Major General Ushijima Mitsuru personally flew to Shanghai to dispatch the headquarters of the Central China Dispatch Army. Reporting the defeat to the commander General Shunroku Hatata, His Excellency Shunroku Hata was extremely shocked, the imperial army fought in China, even if the battle was fierce, it would not lose the flag of the wing, it seems that the tenacity of the defenders of North Thailand far exceeded expectations.

Shunroku Hatatake immediately summoned the commander of the Army Aviation Corps, Lieutenant General Ehashi Eijiro, and ordered him to suspend the bombing of Wuhan and organize a powerful air force to deliver a devastating blow to North Tai.

The aviation sent the 60th Heavy Bombardment Squadron and the 10th Combat Squadron to North Thailand in a vigorous manner to carry out the first round of retaliation.

At the Jiangnan air defense post, the air defense observers under the cover of lush branches and foliage heard a dull roar coming from the sky, and hurriedly picked up the telescope to observe. ”

The air defense siren on the building of the Beitai City Hall sounded violently, and the people entered the nearest air-raid shelter one after another, and many civil defense fortifications were designed at the time of construction, and after the war, residents were encouraged to dig improvised air-raid shelters in their yards, just to resist the Japanese bombing.

The common people entered the air-raid shelter, but the army went up to the roof of the building, set up machine guns, and in the anti-aircraft artillery position, the artillery quickly took position, shook the handle, and pointed the muzzle of the gun to the sky.

Before the 72 Type 93 heavy bombers had just crossed the Huai River, dozens of Soviet-style Iraq-16 fighters appeared in the air, and it turned out that the North Thai side had long expected that the Japanese army would send bombers to retaliate, and after coordination with the Wuhan Military Committee, the Soviet volunteer air force was borrowed to fight an air blockade battle.

The Japanese fighters in charge of cover met them and engaged the Soviet planes, but the bombers were unaffected and continued to move forward, focusing on the Beitai railway station, the steel plant, and the barracks.

From a distance, the chimneys and cooling towers of the power plant in Beitai are still smoking, the city is not big, but it is very regular, presumably it must have taken a lot of effort to build such a city, the pilots thought silently.

Intelligence showed that the Chinese army was equipped with imported Ericon anti-aircraft guns, so the bombers maintained an altitude of 5,000 meters and carried out horizontal bombing.

Suddenly, the plane trembled, anti-aircraft shells exploded one after another, raising clouds of smoke, the plane was shot, the pilots shouted, hurriedly jumped out with their parachute bags on their backs, opened their parachutes in the air, and saw their own planes falling down one after another, and then looking at the feet under their feet, there was anti-aircraft artillery fire everywhere, and the density of fire seemed to be stronger than that of Wuhan.

There are not many anti-aircraft guns that can hit an altitude of 5,000 meters, and only a few FLAK36 88mm anti-aircraft guns imported from Germany can reach this level.

With the 88 guns equipped with proximity fuses, all the planes were vulnerable, and the 60th Heavy Bombardment Squadron hurried back without dropping all the bombs, they were important air units, and they could not be lost in vain in an insignificant place.

The air battle was won and lost, the Soviet air force lost three aircraft, and the Japanese lost six fighters, and the battle was again won by a big victory.

When the news reached Wuhan, Chairman Chiang personally issued a commendation order, and a boatload of condolences was transported from Hankou, and the Military Committee also realized the importance of North Thailand, and if the Japanese invaders wanted to press on Wuhan, they must first pull out the nail of North Thailand, so the highest authorities appointed Chen Zikun as the commander-in-chief of the defense of the middle reaches of the Huai River, and led his troops to resist the Japanese invaders.

The embarrassing problem is that there is no regular army in Jiangbei as a whole, and it relies entirely on the police and militia groups to fight, so it is unreasonable to say that it wants to send more troops, but after the Battle of Songhu, the Central Army's strength is overstretched, and it still has to defend various key cities, so it really can't draw troops.

In the midst of all difficulties, Chen Cheng suggested that the chairman of the committee restore the establishment of the model 17th Division and let the Jiangdong people defend their homeland by themselves.

At this time, Chen Qilin, Liu Xiaoyong and others had been sitting on the cold bench in Wuhan for several months, and during the war years, the state government was in chaos, and there were too many troops that had broken up the formation, and the commanders of the light poles were all over the streets, all shouting for the restoration of the formation, recruiting troops, how could the central government have so many weapons and equipment, and the central army itself could not feed it, let alone the miscellaneous armed forces.

Although Chen Qilin is a descendant of Huangpu, he has been the chief of staff in Jiangdong for many years, and has gradually alienated himself from the center, although those old classmates have become division commanders and brigade commanders, but they can't speak in the Military Commission, seeing that his subordinates can't even eat, Chen Qilin is in a hurry, and his hair is about to turn white.

Suddenly, the news came, North Thailand fought three battles and won three victories, annihilated thousands of Japanese invaders, and the spoils of war were sent to Wuhan for exhibition, Chen Qilin felt that this was an opportunity, and hurriedly came to the Ministry of Military Affairs to report.

A week later, Chen Qilin took a letter of appointment and hundreds of subordinates to Beitai by boat, and the formation of the Model 17th Division was finally restored, but the Military Commission did not have enough soldiers for him, so only two companies were drawn from the garrison to set up the 17th Division, which was enough for Chen Qilin.

He didn't want soldiers and equipment, but a chance to go into battle and kill the enemy.

The reinforcements from Wuhan have once again boosted the hearts of the North Thai army, which shows that they are not fighting alone, in fact, the official has been claiming that they can get a steady stream of supplies from the rear, in fact, there are only a handful of food and ammunition transported from Wuhan, and North Thailand is completely fighting alone.

Fortunately, Chen Zikun took precautions, hid a large number of munitions, and the refugees from Beitai gathered, erected a recruitment flag, and there were people who ate food, and recruited 2,000 strong men in just a few days, so that the 17th Division was pulled up, and Beitai was also garrisoned by a regular army.

Chen Zikun continued to ask Wuhan for supplies, food, ammunition and gasoline were urgently needed in Beitai, but the rear needed these materials even more, especially gasoline, which was extremely expensive, and the chairman of the committee personally approved the slips and replenished only 100 barrels.

Or Gong Zijun had a way, took gold bars and dollars to Wuhan in person, and successfully got a batch of gasoline, it turned out that it was not that there was no gasoline, but most of it was hoarded by people who had access to it, and as long as they were willing to spend money, they could buy it.

……

The Japanese army was anxious to solve the enemy in North Thailand, and sent warships to the north along the river, but the lower reaches of the Huai River were covered with mines, and after losing a destroyer, the navy said that it could not do anything and asked the army to solve the trouble by itself.

The Central China Dispatch Army Headquarters moved from Shanghai to Nanjing, and began to implement the "Key Points for Guiding the War with Autumn Operations as the Center" formulated by the General Staff Headquarters, and destroyed Wuhan, the last center of Chiang Kai-shek's regime.

To attack Wuhan, you must first uproot Beitai, and the six generals of Shun Hata mobilized 50,000 troops, including the mecha wing and the heavy artillery brigade, to approach Beitai with the momentum of killing chickens with knives, and claimed that this was also part of the Wuhan raid on the base camp.

The engineering units first repaired the railroad destroyed by the Chinese army, and then pulled a truckload of troops to the south bank of the Huai River, and the 240-mm super-heavy howitzers carried on the train began to bombard.

The huge 240-caliber artillery shells needed to be loaded with cranes, and with each round fired, the earth trembled, and the shells whistled down to the urban area of Beitai, and there was a sea of fire everywhere.

On the south bank, the 150-mm field cannons of the Independent Heavy Artillery Brigade also joined the shelling, and this time the Central China Dispatch Army made a bloody investment, and the shells poured down on the north bank without a moment's pause.

The north shore was unable to counterattack, and only four 105-mm howitzers were able to get the Japanese army, but there was only one base number of shells left, and since Germany recognized Manchukuo in February, the arms trade with China stopped, and the shells were one less than one, and after the fighting, these four guns were useless.

The city trembled in the artillery fire, countless houses were destroyed, everywhere was in flames, the heaviest losses were the refugee camp in the west of the city, where the tents were dense, the aerial reconnaissance looked like a barracks, so the most shells were hit, the refugees were killed and wounded, miserable, and the death was as high as 1,000 according to later statistics.

As soon as the shelling stopped, the bombing began, and this time the protagonist was the Japanese naval aviation's Type 96 land attack, the emblem of the rising sun in the sky was like the bloody mouth of the god of death, and the four fighters of Beitai were all shot down after shooting down three bombers and five escort fighters.

The Japanese bombers focused on taking care of the airfield in North Thailand, and the runway was bombed with craters, and it was useless to see it, and the worst thing was that the oil depot was bombed and exploded, and all the gasoline that had been accumulated was gone.

The dock was also heavily bombed, and three cargo ships were sunk.

In the underground command post of the city hall, the gloomy clouds were bleak, although they had long known that with the power of the city of North Thailand, they could not resist the Japanese army's overwhelming soldiers, but at the last moment, everyone was still very sad.

"Cheer up, there will be a tough battle to fight tomorrow." Chen Zikun was so strong that he was exhausted by the shelling and bombardment that lasted for three days.

……

At dawn the next day, the Japanese shelled again, Beitai was still unable to fight back, and the Japanese army sent a squadron of infantry to sneak up the Huaijiang Iron Bridge.

In the mist of dawn, the railroad tracks stretched out into the distance like two long snakes, the infantry wore 90 iron caps on their heads, held 38-type rifles, and walked cautiously, they were scouts, born to be cannon fodder, if the Zhina army fired, the rear artillery would be suppressed by fire, in other words, they used their lives to attract the enemy to expose the fire point.

But the Chinese army did not open fire, a squadron of Japanese troops all passed through the iron bridge, a dense burst of gunfire broke out on the opposite bank, and five minutes later, a green flare rose into the sky, which was a signal that the bridgehead had been successfully established.

The mecha brigade moved when it heard the wind, and 32 Type 95 light tanks drove up the Huaijiang Iron Bridge with green smoke, and the convoy was flanked by covering infantry.

In the bunker on the north shore, Chen Zikun put down the binoculars and said calmly: "It's time." ”

Xiao Lang closed his eyes and pressed the switch for electric detonation.

The Huaijiang Iron Bridge was broken into four pieces by the sound of violent explosions and fell into the river, and at the same time, the artillery on the north bank, which had been dormant for many days, let out a final roar.