Chapter 753: Recovering North China

At the end of the Shanhaiguan Campaign, which lasted more than ten days, the North China Independent Division and the Kwantung Army invested more than 800,000 troops in this land of only a few hundred square kilometers in western Liaoning, so to speak, this was a strategic decisive battle between Tang Qiuli and the Kwantung Army.

In this battle, Tang Qiuli's North China Independent Division invested three corps, with a total of more than 320,000 troops, with additional cavalry and aviation, and the Kwantung Army invested 10 divisions and five brigades, with a total of 380,000 troops, and a large number of armored troops and heavy artillery units, as well as a fleet to assist in the battle.

After more than ten days of bloody battles, the independent division severely damaged the southbound troops of the Kwantung Army at the cost of more than 78,000 casualties, and the Kwantung Army troops that could flee back to the northeast hinterland were only about 120,000 people, with losses of more than two-thirds, and they were all incomplete, five division commanders were killed, four brigade commanders were killed, and as for the officers below the rank of big lieutenant, the general headquarters of the Kwantung Army will never reveal the specific figures, of course, there is not a single prisoner, in the words of division commander Tang Qiuli, the grain of our Chinese will not be used to feed a bunch of animals.

Jinzhou, a strategic place in western Liaoning, fell into the hands of Tang Qiuli, and its forward troops seized Linghai on July 2, and then, the independent division with six cavalry brigades, five infantry brigades, such as the autumn wind and falling leaves, swept through the ancient areas of western Liaoning and eastern Méng, only two days, captured more than 20 county seats, the garrisons of the Kwantung Army stationed in various places, more than 20,000 people, in the face of the flood peak-like offensive, the resistance was extremely weak, from Jinzhou, Yixian to Fuxin, to the ancient Kulun in the east, the land west of Chifeng, all belonged to Tang Qiuli.

The largest field airfield of the Kwantung Army in western Liaoning, Songshan Airport, was occupied intact, and more than 100 fighters, more than 40 bombers, and more than 10 transport planes were parked in the airfield, which became the trophies of the two regiments of the 1st Cavalry Brigade of Liu Chūn, which was another generous gift from Liu Chūn to Tang Qiuli.

Major General Zhang Quan, director of the logistics department of the Independent Division and commander of the Joint Logistics Command of the Yellow River Basin Theater, personally led the logistics personnel to rush from the Huangya Dòng base.

On the day of the end of the Linghai battle, Tang Qiuli ordered the Le Yiqin Air Force to be stationed at Jinzhou Songshan Airport, and all the surplus planes should immediately drive back to Dingbian, and all the air defense units should immediately enter a state of first-class combat readiness, and the Jinan Airport Radar Station immediately mobilized key technical personnel to set up a forward radar station in Jinzhou, and the requirement was that the radar monitoring range included the entire northeast territory, Liaodong Bay, and the Liaodong Peninsula, as far as the Yellow Sea.

The eleven field brigades of the Corps directly under the Independent Division, Feng Jiwu's Niangziguan Garrison Corps, and Sun Zhenbang's Yellow River River Defense Corps were deployed along the line of Jinzhou, Yixian, Fuxin, Kulun, and Chifeng, preparing to counterattack the Kwantung Army's repeated battles for the ancient areas of western Liaoning and eastern Méng.

Tang Qiuli's feet finally stepped into the northeast land, from the northeast, which had been occupied by the Kwantung Army for decades and regarded as a strategic rear, and cut off Liaoxi, the choke point leading to North China and Guannai, and put on a posture of fighting a big fight.

In this battle, Tang Qiuli was limited by the lack of troops, and in the Niuxinshan battlefield, he could not fully encircle the southbound troops of the Kwantung Army, so he could only take the method of attacking step by step and intercepting by surprise soldiers to eliminate the living forces of the Kwantung Army to the greatest extent.

If Tang Qiuli had enough troops, he would definitely take advantage of this opportunity to wave his troops to attack the Northeast and take advantage of the situation to recover the entire territory of the Northeast, but he couldn't, even if the Kwantung Army was defeated in Liaoxi, in the Northeast, there were still more than 500,000 troops, and hundreds of thousands of Manchuria ** who obeyed the orders of the Japanese, the troops fought for a long time, and the losses were huge, and the attrition amounted to as many as six field brigades.

Tang Qiuli very much hoped that the Kwantung Army would attack again on the Jinzhou front, and with the troops that had been put together in a hurry, he would be sure that he would be completely annihilated, constantly consume the strength of the Kwantung Army, and drain the blood of the Japanese little by little, and when the ratio of forces reached a certain level, he really wanted to wave his troops to attack the hinterland of the northeast.

On 3 July, the Kwantung Army Air Force dispatched more than 200 fighters and more than 100 bombers to frantically bomb the positions of the Independent Division, which stretched from Jinzhou in the south to Fuxin in the north.

Among them, Jinzhou, Linghai, Yixian, Qinghekou, and Fuxin were the key areas for bombing, with Jinzhou being the most heavily bombed, and an unprecedented fierce air defense battle broke out in the land of western Liaoning.

Tang Qiuli, who had experience in commanding Nanjing's air defense battles, was familiar with all kinds of air defense firepower, mainly high-speed guns equipped with the "Sky Eye" gun-aiming radar, and attached to high-speed machine guns, heavy machine guns, and other anti-aircraft firepower, and the independent divisional aviation unit was used as a mobile force; Tang Qiuli had the strength of four air defense brigades in his hands.

All the Japanese pilots sighed that they had never encountered such a fierce and dense anti-aircraft fire, had never encountered such an accurate high-level gun, and the smoke that exploded all over the sky was a deadly shrapnel, and the blossoming salutes were fragments of the Japanese planes' volley explosions, and in the evening, the Kwantung Army Air Force was shocked to lose more than 70 fighters and more than 60 bombers.

During this period, Le Yiqin's air force made eight sorties, and at the cost of losing seven fighters, it achieved the results of shooting down 16 Japanese fighters and 21 bombers, for these losses, Le Yiqin was so distressed that he almost vomited blood, but the division commander Tang Qiuli expressed satisfaction with the results of the air force, and after the end of the air battle, the air force of the Kwantung Army, which was hurt, never launched a large-scale air raid again, and the air raid in western Liaoning stopped, and Tang Qiuli's independent division troops gained a firm foothold on the Jinzhou line.

If the Kwantung Army had not insisted on going south and presupposing the dangerous situation of more than 400,000 troops in Tianjin and North China, it would not have been attacked in western Liaoxi, let alone given Tang Qiuli the opportunity to occupy Jinzhou, penetrate deep into the hinterland of the northeast, and cut off the road between the northeast and the Kansai inland road.

There was also an even heavier blow to Emperor Hirohito and the Japanese base camp, when the Shanhaiguan Battle was in full swing, the Tianjin Campaign was also in full swing, Liu Tiehan and Tang Qiusheng commanded four corps of nearly 500,000 troops, from eight directions, at the same time to attack more than 400,000 Japanese troops in Tianjin.

The Japanese army in North China, which had no way to retreat, the last heavy army group, launched desperate resistance in despair, and every street and alley in Tianjin became a battlefield, and the battle was beyond the expectations of Liu Tiehan and Tang Qiusheng, and the troops had to pay a considerable price for every step they pushed forward, so to speak, the troops attacking Tianjin were using shells and grenades to blow up every step of the advance.

On June 29, Liu Tiehan and Tang Qiusheng, together with Chang Feng, commander of the Taihang Mountain Field Corps, and Yuan Jinghao, commander of the Shaanxi local garrison, who went out of Henan to join the Tianjin battlefield, sent a telegram to the division commander Tang Qiuli, "Division Commander Xunjian, the battle in Tianjin is extremely fierce, and the Japanese army's stubborn resistance to Cheng Dù is beyond imagination, especially in the street battles in the urban area, because the Japanese army has already fortifieds, the troops retreat slowly, and the casualties are quite large. The original plan to capture Tianjin within two days is really difficult to complete, please forgive the division commander, and after our department adjusts the deployment, we will report the plan to the entire Tianjin front headquarters of the independent division. ”

Tang Qiuli, who was in the Niuxin Mountain Area, organized the troops to set up an ambush, sighed slightly, what could he say, he was limited to two days to capture Tianjin, because he was afraid that the 100,000 Kwantung Army troops who came across the Bohai Sea would be reinforced to Tianjin, in that case, the troops attacking Tianjin would be very passive, and even Liu Tiehan and Brother Qiusheng complained about the bitter battle, even if they personally commanded it, the result was not much better.

He telegraphed back to the command of the troops attacking Tianjin, only thirteen words, "The battle in Tianjin can be handled as appropriate, and there is no need to report it again" completely delegated authority, and gave the attack on Tianjin, Liu Tiehan and Tang Qiusheng, two veterans, not necessarily worse than himself.

In view of the irreparable situation of the war, in order to save the Japanese army in Tianjin from the fate of annihilation, the base camp of the Japanese army and the general headquarters of the Kwantung Army decided to send a large number of ships to withdraw the troops besieged in Tianjin, and the first batch of ships arrived, which immediately broke the will of the Japanese army in Tianjin, and had the opportunity to escape.

The 100,000 reinforcements of the Kwantung Army, who had already seen the port of Tianjin, received the order to transfer to Qingdao, and the commanders of the Kwantung Army were puzzled by such a strange order, and the Japanese troops who withdrew from Tianjin were only about 160,000, and the rest of the more than 200,000 were all annihilated in Tianjin.

On July 4, the troops of the independent division fully occupied Tianjin, which was the third time that the independent division occupied Tianjin after the July 7 incident, this time, Tianjin would not give up, on July 5, more than 10,000 Japanese troops in Beiping, after learning the news of the loss of Tianjin, had no will to fight, Tang Qiusheng waved troops to Beiping, attacked with light infantry, and the Japanese army broke through in the eastern direction of Hebei, and was annihilated on the way, and Beiping was slightly damaged.

On July 6, the war in North China ended completely, so far, there was no Japanese soldier on the land of North China, and on the first anniversary of the outbreak of the July 7 Incident, Tang Qiuli fulfilled his promise and North China was recovered.