Age of Conquest Reborn

Chapter 522: Crisis in Zhengzhou

Not only Tang Qiuli did not understand the information sent by the Zhengzhou Intelligence Station, but the generals in the division were also confused. Tang Enbo still had at least hundreds of thousands of troops, so why was the defensive force still weak? He looked back at Yu Deshui,

The order came: "Director Yu, let the Zhengzhou Intelligence Station figure out the actual situation at all costs." Yu Deshui understood what the division commander meant, and was not satisfied with the ambiguities such as "seems" and "unclear" in the intelligence.

, he immediately rushed back to the intelligence office.

Yu Deshui was also very angry. Tang Enbo could not be contacted. The division commander relied entirely on his own intelligence system to judge the Japanese army's movements, but he was sent such vague intelligence. It was really embarrassing. If it delayed the military plane, he would be responsible for it.

Big.

Tang Qiuli stared at the map on the wall. The more he looked at it, the more his scalp became numb. If the information from the Zhengzhou Intelligence Station was true, Zhengzhou might be in danger now. Henan is the hinterland of the Central Plains, and Zhengzhou has a very convenient geographical location.

The position is too important. This hand holds Tang

Qiu Li's veins, Tang Qiuli sighed secretly in his heart, Zai Ren and Xiang Yue Qingsi are not ordinary people, they were passive in several battlefields, and they did not use this rare soldier in their hands. They are indeed sophisticated. Am I too contemptuous?

They? He thought secretly in his heart.

Zhengzhou, the Zhengzhou that made Tang Qiuli fearful. After the Japanese army captured Zhengzhou, they could have three main directions of attack. If they marched westward, they could attack Xi'an in Shaanxi Province. From the flanks, they could echo the mountain passes of Wuxiang and attack Taiyuan. They could also attack Hanzhong in southern Shaanxi Province and advance with troops.

Sichuan, or take Ankang and attack Hubei.

Going south, the goal is to take Wuhan, the important town in central China, and occupy this city in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, which is the thoroughfare of nine provinces. We can go up the river to attack the southwestern provinces, and we can go down the river to attack Nanjing and Shanghai, and cut China into two halves, east and west.

Advance eastward, go down to Kaifeng and Shangqiu, and approach Xuzhou. Xuzhou is an eye. If we go north, we can defeat the Japanese army in Cangzhou and flank our 300,000-strong troops. If we go south, we can take Nanjing and attack Shanghai.

Tang Qiuli was heartbroken. With Zhengzhou lost, his Yellow River defense line was about to collapse. From the analysis of the Japanese attack situation on various battlefields, the Japanese army was most likely to advance westward and eastward. Otherwise, the Japanese army in Wuxiang and Cangzhou would

, would launch such a violent attack, obviously to support the Japanese army in the middle.

It is unlikely to go south. With less than 100,000 troops, they are trying to sweep across the hinterland of East China. Most of the troops are allocated to the transportation points that need to be defended along the way. How can they attack Wuhan? How many of them can reach the gates of Wuhan?

personal.

In order to prevent the Japanese army from marching west from Zhengzhou to Shaanxi and seizing Xi'an, he telegraphed Sun Zhenbang, commander of the Yellow River Defense Command, to lead his four river defense brigades, totaling more than 36,000 troops, to immediately move to Lingbao, Henan, and build a

Defense fortifications were built to prevent the Japanese army from advancing westward.

He also knew that Sun Zhenbang's more than 30,000 local troops alone could not withstand the nearly 100,000 Japanese troops for many days. He immediately ordered the Zhou Yushan Division of the Transportation Command of the ** Division to leave one regiment to maintain basic transportation support tasks.

, mobilized four infantry regiments and an air defense regiment, and immediately rushed to the Lingbao front line as quickly as possible, and formed the Lingbao Defense Command with Sun Zhenbang.

Yuan Jinghao, commander of the Shaanxi Provincial Security Command, was ordered to lead three local security brigades, totaling more than 22,000 troops, to immediately station in the Shangluo area and set up defenses to prevent Japanese troops from attacking Xi'an in two ways.

In the direction of Texas, he ordered the cancellation of the battle plan to raid Tianjin. Although it was a good move, saving lives was more important at the moment. At the same time, he notified Liu Tiehan, Tang Qiusheng and Li Honggang of the crisis in Zhengzhou in detail, and planned to use it to raid Tianjin.

With no losses on the Cangzhou front line, Tianjin's troops moved south to the Xuzhou area and joined Zhang Zizhong's Sulu garrison to jointly block the Japanese troops who intended to capture Xuzhou. The Dezhou Campaign Headquarters decided how many troops to deploy.

A series of orders were issued, and Tang Qiuli almost collapsed on the kang, feeling weak and weak. This time, he used all his family resources. It can be said that "young and old all went into battle". All the troops from all over the country were mobilized. With the few troops in his hand,

, and have to keep an eye on the mountain pass of Wuxiang to prevent him from escaping back to Taihang Mountain.

He has never felt such a dangerous situation. All the unfavorable situations have appeared. He is so heavy that he can't breathe. His strategic layout is in danger of collapse just because of Zhengzhou.

Tang Enbo, with 230,000 troops in his body, could not defend Zhengzhou, which was protected by the natural dangers of the Yellow River? He was filled with doubts.

He also thought that the Japanese army might march south from Zhengzhou to Wuhan. He struggled to sit up and prepared to send a telegram to Chairman Chiang Kai-shek in Nanjing, reminding him to pay attention to the defense in northern Wuhan.

The Nanjing Military Commission sent a war report. At about 7 a.m. on December 16, the Japanese troops who had retreated to the sea launched a massive attack on our defense positions from Shanghai and Hangzhou Bay.

This time the Japanese army attacked with a fierce offensive. They were equipped with a large number of long-range heavy artillery and the number of troops increased by about 150,000. Fierce fighting took place across the entire perimeter of Shanghai and in the direction of Hangzhou Bay. The fighting was brutal. On the first day, the Japanese attacks were repelled. However, according to

The forward observation post reported that the Japanese troops had not retreated and had the intention to attack again.

Tang Qiuli has two big heads. The Japanese are going crazy. They are fighting fiercely in the northern battlefield, and there is another breakthrough on the center line. In the southern battlefield, the fighting resumes, and it is also a life-threatening attack. This is a typical north-south pincer strategy.

The Japanese want to decide the situation in China in one battle, and the flashpoint of all this is in Zhengzhou.

However, Tang Qiuli could not take care of the southern battlefield because he was powerless. There were hundreds of thousands of elite Central Army troops under Chairman Chiang Kai-shek and there were generals like Zhang Zhizhong. What he was most worried about now was the situation in Zhengzhou, but the intelligence

He didn't come for a long time and the situation was unclear. Asking him how to direct the battle made his eyes burn with anxiety.

If you look at the land of China in 1937 from a high altitude, the south of the Yangtze River and the north of China are full of smoke and artillery fire, but there is peace in the middle. Historically, at this time in the land of China, except for the southwest and northwest, war is everywhere, and the national government

The capital was forced to move, first to Wuhan and finally to Chongqing, because the appearance of Tang Qiuli blocked the Japanese troops in North China from moving south.

Only then did we have the current situation of two fronts, the north and the south. The Japanese army used all its strength to attack the north and the south. In fact, China's anti-Japanese battlefield has been divided into two parts. The south is the Central Army led by Chairman Chiang Kai-shek, and the north is the Tang Army.

Comparatively speaking, in the North China Army Division headed by Qiu Li, Tang Qiuli was under much heavier pressure than Chairman Chiang. He was the number one enemy of the Japanese army.

Tang Qiuli, the commander of the North China ** Division and the commander-in-chief of the Yellow River Basin War Zone, was in a simple farmhouse in his hometown. He was so anxious that he deployed all the available troops to the front line. There were no more troops to mobilize. In Peiping,

Prince Zai, the chief of general staff of the Japanese base camp, and Xiang Yueqingji, the commander of the North China Expeditionary Army on the Niangziguan front line, smiled happily.

These two old foxes were congratulating each other. They originally had no hope of sending less than 100,000 troops to attack Anyang and capture Zhengzhou. Attacking Henan was not their main goal. When the war started, they focused on

We arrived at Datong and Niangziguan in Shanxi on the west line, and Dezhou in Shandong on the east line.

In doing so, it did not violate the overall strategy formulated by the emperor to dispatch troops from Shanghai to join forces under Nanjing City. It also satisfied the army's original idea of ​​moving from north to south, first targeting North China, and then moving south. It was very satisfactory.

Unexpectedly, when the war started, the fighting in the direction of Datong was not smooth at first. Yan Xishan, the local emperor, was determined to fight the imperial army and concentrated all his main forces on the front line of Datong. They fought to the death and the war made no progress. Later, it happened

Finding that the Jin army's garrison at Niangzi Pass was weak, they prepared to raid Niangzi Pass and open the gate to Shanxi from the east. Unfortunately, the Chinese devil Tang Qiuli took the lead. As a result, they were stopped in front of Niangzi Pass, unable to advance or retreat.

The direction of Texas is the battlefield where Zai Ren and Xiangyue Qingji hold the most hope. The shaky Chinese defenders' defense line can be crushed by the Chinese army with just a little more strength. Who would have thought that the Chinese defenders would be at a comprehensive disadvantage?

The army refused to fall. Later, Tang Qiuli mobilized reinforcements, and the situation on the battlefield in Dezhou reversed. The 300,000 imperial troops lost nearly 70,000 to 80,000 troops and were forced to retreat to Cangzhou, where they were overwhelmed and unable to move.

Although His Highness the Prince personally led reinforcements, he could not change the passive situation. He broke into the mountain pass where Tang Qiu left his hometown in the Taihang Mountains, empty-handed, and did not achieve the expected results at all. If he continued to waste it, he might be trapped and die in the Taihang Mountains. In the end, he would not be able to survive.

Without changing the battle plan, they attacked Taiyuan from southern Shanxi, but were blocked by Yan Xishan's hundreds of thousands of Jin troops at the foot of Wuxiang city. Their heads were bruised and bleeding, but Wuxiang was not captured.

In the North China battlefield, nearly one million troops were deployed. From November 5th to December 13th, more than 40 days, none of the original battle plan was realized. It was impossible to go south. North China

Being passive everywhere, Zai Ren and Xiangyue Qingsi were extremely distressed. During this period, Xiangyue Qingsi returned to Peiping many times to discuss with Zai Ren how to change the current passive situation.

Forced by the situation, the two of them decided to launch a long-planned risky move, using the only unused force to attack Anyang, Henan, open the northern gate of Henan, and march directly to Zhengzhou, thereby changing the situation of the war.

A gambling adventure, the entire chess game in North China, they both have such a piece of work in their hands.

Zai Ren was not optimistic about attacking Henan. With more than 90,000 troops, he had to face more than 200,000 Central Army troops. Compared with the strength of the Central Army, he was at an obvious disadvantage. Without the disastrous defeats at Songhu Battlefield and Hangzhou Bay in the south, he would not have been able to defeat the Central Army.

The combat effectiveness of the army has a new evaluation. Otherwise, Zai Ren would have approved the implementation of this plan long ago. The reason for repeated delays is that he is worried that these more than 90,000 troops will be eaten by the Central Army before they even see the Yellow River.

However, Xiang Yue Qingji repeatedly insisted on launching the Henan Campaign. Zai Ren understood the mood of his old friend very well. With North China fighting like this, there was no way to reverse the situation. His position as the commander of the North China Expedition Army would definitely not be preserved, even if he maintained it with all his strength.

, it cannot change the fact that one defeat after another defeat has happened.

However, Xiangyue Qingji was full of confidence. Everything stemmed from the adventurous actions of a Japanese squadron leader. It was this inconspicuous guy in the Japanese army who made Xiangyue Qingji see the dawn of victory.

(To be continued)