Night fell again, and in the headquarters of the First Corps of the Ninth War Zone, General Xue Yue's eyes were wandering back and forth on the wall, his expression was serious, and his brows were furrowed.

He secretly dispatched more than 100,000 troops to encircle and annihilate the Songpu Division in the Wanjialing area.

However, after a battle, it was discovered that the strength of the Matsuura Division was much stronger than expected, both in terms of equipment and soldiers' will to fight, and the front line could only be surrounded after four days, and if you want to destroy it, I am afraid it will take some effort.

But in fact, there was not much time left for them, and the commander of the 11th Army, Okamura Ninji, had already dispatched several elite divisions to desperately get closer.

If the Songpu Division cannot be eliminated in a short period of time, then the troops in the Wanjialing area will be in danger of being counter-encircled.

These troops who participated in the siege of the Songpu Division have been fighting fiercely with the devils on the Nanxun Line and Ruiwu Road for a summer without resting, and they are all exhausted at the moment, and the previous ammunition and materials are almost exhausted, and they are no longer able to continue to start another large-scale battle with the devils who have come over for reinforcements.

If we want to solve the current predicament, we can only start from the surrounded Songpu Division, and only by annihilating the Songpu Division and completely destroying the hope of the devil's rescue, the situation will be greatly improved at that time.

The devils who have lost a division will definitely not dare to rush into the army at that time, and they can also take the opportunity to withdraw the tired troops, let them rest and replenish ammunition and supplies, so as to stabilize the defensive line.

Just as General Xue Yue was looking at the battlefield with red and blue lines on the map and thinking, there was a sound of footsteps behind him.

General Xue Yue turned to look, and General Wu Yizhi, the chief of staff, who was haggard, walked over with a telegram in his hand.

"Chief Xue, the telegram from Commander-in-Chief Wu on the front line has arrived."

Hearing that it was the battle report from the front line, General Xue Yue quickly took it, lowered his head and looked at it quickly.

"The Songpu Division is frantically breaking through today, and the troops responsible for the encirclement have suffered great losses, just on the front line of Zhanggushan, the 306th Regiment of the 51st Division fought hand-to-hand combat with the devil nine times in one day......"

General Wu Yizhi, chief of staff, had personally fought on the battlefield, and he could imagine what it was like to fight nine hand-to-hand combat with devils in one day, and I am afraid that the battle situation was already unimaginably tragic.

General Xue Yue paced to the bench and sat down, placing the telegram on the table of the Eight Immortals, without the slightest emotional fluctuation on his face.

As a senior commander, General Xue Yue was called "Tiger Boy" by the outside world, which was a compliment to him.

He did not live up to this reputation, in addition to commanding troops to be as brave as a tiger on the battlefield, he also possessed the calm and calm quality of a senior commander who did not change his face in the face of the overwhelming pressure of Mount Tai.

"The more crazy the Songpu division is in order to break through, the more it means that they have reached the point where they have run out of oil and lamps, this is just a dying struggle of the trapped beast, and only the troops need to be strictly guarded, and their destruction this time is a sure thing."

Hearing that the Songpu Division was so frantically attacking in order to break through, General Xue Yue relaxed instead.

If the Songpu Division was holding on to the reinforcements and waiting for their troops to attack, it would be a troublesome thing, after all, in the mountainous area of Wanjialing, which is difficult to defend and difficult to attack, the devils are strong, and if they want to capture it, they will definitely pay a lot of casualties.

Once the casualties of the troops are too large, then they will not be able to consolidate the defensive line and defend against the other divisions under the 11th Army of the devil, which will be self-defeating.

Although they all understood the truth, General Wu Yizhi, chief of staff, still had a worried face.

"Chief Xue, the 74th Army on the front line of Changling-Zhanggushan, the breakthrough point of the devils, suffered heavy casualties, and I am worried that they will not be able to bear it."

If General Wu Yizhi had said this before the battle, General Xue Yue would have definitely agreed, after all, although the 74th Army had emerged in a series of battles ahead, it remained to be seen how effective it was.

But now he is not worried at all, two days ago, when the devil soldiers were full of food, the 58th Division was able to resist the devil to the death, and the devil did not let the devil move forward for two days.

Although there were heavy casualties, this fully showed that the strength of the 74th was not inferior to his 4th and 66th armies and other Cantonese troops.

"The 58th Division was able to fight the devils for two days when the devils were full of food, so now that the devils are sleepy, I think the 51st Division will definitely be able to block the devils' breakthrough." General Xue Yue said confidently.

In fact, General Wu Yizhi was also impressed by the 74th Army, since four months before the start of the war, several German armoury divisions were exhausted, a large number of veteran elite soldiers were lost, and the result was that the combat effectiveness of the Central Army troops plummeted, and it was even inferior to some provincial armies.

This is also why they did not have much confidence in the combat effectiveness of the 74th Army, the central army, and deliberately transferred the Cantonese troops of the 66th Army from Lushan, because they were afraid that Ou Zhen's 4th Army would be unable to support it alone when they besieged the Songpu Division.

At the beginning, the 66th Army was placed in Lushan to prevent the southern front battlefield from being unable to hold, and was ready to let them fight guerrilla warfare in Lushan to contain the devils, but General Xue Yue transferred them without authorization, which made the chairman of the committee a little dissatisfied.

Now the combat effectiveness of the 74th Army has exceeded their expectations, and it is stronger and better at fighting than expected, which makes General Wu Yizhi overjoyed and deeply worried.

General Wu Yizhi also sat down along the bench, took out a cigarette from his pocket and lit it for himself, he took a long breath, and then turned his gaze to General Xue Yue again.

"Chief Xue, there is a sentence that I don't know if to talk about ......."

General Wu Yizhi said as he observed General Xue Yue's complexion.

Seeing General Wu Yizhi so serious, General Xue Yue was also stunned, and immediately said with a smile: "You and I haven't known each other for a day or two, if there is anything that should not be said, if there is any idea, just say it."

General Wu Yizhi took another deep puff of cigarette, and this time said slowly: "A few days ago, the chairman of the committee sent a telegram saying that the 74th Army had suffered great losses in the battle of Minshan and promised to be transferred to the rear to make up for it, but you refused."

General Xue Yue nodded and said: "Although the 74th Army has suffered heavy losses, the rest of the troops are also fighting continuously and tiredly, and they should all be transferred to rectify and replenish, how can I favor one over the other, as the commander of the corps, I should naturally treat all armies equally, there is no problem with this."

"That's right, but the 74th Army is the heart and soul of the chairman, and not letting it be transferred down to make up has already swept the chairman's face, and now they are blocking the front of the Songpu Division's breakthrough, and the 58th Division has been exhausted, if the 51st Division is wiped out again, it is not easy to explain to the chairman, after all, in our Wanjialing battlefield, this is the only Central Army unit, if they are exhausted by then, our Guangdong Army troops will be intact, and it is not easy to deal ......with them."

General Xue Yue frowned, he hadn't thought about these thoughts of General Wu Yizhi, but now there were so many troops on the entire southern front.

It is necessary to ensure the strength of the siege of the Songpu Division, and to ensure that there is enough strength to block the devil's reinforcements, the strength is already stretched, where is he going to transfer troops to replace the 74th Army?

"I will personally explain this matter to the chairman of the committee, if there is any problem at that time, I will bear it alone, now is the critical moment to encircle and annihilate the Songpu Division, we must go all out, not a single soldier can retreat, if the 74th Army is transferred down, the entire encirclement will be shaken, and the gains outweigh the losses."

Although there was a lot of pressure, in order to destroy the Songpu Division, General Xue Yue also let it go, even if someone settled the account after the war, he also admitted it.