But now that Kimura is in a hurry, he doesn't want to think about the possible consequences of ceding Myanmar's Shan State to Thailand. As de facto governor of Burma, he did not worry about what the puppet government in Rangoon had in mind, and the reality was that he urgently needed Thai troops to hold the Nu River defenses.

The 180,000-strong Thai army of Luang Pi Boon Song Khan (then Prime Minister of Thailand) had now crossed the Sino-Thai-China-Burmese border and was assembled in the forests of Shan State, close to the most likely route of the Chinese army northward (along the railway), separated only by the Ruili River. And morale is high. This is the military department has no way to give him reserves, and it is the strength he desperately needs.

His staff officer, Takamura, had served as an adviser to the Thai army a few years earlier, before even the southern government had been established. Takamura participated in several conflicts between the Thai army and the French army in Vietnam, and he came to the conclusion that the weakness of the Thai army was the lack of experience in the use of heavy weapons, but the Thai army was good at jungle warfare, and the Thai army had a martial tradition, and all the division-level officers studied in Japan or Europe, the soldiers were fully trained, the weapons were relatively sophisticated, and the combat capability was far above the Kuomintang army, second only to the Japanese army in Asia, and once a superior war was formed, its combat effectiveness would be very strong.

Obviously, one of the reasons why Thailand was able to stand alone and raise its army during the colonial wave that swept through Asia for more than 100 years.

Of course, another reason is the shrewdness of the Thai political elite, for example, at this time, the Thai Emperor Rama VIII was studying in Switzerland and refused to return to China, and the royal family deliberately escaped from this troubled water, obviously after political actuarial calculations, sharing the risk strategy, they did not put their eggs in one basket.

"It seems that we can only turn to Luan Piwen, this old fox." Kimura had a plan in mind, and of course he was still thinking about one thing, the most interesting sentence in Takamura's report: "Once an advantage is formed, the Thai army is very strong in combat." ”

Literally, the Thai army is not the type like Japan, the more frustrated it is, the more courageous it is, but it needs to rely on the strength of the people to exert its might?

"Dongxiang Communications Staff, send a telegram to Bangkok immediately, I agree to all their demands, and those heavy weapons that have just been unloaded in Cam Ranh Bay will be handed over directly to General Somchai ......"

"Yes."

Kimura regained his self-confidence, and was looked at the map with his hands behind his back, and handed over more than 20 cannons to the Thais at a very small price, and the transfer of the Shan State of Burma to Thailand was only a private gift, but his urgent need was solved. He estimated that the Thai army was not counted in the offensive plan drawn up by Chu Tingchang, at least according to the current exchange of fire, only a few Chinese troops entered Shan State, and he estimated that there were no more than a few companies.

The main forces of the Thai army, including the 1st Army, which is all Japanese, and the 2nd Army, which is mainly equipped in Europe, have long been on standby in northern Burma. Apparently waiting for a call from Japan in a hurry. At the same time, Thai envoys were negotiating borders with the Chinese government in Chongqing, while hinting that participation in the Axis was a last resort, and as a means of confusing Chiang Kai-shek, Thailand released 120 captured Chinese prisoners.

Of course, the so-called dispatch of secret envoys was completely planned by the Yugoslav authorities in the past two weeks, in order to make the Thai army's attack sudden. The only problem was that the Thai government suddenly opened its mouth, but Kimura decided to satisfy them.

"The report, Luang criticized Prime Minister Boon's telegram and asked for the restoration of the traditional border with French Laos."

"I don't have an opinion on this, but I have to wait for the instructions of the cabinet, but I don't think it's a big problem, I hope their army will not miss the fighter plane, and start crossing the river immediately, and I will send Gao Village to contact them for specific matters."

"Yes."

Kimura knew that Luang Piwen was also a bluff to some extent, pretending to be an existence on par with the Japanese Empire, of course, in addition to being afraid of Japan, but also to make profits, and the places he asked for were not all ancient Siamese territory, so he agreed to deal with it first.

Tojo's secret order to Kimura required him to stay until the beginning of 1943, which meant that he would have to endure for more than a month. At that time, the situation in Australia will be decided, and then Burma will once again become the main direction of the military department. A large number of troops will turn here, a new plan to attack India is being drawn up in the base camp, and the combined fleet that annihilates the US Pacific Fleet will also kill a horse gun, completely annihilate the British fleet, and completely destroy the British Navy's presence in the Indian Ocean.

Zhou Youfu's tank group was rapidly moving north, only to encounter slight resistance from the garrisons of the Japanese garrisons along the way. His tanks followed the extension of the Yangman Railway, in the direction of Lashio. On the east side is the Shan Plateau, and according to American and British intelligence (mainly provided by the pro-American and British Free Thai organizations), the Thai army has been increasing troops on the border since October, and it is possible that the Japanese army will be dispatched to fill the gap in Japanese forces in this area. Since the Thai army had already taken advantage of the danger and seized territory when the expeditionary force withdrew half a year ago, it was necessary to be highly vigilant against the emergence of the Thai army.

Zhou Youfu didn't take the Thai army too seriously, although a few months ago, the 94th and 55th divisions couldn't beat the Thai army in turn, but he knew how effective those miscellaneous cards were. Chu Tingchang's request to him was to quickly open Songshan, and he was unwilling to mobilize a valuable mechanized force into the complex eastern mountains to protect his flank. Just two days ago, according to the direct order of Chief Chu Ting, the reconnaissance unit directly under the military headquarters entered the area. Xu Chong's troops have been closely following his Zhou Youfu operation, this unit is very small, but it is equipped with a high-power radio station that is only available at the regimental level, and it has always directly obeyed the orders of the command and did not listen to Zhou Youfu's dispatch. So Zhou Youfu doesn't care about them at all, where he likes to go.

In the afternoon, US P40 fighters took off from Yunnan and went deep into the forest area south of Kokang to conduct low-altitude reconnaissance, and found that Japanese sappers were reinforcing the bridge in the lower reaches of the Ruili River, which was probably a harbinger of the Thai army's dispatch.

However, only one bridge was found. Stilwell's staff judged that if they only started building the bridge now, it seemed too late.

The General Staff continued to assess that even if a unit could wade across the river, it would not be able to carry heavy weapons and baggage, and would not be able to pose an effective threat. The arrival of the main forces may be a few days later, but by then, the follow-up forces of the Chinese army will firmly control this corridor (the Yangon-Lashio railway runs along the rare flat terrain in northern Burma), blocking the Thai army from the main battlefield.

The intelligence analysis is more optimistic, judging that the Thai army's support for the Japanese army may be symbolic, although Thailand has joined the Axis powers in January and declared war with the allies, but the Thai government will not go far based on the recent release of prisoners by its government. The intelligence department gave the upper limit of 5,000 Thai troops.

At night, in the northwest of Jingdong in northern Myanmar, a large army drove out of the jungle and began to wade through the lower reaches of the Ruili River. Lieutenant General Chakuren's 1st Army is about to officially participate in this world war, which is one of the historical changes caused by the disturbance brought by the Japanese traversers. To some extent, Asano's vision of the most favorable geopolitical changes for Japan was realized, and not only Turkey but also Thailand stood firmly on the side of the Axis powers.

The Japanese sappers slowly built bridges on the water only to deceive the United States from aerial reconnaissance and make the Allies misjudge the progress and scale of the Thai army's entry into Burma. At this time, in the dry season, during the dry period at night, soldiers can cross the river with water, and the Thai army does not need roads or bridges to solve the problem of baggage, for this operation, the 1st Army dispatched 1,500 elephants, these large animals, can carry the weight of each head, can be worth eight horses, and can easily cross most of the rivers in northern Burma, which is not carefully calculated by the Allied staff and intelligence units, in fact, Chu Tingchang almost missed this point.

Zhou's troops stopped 90 kilometers west of Lashio and waited for supplies to be airdropped.

In order for the US planes to find their heads at night, they lit a large number of bonfires in the nearby open field. This is tantamount to completely exposing the current position and direction of their main force. And another disadvantage is that the Japanese bombers, who are at a disadvantage, can take advantage of the darkness to sneak attack, they can easily find the target, drop * and quickly flee back to their base in Thailand. So he deployed his troops in an area at a considerable distance from the drop site.

His vanguard had already made contact with the radio station set up by the 58th Division of the Songshan Lone Army, and he was considering whether to attack Lashio or attack Songshan first, but the elite 56th Division of the Japanese army never appeared, and Zhang Lingfu did not have accurate information.

Zheng Tou Da, Chu Tingchang sent a telegram, asking him to prevent a sneak attack by the Thai army in the southeast, Chu said that he had just calculated a hexagram, and tonight I am afraid that there are villains in the southeast who covet it.

Of course, this was not calculated by Chu Tingchang, but detected by Xu Chong. After Xu Chong's troops arrived in Mandalay with Zhou Youfu's main force, they drove several half-tracked vehicles into the Shan State Plateau to reconnoitre.

Naturally, the US military planes could not see the Thai troops marching in the primeval forest, but Xu Chong's night vision devices could see a long line of oversized animals in the valley a few kilometers away in the mountains, heading northwest.

There is no doubt that this transport team is transporting supplies for the main force in the front, Chu Tingchang calculated from the path, and felt that this force was most likely to go to the vicinity of Lashio, that is to say, the United States and Britain's estimation was wrong, in fact, in recent months, Japan has taken advantage of the Allied aerial reconnaissance advantage, so the deployment of suspicious formations has not been once or twice, and the methods are becoming more and more mature, of course, it is still difficult to judge the size of the army, he has no bottom in his heart, so he sent a telegram to Zhou Youfu, hoping that he would deal with it carefully. In order to avoid his own mistakes, he used the word covetous, and once the enemy army did not come, he could also say the past.

Zhou Youfu can turn a deaf ear to the British and American aerial reconnaissance intelligence, but he will never dare to slack off on the conclusions reached by Chu Tingchang's fortune telling. He ordered a tank company to be deployed to the southeast for a possible assault.

At 8 o'clock in the night, the roar of airplanes sounded in the air, and the troops, according to Zhou Youfu's instructions, stayed away from the airdrop site where the bonfire was lit. Because I don't know whether it was an American plane or a Japanese plane that flew over.

A sharp * whistling sound came, and sure enough, the Japanese Zhang Nengeng knew that the night was attacking.

The explosion will blow up the preset drop site. If in the past, in order to grab supplies with his friends and neighbors, Zhou Youfu must have deployed people and horses to wait there early, and he would have suffered a lot of losses, but fortunately, no one robbed him today, and he finally escaped.