Chu Tingchang had insight into Sakahara's plan, and this old devil wanted to cut through the mess quickly. Therefore, the corresponding solution is to force him to slow down. He already had a rough plan, but he needed the cooperation of the 74th Army. He hoped that the 74th Army would not continue to run to the north and be eaten by the enemy in the retreat, but would stop and defend in a place with favorable terrain for a few days, so that the menacing enemy would be attracted to the surroundings in the future, and then he would lead the 5th Army to march in parallel in several ways and strike hard at Sakahara, the old devil, from behind, and he would not dare to underestimate himself from now on.

The plan had not yet been discussed with Stilwell, nor was it coordinated with other forces, but secret troop movements had already begun. Zhou Youfu's main force continued to confront the enemy, making the illusion of slowly advancing westward along the railway, which was of course the enemy's expected direction of attack. In this direction, the enemy placed the strength of two brigades and one main division, and carried out layers of defense.

But the real killer move came from the two young divisions 203 and 204 led by Xiong Xianghui and newly trained. The two divisions, which were now massing near King Tung, were originally intended to follow the route of the previous attack into Thailand, but now it appears that they can cross the Golden Triangle of Shan State directly from northern Myanmar and move closer to Mandalay.

Chu Tingchang studied the battle of the 56th Division from Mandalay last year, and the Japanese army attacked Lashio in a few days and cut off 100,000 Du Yuming, which indeed created a miracle in military history. The Japanese army was actually marching motorized in most of the mountainous and densely forested areas, and the passage should still be there, probably covered by new vegetation, but it should still be accessible to cars. And the enemy will certainly not be there for it. Because his two young divisions must not be in the sequence of the Chinese army listed by the enemy's general staff. Not only is it not in the Japanese statistics, but in fact, these two divisions are not in the Allied plan.

Regarding his specific strength, Chu Tingchang has always been on the side of Chongqing and Stilwell, and has set up some ambushes, even though he has taken all the numbers from the 203rd Division to the 209th Division, but except for Xiong Xianghui, who is specifically responsible for recruiting recruits and training, no one knows what kind of training these troops are in.

Chongqing received a report from the military commander, and it is very likely that Chu Tingchang will use these numbers to eat empty salaries. This report was originally not well-intentioned, but the effect backfired, making Lao Jiang let down his vigilance against Chu Tingchang a little.

Chongqing only knew that a number of infantry battalions had been trained to replenish the rest of the troops, but no one knew that he had two divisions that could already fight. Even if the Japanese had lurked high-level spies at the Chongqing Military Command Headquarters and Stilwell Headquarters, they would not have received real information.

He concealed this information, not originally to deal with the Japanese counterattack, but not to let Lao Jiang feel that his strength was rising too fast. Stilwell also had to give priority to replenishing the rear of Chief Chu Ting, as soon as the trucks that set off from Lido, India and transported supplies through a tortuous route arrived near Jingdong, they would be intercepted along with the supplies and vehicles, and sometimes even the driver, and his dozen or so training camps were entrenched there, stretching for hundreds of miles, where about 500 US military instructors conducted basic training, but they could not get a glimpse of the whole picture.

The instructor's message to Stilwell was that it would take another two months to complete the training. However, during the Chiang Mai Campaign, while augmenting the old units with new recruits, Chu Tingchang also sent some non-commissioned officers of the old units and the lightly wounded who had recovered from the rear hospitals to the new units to serve as grassroots commanders, thus rapidly forming combat effectiveness. Although by U.S. military standards, these two divisions had only just completed basic platoon and shooting training, Commander Chu knew that the Chinese soldiers were far faster than the Americans in learning.

Among the soldiers, there is a high proportion of Burmese Chinese, which is another trump card of his, and these locals can easily hide among the Burmese population to gather intelligence, and it is bound to be useful in finding some routes that do not exist on the map.

This counterattack could not be carried out via the Lashio-Mandalay railway, and in his opinion, it was best to keep the secrets of the national army system from them, and Sakahara was not only a good soldier, but also a intelligence chief, and he had to be more careful when dealing with him.

Xiong Xianghui received an order dropped by a liaison plane, asking him to quickly assemble the 203rd and 204th Divisions, carry out the necessary camouflage with the night of the day, and set off in the early morning, bound to move closer to the Mandalay battlefield by all possible means.

Thrown down with the order, there was also a detailed path of the march.

Originally, the troops were preparing for the New Year, and after hearing the news of the defeat at the front, their morale was a little low, because they heard that it was the undefeated god of war of the Japanese army, Itagaki Seishiro, who personally commanded it, and everyone was a little worried, for fear that the enemy would repeat last year's Tianchangjie surprise attack, so that the 100,000 army would have to go to the Savage Mountain again.

Xiong Xianghui summoned the senior officers of the two divisions to the headquarters and read out the order of Chu Tingchang, commander of the Burma-Thai theater of operations.

Finally, he also read a copy of the situation prediction made by Commander Chu after observing the sky at night.

In the prediction, he believed that Sakahara was the White Tiger Star descending to earth, this person was implicated in Japan's national fortune, and after 918, China suffered defeat all the way, which was due to the outstanding martial arts of this fang. However, observing the sky at night, the white tiger is declining or will fall. If Sakahara can be defeated in this battle, the victory and defeat between China and Japan will be decided.

This is not the first time that Chu Tingchang has exaggerated the strategic significance of a certain battle and carried out pre-war agitation, and he knows that this kind of agitation is always effective in raising morale. Let them feel that they are standing on the cusp of a historical turning point, and they will have a heartfelt sense of mission in their chests, and this sense of mission can allow novices who have not fought in World War I to restrain their pre-war apprehensions, and let them burst out with courage and become resolute.

Sure enough, the young officers were provoked by Chu Tingchang, and it was inevitable that they would be fierce, and they all asked Ying to take the lead.

Xiong Xianghui assigned Huang Tianyang, the commander of the newly promoted independent transport regiment, to be the vanguard, using his automobile soldiers and combat engineers as the lead to open up a transportation channel for the follow-up troops, and at the same time defeat all the enemies intercepted along the way. The reconnaissance units directly under the 5th Army will cooperate during the attack.

It is obviously a risky move to use automobile and sappers directly as offensive leaders, and neither sappers nor sappers are suitable for special operations. However, this is the fastest way of action that Chu Tingchang can think of. He felt that the greatest advantage was surprise, which was a universal military principle.

Huang Tianyang fought a battle in Chiang Mai, and he is a veteran here, so he is bound to be used in this battle. And after his family fled from Malaya to Burma, it was from Mawlamyine that they traveled north along the mountains of the Thai-Burmese border to their homeland, a route they had traversed last year.

Xiong Xianghui took out the whiskey and wanted to give Huang Dashao a strong trip, but without waiting to pour the wine, Huang Dashao grabbed the bottle and filled half a bottle himself. Then he dropped the wine bottle, sang out of tune Man Jianghong, and went out with a wine burp.

90 kilometers away, Xu Chong was already on the way. He knew that Chu Tingchang's operation was extremely difficult, and he had to rely on himself. The reason why the Japanese dared to take this passage last year was because the southern agency spent two years studying the path here, and what he lacked most now was time.

There are several key points along the way, all of which are bridges built by Japanese sappers in the valley last year. Once Chu Tingchang's intentions are exposed, the enemy will destroy the bridge and kill Mandalay in three days, and the possibility will no longer exist.

In addition, this area is not without the main force of the Japanese army. The Japanese controlled several tungsten mines here, and there was a garrison of at least 1,000 people stationed in the mines. In addition, an unknown number of convoys are looting in the vicinity. These can all cause problems with planning.

The best way to seize these bridges is to use paratroopers, but Chu Tingchang did not want the Americans to know about this operation, so he could only use his most trusted direct reconnaissance unit to carry out these special operations.

His troops did not need to be trimmed, and mountain marching was also a good thing. An hour after receiving the order, Xu Chong led 70 men under his command and began a rapid march with two days' rations. This operation appeared to be very blind, without the support of drones and Qin Xiaosu, the enemy situation in the area was also very chaotic. The only thing that is known precisely is the location of those bridges of the Japanese army.

As they crossed the border, they saw a fire in the distance reflecting the sky, and they bypassed the sea of fire. It was noticed that it was a Shan village that was set on fire, and there were cries, shouts, and gunshots in the village. It was probably a rabble of the Burmese Independence Army (MIA) that invaded the village and set it on fire. They are carrying out the operation of clearing the wilderness with strong walls, and at the same time taking revenge on the feuding mountain peoples.

Before sunrise, they traveled 20 kilometers, but the nearest bridge was still 25 kilometers away.

At this time, the overdrunk Huang Regiment Commander was still asleep in the passenger seat of the truck, and after the southern exhibition, he would soon enter the area controlled by the Japanese army. Like Xu Chong, he also broke into the enemy-occupied area with a black eye, and did not reconnoiter in advance at all. However, he is not as nervous as Xu Chong, he was a fortune teller when he was a child, and the fortune teller said that he has his own natural appearance.

After his rocket-like ascension after joining the army, and after winning a fourth-class Yunlu medal for successfully intercepting the Japanese armored forces half a month ago, he felt more and more invincible.

Soon he will face a bridge over a tributary of the Ruili River, which was originally built by the 55th Division and captured by the Japanese last year. I don't know if there is a defense now. The driver woke up Commander Huang, and Huang Tianyang ordered the driver to overtake other vehicles and drive to the front. He forgave the Japanese that they would not bury themselves in their paths*.

In the morning light, a small team of Japanese sappers guarding the bridge was reinforcing the bridge. They received an order from their superiors yesterday to quickly reinforce the bridge, and the superiors, of course, would not explain the reason to the squad leader. However, it is guessed that Mandalay is about to win a big victory, and Sakahara wants to use a surprise army to kill the Chinese army from here again, so the bridge must be strengthened in advance.

When Huang Tianyang's troops arrived, the squad leader was leading most of the people up the mountain to cut timber, and there was only one machine gun group guarding the bridge. The Japanese were not worried about a surprise attack, because there was a company of the Burmese Independence Army on the north side of the bridge, and if there was a fight, it would definitely start there first. However, by mistake, a company of the Independence Army went into the mountains in the morning to carry out the mission, and their favorite task of robbing the mountain people did not bump into the sudden killing of the automobile troops.

Huang Tianyang was in the first car of the convoy, he was hanging a Japanese flag, he didn't care about the rules of engagement, the Geneva Conventions and the like, what rules to fight with the Japanese, what rules to talk about.

The Japanese soldiers at the bridgehead were a little stunned, seeing that in the fog, a truck rushed to the front, and the Japanese flag was hung on the reflector, but the car was an American-made ten* truck.