Chapter 62: Total Annihilation of the Japanese Invaders; Only the Central Army Gets This Kind of Treatment

"Bold Wu?"

He had an impression of this 1st Squad leader from the 2nd Battalion.

Luo Weiguo strode out of the operations room: "Let him go!"

"What urgent military intelligence do you have to report?"

Bold Wu swallowed hard and said quickly, "Commander Luo, the Eighth Route Army has launched a counterattack, and they even used their lives to blow up the little Japanese devils' armored car."

"What did you say? They also blew up a Japanese armored car?"

Bold Wu nodded: "Yes, a group of them charged forward carrying explosives, disregarding their own lives, and wiped out one of the little devils' armored cars."

Luo Weiguo could no longer help taking this seriously: "How many troops do they have participating in this attack?"

"According to our company commander looking through the binoculars, there is at least a regiment!"

"A regiment? Can you be sure?"

If it truly was a regiment's strength, even if it were a thousand men, it would be enough to relieve a significant amount of pressure on them.

This was an excellent tactical opportunity!

Bold Wu hurriedly nodded: "Our company commander sent me to ask for permission to fight, saying we cannot let these outsiders look down on our Shanxi-Suiyuan Army!"

Luo Weiguo's expression changed, and he roared sideways: "Bugler~! Bugler!"

A soldier quickly rushed out from the side room, stood at attention in front of Luo Weiguo: "Present!"

"Sound the charge!"

"Yes!"

There are many kinds of bugle calls.

The first to sound was the call preparing for the charge.

Following the clear and resounding bugle call,

on the nameless highland on the left flank of Zhuanshui Village,

Guo Yanzheng immediately shouted orders: "Everyone, fix bayonets and prepare to attack!"

"Machine gunners, fire at full strength to suppress the enemy's firepower!"

"Mind the charging echelons; don't bloody block your own machine guns!"

"Brothers, we are the 358th Regiment, the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army! We are defending our own homeland, and we must never let these Eighth Route Army soldiers from Shaanxi outdo us!"

As his voice fell,

the resounding charge bugle echoed through the air.

"Doot doot doot doot~! Doot doot doot doot!"

Guo Yanzheng drew his C96 pistol and was the first to rush out of the trench: "Charge!"

"Da da da da da da!"

The Third Battalion's remaining four or five machine guns opened fire at full strength to provide cover!

At all costs, they suppressed the Japanese machine gun positions and firepower.

As the battalion commander, Luo Weiguo had also picked up the broadsword placed on the command table.

At this moment, his gaze was filled with deep solemnity.

Ever since he became this battalion commander,

he had never charged on the front lines again.

He wondered if the broadsword from back then was still sharp today.

His guards were fully armed and stood by Luo Weiguo's side: "Battalion Commander!"

"Battalion Commander."

Looking at these brothers who had shared life and death with him, Luo Weiguo felt a sense of release, and his gaze grew increasingly firm: "Brothers, charge with me and smash the little devils!"

"Kill!"

The fierce battle at Zhuanshui Village was in full swing.

Meanwhile, at a nameless hillside less than forty-five kilometers north of Xinkou,

the last three to four hundred Japanese soldiers of the 15th Independent Mixed Brigade were surrounded.

To completely annihilate this vanguard unit of the Independent Mixed Brigade,

the 54th Division, which was responsible for the main attack, had already paid the price of over five thousand casualties.

Artillery shells had even leveled several nearby hills.

Division Commander Liu Jiaqi personally went to the frontline command post to oversee the battle, staying less than three kilometers away from the forward hills.

The battle, which was originally scheduled to end in three days, was still ongoing.

In the distant sky,

the roaring sound of engines rang out once again.

A group of officers immediately began to curse angrily: "Dammit, the little devils' planes come seven or eight times a day, as annoying as flies!"

"Just how many planes do the little devils have? It takes quite a bit of time to fly all the way from Beiping... With this sort of sortie frequency, could the Japanese have built an airfield in the Shanxi region?"

The staff adjutant's remark reminded Division Commander Liu Jiaqi, who was holding up binoculars to observe the battle.

They were Central Army troops fighting in this region,

yet they possessed hardly any military maps.

The division headquarters' operations staff even had to crowd around a single table to discuss strategy and tactics.

Still, only elite units of the Central Army enjoyed even this luxury.

Similarly supporting the Second War Zone,

as an elite unit originating from the Northwest Army,

Sun Lianzhong—serving as the Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the Second Group Army and Commander of the First Army Corps—did not even have a single complete combat map in his hands.

The 22nd Group Army from Sichuan, which had come from afar to provide reinforcements, was even more so.

Old Man Yan seemed not to take the Sichuan army seriously at all, not even providing a single incomplete map.

And yet, this was still the period of the United Front.

The Grand Commander was concurrently serving as the Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the Second War Zone.

And then?

The map used by Division Commander Liu of the 129th Division while commanding operations was actually taken from a Shanxi junior high school geography textbook, having nothing whatsoever to do with military maps.

Be that as it may,

upon hearing the operations staff's remark, Liu Jiaqi immediately turned around and said, "Is it possible that the Japanese are using airfields in the Shanxi region for their aircraft to take off and land?"

"Otherwise, their support frequency could never be this high."

The operations staff nodded: "It is very likely, but our maps do not show the locations of any field airfields."

"Send a telegram to the Army Headquarters."

"Yes!"

At that moment,

as of five o'clock that afternoon,

the main force of the 14th Group Army had basically all reached their combat positions.

The defensive fortifications along the Xinkou line had also been completed.

The defensive positions outside Yuanping City had basically been breached by the Japanese invaders.

The First Battalion had already suffered casualties exceeding half its strength.

The mountain artillery battalion and anti-aircraft artillery battalion had been urgently redeployed,

retreating to a position four kilometers south of Yuanping City to rebuild their artillery positions.

At the 358th Regiment Headquarters,

Chu Yunfei had already learned that Chen Changjie's forces had outflanked the enemy to strike behind the little devils, cutting off the 5th Division's logistics supply line.

Although it was unclear why it had taken so long,

Chu Yunfei and Fang Ligong judged that

it was most likely to avoid being spotted by Japanese reconnaissance planes, leading them to choose minor paths.

The mountainous terrain of Northwest Shanxi was not suited for the movement of large forces.

A week's time could already be considered quite fast.

"Commander... the latest telegraph order from the Second War Zone Commander-in-Chief Headquarters."

"Commander Yan orders us to retreat to Taiyuan, and after resupplying, proceed to set up defenses outside Yangquan City."

Chu Yunfei took the telegram handed over by Fang Ligong and scanned it carefully.

"Shahe and Fanshi counties have fallen."

Chu Yunfei stroked his chin and mused, "Doesn't this mean the 5th Division's retreat route has been entirely cut off?"

"If we launch an all-out offensive across the board, we might be able to attempt the encirclement and annihilation of the 5th Division."

Fang Ligong sighed: "Commander... I'm afraid it's not that simple."

He pointed to the Xinkou line on the map: "According to the telegram, the 54th Division, an elite unit of the 14th Group Army, has already paid the price of nearly 6,000 casualties just to annihilate these two thousand-plus elite Japanese invaders, and the battle is not even over yet."

"You must remember, to assist in this operation, Commander Yan even dispatched an artillery regiment to them."

Chu Yunfei said noncommittally: "This proves one thing: to encircle and annihilate Japanese troops occupying advantageous terrain requires paying an extremely heavy price."

"Under the current circumstances, the 5th Division plus other Kwantung Army units conservatively number at least twenty to thirty thousand men," Fang Ligong said.

He furrowed his brows slightly, a hint of helplessness in his tone as he adjusted his glasses and pointed a finger at the operational map placed on the table: "Looking at the overall battlefield in the Shanxi region,

the enemy can tie down an entire army group of ours with just a main force component of the First Mixed Brigade and over three thousand puppet troops. The enemy's 4th Brigade Sakata Regiment, which has recently been active on the right flank, has even shattered a Central Army division head-on with just a single regiment."

Chu Yunfei nodded: "Even if all battles go smoothly and we achieve a 2:1 casualty ratio, we would still need to pay a price of over sixty thousand men... The direct forces of our Second War Zone are down to fewer than one hundred and fifty thousand men. If I were Commander Yan, I most likely wouldn't stake everything on a single throw."

"It's just that from the perspective of military command, such a tactical opportunity is fleeting; once missed, it will never come again."

Fang Ligong nodded.

How could he not understand?

The 358th Regiment had thrown itself into the fray, exchanging a hard-won victory at the cost of heavy casualties,

which boosted the morale of all soldiers and civilians throughout Shanxi.

Chu Yunfei was a soldier, a pure soldier, so as a commander, he was willing to put himself in danger and pay such a price.

Old Man Yan was different.

While he was a warlord, he was also a politician and a person in power.

He had more things to consider and naturally more misgivings.

"If the more than two hundred thousand troops within Shanxi were all generals of our Shanxi Army, Commander Yan might still choose to give it a try."

Fang Ligong put his hands behind his back and sighed: "Unfortunately, among them are the Central Army, the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army, the Sichuan Army, the Northwest Army, and the Eighth Route Army..."

As a time-traveler,

Chu Yunfei was well aware that the Japanese 20th Division was already plotting an offensive against the Niangziguan area.

Under the circumstance of a direct threat to their flank,

the defenders along the Xinkou line were not only unable to take the initiative to attack and reverse the rhythm of offense and defense,

they even needed to pull away some of the reinforcing units from various departments to support the Niangziguan area.

War was no game.

Sixty thousand men was not just an ordinary number.

Even in a real video game—

especially realistic-themed war games—

if human players or even AIs lost that many people in a short period, it would pile on numerous hard-to-remove debuffs.

Let alone the real world, where things were far more complex.

Even if the braggadocious claim of the Japanese invaders capturing Shanxi in a month had been shattered,

they still possessed the capability to continue their offensive.

If the various forces in the Shanxi region truly launched an active counteroffensive for an annihilation battle,

the slightest mishap would cause problems along the entire defense line.

By that time, let alone holding Xinkou or Shanxi,

they would probably lose places like Southwest and Southeast Shanxi as well.

"Report, a telegram from the 386th Brigade."

"Read it."

Sun Weimou lowered his head to look at the telegram in his hand: "We have now completely annihilated a portion of the Japanese Independent Mixed Brigade in the Zhuanshui Village area, killing the enemy commander Nan Kamimura and a total of over eight hundred officers and soldiers below him..."

Chu Yunfei turned around and continued: "Completely annihilated? Reply to confirm the battle results; are there any fish that slipped through the net?"

"Also, please ask Commander Chen to relay a message on my behalf to my Third Battalion Commander Luo Weiguo... Tell him there is no need to return to the Yuanping area; he is to directly detour and retreat to Taiyuan City. The main force of our 358th Regiment is going to take a step ahead!"