Chapter 319: Fighting the Eighth Route Army in the mountains? Unless the Japanese commander is crazy
Now the Vanguard Regiment has basically solved the problems in Ping'an County. The next step is to see when the Independent Regiment can eliminate the Zhangzhuang stronghold and then rush to Ping'an County from the Zhangzhuang stronghold.
Li Yunlong had an idea of how long it would take to capture the Zhangzhuang stronghold.
Although Li Yunlong believed that with the ability of the independent regiment and the artillery battalion of the vanguard regiment, it would take at most two hours to capture the Zhangzhuang stronghold.
However, it takes a lot of time to move from the Zhangzhuang stronghold to the Ping'an County seat.
Li Yunlong originally wanted to let the local comrades in the Ping'an County area explore the road first, bring tools to understand the road conditions, and then repair the roads that are not suitable for passing, so that the large army can directly use the highway to go to Ping'an County and save time.
After all, the real difficulty of this battle is not how to attack the Zhangzhuang stronghold or the Ping'an County seat, but the 11th Brigade of the Japanese devils in Shuiquan.
Therefore, the faster the independent regiment reaches the county seat of Ping'an County, the more advantageous it will be for this battle.
However, after Li Yunlong came to Zhaojiayu, he asked the local comrades to arrange people to meet him so that he could assign tasks to the local comrades and let them cooperate with their independent regiment in combat.
As a result, up to now, those comrades from the district and county committees are still holding meetings, which makes Li Yunlong angry.
If Li Yunlong had not come, it would be normal for local comrades to do these things.
But now Li Yunlong has brought his troops here, and he is not here to rest, but to carry out combat missions.
Then the local comrades here should give up everything else in their hands and fully cooperate with the main force to carry out combat missions.
As a result, now, let alone cooperating with the main force to carry out combat missions, no one has even been seen.
Especially after receiving the telegram from Qin Yangming about Murakuchi Saburo and others handing over the Xiaocaozhuang stronghold to Ding Wei.
So much time has passed now, and Qin Yangming might have already negotiated with Cunkou Sanlang and others about the Ping'an County seat. The battle might start as soon as night falls.
If the local comrades don't come, then Li Yunlong will have to find a way to arrange manpower and gather the common people to help transport supplies.
If the entire independent regiment is here, then there will be no problem. You can make arrangements on your own. With Zhao Gang here, everything can be arranged quickly.
But the problem now is that Zhao Gang is not in Zhaojiayu...
There is only one battalion in Zhaojiayu, and all of them are combat troops.
This time when attacking Ping'an County, Li Yunlong did not bring any auxiliary agencies such as the Political Department except the troops related to the combat.
All of them were handed over to Zhao Gang, who stayed in Fu'an County.
Let the combat troops do these tasks. Let's not talk about whether Zhang Dabiao and others can do these tasks well. Even if Zhang Dabiao can do these tasks well, he doesn't know which villages' people have been worked by the Eighth Route Army and can transport supplies for the Eighth Route Army.
Originally, if it was just the supplies from the Independent Regiment, then Li Yunlong wouldn't have to be so anxious.
But now the independent regiment still has the artillery battalion of the vanguard regiment.
The artillery battalion of the Vanguard Regiment had a lot of artillery pieces and a lot of artillery shells. In addition to the artillery shells, because the Vanguard Regiment and the New Second Regiment were the first to enter the Ping'an County area and hide, the two regiments did not carry much supplies, and the ammunition was only enough to fight for two or three hours.
Because when crossing the river from the pontoon bridge, the larger mules and horses could not pass through the bridge quickly. In order to save time and speed up, the Vanguard Regiment and the New Second Regiment only brought a few donkeys to help carry ammunition.
Most of the ammunition and supplies were carried by the soldiers themselves.
Then most of the remaining supplies are with the Independent Regiment, and the Independent Regiment will drive the mule and horse team to deliver those supplies when the time comes.
However, the combined supplies of the three regiments, the Independent Regiment's Vanguard Regiment, and the New Second Regiment, are indeed a bit too much.
In particular, some supplies need to be sent to the New Second Regiment urgently.
If Li Yunlong wanted to deliver all those supplies to the Vanguard Regiment and the New Second Regiment as quickly as possible.
Then at least one battalion of troops must be allocated to escort those supplies, and then another battalion of troops must be allocated to transport those supplies.
With so many people being mobilized at once, and on a forced march, by the time these soldiers deliver the supplies, they probably won't have much strength left.
So Li Yunlong thought of asking the local comrades in Ping'an County to help gather the people to form a transport team, and then he would lead the independent regiment to capture the land along the river and occupy the Dongzhang River Bridge.
Then we can immediately organize a transport team composed of ordinary people to start transporting supplies.
Then he attacked Zhangzhuang stronghold.
In this way, there will be no delays, and the supplies can be delivered to the Pioneer Regiment and the New Second Regiment in time, and his independent regiment will not need to allocate a large number of soldiers to serve as transport troops.
The most important thing is that the transport team composed of ordinary people will be able to obtain an additional batch of mules and horses.
Li Yunlong specially prepared a lot of money, waiting for the comrades from the district team to come over and then buy all the mules and horses here.
Then, after taking the Zhangzhuang stronghold, they would not have to worry about the casualties of mules and horses, and could use a large number of mules and horses to transport the dozens of mountain cannons to the county seat of Ping'an County as quickly as possible.
At that time, even if Murakuchi Saburo and others did not hand over the county seat of Ping'an County to Qin Yangming, once the artillery arrived, the city wall of Ping'an County would be blown down in less than half an hour.
"Zhang Dabiao, go ask the person in charge of Zhaojiayu when their district chief will be back?"
Li Yunlong thought of the many artillery shells in the Vanguard Regiment's artillery battalion, especially those special artillery shells that would require the entire Vanguard Regiment's artillery battalion's transport team, and he couldn't help but urge Zhang Dabiao anxiously.
"Captain, you asked me to ask this just an hour ago.
Are you asking again now?"
Hearing Li Yunlong asking him to ask again, Zhang Dabiao was a little hesitant.
Li Yunlong had asked him to ask no less than five times that night, and even the cavalry scouts they brought with them were sent out to act as communicators to find those local comrades.
As a result, less than an hour had passed since the last interrogation, and Li Yunlong asked him to go again.
Zhang Dabiao felt that Li Yunlong was worrying too much.
After listening to Zhang Dabiao's words, Li Yunlong did not respond immediately. He just stood with his hands behind his back and looked at the map hanging on the wall.
"I'm a little bit uneasy. I always feel that there will be a big chaos in the attack on Ping'an County this time. If I don't settle things soon, I won't be able to calm down."
Li Yunlong looked at the location of Ping'an County marked on the map, thinking constantly in his mind. The map on Li Yunlong's side was only a map of Ping'an County and the surrounding areas.
It was not the kind of map that Qin Yangming or the brigade commander had, where even springs and other places were drawn.
Li Yunlong looked at Ping'an County marked on the map, and then looked at the northeast corner of the map where he had inserted a chopstick to represent Gucheng County, and kept thinking in his mind.
"Zhang Dabiao, tell me, if Murakuchi Saburo really agrees to hand over Ping'an County to our Eighth Route Army, then do we have time to move the troops to the upper reaches of the Dongzhang River, or to the Song River?"
Li Yunlong looked at the map, pondered for a while, and then asked Zhang Dabiao.
Hearing Li Yunlong's call, Zhang Dabiao walked forward, looked at the map, and then said to Li Yunlong.
"Captain, if we can really capture the Zhangzhuang stronghold within two hours, then all of our troops and supplies will be able to reach the outside of Ping'an County by midnight at the latest.
If the Japanese chose to surrender all their troops, they could take over Ping'an County in half an hour and take control of the county.
If we just open the city gate to let our troops in, there will be no need for a siege, but we will still need to fight against the Japanese troops inside Ping'an County.
With the combat effectiveness and weapons and equipment of the vanguard group, it would take about two to three hours to clear the county seat of Ping'an County.
In other words, by the time we arrived at Ping'an County, the Vanguard Regiment should have ended the battle in Ping'an County.
It is now around five or six in the morning. If we abandon those non-important supplies, our Independent Regiment and the Pioneer Regiment will definitely have time to reach the upper reaches of the Dongzhang River before dawn.
"Captain, you are not planning to attack the 11th Brigade of the Japanese?"
Zhang Dabiao looked at Gucheng County, which Li Yunlong represented with a chopstick, looked at the direction on the map, and thought about the location of the spring. Then Zhang Dabiao asked Li Yunlong in surprise.
"What else? What do you think I'm doing? If we can really capture Ping'an County before midnight and successfully reunite our Independent Regiment with the Vanguard Regiment, then why can't I make a move on the Japanese 11th Brigade?
Tsk tsk tsk, take down Ping'an County, and then take a bite out of the Japanese 11th Brigade."
Looking at the map, Li Yunlong wondered how feasible it was to take a bite out of the Japanese 11th Brigade.
In other words, the map that Li Yunlong brought did not include the Gucheng County area. Otherwise, Li Yunlong would be able to make a quick judgment based on the terrain on the map.
But now Li Yunlong's map only includes Ping'an County and a few surrounding areas, so he can only rely on Li Yunlong to make inferences based on various information.
"As long as the two Japanese devils, Murakuchi Saburo and Kiyomizu Muichi, can hand over Ping'an County to our Eighth Route Army, it doesn't matter if they open the city gates and let our troops into Ping'an County.
It would be better to bring all the troops in Ping'an County out and surrender.
No matter which situation it is, the losses of the vanguard group will not be great, or even no losses.
The biggest losses should be some light weapons and ammunition.
By then, there will be no loss of heavy weapons and equipment of our Independent Regiment and Vanguard Regiment. With so many heavy weapons, our heavy firepower is definitely not inferior to that of the Japanese 11th Brigade.
With equal firepower and the defensive fortifications prepared in advance by the New 2nd Regiment, we may be able to take a piece of meat from the Japanese 11th Brigade.
In other words, I don’t know what the terrain here is like.
If I knew the terrain and the situation in Gucheng County, I would not just take a bite out of the 11th Brigade of the Japanese. If the terrain was suitable, I would have swallowed up the entire 11th Brigade of the Japanese!"
Looking at the map in front of him, Li Yunlong spoke to Zhang Dabiao with considerable confidence.
Originally, Li Yunlong had no idea about the Japanese 11th Brigade.
The plan was to wait until Ping'an County was captured, and then gather the troops to support the New Second Regiment to stop the Japanese 11th Brigade and let the Japanese see that Ping'an County had been captured by the Eighth Route Army.
Moreover, the Eighth Route Army is also capable of blocking their support troops.
Under such circumstances, the Japanese support troops would naturally choose to retreat and would not continue to attack the Eighth Route Army.
Because it's not necessary.
Since the county seat of Ping'an County has been captured by the Eighth Route Army, and the Eighth Route Army still has enough combat power to block their support troops, continuing to entangle will only expand the battle and start a war ahead of time.
The Japanese don't want to start a war so early.
The war started ahead of schedule, and the Taihang Mountains were the main battlefield. This was not a good thing for the Japanese.
Compared to the battle that broke out in the Taihang Mountains, and the main battlefield was formed with the Taihang Mountains as the center.
The Japanese would rather the battle break out in the North China Plain and then form the main battlefield with the North China Plain as the center.
After all, it is a plain area, so the Japanese motorized troops and mule and horse troops can take advantage of the well-connected nature of the plains to quickly mobilize troops to any place to launch an attack.
On the plains, the Eighth Route Army, whose troop mobilization speed was slower than that of the Japanese, could only defend everywhere and passively resist the Japanese attacks, and had no way to actively launch an attack.
However, if the Taihang Mountains are used as the main battlefield, it would not be a good thing for the Japanese.
Although the current level of weapons and equipment of the Eighth Route Army cannot be equated with that of the Japanese invaders.
But it's not much different.
Moreover, in mountainous areas, many heavy weapons are difficult to carry, and even if you carry heavy weapons, you cannot carry much ammunition.
Then the Japanese's heavy weapons will be restricted.
As for the Eighth Route Army's heavy weapons, there were not many of them to begin with, so to what extent could the restrictions be imposed?
At that time, the Eighth Route Army and the Japanese devils would only be able to fight with light weapons in the Taihang Mountains.
Fighting against the Eighth Route Army in the mountainous area, without any heavy weapons support, and fighting against the Eighth Route Army who were extremely familiar with the terrain.
Or conduct large-scale combat.
Unless the Japanese had water in their brains and their heads were filled with paste, it would be impossible for their commander to give an order to launch a large-scale battle with the Eighth Route Army in the mountainous area.
(End of this chapter)
