readx; After Chen Jingyun had just appointed Yuan Fang as the commander of the Second Army and announced the appointment of Shen Gang as the chief of the General Staff in a high-profile manner, the front-line troops seemed to be also congratulating, and the Ninth Division came with good news that day, and the division cooperated with the Fifth Mixed Brigade to defeat more than 5,000 people of Wu Peifu in the north of Caijiagang, forcing Wu Peifu's department to retreat more than ten miles back. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 At this time, Yuan Fang, who had not yet arrived in Wuhu on the warship, immediately ordered the Ninth and Eighth Divisions and the Fifth Mixed Brigade through the wireless telegraph on the warship, asking them to solve the Beiyang Army trapped in Chaohu City as soon as possible, while he himself was preparing to arrive in Wuhu, and then not stop in Wuhu but to prepare to move the headquarters of the Second Army to Chaohu.

Now the divisions of the Second Army have already gone north one after another, and they are already fifty or sixty kilometers away from Wuhu, which is even farther away, and the Chaohu side will also be an important logistics base of the Second Army in the future, because the relocation of the army headquarters to Chaohu can effectively command all units nearby and make full preparations for launching the next campaign. As for whether or not Chaohu can be taken, this is no longer a problem.

Although there are still thousands of Beiyang troops in Chaohu, they are short of soldiers and food, and their morale has plummeted. In the face of the siege of the superior strength and superior firepower of the Nationalist Army, it could not hold out for many days.

Sure enough, soon more than 2,000 Beiyang troops in the Bantang area gave up resistance, and then turned around to break through to the northern hilly area, trying to escape from the encirclement of the national army. At the same time, Zuo Yugang of the Ninth Division also asked for cooperation with the 12th Regiment deployed by the First Division in the hilly area north of Bantang, because under the heavy encirclement of the Nationalist Army, it was not an ordinary difficulty for the more than 2,000 Beiyang Army to break through the encirclement.

In Chaohu City, knowing that the general trend had gone, Wang Chengbin did not desperately let his brothers defend like a madman, but issued an order to disperse and break through. As soon as this order was given, the Beiyang Army troops that resisted the Eighth and Ninth Divisions on the front line in Chaohu City immediately collapsed, and then a small part of the men and horses grabbed the boats, and then fled to Hefei overnight. But more often than not, they were killed, wounded, or captured by the Nationalist Army after the collapse.

Almost in a day, the Beiyang defenders of Chaohu completely collapsed under the encirclement of more than 20,000 people of the national army, and the Beiyang army suffered more than 2,000 casualties that day, and about 700 people escaped from Chaohu (lake) by boat, and the rest were all taken prisoner. Some surrendered voluntarily in the final stages of the collapse, while others were forced to surrender at gunpoint by the National Army.

On the 22nd, Yuan Fang, who arrived at Chaohu, together with Situ Jun, chief of staff of the Second Army, hurriedly inspected Chaohu after the war, and sent a good news to the headquarters, saying that Chaohu had been taken in its entirety, and attached a list of relevant losses and booty.

It didn't take long for this battle report to be handed over to Chen Jingyun, and the first thing to enter was the report on the casualties of the Nationalist Army itself: Since our army crossed the river, according to incomplete statistics, 1,500 soldiers have been killed and more than 2,000 wounded, more than 300 are missing, 13 officers have been killed and 20 wounded, and 2 officers have been killed and 6 wounded. Losses were incurred by various types of artillery, mortars, light and heavy machine guns, and infantry, all of which are listed in the table below......

This so-called incomplete statistical list is somewhat watery, for example, the loss of less than 1,000 rifles is written on it, which is simply impossible, according to the normal casualties and usage, this war also lost more than 3,000 rifles. But why is the data so small, it is because the Third Division of the Beiyang Army and the Anhui Army use Type 88 and Hanyang-made, and some of the main forces of the National Army also use these guns, Type 88, Hanyang-made, and Type 12 rifles are all officially installed rifles of the National Army, and they are directly used after the front line is captured.

The casualties were also within acceptable ranges, with a total of about 4,000 casualties. And this data includes the total number of many units of the Second Army, including the 9th, 8th, 6th, 5th, and 5th mixed brigades. In the middle, the casualties of the Fifth Mixed Brigade and the Ninth Division were slightly higher, reaching about 1,000 casualties, and the casualties of the other units were only a few hundred. This casualty ratio was well controlled within one-tenth, and it did not make the Second Army incapacitated. Even the besieged Fifth Mixed Brigade, although the casualty ratio was as high as 20 percent, it did not completely lose its combat effectiveness. Of course, it is impossible to take on the main combat mission before completing the rest and replenishment, which is also the reason why Yuan Fang did not let the Fifth Mixed Brigade continue to go north but was stationed in Chaohu, he was ready to let the Fifth Mixed Brigade rest for a few days, and wait for the new battalions sent by the General Staff to replenish it when it arrived, and the follow-up combat tasks of the Second Army were handed over to the Ninth and Eighth Divisions.

However, after a big battle, these two divisions did not advance quickly, the speed of the march was a little slow, and there was also a tenth division of Tang Tianxi in the Xianji area, although there were some troops of the fifth division and the first division blocking it, but it could not be completely ignored.

Yuan Fang, the commander of the Second Army, had no right to decide how to proceed in the next step of the Anhui war, and he could not take further action until the command issued an operational order. Chen Jingyun had already asked Shen Gang to arrange and plan the next step of the Anhui war when Shen Gang was appointed chief of staff. Because the development of the war in Anhui was beyond the operational plan arranged by the General Staff at that time, and even the preparatory plan arranged at that time was not used, it took more than ten days to conquer Chaohu, starting from the crossing of the Nationalist Army on August 4 and the formal attack on Chaohu by the Ninth Division of the Seventh Division, until the Ninth Division of the 20th and the Fifth Mixed Brigade met at Caijiagang to establish the victory of the Chaohu Campaign, and it was not until the 22nd that Chaohu Lake was officially captured. This has taken fifteen days and half a month, and it can be said that it has seriously exceeded the original battle plan of the General Staff, and Tang Tianxi's 10th Division went out of the line in advance in the Xianji area and fought with the National Army, which also made the original battle plan have many more variables, so now the previous plans are useless, and Shen Gang must take those people from the Staff Department to make a new plan.

But in any case, Chaohu Lake was finally taken, and it almost surrounded and annihilated more than 10,000 Beiyang defenders in Chaohu, so that the Third Division of the Anhui Provincial Army was wiped out, and the ** Brigade of the Third Division of the Beiyang Army did not escape a few people, and by the way, it also annihilated part of Wu Peifu's reinforcement detachment of the Beiyang Army.

In this battle, the Nationalist Army annihilated about 10,000 people of the Third Division of the Anhui Provincial Army, about 5,000 people of the ** Brigade of the Third Division, and about 1,000 people of Wu Peifu's detachment, of which more than 6,000 were descendants of the Third Division of the Beiyang Army, and about 10,000 people were in the Anhui Provincial Army. Of course, this annihilation does not mean that all of them were killed and wounded, in fact, the casualty ratio of the Beiyang Army was only about half, and then the remaining nearly 10,000 people were taken prisoner.

The treatment of the captured Nationalist Army is already handy, all the officers below the rank of lieutenant are listed separately, those who are willing to serve the Nationalist Army on the spot are directly sent to the Fuzhou Military Academy to study, and then they are assigned according to the situation, as for those who are willing to serve above the rank of colonel, they will first be given a false post to be raised, and they will all be sent to Nanjing under house arrest for surveillance.

It's a pity that this time the national army did not catch the traces of the other party's generals, I heard those Beiyang Army prisoners say that Wang Chengbin was still in command on the day of the 20th, but it disappeared not long after, and I don't know whether he secretly took a boat to fatten up or absconded with makeup, in short, there is no whereabouts, as for the division commander and other senior officers of the third division of the Anhui Provincial Army, it was confirmed that he had escaped by boat. So much so that among the prisoners captured by the National Army, there was not a single general, and there were only a few colonels among the senior officers.

Since Chaohu Lake has been taken, there are a lot of other trophies, the most important thing is that a batch of artillery pieces has been captured, including five 75-mm mountain guns and ten 57-mm mountain guns, all of which are the artillery units of the ** brigade and the third division of the Anhui Provincial Army. A lot of artillery was captured, but not many shells were captured, after all, if they had enough shells, they would have fired them out a long time ago, and then a dozen light and heavy machine guns were also captured. Of course, the most are those rifles, the Type 88 rifle and the Hanyang-made rifle have been captured in tens of thousands, which still excludes those that have been used by the various units before. If the standard of army building is the same as that of ordinary warlord troops, only rifles are enough, then Chen Jingyun can pull out an infantry division again.

There are a lot of trophies, and most of them are common to the Nationalist Army, such as rifles, light machine guns, and artillery are of the same caliber, and even the models are the same, such as Hanyang-made, Type 88 rifles, Hanyang 57-mm mountain guns, German 75-mm mountain guns, etc., and light machine guns are also Madsen light machine guns. The heavy machine guns of the Beiyang Army mainly used German-made Makqin, French-made Hatch Chase and Made-38 type. Most of these heavy machine guns were used in conjunction with rifles, with Type 38 heavy machine guns and Hatch Keys for those who used this rifle, and German Makqin for those who used Type 88 rifles. The third division of the Beiyang Army was regarded as a German armament division before, the infantry and baggage, engineering troops, etc. were 88-type rifles, and the cavalry used 88-type carbine and Hanyang-made carbines, and the three artillery battalions under the jurisdiction of the artillery regiment were Krupp 75-mm field guns, Krupp 75-mm mountain guns, and Grusen 75-mm mountain guns.

Strictly speaking, the equipment of the Beiyang Army and the equipment of the National Army have a great common surname, or even the same surname. Everyone is equipped with the same calibre, even the Type 12 rifle of the National Army is the same caliber as the 88 and Hanyang, and the biggest difference is those mortars.