Shinichi Hirai is also planning. Shinichi Hirai also longed for military exploits, but standing tall and seeing far away, Hirai Shinichi did not limit his exploits to the opposite Cutler Mountain.

In order to overwhelm another infantry wing, it was not enough to take the opposite side of Cutler Hill. Even the capture of Tang Port was not brilliant enough. The only thing that could be more brilliant was the capture of Colombo, and even the entry into Colombo could overshadow the exploits of another infantry wing.

If the officers of the Naval Resistance Army knew about Shinichi Hirai's thoughts, they would definitely scoff at it. But in the Japanese army. Shinichi Hirai's arrogant ideas are definitely not shared by a few.

Neither Shinichi Hirai nor one of his subordinates, including Saburo Takeshita, who suffered the defeat, did not think that taking Cutler Hill was a problem at this time.

This is also overly arrogant. Having just taken Mount Monal, and not even being able to capture Mount Cutler, they wanted to attack Colombo. What's even more incredible. Shinichi Hirai did not even think that the Naval Resistance Army in Tang Port was the main opponent.

Shinichi Hirai's transformation speed is amazing, and he still looks steady and steady in the morning. Now he is hurriedly deploying an attack.

In yesterday's battle. The Japanese artillery battle was completely defeated. BUT WITH THE SUPPORT OF AN INDEPENDENT FIELD ARTILLERY BRIGADE, HIRAI SHINICHI ALREADY HAD SIX 105MM CANNONS, SIX 120MM HOWITZERS, AND EIGHT 75MM MOUNTAIN GUNS (ORIGINALLY TWELVE, FOUR WERE DESTROYED YESTERDAY BY THE NAVAL RESISTANCE FORCES. ）

HIRAI SHINICHI BELIEVES THAT THE 75MM MOUNTAIN ARTILLERY IS NO MATCH FOR THE NAVAL RESISTANCE ARMY. HOWEVER, THE 105MM CANNON AND THE 120MM FIELD CANNON ARE VERY POWERFUL AND CAN DEFINITELY SUPPRESS THE OPPONENT.

Even without air support, Shinichi Hirai had strong confidence to take the position.

What's more, Shinichi Hirai's tank squadron, eight Type 95 light tanks and four Type 97 medium tanks are now also fully in place.

With his troops and heavy equipment, Shinichi Hirai decided to attack immediately. He also intends to take the Cutler Hill position before dawn tomorrow. Then divide the troops into the mountains and attack Colombo.

For Hirai Shinichi's command, Saburo Takeshita scoffed, he didn't prepare early, and it was too hasty to start the fight now. However, Takeshita Saburo's voice is now a little weak, and in Hirai Shinichi's deployment, Takeshita Saburo will be responsible for garrisoning Cutler Mountain and Monar Mountain after the Japanese army occupies Cutler Mountain.

At six o'clock, the Japanese artillery opened fire.

If it is in the navy, the heavy artillery of this level of the Japanese army is nothing. But on land, the power of the Japanese heavy artillery was still quite terrifying, and the position of Cutler Hill hit by twelve heavy guns was in shambles.

Shinichi Hirai was very satisfied with the effect of such an artillery bombardment. Fifteen minutes of artillery preparation, the mountain beam in front of him has been ravaged by shells. With the extension of routine artillery fire, the Japanese infantry attacked with the support of tanks.

The Japanese heavy artillery looked good, but it did damage to the naval resistance army. The Naval Resistance Army left only one or two observation posts on each position, and the main forces rested in the anticline fortifications behind the mountain.

With the cover of fortifications, even if the Japanese army can cover and attack Kattler Mountain, it will be difficult to inflict much damage on the Naval Resistance Army. What's more, although these twelve cannons are powerful, the little devils who cut the door are not willing to bomb continuously at all, and only destroy some temporary fortifications on the mountain, and the real damage to the naval resistance army is extremely limited.

The little devil with a serious lack of transportation capacity is simply not able to consume a small number of shells unscrupulously.

Under the cover of artillery fire, the devils did not advance slowly, and finally gained a foothold a kilometer or two in front of the position.

The Naval Resistance Army's study of the Japanese army's tactics was quite profound, and on the Chinese battlefield, the Japanese army had always relied on aircraft and artillery to open the way, and its tactics of attacking fortified positions were actually very monotonous. The tactics of the Japanese army are nothing more than the artillery bombardment of the infantry attack, and if it can't be attacked, it will come back again, and so on.

To deal with such tactics, Qi Ruixuan not only had experience, but also prepared early. To say that the difference between the naval resistance army and the domestic Chinese army, in addition to the strength of weapons and equipment, more important is the advanced tactics. On the domestic battlefield, a division-sized commander may not necessarily remember calling for air support. One is that it is useless to call, and Chairman Chiang does not have a few fighters at all. The second is that most of the officers of the miscellaneous units have no experience in commanding the air force at all. Even when the air force fighters arrived on the ground, they could only rely on the pilot's eyes to find the target, and the ground troops had no equipment to communicate with the pilot, and they could not indicate the target to the pilot at all.

But the naval resistance army is completely different, fighting at the company and platoon level. Calling fighter support is already a normal cooperation.

Qi Ruixuan had already called for fighter support when the Japanese heavy artillery fired. He understands that the best weapon against long-range heavy artillery is a fighter.

The Japanese attack was hasty, and the artillery was a temporary artillery fortification, and more than a dozen heavy guns were actually displayed in the field behind a forest.

Sheltered by mountains and forests, although it can block the sight of the artillery of the Maritime Resistance Army, it cannot evade the reconnaissance of the fighters. In addition, the observers on the ground of the Maritime Resistance Army accurately reported the position of the Japanese heavy artillery, and if the pilots of the Naval Resistance Army could not find the devil heavy artillery. That's weird.

At half past six, Japanese infantry, supported by six tanks, stormed the Cutler Hill position. Shinichi Hirai couldn't help but feel a little proud when he saw that his troops had already attacked the mid-mountain and victory was already in sight.

At this moment, the only four fighters of the Naval Resistance Army arrived on the battlefield.

Army aviation of various countries bombed the ground. It's nothing more than horizontal bombing and dive bombing. But the army's dive bombing, because most of the fighters used are not professional dive bombers. The direct hit rate on the target is low. In order to increase the effectiveness of bombing. A quantity-plus-quality approach was taken, so most of the bombs were carried.

However, the training mode of the naval resistance force is the same whether it is naval aviation or ground aviation, and its dive bombing training is aimed at moving targets such as surface ships, and it is really not too simple to bomb targets on the ground.

The two 250-kilogram bombs dropped by the two fighters were terrifying enough, and only two bombs blew up a heavy Japanese artillery. Dozens of devils went to meet Aunt Amaterasu.

And the 800-kilogram grenades dropped by two dive bombers were even more terrifying.

The killing range of the two 800-kilogram bombs was so terrifying that almost no one was spared within a radius of three or four hundred meters from the explosion point. ONE OF THE BOMBS EXPLODED LESS THAN TWENTY METERS FROM A JAPANESE 120MM FIELD GUN. This powerful bomb not only killed dozens of devils on the spot. And at a distance of twenty meters, a steel heavy cannon weighing three or four tons was overturned. What's more serious is that the dozens of shells piled up nearby were blown out tens or hundreds of meters by a powerful shock wave, and when the shells landed, they exploded violently again.

When the smoke cleared, the Japanese artillery positions were in shambles, and the dead were all over the ground. If the bloody scene frightens the devils, a corpse that does not have much damage on the outside is even more terrifying.

From Qi Ruixuan's point of view, the mud blown up by the explosion of the two giant bombs was like a black rose in full bloom, which was extremely spectacular. Qi Ruixuan suddenly had a thought in his mind, how enjoyable it would be to replace large-caliber artillery with dive bombers. It doesn't take too much, ten bombers drop bombs at once, and they can clear at least one square kilometer of positions.

YOU MUST KNOW THAT IN THE ARMY, MORE THAN 100 MM ARTILLERY CAN BE CALLED HEAVY ARTILLERY, AND MOST COUNTRIES ARE ARMED WITH SIX-INCH (150MM LEVEL) ARTILLERY AS THE MAIN FORCE. LIKE THE 203MM, OR 240MM GUNS ARE NOT NOTHING, BUT THE BARREL IS TOO HEAVY AND DIFFICULT TO MANEUVER. However, no matter what kind of heavy artillery it is, compared with the 800 kilogram bombs carried by dive bombers, it is really not a grade weaker.

It should be said that Qi Ruixuan's idea is very reasonable. In World War II, German Hitler also wanted to replace large-caliber heavy artillery with dive bombers, but limited by national strength, Germany could not manufacture enough dive bombers, so it was not able to be used on a large scale on the battlefield.

If the naval resistance force adopts this tactic, it will have an inherent advantage. First of all, the tactic that the pilots of the Naval Resistance Army trained the most was dive bombing, and the top masters are now able to achieve almost the level of precision strikes. Secondly, the Naval Resistance Forces were able to buy dive bombers from the United States.

After this battle, Qi Ruixuan reported the idea to the staff of the Naval Resistance Army, which immediately aroused the interest of the staff.

Just four fighters and a small wave of air raids paralyzed the Japanese heavy artillery.

Taking advantage of the short time when the Japanese heavy artillery was extinguished, the artillery of the Naval Resistance Army, which had been suppressed for half an hour, began to fire retaliatory, and almost all the artillery fire was fired together.

The devil soldiers are also battle-hardened, but whether it is on the Chinese battlefield or in the Nanyang battlefield, it is the first time they have encountered such a fierce artillery cover. In just a few minutes, the Japanese attacking troops suffered heavy casualties under the raging artillery fire.

Shinichi Hirai was dumbfounded. Although the heavy artillery was not destroyed by the fighters of the Naval Resistance Army, the casualties of the artillery were too heavy. A quarter of the centaurs were removed at once.

In just such a round of artillery fire, the devil was killed and wounded more than 200 people, and lost one tank.

Shinichi Hirai's eyes were blood-red from this loss, and he immediately organized another attack. However, until dark, the Japanese were not able to launch another attack.

A miracle happened, the independent field artillery brigade was not a direct unit of Shinichi Hirai, and the commander of the artillery brigade, Ono, refused to fight. He believed that there must be artillery positions with better concealment, otherwise it would be irresponsible to the emperor, and the precious artillery could not be destroyed by the opponent in the wild.

Shinichi Hirai was furious, but to no avail. He had already seen the opponent's artillery fire, and without heavy artillery support, letting the infantry attack was absolutely in vain. It was normal for the Japanese army to ignore the lives and deaths of lower-level officers and soldiers. But all the soldiers are dead, where can I find Shinichi Hirai's exploits? Therefore, it is rare that Shinichi Hirai did not drive the infantry to attack again. (To be continued......)