Glorious Mission 1937

Chapter 670 Eight: Gambling

The fall of Xuzhou made the North China Front Army very passive. The original plan to withdraw to the south can only be canceled now. The retreat is a systematic operation. If it is intercepted halfway, the entire army may be wiped out.

After urgent consultations between the North China Front Army Headquarters and the No.12 Army Headquarters, it was decided to order the No.12 Army stationed in Shandong to withdraw to Qingdao urgently, or go south to Shanghai by water, or go north to Yingkou to Dalian, no matter how you go , just can't stay in Shandong and wait for death.

But doing so also entails certain risks, because the Chinese navy is no longer what it was a few years ago, and the current Chinese navy is extremely powerful, not to mention the Japanese Third Fleet stationed on the coast of China, even if it is a combined fleet The main force was also beaten black and swollen.

When withdrawing troops by water, we must consider whether the Chinese navy will send troops to intercept them?Once it encounters an interception, does the Third Fleet have the ability to deal with it? If it is on land, even if it encounters an interception, at worst it can fight back desperately. I can't exert any combat power, and I can't do it even if I want to give it a go.

But staying in Shandong is equally dangerous. The Chinese army in the direction of Tianjin has already moved south and launched an attack in the direction of Dezhou.In addition, the local anti-Japanese armed forces in Shandong have also become active, carrying out attacks and sabotage everywhere, and the law and order in the No. 12 Army defense area has suddenly deteriorated.

If this momentum continues, at most one month.The Chinese army could reach Jinan, and the complete annihilation of the No.12 Army was completely predictable.

In the end, the base camp made the decision. The No. 12 Army withdrew to Shanghai. While the North China Front Army Command was in charge of the retreat, it also had to ensure the defense of East Hebei and Rehe. The No.12 Army still has Qingdao and Yingkou for retreat. If Jidong and Rehe are lost, the North China Front Army may not even have a way to retreat.

The action of the Japanese army was very fast. In just one week, the large army was withdrawn to Qingdao, leaving only a part of the puppet army to continue to pretend in various places.Obviously these puppet troops have been abandoned.

Regarding the southward retreat, the Japanese military seat is very confidential.Even the officers of the No.12 Army Regiment at the first level were not notified, and only senior officers above the head of the brigade knew the real purpose of going to Qingdao.

Chen Feng's troops also didn't know that the Japanese army was trying to escape. Since 1937, the Japanese army had rarely escaped on the frontal battlefield.Also rarely surrendered.Therefore, the Chinese commanders on the front line never thought that the Japanese army would escape.Therefore, the No.12 army took advantage of this loophole.

On July 7, when Zhang Jingjun and others captured Tai'an, they discovered that most of Shandong is now empty.Including Linyi, Tai'an, and Jining, only a small number of puppet troops were maintaining local law and order. As for the Japanese army, there were none.

Zhang Jingjun understood as soon as he heard that these puppet soldiers had been treated as abandoned sons, and the puppet soldiers had no idea where the Japanese had gone. Through analysis and multi-faceted investigations, Zhang Jingjun finally knew that he had been duped by the Japanese. , the little Japanese devils have all concentrated in Qingdao, and they boarded the ship and retreated two days ago.

Zhang Jingjun was furious, and ordered the troops to immediately divide into more than a dozen groups, and rushed to various parts of Shandong in regiments.Sure enough, like Tai'an, there were only puppet troops and no Japanese troops in these places.Zhang Jingjun's troops took down the entire Shandong Province in just 4 days, but failed to destroy the No.12 Army of the Japanese Army.

Although it failed to wipe out the No.12 Japanese Army, it is still a major event to recover the entire Shandong. When the government announced the matter, it quickly aroused great repercussions at home and abroad, whether it was the United States, Britain, the Soviet Union, France, the Netherlands, etc. , all agree that the Chinese battlefield is the battlefield where the entire anti-fascist war crimes in the world first entered the counter-offensive.

The domestic people are also very satisfied with the current government. Education and medical reforms are in full swing, and the common people have received tangible benefits.Now that the army is so strong, there are successive victories. Heilongjiang, one of the four eastern provinces, has recovered its entire territory. In just over a month, the government troops have recovered two provinces one after another. From the perspective of ordinary people, victory is imminent.

While the army launched an attack on the Japanese troops in Northeast China and North China, Chen Feng believed that it was necessary to carry out a final strike against the Japanese Navy and wipe out the last remnants of the Japanese Navy in one fell swoop. Therefore, Chen Feng sent a report to Chen Shaokuan, ordering them to immediately formulate corresponding battle plans , to destroy the Japanese navy.

In Chen Feng's words, the Japanese army is a war machine, and their navy is responsible for delivering nutrients to this war machine. Once there is no nourishment, this war machine is no different from scrap metal.

After receiving Chen Feng's telegram, Chen Shaokuan and others quickly formulated a battle plan against the Japanese Navy's Third Fleet, and decided to send troops to the Japanese naval base in Wusongkou, looking for opportunities to annihilate this Japanese naval force in China.

On July 7, under the order of Chen Feng, the Northern Group established the Harbin Arsenal on the basis of the former Japanese Army Beiman Arsenal in Harbin. It mainly produced tanks and tanks. At the same time, a large number of oil refiners entered the Daqing area.

Changchun, called Xinjing by the Japanese and the puppet, is the capital of the puppet Manchukuo. Now the whole Xinjing is full of panic from top to bottom, from the inside to the outside. After half a month of fighting, although the Japanese puppet army has an absolute advantage advantage, but still suffered heavy casualties. Both sides have tens of thousands of troops entering the Xinjing battlefield every day. In addition, there are hundreds of thousands of reserve troops ready to participate in the battle at any time. devouring life.

Achieving a war of attrition on the Xinjing battlefield is not the result that Umezu Yoshijiro wanted, and at the same time, it is also the result that Chen Feng wanted, but Umezu Yoshijiro and Chen Feng can't do anything about it. Can keep adding troops to Xinjing.

Up to now, almost all battlefields have fallen into bitter battles. Although Chen Feng's troops are powerful, the Japanese army is on the defensive side after all, and they have been operating in China for a relatively long time. Chen Feng's troops want to wipe out all these invaders in a short time. It is obviously impossible to drive out of China, and a war of attrition is inevitable.

The army's defeat on the Chinese battlefield made the Japanese base camp very anxious.Although they launched the Pacific War because of resource issues, the ultimate goal of Japan is to occupy mainland China.Now they have achieved great results in the Pacific battlefield, but problems have occurred in the Chinese battlefield, which is completely putting the cart before the horse.

The Japanese side urgently held a meeting to discuss this matter, hoping to find a solution to this matter.High-level officials including the Japanese emperor, members of the royal family, and the prime minister, ministers of the interior, foreign affairs, land, and sea attended the meeting.

After urgent consultations, Japan believes that the most effective way to solve the current crisis is to destroy the Chinese government, or disintegrate the Sino-Soviet, Sino-US, and Sino-British alliances.Therefore, on the one hand, Japan must increase its support for Wang Jingwei's regime, absorb those who are dissatisfied with Chen Feng, and at the same time negotiate with the United States, the Soviet Union, Britain and other countries, even if they withdraw their troops from Southeast Asia.

But what makes the Japanese government feel depressed is that no matter how much they try to lure them, the United States, the Soviet Union, and the United Kingdom remain unmoved.Although the conditions offered by Japan were attractive enough, the United States, the Soviet Union, and the United Kingdom were very aware of the importance of Chen Feng's troops to the entire world's anti-fascist war.

On the one hand, Chen Feng's department holds 80% of the world's patents for the production of medicines necessary for war. Secondly, Chen Feng's department has a large number of elite troops and advanced weapons and equipment. After solving the domestic war in China, this part of the force is likely to Investing in the attack on the Japanese army in Southeast Asia or the German army in Europe is a great boost to the United States, Britain, the Soviet Union and other countries.

Secondly, the Chinese high-level leaders headed by Chen Feng are conducting large-scale industrial construction, which covers all light and heavy industries.However, China's industrial base is weak, and almost all industrial equipment needs to be imported from other countries. In the past few months alone, the orders placed by the Chinese government to the United States and the Soviet Union have reached more than one billion U.S. dollars. There will always be new large orders, which greatly eases the financial constraints of the US and Soviet governments.

The large-scale industrial orders have also greatly alleviated the problems of the United States and the Soviet Union’s domestic economic decline and high unemployment rate. For the US and Soviet governments, cooperation with China is mutually beneficial and win-win, and cooperation with the Japanese is seeking skin from tigers. Chen Feng taught them that they would also make the right choice.

After the failure of dividing up the whole vehicle, the Japanese government fell into a dilemma. The Chinese battlefield and the Southeast Asian battlefield can only choose one of them now, either withdrawing troops from the Chinese battlefield and sticking to the Southeast Asian battlefield, or withdrawing troops from the Southeast Asian battlefield to stick to the Chinese battlefield.

Withdrawing its troops from the Southeast Asian battlefield, Japan will lose its overseas resource base and the capital to continue fighting.If the troops were withdrawn from the Chinese battlefield, the Japanese high-level officials would not be willing. After all, the price paid by most of China in the Great Xia would be heavy. The economy dragged down by the war alone would set Japan back by more than 10 years.Not only the high-level officials are unwilling to withdraw troops in such a desperate manner, but most of the army is also unwilling!

On August 1942, 8, Emperor Hirohito, the headquarters of the Japanese army, decided to authorize the headquarters of the Chinese Expeditionary Army to launch a large-scale attack on Chongqing, the seat of the Chinese government. It was hoped that this campaign would destroy the Chinese government in one fell swoop. The empire can start to withdraw its troops from the Chinese battlefield. It can be said that this is the last big gamble between the Great Japanese Empire and the Imperial Japanese Army on the Chinese battlefield. If you win, you will survive, and if you lose, you will perish! (To be continued..)