The Iron-Blooded Army of Beacon Fire

Chapter 171 The rain is coming
In the next half month, He Wei's layout actually had little to do with him. The military police were watching the transportation of people and the construction of fortifications, and everything went smoothly.

On November 5000, the first batch of people crossing the river had already been transported across the river. After the transportation vehicles sent by the navy were in place, the number of people crossing the river in one night had reached [-], and its ferrying efficiency was far more than According to initial estimates, this also means that more people will be rescued. At the same time, various defense systems near Xiaguan are also working overtime to build.

In the last negotiation that He Wei participated in, all the mines and naval artillery promised by Lieutenant Colonel Sun of the Navy were in place. The Navy transferred all the artillery dismantled from the former Qing warship Hai Rong that was scuttled in Jiangyin to Xiaguan Pier, including gunners and shells. They were all deployed to Xiaguan Wharf in the name of strengthening the defense of the Yangtze River.

The sea warship is a protected cruiser ordered by the Qing Dynasty from Germany after the Sino-Japanese War of 150. It has a displacement of [-] tons and is equipped with three [-]mm and [-]-caliber Krupp rapid-fire cannons and a [-]mm Eight of the [-]-caliber Krupp rapid-fire cannons have been shipped to Xiaguan. He Wei even took the time to see them.

Although these naval guns produced at the end of the [-]th century are already very old, the Navy has maintained them well. In order to enhance the combat performance of these guns, the military police specially invited a group of technicians from the Jinling Arsenal to refurbish these guns. Maintenance has been done, so it can be kept in good condition.

These artillery were all installed on the temporary shore fort built near Xiaguan Pier. Each artillery was arranged in a temporary artillery shooting fortress made of concrete. The deployment position of each artillery was determined by He Wei and the leader. The naval officers of the team jointly selected it. With these eleven artillery pieces, it can basically cover the entire river near Xiaguan. If it encounters a small Japanese warship, it will be fully capable of fighting.

He Wei's mine plan is also proceeding in an orderly manner. The navy has given more than 300 real mines, and the production of fake mines has been handed over to the military police. The military police really have the means to issue an announcement in Nanjing. The whole city was looking for carpenters. In order to recruit enough carpenters, the gendarmerie even issued a statement to apply for the job. Those who passed the test would be given ten yuan each, and they would also be provided with a free ticket to leave Nanjing. The first priority is leaving Nanjing.

Initially, none of the carpenters in the city were interested in the gendarmerie's recruitment announcement. However, as soon as these additional conditions came out, all these carpenters came to apply with red eyes. The gendarmerie simply accepted all the recruits and accepted them. The carpenter does nothing else every day. He just makes fake mines out of wood according to the real mines. It won't take long to get enough fake mines. When the river is closed, he mixes the real mines and fake mines and throws them into the river. In Jiangli, He Wei believes that the Japanese will enjoy their creativity.

In addition to these deployments, the training of the secret agent camp is also booming. In short, all of He Wei's deployments are moving in an excellent direction. However, the good thing is the small situation, but the big situation has gone wrong, and even He Wei is not happy at all. Get up, because on November [-], the highest authorities issued a general retreat order to the troops on the Songhu front line.

This also means that this super-large-scale battle that took place in the Songhu area, the economic core, gathered hundreds of thousands of troops from all provinces across the country, and lasted for more than three months, is over.

In what direction will the war situation and events develop next? As a time traveler, He Wei knows very well that the hundreds of thousands of troops on the Songhu front line will soon withdraw from the Songhu battlefield in various forms and march toward Retreating in all directions, the Japanese army will not stop here. They are about to attack Nanjing with heavy troops. In less than half a month, the Japanese army will reach Nanjing.

During this time, He Wei was not idle when he was training the troops. From time to time, he would contact General Xiao to communicate with each other and discuss the evacuation of Xiaguan Pier. In fact, this was all a cover. He Wei did not need to worry about these things now. , the military police handled it properly.

He Wei's real purpose was to get some high-level information from General Xiao. He wanted to know how the higher-ups were thinking about the future situation. After going back and forth several times, he really gained a lot.

From General Xiao, He Wei could learn that the top management had held three meetings so far. The first meeting was probably in early November. There were not many attendees, including his bald principal, Minister He, Xiao Zhuge, and Xu Yongchang. Waiting for a few people, the content of the discussion was about what Nanjing should do after President Songhu retreated.

During the meeting, most people expressed that the main force of the national army should be withdrawn from the quagmire of Songhu as soon as possible, and that too many troops should not be invested in the defense of Nanjing. After all, the terrain of Nanjing itself is an easy-to-attack and difficult-to-defend place. The investment of more than a dozen regiments symbolized Just be on guard for a while, and my dear bald principal also agreed with this.

But at the same time, he also said that Nanjing is the capital after all, and it is best to defend it seriously. Anyway, this first meeting did not have any nutritious content other than confirming that Nanjing should be defended.

The real highlights are the second and third meetings.

The second meeting was probably in the middle of the month. This time there were more people attending the meeting. The content of the discussion was still about the defense of Nanjing. The views of most people at this meeting were still the same as the first time. Nanjing must be defended. But they could only stick to it in a symbolic way, but at this meeting someone put forward a different opinion. Tang Mengxiao, the director of the Training Directorate, suddenly jumped out and said that Nanjing must stick to it. The reason he gave was also impossible to refuse. He believed that Nanjing must stick to it. Nanjing is the site of the tomb of former Prime Minister Dr. Sun Yat-sen, and it is also the capital of the country. If Nanjing is given up so easily, how can we meet Mr. Sun?

Regarding Tang Mengxiao who suddenly jumped out, the bald headmaster only praised him a few words, saying that his spirit was commendable and that it made sense, but that was all. He neither changed the previous arrangements nor over-affirmed them. This time The meeting ended hastily.

The real bombshell came at the third meeting a few days later.

At this meeting, Tang Mengxiao jumped out again and continued to decide to defend Nanjing. As a result, the bald principal agreed to Tang's request on the spot and asked who could defend Nanjing.

At this time, no one said anything. In the end, the person who tied the bell had to be untied. Tang stood up again and expressed that he was willing to take on the responsibility of guarding Nanjing if no one took over. Naturally, the bald principal agreed on the spot.

Tang Mengxiao thus became the commander-in-chief of the future battle to defend Nanjing.

Although He Wei already knew the results, he did not know so many historical details. These were all told to him by Commander Xiao, and Commander Xiao was quite confident in Tang's appointment, believing that Tang had commanded a large-scale military exercise to defend Nanjing. He has rich command experience and is a veteran of the Hunan Army. He has served in the army for many years and has experienced wars. He should be the best choice for the Nanjing garrison commander.

The best choice?When He Wei knew that Tang Mengxiao had become the commander of the Nanjing garrison in the timeline he was in, he felt a chill in his neck. The main reason was that this person was not suitable for such an important task, even if He Wei left the time traveler behind. He also has this view as a prerequisite.

He Wei analyzed Tang Mengxiao's decades of military experience. After the analysis, He Wei believed that this man's character had serious flaws, or that his character was simply not good enough to serve as a commander of so many armies.

Tang Mengxiao had a life-threatening attitude when fighting, but once the battlefield fell into decline and suffered disadvantages, he simply did not have the courage to persevere to the end. In general, he lacked resilience in fighting.

Whenever he was defeated, he always abandoned the army and ran away.He was defeated by Li Zongren in 1927, abandoned his army of more than [-] people, jumped on a ship and ran directly to Japan.

In January 1930, he failed in his rebellion against Chiang Kai-shek. He abandoned his 1-strong army in the snow and ran away with only three followers. Many people criticized his performance in the historical battle to defend Nanjing. In fact, in He Wei's view, Later, his performance in the Battle of Nanjing had been previewed many times in many battles in the decades before his life. The Battle of Nanjing was almost a relapse of these failures.

He really can't shoulder this responsibility.

． ． ． ． ． ． ． ． ． ． ． '
"Battal Commander, Battalion Commander, someone from the teaching team is here."

On this day, He Wei was organizing training for the whole camp on the playground. Suddenly, he saw Tao Heiwa, the little messenger, running over panting. He Wei immediately called Tao Heiwa to explain the situation.

"Battal Commander, there are a lot of people at the gate of the camp, a lot of wounded soldiers, all of whom came from the Songhu Front. Now all the people left behind in the camp have gone to help. It's so miserable. Battalion Commander, they asked us to send a few people over there to help. It’s too busy at all.”

He Wei heard that there were troops coming down from the Songhu front line. He Wei estimated that the troops from the teaching corps were gradually withdrawing from the Songhu front line. Without saying anything, He Wei immediately took Ge Guicai's baggage train and rushed to the gate of Xiaolingwei's camp. He went to help, and when He Wei arrived at the gate of Xiaolingwei's camp, the scene in front of him shocked him greatly.

He Wei saw a long dragon stretching for more than ten miles on the road in front of Xiaoling Guard. They were all soldiers. Almost all of these gray-headed soldiers were covered in blood, and their equipment was all smashed. Wearing steel helmets, some wearing cloth caps, seriously injured soldiers with broken arms and legs were lying on stretchers dying and talking nonsense, while lightly injured soldiers supported each other and moved forward step by step on crutches.

Some were carrying rifles, some were carrying mortar seats and heavy machine gun mounts, but some had no weapons and only had bayonets and grenades on their bodies. Some soldiers were even carrying wooden cannon wheels. He Wei knew , that is the wheel of the German-made 37mm tank defense gun.

Some soldiers seemed to have exhausted all their strength to rush forward. When they entered the Xiaolingwei camp, many of them threw away their weapons and sat on the ground crying. There were even many officers among them.

He Wei understood that they were all defeated and retreated on the Songhu front line, but their image was much worse than the image of the defeated soldiers He Wei saw at Xinkou. For such a miserable army, He Wei passed the sacrifice of these wounded soldiers. Their identities were determined by their collar badges. The collar badges of these soldiers were round collar badges. Except for the students of the Central Military Academy, the only field troops who wore such collar badges on a large scale were the Central Military Academy Teaching Corps.

That's right, these extremely miserable and extremely miserable soldiers were the former Royal Forest Army's teaching corps.

"Oh my god."

He Wei gritted his teeth and sighed. The officers and soldiers of the teaching corps were constantly pouring into the Xiaoling Guard camp. Many of the people left behind were treating the wounded soldiers. He Wei could not just sit idly by and watch. He Wei immediately told the platoon leader of the baggage platoon. Ge Guicai ordered the soldiers from the baggage platoon to go over and help.

Dozens of brothers in the baggage queue immediately stepped forward to help the left-behind personnel of the teaching corps to support the wounded soldiers and guide the soldiers to sit down and rest. He Wei happened to want to know the status of the troops on the Songhu front line and saw a man carrying a speed machine. He Wei immediately stepped forward and helped the second lieutenant sit down. He took out two boxes of biscuits from his waist and handed them to him. The second lieutenant was not polite and took the biscuits and wolfed them down.

"Brother, eat slowly, eat slowly, you are all teaching the corps, right?"

"Yes, sir, my name is Zhang Wei. I am the second lieutenant platoon leader of the Second Infantry Regiment of the Teaching Corps. I am a student of the [-]th batch of Huangpu."

The platoon leader named Zhang Wei ate the biscuits and regained some strength, so he informed He Wei of his situation.

He Wei nodded. Unexpectedly, he was his classmate at the same time. Unfortunately, he didn't know him, so he continued to ask: "Brother, why did you fight like this?"

The platoon leader named Zhang Wei sighed and said to He Wei: "Our teaching corps originally had three infantry regiments. Our second regiment was the first unit to go into battle in August. It fought with the Japanese army near the Bazi Bridge, and later on We moved around Songhu and fought with the Japanese for three months. Of the three infantry battalions in our regiment, less than one battalion remained."

"The first and third regiments are not much better. They all suffered more than half of their casualties. The entire regiment used to have more than 1 people before the war. Now I estimate that not even half of them are left. The casualties are heavy, the men and horses are exhausted, and the retreat order was given too hastily. , many brothers were scattered on the way to retreat. Only the few people left in our regiment are what you see, sir. According to the establishment, the regiment has an infantry howitzer company, six infantry guns, and a tank. There was a defensive artillery battery, six [-]th battle anti-aircraft guns, and a small artillery battery with six Sulotong machine guns, but after the battle of Songhu, there was nothing left, and almost all of them were scrapped in Songhu."

As the platoon leader spoke, tears flashed in his eyes. He Wei couldn't say anything more and could only pat him on the shoulder.

"Brother, it's okay. Once the troops are withdrawn, we will train them properly and continue to fight against the Japanese."

He Wei tried his best to comfort him. Although he said so, he knew in his heart that there was no time for training at all. These brothers who had just escaped from the bloody battle would soon be involved in another new bloody battle. go.

(End of this chapter)