Boom Boom Boom ...... The Japanese shelling continued, and in just two or three minutes three or four hundred shells were poured into the town. The dense rain of bullets plowed almost the entire town with artillery fire, destroying one house after another, and even knocking down a large area of aspen by the canal at the entrance of the village. Although Okazaki Kiyozaburo Osa gave the artillery brigade ten minutes to prepare for artillery fire, it was not necessary to see that this situation was not necessary at all.

The soldiers of the 388th Regiment hid in the trenches less than 50 meters outside the town, and the rubble and wood chips blown up by the shells were scattered and splashed on their heads from time to time. In this case, the only thing the fighters could do was to squat as low as they could, and then a little lower. Even so, the powerful shock wave from the explosion still shook everyone's ears. The only thing to be thankful for was that the Japanese artillery hit it accurately, and the shells all fell in the town, without causing any losses to the 388th Regiment, which was close at hand.

Commander Liu Yuanxun glanced at the town with palpitations, and said fearfully: "Look at it, look at the formation of the little devil!" Fortunately, we were stationed outside the town, otherwise we would have been blocked by the little devils in the town for a burst of bombardment, and only half of the regiment of brothers would have been lost. ”

The deputy regimental commander said: "Judging by the density of shells, the enemy troops dispatched at least one artillery brigade, and each gun fired at least half a base of ammunition. It's just a small town, and the little devil is really crazy! ”

For the Chinese army, which was desperately short of ammunition, the saturation attack of the Japanese army could indeed be called frenzied. However, compared with the carpet bombing of the US military, it can only be regarded as pediatrics. As for the more terrifying sea of fire offensive and the amount of ammunition used by Van Vliet, I am afraid that it can only be described as the extermination of humanity.

The chief of staff analyzed: "The enemy's back is on Tianjin. The material reserves are sufficient and the supply is convenient, so I dare to fight like this. If it is changed to the mountainous area of western Hebei, I am afraid that the logistics of the little devil will not be able to bear it. ”

Regiment Commander Liu nodded and was about to say something when a burst of cheers suddenly came from the enemy position. Several officers hurriedly picked up binoculars and looked at the opposite side.

"Onboard!" Seeing that there was no resistance, the arrogant Japanese infantry straightened up and watched the battle. After seeing the effect of the shelling, they all opened their arms and cheered loudly with excitement. Some soldiers even stood on high places and sang war songs while waving the Japanese flag. Although there are not many fighters who can understand it, the provocation and mania in it cannot be concealed by any language.

This situation deeply pierced the hearts of the soldiers of the 388th Regiment, and they all turned their heads to look at their respective commanders, their eyes revealing a strong fighting spirit. However, they could not wait for the order to attack, and the warriors' hearts were as anxious as if they were scratching their claws. I can't wait to rush out of the trenches and fight the devils right away.

Hu Zhanjun, the commander of the heavy mortar company, has a fiery temperament. Directly ran to ask the head of Liu Yuanxun for his life: "Tuanzao, take advantage of the little devil's defenselessness, just hit him cold!" Give the order, brethren, don't wait! ”

Captain Liu Yuanxun reprimanded: "What's the hurry? You go back first. Wait for the signal of the passenger seat! ”

Company Commander Hu is still to be said. was interrupted by a wave of head Liu. He shouted: "Execute the order!" Company Commander Hu had no choice but to go back to the past, and when he left, he wrote all his opinions on his face.

The deputy head of the regiment looked at his back. laughed and scolded: "This bastard! But the regimental seat, the soldiers are murderous, and the military spirit is available! I think we will win this battle! ”

Regiment Commander Liu snorted, and said to the chief of staff: "Call the deputy seat immediately and ask when the attack will be launched?" Don't let us lie here for a long time, but let the devil do it first. ”

Behind Yangliuqing Town, Deputy Division Commander Wang Lihuan was also coldly observing the movements of the Japanese army. Zhao Longtao, chief of staff of the 130th Division, picked up the binoculars and looked in the direction of Yangliuqing Town, and said angrily: "The artillery of the little devil is also ruthless, and it is necessary to bombard the town with this momentum." Fortunately, the villagers have all been evacuated, otherwise where would there be any living people? ”

Deputy Division Commander Wang said: "The artillery directly under the 27th Division is a mountain artillery wing, and according to the intelligence conveyed by the military headquarters, the 27th Wing of the enemy's mountain artillery is all equipped with the latest Type 94 mountain artillery due to its late establishment. This kind of artillery has a fast rate of fire and is also very accurate, and its power is a little greater than that of our Type 41 mountain gun. ”

The main mountain artillery of the Japanese army before was the Type 41 mountain artillery, which belonged to the products of World War I, and its performance was seriously outdated in all aspects. Deeply impressed by this, the Japanese Army developed a new generation of Type 94 mountain artillery and began to equip the troops in 35 years. This artillery can reach a range of 8,300 meters, and its comprehensive performance is not only above the Type 41 mountain gun, but also surpasses the Type 38 field gun.

This has led to an interesting phenomenon in which divisions equipped with mountain artillery wings are actually more combat-effective than divisions equipped with field artillery wings. In the Battle of Wuhan in history, the first to break through the defense line of the national army were the pack horse division regiments (that is, the divisions equipped with mountain artillery), and the horse pulling divisions were all lagging behind due to the inconvenience of marching.

In order to deal with the enemy's artillery, Deputy Division Commander Wang Lihuan has already won the support of the field artillery regiment of the military headquarters. As mentioned above, the 53rd Army and the 63rd Army each had a field artillery regiment, although there were only 12 old Type 38 field guns, but they all used new gun mounts, and the longest firing range reached more than 11,500 meters, which was enough to pose a threat to the Japanese mountain artillery brigade. This artillery unit has now moved to a position 8,000 meters west of Yangliuqing Town, and since the enemy's mountain artillery brigades are all deployed in advance, they can bombard their positions at any time.

Chief of Staff Zhao narrowed his eyes and said, "Deputy seat, I think it's time for the little devil to transfer his position after two more artillery shots, notify the military field artillery regiment to do it!" Blow up these guys and see who dares to show their heads! ”

Wang Lihuan nodded and said, "Okay, you immediately notify the field artillery regiment." Tell them to fire as soon as they're ready, without waiting for my orders. Inform the 388th Regiment to pay attention to concealment, so as not to be injured by our artillery fire. ”

Chief of Staff Zhao was about to call the field artillery regiment, but he didn't expect the field phone to ring first, picked up a few questions, and said to Wang Lihuan: "Deputy seat, it's the 388th regiment calling." ”

Deputy Division Commander Wang took it and said, "Hey, I'm Wang Lihuan!" ”

The head of Liu Yuanxun asked on the other end of the phone: "Deputy seat, it's me, Lao Liu!" Vice-seater, when are we going to attack? You can't grind any longer. The little devils are almost touching my avant-garde position. ”

Deputy Division Commander Wang said: "Well, I will immediately inform the field artillery regiment to destroy the enemy's mountain artillery, and you should be patient for a while and try not to expose it." The Japanese would never have imagined that you would lurk in front of the town and wait for the large group to approach before making a move. ”

Head Liu said with a bitter face: "Deputy seat, I don't want to be exposed, but the little devils are almost under my nose!" ”

Deputy Division Commander Wang reprimanded: "Anyway, you are not allowed to take the initiative to expose, as long as the Japanese army does not find you, even if you pee on your head, you have to endure it!" Well, you ask the artillery observation squad to re-measure the data on the azimuth of the enemy's artillery positions. And then quickly sent to the artillerymen. ”

In order to better play the role of artillery. Zheng Weiguo specially equipped each infantry regiment with an artillery observation class, and carried equipment such as scissor-shaped artillery mirrors and calculation boards (simple mechanical calculators for artillery, which can calculate trigonometric functions). This was the first to be adopted by the U.S. military in World War II, and it proved to be of great value in actual combat. It is equivalent to installing clairvoyance on the artillery.

"Attention platoons. Gives Shot Direction! Gauge 100. 80 Positions to the Left! Full charge, instantaneous fuse! 3 rounds of reloading, using colored marker rounds! ”

"A row is loaded!"

"The second row is loaded!"

"Three rows are loaded!"

……

"Ready. Put! ”

Boom Boom Boom ...... Twelve field guns opened fire in unison, and the shells whistled across the sky and headed straight for the Japanese artillery positions, emitting an unusually sharp whistle. For veterans, this voice is all too familiar, it is simply an invitation sent from Lord Yama.

"Be careful, enemy shelling!" The Japanese soldiers on the position shouted heartbreakingly. One by one, they were pale, and they hurriedly lay down on the spot, trembling like frightened deer, and the bravery of the previous bombardment of villages and towns was gone.

The shells quickly hit the ground and blossomed, and although not a single shot hit the target, it put great pressure on the Japanese artillery. Even the infantry of the 2nd Wing, who had been watching the battle, scattered in all directions. It seems that their bravery is only based on the weak, and their performance in the face of artillery fire is not much better than that of the Chinese army.

"A series of close misses, 700 to the left of the dense position 300 meters ahead; The second company missed the bullet closely, and the 900 dense position to the right was 150 meters ahead; The three companies missed the bullet closely, the orientation was correct, and they were 50 meters ahead. ”

Although the Japanese were taken by surprise, it was a pity that not a single shell fell within 50 meters of the Japanese position in the first round of shooting. On the one hand, because the field artillery regiment was worried about accidental injury, the artillery fire deliberately extended a little; On the other hand, it is on the new gun mount, which is hollowed out in the middle, which looks like a harpoon, and the barrel rests in the hollow position. Although the firing angle of the gun is increased, the strength of the gun carriage is not as strong as that of the single gun mount, and when firing at an angle of more than 40 degrees, the gun carriage will have elastic deformation under the impact of huge recoil, resulting in an increase in the firing angle, which has a great impact on the accuracy.

In addition, the Japanese artillery was indeed well-trained, and most of them lay down in time within a second or two after hearing the sharp sound of incoming shells, so this round of shelling did not cause any actual damage to the enemy artillery, but wounded a few Japanese infantry watching the battle.

After the first salvo of the field artillery regiment, the artillery squad quickly counted the distribution of the bombing points and immediately fed back to the artillery headquarters. The reason why it was possible to distinguish the explosion points of each company was that three field artillery companies used shells with different colors of smoke agents during test firing.

After correcting the ballistics, the field artillery regiment soon began a second round of bombardment. This time it was obviously more accurate than the first time, and at least a dozen shells fell within 50 meters of the Japanese position, causing even greater panic among the Japanese soldiers, especially the artillerymen.

"The enemy has an observation point nearby!" Ichiro Yuda, the captain of the artillery group, screamed in horror: "Quick, evacuate and hide!" Baga, don't lie on your stomach, get up and move your position! ”

But no matter how Ichiro Yuda called, the artillerymen were reluctant to move the artillery, and they didn't want to get up no matter how they shouted when they pouted on the ground one by one. Ichiro Yuda had no choice but to kick these cowards with his feet. Although the soldiers were reluctant, they were forced to move with their guns under the strict orders of their commanders. The Type 94 mountain gun was very light, and a gun squad could push it completely, and if you put on a horse, it would be faster.

The leader of the artillery observation squad saw clearly in the artillery mirror, and hurriedly said: "It's not good, the little devil's artillery wants to escape!" Notify the field artillery regiment and speed up the firing! ”

The field artillery regiment also knew that the opportunity was rare, so they hurriedly opened fire with all their strength. The shells whizzed towards the Japanese positions, bringing up a patch of flesh from time to time, causing the Japanese artillerymen to scream in horror. However, the Japanese position was set up very reasonably. The mountain artillery was also easily transferred, and soon fled from the area covered by artillery fire and quickly withdrew to a hidden place to hide. The ballistics of the field artillery are very straight, and they are powerless against firing enemy troops in dead corners.

Seeing the embarrassed appearance of the artillerymen, the Japanese infantry couldn't help but laugh loudly. The artillerymen who had just escaped were so frightened that they had no intention of fighting back. The infantry looked smug and became more and more brazen.

"Hey, look, that artillery lieutenant is almost scared out of his pee!"

"My face turned white with fright, I really don't deserve the title of samurai."

"Of course, the soldiers who work can't be compared with the soldiers who fight our wars!"

……

The artillerymen were greatly dissatisfied. But they can shoot at the field artillery, but they don't dare. I had to ask Okazaki Kiyozaburo for help and asked the division headquarters to send more powerful artillery to "provide tactical guidance".

The artillery directly under the 27th Division nominally has only one mountain artillery wing, the 27th wing, which is organized by 2322 (the wing has two brigades under its command, and the brigade has three squadrons. The squadron has two squadrons. The squad has two artillery squads. One mountain gun per squad), only 24 Type 94 mountain guns. However, the division commander Masaharu Honma also served as the commander of the defense of Tianjin, and could mobilize the artillery and armored troops of the garrison.

Among them, the artillery alone had a three-unit heavy artillery wing. There are a total of 24 150mm heavy howitzers, and what is even more amazing is that these 24 guns are the latest Type 96 150mm howitzers, which have been equipped for less than a year. This kind of artillery is mechanically towed, very powerful, extremely high-precision, and the firing range has reached 11,900 meters, which is called the most perfect 150-caliber howitzer by the Japanese army. The "tactical guidance" requested by the mountain artillery brigade was actually to want this unit to be dispatched.

Kiyozaburo Okazaki said in surprise, "Nani? Is the artillery fire of the Chinese army strong enough to this extent? ”

"Hello!" Yuda Ichiro Shaozo bowed and said, "Your Excellency, according to the analysis of the radius of the explosion point, the people of China should be using the Imperial Type 38 field artillery. From the point of view of ballistics, a new gun carriage was adopted, and the firing range far exceeded that of our mountain artillery. Under the enemy's suppression, it is very difficult for our artillery to be dispatched, otherwise it is in danger of being destroyed. As you should know, just now we lost two guns, and we also suffered casualties......"

"Alright, alright!" Okazaki Kiyozaburo Osaku impatiently interrupted Ichiro Yuta's chattering words, and said with a little dissatisfaction: "I have seen all your performances just now, and I will report to His Excellency the division commander." ”

Ichiro Yuda was overjoyed, bowed deeply again, and said, "Your Excellency, it would be great if you could get the guidance of the air force. ”

Kiyozaburo Okazaki snorted and said, "Yes, but the first thing we need to do is to resume the attack!" The Imperial Army must not give up the desire to attack at the slightest difficulty. Your artillery brigade should also be involved! ”

The official level crushed people to death, and although Ichiro Yuda was extremely dissatisfied, he had to helplessly reply: "Hayi! ”

The Japanese troops quickly relaunched the offensive, with the 1st Brigade of the 2nd Wing of the garrison as the arrow, and the 2nd Brigade and the 3rd Brigade as the two flanks, and quickly launched a cone offensive towards Yangliuqing Town. Due to the fact that the enemy and our armies were not far apart, the 1st Brigade soon approached the forward position of the 388th Regiment.

"Company commander, the devil is here!" Forward scouts rushed to report.

The commander of the avant-garde company said in a low voice: "I know the way, inform the brothers, prepare for battle!" ”

With the order of the company commander, the soldiers opened the safety one after another, pulled the bolt and loaded the bullet. The safety cover of the grenade was also unscrewed and neatly stacked on the edge of the trench. The light and heavy machine guns were secretly decamouflaged, revealing a swarthy and blue-tinged barrel.

As soon as the battle began, the herald of the regimental headquarters hurried along the communication trench, found the company commander and said: "There is an order from the regimental seat, ordering you to feign defeat and retreat after receiving the enemy, and you must not defend to the death!" ”

The company commander nodded and said, "Okay, I understand." When I went back and told the regimental headquarters, I said that the headquarters would organize an evacuation three minutes after the battle began, and asked the regimental headquarters to organize fire cover. ”

After the herald left, the deputy company commander said with a little dissatisfaction: "Company commander, why do you only let us stay for three minutes?" Believe it, but let's still drop it? ”

The company commander reprimanded: "What kind of calf are you, how many devils can we kill in one company?" It's easy to get to the front of the main position, you know? ”

As he spoke, the Japanese search team had already touched the avant-garde position. One of the Japanese soldiers also wore a Japanese flag on the barrel of his gun. As the two sides drew closer, the soldier saw something and shouted in horror: "Enemy, be careful! ”

The commander of the avant-garde company raised his shell gun and knocked it down with a loud bang, raising his arms and shouting: "Brothers, beat me hard!" For a while, there was a loud sound of gunfire, and a Japanese search detachment was swept away by a dense rain of bullets on the spot, and the two detachments that followed up also suffered heavy losses in the sudden change.

Okazaki Kiyozaburo Osa was surprised and delighted, surprised that the Chinese army was so close to his position, and happy that since the enemy had been discovered, would victory be far away?

"Kill, give!" Yoshio Tanaka, the leader of the 1st Brigade who thought the same as Kiyozaburo Okazaki, drew his command knife and howled hysterically.

"Onboard!" A squadron of Japanese troops, under the personal leadership of the squadron leader, launched a rapid offensive. Mountain artillery brigades were also scattered in small units to provide fire support to the infantry.

Since most of the positions and firing points of the Chinese army had not yet been exposed, the artillerymen appeared to be somewhat idle, and instead judged the infantry's attack.

"This charge is so dangerous!"

"yes, it's a joke with your own life!"

"This tactic is long overdue."

"When my Taro grows up, I will never let him become an infantryman."

……

Just as he was talking about it, Oshida Daisa angrily flew over with a horsewhip and shouted angrily: "The geisha on the streets of Tokyo don't have so much nonsense from you, go fight, right away!" ”

The artillerymen had just fired two shots, and a company took advantage of the situation to retreat. However, instead of retreating directly to the main position, they withdrew to the flank of the main position.

"Onboard!" Seeing that as soon as the enemy army reached the route, the first brigade of the Japanese army desperately pursued forward as if it had been beaten with chicken blood. The captain of the group, Yoshio Tanaka, also flew his command knife excitedly, howling, "Catch up with them and destroy them." ”

The chief of staff of the 2nd Wing of the garrison put down the binoculars, turned his head and said excitedly: "Your Excellency, we have won!" (To be continued......)

PS: The subsistence allowance has been used up, ask for the help of the rich and handsome!