Just as Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama was sitting at his desk thinking about entering Fei Fei, a voice at the door interrupted his train of thought: "Report!" Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama let the person who reported in, and a confidential staff officer came in and saluted upright, and then said, "Your Excellency Commander, there is an urgent telegram on the front line of Zhangshu. Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama said with a smile: "Maybe Lieutenant General Iide Tetsuzo has another good news." After speaking, he took the telegram from the staff officer and read it.

The staff officer looked at Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama as he watched the smile on his face gradually disappear, and when he finished reading, he slapped the telegram on the table and scolded: "Yaga! Damn! Incompetent! Stupid pig! A fully equipped division was completely lost in only half a day! He still had the face to ask for help! The face of the Imperial Japanese Army was about to be lost to him!" Seeing that Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama was furious, the staff officer did not dare to raise his head in fright, let alone say a word more.

After being furious, Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama said to the stunned staff officer: "You, immediately send a telegram to Lieutenant General Kuichiro Nagano, commander of the 37th Division, ordering his troops to immediately rush to the foot of Zhangshu Castle and join the 116th Division of Lieutenant General Shunjiro Takeuchi. and launched an attack on the Chinese army in Zhangshu City. The staff officer recorded the message dictated by Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama, saluted and sent a telegram.

When Lieutenant General Kuichiro Nagano, commander of the 37th Division, received a telegram from Commander Isamu Yokoyama, the advance of the troops had already arrived in the county seat of Toyojo, and the commander of the brigade, Major General Harada Jiro, was waiting for his arrival outside the city. After reading the telegram, Lieutenant General Kuichiro Nagano said to the signal corps: "Call back to the commander, our unit has arrived at the county seat of Fengcheng, and it will be able to reach the outside of Zhangshu City tomorrow morning." After dictating the telegram, he ordered his troops to speed up and camp in Fengcheng County tonight.

At 3:50 p.m., in the camp of the 462nd Brigade outside the south gate of Zhangshu City, the troops were ready to go, and the 877th Regiment, the 878th Regiment, and the 879th Regiment all had only two infantry battalions available. The 50 heavy guns of the 130 Heavy Cannon Regiment in the rear of the garrison raised their barrels in unison, and their target was not the Japanese position outside the east gate, but the main position of the 116th Division of the Japanese army outside the north gate.

As for the Japanese positions outside the East Gate, the task of bombardment will be carried out by the artillery in the city and the self-propelled howitzer and artillery regiments of the 211th Division. The city's large and small-caliber artillery had less than 10 shells per cannon on average, and Wang Haitao ordered them to shoot all the shells. No one will disobey Wang Haitao's order, Wei Bin is now acting as the commander of the 210th Division, and personally instructed Dongfang Shengli, the commander of the heavy artillery regiment under the division, to carry out the commander's orders.

At four o'clock, the city's artillery opened fire first, and then dozens of large and small-caliber mortars placed on the city walls also joined in. For a time, the sound of explosions on the Japanese position outside the east gate continued, and the smoke filled the entire sky. The Japanese fled in panic in the smoke of gunpowder. There were originally two infantry brigades on the Japanese position outside the east gate, but after the first regiment of the Jurong Independent Brigade attacked for a morning, it lost nearly one infantry brigade, and then the division headquarters reinforced an infantry brigade, and the strength on the position exceeded the original two infantry brigades.

But after the attack of the Jurong Independent Brigade, the Japanese commander in charge of the command was worried that there would be another attack from behind, so he insisted on arranging two infantry squadrons on the last line of positions. In this way, only one infantry brigade was deployed on the first line of positions facing Zhangshu City. As soon as the heavy artillery bombarded the city, the Japanese commander immediately reacted that the Chinese army was about to launch an attack on his position.

It didn't take long for the heavy artillery in the city to finish all the shells, but the mortar shells on the city wall were sufficient, and they were still bombarding, at this time the east gate quietly opened, and the chariots that had been waiting for a long time rushed out, and behind the battlecars were the officers and men of the 871st Regiment and the 872nd Regiment. At this time, the city gate people used all the fuel, but they could only ensure that four heavy tanks, six light tanks, and eight heavy armored vehicles could travel fifty kilometers.

As soon as the chariots left the city, they formed an attack formation and attacked the Japanese positions 1,000 meters away, and behind the chariot were the 872nd Regiment accompanying the protection, and the 871st Regiment had not yet moved. For the Japanese army, which lacks heavy artillery, even heavy armored vehicles are extremely difficult to deal with, not to mention the existence of a steel monster such as a heavy tank. Under the scolding of the officers, the Japanese troops on the position resisted the mortar bombardment, and used their own mortars and Type 921 infantry guns against the assault vehicles.

It is a pity that neither * nor Type 92 infantry artillery shells can cause the slightest damage to the assault tanks, but because the target is exposed, these small cannons have become the target of dozens of mortars on the city wall. Dozens of mortars concentrated their artillery fire, and it didn't take long to destroy more than a dozen small guns of the Japanese troops on the position, and now the Japanese army was even more unable to deal with the assault tanks.

The Japanese commander also saw that the situation in the forward positions was not good, and in order to stabilize the morale of the troops, he announced that reinforcements would arrive soon, and at the same time sent additional troops to the forward positions. At his instigation, the Japanese troops on the forward positions regained stability, and the blocking of the 872nd Regiment became organized. Once the Japanese army is able to stabilize and form organized shooting, the threat to the attacking troops will still be very great, and the quality of the Japanese army's individual soldiers will certainly be there, and the accuracy of the bullets fired by the bullets and the grenades and bullets fired by the grenades and bullets will not be bad.

Although the 872nd Regiment was covered by chariots, under the desperate resistance of the Japanese army, casualties began to increase, and soldiers continued to fall from bullets. Wei Bin, who was watching the battle on the city wall, was also a little anxious, and kept directing the heavy machine guns on the city wall to suppress the Japanese firepower points. The city wall must have been more than a thousand meters away from the Japanese forward position, and even if the heavy machine guns could hit the Japanese position, their power was much weaker, and because the attacking troops were already close to the Japanese position, the mortars did not dare to bomb without scruples.

At this time, the only thing that could suppress the Japanese army was the vehicle-mounted heavy machine gun and vehicle-mounted artillery, and the combat vehicle did live up to expectations, and the vehicle-mounted artillery and vehicle-mounted heavy machine gun kept spitting flames. Soon, several machine gun fire points of the Japanese army were destroyed by the vehicle-mounted artillery, and the soldiers were also hit by the intensive fire of the vehicle-mounted heavy machine guns, and it was difficult to use intensive fire to block the advance of the Chinese army.

Seeing that the chariots were about to rush to the Japanese position, but all the Japanese troops on the position retreated to the rear, and after the chariots rushed to the Japanese position, they did not stop, but chased after the defeated Japanese troops and rushed to the second position. The 872nd Regiment also did not stop, and followed behind the chariot and also chased the defeated Japanese army forward. The distance between the first and second positions is about 500 meters, and the ground is level, and there is no type of ground that can be used for concealment.

At the forefront of the pack was a light tank and a heavy armored vehicle, and light tanks and armored vehicles showed an advantage in speed in this terrain. The chariot was about to catch up with the retreating Japanese soldiers, and the on-board machine gun had swept the Japanese soldiers who had fallen behind to the ground, and at this moment, the change was sudden. The two heavy armored vehicles and light tanks that rushed to the front slammed into the ground. The vehicle behind hurriedly braked urgently, and only then stopped by an anti-tank trench.

Seeing this, Chen Dian, the commander of the 872nd Regiment, hurriedly sent people to climb down the anti-tank trench to rescue the crew members who fell into the chariot. The remaining tanks on the edge of the trench were equipped with heavy machine guns and artillery at any time, and the officers and men of the 872nd Regiment were also on alert. After a while, the soldiers of the 872nd Regiment rescued the crew members of the chariot in the trench, but fortunately, only three soldiers were wounded, and no one was killed.

After Chen Dian sent someone to check it carefully, he realized that the Japanese army probably knew that there were a lot of chariots in the city, so between the first position and the second position, they secretly dug an anti-tank trench ten meters wide across the battlefield, in order to prevent the defenders on the city wall from discovering, the Japanese army spread a thick wooden board on the trench and covered it with soil.

In this way, the soldiers could walk freely on the trenches, and the chariot, a large man, would collapse the planks and fall down as soon as they pressed against them. Seeing the situation of the anti-tank trench, Chen Dian also had a headache, there were still more than 300 meters away from the second position of the Japanese army, if there was a tank cover, it would naturally not be much of a problem to attack, but now because the anti-tank trench was lying here, the tank could not pass. With the strength of only one regiment, if you want to rush through the unobstructed flat land of more than 300 meters, I am afraid that you will have to pay heavy casualties.

Chen Dian, who didn't come up with any good ideas for a long time, could only report the situation to Wei Bin, wanting Wei Bin to get an idea. Unexpectedly, after waiting for a while, the order sent by Wei Bin was to let their regiment cross the anti-tank trench and make a feint attack on the Japanese position, just attract the attention of the Japanese troops on the position, and at the same time prepare the whole regiment to charge and wait for the order to charge. Chen Dian couldn't understand Wei Bin's order at all, but it didn't prevent him from carrying out the order.

The reason why Wei Bin issued such an order to Chen Dian was because Wang Haitao ordered him like this, but Chen Dian didn't know, but Wei Bin knew very well that when the 872nd Regiment was out of the city, the main force of the 462nd Brigade outside the south gate and the self-propelled howitzer and artillery regiment of the 211th Division also began to break through to the Japanese position at the east gate.

Sure enough, the effort was not great, from the side and rear of the Japanese position, there was a rumbling cannon, and then a stream of gunpowder smoke rose from the Japanese position, and from time to time Japanese soldiers were blown into the air, sprinkled with blood rain and then fell. The sudden shelling from the side and rear stunned the Japanese commander. Originally, because the chariots rushing out of the city were blocked by anti-tank trenches, he was very proud, and the Japanese army, which had a strong position, was not afraid of pure infantry attacks.

Now a large number of artillery pieces have suddenly appeared in the flanks and rear, and in terms of power, they are not yet small cannons such as mortars. This shows that there is a main force of Chinese in the rear of the position, and if the Chinese army attacks from the rear of the flank at this time, it will be difficult to hold this position under the attack from both sides. Thinking of this, the commander rushed to the telegraph machine despite the falling shells, and ordered the signal corps to immediately send a telegram to the division commander, asking for reinforcements or retreat.