Chapter 5 big joke

On August 29th, the 58th Division, headed by Yu Ji at the time, also arrived in Jiading from the training ground in Hankou. The Fifty-eighth Division, like the Fifty-first Division, originally belonged to the designation of the local army. Later, the old Fifty-eighth Division was defeated in the battle with the Red Army, and the unlucky division commander was taken off his black hat.When Yu Jishi took office, in addition to the original remnants, the division was also merged into three provincial security regiments in Zhejiang Province, and gradually developed into a Division A division with two brigades and four regiments.

During that time, there was a steady stream of troops from all over the country pouring into Shanghai to participate in the war. In order to facilitate coordination and cooperation, the High Command reorganized a batch of military-level designations and organized each division into the new army. On August 30, the order to establish the Seventy-fourth Army was officially issued.The 74th Army consisted of the 51st Division, the 58th Division, and the 34th Brigade, whose officers and soldiers were mostly from Guizhou. Yu Jishi served as the commander of the army and the commander of the 58th Division.

Before the Anti-Japanese War, whether it was the Central Army of the Kuomintang or local warlords, the scope of troop control was generally delineated according to factions. This army-building rule, which was unbelievable in the West and even in Japan, has long been a practice in China.If it were not for the need of the Anti-Japanese War, it would be difficult to break such a vicious circle, because it involves a topic that is most taboo for military officials: "annexation." Wang Yaowu once racked his brains to avoid this big pit. The Anti-Japanese War made everyone consciously put down this detailed account.Wang Yaowu didn't care. Since the supplementary brigade period, it was because of Yu Jishi's care that his troops were able to be as stable as Mount Tai. Wang Yaowu himself was also very knowledgeable. To send a copy of the daily march and battle situation to Yu Jishi, it seems that Yu Jishi is regarded as his eternal boss.Such a close relationship made the merger of the two divisions a matter of course.As for the Thirty-Fourth Brigade, its own combat power is extremely limited. With two Central Army-level troops blocking the front, it undoubtedly relieved a lot of pressure on them.

After the establishment of the 74th Army, the 51st Division was mainly responsible for the defense of Shixianggong Temple, and the 58th Division held the position on the northwest side of Luodian. Just log in there. The tenacity of the Chinese resistance in Shanghai far exceeded the expectations of the Japanese government and even Western observers. Carlson, an American, had come to Shanghai on the passenger ship "President McKinley".This was his third visit to Shanghai, and his original purpose was not to watch the battle, but to learn Chinese, but he did not expect that he would plunge into the vortex of war, and the war would turn out like this.

When Carlson came to China for the first time in 1927, it was the time of the Northern Expedition. At that time, China was obviously unified, but in essence it was still a mess.As a soldier, he had a very low evaluation of the Chinese army at that time. On the one hand, he saw that the Chinese army was quite problematic in terms of organization, training, and equipment; on the other hand, he also found that the loyalty of Chinese soldiers, especially military leaders, was not high. " The head of the city changes the king's flag", and it is almost a common phenomenon in the Qin and Mu Chu Dynasties.

What Carlson saw, the Japanese also saw, and it was precisely because of this that the leaders of the Japanese government brazenly launched a war of aggression against China.They fully thought that as soon as the war broke out, China would have a situation that had occurred many times in civil wars, and what they would have to face at that time was a weak country divided into pieces and many different military and political parties who quarreled and hindered each other. faction.According to their thinking, to deal with this group of Chinese who are busy with internal friction, at most it only needs to be cut and punctured with a little force like pulling facial tissues out of a cardboard box.

This is obviously the rhythm of "many land, weak people, come quickly", but the reality is still a big joke with the crazy Japanese.No matter how fierce the Japanese army attacked and how scary their fangs and claws were, they continued to resist, and from the beginning to the end, none of the important Chinese military and political leaders split or fell to their side. Where is the secret? Carlson's interest was greatly increased. He simply gave up the original plan, and then, as an official observer of the US Navy, he tried every means to get a pass to go to the front line for interviews.

When Carlson entered the front-line trenches with his pass, he found that the weapons and equipment of the Chinese army were still very shabby.The backwardness of the country's military production and the arms embargoes of various countries in the world have made all kinds of guns that should have been eliminated many years ago still popular, and soldiers have a variety of gun models, German, Russian, and Czech. Have. Due to the serious shortage of automatic firearms, German-made shell guns outside the scope of the embargo became a highlight. They were mounted on wooden butts and used as submachine guns.

Seeing Carlson enter their bunker, the officers and soldiers showed expressions of surprise.Carlson had studied Chinese for two years when he was working in Beiping. He greeted with the customary greeting in rural China: "Hi, fellow!" This foreigner with a high nose and blue eyes immediately amused everyone and shortened the distance between them.In the traffic trench leading to the rear, Carlson met a private who asked him in very fluent English: "Are you American?" Now it was Carlson's turn to be surprised.In his impression, although China has a large population, there are not many highly educated people, and there has always been a proverb that "good iron does not make nails, and good men do not serve as soldiers".

Seeing Carlson's unbelievable expression, the private soldier told him with a smile that he graduated from an American university and became a teacher after returning to China. Carlson immediately became very interested in what Private Bing said: "Are there many people like you in the Chinese army?" The private replied in the affirmative: "In our country, it is precisely the students in middle schools and universities who have maintained nationalist ideals for many years and insisted on resisting the Japanese." Compared with the equipment that can be seen at a glance, Carlson pays more attention to the mental outlook and professionalism displayed by the troops. The difference from ten years ago is that at least the soldiers now know what they are fighting for.