However, although Terauchi Shouichi's serious choice avoided the danger of the Red Party's secret losses, it really cut off the Red Party's most important source of Japanese intelligence, and with the reorganization of the Japanese cabinet, Ozaki Hidemi also lost the possibility of directly obtaining the core secrets of the Japanese army. And when Japan acquired from Germany the "Enigma" cipher machine (the Japanese version is called the "purple cipher machine") that was still very advanced despite being killed in the Midway and other battles in history, the difficulty of the telecommunications center of the 15 th Army in deciphering the Japanese cipher suddenly increased by many times, and the advantage of the 15 th Army, the Eighth Route Army, and other units of the Red Party Army in knowing the Japanese army's intelligence well disappeared for the time being, and all they could rely on was the support of the masses and their own strength

For the time being, Hu Weidong can only confirm that the Japanese North China Front now has a total of 15 divisions (half of which are permanent divisions, and more than two-thirds are field divisions). ), close to 500,000 troops, and a large number of puppet troops claiming to be 200,000 and more than 100,000 actual troops are helping to abuse, but Hu Weidong is not very clear about the specific distribution of these Japanese troops.

Considering the losses in previous battles, Hu Weidong believed that the Japanese army in North China now has only one field heavy artillery brigade at most, and even if it did, it must have crossed the Yellow River south to participate in the attack on the Fifth Theater, that is, the Japanese army north of the Yellow River had no heavy artillery available. According to the analysis of the information sent back by the underground party in southeastern Shandong, the total number of Japanese troops who crossed the Yellow River and attacked south along the Jinpu line should be no less than 150,000, which means that the devils still have more than 300,000 troops north of the Yellow River. But there was a lack of heavy firepower.

Although the quality of the Japanese troops north of the Yellow River may be poor, the number is too many, and even if the 15th Army joins hands with the Eighth Route Army again, there is no certainty of total annihilation, and it must be taken into account that the Japanese army may also send reinforcements from the northeast. That's even more dangerous. Although the Japanese army on the Jinpu Line had fewer troops, it was all elite field divisions, not to mention that there was also a powerful chariot division in the field. He could also obtain air support from the North China Front, the Central China Front, and even the Japanese Navy at the same time, which undoubtedly made Hu Weidong particularly jealous. In particular, although the Fifth Theater had more numbers than the Eighth Route Army, the 15th Army cooperated with them. It is definitely far less tacit than the Eighth Route Army

Therefore, in North China, the two main forces of the Red Party Army and the Japanese North China Front Army actually formed a stalemate, and no one dared to launch a large-scale offensive until the enemy's reality was ascertained. Therefore, after planning for a long time, Hu Weidong came up with a plan to "scare the grass and scare the snake".

Although the three major uprisings launched at the same time caused the Japanese army to suffer a huge blow and strongly supported the squadron to recover Shanxi, in order to prevent the Japanese army from prematurely using its main forces to "sweep" the base areas, the three major base areas of eastern Hebei (including Hebei Rebian), Pingxi (including Pingbei) and central Hebei (including southern Hebei and northwest Shanxi) became much more low-key after the main forces of the Eighth Route Army and the 15th Army recovered Shanxi, and the Japanese army dared to ignore the threat of these anti-Japanese base areas behind enemy lines and sent troops south to attack the Fifth Theater on a large scale. In order to open up the Jinpu line as soon as possible and join forces with the Central China Front.

Therefore, Hu Weidong suggested to the central authorities this time that the three anti-Japanese base areas behind enemy lines should launch a large-scale sabotage war at the same time to paralyze the logistics supply of the Japanese army on the Jinpu Line, and on the one hand, fulfill the promise and support the Fifth Theater; On the one hand, it took this opportunity to test the exact deployment of the Japanese army in North China, in order to find an opportunity for a large army to fight.

It is also worth mentioning that Hu Weidong had already sent Lu Zhengcao as commander and Chen Xianrui as political commissar before this. The "Eastward Advance Detachment," which was more than 3,000 people, most of whom were members of the Anti-Japanese University, boldly advanced into the fallen southern part of Shandong, rapidly developed and strengthened the Mengshan Base Area, which had been laid down before the outbreak of the all-out War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, and established a larger, more populous, and stronger Lunan Base Area. By the end of April 1938, the major base areas in Shandong had been basically connected, with a total population of more than 8 million and more than 100,000 troops, which was stronger than any of the three major base areas behind enemy lines in Hebei.

Therefore, this large-scale sabotage battle unprecedented in human history was actually participated in the "four major base areas behind enemy lines" rather than the "three major base areas behind enemy lines", with a total of more than 200,000 troops (Note 1) and a total of 103 other regimental units such as regiments, independent regiments, and Muslim detachments, so it was called the "Battle of 100 Regiments"

Since the main forces of the Eighth Route Army and the 15th Army basically did not participate in the battle, the actual combat power invested in this "Hundred Regiments Battle" was weaker than the historical battle of the same name, but the results of Zuihou were greater, which surprised Hu Weidong, the initiator of the campaign. First of all, the current strength of the Japanese army in North China is not as sufficient as it was in the 40 years in history, especially the number of puppet troops is too much worse, and there is no large number of pillboxes and road networks, so that they can basically only control large and medium-sized cities and major communication routes, so that the countless independent regiments and guerrillas in the four major anti-Japanese base areas behind enemy lines have a great space for maneuver, and thus they are becoming more and more like fish in water.

Then, it was the early emergence of guerrilla warfare, such as tunnel warfare, mine warfare, sparrow warfare, and armed engineering teams, and even special tactics, which made the guerrilla warfare behind enemy lines much higher than in history, and the blow to the Japanese puppet army was naturally greater, and the development of the base areas was also more rapid (which further increased the efficiency of the base areas behind the enemy lines to resist Japan).

More importantly, the Red Party Army's ability to attack fortifications is much stronger than in history, even the militia guerrillas and local units in the anti-Japanese base areas behind enemy lines are no exception, whether it is the "unconscionable artillery" or the sapper excavation and blasting tactics, they are enough to deal with the devil's field fortifications, pillboxes, and even city walls and some permanent fortifications

Note 1: At this time, the total strength of the four major base areas behind enemy lines was 50,000 in eastern Hebei, 40,000 in Pingxi, 70,000 in central Hebei, and 100,000 in Shandong. (Your support is my biggest motivation.) )