Rise from eight hundred.

Chapter 1449: War Version of Safari

  No one expected that the siege on Beidou Mountain would last for nearly two and a half months!

The siege, which began two days before the Chinese New Year in 41 and lasted until early April, was not only the longest siege in the history of China's War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, but also the most humiliating war since the Japanese Empire began to harass the fertile land of China hundreds of years ago.

包围圈中的231步兵联队其实到了2月底，就已经彻底失去了战斗力，不是没有枪支和弹药，根据战后进入日军高地的中方统计，231步兵联队到最后依旧拥有超过20万发各种机步枪子弹，甚至还有150发山炮炮弹以及300余发70毫米步兵炮炮弹，另有1300枝完好无损的三八式步枪和35挺96式轻机枪及17挺92式重机枪等制式武器。

Just looking at these weapons, equipment and ammunition stocks, even a fool would know that this could cost the lives of at least thousands of Chinese soldiers.

However, these sophisticated firearms developed by human civilization to date were unable to fire a single shot until most of the officers and soldiers of the 231st Infantry Regiment became wandering ghosts in this mountainous area.

Firstly, the Chinese side had no intention of attacking at all. They just kept strengthening their defenses. As long as the Japanese army had no intention of attacking and breaking through, they were not even willing to waste a single shot on the Japanese.

By mid-to-late February, the Japanese army had already given up the idea of ​​breaking out, especially after a trench 2 meters deep and 4 meters wide appeared in front of the Chinese defense line.

Yes, under the order of Tang Dao himself, each unit had used the nights since early February to dig trenches in front of their respective defense lines so deep that even a wild boar could fall to death. The trenches were completely connected around February 2. The deep trenches with a circumference of more than 2 kilometers surrounded the remnants of the 20st Infantry Regiment on the small hills that were completely isolated from the outside world.

If we have to describe it more accurately, the trenches and fully armed soldiers in the distance are like tall electric fences. Whoever touches them will die. The deep trenches are the trenches in the zoo that separate the animals from the electric fences to prevent ignorant wild animals from rashly seeking death.

And the hill surrounded by trenches is nothing more than Monkey Mountain!

People outside the barbed wire can see what is happening to the monkeys on the "Monkey Mountain", and the monkeys can also see the Chinese who are silently watching them.

The only slight difference from the animals and tourists in future zoos is that these observations must be completed quietly and in a sufficiently safe area. Any blatant gaze between a human and a monkey may very well be the last time that a human and a monkey gaze at each other in this world.

Of course, this should probably be considered a "wild animal park" because the "monkeys" inside will not receive any food from the visitors. If they want to survive, they have to rely on themselves.

Fortunately, monkeys are omnivorous animals, and the idea that everything is edible is engraved in their original genes.

  The mountains in the heart of China welcomed the long-awaited spring breeze after the first month of the lunar year. The leaves turned green, the flowers bloomed, and the insects came out of the soil.

As for the various small animals hibernating, they had already been dug out of their burrows with bayonets before that and turned into good protein.

This scene appeared on the front pages of several major newspapers and magazines in China and the United States.

There are always some people in this world who are willing to dance on the edge of a knife for their beliefs, such as war correspondents.

China has it, Japan has it, and Westerners have it too.

Soldiers use guns to defend their ideals and lives, while journalists use cameras to record the cruelty and sadness of war.

"The encirclement is like an unbreakable cage. The Japanese are like sheep being driven into a sheepfold. We have completely won the victory. From a humanitarian perspective, we urge the Japanese to surrender collectively. They have no chance of turning the tide of the war."

Shen Bingyun, the Chinese war correspondent who distributed the picture of "Monkey Mountain" and wrote such a comment, is another female journalist who has become famous in China after Tan Tai Mingyue.

As a war correspondent who personally experienced the Battle of Jiangxia and the first Battle of Changsha and personally recorded the soldiers leaping out of the trenches charging with rifles in hand, this third-year Chinese major at Jiangxia University, whose idol is Tan Tai Mingyue, has witnessed too much tragedy.

She had seen the bloody bodies of soldiers torn into pieces by mountain artillery bombardment. She had also seen the bravery of soldiers who carried explosives and threw themselves under tanks in order to blow up Japanese tanks, but in the end only a few finger bones were found. She had also seen the cruelty of the Japanese army breaking through the positions and putting all the wounded who had no time to evacuate under the tank tracks and crushing them back and forth.

She always carried a grenade and a small bottle of poison obtained from her chemistry teacher with her, in case she fell into the hands of the Japanese army that day and destroyed her body and soul together.

After seeing so many deaths, you are no longer afraid of death. This is the most personal experience that the war brought to this 21-year-old Chinese woman.

But after one and a half months on Beidou Mountain, when this brave female Chinese war correspondent used her camera to clearly record everything that happened on "Monkey Mountain" through the observation hole, the female reporter who was most eager to watch the death of the Japanese soldiers actually asked them to surrender.

Because that kind of cruelty far exceeded the bloody battlefield! It had already surpassed the limit of the word cruelty defined by a person with strong nerves.

Since the end of February, the Japanese army has stopped burying bodies. Even when someone died, the Japanese army showed not sadness or numbness, but excitement.

  Extremely excited!

They drew their bayonets, looking like hyenas finding a buffalo lying on the grassland.

"Captain Tang, the Japanese have been out of food for half a month, why don't they surrender?" Shen Bingyun, who had just vomited in the trench, finally couldn't help asking Tang Dao, who had just "beaten" ten scouts and returned to the headquarters at the training ground behind the mountain.

"Everyone has their own persistence and principles, just like you, me and them. The Japanese far away in Japan may also ask the same question: The Chinese can't even make guns and cannons, why don't they surrender?" Tang Dao raised his head, pointed at Xia Dayu and Shi Dakuan who were following him, and replied lightly.

"We still have enough population and vast territory. What do they have?" Shen Bingyun frowned.

"They have a strong enough will and extremely perverted Yamato national philosophy. You know, since they brought back porcelain, silk, tea and so on from our Tang Dynasty thousands of years ago, the Japanese people who were still wearing linen suddenly discovered that there was such a beautiful and rich place in the world? Perhaps from that moment on, occupying this land has been quietly engraved in their genes." Tang Dao said.

"How can a robber surrender to his prey? If it were me, I would never do that either."

"What if they surrender to our army? I mean if!" Shen Bingyun continued to ask with a frown.

"Then I can assure reporter Shen on their behalf that they won't do that." Tang Dao suddenly laughed.

"Reporter Shen, you still don't know much about the Japanese people. Of course, maybe you don't know much about me either, because I know a little more than you think."

In the spring sunshine, Tang Dao, who is already over 25 years old, still smiles so brightly. He is handsome in his military uniform, and smiling in such a spring day, he is indescribably handsome. I wonder how many women think he is the perfect lover.

However, in this warm smile, the Chinese female reporter only felt a chill running from the soles of her feet to the top of her head.

She finally understood the real point of what Tang Dao said. Since the day they were surrounded, whether the Japanese surrendered or not was no longer up to them, but all depended on this young army colonel.

He said that the Japanese refused to surrender because of their strong will, so the Japanese had no choice but to refuse to surrender.

What he wanted was not to starve these Japanese soldiers to death in these mountains, but to turn this place into a base to humiliate the Japanese Army. These Chinese and foreign reporters were just a group of tools, just like the Japanese soldiers who were surrounded and watched.

The only difference is that these tools consume words, while the surrounded Japanese consume their lives and humanity that has sunk into darkness.

She even had reason to believe that this scene would be recorded in words and photos, and released at any time in the future, becoming a wound that the entire Japanese nation would never heal. "Reporter Shen, you are very smart!" Tang Dao glanced at Shen Bingyun, who was standing there in a daze, with a smile on his face. "But don't forget, you are a Chinese, and a Chinese who has seen the great pain of my Chinese nation."

He looked up at the Japanese high ground opposite, his eyes were calm as if he was really looking at a group of monkeys: "If you can live to be 100 years old, you will know that they are just a group of clowns. The meaning of their existence is to disgust you continuously. Tell me, will you fight back?"

Of course Shen Bingyun didn't know that the Japanese troops in the encirclement had already intended to surrender. As early as a few days ago in the evening, some Japanese soldiers held white flags and walked towards the Chinese position. The Chinese did not shoot them directly, but let them into the trenches for negotiations.

However, the surrender conditions proposed by China were simply unacceptable to the Japanese army.

As the supreme commander of Beidoushan, Tang Dao formulated three conditions: surrender all weapons; the flag of the 231st Infantry Regiment must not be damaged and must be handed in; the then supreme commander of the Japanese army must kneel on the ground and hand in his command sword in front of the Chinese commander who accepted the surrender.

The first condition was easy to agree on, as surrendering meant handing over weapons and equipment. But any of the last two conditions would nail this Japanese army to the pillar of shame in history.

There was naturally no question of surrender. The Japanese had no choice but to endure it even if it meant eating dirt.

The Japanese military high-ranking officials also thought of ways to deal with the situation. They even contacted the German Empire's envoy and the Chinese military and political high-ranking officials, hoping that China would quietly accept the surrender. They were willing to pay a sufficient price to redeem these surrendered soldiers.

Ten thousand prisoners of war in exchange for two thousand, this deal is actually quite tempting.

  But at this moment, that person's opinion miraculously agreed with Tang Dao's!

"The Japanese want to end this battlefield in a less embarrassing way, but have they ever thought about who can help me get back the face I lost in Songhu, Nanjing, and Central China? Although Tang Dao is unruly and hard to tame, his mind is much clearer than you idiots. His move is to force the Japanese into a desperate situation. No matter whether they fight or surrender, the Japanese will lose face all over the Pacific Ocean. On this point, I support him!" The man scolded a senior military and political official who came to report.

All men are like this. It's not that they can't change their minds, it's just that the temptation is not enough. However, the stingy Japanese obviously don't think that the chips they offer are not enough.

  The equipment of an infantry division plus 10,000 prisoners of war was something that even a great noble like Fujiwara no Sen'o could exchange for. Why are the Chinese so stubborn and refusing to give in this time?

Although he was only at the level of a battalion commander in terms of combat deployment, when it came to maneuvering, there were only two or three people in the whole of China who could match him.

He had long seen through Tang Dao's purpose. Tang Dao wanted to put this humiliation on the Japanese and make them bear it forever. Even if they won the final victory, the shadow of the Japanese troops in the encirclement being treated like monkeys by the audience all over the world would never go away.

With this person's attitude, Tang Dao is more determined to implement the cage tactics and also welcomes Chinese and foreign journalists to visit and take pictures.

The front-page headlines were like salt in the wound, making Yokoyama Isamu and several senior generals of the China Expeditionary Army Headquarters so angry that their eyes turned blue.

The Chinese Expeditionary Army Headquarters even planned to urgently dispatch the 13th Army to approach Jianghan. Together with the 11th Army, the two armies had 7 divisions and 6 independent brigades, with a total strength of 21.

But China had long been on guard against the Japanese, and more than 40 troops in the three major war zones, the Third, Fifth, and Ninth, also made corresponding adjustments.

At worst, there will be another large-scale battle. China, which has experienced no less than ten battles, has lost almost all of them, suffered heavy losses, and has not yet defended its homeland. It has been scolded by the people, but one thing has to be admitted: the entire war is heading towards a protracted war as Mr. Baili said.

Not to mention occupying all of China, even connecting the north and south of China would take the Japanese at least two or three years. Now with the military aid from the United States, China has more confidence to fight the Japanese army.

In fact, Chinese senior officials who have keenly sensed the shift in Japan's strategic focus have realized a very important problem: Japan is risking a break with the old Western empires, perhaps not because of its collusion with the little mustache, but because with the embargo on steel and oil, Japan is already short of strategic materials for war.

  Large-scale battles will undoubtedly continue to increase this consumption!

As for China, if the 50 troops were used up, they could just recruit another 50! If they ran out of weapons, they could just buy more. If they ran out of money, they could just take out a loan.

It’s still the same old saying: Those who are barefoot are not afraid of those who wear shoes! China is like this anyway, so you can fight or not!

I can only say that those who can sit in those positions don’t all have shit in their heads, after all, they still have something.

Once the attitude was firm, the Japanese became timid!

It was in this context that Masayoshi Yamada and his 231st Infantry Regiment became a rare unit in the history of World War II that was surrounded for a full 0.5 days on a battlefield of less than 73 square kilometers.

In fact, there were many besieged cities in the history of World War II. For example, the Battle of Stalingrad broke out in July 1942. The Germans besieged the city for 7 months. It was also the bloodiest battle in modern history. The casualties on both sides were estimated to be more than two million, and more than 8 residents in the city died. After the victory, only a few thousand residents survived.

  Another example is the even more tragic Battle of Leningrad, known as the most tragic siege in human history, which lasted for more than 900 days and 64 civilians starved to death.

But during these two sieges, supplies were actually delivered to the besieged soldiers and civilians. During the eight months of the siege of Stalingrad, the Russians transported 8 carloads of military equipment to the Stalingrad area.

The factories in Stalingrad continued to produce. For example, only 10% to 15% of the workers were left in the factories in the Kirov District, but they produced 5,000 tons of food, 100 tons of mustard oil, 67 tons of soap, 12,000 bottles of mixed fuel, 5,000 military stoves, 1,300 mines, etc. for the front line.

The 231st Infantry Regiment had not received even a single biscuit since February 2.

Their only food source is newly grown wild vegetables and tree bark, as well as those fresh remains!

By the time the Chinese army sent troops to attack the Japanese positions on April 4, the Qingming Festival, there were almost no survivors. The Japanese soldiers who were still breathing and lying in the trenches did not move except to stare with their eyes wide open.

They no longer have the strength to pick up their guns!

When the only six remaining prisoners of war were weighed after the war, their average weight was a terrifying 57.5 kilograms. To say that they were skin and bones was an exaggeration. It should be said that they were almost skeletons.

  Artificially created breathing skeletons!

Its commander, Colonel Masayoshi Yamada, had committed suicide in despair as early as mid-March, and his body was not found for identification.

  In the eyes of a group of "monkeys" who are about to starve to death and have already turned into wild beasts, everything that can be eaten is food!

The huge bone with teeth marks all over the trenches was so heavy that Cai Yongguan, a veteran of the battlefield who had killed seven Japanese soldiers in a row, couldn't help but vomit on the spot.

"Damn it, as soon as I set foot on that piece of land, I felt a gust of cold wind there. Now that I think about it, it must be because there are too many innocent people who died unjustly." Cai Yongguan couldn't help but turn pale when he thought of that hellish scene.

"Reporter Shen, take all the pictures. I don't care how many you develop, just remember to give the negatives to me." Tang Dao always had a gentle smile on his face.

Shen Bingyun really wanted to stay away from this gentle and handsome guy. It was he who created this tragic hell.

Fortunately, he is Chinese!

This may be the greatest blessing for the female reporter who has once again experienced what cruelty is while recording everything on the battlefield.

  At night, the siege of Beidou Mountain came to an end!

(End of this chapter)