Chapter 557: Desperate Situation

For the Japanese army, being able to save Ryosuke Isoya from the danger of annihilation means that it can break through the defense line of the Chinese army and break the current stalemate, and the pattern of the Sino-Japanese war will be rewritten.

For the army, the elimination of the first army of Isoya Ryosuke is equivalent to the elimination of a sharp knife inserted into the hinterland, the central army on the southern front and the independent division troops on the northern front, back to back, have no worries, on various battlefields, the Chinese army and the Japanese army are fighting, and they are very clear about the significance of the battle of Xiaoxian for their side.

Xuzhou, an antique deep house compound, carved beams and paintings, the black lacquer door is nailed with a large copper nail at the mouth of the bowl, there are two stone lions squatting at the door, maybe it is old, you can see the traces of rain washing, compared with most of the surrounding houses that were shelled by the Japanese army, miraculously survived the war, this was originally a large family's house, after Li Zongren arrived in Xuzhou, the master had to give the yard to the anti-Japanese commander, and the headquarters of the commander of the Xuzhou Theater of the National Army was located here.

In the living room, there are several delicate side dishes on the table of the Eight Immortals, a tin wine jug, scalded in boiling water, exuding an intoxicating aroma of wine, giving people from the cold, a kind of heartfelt warmth, Li Zongren, commander of the Xuzhou Theater of Operations, with his hands behind his back, pacing back and forth in the room, with a smile on his fair face from time to time.

Tang Qiusheng, deputy commander-in-chief of the Yellow River Valley Theater General Headquarters and deputy commander of the Independent Division, had already received a telegram from Tang Qiusheng, and the troops of the Independent Division received an order from General Tang Qiuli, commander-in-chief of the theater, to immediately go to the Taihang Mountains to carry out a new combat mission.

Li Zongren was relieved, his heart suddenly relaxed, to be honest, there are independent divisions in the Xuzhou area, he always has a sense of oppression, not Tang Qiuli is flying and domineering, but a kind of instinctive fear of the strong, Gui Department took advantage of the battle of Xuzhou, re-onto the political stage of the Republic of China, this is the strategy he discussed with Bai Chongxi, and it is also the main motive for Gui's army to actively participate in the battle of Xuzhou.

Now, the start is good, the remnants of Isoya Ryosuke have been tightly surrounded in the land of Xiaoxian projectiles, and it is a matter of time before they are destroyed, and they don't need to waste too much strength, so Li Zongren hopes that the end of the Battle of Xuzhou will be fought by the Gui army, so that the influence will be different, and with this battle, the new Gui family and the Gui army will become famous and recognized by the people.

What is difficult to do is that the troops of Vice Chairman Tang Qiuli fought in the first half of the Battle of Xuzhou, and they contributed the most and paid the greatest price; without the desperate resistance of Kaifeng and Shangqiu for six days, they could not have deployed their troops to the front line of Xuzhou, and there would be no such good situation as today.

Therefore, Li Zongren took great pains to arrange Tang Qiusheng's five brigade troops, first put them away from the main battlefield, and as a result, the blessed people did not have to be busy, and they could also pick up a big bargain by sitting on a cold bench, and more than 40,000 Japanese troops were stunned to send them to their mouths for people to eat, and later put the troops of the independent division on the periphery of the Xiao County encirclement.

In his own later words, he was a little inferior, cautious, until now, the troops in the direction of Cangzhou of the independent division are still under the attack of more than 300,000 Japanese troops, and he has enough time to arrange and destroy the first army of Isoya Liansuke who is cowering in Xiao County.

His telegram to Tang Qiuli also implied a tentative tone, if Tang Qiuli, who was the vice chairman of the Military Commission, insisted on letting his troops participate in the final general attack on the Japanese First Army, he Li Zongren would not be able to say anything, and he would not be able to get the reason on the table to refuse, but fortunately, Tang Qiuli did not insist, which made Li Zongren feel faintly uneasy in his heart.

Now, Tang Qiuli actually withdrew his troops in front of this great achievement that could cause a sensation in the whole country, which surprised Li Zongren, and at the same time, he also felt that in terms of being a person and doing things, he was so bad, and he could only use the reason that the Gui family needed Xuzhou's victory too much.

There was a sound of guards standing up and saluting at the door, Li Zongren walked quickly to the door of the living room, he had cooperated in Xuzhou for many days, he had not seen the face of the third person in the independent division, he according to his own imagination, depicted the image of Tang Qiusheng in his heart, a cold air came to his face, Tang Qiusheng appeared in front of Li Zongren with the dust of the battlefield.

Both of them were stunned, in Tang Qiusheng's mind, this prestigious head of the Xingui family must be an old and sophisticated, shrewd character, in Li Zongren's mind, this deputy division commander Tang must be a majestic martial artist, who knows, as soon as they meet, they all subvert each other's imagination.

The guests and hosts sat down, and Li Zongren explained the intention of the banquet, which was to thank the troops of the Independent Division, in the Battle of Xuzhou, for their vigorous assistance to the Xuzhou Theater, and for the heavy sacrifices they made.

Tang Qiusheng politely said a few words, without saying too much, with his delicate mind, how could he not guess what Li Zongren meant, and he was not willing to be too entangled and false in this, so he conveyed Tang Qiuli's words to Li Zongren as they were, although the Japanese army is now surrounded in Xiao County, but their command structure still exists, and the combat effectiveness of more than 50,000 Japanese troops cannot be underestimated.

Therefore, Tang Qiu should not blindly attack on the ground, which would bring great casualties to the troops, and should adopt the tactic of peeling off bamboo shoots layer by layer, gradually compressing the Japanese army's activity space from the outside to the inside, consuming its troops, and finally, adopting concentrated artillery fire to cover and destroy the attack, so that the final victory can be achieved at the minimum cost.

It should be noted that to prevent the Japanese army from risking death to break through the encirclement, the allocation of troops should be equal, so that the Japanese army would not find its weak links and would not have an opportunity to take advantage of it.

Li Zongrenhe listened very carefully, and called the chief of staff, he secretly broke out in a cold sweat, he did think that the battle of Xiaoxian was too easy, originally thought that it would only take two days to end the battle, 230,000 troops, even if they were heaped with people, could also crush more than 50,000 Japanese to death, but did not estimate the Japanese army's will to fight, in that case, Isoya Ryosuke's first army was wiped out, and his 21st Group Army was almost consumed, killing 1,000 enemies, losing 800 of his own money, and losing money.

He believed that what Tang Qiusheng conveyed was the truth, that no unit knew the Japanese army better than the independent division, and that it had been fighting against the Japanese from the northeast to north China, and that these experiences were too important to him.

Seeing Tang Qiusheng's dashing back and disappearing at the gate, Li Zongren didn't speak for a long time, this Tang Qiusheng made him feel refreshed, that Tang Qiusheng, who was famous all over the country and had not yet met, was there? Is it more attractive? In Li Zongren's mind, Tang Qiuli and his generals have been listed as a group of people who can be deeply friends but cannot be offended.

On 25 December, Li Zongren moved his headquarters to Xiao County, commanding Liao Lei's troops of the 21st Group Army and eight divisions of the Sichuan Army.

Under the command of officers at all levels, the Japanese army faced a desperate situation and broke out of its strong combat effectiveness, and the will to fight to the death, or beyond Li Zongren's imagination, the battle to the afternoon, the progress of the attacking troops in various places was slow, the casualties were quite large, every position, had to go through repeated battles, the bloody corpses of soldiers on both sides could be seen everywhere, there were many Japanese soldiers, completely suicidal attacks, covered with explosives, howling and rushing into the crowd of Chinese soldiers, a loud bang, often with the death of a Japanese soldier, In exchange for the lives of four or five Chinese soldiers.

In the evening, Li Zongren ordered to stop the offensive and consolidate the existing positions, on this day, the Chinese army's offensive had little effect, the average advance was less than one kilometer, the ferocity of the Japanese soldiers, Li Zongren was quite a headache, and he now absolutely believed that Tang Qiuli's words were completely correct.

The fierce gunfire on the front gradually fell down, Li Zongrenzi thought hard in the headquarters, and followed Tang Qiusheng to fight the division commander of the Gui Army in the Tongshan Campaign, and asked to see the commander.

Sure enough, the next day, the battle of the Chinese army, fought very easily, with artillery with infantry tactics, gradually advanced, in this way, the Japanese soldiers were dumbfounded, even desperately could not find an opponent, in the face of endless shells, fierce fighting for a whole day, good news came from all directions, the Japanese army on the opposite side, was gradually repulsed, retreated to the core area of Xiao County, the remnants of the Japanese army, finally compressed in a radius of only a few kilometers.

Ryosuke Isoya was already completely desperate, and received telegrams from all directions desperately reinforcing troops, all claiming that they could not break through the resistance of the Chinese army, and fought fiercely for two days and nights, without advancing an inch, and were stuck in a bitter battle, he understood that there was no hope, and that the Chinese army commanded by Li Zongren was ruthless to keep himself and tens of thousands of imperial soldiers here.

The staff officer sent another telegram, which was sent by the commander of the dispatch army, Kazuki Kiyoji, in the telegram, Kazuki Kiyoji ordered him to organize the troops to break through, and the direction of the breakthrough can be chosen in the direction of Cangzhou, Prince Zairen is commanding the troops, and attack the blocking position of the Chinese army with all his might, and your troops are trying their best to move closer to Cangzhou, and there is a great opportunity.

After reading the telegram, Ryosuke Isoya didn't even give a sneer, and tore the telegram to shreds a few times, all at this time, and said this kind of tasteless, if he could break through, why bother with the attack of more than 200,000 troops here, being hit by artillery bombardments and guns, dying every minute, and unable to move a single step.

(To be continued)