Rise From Eight Hundred

The Japanese 10th Army's three-pronged tactic seemed successful on the first day of November 12.

The 50,000 troops led by Yanagawa Heisuke reached the outskirts of Kunshan in one day, and the 18th Division also caught up with the 20,000 Chinese troops who chose to resist stubbornly instead of retreating.

In addition to the 36th Infantry Brigade, which was extremely hard to chase the thousands of Chinese more than ten kilometers ahead, they could catch up at any time, but when they took a long step, the short legs almost ran out of breath.

The Battle of Kunshan was relatively smooth. The Chinese army had basically withdrawn its main force and almost didn't put up a decent resistance, so they slipped away.

But the 18th Division encountered a stubborn resistance.

Regarding the first three days of the Battle of Jiashan, the Japanese 10th Army's battle report recorded it like this.

On the evening of November 12, 1937, the Imperial 18th Division chased the main forces of the enemy's 67th and 43rd Armies and arrived in Jiashan County, Jiangsu and Zhejiang, China.

In the early morning of November 13, it encountered an enemy night attack.

The enemy soldiers were all naked from the waist up, holding sharp bamboo swords, and stabbed anyone wearing clothes. The night was as dark as ink, and our soldiers could not see. The 2nd Infantry Battalion of the 124th Infantry Regiment of the 35th Infantry Brigade of the 18th Division, which was attacked by the enemy, suffered more than 230 deaths in this battle, more than 300 were injured, and 200 enemies were killed.

On November 13, the 18th Imperial Division dispatched the 2nd and 3rd Infantry Battalions of the 114th Infantry Regiment, the 1st and 3rd Infantry Battalions of the 124th Infantry Regiment, the 1st and 2nd Infantry Battalions of the 55th Infantry Regiment, the 3rd Infantry Battalion of the 56th Infantry Regiment, the 12th Artillery Regiment, and the 12th Engineer Regiment, with a total of 7,000 infantrymen, 600 engineers, and 70 artillery pieces of various types, to attack the enemy's defense line with a width of 12 kilometers. For a whole day, a total of 13 enemy positions were captured, more than 2,000 enemy soldiers were killed, and nearly 1,000 casualties were suffered by the division itself.

In the early morning of November 14, the division encountered another enemy attack.

The enemy's tactics did not change, their attire did not change, and they were also equipped with sharp bamboo swords. They sneaked into the position again. Although we were on high alert, we still suffered heavy losses. All the positions captured during the day were lost, and the number of enemies killed was unknown!

On November 14, the commander of the 18th Division, Lieutenant General Ushijima Sadao, personally went to the front to supervise the battle. In this battle, nearly 10,000 infantry artillery were deployed, all heavy artillery of the heavy artillery brigade participated in the battle, and the navy also sent fighter planes to assist. The whole army bravely moved forward and conquered 15 more enemy positions. The enemy's defense line was already shaky.

In the early morning of November 15, the enemy attacked again! The conquered positions were lost

The battle report became more and more concise.

As long as you are not a fool, watching the battle report of the Japanese Tenth Army on the Jiashan front, you will know that the 18th Division on the Jiashan front seems to have fallen into an almost unsolvable dead loop.

The positions that were finally captured by investing a large number of troops during the day seemed to be lost again at night, all because of a group of Chinese soldiers who liked to be naked and holding bamboo swords, weapons that were almost only available in primitive times.

But in fact, the real experience of the 18th Division was much more cruel than the understatement in the battle report.

During the day, with the assistance of the large-caliber heavy artillery of the division artillery regiment and the heavy artillery brigade, the offensive of the Japanese infantry was relatively smooth. Although the Chinese were tenacious enough, they were forced to retreat because they lacked heavy weapons to counterattack.

But the Japanese infantry occupying the position was not at all relaxed, because they had to endure the test of the night.

But no matter how vigilant they were, people were not machines. They were already exhausted after fighting for a whole day, and the silent night was simply a deadly lullaby.

And those Chinese who were only wearing shorts and straw sandals and holding sharpened bamboo poles could always sneak into the position from the wide wilderness without being noticed by the sleepy sentinels.

The Japanese infantry even changed the way they stored their weapons because of the sneak attack in the previous two days. Each rifle was next to the sleeping soldiers in the trenches and could be put into battle at any time.

However, it did not change the fact that they were eventually driven out of the position by the Chinese, and suffered heavy losses.

All the infantry who did not return to the main position were sentenced to death in battle.

Missing, it is impossible to appear here, there will be no living people under the Chinese with bare upper bodies.

The Japanese did not know what kind of Chinese soldiers they encountered.

The 128th Division of the Hunan Army was perhaps the most special army in the Chinese army at that time.

What kind of place is Xiangxi?

I am afraid that when the Chinese in the future see this name, the first thought that flashes in their mind is definitely not the beautiful county with beautiful mountains and rivers and a great writer with a moving name.

Fenghuang was not called Fenghuang before, but "Ganzhen". The area controlled by the Miao people has been maintaining an armed force for nearly two thousand years because of the constant conflicts caused by the migration of a large number of people during the Tang and Song dynasties. It is called "Gan Army".

It may also be one of the few mercenaries in Chinese history. Fighting is a lifelong career. Every household is accustomed to it. Almost every household has a soldier.

This is no longer a fierce folk custom, but a professional army that does the work of killing.

The 128th Division of the Hunan Army is such a Ganzi Army. 90% of the officers and soldiers are from "Fenghuang".

The small town, which will become a tourist attraction in the future, was ordered to go to war. A banner with the words "Gan Army Goes to War, China Will Not Perish" was hung at the gate of the small town. The whole town came to see them off.

7,000 soldiers accounted for one-fifth of the young and strong men in the small town.

The 128th Division, which was mainly composed of the Miao and Tu ethnic groups, was best at hand-to-hand combat. They had practiced martial arts since childhood, and their combat effectiveness in close combat was unmatched in China.

Unlike the Northwest Army who entered the barracks to learn the art of swordsmanship, the soldiers of the 128th Division liked bamboo poles that were made from local materials and cut them into half-meter-long pointed ends. The spiky bamboo poles with a length of nearly two meters should probably not be called so. It should be called bamboo spear instead of bamboo knife.

But this weapon is similar to the red tassel gun that the northern troops like to carry on the battlefield. It beats the Japanese army's 38 Dagai in terms of length.

Regardless of the fact that the Japanese army's stabbing skills are said to be unparalleled in the world, this is based on the fact that the opponent's physical fitness and the length of the spear are not as good as theirs. If they encounter someone whose skills are not inferior to theirs and whose spear is longer, they will be in trouble unless they are unlucky.

Facing the army armed with red tasseled guns and wearing gray military uniforms, the Japanese were proud of the hand-to-hand combat and lost eight out of ten battles, but here, they lost three out of three.

But this is by no means the main reason why the "Gan Army" can repeatedly succeed in night attacks.

The real reason why they have never been defeated in night attacks is their spirit of not fearing death.

At that time, each army would have officers to supervise the battle. Once a soldier retreated, military law would be conducted on the spot. In this regard, even the 67th Army and the 43rd Army are no exception. During the Songjiang battle, no less than a hundred officers and soldiers died under the machine guns and pistols of the supervising team.

However, there is no such organization in the Gan Army. They never need to supervise battles, and even the so-called pre-war mobilization is omitted.

All the ministers had to do was shout: "Brothers, get on top! Don't embarrass us Phoenix people!" The Gan Army soldiers would charge desperately until the last person was left.

This sentence is more useful than any impassioned statement, and there is no simpler motive for fighting.

In ancient times, when Gan Jun went to war, he usually wore a large earring on his right ear and engraved his name on the earring. This is not for the sake of looking good, but for the hope that someone will claim him after he dies in battle, and that the fallen leaves will return to their roots.

When clearing the battlefield, anyone with a big earring on his right ear must be a soldier from Xiangxi. Then, based on the name and place of origin on the earrings, the remains were transported back to western Hunan and buried.

If you can't transport the remains back home, take the earrings with you.

As soon as the family saw the earrings, they knew that he had died in battle and would never come back. Then he enshrined the earrings on the shrine to indicate that he had returned.

Now, they wear earrings again and have their names and places of origin engraved on them.

Wrapping corpses in horse leather has become the most glorious thing for the disciples of the Gan Army.

If it were not such an army, how could it have been able to block the nearly 30,000-strong attack of the 18th Division with the strength of an infantry division in that time and space? In Tang Dao's view, that battle was more of a hell mode than the battle of 30,000 vs. 100,000 in Songjiang.

But miraculously, they did it.

And their fighting method was just like what was written in the battle report of the 18th Division at this time. During the day, they were hard-hitting and lost as few positions as possible. At night, they organized suicide squads to go into battle and seize them back.

It’s not that the Japanese army was just dregs, and they were immediately confused when they encountered a night attack. They also tried to prove that they were not weak.

But the tragedy is that they are really no match for this "pole" army in a hand-to-hand fight. What's even more painful is that this is a real water town in the south of the Yangtze River.

Jiashan has more water than Songjiang.

The Chinese and Japanese armies were all fighting in the mud.

The Chinese wear pitiful straw sandals, while the Japanese wear sturdy cowhide shoes that can crush mountains and rivers.

If you are on the road, cowhide boots will naturally beat straw sandals.

But if you are in a muddy field, even a fool knows what a terrible experience it would be to have muddy leather boots.

Mother Earth of China and the Japanese themselves dug a big hole for the Japanese infantry.

That's not all, because there is an extra little butterfly that has traveled through time and space.

Tang Dao added another fire to the night attack battle.

After the Songjiang Command arrived in Jiashan, it requested instructions from the Songhu Theater Command and jointly established the Jiashan Command with the 128th Division. Lieutenant General Wu remained as the commander-in-chief, and Lieutenant General Guo and the commander of the 128th Division, Lieutenant General Gu, served as deputy commander-in-chief.

The 67th Army was the main force in defensive operations during the day, while the entire army of the 128th Division huddled in the rear garrison fortifications to recuperate from heavy artillery.

At night, he served as the main force for night attacks.

To put it bluntly, one is responsible for the day and the other is responsible for the night, so it’s a shift battle.

Japanese 18th Division

idiot! I have never seen such a 'shameless' style of play. How about you run away and I won't chase you, okay?

On the fourth day of the Jiashan Defense Line offensive and defensive battle, the night attack team of the Ganzi Army came again.

The Chinese used their actions to tell the Japanese that this really doesn't work.

With Hisao Tani's unlucky man's lessons learned from the past, one can imagine the distress in Ushijima Sadao's heart who still went to the front line to supervise the battle.

However, the reason why Ushijima Sadao could occasionally laugh out of his misery was not the fact that he had advanced a few meters during the day.

Rather, there are people who are more miserable than him, Ushijima Sadao, and

There are people who are more unlucky than themselves, which is one of the reasons why many people persist in living in misery...

PS: It’s not that Fengyue doesn’t work hard! It’s really a holiday, but I’m even busier than working. From noon yesterday to tonight, there have been no-stop meals for classmates who returned home from junior high school, high school, and college. Fengyue is not good at drinking, and she will feel dizzy after three glasses of beer. I insisted on not drinking at noon and took the time to write in the afternoon. I have to participate in the fourth game soon, so I can only write this chapter. It is a holiday for the holidays! I will update normally in the next few days, please forgive me.