It makes sense that the Japanese did not reinforce Xib.

At this time, the two most important strongholds for the Japanese army should be Lashio and Mandalay.

As soon as Lashio loses the Japanese 56th Division, it will be surrounded and killed, and as soon as Mandalay loses the Japanese 18th Division, the defense line will be breached, and the Chinese army will drive straight south along the Irrawaddy River.

Therefore, although Xibu is important, these two strongholds will not send reinforcements to Xibu no matter what, otherwise it will be tantamount to picking up sesame seeds and losing watermelons.

"Your Excellency, Commander!" When he knew that Xibu was surrounded, Tanaka Shinichi hung up the phone to the military headquarters again: "Xibu has been surrounded, I think the next target of the Chinese army will be Mandalay!" Your Excellency the Commander, please be ready to reinforce Mandalay! ”

"Tanaka-kun!" Honda Masasai replied impatiently: "The presence of Chinese troops in Syb is a normal phenomenon, and their purpose is to cut off the connection between Mandalay and Lashio, so that our army cannot continue to reinforce Lashio. As for Chinese attacking Mandalay...... You can rest assured, the British will not allow the Chinese army to do this! ”

It was no secret to the Japanese that the British did not allow the Chinese army to move south, and even the Japanese knew why the British army behaved so strangely in the First Battle of Burma...... The British preferred to leave supplies to the Japanese rather than to the Chinese.

Therefore, these words of Honda Masako should be said...... Historically, the British did not allow the Chinese army to go further south, and the southernmost position of the Chinese expeditionary force was the most important position in Xibu, and the Chinese army has not been able to return to such a southern part of Burma for decades.

But now history has changed, because the crisis of the Imphal war situation forced the British to make concessions on this point, so that Xib was no longer the southernmost stronghold of the Chinese army.

In other words, the news of Honda Masaki is actually lagging and outdated.

This directly led to Honda Masasai focusing all his attention on Lashio...... The town of Lashio was now home to two infantry wings and an artillery wing of the 18th Division, as well as a wing of the 56th Division. The total strength is nearly 20,000.

The Chinese army has a total of two divisions and more than 20,000 people, so this is a close battle.

Of course, the air superiority and logistical superiority of the Chinese army have been automatically ignored by Honda Masato, who wants to ...... With the efforts of the 18th Division and the 56th Division, the Chinese army can be defeated at Lashio, and then Lashio and Mandalay will naturally form a two-sided situation against Xib, so reinforcements of Xib are redundant.

The Battle of Sib was launched at two o'clock in the afternoon, and as soon as the Chinese army came up, a large number of shells were poured on Sib...... The Sea of Fire tactics, though not very clever, can undoubtedly clear a lot of obstacles for attacking troops, especially before the first attack. Because before the first attack, the Japanese army often planted a large number of mines, traps, bamboo sticks, etc. in front of the position, and if it did not bombard it once, launching an attack would cause unnecessary combat attrition.

The artillery bombarded Xibu for half an hour, and the shells not only swept away Xibu's house, but also cleared the big trees in front of the Japanese position.

Then the soldiers of the expeditionary force drove up to the Japanese line under the cover of M3 tanks.

Of course, only a small number of tanks and troops went up at the beginning...... This was a common tactic used by the Chinese Expeditionary Force against the Japanese army, and this tactic was mainly due to the insufficient performance of the M3 tank.

M3 Stuart Tank ...... The soldiers of the expeditionary force can be said to love and hate it.

I love it because this tank has made many feats on the battlefield, and has always beaten the Japanese armored forces on the battlefield, especially against the Japanese infantry.

Hate it. It was because of its lack of protection that the Japanese army's anti-aircraft guns could easily destroy the M3 tank from the front.

Therefore, when using this kind of tank to fight the Japanese army, the Chinese army could only adopt one tactic: first use a small number of tanks to test the number and position of the Japanese army's anti-aircraft guns, and only after destroying them with the cooperation of artillery did they dare to send tanks on a large area to launch an effective attack.

However, upon a try, the Chinese army was surprised to find that the Japanese defending Xibu had almost no heavy equipment. Not to mention the battle defense artillery, which directly led to the fact that the tentative troops of the Chinese army almost broke through the Japanese defense line.

A Japanese army of more than 4,000 people is not equipped with anti-aircraft guns?!

This made Chen Shanguo, the commander of the new 1st Division, a little incredulous, and he once wondered if this would be a conspiracy of the Japanese army, or that the Japanese army was preserving its strength. The aim was to attract tanks from the Chinese army to go up and then deliver a fatal blow to the Chinese army.

"What do you think?" Wang Mazi asked Zhang Chi.

"It should be true!" Zhang Chi replied: "It's very likely that the devil of Xibu doesn't have heavy equipment!" ”

After a pause, Zhang Chi continued: "The reason is that Xibu is the devil's soldier replenishment base, and the devil's soldiers here are to be replenished to the front line. They hadn't even thought about defending here before. So...... Although there are many soldiers here, there are few heavy equipment! ”

"Hmm!" Wang Mazi nodded: "Their heavy equipment should be concentrated in Lashio and Mandalay, if this is the case, then they will be in trouble!" ”

Saying that, Wang Mazi reported this judgment to the division commander Chen Shanguo.

The order was soon issued: with the cooperation of artillery and tank battalions, resolutely annihilate the enemy at Sib.

The next scene is bigger, a tank battalion of more than forty tanks, and a few Shermans at the start...... The Sherman tank was known as a Ronson lighter in the face of German tanks, but it was invincible in the face of the Japanese army.

Dozens of tanks majestically covered the advance of a regiment of fighters as the artillery fire extended.

The battle situation was indeed as Zhang Chi predicted, the Japanese army did not have many anti-aircraft guns in their hands at all, and even heavy machine guns were pitiful...... The few anti-aircraft guns were crippled by the bullets and shells rained down by the Chinese army's infantry, tank, and artillery before they could exert their power.

At this time, the tactics of infantry and tank coordination were fully effective, and each tank was like a moving fortress, which easily destroyed the Japanese army's firepower points with tank guns, easily blocked the machine gun holes of the Japanese bunkers, and even directly crushed their bunkers...... Then the infantry that followed them swarmed up, guns and grenades, knocking the surviving Japanese soldiers to the ground as they tried to flee or struggled to fight back.

The Japanese had only one choice, either to wait for death in place, or to charge the Chinese army's steel "fortress" with bayonets and cluster grenades. (To be continued.) )