NFBE Chapter 209 Defeating the Changhuan Northern Army
Chapter 209 Defeating the Changhuan Northern Army
After the plan was completed, the various divisions began to move. The 4th Division had to go the farthest north, so it had to travel a short distance, while the 5th and 8th Divisions had relatively close destinations.
At two o'clock in the afternoon, the artillery of the Fifth Division once again launched an artillery attack on the positions of the Eleventh Army.
"The Nanshan Army's artillery shells are free, right? They've been bombing for so long." Li Yonglin couldn't help but complain behind the position.
The Chief of Staff shook his head and smiled bitterly: "I'm afraid the battle in the middle has already been decided. The Nanshan Army on the opposite side is trying to prevent us from escaping."
"Are the troops ready to break out?" Li Yonglin asked.
Chief of Staff: "Don't worry, Commander, the whole army is ready and can take action after nightfall."
Even if the Nanshan Army was well prepared to break out at night, it would be difficult to effectively intercept them in the dark. Unless they surrounded the area, there would be no possibility of breaking out.
After half an hour of shelling, the Nanshan Army launched an attack on the 11th Army from three directions: north, east and south.
Soon after Li Yonglin and the chief of staff walked out of the anti-artillery cave, an officer came to report: "Commander, Chief of Staff, the Nanshan Army has launched an attack on us."
At first, Li Yonglin did not take it seriously. In the morning, the Nanshan Army also launched a feint attack after the artillery bombardment, and the battle was not fierce.
"Commander, the east is no longer safe."
"Commander, the enemy is coming from the north."
Soon, two more officers entered the headquarters to report.
"What?" Li Yonglin was shocked and his face turned pale when he heard the news from the east and the north.
The chief of staff also looked unhappy: "How many Nanshan troops are there in the east and north?"
"There are tens of thousands of Nanshan troops in the north." The two officers who came in from behind said in panic.
"There are at least 10,000 people in the east."
Waving his hand to let all the messenger officers go down, the chief of staff said to Li Yonglin with a wry smile: "The reinforcements of the Nanshan Army should have arrived."
He didn't expect that the enemy reinforcements would arrive so quickly, and that so many people would be dispatched to deal with the 11th Army.
"Choose an elite force to break out with me, and let the remaining three divisions continue to hold their positions." Li Yonglin planned to use a large force to contain the Nanshan Army, and break out with a small number of troops himself.
The chief of staff looked at Li Yonglin with a complicated expression, responded, and went down to arrange the troops.
Half an hour later, Li Yonglin and the chief of staff led the guard regiment, the gendarmerie regiment, and the reconnaissance battalion, a total of more than 3,000 people, and broke out to the northeast.
Although the idea was good, in the northeast direction, they encountered a complete blockade by the Eighth Division. After the Nanshan Army supported the northeast direction, Li Yonglin had to lead his troops back to the command center.
Although the 11th Army resisted tenaciously, it was basically wiped out around 5 pm under the siege of 60,000 Nanshan troops.
Most of the senior officers, including Army Commander Li Yonglin and Chief of Staff, were captured alive by the Nanshan Army, while a small number committed suicide or were shot dead.
At the same time as the Lingshan Campaign ended, the Jingshui Campaign also ended. Most of the 14th Army of the Jingshui North Army was wiped out, and its commander Zhu Changyue fled with a small number of soldiers.
After defeating the Northern Army, the Nanshan Army did not relax its vigilance. The 11th Division quickly returned to defend Changhuan City to guard against a surprise attack by the Southern Army.
It was not until the morning of the next day that the battle results of each unit were fully summarized.
In the Yanping City Command Center, Fang Guoxuan, Li Zhongwu, and Fang Tianming gathered together, and the Chief of Staff of the First Division reported.
"In this battle, we captured Northern Army soldiers and killed more than 8843 enemies. We also seized 1732 light machine guns, 1365 heavy machine guns, and box guns."
“缴获60口径迫击炮367门，57口径火炮132门，75口径57门，105口径火炮15门。”
"In addition, a large amount of grain, meat, silver dollars, etc. were seized."
After reporting the spoils, the chief of staff said: "In this battle, a total of our soldiers died."
Hearing about the loss, they felt a little heavy, but they quickly adjusted themselves.
Fang Guoxuan said: "Send the battle report to the commander and wait for the commander's arrangements."
Afterwards, Fang Guoxuan made some new arrangements, leaving the 5th and 3rd Divisions to continue defending Lingshan and Jingshui, and the 2nd, 4th, 8th and 9th Divisions were transferred back to Yanping to wait for Fang Jian'an's arrangements.
Fang Jian, who was in Yanshan, also breathed a sigh of relief after receiving the telegram from Fang Guoxuan in Changhuan.
He couldn't help but smile and joked: "Hearing the news of defeating the Northern Army, the heavy stone in my heart fell a little."
"Commander, if we attack with all our strength, the small Northern government can be easily destroyed." Seeing Fang Jian'an happy, Tao Yunong immediately flattered him.
Fang Jian couldn't help but chuckled and said, "It's not that easy. If we want to defeat the Northern Government, our military strength must at least double."
Currently, the Nanshan Army has more than 330,000 troops, which are enough to garrison Nanshan and Nanchuan.
If you want to occupy more territory, you have to continue expanding your troops.
Expanding the army is not something you can do just because you want to. It also has to be done based on economic, population, food and other conditions.
Take the current Nanshan Army for example, with 330,000 troops, the monthly salary alone is 2.7 million silver dollars, not to mention other expenses.
The military expenditure is more than 30 million a year. If the troops continue to expand, the annual military salary expenditure will be a huge expense.
Thanks to the garment factories, canning factories, cigarette factories, etc. in Nanshan Province in recent years, Fang Jianan was able to earn a lot of income every year to subsidize military expenses.
It would be a complete pipe dream to support these troops by relying solely on the tax revenue of Nanshan Province.
Moreover, Nanshan Province has spent a lot of money on construction in recent years, and most of the government's fiscal revenue has been invested in it.
Fortunately, thanks to the banks, government-controlled industries, and the property seized from house searches in previous years, Nanshan's economy has become increasingly prosperous.
"Commander, now that we have defeated the Northern Army, what should we do next? Do we need to send troops to Sanjiang Province?" Tao Yunong asked.
Fang Jian shook his head slightly: "It is not appropriate for us to take the initiative to attack the Southern New Army and the Northern Army now. The main target of the attack is still the warlords to strengthen our strength."
Only by maintaining a balance between the North and the South can Fang Jian develop quickly and unify the new country.
If one side quickly defeats the other, regardless of whether the Northern Army or the Southern New Army wins, their first target will definitely be the Nanshan Army.
Tao Yunong slowly put away the smile on his face: "Commander, the Northern Army has suffered such a big loss, will they let it go?"
Francis Xavier was also very troubled by this problem. The Northern Army lost nearly 150,000 people, and even the Southern Army had not achieved such results in several northern expeditions.
There is no guarantee that the Northern Army will not remain stubborn and continue to mobilize troops to attack Nanshan Province.
"This time we defeated the three-party coalition force of more than 300,000. We can't guarantee that the new army in the south will also be afraid of us." Fang Jian rubbed his eyebrows and said helplessly.
"If the Northern government contacts the Southern Army to reach a consensus and jointly attack Nanshan, then we will be under greater pressure."
Tao Yunong frowned and asked, "Will the Northern Government make this choice? Will the Southern New Army agree to unite with the Northern Government?"
Tao Yunong did not agree with Fang Ji'an's statement. The North and the South had been fighting each other for seven or eight years. How could they unite just like that?