When the fat man heard this, he hurriedly shouted to one of the brothers beside him: "Quickly call Battalion Commander Cheng to me, the commander has something to look for him."
Soon, Lao Cheng came panting, he received the news that the brother wanted him to come, and he probably knew what Zhou Wu was going to do, and he took his brothers to dig an anti-tank pit in front of the blocking position, and captured a few American-made tanks of the 18th Division.
As soon as Zhou Wu saw Lao Cheng coming, he hurriedly ordered him: "Lao Cheng, hurry up and drive out your tanks, we are going to fight against the armored troops of the 18th Division here, I will allocate you a battalion of troops, plus your original battalion, can you withstand the enemy's attack?"
Since Lao Cheng defended Nanjing, he lost the tank armored car he was originally equipped with, and he and his tank soldiers changed their careers to be infantry for more than eight years, although they followed the fat man halfway through a few tanks of the little devils, but it was all expedient, in order to let the brothers in distress run out of the encirclement of the devils, it was not a big scene, and now when he heard that Zhou Wu asked him to take a few captured American-made tanks as the lead, and cooperate with two battalions of infantry to resist the armored team of the 18th Division, his mood was surging, and he saluted immediately:" I promise to complete the task" At the same time, Zhou Wu ordered all the troops ambushed in Binhu Town to prepare for battle and wait for him to give the order to attack, once all the large troops of Qian Mou's 18th Division entered the ambush circle of Binhu Town, the attack order issued by him would prevail, and at the same time launch a fierce attack on the enemy, striving to encircle and annihilate the most elite trump card troops under the Kuomintang Chairman Chiang Kai-shek in a short time Fat Man, Ge Sanmin and Xiao Zheng each rushed back to their own troops to prepare, this is the first major battle against the Kuomintang army since the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, whether it is fought well or not is directly related to the future trend of the campaign, not only the military leaders are staring at the trend of this war, even the central leaders in Yan'an are also very concerned about this battle that happened under the nose of Lao Jiang, and several times urgently asked the military headquarters of the New Fourth Army to ensure all the requirements of the New Fourth Army in Jiangbei with the greatest strength, for this reason, The military headquarters urgently transferred two divisions of the New Fourth Army from the front line south of the Yangtze River to the north, risked breaking through the blockade of the Kuomintang army, crossed the Yangtze River, entered Tianchang in Jiangbei, and reinforced Zhou Wu's Jiangbei New Fourth Army to deal with the besieging Kuomintang army.
Zhou Wu's confidence after receiving the news of reinforcements increased a few points, originally Zhou Wu had already sent out all the teams in his hands, and there was nothing left that could be used as a reserve, as soon as the reinforcements sent by the military department came, Zhou Wu had a reserve in hand, and a reserve in hand, and he could deal a fatal blow to the 18th Division of Commander Qian if necessary, and completely wipe him out in the area of Binhu Town.
According to the scouts' report, the forward of the 18th Division was about to arrive here, and it would not take more than half an hour for the enemy tanks and armored vehicles to appear in front of the position.
The American-made "Sherman" tank, the specialty armor equipment of the US army during World War II, also known as the 4 medium tank, is equipped with a 76 mm tank gun with a 33-ton dead weight, which can run at a speed of 40 kilometers per hour, and two 762 mm heavy machine guns are divided into the left and right sides.
Lao Cheng, as the commander of the first group of armored troops, knew very well that he could not defeat the vanguard of the 18th Division that rushed over with great momentum by relying on the few captured tanks at hand alone, although after that blockade battle, the armored regiment of the 18th Division lost a lot of tanks, but the main armored force of Regiment Commander Li was still there, and Binhu Town was a flat river, and behind it was the misty Hongze Lake.
But Lao Cheng had a way, taking advantage of the fact that the enemy's tanks had not yet arrived, it was obviously too late to dig a deep trench and anti-tank trenches, so he ordered all the brothers of a battalion under his command to lay mines within three or four miles of land in front of the position, and if there were no anti-tank mines, then use seven or eight grenades made in the base area, set up a fuse, dig a pit and bury them, and if the grenades were not enough, they would replace them with explosives packets, and hang a grenade on the explosives bag as a detonator, and as soon as the enemy's tanks came over, they encountered those mines and explosives packs.
If you don't die, you have to be crippled The four or five hundred brothers went into battle together, and soon laid all kinds of mines within three or four miles of land in front of the blocking position, and just after finishing the work, the brothers who were reconnoitring in front ran out of breath to report: "Battalion commander, the enemy tank is outcropping" Lao Cheng hurriedly picked up the binoculars and looked ahead, isn't it, the enemy's three "Sherman" tanks are "rumbling" towards the blocking position surrounded by a large number of Kuomintang infantry, the back is dusty, tanks and armored vehicles are mixed together, the blue sky and white sun flag are fluttering in the wind, and then look behind, Lao Cheng just saw the dust flying in the sky, look at this way, this is not the vanguard of the 18th Division, but the entire 18th Division's large force tens of thousands of horses are attacking here.
Lao Cheng hurriedly radioed the situation to Zhou Wu, Zhou Wu listened, immediately ordered Lao Cheng not to fight, a little resistance, then led the team to evacuate towards Hongze Lake, the enemy is strong, must not fight hard, to suffer a big loss, since the 18th Division is so anxious to come, then we are waiting for him on the shore of Hongze Lake, there are several tables of wine and food waiting for Master Qian to open the banquet.
Lao Cheng listened to Zhou Wu's order, and muttered in his heart: he finally took four captured tanks to get over the addiction of tank battles, but Zhou Wu asked himself not to fall in love with the war, and retreated towards Hongze Lake after a little resistance, daring to love that his tanks were used to lure the enemy The more Lao Cheng thinks about it, the more unwilling he becomes, the opportunity for such a tank battle is not easy to find, the fuel that makes the tank move this time is still from the enemy tanks that were blown up and lying on the blocking position, and after this time, where to find the fuel for the tank in the future, no, this time I have to let these captured tanks rush up, before they run out of fuel, let Zhou Wu see, as long as we have the conditions, there is still the possibility of forming armored forces, The captured tanks should not be allowed to lie on the position in vain and be used as pillboxes, and they should be used to the fullest Lao Cheng made up his mind, so he instructed the two battalion commanders under him: "You each draw a platoon of brothers to follow me, and the rest of the brothers use fire to cover our tank charge on the blocking position, brothers, this is the first time that our New Fourth Army has fought a tank battle with the enemy, and they have given me enough energy, so that those self-righteous 18th Divisions can see that our New Fourth Army is not all dirt buns" Lao Cheng's pre-war mobilization was quite effective, and when the brothers heard that they could see the tank battle with their own eyes this time, they all said one after another: "Okay, this is good, we can see this scene this time, it can be regarded as a feast for the eyes, battalion commander, you can rest assured to rush forward boldly, we will provide you with fire cover on the position and solve the infantry around the enemy's tanks."
At this time, the ground on the position suddenly shook, and Lao Cheng shouted: "Tank brothers immediately enter the tank and participate in the battle after being ordered."
As soon as Lao Cheng's words fell, the old tank soldiers under his command climbed into the "Sherman" tank, covered the top cover, drove at full speed, and roared towards the tank formation of the Kuomintang armored regiment in front of the position, and almost at the same time, the deputy battalion commander who remained on the position had already ordered: "Detonate the mines, mortars and machine guns will all fire" This can be lively, with the sound of "boom" explosions one after another, the mines that Lao Cheng's brothers had originally planted in front of the position were detonated one after another, and the explosions were filled with plumes of smoke, shrapnel flew one after another, and the shock wave was like a typhoon towards Commander Li's tank and armored vehicles, and several enemy tanks that rushed in front were immediately hit, and the tracks were blown off by the huge air wave of the explosive pack, and the American-made "Sherman" tanks that lost their tracks immediately lay there and did not move.
The area around Binhu Town belongs to the alluvial plain terrain by Hongze Lake, the soil is soft, and it is not very able to withstand the passage of heavy equipment such as tanks, and the tank tracks were blown up by the explosives buried by Lao Cheng's men, and they fell directly into the mud, and the load-bearing wheels on the tank were all sunk in, and even the turret could not be rotated, only to be beaten.
Before Commander Li could take remedial measures, mortar shells and machine-gun bullets from the position were smashed towards his tank team like a raging storm, although these small arms hit his thickly armored tank, which had little effect, but it hurt the infantry brothers who were clustered around his tank, and a large number of infantry brothers were cut to the ground by an invisible but powerful scythe in the rain of bullets from the blocking position, like wheat in an autumn wheat field.
Regiment Commander Li hurriedly shouted at the top of his throat and ordered the tank corps with a car intercom: "Open artillery to bombard the position, suppress the enemy's fire, and cover the retreat of the infantry."
It is said that this emergency measure taken by Regiment Commander Li is quite correct, using his superior tank artillery fire to suppress the fire of the infantry on the enemy's position, so that the infantry can breathe and retreat, and then concentrate tanks and armored vehicles to rush up, forming a powerful steel armor and iron fist, and smashing it on the position held by the New Fourth Army, so that no one can withstand such a strong armored force assault, and it is a matter of an instant to break through the enemy's position t1706231537: