How can anti-tank be anti-tank with almost no anti-tank weapons? This is a problem, if it is a cowardly scraping army, the commander may take the lead at this time, and then the big guy will run away. However, the Eighth Route Army is not a scraping army, and every time it comes to such a critical juncture, party members can play a leading role.

Sure enough, at this critical moment, a small man picked up an explosive bag and swooped out of the trench, only to see him hunched over and his right hand clamping the explosive bag under his armpit, running wildly with both legs, and rushing towards the oncoming rumbling tank.

This person's name is Zhong Chuan, and he is a platoon commander of the Eighth Route Army. Isn't his name weird? That's also for a reason, at the beginning his name was Zhong Shoushan, and it is said that his grandfather asked the old Xiu in the village to give him, which means to live a long life.

But after Zhong Shoushan was born, he really couldn't see the signs of longevity, in the year of the Central Plains War, his hometown happened to be a battlefield, and his father and uncle were arrested overnight, and the only two grass houses in the family were also destroyed in the war, and the old grandfather starved to death. His mother had to take him and his younger siblings all the way to Hubei to beg for a living.

It's easy to wait for the end of the Central Plains War, and when their family returns to their hometown, it will be considered ruined. At the age of fifteen, he had to shoulder the burden of his family and work as a cow and a horse for the landlord to earn a living. Zhong Shoushan originally thought that no matter how hard this life was, it would be like this, but who would have thought that in 1938, the devil would come again, and for a while, Henan was plagued by floods, droughts, and locust soup for four years, and it was unspeakably miserable.

At this time, the Eighth Route Army came, and they not only defeated the devils and traitors entrenched in their village, but also organized production for the villagers. After coming and going, the old Zhong family, who was originally so poor that there was only one breath left, relieved themselves. Zhong Shoushan, who was influenced by the new ideas, changed his name to turn over. The implication is self-evident.

In 1941, under the call of the Eighth Route Army, Zhong turned over and resolutely handed over the family's land to his younger brother and chose to join the army to fight devils. In the past three years, he has made rapid progress, not only in terms of culture, but also in the party. This time, seeing that the situation was critical, he was the first to rush out.

Zhong Fang, who grew up at the foot of Wangwu Mountain, is a well-known mountain climber, and all kinds of mountain roads and rugged trails are like walking on flat ground. So he didn't look reckless when he jumped out, but there was a rule under his feet. It's not particularly fast, but it's very strange, how strange is it? Three steps, one turn, five steps and one circle, looking at his body is facing east, but in fact his feet are facing west, so that you can't judge where he is going at all.

Naturally, the devils who hid in the tank with narrow vision couldn't judge the movement of Zhong Chuan's turn, don't look at their bullets chasing Zhong Chuan and turning over, hitting the ground with smoke and dust, but they couldn't touch a single foot hair of Zhong's turnover.

It was too late, Zhong turned over and trotted to the side of a devil tank, without saying a word, he lit the fuse, stuffed a dozen pounds of explosives under the tank, and then hid in a crater by himself in two consecutive rolls. With a loud bang, this little devil's Type 97 tank was directly blown into the sky and ended up in a different place.

The comrades-in-arms who turned over on the battlefield looked at it, it turned out that this is okay? Immediately, they began to charge to the death with the explosives bag! Of course, not everyone can succeed like Zhong turned over, a considerable number of soldiers were either knocked down by the devil's machine gun just after jumping out of the trench, or the devil's shell exploded to the ground on the way, but none of the soldiers flinched, all the commanders and fighters of the Eighth Route Army went forward one after another, tried again if it didn't work once, even if they could only succeed once out of ten, they also resolutely embarked on this journey of death.

Rumbling explosions resounded across the battlefield, and one by one, the tanks used by the devils for assault were blown up. This made Tanaka Kuichi, who was personally watching the battle in the rear, frown, but then he issued a new order: "Cover the artillery fire, let the 13th Tank Wing continue to attack the position of the Eighth Route Army, and be sure to open the breakthrough!" ”

Tanaka Kuichi is also out of the way, he doesn't believe that the Eighth Route Army can still hold under the continuous armored assault of the 13th Tank Wing, even if their will does not collapse, people will be defeated!

Indeed, the company where Zhong turned over was under the madness of the Japanese army, and the losses were quite heavy, and the more than 100 men of the whole company have lost a small half of them so far, and almost everyone in the remaining half is hanging flowers.

"Shoot the light, light it!" The company commander shouted categorically, "Even if we only have the last person left, we won't allow the devil to take a step forward!" ”

Under the encouragement of the company commander, the company was ready for a decisive battle, and some comrades directly carried explosive bags on their backs, which was to prepare to die with the enemy. The soldier who did not have an explosive bag silently stuffed grenades into the armed belt, and a full circle of grenades was not much worse than an explosive bag!

Just when the company commander was about to rush out with the remaining soldiers to burn the devil's tank and jade, the herald came, and General Yang personally gave the company an order: "Don't be brutal, the air support of the Soviet big brother will come soon, and if necessary, you can give up part of the position first!" ”

As he spoke, a dull roar came from the sky, and Zhong turned over and put his hand on the pergola to look north, and a small black dot could be faintly seen under the blue sky. This group of small black dots flew very fast, and as they grew larger and larger, they gradually revealed the true face of Lushan-IL-2.

Zhong turned over and only saw the devil's plane, and this was the first time he had seen his own plane, and each Il-2 had a shining red star under its wing. The superiors told them that these planes sprayed with red stars belonged to the big brother of the Soviet Union, and that they should not attack if they saw it, and that if the pilot of the big brother parachuted, they must go to the rescue as soon as possible.

Zhong turned over and was really curious, how did the iron bird flying in the sky hit the iron turtle crawling on the ground. Under his gaze, the Il-2 soon began to dive, and then the fire flickered under the wings, and in an instant the Japanese iron turtle on the ground was shrouded in smoke and dust.

A few minutes later, the group of Il-2 flapped their wings and flew away, and the bell turned over and could see that the opposite position was full of scrapped iron turtles. They were rampant like crabs just now, but now they have turned into a pile of scrap metal in the burning.

Tanaka Kuichi's face was as black as the bottom of a pot, and in the blink of an eye, one of his tank squadrons was reimbursed, which was completely beyond his expectations, who would have thought that Tsuchihachi could also have air support? What is this called?

"Lucia, you don't want to die!" Kuichi Tanaka angrily brandished his sword in the air, and he was so angry that he had always been good at keeping calm, which showed how much he hated the Soviet Union.

From the moment the Soviet Union expelled the Japanese ambassador and formally declared war on Japan, the Soviet Union and the Bolsheviks became the most hated targets of the Japanese soldiers. In their eyes, this is treachery, this is falling into the well, and it is undisciplined!

Probably in the logic of the Japanese, they can only play hooligans, and once it is their turn to be played hooligans, it is completely unacceptable, and they start to talk about morality.

Of course, this is meaningless, a truly intelligent person would never be morally righteous with a group of brutes, let alone even worse than brutes. For Li Xiaofeng, there is only one kind of devil that is a good devil -- that is, a dead devil.

To get back to the point, after this round of air raids, Tanaka's tanks suffered heavy losses, and few of them managed to make it back from the front. To make matters worse, the infantry that charged with the tanks was also plowed back and forth several times by the Il-2, and a whole squadron was reimbursed.

"Night Fight!"

After some thought, Tanaka Kuichi made a new decision, there was no point in continuing the offensive now, his side was demoralized, and the Eighth Route Army still had air support, and if he continued to rush hard, he would die delivering food. It is better to launch a night attack at night, when the Eighth Route Army without air support is not a dish on his table!

According to Japan's published war history, "It was day and night, and Lieutenant General Tanaka organized about 150 elite members of our imperial army to carry out a night raid. At about 9 o'clock that night, the night raiding team successfully broke through and occupied the position of the Eighth Road. However, about an hour later, the Eighth Route carried out a counterattack with a sea of people with the support of artillery fire from the exposed animals, and our night attack team resisted desperately, destroying countless enemies. Helplessly outnumbered and the enemy's artillery fire was extremely fierce, he had to temporarily retreat. ”

Looking at the records of the Japanese army, it seems that their night attack was very successful, but in the end, the artillery of the Soviet Red Army was too sharp, and then the Eighth Route Army used the tactics of crowds, so it had to withdraw from its position. Later, when he repaired the history of the Anti-Japanese War, he quoted the records of the Japanese army in full, and also helped the Japanese army to fill the hole of the innumerable enemy annihilation, saying that after the First World War, the Eighth Route Army lost about 1,000 people.

So is this the case? Take a look at Xinhua News Agency's narrative in "Handan in World War II": "That day and night, the Japanese army suddenly launched a night attack and conquered one of the positions of our second battalion. At about 9 o'clock in the evening, the commander of the third battalion gathered more than 20 people, and joined a squad of the fourth company to launch a counter-charge. After a short encounter, they saw the enemy in groups of three or five, and fled to the anticline of the mound. The commander of the third battalion immediately instructed the grenadiers to fire 10 rounds in a row, killing more than 10 enemy soldiers on the spot. When our infantry entered the top of the mound, we saw six or seven of our infantry rushing out of their hiding places and rushing towards the enemy, flanking the front and rear, and about 30 of the remnants of the enemy were desperately unable to retreat, and the enemy collapsed immediately. At 10 o'clock, our troops re-advanced to their original positions and found that five more soldiers were holding a bunker that had not been conquered by the enemy, and more than 20 dead bodies of the enemy were piled up outside. In the re-inventory of the position, the enemy and our soldiers hugged each other and killed a total of 31 pairs, covering the trenches. On the anticline, the limbs are dissolved, the intestines and lungs are in disarray, the heroism is unprecedented, and it is unbearable! ”

And General Yang of the 685th Regiment also mentioned Yang Jingguo, a combat hero in this night, in his memoirs, who showed extraordinary bravery in this battle. After the counterattack began, the fighters had just rushed up when three people were shot by the Japanese army. This made Yang Jingguo furious, and immediately rushed to the side of the soldier who had just died with a submachine gun and six grenades, and then threw two grenades at a large mound. Then he waved his arms and called the warriors behind him to charge with him, fighting and advancing like a bamboo!

Not only did the Eighth Route Army have memoirs to prove that the real situation was not at all what the Japanese had described, but the Allied side also had war correspondents to record the battle, TASS correspondent Alexander was one of the first Soviet journalists to be allowed to enter the Eighth Route Army to cover the army, and he entered the position as soon as the battle ended, he recorded:

"It's my first time on the front lines, and I'm very excited and nervous. When I arrived at the recaptured position, I couldn't help but be shocked by the brutal battle, the trenches and positions were densely covered with the corpses of both the enemy and the enemy, some of them scuffled with each other, you hold my head, I choke your neck, or you grab my thighs, I pinch your lower body! The soil, soaked in the blood of the dead, emitted a fishy stench and the smell of gunsmoke, as if crying and burning. ”

"I can tell that this is the last battle scene before this position is taken by the Japanese. The remaining dozen or so soldiers of the Eighth Route Army did not flee in the face of the multiplier enemy, but fought to the death, and almost all of these soldiers died heroically in the end...... By that time, only four fighters had hidden in the last firing point in this position to continue the resistance. However, their sacrifice was worth it, not only did they annihilate many Japanese invaders, but they also gained time before they could regain their positions by counter-charge. ”

It can be seen from this that the artillery fire of the so-called Soviet Red Army and the tactics of the Japanese did not exist, and this position was not completely taken by the devils in the end, and at least four soldiers of the Eighth Route Army resisted until the end until the position was regained, and in a strict sense, the Japanese army failed to conquer this position at all!

The story about this position is not over, when war correspondent Alexander was inspecting and cleaning the battlefield with the Eighth Route Army, the commander of the third battalion suddenly found that a group of Japanese troops approached from the southwest at high speed, like a group of vicious wolves, coming extremely fiercely.

At this time, Alexander also recounted: "There was another large number of Japanese troops attacking, we had to drag away the corpses, set up heavy machine guns and shoot at the Japanese invaders, and the large-caliber bullets hit the scorched and crooked trunks of the trees in front, and immediately turned out the white and tender heart of the tree, which was particularly eye-catching." The Japanese soldiers who rushed to the front were knocked down one by one, but the ones behind did not flinch, but continued to rush over with the corpses. Several Japanese officers rushed a few meters in front of me before being killed...... After the first battle, we killed and wounded more than 200 Japanese soldiers......"

Seeing no, at this time, it was the Japanese who really used the tactics of the sea of people, but the results of the Japanese army's pig tactics were quite unsatisfactory, and they suffered heavy losses in the concentrated fire shooting of the Eighth Route Army.

Later, when General Yang summed up the reasons for the victory in this blocking battle, he mentioned: Our officers and men were very stubborn in their will, and from the beginning of the battle to the end of the campaign, they always maintained strong morale and determination, and were able to fight until the last moment, no matter how dangerous the environment was.

What General Yang said is not wrong at all, the Eighth Route Army was able to win this blocking battle, and the key point was the quality of will, without the support of tenacious will, it would not be able to survive at all, because the Japanese offensive was still quite fierce!

At dawn the next day, seeing that the night attack had no effect, Tanaka Kuichi also let go, and the entire squadron, the entire brigade, and even the entire wing launched wave after wave of fierce attacks on the main position of the 115th Division, and by 4 o'clock in the afternoon, a total of 13 times!

Zhao Huzi, who was a herald at the time, recalled: "I was ordered by the battalion commander to go to the front line to find Wang Xingfa, the commander of the second company. Speak completely by shouting at the top of his voice. ”

"When I had finished delivering the order, I saluted and said, 'I'm going back!' Just as he was about to leave, a shell landed nearby, and the trench was blown up in an instant! I was turning around, and before I could react, I was buried in my chest by the dirt that had been blown up, and it took a lot of effort to climb out. And when I turned to look, Company Commander Wang was no longer visible, and later I learned that the shell hit Company Commander Wang's location directly, and the whole person could not be found......"

Li Wende, a medical officer of the 688th Regiment, also recalled: "The battle was very hard, and the wounded were carried back from the front almost every minute, and some died on the way. Because the battle was so fierce, the sacrificed soldiers had no time to bury them, and they could only be temporarily stacked together after being carried down, often stacking more than one person high at the end of a day. At the height of the battle, the sacrificed fighters did not even have time to take off their weapons and equipment, so they piled them together with grenades, clothes and leggings. In those days, Li Wende never had time to wash his face, let alone change his clothes, and carried the wounded and sacrificed soldiers every day, and the blood on the sleeves of his arms was hardened together! ”

Li Wende recalled: "The health team he was in should have been relatively safe, but after the Battle of Handan, only five or six of the more than 40 people were not injured, and seven or eight health workers like him, who had to travel frequently to the front line, were killed." This is not the worst, Li Wende also said: "Not all the soldiers who died can be carried back, and a considerable number of soldiers who died on the front line were blown away by the fierce artillery fire of the enemy and us before they could carry it!" ”

It was a scorching summer, in order to avoid the spread of disease, halfway through the battle, according to the instructions of the Eighth Route Army Headquarters, the sacrificed soldiers were collectively cremated and buried nearby. After the victory of the battle, a large monument was erected in the resting place of the martyrs and a martyr's cemetery was established to commemorate the more than 10,000 loveliest national heroes who died in this battle.

After three days of fierce fighting, Tanaka did not advance an inch, but lost nearly 3,000 men. He had never encountered such a huge loss, so much so that he didn't know how to report it to Okamura Ninji for a while. Of course, Tanaka Kuichi didn't know that his losses were far more than these 3,000 people, and that the end of the Fourth Cavalry Brigade was imminent...... (To be continued.) )