Yan Changxi is doing a good job in the United States, but Chen Feng is very busy at home, and although the large-scale reorganization of the troops has refined the establishment and functions of the troops, it has also brought about tremendous changes in the entire Eighth Theater from top to bottom, especially the command level. The improvement and expansion of the troop is a test for both soldiers and officers, especially officers.

In order to strengthen the command ability of officers and also to enhance the combat effectiveness of the troops, Chen Feng began to train officers at the division and brigade level after the troops completed their redeployment in early March. Unlike the Central Army, a large part of these officers under Chen Feng's command have not received systematic military education, and if they only serve as grass-roots officers at the battalion and company level, it is nothing, and now neither the Japanese army nor the Kuomintang troops have very high requirements for the quality of grass-roots officers.

However, with the small expansion of the establishment of the troops, many former battalion and regiment-level officers have become divisional and brigade-level officers, and Li Wensheng, Li Yifeng, and others have become the commander-in-chief of the group army, which has made Chen Feng have a lot of doubts about the command ability of these capable cadres. Whether they are up to their current position or whether they can lead tens of thousands of troops, if not, the result will be disastrous.

After the eventual meeting, Chen Feng discussed with Yang Yi and others and decided to conduct a whole training for officers at and above the division and brigade level, with him personally serving as the instructor, so as to make these old and rough mud legs know what a large corps combat is in the shortest possible time.

In addition, as the weather warms up, the production and construction of the entire Suicha area in the new year is about to begin, and Chen Feng needs to personally approve the design and design of the agricultural industry and commercial construction throughout this year. So, during the day, he gave lectures to the officers. In the evening, Chen Feng stayed up all night to give instructions to the documents sent by various departments, and he had to prepare for classes at the end of the day, and the whole person was busy like a spinning top.

Chen Feng's life is not easy, and the Japanese are also having a hard time. They first knocked on the door of the Eighth Theater with mines and won their first victory in the Eighth Theater. But the Chinese army was not slow to retaliate, and immediately after that, they blew up the warship they were going to transfer the gold of Chinese cultural relics in Tianjin, sinking a cruiser and damaging two destroyers.

This is secondary, and the most important thing is that the friction in the north is getting bigger and bigger, and the Kwantung Army and the Soviet Far Eastern Front are tense, and the atmosphere is becoming more and more tense. A big war could break out at any moment.

Since the Russo-Japanese War. The Japanese threat from the north was gradually eliminated. But nine. After the 18th Incident, as the Kwantung Army believed that the time had come to intervene in China's internal affairs, and wanted to realize its old dream of invading Manchuria, it brazenly sent troops to occupy the four eastern provinces (including Rehe). As a result, the Soviet Union was in direct contact with Japan over the defense line. The nerves become extremely tense. After Japan and "Manchukuo" shared responsibility for defense. The Soviet Union immediately concluded the same agreement with Outer Mongolia to confront it.

This nervous tension escalated as the puppet "Manchukuo" state began to build a military railway to develop the border, and in response to the military pressure from the Japanese Kwantung Army and the puppet Manchukuo, the Soviet Union also accelerated the completion of the double-track project in Siberia. Full development of Eastern Siberia. The Trans-Siberian Railway stretched from Chita around the border of "Manchukuo" to Vladivostok, so the defense line of the Soviet Union ran from the coast in the east, through Siberia in the east and Outer Mongolia in the west, encircling "Manchukuo" on three sides, and the border of "Manchukuo" was in direct contact with the most active artery of the Soviet Union, so border disputes often occurred.

More importantly, due to the independence of Outer Mongolia and the September 18 Incident, the border line between the Soviet Union and Manchu was not clear. Originally, the national border around Manchuria was demarcated by 11 treaties and agreements between China and Russia, including the Treaty of Nebuchu in 1689, and the puppet "Manchu" government had to inherit these provisions, but some of them were often very vague and could be interpreted arbitrarily, and the boundary markers were set very few, and they had lost their role as boundary markers because they had been exposed to wind and rain for many years, especially the 600-kilometer eastern suburbs from Xingkai Lake to the Tumen River and the Hulunbuir grassland in the northwest bordering "Manchu" and Mongolia were the most blurred.

The Nomenkan area refers to the area about 200 kilometers south of Hailar, that is, from the Khandagai - General Temple - Amu Nei line to the Haraha River. This area is a strategic point that both Outer Mongolia and the puppet state of Manchukuo attach great importance to, and in the eyes of Japan, it is an excellent area for entering and exiting Outer Mongolia and even the Soviet Union, so the Japanese Kwantung Army and the General Staff Headquarters wishfully determined the border line in their favor and prepared to launch a blitzkrieg at any time to capture Outer Mongolia.

The Outer Mongolian side asserts that the Haraha River is their territorial river, and the border between the two sides is through the east and north sides of the Haraha River. The line they advocate is the demarcation line drawn by the Qing government as early as 1734 when the Harga and Haraha were fighting each other for territory. The Soviet Union was not a vegetarian either, and Stalin was always wary of Japan, an East Asian power that had defeated the Slavic nation in the Russo-Japanese War, so he quickly sent troops into Mongolia, preparing for the worst, and was determined to fight Japan to the death.

As early as the beginning of the 30s, there were signs of the Kwantung Army getting involved in Outer Mongolia. By 1935, there was a sharp increase in conflicts over specific borders. In the spring of 1937, someone in the Outer Mongolian Army secretly planned a counter-insurrection. In July of the same year, news of the Japanese army's military operations in the Pingjin area caused great fluctuations among the Outer Mongolians. As a result, the Soviet Far Eastern Army was "invited" to enter Outer Mongolia. In this way, the Kwantung Army, which single-handedly assumed the military power of "Manchukuo," and the Soviet Union, which was constantly strengthening its military strength, directly confronted each other on the national border, and border disputes continued to occur. Some of these disputes have even developed into extremely dangerous local wars that threaten to lead to full-scale combat readiness. The most famous of these is the Ganchazi Incident that occurred in 1937.

The Ganchazi Incident revolved around a small island in the Heilongjiang River on the northern border of Manchuria, and in February 1937, Japanese and Manchurians landed on Ganchazi Island and Dabekitchev Island. In this regard, the Soviet Union repeatedly protested to the side of "Manchukuo". By May, perhaps the Soviets had decided that protests would not help, and sent a small number of troops to land on Nishima.

At this time, the Kwantung Army mobilized a division of troops here, and the Soviet Union also mobilized gunboats and gunboats. So the two armies faced off. Originally, the Japanese General Staff Headquarters believed that such a remote island. It is not worth pouring troops, and a policy of non-expansion has been adopted. But the Kwantung Army was dissatisfied with this negative attitude. June 30th. He arbitrarily opened fire on the Soviet gunboats and sank one of them. As a result, the conflict between Japan and the Soviet Union intensified. On July 1, 1938, in Siberia, on the border with East Manchuria, and northern Korea, Japan and the Soviet Union once again had a fierce military conflict, which became known as the Zhang Gufeng Incident.

As the conflict between the two sides intensified, more and more troops were amassed on the border between the Soviet Union and Japan, but with the setback of the Japanese offensive in North and Central China, especially the strong rise of Chen Feng's troops, the Japanese base camp rushed to a great crisis. In particular, the relationship between Chen Feng's unit and the Soviet Union has become closer and closer, and a large number of weapons and equipment have been transported into China through the newly built Suimeng Highway, and this crisis has become more and more urgent. As a result, many senior officers in the base camp have begun to deduce on the sand table the sand table in which the Soviet-Mongolian coalition forces and Chen Feng's troops jointly launched a large-scale attack on the Kwantung Army. And the results of the deduction are far from ideal.

Against this background, the base camp of Nichiguan is eager to break this situation. There are only two ways to break this situation, one is to eliminate the Eighth Theater of Operations, and the Japanese army will capture Chahar and Suiyuan on a large scale. Strategically form an encirclement of Outer Mongolia. The second method was to drive the Soviet troops out of Outer Mongolia or eliminate them outright.

Therefore, the commander of the Kwantung Army, General Kenkichi Ueda, ordered the commander of the subordinate corps to implement the "Outline for the Settlement of Manchu-Soviet Border Disputes." The main contents of this compendium are:

"I don't offend. No one is allowed to offend me." This is the fundamental stance of the Kwantung Army on the border line. If there was to raid and annihilate the Soviet troops (including the Outer Mongolian army) that crossed the border, then "temporarily entered the territory of the USSR."

2. In areas where the border line is not clear. The defense commanders of the localities can "demarcate the border line at their own discretion" and clearly tell the troops at the front.

3. In the event of a dispute, the front-line troops are required to "take resolute and resolute action" and to "trust the higher command" in dealing with the resulting situation. From the above, we can clearly see that Japan's idea of settling disputes by force is now more obvious than in the past. In this way, as long as the local army faithfully carries out the orders of the command, or the Soviet side does not make concessions, it is inevitable that sooner or later a major conflict will break out on the territory.

The consequence of such a tough attitude of the Japanese army was that the conflict intensified, and less than a month after the outline was issued, dozens of Outer Mongolian cavalry crossed the Haraha River and entered Nomencamburt. About fifteen kilometers southwest of Opo. The "Manchukuo" garrison immediately drove them back to the west bank.

Subsequently, the Outer Mongolian cavalry again entered the east bank and engaged the "Manchukuo" garrison. If the Kwantung Army decides to start a war with the Soviet Far Eastern Front, then the North China Front will have a heavy responsibility on its shoulders, not only to be responsible for the defense of the region, but also to be ready to reinforce the Kwantung Army at any time, and in addition to containing the Eighth Theater of Operations to reinforce the Soviet-Mongolian coalition forces.

However, the situation on the side of the Kwantung Army had not yet been resolved, and the Chinese Dispatch Army Headquarters issued another order to the North China Front, sending the military authorities to launch a second full-scale attack on the Wuhan camp of the Nationalist Government, and demanding that the North China Front send powerful troops to launch an attack on the first and second theaters of the China War in order to contain the China Army in Henan, Shanxi, and Shaanxi. In order to strengthen the strength of the North China Front, the base camp ordered the newly formed 7th and 8th brigades and regiments of the independent mixed army to be incorporated into the direct jurisdiction of the North China Front; The 9th Brigade was incorporated into the 1st Army; The 6th and 10th brigades were integrated into the 12th Army.

Although the strength of five infantry brigades was increased at once, Bin Shan Yuan did not feel the slightest relief, although the North China Front Army had more than 300,000 troops, plus nearly 100,000 imperial troops, a total of more than 400,000 people. However, they had to deal with the pressure of the three theaters of the Nationalist Government, and the first theater was needless to say, with Cheng Qian's army of more than 400,000 troops guarding the Central Plains and eyeing Shandong and Jiangsu.

The Second Theater has just recovered Taiyuan, and the more than 300,000 troops are in full swing, and they have the potential to drive the remaining Japanese troops out of Shanxi, and their strength should not be underestimated.

The most important thing is Chen Feng's Eighth War Zone, according to the intelligence department during this period of information, the strength of the Eighth War Zone in China has far exceeded the expectations of the empire, according to the deciphered incomplete telegram, the Eighth War Zone in China has at least 10 integrated divisions and a large number of affiliated troops, with a strength of at least 300,000 people, or even more. In addition, the Eighth Theater has established a universal military service system in the provinces of Suiyuan and Chahar, and can arm a large number of new troops at any time, which poses the greatest threat to the front army.

In addition, the Second Group Army of China Entrenched in Lunan and Eastern Henan was entrenched in the mountains and held on to the mountain, and the Imperial Army returned from several encirclements and suppressions, which was equivalent to putting a nail in the chest of the Imperial Army, which could launch a fatal blow to the Twelfth Army at any time, and had to be guarded against.

The external treacherous environment made General Binshan Yuan quite entangled, and once the Dispatch Army Headquarters and the Kwantung Army Headquarters launched a war at the same time, his North China Front would be in a dilemma, and the war to support the North would not be able to support the South, and vice versa. If both sides support, then the nest is likely to be wiped out by the Zhina, which is difficult! (To be continued......)