Chapter 131 5. A model of fighting in plain villages

After May 14th, the Japanese army in North China gathered heavy troops, and by virtue of their superior strength, they divided into multiple routes and used rapid transportation.Continuously pursued and wiped out the troops of the 3rd Column and Jizhong Military Region in Jinxian, Shenze, Anping, Suning, Hejian, Shenxian, and Shulu areas.Or use cavalry and bicycle teams to travel through the woods and wheat fields to search for cadres and the masses hiding in the wild.At the same time, set aside mobile troops and hide in the main point line. After the third column and the main force of the Jizhong Military Region return to the central area, "overwhelming warfare" will be implemented.

The army and people in Jizhong fought hard and tenaciously.Some troops were dispersed by the enemy again and again, and they were assembled again and again; several units that were dispersed immediately formed a new combat group; When the struggle against "sweeping up" was very tense, the Northern Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the North China Army Branch pointed out on May 20: "The large-scale 'sweeping up' in central Hebei is developing rapidly, reaching the climax of 'sweeping up' day by day." "It must be unprecedented." Difficult and serious." At the same time, "Since Jizhong District has the basis and experience of anti-Japanese plain guerrilla warfare in the past five years, and the development of mass struggles, we believe that Jizhong District has the strength and confidence to crush any cruel enemy. Mopping up'. However, in this unprecedentedly difficult and serious situation, the Party, government, military, civilians and academics in the entire Jizhong region are required to strengthen close unity and persist in the struggle to the end with the greatest tenacity and perseverance."

The 3rd Column and the garrison brigade of the Jizhong Military Region, the 6th Military Division, the 8th Military Division, and the main force each, successively on the 23rd and 24th, respectively, in the southern part of Shenxian County and the He (inter) Su (Ning) Highway The area south of Xidaokou was encircled by the Japanese and puppet troops, and a bloody battle began.The party, government and military personnel scattered in the central area, leading the masses and militia guerrilla groups, stubbornly dealt with the Japanese and puppet troops, concealed supplies, accommodated lost personnel, covered the transfer of combat troops, and persisted in the struggle.

In order to cooperate with the struggle in the central area, the 17th and 22nd regiments of the 7th Army Division transferred to the outer line. With the cooperation of the militia, the squads and platoons were used as units to disperse activities in Shenze, Wuji, Xinle, and Dingxian areas. Either rely on villages, or use tunnels, or hide on the side of the road to ambush, attack, meet, and block the Japanese and puppet troops. From the beginning of June, the Japanese North China Front Army, on the one hand, controlled the main traffic arteries around central Hebei, such as the Ping-Han, Jinpu, Deshi Railway and Cangshi Highway, with 1/2 of its strength, and implemented a blockade, Blocked and chased and intercepted, and repeatedly attacked our main force and leading organs; on the one hand, with 1/2 of the force, stepped up in the central area of ​​the anti-Japanese base area, captured the armed forces, local cadres, and separated personnel left by our army, and destroyed party, government and civilian organizations. They also used traitor organizations such as the "Xinminhui" and "Xuanfu Ban" to deceive the masses, searched villages and households, and frantically carried out "clearance and suppression".

At that time, our army in central Jizhong was in a highly dispersed state.The Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei Branch of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei Military Region pointed out on June 10: In the future, the environment in Central Hebei will no longer be as large as in the past, but will become a majority of small areas under the severe blockade and division of the enemy. We cooperate with each other and communicate with each other in these small areas, and insist on guerrilla warfare in the small areas of the plains. This is a new feature of guerrilla warfare in the future in Jizhong.Therefore, it is necessary to vigorously strengthen the work on the outer wing and the east as our base and the stronghold for the recovery of the central area in the future, and to change the form of organization and struggle in the central area and the area of ​​the outer wing where the environment is becoming more and more serious, so that they are suitable for the new situation. struggle environment.On June 4, 11, and 21, the Party Committee of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the Jizhong Military Region successively made decisions and issued instructions on several occasions: the main force will continue to move outward, and the base regiment and regional team can also transfer their own camera. The route and self-determined time; the recruited new fighters should be taken in as they go; the remaining staff should widely use the revolutionary two-faced policy and persist in small-scale and covert armed struggles.

In accordance with the spirit of the above-mentioned instructions, the military divisions led the main forces to select areas where the enemy's troops were weak in multiple ways, and adopted the combat method of avoiding the actual situation and flexibly interspersing it. On June 8, Zuo Ye and Liang Dasan led several companies of the 22nd Regiment to Songzhuang, about 8 kilometers north of Shenze County.On the way, I encountered a company from the 6th Army Division and the 15th and 16th Militia Battalions. Together, there were more than 300 people.At this time, they suddenly found that the surrounding Japanese strongholds had increased their troops, and the enemy showed signs of sending troops to "mop up".Therefore, Zuo Ye and others immediately checked the terrain, deployed troops, and organized the transfer of villagers, while quickly investing in intense fortification construction.They blocked the streets, opened up the courtyards, and built three fortifications tightly from outside the village to inside the village, from the bottom of the house to the top of the house.After several hours of work, a defense system with firepower connections inside and outside the village, above and below the houses, connected with each other, and connected with each other was formed.

At around 7 o'clock on the 9th, a group of about 200 Japanese soldiers came towards Songzhuang.Zuo Ye immediately ordered all the troops to enter the position and prepare for battle.When the enemy was only more than 30 meters away from the position, he said: "Fight!" Suddenly, light and heavy machine guns fired together, and the smoke and dust rose, and the Japanese army fell on their backs.When the enemy realized that they were ambushed, they immediately turned to counterattack, but rushed four or five times in a row, but there was no result. At this time, the enemy stopped charging, but surrounded Songzhuang from all sides, waiting for reinforcements.

It didn't take long, and the nearby enemies gradually gathered. By about 10 o'clock, the total number of reinforcements from the major strongholds of Fukasawa, Wuji, Dingxian, Raoyang, Jiucheng, and Anping had reached more than 1,700.The enemy surrounded Songzhuang even tighter. At about 11 o'clock, the enemy reinforcements from Fukasawa and Wuji began to attack violently, and the enemies from other directions also launched an offensive after hearing the gunshots. The soldiers of the 22nd regiment immediately took advantage of the position to fight back aggressively, and several special shooters showed their skills at this time.Li Qingzhai aimed at the enemies moving from north to south with his kneeling posture, and knocked down 7 of them in a row; Yu Zhiguo raised his gun and shot, knocking down one machine gun shooter and one ammunition hand of the enemy on the west temple platform of the village... some Soldiers deliberately shake their handkerchiefs in the high-level gun holes to attract the enemy to shoot at them; while special shooters use the low-level gun holes to aim, shoot quietly, and the guns hit.When groups and rows of enemies were about to rush to the base of the wall, soldiers jumped out of the fortifications and threw rows of grenades at the enemy group.The enemy's multiple charges were thus defeated.

But the enemy's attack became more and more fierce.Most of the forward fortifications have been damaged or collapsed after being bombarded by enemy artillery for seven or eight hours. What is even more worrying is that the soldiers have less and less ammunition, but there are more and more enemies.Zuo Ye decided to hold on for a few more hours and break out after dark.At present, you can release the enemy first and then get closer. This can not only reduce the lethality of the enemy's heavy weapons, but also give full play to your close combat expertise. The fight continued.Seeing that the firepower in the village had weakened, the enemy rushed over immediately, but as soon as they rushed into the village, they were immediately hit hard.By 18:00 in the evening, the enemy had charged more than 30 times, but in the end, except for leaving countless corpses, they did not rush into the village for half a step.

When night fell over the land, the enemy army stopped attacking and lit piles of fires on the position. The frightened enemy army emboldened and cheered with the fire.At this time, Zuo Ye ordered all the troops to divide into small teams, bypassing the sentry while the enemy was asleep, and quietly touched the enemy's position through the gaps in the enemy's fire, and moved safely without bloodshed or a single shot. At dawn on the 10th, after the enemy bombarded with artillery for an hour, when they cautiously entered the village, the troops of the Eighth Route Army had already disappeared.

In this battle, the enemy's total strength reached more than 3,500 at its peak, and the Eighth Route Army killed more than 600 enemies, including Major General Sakamoto, the commander of the Japanese Zhenbo Special Zone, and wounded more than 300 people, while only 73 people were injured.The Battle of Songzhuang became a model battle in plain village warfare in the history of the Anti-Japanese War. (He Ming: "The Battle of Songzhuang")