Chapter 13: Changing Guards (24)

After an afternoon and half a night's rapid march, at the end of the night, Mo Di led his troops to the mouth of the new river. Huang Yingyi had already prepared a camp for them and prepared a night meal. After eating some hastily, the people fell asleep when they were sleepy, and when they woke up the next morning, Li Benyi also arrived. Li Benyi told Mo Di that the reason why he was close and came later was because he was unfamiliar with the night road, first he took the wrong road, and then Li Baicheng's horse-drawn mountain artillery was stuck in the muddy road, and Li Picheng's infantry became sappers, so that they tossed all night.

Arriving with Li Benyi, there were two battalions of Li Picheng's 412th Regiment and two mountain artillery battalions of Li Baicheng.

"Brother Li Guang, as far as you can see, can Hefei reinforcements reach the other side?" After a sleep, Mo Di was quite energetic, and compared to Li Benyi, who was in a hurry all night with red silk in the corners of his eyes, he was much more energetic.

Because he was in a hurry, Li Ben didn't take a break, and as soon as he arrived at the station, he found Mo Di, and he had made it clear from these Lujiang battles that Mo Di's war wisdom was far above his own. Compare yourself with Mo Enemy, you are more ruthless than Mo Enemy, and you can make up your mind more, as for anything else, you really can't find anything better than the little brother in front of you. From the fourteenth year of the Republic of China to the present, fifteen or sixteen years, although he is also improving, this little brother's progress is also very rapid. If he is still a brave general, then Mo Di is a typical wise general, and his small body is full of infinite wisdom.

"I don't think so. There was a flank attack by the 173rd Division, a friendly army from Lu'an, the Hefei Army was too busy to take care of itself, and Shen Xilin could only become an outcast. Li Benyi said: "What we need to do next is how to prevent this trapped beast from fighting to the death before it dies and causing us losses." With only the strength of the previous three rivers, if you want to end the battle successfully, I am afraid that you will kill 10,000 enemies and lose 3,000 yourself, and now with you, although it cannot reach the level of ten sieges, but the strength is superior, and the strength is beyond doubt, I am absolutely sure that I will take Shen Xilin's department. What do you think? ”

Mo Di nodded, agreeing with Li Benyi's opinion, but also expressed his own different opinions: "Brother Li Guang, in the eyes of the younger brother, the Seventh Army's attack is just a formality, or an attitude, aimed at telling the 130th Brigade of the Japanese Army in Hefei not to act rashly. The Lingyun Shang Regiment and Liao Hanguo's Regiment came out of Zipeng Mountain, and it was just a containment, as long as Shen Xiru's army no longer came to the south, they would withdraw their hands and would not really form a battle. ”

"But even so, we accept their affection." As soon as Li Ben grabbed the conversation, if Shen Xiru's reinforcements were to come, his pressure would be great, and if he didn't do it well, it would be a situation of two shots and two scattering. Li Benyi continued: "Let us have the opportunity to calmly lay out and annihilate Shen Xilin. ”

"Annihilation? That's too early! Mo Di directly denied Li Benyi's words this time.

"Why?" Li Benyi asked.

"Sanhe bombed, Wei Jiebo attacked Fengluo Hebei, and it was the 18th Regiment of the 9th Brigade of the 5th Division that was defeated, but the brigade and the 17th Regiment had no losses, and there was also a complete Japanese infantry brigade, which was enough for a battle. If reinforcements arrive, there may not be no possibility of a turnaround. Mo Di said.

"Reinforcements?" Li Benyi was a little puzzled and asked, "From here?" ”

Mo Enemy pointed to the sky and said, "Heaven." Then he pointed to the river in front of him and said, "In the water." ”

Li Benyi was not stupid, and immediately understood what Mo Wei was referring to, the sky naturally referred to the Japanese plane, and the water was the motorboat of Chaohu. The waters of the Chaohe River are vast, since the New Fourth Army withdrew from the Wuweihan Mountain Chao County, the Japanese 116th Division was transferred from Wuhu to Chao County, the Weixu River became the sphere of influence of the Japanese puppet army, and the fireships entering Chaohu Lake from the Yangtze River gradually increased, and the material supplies of the Hefei 130 Brigade and Shen Xiru's Fifth Division were all transported by ship in addition to the local self-raised. On Chaohu Lake, in addition to fishing boats and merchant ships, there are also small gunboats with artillery and patrol boats with Type 92 heavy machine guns. This place, not far from the mouth of Chaohu Lake, the river is wide, all kinds of ships can pass through, and it is not difficult to send reinforcements by ship. Thinking of this, Li Benyi gasped.

Mo Di's prediction was good, and the reinforcement ships from Chao County had already set off. The flotilla was not small, two troop carriers, turned out to be a standard infantry brigade, in addition, two gunboats. The Japanese inland river gunboat has a displacement of 25 tons, a length of 17 meters, a width of 4.2 meters, and a height of 4 meters, and the power system is a set of Type 100 in-line 6-cylinder air-cooled diesel engines like the Type 95 tank, with a maximum power of 130 horsepower and a travel speed of 20 kilometers per hour. The gunboats were loaded with a 125-mm main gun and an 80-mm tail gun, and on the sides, each had two Type 92 heavy machine guns. It pressed over the surface of the lake and pulled up a long wave, which was very powerful.

As soon as the fleet set off, the military commander's spies in Chao County immediately spread the news that there was such a fleet heading westward, but the military commander could not judge where the destination was. The General Staff of the 21 st Group Army believed that the destination of this fleet was the lower reaches of the Bayang River, where fierce fighting was raging. The news was transferred to the 48th Army as soon as possible, so that Li Ben was ready to meet the enemy.

Li Ben didn't say a word, let Li Baicheng's two mountain artillery battalions fight the first wave first, and then, under the cover of the mountain artillery battalion, the 138th Division Field Supplement Regiment led by Xie Qibu carried out a strong attack across the river. Li Picheng's troops rested for a while and made preparations, while Mo Di led the 176th Division Field Supplement Regiment to move to Laolongba in the lower reaches of the Bayang River to strike at the fleet coming from the direction of Chaohu.

After receiving the order, Mo Di felt that it was inappropriate and could not change it, so he immediately contacted Li Baicheng and asked him to adjust his tactics and first use five mountain guns to carry out indiscriminate artillery bombardment on the other side of the river, aiming to attract the enemy's artillery fire, once the opponent's artillery position was identified, immediately carry out artillery bombardment, the first wave will be an artillery contest, whoever can leave artillery in the duel between artillery and artillery will be able to dominate the victory.

Only then did Li Baicheng remember that the artillery power exposed by the other side in Sanhe was not lower than his own, and if he took the lead in shelling, he would expose his artillery position to the enemy's artillery fire, and it was estimated that after a round of shelling, it would definitely attract retaliatory bombing from the other side, and the result would be unimaginable. Mo Di was able to figure out these things in this lightning and flint, and sure enough, his vision was a line higher than his own.

That's it.

In Li Baicheng's artillery array, such a strange phenomenon appeared for the first time, the five mountain guns were exposed, but on one side of the gun carriage, a super strong bunker was made, half on the ground, half on the ground, the bunker on the ground was piled up with sandbags in two layers, and a huge wooden fortress was built on the top, and five cannons surrounded this bunker like a plum blossom array. The five fighters, after adjusting the direction of the barrel, reloaded, fired, and then ran into the bunker like a fly, knowing that next, the shells on the opposite bank would fall on their heads.

Less than 500 meters away from the five-gun artillery array was another artillery array, and the atmosphere here was even more tense, and the observation post was watching the opposite shore to find the firing area of the artillery fire on the opposite bank.

The first round of five shells was fired, which scared Shen Xilin a lot, and he couldn't stop screaming and firing back. The artillery of the Fifth Division of the Founding Army was awakened by the explosion of artillery shells, and only then did they hurriedly push out the mountain artillery and infantry artillery. It was not until three rounds of artillery fire from the opposite bank that the artillery on the north bank was ready to fire. Although there were only five artillery pieces on the other side, they were also accurate after two rounds of fire, and the third round of shells accurately landed on the headquarters of the puppet 17th Regiment, which immediately caused a raging fire. Seeing the excellent results of the opponent's shelling, Shen Xilin was so angry that he scolded the artillery waste.

The artillery fire on the north shore finally spoke, and the first round was a test fire, which was not a big threat, but it also drove five artillery pieces into the bunker. In the second round, there was an accurate head, and the mountain artillery shells and infantry shells accurately fell on the artillery array, directly overturning the five mountain guns and directly scrapping them.

At the moment when the second round of artillery shells landed on the north bank, the 12 mountain guns of Li Baicheng's second artillery column also fired shells and landed on the positions on the north bank. Almost at the same time, the Liangtang battalion of the 138th Division rushed towards the pontoon bridge over the Bayang River.

Mo Enemy asked Liu Wukui to organize all 45 Type 89 grenadiers in the whole regiment, rush to the Bayang River, and use the best elevation angle to throw the hand cannon shells to the farthest place as far as possible.

The Type 89 grenadier is an improved version of the Taisho 10th year, with a caliber of 50 mm, a total gun length of 413 mm, a barrel length of 260 mm, a total gun weight of 2.7 kg, a barrel weight of 1.6 kg, a barrel foot length of 170 mm, a barrel plate weighing 1.1 kg, a foot plate height of 60 mm, and a foot plate width of 67 mm. When using the grenadier type 91* plus the projectile, the range can only reach 400 meters, and the effective range is 300 meters, but if the grenadier standard bullet is used, the maximum range is 700 meters, and the effective range is 500 meters. Although the distance between the Japanese positions and the river bank was not 700 meters, it was already more than 500 meters. The 91 type * is easy to find, but the standard bullet is quite precious, and the Mo Enemy Department also captured a batch by the Shizhong Guard Battalion in Yegong Mountain this time. He was invincible, never stingy, and told Liu Wukui to shoot all the standard bullets and cover the 138th Division to cross the river to the greatest extent.

Li Benyi also knew that crossing the river was extremely expensive, and forcibly crossing the river was really a last resort, so Li Picheng also organized all the grenadiers to participate in the cover, and as a result, the range of the Min-24 grenadiers was only 250 meters, which not only failed to hit the enemy, but hindered the charge, so he had to retreat.

Seeing that the 138th Division's Field Supplement Regiment had entered the landing point of the grenadier shells, Liu Wukui asked the brothers to retreat and keep up with the army that had already marched east.

Xie Qi's troops took advantage of the remaining courage of the Shengqiao battle, fearless to the death, and entered the enemy camp, and met the Japanese Miyata Brigade head-on. In one shot, Xie Qibu was pushed to the ground by Miyatabe, and the two sides lay on the ground and shot at each other.

At this time, Li Baicheng's artillery fire had already plowed the artillery position of the puppet Fifth Division, and the artillery observers also entered the front line with Xie Qi's troops. Under the command of the artillery observers, twelve mountain guns shifted the landing point to the head of the Miyata brigade. The pressure on Xie Qi's department has been greatly reduced, and Xie Qi has the possibility of surviving, which can be regarded as a foothold.

Li Picheng, who had a little rest and breakfast, walked smoothly across the pontoon bridge and joined the position of Xie Qi's department.

Li Benyi had just received a telegram from Zhao Xueliang that the vanguard of Wei Jiebo's and Zhao Xueliang's troops, who had been outflanked from Jiangbei, had arrived less than a kilometer away from the enemy camp. He breathed a sigh of relief, attacking from both sides, victory was only a matter of time, as long as Mo Wei could block the fleet coming from the east, this battle would be won.