Traveling through the sword to engage in military industry.

Chapter 189 New Operation No.

Due to the Eighth Route Army's massive attack on the airport, more than half of the Japanese fighter planes stationed in North China were destroyed. Operation No. 5, which was originally scheduled to be launched in May, had to be postponed to June due to the prolonged preparations and the expansion of its scale.

The battlefield first started from the Ji-Zhong base area. The Japanese in North China gathered more than 50,000 Japanese and puppet troops. With the cooperation of the Army and Air Force, hundreds of Japanese light armored vehicles such as the Type 97 Douding tanks and Type 94 Dou tanks rushed out of the Beijing-Tianjin base in a mighty force. Under the command of the Japanese commander of the North China garrison army, Okamura, they began to divide their troops and attack the Ji-Zhong base area, implementing their so-called iron wall encirclement.

The Japs' tactics this time were extremely vicious and cruel. They adopted the tactics of "setting up a net vertically and horizontally, clearing out the enemy diagonally, and repeatedly and comprehensively attacking" and the "Three Alls Policy". They built strongholds and bunkers, constructed roads, and dug blockade trenches, preparing to completely divide and consume the Anti-Japanese Base in Central Hebei and destroy the main force of the Eighth Route Army's Central Hebei Military Region.

For such a large-scale operation, if Ren Zhong had not given an advance warning, the main force of the Ji-Zhong base would probably have suffered heavy losses in this wave of mopping-up operations. In the original historical time and space, the base had misjudged the situation, and not only did the main force suffer heavy losses, but the base almost entirely fell into enemy-occupied areas.

It took more than two years to slowly recover.

However, with Ren Zhong's advance warning, the Border Region Staff attached great importance to it and made direct deployments according to Ren Zhong's estimate. They communicated with the Eighth Route Army Headquarters to move the eight main regiments of Ji Zhong (22nd, 23rd, 26th, 27th, 28th, 31st, 32nd and 33rd Regiments) out of the base and fight on the outside lines in advance, and the remaining troops were broken up into small units and switched to a secret underground struggle mode.

The Eighth Route Army's strategy was like hitting a cotton ball. The Japanese were a little confused about the Eighth Route Army's fighting style. When they entered the base, they found that they could not find any opponent. Just when they thought they had won without fighting, they began to capture civilians to build artillery towers, strongholds and roads.

The main force in Ji Zhong suddenly attacked the Japanese.

They made full use of the tactics of feinting to the east and attacking in the west, hiding during the day and moving at night, and avoiding the strong and attacking the weak.

They would seize the opportunity to launch a sneak attack on the puppet troops who were at a distance, kill them with one strike, and then resolutely turn around and leave. They never engaged in positional warfare or hard battles!
This method made the Japanese troops who were attacking exhausted from chasing the main force in Central Hebei. Before they knew it, they were led by the nose to the edge of the Taihang Mountains and started to circle around the mountains.

Thanks to the accumulated spoils of war in the annihilation war against the puppet army, and the support and ammunition supply from the brother units in the Taihang Mountains, the main force in Central Hebei had been fighting non-stop for two weeks. They had food and ammunition, and their strength did not decrease. Instead, it became stronger with combat experience.

After receiving the mortars and 56 semi-automatic weapons prepared for them by Taixing, the strength of the eight main regiments in Ji Zhong increased suddenly.

We seized the opportunity when the Japanese and puppet troops were out of sync and fought several beautiful annihilation battles, wiping out more than 5000 puppet troops and hundreds of Japanese.

However, the Japanese were not fools. They followed the established strategy and resolutely turned the tide in the Ji Zhong base area. They verified the local people one by one, causing heavy losses to the armed work teams that remained. As for the villages that used mine warfare and guerrilla warfare, the Japanese did not pretend and directly started a village annihilation mode, capturing most of the young and middle-aged people in the village and transporting them away, while the remaining elderly, weak, women and children were killed.

More than 5 young and middle-aged people were captured and forced to work as death laborers.

The Japanese didn't feel any pain at all for the loss of the puppet army's cannon fodder. After all, after giving them some dog food, there would always be many people willing to make a living and come to serve as their running dogs, and the ones being consumed were still the Chinese.

When the news came, Ren Zhong was powerless to do anything about it.

He is not a god. In the face of absolute advantage, he is able to preserve the main force of Ji Zhong and keep the spark so that he can return for revenge when his heavy weapons production capacity explodes. He would suggest not taking any prisoners.

The anti-mopping-up campaign in Central Hebei entered its most brutal mode from the very beginning. The Japanese devils in Gangcun were indeed butchers destined for the gallows. They were vicious and ruthless, creating one tragedy after another without any bottom line.

There are countless blood debts in Jizhong.

Just when everyone thought that the Japanese would end their operation after sweeping through central Hebei, they did not expect that the main force of the Japanese in North China would suddenly change its formation.

Two full divisions and three mixed brigades, plus two main divisions of the Kwantung Army that had secretly moved south, suddenly appeared on the edge of the Taiyue, Taihang and other bases, and divided into several routes to raid the Eighth Route Army headquarters and the tens of thousands of troops that had retreated to the mountains and had not yet been transferred out.

During the day, the Japanese reconnaissance planes kept flying around in the mountains, looking for traces of the Eighth Route Army and the Guoju main force. Once they found them, the Japanese on the ground would swarm in. Facing the sudden appearance of two Japanese divisions, the Eighth Route Army and the Guoju army were not mentally prepared. The Japanese did a good job of keeping it secret this time, and directly mobilized two divisions of the Kwantung Army to Shimen by rail before they were exposed.

The previous combat plan of the Eighth Route Army, whether it was the Border Region General Staff or the Eighth Route Army Headquarters, was a strategy to avoid the enemy's sharp edge in the sweep of Central Hebei.

Who knew that the Japanese would not abide by the moral code of war and suddenly change their formation.

This was somewhat unexpected, but the Eighth Route Army Headquarters and the remaining troops had already adapted to the repeated encirclement and suppression by the Japanese. Although they were not prepared for such an unexpected action, they were still very skilled in escaping.

In the mountains of Taihang and Taiyue, if you are determined to escape, you will basically lose your shadow. If a battalion or a company scatters across a mountain, even a dog cannot catch up with it.

Not to mention that when it comes to running away, no one is better than the Candied Fruit Army.

Therefore, in response to the Japanese's new encirclement and suppression, these troops dispersed and roamed among the mountains and forests, making it impossible for the Japanese to find the specific location of the main force.

For the Eighth Route Army, this was just a common occurrence, and moving every day was commonplace. However, for the Fruit Preserves Army, this kind of daily running life could be tolerated for a few days, but it would definitely not work for a long time.

So after two weeks, both sides were very tired and it was time to enter the critical period of testing willpower.

Running and chasing in the mountains, walking on the edge of life and death every day, is a cruel test for both parties.

This was not too bad for the Eighth Route Army troops, as moving dozens of kilometers a day was commonplace. The soldiers were very determined, and they had a firm belief that they must drive away the Japs, so they moved randomly and the more they ran, the stronger the troops became.

But for the preserved fruit troops, who lacked a strong spiritual core, being able to run thirty miles a day was considered good enough.

So when they saw that the Japanese were chasing them endlessly, which was contrary to their usual practice, the preserved fruit troops began to complain, and the top leaders of these troops had to propose finding a way to return south.

If we continue chasing like this in the mountains, the team will really get separated after a few weeks.

Given their current size, it is impossible for Guosu to give up on them easily.

After all, it would be fine if they ran away and went home to farm, but if they were allowed to surrender and become puppet soldiers, the harm would be even greater, as it would be equivalent to doubling the strength of the Japanese.

Faced with such a major event, the preserved fruit department must cooperate with the Eighth Route Army.

Otherwise, it would be difficult for the remnant of the Guofu army to break through the encirclement of the Japanese invaders with their own strength. The supply was not in place, and the Guofu troops were much less intelligent than Li Yunlong, and it was impossible for them to get supplies on their own. So after several months of wandering, they could not even guarantee a gun per person, and the number of bullets per person was as low as that of the early Eighth Route Army, reaching the beggar's level of only a few rounds per person.

Naturally, the Eighth Route Army Headquarters could not sit idly by and watch this friendly force become the enemy. After some negotiations via radio waves, they finally agreed to open a passage to the south for the friendly forces and then send them to the north bank of the Yellow River.

It is necessary to let the remaining Guofu troops break through the Japanese encirclement on the southern line, ensure that the Guofu troops are not completely lost here, and reduce the Japanese military pressure in North China.

Now the area south of the Yellow River still has to rely on the First War Zone to hold up the war situation. Since this time and space did not suffer the consequences of the Zhongtiao Mountain collapse war, Commander Wei is still firmly in charge of the First War Zone. For the Eighth Route Army, this is already a good ending.

Second update
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(End of this chapter)