Traveling through the sword to engage in military industry.

Chapter 252: The Battle of North China Arrives Ahead of Time
Ren Zhong had a good idea. He waited until the reorganization and joint training of the mechanized infantry brigade was completed, and then suggested to Staff Officer Ye to launch a heavy attack on the Northeast.

However, the Japanese could not give the Eighth Route Army so much time to develop.

The Eighth Route Army, which had risen from a thorn in the side of the North China Front Army and the Kwantung Army to a thorn in the side of the Japanese invaders' headquarters, finally formed a new combat plan after several months of secret mobilization of troops.

This plan was named Operation Zero internally by the Japanese.

小鬼子的零号作战规模庞大，集结新扩军组建起来的107师团、108师团、112师团、117师团、第119师团、122-128师团、134-139师团、148师团、149师团等20个新编警备师团和87师团、战车第二师团组成第九方面军。

It will cooperate with the Operation No. 1 of the Sixth Front Army.

For this purpose, the headquarters also dispatched 100 Zero fighters and 150 Type fighters to provide air fire support for Operation Zero and Operation One based on the North China and Central China airports.

Prepare to go to war at the same time.

The scale was unprecedented, with more than 50 troops mobilized to participate in the war.

This time, the Japanese have basically mobilized all the field troops that can be mobilized. Even though the war in Southeast Asia and the South Pacific is tense, they have to endure it for the time being and first deal with the threat from the Allied bomber bases in North China and Henan, Hunan and Guangxi.

The Japanese headquarters sees it very clearly that if North China cannot be defended, East Asia will be at great risk of collapse. Now the strength of the Eighth Route Army in North China has exceeded the threat posed by the preserved fruits to North China.

Even the most arrogant Japanese advisors in the headquarters had to admit that after two bloody lessons of being encircled and annihilated, it was already very dangerous for a cluster of 3 or 5 divisions to attack North China, and there was a risk of being encircled and annihilated by the Eighth Route Army at any time.

After a serious and in-depth review by the headquarters, they believed that the battlefield in North China was actually out of control. Not only was the North China locust army unable to control the deteriorating situation in Shanxi Province, Suiyuan, Chahar and other places, they were unable to rely on their own strength to retake the completely lost Shanxi and Suiyuan provinces and the mostly lost Chahar Province. Moreover, the entire North China was in a very dangerous situation.

There are only tens of thousands of locust soldiers in the Jizhong Plain now. Once the Eighth Route Army in Shanxi Province completes its internal integration and reaches an agreement with Guosu, they will come out in full force and pose a fatal threat to Jizhong.

The situation in North China is currently the most dangerous since the incident.

From now on, the Empire absolutely cannot afford the loss of North China. This is not only the loss of the rich North China logistics base, but also the blow to the morale of the Empire is even more unbearable.

There has been too much bad news in the Pacific, and the national mood is already unstable. If North China is lost, the newly captured central Henan and the previously captured Qi and Lu areas will all be very dangerous. Under the worst condition, the Imperial Locust Army will have to retreat to Shanhaiguan and give up more land north of the Yangtze River.

In the pessimistic scenario, the Empire's situation in East Asia would become three independent pieces of land, namely Northeast China, Jiangnan and South China, giving the Allied Air Force more bases to pose a greater threat to the Empire's homeland.

For the empire, this was an even more unbearable loss.

Operation Zero can be said to have unleashed the last bit of potential of the headquarters, and was determined to resolve the seriously deteriorating situation in Jinsui and Chahar.

"Operation Zero?" Ren Zhong's head was buzzing after receiving the latest intelligence from the telecommunications cracking team.

He had checked in the main world and found out that this was a brand new plan that left no traces in the main world's time and space.

Therefore, they were suddenly at a loss as to the target of Operation Zero and the size of the Japanese army's forces.

Powerful computer computing power can brute force the Japanese's telecommunications signals, but relevant intelligence information is very scarce in telegram exchanges.

Ren Zhong collected all the Japanese telegrams that had been deciphered in the last three months. After spending several days combining them with the historical information of the main world, he slowly pieced them together and came up with a rough idea. The Japanese Operation Zero might have involved all the new forces of the Kwantung Army that had been expanded in the last three months.

This aspect is intertwined with the historical time and space information of the main world. Ren Zhong found out the information about the Kwantung Army's expansion in the final crazy stage of the Japanese devils, and basically pieced together the main force of the Japanese devils' so-called Ninth Front Army.

Although this is not first-hand intelligence information, after careful consideration, Ren Zhong basically confirmed that his guess is correct.

So after completing the summary, Ren Zhong shared his findings with Staff Officer Ye.

"Nearly 20 divisions?" After hearing the approximate data, Staff Officer Ye immediately became a little nervous.

This is an unprecedented large-scale operation by the Japanese.

"It's a security division, which is what the Japanese call a three-command C division. Its combat effectiveness and manpower are completely different from those of a Type A division." Ren Zhong corrected. If it was a Type A division of the Japanese, everyone would basically have no chance of winning. Ren Zhong could only suggest that everyone quickly find a way to go back to the mountains to fight guerrilla warfare. However, with the strength of the Eighth Route Army in Shanxi, 20 reduced versions of the security divisions might not be impossible to deal with. After all, in terms of terrain, the land of Shanxi and Suiyuan is conducive to the defense.

“简单说，小鬼子这个警备师团同我们3个甲种团相比要弱些，大致相当于2个甲种团和1个乙种团战斗力。小鬼子警备师团主要重火力是3个野炮大队，24门75毫米野炮和12门105毫米榴弹炮，另外是跟随版本的3个步兵炮中队，12门41式75毫米山炮和12门九四式37毫米速射炮和6门70毫米步兵炮，加上5辆轻战车。”

“现在我们的甲种团，4门75毫米山炮，7门107火和36门82毫米迫击炮和45具RPG火箭筒和18挺20毫米高射炮，这样3个甲种团的重火力就有12门75毫米山炮和21门107火，36挺20毫米高射炮，108门82毫米迫击炮及145具RPG火箭筒，同小鬼子警备师团的66门身管炮相比，火力强度只强不弱。

After changing to 2 Type A regiments and 1 Type B regiment, we lost 1 mountain artillery company, 1 anti-aircraft artillery company, and 3 firepower companies, but we are not inferior to the Japanese guard division. In the field, our heavy firepower is more mobile and has a greater actual tactical advantage. "

For the standard Type A and Type B regiments, Ren Zhong had referred to a lot of experience from the main world and configured them completely to target the firepower of the Japanese divisions and regiments. That is, he took into account how to restrain the main combat units of the Japanese when he encountered them through the combination of Type A and Type B regiments.

For the Japanese Type A division, at least 6 Type A regiments and an artillery regiment are needed to restrain it. For the Type B regiment, only 5 Type A regiments are needed to fight against it. As for the Guard Division of the 3rd Regiment, Type A regiments can completely suppress it.

When facing the Japanese mixed independent brigade, we can also restrain them by organizing them into two Type A regiments.

By this calculation, if we can wait until the Eighth Route Army in Shanxi completes its reorganization, with 13 mechanized infantry brigades, 44 Type A regiments and 76 Type B regiments, the Japanese's 20 or so guard divisions will really be no problem.

Leaving behind three mechanized infantry brigades for mobile combat forces and 3 Type B regiments for rapid mobile defense, plus local county-level Type C regiment garrison forces, as well as the strategic support of the main forces in border areas and outside the Great Wall, there will be enough strong defensive forces to defend the base even after the main forces are deployed.

Because the base has a strong weapons production capacity, if it can be delayed for a month or two, the weapons produced will be enough to arm tens of thousands of people. Moreover, heavy weapons such as tanks and artillery can double the defense strength of several major strategic bases.

Of course, the prerequisite is that air superiority must be maintained and the military industry in the base must not be bombed by the Japanese air force.

After Ren Zhong went over the data with Staff Officer Ye one by one, Staff Officer Ye nodded frequently. He had a better understanding of his own troops, but he did not know as much about the information about the Japanese as Ren Zhong.

Of course, in this era, few people know the Japanese's background better than Ren Zhong. After all, the main world has too many records of this period of history. Even if some historical materials are of varying quality, Ren Zhong can verify them from multiple different channels to get the most likely truth.

Therefore, in terms of deduction, Ren Zhong's foresight is a great advantage. For Staff Officer Ye, he often has a sense of being powerful without knowing why.

Even if it seems a bit unbelievable at first, you will be convinced in the end.

"Our weakness now is that the mechanized infantry brigade has not yet completed its reorganization, and it is unrealistic to pull it out for a large-scale battle, so the most likely thing is to fight to defend the territory. However, the current way of fighting to defend the territory is completely different from that of Guoju. We must combine our advantages, and comprehensively integrate positional warfare, mobile warfare, and guerrilla warfare to strive for the greatest results." Ren Zhong pointed to the situation on the map.

"For example, we don't have to defend Hanoi, which we have just recaptured. This place is facing a plain and the area is open, so the Japanese can deploy a large number of troops. If we choose to defend it blindly, even if the final victory belongs to us, it will be a miserable victory."

Hanoi is the newly liberated place, but Ren Zhong knows that there will still be contention here, so in the major construction plan, he has not listed it as an industrial development zone. Now that the war is about to come, there is no doubt that this will be the focus of the fighting area.

"That's true, but in this way, the local people will suffer again. In this world, the people are suffering too much." Staff Officer Ye nodded and expressed his agreement with what Ren Zhong said.

"We can now basically confirm that the summer harvest is a bumper harvest. The grain output this year in both the border areas and the base areas is sufficient to support the influx of a million new people.

I suggest that we fortify Hanoi and clear the fields, and temporarily relocate one million Hanoi residents to Hedong, Shangdang and other areas for temporary resettlement. This war will last at least two or three months, and at most half a year. For these temporary refugee people, we can also adopt the method of work-for-relief, let those who can work contribute, and large-scale farmland and water conservancy construction will be carried out in Hedong and Shangdang areas, and a small number of them will be sent to work in mines and factories.

This way, after the war is over, we ordinary people will have more than half a year's worth of food to take back home, and we will learn how to build farmland and water conservancy projects, which will also be good for the construction of our hometown. After this war, I think we will be able to win, and ordinary people will no longer have to be displaced. "

Staff Officer Ye nodded. Judging from the route of attacking Jin, there were only two options: the northern route along Yunzhong to open the Tongpu Line and go south; the central route along the Zhengtai Line to go west; and the southern route through Qinyang-Zezhou and Jiyuan-Yuanqiu-Houma.

Under the current circumstances, it is too difficult for the Japanese to fight their way south from the grassland to Yunzhong along the Pingsui Line. The powerful enemy on the grassland and the long logistics line are enough to make the Japanese shudder.

From the perspective of logistics supply and reality, the central and southern routes are the normal choices for the Japanese.

As Ren Zhong and Staff Officer Ye continued to deduce and question, they soon had a gradually clear framework for the Japanese's strategy. Although this was a private communication between the two, Ren Zhong knew that after this communication, Staff Officer Ye would incorporate some of his ideas into the overall strategy of the Eighth Route Army Headquarters. After all, the intelligence he obtained was top-secret information that even the Eighth Route Army Headquarters could not obtain.

Second update, please give me your monthly vote!

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(End of this chapter)