The horn of the decisive battle has been sounded, and both China and Japan are already loaded with bayonets and bullets, and there is no way out, and the only thing they can do is to fight and fight again.

With regard to this decisive battle, the Chinese and Japanese governments have carried out the most extensive mobilization and concentrated almost all or more than half of the war resources in the hands of the two countries.

According to Chen Feng's order, the Central China Theater as the main force of this battle, the Southwest Theater and the Chongqing Special Theater as auxiliary forces, for the invading Japanese puppet army to be defeated or annihilated cleanly, one city and one place is nothing, do not care about those rules and regulations, everything has been defeated by the Japanese army as the ultimate goal, and the front-line commander is given great autonomy.

Xue Yue, as the old man's henchman, since the old man was assassinated, Xue Yue's life has been like a roller coaster. When he heard that the old man had designated Chen Feng as his heir, Xue Yue was very worried about whether that young man would be able to carry the banner of China's War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, and at the same time worried that the young man would eliminate dissidents and consolidate his power as soon as he came up, and whether he, the commander of the Ninth Theater and a senior officer with the most elite armed forces of the party-state, would be the first to be liquidated?

But these worries disappeared with Chen Feng's series of big moves, whether it was to buy the military power of the Gui, Sichuan, and Yunnan warlords out of his own pocket, or to accept the Communist Party in Yan'an, and then to the later separation of military and government, Chen Feng walked very steadily every step and walked in front of everyone.

Chen Feng not only agreed to the military order for the reorganization and re-outfitting of the army, but also put an end to China's lack of uniformity in weapons and equipment and military uniforms in the past 100 years. There are many inconsistencies such as inconsistent training methods. It has not only greatly improved the combat effectiveness of the armed forces, but also greatly reduced the pressure on the logistics departments, so that China's national defense capability can at least appear to be a country's regular army on the surface.

Operation Thunder was the first major military operation carried out by Chen Feng after he took charge of Chongqing, and for the time being, this operation was very successful, and if nothing else, it could drive the Japanese puppet army in northern China to the Korean Peninsula within three months to six months, ending the war in the north.

And the navy, which has always been a short board in China's national defense strength, has also improved greatly, and the navy that Chen Feng himself tossed is very brilliant. The Japanese Navy was inflicted heavy losses in naval battles one after another. Since the First Sino-Japanese Naval War, the Chinese Navy has finally entered the eyes of all countries in the world for the first time.

This series of actions allowed Xue Yue and others to see Chen Feng's super high command art, and in the eyes of many senior officers who have fought all their lives, Chen Feng's command of operations is like a play. It looks completely unorganized. But the effect is surprisingly good. Every time it can create a miracle in military history.

This time, the Japanese army attacked with all their might, if it was before, Xue Yue would definitely be a little worried. After all, the fifth, sixth, and ninth theaters, which had less than 300,000 troops in the 11th Army, were in a hurry, and now the Japanese have concentrated 6 to 700,000 troops to attack at one time, which is bound to cause a panic.

But now Xue Yue is not worried at all, although the Japanese army has hundreds of thousands of troops and a large number of heavy equipment to cooperate, but now he Xue is also a shotgun for artillery, which is terrible. The more than 800,000 troops under his command are not only all strictly trained elites, but also the guys in the hands of each soldier have also changed.

As one of the most cutting-edge theaters, the 24 integrated divisions under the jurisdiction of the Central China Theater are all AK assault rifles + M1911 pistols, in addition to the Central China Theater There are 3 armored divisions, equipped with a total of 770 T34 main battle tanks, 980 light tanks, and a large number of armored vehicles.

In addition, there are a large number of artillery units in the Central China Theater, with a total of nine brigades, and in addition to the three mountain artillery brigades formed by the original Ninth Theater, Chen Feng has added three artillery divisions, all of which are 105mm caliber heavy howitzers.

With these guys, Xue Yue is very confident in this operation, the only thing he is worried about is those Japanese warships in the Yangtze River, no matter how capable the army is, it is impossible to extend its tentacles into the water, besides, the naval guns of the warships are not vegetarian, we can't fight people if we are far away, and we will be bombarded if we are close. Unlike the army artillery, naval guns only have a caliber of several tens of millimeters, and they can move by several hundred millimeters, and a radius of several tens of meters from that cannon is an absolute death zone.

However, Chen Feng did not hand over the task of dealing with the Japanese naval fleet to Xue Yue, but to the air force, and Chen Feng asked the air force to kill the Japanese naval fleet cruising in the Yangtze River at all costs, and at the same time let Zhou Tiedan's special combat team cooperate with the air force.

On August 18, the Battle of Yichang began, and Zhang Zizhong, deputy commander of the Central China Theater, personally went to the Yichang front line to command the operation.

The Japanese army invested a total of 4 divisions of infantry and more than 50 large and small warships in Yichang, with a total strength of more than 100,000 troops, under the command of Lieutenant General Tsukada Tsukashi, chief of staff of the Japanese Central China Dispatch Army.

Tsukada was a great admirer of the German army, and was famous for his study of the history of the German front of the First World War. Regarding the German counteroffensive on the Sem-River in 1918, which historians call the German army's last attack, Tsukada collected all the materials and compiled them into a special book, and only the materials on the activities of the Spard's army base camp have been collected in a thick volume. After the First World War, Tsukada went to Germany to study with Erich. Feng. Ludendorff, the disciple is very respectful.

According to the information sent back by the intelligence department, Yichang only has the strength of two infantry divisions in China's newly established Central China Theater, and these two divisions are composed of the previously defeated Shina rout and newly recruited recruits, and their combat effectiveness is very limited, even without the support of the navy, Yichang can be easily defeated by the army in their hands alone.

In the absence of communication with the navy, Tsukada ordered the four divisions under his command to march together and launch a strong attack on the frontal land acquisition in Yichang.

Tsukada took it for granted that with the combat effectiveness of the Chinese defenders, two divisions were equivalent to a division of the Imperial Japanese Army, or even far inferior, and now that he had four divisions at once, the Chinese defenders should take the initiative to withdraw from Yichang! Even if it is resistance, it is just a show.

But in fact, on the first day of the attack on Yichang, the Japanese army was fiercely blocked by Zhang Zizhong's subordinates. Since Chen Feng made it clear that he did not care about the gains and losses of one city and one place, Zhang Zizhong directly ordered the troops to deploy along the favorable terrain near Yichang, and even transformed all the areas around the city gate into fortifications, and more than half of the people in the city were urgently evacuated, and the rest were all hid in air-raid shelters.

Zhang Zizhong's headquarters established a total of 4 lines of defense outside Yichang City, and more than 60,000 defenders of 2 divisions and 2 regiments were stationed in batches to block the Japanese army. In addition, 300 kilometers west of the battlefield, three integrated divisions were hurrying to the Yichang front.

Tsukada launched 23 charges on the first day of the attack, but they were all defeated by Zhang Zizhong's department, and the department suffered heavy losses. As a last resort, Tsukada had no choice but to contact the navy and ask them to immediately cooperate with the army in the war.

However, just as the navy had just left the port of Wuhan and was blocked by the Chinese air force on the way to Yichang, more than 80 Chinese bombers suddenly appeared on the Yangtze River channel under the cover of more than 30 fighters and launched a chase and bombing of the Japanese naval fleet.

Not to be outdone, the Japanese naval fleet counterattacked with anti-aircraft machine guns and antiaircraft guns on warships, and at the same time sent a telegram to the Central China Dispatch Command, requesting air support.

Soon the Japanese fighters that took off from the Wuhan airport arrived at the battlefield, and the air forces of the two sides engaged in an extremely tragic air battle over the Yangtze River. After two hours of fighting, the two sides ended the air fight, in which each side reinforced twice and put in a total of more than 620 fighters. In the end, the Japanese army was shot down 183 and 16 ships were sunk, and the Chinese Air Force was shot down 112 fighters.

At the same time as the Battle of Yichang began, the main force of the 11th Army of the Japanese Army, 12 divisions plus 9 divisions of the puppet army, a total of 480,000 people, advanced along Changde under the command of the commander General Anan Weiji, and its forward troops had reached Dayong (Zhangjiajie).

The Central China Theater was met with 15 integrated infantry divisions, 3 armored divisions, and 7 artillery brigades, with Xue Yue as the commander, and behind the army, Chen Yi led 6 integrated divisions as reserves to press the formation.

Dayong was only an inspector district at this time, equivalent to a county, and it was not Zhangjiajie, a famous tourist city in later generations. However, this is the only way to enter Chongqing from Xiangxi, so it has become the focus of contention between China and Japan.

However, this place is more favorable to the defenders than Yichang. Dayong is mountainous, many mountains, and the land is vast and sparsely populated, the defenders are deployed along the mountains, and the Japanese army is attacking from the mountains, which is in a disadvantageous position.

Coupled with the limitations of the terrain, the Japanese army could not invest too many troops at all, and could only use the tactics of adding fuel. So from the very beginning of the battle, the Japanese suffered heavy casualties and made little progress.

After inspecting the front line, Anan Weiji thought that it was meaningless to continue fighting like this, and adding fuel tactics was a taboo for soldiers, so that even if they fought for a year or two, it would not be possible to defeat Dayong, and it would only increase casualties.

In view of the fact that there were more than 400,000 troops under his command, Anan Weiji continued to attack Dayong on the one hand, and on the other hand, he sent two divisions south to Guzhang, preparing to copy the back road of hundreds of thousands of Chinese defenders on the Dayong front.

But how could Xue Yue give the Japanese this opportunity, when the two master regiments of the Japanese army arrived in Luoxi Town, Guzhang County, they suddenly found that there were already Chinese defenders stationed here, and there were complete fortifications.

Annoyed and angry, Anan Weiji, despite the dissuasion of the chief of staff, ordered the troops to immediately launch an attack on Luoxi Town, but unfortunately, the Japanese army stormed for a day, except for some casualties caused by themselves, the position of Luoxi Town remained unmoved. (To be continued......)