Chapter 549: Night Attack

Feng Zhi'an looked at the dozen or so young officers who walked in front of him in surprise, and thought quickly in his mind, what were they going to do? Do you want to mutiny, or do you want to hold yourself hostage and force you to agree to their demands?

Suddenly, these dozen officers fell to one knee in unison, "Deputy commander, please fulfill all your wishes, the commander and how many good brothers, have fallen under the guns of the little devils, this revenge is not avenged, we will not be at peace for the rest of our lives, a few of us, recruit brothers in the army who volunteer to follow us to kill the Japanese devils, and the large army can be evacuated according to the plan to ensure that it will not affect your plan." ”

A tragic momentum rose in the room, Feng Zhi'an choked in his throat, he could no longer refuse the wish of these enthusiastic soldiers to kill the enemy to the death, he sighed, "Okay, the soldiers can choose as you like, and then I will exchange all the best weapons of the whole corps to you, I only have one word, to come back alive, find the chief of staff to retreat the road map." ”

After a pause, he said again: "This is also the commander's wish, I am old, I may not think the same as you, I hope you don't blame me," After speaking, there was a lonely expression on his face, and under the dim light, there seemed to be an indescribable loss, perhaps, the blood of these young officers aroused the will to fight of the old soldiers in his heart, but he could not charge into the battle in person.

In the cold wind, reflecting the swaying firelight, more than a thousand men, standing in the dark night into a statue of solidification, this is the soldier who volunteered to participate in the death squad, all light machine guns and submachine guns, the body is full of grenades, each person has a big knife, the silk on the knife handle, fluttering in the wind, hunting like a flag.

It was already more than one o'clock in the morning of December 21, and the troops of the Sulu garrison corps were quietly withdrawing from their positions in an orderly manner, and the Japanese troops on the opposite side were huddled in the trenches, without noticing at all, under the cover of night, the positions of the Chinese troops had changed, and Feng Zhi'an had arrived in front of the queue of the death squads.

This veteran who has experienced countless battles, half his life has been fighting with his compatriots, only on the battlefield of the bloody battle with the foreign invaders, only to find the blood that has long been lost, he saluted a military salute, towards every subordinate he was ready to fight, and then, turned away, no one saw that this old soldier who was more than half a hundred years old, tears welled up from the corners of his eyes, sprinkled in the cold wind of the Central Plains, in the night.

Isogu Lian sat in the headquarters in a low voice, the staff officers went in and out, although the fire was very strong, but he still had a chill in his heart, only five days, in Kaifeng, his troops, lost more than 20,000 people, in Shangqiu, has lost nearly 20,000 people, and there is no hope of conquering Shangqiu, tomorrow, tomorrow can not be predicted, only know, it is still a bloody fight, the Chinese army on the opposite side is like an impenetrable wall, blocking him and his troops.

Especially today, the sudden bombing of the independent division's air force, the fire bombs that fell from the sky, caused an immeasurable blow to the morale of the troops, and even he, a veteran soldier who was accustomed to seeing the battlefield and corpses all over the field, thought of the soldiers on fire, and the bitter wail before death, his heart was cold, not to mention those ordinary soldiers, no matter how powerful the bushido spirit was, they could not bear the bullets.

He regarded the bombing of the Independent Division at Shangqiu as the most important piece of information, and quickly reported it to the North China Dispatch Army Headquarters, hoping to attract the attention of the top brass to regain the lost air superiority.

A division of Xiangyue Qingji from the Niangziguan battlefield was preparing to break through into Henan from the Anyang breakthrough, and as a backup force of the First Army, he wanted to expand the breakthrough and stabilize the situation west of Zhengzhou and Luoyang, so as to prepare for the full occupation of Henan.

This is the decision made by Kazuki Kiyoji and Isoya Ryosuke, when they did not know all the key points of the line from Anyang to Zhengzhou, which had been recovered by Tang Qiuli's command, when the Japanese troops of this division crossed the Zhanghe River without warning, they were suddenly attacked by Yuan Jinghao's troops, who had been prepared for a long time, and the smooth ice surface limited the speed of the Japanese army's movement, and became a live target for light and heavy machine guns.

After half a day of fierce fighting, the Japanese army of a division was beaten back again and again, and once retreated to Yuecheng and then to Cizhou, the Chinese army crossed the Zhanghe River and pursued closely, until the Japanese army was driven to Handan, before stopping the attack, and occupying Cizhou, advancing the front lines of Hebei and Henan to the territory of Hebei, and Anyang became the rear.

Ryosuke Isoya looked at the telegram, his mouth was full of taste, although he never had the intention of returning to North China along the Zhengzhou and Anyang routes, but the back road was cut off, and it was not a good thing after all, he always felt a cool breeze in the back of his head, and there was a feeling of unsteadiness, which also meant that the follow-up troops had no hope, and the First Army really became a lone army.

Several things together, what good mood can Isoya Ryosuke have, he has not seen the shadow of Xuzhou, the attack of the First Army is sharp and blunt, and the ambition when he was ordered to form the First Army has been crushed by the ruthless reality and repeated blows, and Isoya Ryosuke feels more and more that this time he will go south, and he will never go smoothly.

It's already around two o'clock in the morning, and Ryosuke Isoya has no sleep, and the fire that was dropped by the damn Shina plane has been extinguished a lot, and it will not affect tomorrow's attack action, and I hope that tomorrow's battle of Shangqiu will have an ending.

The sudden sound of gunfire and shouts of killing woke him up from his contemplation, and a staff officer rushed in in to report that the Chinese army had suddenly launched a sneak attack on the depth of our position, and the number of enemy troops was unknown at present, and there were battles everywhere, Isoya Ryosuke was startled, and suddenly remembered that Kaifeng City, and it was also after the sudden attack that the troops of the independent division took advantage of the chaos to withdraw.

Could it be that it was this trick again, with a sudden attack by a small number of troops, covering the withdrawal of the main force, he immediately ordered, the troops immediately began to attack, surrounded and annihilated the sneak attack of the independent division troops, the staff officer was just about to convey the order, and was shouted by him, Tang Qiuli's officers would not be so stupid, on the contrary, they were all cunning and unusual, and they were cunning and scheming, yin* I attacked overnight and set up an ambush, and the Imperial Japanese Army was not good at night battles.

He canceled the order to attack immediately, and instead ordered the troops, never let go of the sneak attack of the Chinese troops, the shouting of killing and the fierce gunfire, the sound of explosions lasted for more than an hour, before gradually subsided, the battle was over, the sneak attack of the Chinese troops were annihilated, in the words of the Chinese people, this is called "stealing chickens does not make rice", in fact, he called this "smart but clever mistake", if he attacked immediately, at least he would buy himself more than five hours.

The staff officer came in and reported: "Your Excellency, the sneak attack on the Chinese army has been repelled by us," "Hani? Repulsion, not total annihilation? The result was very surprising, and he asked, "Details?" ”

The staff officer hesitated for a moment and replied: "According to the report from the front, there is a force of about 1,000 Chinese soldiers, all of whom are very well-equipped, all of them are automatic weapons, and they also carry broadswords, and suddenly launched an attack on the defensive position of our Katayama brigade, causing great casualties to our soldiers. ”

Ryosuke Isoya was furious, with more than 1,000 troops, launched an attack on more than 100,000 of our imperial troops, and retreated, Katayama was incompetent, the shame of the Japanese Imperial Army, he rushed to the position of the Katayama Brigade with anger, along the way, from time to time saw the corpse of a soldier with missing arms and legs, and accidentally kicked a person in the head, without looking closely, he knew that it was his own soldier, and he still had a steel helmet on his head

This group of Shina soldiers used cold weapons to kill the brave and combative imperial soldiers all over the field, and Isoya Ryosuke was almost mad, and when he saw Katayama Hirono, who was also blue-faced, he learned that it was indeed a group of Shina soldiers armed with big knives, killing one in and one out on the position of the Katayama Brigade.

Because it was at night, the soldiers did not dare to shoot blindly, for fear of accidentally injuring their own people, and as a result, they suffered a big loss, more than 1,000 people were hacked to death by big knives, more than 2,000 people had their arms and legs cut off, and more than 3,000 troops were reduced.

Feng Zhi'an, who had withdrawn from Shangqiu with his troops, ordered the chief of staff to continue to march in the direction of Maozhou with his troops, and he took a regiment of troops, on a hill about ten kilometers outside the south gate of Shangqiu, listening to the fierce gunfire in the city, anxiously waiting, he hoped to see those young figures, knowing that there was little hope, but he was unwilling, and there was always hope in his heart.

The gunfire stopped, in the dark night, there was still no figure in sight, more than half an hour passed, he was desperate, but it was a pity that there were more than a thousand loyal and brave good men, and suddenly, the adjutant next to him shouted in surprise: "Deputy commander, look, it should be them"

Following the direction pointed by the adjutant, Feng Zhi'an saw his familiar figure, and when he got closer, a strong smell of blood came to his nose, and the murderous aura in his body had not yet dissipated, he said to himself, just come back, come back This raid can be described as a complete victory, at the cost of less than a hundred casualties, killing back and forth on the Japanese position, I don't know how many little devils' heads have been cut off, anyway, the big knives are curled.

The head of the guard regiment was covered in blood, touched his feet, and reported: "Deputy commander, the death squad reports to you, fortunately it has fulfilled its mission, and at the cost of eighty-seven casualties, more than 1,000 little devils have been killed, and now I request to return to the team" Feng Zhi'an looked at the soldiers covered in blood, did not speak, waved his hand, and disappeared into the darkness with the troops.

The soldiers clearly saw the sparks jumping from the eyes of the deputy commander, but they didn't see it, Feng Zhi'an saluted solemnly in the direction of Shangqiu, and said secretly in his heart: "Xun Chen, I brought the troops out safely, and the soldiers have avenged you, you can go with peace of mind."

He seemed to see the tall figure and hear the heroic laughter, this figure, this laughter, had always accompanied him in his military career.

(To be continued)