Kiev, the headquarters of the Second Army Corps of the Chinese Expeditionary Force.

"The report shows that the German 11th Army has arrived in Zhytomyr and began a fierce attack on Zhytomyr, Korostviv and other fronts yesterday morning, and this time the German army prepared 3,000 guns of large and small calibers to shell the Russian positions in the two places for a day of continuous shelling, according to statistics, the Russian army killed more than 20,000 people, and another ??????."

This is the advantage of having a large number of artillery, you can carry out large-scale artillery bombardment of enemy positions at will, the key is that now there are no air force combat units here in the Tsarist Russia and the Second Army of the Chinese Army, and the Tsarist side has deployed the only fighters in the Western Front and the Northern Front, while the Southwestern Front has almost no fighters here, on the contrary, the German army has several airstrips nearby, and there are more than 100 fighters of various types.

The commander of the German 11th Army was August. Feng. Born on December 6, 1849, Mackensen was not born into a military family, his father was a real estate merchant. He entered the army on October 1, 1869, and was assigned to the elite skeleton hussar regiment and participated in the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71). In 1880 he was transferred to the General Staff, and in 1901 he was promoted to military attaché to Kaiser Wilhelm II. At the outbreak of World War I, he served as the commander of the 17th Army of the 8th Army (Commander General Prittwitz) on the Eastern Front, and later defeated the Russian army in the Battle of East Prussia under the leadership of Hindenburg and Ludendorff. In September he took part in the siege of Warsaw and the attack on Lodz in Poland, and subsequently rose to the rank of commander of the 9th Army. In April 1915, he was transferred to the commander of the 11th Army and was promoted to marshal for the defeat of the Russian army in the breakthrough of Gorlice. He served as commander of the 11th German-Austrian Army and moved to the Balkans. They swept through Serbia in two months, after which they returned home for a few months to recuperate. This time, together with the 11th Army, it was transferred to attack Kiev.

August. Feng. Mackensen is an extremely well-known expert in mobile warfare and a master of mobile warfare. Zhang Xiaozhun knows this very well, fighting a mobile war with Mackenson? With these rotten soldiers recruited from Southeast Asian countries, fighting a field battle with the elite German 11th Army commanded by Mackensen is purely looking for death, and living impatiently! Therefore, Zhang Xiaozhun decided to fight a defensive war with Mackensen in Kyiv.

Huaguo's military thinking has always been known for defense, in military history, most of the time Huaguo is in the defensive period, so many classic defensive warfare and defensive warfare ideas were born, but in fact, offense is the best defense, Zhang Xiaozhun decided to attack in the defensive process. Engage in urban street battles with the Germans.

After listening to the report of the operational staff officer of the headquarters, Zhang Xiaozhun picked up his military hat and put it on, and said: "It seems that in the next few days, our life will be difficult, pass the news to all departments, and let them be ready to fight the German army!" ”

On July 16, the Russian army retreated from Zhytomyr and Kolostviv, and the remnants of Zhytomyr's three Russian infantry divisions withdrew to Andreushovka, but on the way were overwhelmed by German Field Marshal August. Feng. The three cavalry divisions arranged by Mackensen were routed, and only more than two thousand escaped. 13,000 were killed and 22,000 were captured.

From this battle it can be seen that August. Feng. Mackensen was extremely adept at using highly mobile troops, especially cavalry units, to take advantage of its high speed to detour to unexpected places for surprise attacks.

Korostviv is actually very good at defense. It is located between two high mountains, stuck on one of the main roads to Kiev, and the journey from Korostviv to Kyiv is basically a flat race. There is no danger to defend, even if there are a few small towns in between. But this was not enough to withstand the German advance. The loss of Korostviv meant that there was nothing left in front of Kiev to stop the German offensive.

In these days. The counter-espionage department of the Second Army captured several German spies operating in Kiev, and these spies were captured in the first line of defense positions of the Second Army of the Chinese Army, after the defense of Kiev was taken over by the Second Army of the Chinese Army, the construction of fortifications basically did not involve the Russian army, so when building defensive positions, few Westerners appeared on the positions, and some Westerners appeared on the positions, which often means that this is likely to be German spies.

The German army was about to attack Kiev, and it was normal to send spies to spy on the military situation of the Second Army of the Chinese Army and obtain the deployment of defensive positions, so after capturing several German spies, Zhang Xiaozhun thought that it was necessary not only to strictly investigate the spies on the frontline positions, but also to strictly investigate the city of Kiev.

As the Germans became more and more convinced, Zhang Xiaozhun ordered all the local civilians in Kiev to be transferred to Dongcheng District and even other cities, and these civilians staying here would not only not be able to help, but would also be attacked by the Germans and cause unnecessary casualties. After the civilians were evacuated, the German spies could no longer hide, and many German spies were found and arrested under the strict investigation of the Chinese army.

On July 20, two infantry divisions of the vanguard of the German 11th Army arrived in front of the first line of defense defended by Wang Zhanyuan's Three Kingdoms Army. In this era, even the Germans could not shake off the shackles of positional warfare, and mobile warfare could not be developed when automatic firearms, tanks, and other equipment had not yet become widespread.

After the news of the arrival of the German army at the front reached the headquarters of the Second Army Corps, Zhang Xiaozhun very much wanted to take advantage of the fact that the German army was not firmly established to send troops to take him by surprise, but Zhang Xiaozhun quickly gave up this idea, he did not have a field force in his hands, and the combat effectiveness of the Three Kingdoms Army, the Vietnamese Army and the Korean Army was not even comparable to the Japanese, Tsarist Russians, and British, let alone fight the Germans, so it was better to fight the positional war honestly.

There were more than 20,000 Russian troops who fled back from the front, but these remnants of the defeated soldiers had been frightened by the German army, and Zhang Xiaozhun did not expect these Russian troops who had lost their courage to do anything more, he sent people to transfer all these defeated troops to the city east of the Dnieper River to rest, and sent officers to reorganize them, distribute them with new equipment, and wait for these mud people to recover their morale before sending them to the battlefield as artillery fire.

On July 22, the commander of the German 11th Army, August. Feng. Marshal Mackensen and his command had arrived in Zhytomyr, and he felt a headache after listening to the reports of several division commanders at the front, according to the limited information from the spies, the Chinese had turned Kyiv into an iron bucket, they had their backs to the Dnieper, and relied on the surrounding hills, highlands, rivers and lakes to dig a large number of trenches in all directions, and train all the defensive positions into a line, but each position existed separately, and the intelligence services suffered heavy losses. However, until now, we have not been able to find out the situation of the opponent's troop deployment, and this is very crucial, because if we do not understand the opponent's troop deployment, we will not be able to know the key points and weak points of the opponent's defense.

On this day, Zhang Xiaozhun also took Wu Peifu and Yang Jie and other headquarters personnel to Wang Zhanyuan's defensive position to inspect, and the group inspected the defensive line position for nearly two hours, and the chief of staff Yang Jie found that the front of the mountainous position garrisoned by the Bhutan and Nepalese Corps was very broad, and the positions of their own personnel were all at a high place, if the German army attacked from here, our side could be condescending, which was very advantageous in operation, and the only deficiency was that the Nepalese Corps and the Bhutanese Corps were small in number. After the Nepalese Corps was transferred from 3,000 Gurkha elites, only 12,000 people remained, while Bhutan was a small country with few land, and only 10,000 were recruited this time, and most of these soldiers were people who had not undergone formal training, and they had only learned to shoot guns before they came, which made many senior generals of the Second Army very worried.

During the inspection, Yang Jie, chief of staff of the corps, suddenly thought of a way, perhaps this method can play a certain role in the defense, he immediately said to Zhang Xiaozhun and Wu Peifu: "Two corps commanders, you see that the front is open, and our army's defensive positions are basically located in high places, if we divide the area in the large open land in front, draw a square grid with white paint, and use these drawn squares to divide the entire open area into several areas, and each platoon or each company is responsible for defending an area. As long as the German army enters a certain area, the company or platoon in charge of this area will immediately open fire, each responsible for its own area, if there are casualties, it must be immediately replenished to keep the firepower not weakened, the advantage of this is that each performs its own duties, each is responsible for its own area, our side will not lightly expose all the fire points, even if the German army conducts fire reconnaissance, it is useless, and there is another advantage, that is, after the division of the area, it is actually equivalent to the action of the German army is fixed, The company in charge of the area is like a fixed target, and it also avoids unnecessary waste of ammunition."

When Zhang Xiaozhun and Wu Peifu heard this, their eyes lit up at the same time, and Wu Peifu said to Zhang Xiaozhun: "Commander, I think this tactic is feasible, why don't you try it?" ”

Zhang Xiaozhun thought for a while and immediately said: "Okay, then try it and see the effect of defensive tactics!" ”

So the order was quickly issued to Wang Zhanyuan's hands, Wang Zhanyuan immediately gave an order to his generals after receiving the order, according to Yang Jie's instructions to divide the area of hundreds of meters in front of the position into a square grid, draw lines with white paint, after a busy day, finally all the areas in front of the position are separated by white lines, and then assign tasks to the defending troops, so that each company is responsible for an area. Whenever an enemy enters the area, open fire.

August. Feng. Markenson was never a man who liked to sit and wait for the situation to change, despite his age, he was still full of energy, he liked to take the situation into his hands rather than be led by the nose, so he ordered his troops to launch a tentative attack on the first line of defense of the Second Army of China, as a way to conduct fire reconnaissance of the defense line of the Three Kingdoms Army.

On the morning of July 23, the eight infantry divisions of the German 11th Army respectively drew part of their forces to launch a tentative attack on the first line of defense defended by Wang Zhanyuan's corps, so as to conduct fire reconnaissance on Wang Zhanyuan's defense line, in order to find out the weak points of Wang Zhanyuan's defense line (to be continued......