Chapter 61 Big defeat

If you want to attack at night, you must have people who go to attack at night. The "patriotic column" was beaten to pieces, and the 34th Division had a bunch of experienced combat soldiers here and there, mostly hiding in scattered fortifications. It was really not easy to reassemble a mobile force. However, Saito's instructions had to be followed.After a fuss, 1,000 infantry and 36 tanks were finally assembled, and they could set off for a night attack. Saito has an instinctive love for formalism. He gathered the night raid troops on the mountain and said that he would personally see the night raid troops off.With so many people and tanks running noisily to the mountain, how could it not attract the attention of the US military, and the US naval guns immediately bombarded the mountain.

Even though the shelling at night was not as powerful as it was during the day, it still caused confusion.In the chaos and darkness, Saito and his staff were lost and disappeared. What kind of master is there to bring out what kind of apprentices, a group of officers' brains are no more flexible than their chiefs, they chose to wait for Saito to reappear.Time passed hour after hour. After midnight, news finally came that there was no need to wait any longer. Someone saw that Saito had been burned to death in a sugarcane field. The division commander is no ordinary soldier, even if he is burned to charcoal, he must be brought back.The officers redistributed their duties. Major Hirashisa, the commander of the night attack, was transferred from the news release officer to the infantry commander. Now he returned to his old position, responsible for recovering Saito's body, and his command was handed over to another officer.

Marching to the front line, the tanks thought they were running fast, and they rumbled down the mountain without waiting for the infantry.There is a large swamp at the foot of the mountain, and most of the tanks have sunk into it, which created an opportunity for the infantry to catch up. The infantry was panting after chasing them, and the tanks struggling out of the quagmire were also in a state of distress, but when they reached the front line, they were all as excited as if they had been injected with chicken blood.The officers didn't even investigate the situation on the battlefield, so they held their sabers high and led the tanks and infantry to charge.

The main battle tanks of the Japanese army are the "Type 89" series, which belong to the same medium tank as the American "Sherman" tank in terms of level, but the Japanese medium tank and the American medium tank are not the same concept. Measured by the technical standards of tanks, the "Type 89" series are just light tanks. In front of the heavy "Sherman" tanks, they are simply children. The U.S. Army had sent the "Sherman" tanks, half-tracks and artillery ashore with tank landing ships, but they did not need the "Sherman" tanks. Many infantry weapons could be used to destroy Japanese tanks, such as Rocket launchers, rifle grenades, 37mm anti-aircraft guns, and even light and heavy machine guns and ordinary rifles at certain angles can penetrate the weak armor of Japanese tanks.

When the Japanese army charged, they used tanks as their attack spearheads, but the way they used them seemed to the U.S. military to be very brain-dead—there were more than 30 tanks, but only three to four were dispatched each time, and they did not cooperate with infantry. It seemed that they were specially provided for The U.S. military defeated them one by one.Going forward, a tank was still going the wrong way in the dark. In the end, a Japanese intelligence officer sitting in the car and the tank were captured by the U.S. military. The tanks were weak, and the shouting of the infantry was only a bluff.In fact, what the U.S. military really used to stop the Japanese night attack was only one company, but with the strength of this company, it was enough to repel the Japanese charge after charge alone.

In this night attack, the U.S. positions remained intact, while more than 700 Japanese soldiers were killed.At dawn, "Sherman" tanks and half-track vehicles drove to the front line to mop up the remnants of the Japanese army.At this time, the American tank soldiers discovered that 31 destroyed Japanese tanks were scattered on the battlefield. What is puzzling is that there are no remains of Japanese soldiers on the battlefield.It was later learned that the Japanese army had transported the corpses to the rear, where there had already been a mountain of corpses.The Japanese want to use similar "suspect tactics" to intimidate their opponents, and they dare to use all their IQs in this regard.

The night attack was a complete failure, and Major Hiragusa, who went to find Saito's body at night, was almost killed.He went down the mountain in a tank, and after walking not far, a shell came flying, and the tank broke down, so Hiragusa had to get out of the car and walk.Then when passing the sugarcane field, it happened that the U.S. military incendiary bombs came over, and the sugarcane field was burned into a sea of ​​flames.In desperation, Hirashishi used the command saber in his hand as a sickle, and desperately cut a way out, only to be able to escape. An hour before dawn, the exhausted Hirashishi arrived at the division's temporary command post.He couldn't believe his eyes, just in front of that cave, there was a person sitting alone, none other than Saito, who was rumored to have been charred.

Ping Kuo was both surprised and happy, and hurriedly stepped forward and asked, "Your Excellency, Division Chief, how are you doing?" Hearing the greeting from his subordinates, Saito, who had been bowing his head in silence, finally raised his head, still silent.It seemed that he already knew the news about the fiasco of the night attack. It was the morning of June 16 when Hirakushi found Saito.At that moment, Spruance received a report from the submarine that the Japanese fleet was coming. The U.S. submarine force deployed near the Tawi-Tawi anchorage and in the Philippine waters has always been closely monitoring the actions of Ozawa's troops.As early as June 13, the submarine "Little Silver Fish" discovered that Ozawa's troops had left Tawi Tawi Island and headed north.In the next few days, the submarines "Flying Fish" and "Haima" also successively captured traces of two Japanese formations in the Philippine Sea.

Spruance immediately held an emergency meeting aboard his flagship, the heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis.He judged that one of the two Japanese army formations should be Ozawa's troops, and they would definitely sail to the Mariana Islands. On the surface, Spruance's situation is somewhat similar to Yamamoto's situation at Midway Island two years ago: the Saipan landing battle is still in a stalemate, and the outcome is uncertain. The 58th Task Force of the Mobile Force is also separated. In different sea areas, half of them are in the north of Iwo Jima and Chichi Island, and the other half are in the sheltered waters west of Saipan.

If Ozawa can attack the two aircraft carrier groups west of Saipan before the other reinforcements of the Fifth Fleet, Spruance and Mitchell are likely to repeat the mistakes of Yamamoto and Nagumo . After two years, because of the efficient intelligence work of the US military and the huge role played by submarines, Spruance has the ability to change his own destiny.After calculating the advance speed of Ozawa's troops, he decided to postpone the planned landing on Guam, and quickly transferred 8 cruisers and 21 destroyers from Turner's landing formation to strengthen the strength of the 58th Task Force. Order the two aircraft carrier brigades going north to go south and join the other two brigades.

Japan's Tokyo Radio Station has repeatedly advertised: "A sea battle is about to begin." American journalists interviewed Nimitz about this and asked him what he thought. Nimitz replied: "I hope what they (referring to the Japanese side) said It's true, but I really don't know how to lure them out to fight a big battle." Now, it's finally drawn out.