When the sun rose, from Jixian to Baodi, from Baodi to Yangcun, and from Yangcun to Machang, on the more than 150-kilometer front, after more than a month of confrontation and silence, the sound of Fuxing Army cannons was everywhere.↑The 3,500 cannons prepared for the general attack had exceeded the regulations of Caodian, and were densely arranged, bombing the Japanese trench defense system. In the fierce artillery fire, the thin wire mesh and trenches with intertwine teeth were all destroyed and shattered, and many of the shells exploded, which smelled yellow garlic, drifted on the Japanese positions with the smoke.

Faced with the bombardment of such a huge number of artillery fire by the Fuxing Army, the Japanese army did not dare to respond at all. In fact, they could not respond. For Japanese artillery soldiers who lost air superiority and lacked concealment, as soon as the artillery battle began, the artillery shells of the Fuxing Army fell on their artillery positions. The number of artillery arrays was so large that they could no longer be bombarded according to a certain order as stipulated by Caodian. As soon as the artillery battle began, the Japanese army was subjected to a comprehensive and covered firepower attack, and all valuable targets were the targets of artillery bombardment, regardless of order.

Smoke, explosions, gun smoke, all of this made the small battlefield in the capital shake and cover the sky and the sun. One hour after the artillery battle began, the observation station in the sky had no way to look at the shelling targets on the ground. Therefore, the artillery battle could only rely on map operations, repeatedly bombarding and crushing those targets.

From the beginning of the artillery battle, the chief of staff of the Zhili Expedition Army, Uehara Yong was the general, and Kuroki was the general, and Marshal Obogong sat in the headquarters outside Tianjin. When he knew the scale of the artillery, no one had any words. Judging from the organization of the Chinese army, more than 3,000 cannons mean that all the main forces of the Fuxing Army were transferred to the battlefield in the Jingji. Although this was impossible in time, the fact was right in front of him. Since the main forces of the Chinese army had entered the pass, defeat was only a matter of time.

Unlike the quietness in the inner room, the telecommunications office where the staff is located is constantly reporting the phone. The anxiety and madness of the commander of the division on the other end of the phone are completely infected, and the tone of the staff members is also loud and anxious. Only when the staff officer Takaya Koichiro, who is responsible for the internal report, calms his anxiety and mania a little while when every news is reported to the inside, and eventually turns into the brows of the generals.

Reported again that the Chinese army used an unknown poison gas. After the casualties of his army were severe, Takahara Koichiro bowed deeply and retreated. Chief of Staff Uehara Yusaki wanted to speak, but when he thought about it, he found that he had no choice but to be silent again. When the General Staff was determined to use chlorine shells, he raised an objection, believing that this action would eventually lead to revenge in the Chinese army. However, under the strong persuasion of Major General Tanaka Yoshiichi, this decision was supported by Chief of Staff General Hagua. Everyone thought that he would surrender to the capture of Beijing China, so how could he say revenge?

Now, revenge has finally come. Not only is more than 300,000 people besieged in the capital and bombarded by more than 3,000 cannons, unknown poison gas bombs have also appeared. Unlike the Chinese army who is not afraid of chlorine shells, their army has no ability to resist poison gas bombs at all.

In the silence of Uehara, while regretting, near noon, Tachiha Koichiro came in again, and he still reported in a calm voice: "Your Excellency, the Chinese army has begun to attack the entire line, and according to the reports of various divisions, the most violent attack is now in the direction of the Baodi."

"Baodie! Yoxi." The silent General Heimu finally spoke, "The Chinese army wants to occupy Tangshan."

"I'll order it to each department. Today, three meals will be restored." Obogou said to Uehara Yuki, which was also against Hana Koichiro.

"Hay!" Takahara Koichiro looked at the Chief of Staff Uehara Yuki. Seeing that he had no objection, he finally went out to issue the first order from the headquarters: to resume three meals from today.

When the news reached the 19th Division headquarters stationed at the Baodi defense line, Lieutenant General Kamio Mitsumon smiled at Chief of Staff Yamata Hakusaki, "Now you can smash the phone."

‘Smash the phone’ is a famous saying by Luci’s runner-up General Staff. Lucia’s general mobilization was repeatedly blocked by the Tsar more than ten days ago, so he declared that if he receives the mobilization order again, he will smash the phone and no longer accept the opposite order. This sentence is a kind of determination to the Lucia people, but Lieutenant General Mitsukoshi said goodbye.

The reason why the Chinese army attacked Baodi was to take Tangshan and take Tangshan was to divide its army into two parts, north and south. Among them, the cluster responsible for the Jingdong offensive in Jixian County would be completely surrounded by the Chinese army. No, the word surround cannot be used. Now the Chinese army is surrounded. The naval rescue plan that was originally full of hope can only be completed because of the emergence of the aircraft. Except for a few warships that escaped, all merchant ships were sunk in the Bohai Sea by the Chinese navy and aircraft.

Lieutenant General Kamio Koto was still worried about himself, but Major General Fumijiro Horiuchi, who was on the front line, could not even speak. He was holding a piece of cotton cloth stained with special medicines and hid it in his mouth. The outside of the headquarters was full of soldiers' shouts. According to the news from the front line, the Chinese army used a lot of poison gas, many people began to cough, and some were already blind.

"Your Excellency, we must retreat." As the staff officer Maj. Osugi couldn't help but say loudly.

"Where to retreat, are you in the sea?" Major General Fumijiro Horiuchi asked, then said, "Say goodbye to the division headquarters on my behalf. All of my generals died here in battle, and the battlefield is our burial place."

After saying that, the major general threw away the annoying anti-virus cotton cloth, walked out of the command center and came to the middle of the extremely panicked soldiers in the trench. After watching silently, he jumped onto the height of the trench and began to speak loudly: "You guys: the battle is at the last moment, and we are on the front line, praying that the imperial kingdom will win and be at peace. At present, the Chinese army is raging, and I will do my best to repay the emperor's kindness." After saying that, he pulled out his command knife, and then shouted with all his strength: "Your Majesty the Emperor! Your Majesty the Emperor!!"

Major General Fujiro Horiuchi's words and shouts finally restored the morale of the soldiers in the trench. Many of these Japanese soldiers with large masks tied to their mouths threw away the masks and shouted long live together. Then, with Major General Fujiro Horiuchi's words "Kill and give it to", all the soldiers jumped out of the trench and rushed towards the first two trenches filled with gunpowder.

When the Japanese army launched an on-board charge across the board, the Fuxing Army assault team responsible for this offensive had just solved the defenders of the two trenches in front. They were rushing towards the last trenches. Although the smoke of gunpowders was like a shout that the Japanese army used to charge. However, they were deaf and were only waiting for the Japanese army to run nearby and did not find them.

Major General Fumijiro Horiuchi, who was charging in the front, was shocked when he looked at the Chinese army carrying a terrifying mask, but since he had already rushed here, he endured the discomfort of poisonous gas invading his body, pointed his sword and shouted again: "Kill and give me some more", and rushed towards him with many soldiers.

It would be fine if Fujiro Horiuchi didn't call him, but he woke up the assault team. For a moment, the shotgunist rushed to the front and shot wildly, and the accompanying machine gun team immediately fell to the ground and fired. At such a close range, the bullets immediately beat the Japanese army that rushed forward. However, more commandos were rushed to the side by the Japanese army in a hurry, and the extremely tragic hand-to-hand combat began. Although the soldiers of the commando were masters of hand-to-hand combat, they were inconvenient to fight with poison gas masks. The Japanese army was fighting again, and suddenly suffered heavy casualties.

While I was struggling to support, I saw these Japanese soldiers who were shattered and went crazy one after another, and finally shouted that they would kill their own people. The situation reversed. The mustard gas used here is worthy of being the king of poison gas of this era. This effect was achieved in just a few hours. Finally, the assault soldiers who felt something was wrong gradually withdrew from the battle, bypassed the Japanese army that had already gone crazy and drove deeper. Half an hour later, the front command received a report from the assault team. The vanguard had just passed Shijiuwo, crossed the Shuangcheng River and the Return River. They were approaching Tangshan quickly.

After receiving a telegram from the front line, the staff of the theater command immediately marked the corresponding mark on the combat map. Chief of Staff Xu Dachun and Commander Lei Yizhen looked at each other and said, "It seems to be much faster than we expected. The 18th Division said that it was transferred from the Northeast just now, and it was also the main division. Why did this defense line collapse so quickly?"

"In the intelligence, the Japanese army only eats two meals a day, that is, two rice balls with fists, so they are afraid they are hungry." Lieutenant General Xu Jingxi, who was worried that the troops would go out too much, was not in the Prime Minister's Office and was here. In fact, he had seen the power of mustard gas, but he couldn't say it was a powerful poison gas, so he had to joke about the Japanese supplies.

"Have the troops followed?" Lei Yizhen was not worried about the Japanese army's resistance and ambush. Now it was time. The more Japanese troops had more tricks, the more difficult it would be to resist the offensive of the Fuxing Army. The decisive battle was determined by troops, firepower, luck and will. In such a short thirty kilometers of assault, he did not believe that the Japanese army, which was restrained by the attack on the entire line, had the remaining strength to turn the tables.

"As soon as the breakthrough was opened, the entire army followed." Xu Dachun felt that he was worried again when he said this, and smiled, "The 2nd Army rested for so long. If the tiger went down the mountain, even if the Japanese army defended to the death, they would be afraid that they would not be able to stop it."

After the Yangcun victory, the main divisions basically went down to rest and rest, only a few divisions supported the defense line with many reserve divisions. During the period before the rainy season, the reserve division basically fought a war of attrition with the elite Japanese divisions. After more than two months of rest, the 2nd Army was full of fighting spirit and waiting for the decisive battle. Now the cannons are clearing the way, and poisonous gas is accompanying them, and of course the offensive is unstoppable.

Xu Dachun was just thinking that the 2nd Army was in a state of unstoppable force, but when it was almost dark, the vanguard of the Fuxing Army was blocked by the Japanese reserve team transferred from Tianjin in Xinjun Village, which was fifteen kilometers away from Tangshan. Tangshan was just a station, and there was no city or danger to defend. After hearing that the Baodi defense line was broken by the Chinese army and the 18th Division was broken, the dispatching army headquarters immediately issued a reinforcement order, from the 6th and 17th Divisions who had been staying in the country and then went to Tangshan to defend this place so that the Japanese army would be defeated in the direction of Jingdong and the Chinese army would be defeated in Tianjin.

——This dispatch order should have been issued long ago, but he was greedy for the port of Qinhuangdao, and was worried that leaving the trench would be followed by the Chinese army and affect the morale of the entire army, so the order was delayed. Now, the Chinese army's troops were pointed directly at Tangshan, and Jixian was bitten by China again. Even if Tangshan was saved, some troops could be withdrawn.

As soon as the 6th and 17th Division arrived in Tangshan, while strengthening the fortifications of Tangshan, Lieutenant General Umezawa, the commander of the 6th Division, led his troops to the west to try his best to contact the Chinese army and defend on the spot. The two armies met in the Xinjun station. The 2nd Army was the main force of the Fuxing Army, and the morale was strong before two months of rest. The 6th Division was a veteran Japanese division, and had been stationed in the country after the war started. He had never been on the battlefield before and was full. As soon as the two new forces joined the battle, they fought to the death. However, the vanguard of the Fuxing Army was just a brigade, and it was still very difficult to overturn a division that was specifically supported. So after an hour of fighting, the brigade commander Colonel Zhang Fugui issued an order to fight the battle.

As soon as the two regiment commanders received the order, they rushed to the front line headquarters in a hurry, but at this time, Zhang Fugui also took his people to the front line, and the three met on the way.

"Brig Commander, why did the battle stop? It's dark right away." A regiment commander asked when he saw the brigade commander saluting, feeling aggrieved.

"What are you worried about? I can still play a round before dark." Zhang Fugui replied indifferently, and then said, "Go and go to the front line."

The front line was just outside the Xinjun Tunnel. When the two armies met, the Japanese army was taught a lesson by the Fuxing Army's mortars and grenade launchers. When the Japanese army suffered serious losses, the Fuxing Army was chasing them on the back, they were tortured by the Japanese artillery gang. Taking advantage of this gap, the Japanese army hurriedly dug a trench. Their order was not to recover the lost land, but to defend the spot immediately when they met the Chinese army.

In the same trench dug, Zhang Fugui looked at the Japanese army a kilometer away in the telescope. The chief of staff Shang Gao next to him said: "The result of the aircraft reconnaissance said that these were the two newly arrived divisions of the Japanese General Reserve Team. Judging from the wing flag, it was the 13th Regiment. That is, the Kumamoto Division."

"Yes." Zhang Fugui responded softly, and then smiled: "Damn we have beaten the general reserve team, good guy!"

When he heard that the enemy's general reserve team was right in front of him, the two anxious regiment commanders immediately became happy. Since the general reserve team had appeared, the Japanese devils could only breathe a sigh of relief.

Finally, after surfacing the terrain of the Japanese trench, Zhang Fugui put down his telescope and asked, "Is the artillery regiment coming up?"

"Here I came up, but the artillery regiment said that we should not use poison gas cannons, otherwise we would suffer if we rushed up until dark." Shang Gao said. Mustard gas is too toxic. If we wait for it to dissipate after half a day when using it, even if there is poison gas mask, the troops will be in great danger. Therefore, this fast close-killing artillery still uses howitzers.

"If you don't need it, don't need it. That thing is even more refreshing without a fight." Lieutenant Colonel Wu Dianyang, the commander of the regiment, said. When he broke through the Japanese defense line just now, his regiment was caught off guard by the Japanese army carrying charges on the board. Although there was no big loss, it was a blow to the head. After all, it was the poison gas mask that made the mistake.

"Rare! We don't use poison gas, so the Japanese won't use it?" Zhang Fugui scolded. "When you attack later, let your brothers bring all the poison gas masks. The poison gas of the Japanese army is yellow-green, and our poison gas has a garlic smell. If you encounter both, put on the pig's hood."

"Yes, brigade commander!" Wu Dianyang was scolded by the brigade commander and immediately grabbed the back of his head.

"Go back. The preparation time for artillery is half an hour. Be sure to defeat Kumamoto's division before dark!" Zhang Fugui gave an order on the spot.

A few minutes later, the artillery of the Fuxing Army roared again at the Japanese trench and the artillery positions that followed. Half an hour later, when the artillery fire turned to the depth of the Japanese defense and the Japanese trench was still completely covered by gunpowder smoke, the first regiment reported that the first battalion had set off. At this time, Zhang Fugui stood on the stools built up by several ammunition boxes regardless of the danger. After listening to the staff's report uneasy, he looked at the impacting battalion with concern in the telescope.

The artillery fire of the Chinese army has extended to the enemy's back, but the Japanese army's artillery fire, which was not completely suppressed, is still fifteen meters away from the open area between the two armies. Some are shrapnel shells, which bloom like fireworks, explode high in the air of fifteen meters, spitting out shotguns, killing the soldiers who jumped from one crater to another; while some are grenades. After landing, under the action of the collision fuse, the shells suddenly exploded, and the flames, soil, and life all drifted away in this explosion.

Zhang Fugui did not hear the shouts of the company's attack, but he could feel that their lives were rushing from the movements of the soldiers. However, he felt that the possibility of success of this attack was not high, because whenever the shells exploded, he always felt that human life was so weak and vulnerable, especially now that the Japanese artillery was still firing shells.

Colonel Zhang Fugui frowned. He looked at the phone on the side uneasy, wondering if he wanted to urge the artillery to suppress the Japanese artillery with all his might. But at this moment, the phone rings. The telephone officer took it and shouted: "Report, the first battalion rushed into the enemy trenches and is cleaning up the enemy!"

Colonel Zhang Fugui was shocked when he heard this, and felt a needle-like goose bump on his spine. He immediately shouted to the telephone: "Second and Third Battalions, charge immediately!"

The brigade commander issued a command to attack the entire regiment. Wu Dianyang, who received the order, also connected the two battalions by phone. He shouted in the loudest voice on the phone: "Second Battalion and Third Battalion, charge immediately! Charge immediately!"

With his orders, soldiers in the low trench jumped out of the trench and rushed to the Japanese positions with gunfire and shouts. Nearly a thousand soldiers immediately covered the fields, and Japanese artillery shells continued to explode among them, exploding on their heads. The smoke of gunpowdered the soldiers' shadows, but was blown away by the wind. The soldiers fell down, got up, ran, crawled, passed through the blue-gray smoke, and bypassed the black bullet crater, and galloped away from the Japanese trench.

"The Second Battalion is great!" Wu Dianyang looked at the military flag that was constantly advancing in the front, and he recognized it. It was the camp of his fellow villager Yu Jichun.

He praised him, but Major Chen Guifa, the regiment officer next to him, looked sweaty. He didn't understand why his artillery has not suppressed the Japanese artillery until now. Now the soldiers are killed and injured by enemy artillery. If the Japanese army is the same as before, when the Japanese army completely rushes into the Japanese trenches, the losses will be great.

This is the case with the regiment headquarters. Zhang Fugui of the brigade headquarters was also very satisfied with the battalion that attacked. This battalion was on the front of the battlefield and suffered a lot of firepower from the Japanese army. He asked, "Good! Whose battalion is this?"

"It should be Yu Jichun's." Chief of Staff Shang Gao said. He also recognized the military flag, which was different from the flags of other battalions. The second battalion's battalion flag was made several holes by the Qing imperial guards a few years ago. The battalion commander at that time did not want to make up for it, so he eventually left such a broken flag.

The chief of staff was talking, and two long-range shells fell near the command post in a muffled voice. After the rumbling explosion, huge waves wrapped in soil fell into the trench. The soil hit Lieutenant Colonel Shang Gao's head and called on the phone. The brigade commander Zhang Fugui, who was standing on the ammunition box, was pushed to the other side of the trench by the explosion air waves, and his military cap also fell to the ground.

At this time, on the other side of the trench, Wu Dianyang saw that the other military flag without holes had stopped. He shouted loudly, "What's going on with the Third Battalion?" He pulled the telephone and said, "Hurry! Order the Third Battalion, do not stop and rush forward!"

From the telescope, he saw that the second battalion responsible for the frontal impact had rushed into the Japanese trench, but the third battalion on the far right did not rush in. This delay made him extremely nervous. He knew what it meant to lose the attack speed during the impact. When the phone was connected, Wu Dianyang's face turned red with excitement. He snatched the phone from the telephone and shouted: "Ma Xiucheng, what the hell are you doing?! You want to lead this entire battalion..."

Wu Dianyang shouted violently, but before he could finish speaking, another person's voice sounded in the microphone, "Report to the regiment commander, Battalion Commander Ma died! The enemy has two machine guns... There are two machine gun bunkers, and the mortar cannot be shot..."

The sound of the phone was intermittent with the cannon, but Wu Dianyang finally knew that the Third Battalion was blocked by two machine guns. He threw down the microphone and grabbed the telescope and tried his best to find it. Finally, he seemed to have seen the two so-called bunkers, which were two graves. The two machine guns were vaguely spitting out flames. The soldiers of the Third Battalion fell to the ground, not knowing whether they were dead or alive.

"Contact the artillery of the division and blow up the two tombs." Wu Dianyang shouted loudly. But when the phone was connected, bad news came. Just now, a shell fell near the command post, the gun regiment observer was killed, and the telephone line contacted behind was also blown off. This means that the artillery fire could not be mobilized in a short time to pull out the tombs, and the regiment mortar was not so powerful.
Chapter completed!