Volume 4 Chapter 72

  Li Bin continued: "Since our team has a large number of people, I suggest that we must act in batches. Now I arrange, after dark, we will act in batches and must gather at the railway line 20 kilometers south of Changtu before 2 am tomorrow. After everyone arrives, our special forces, snipers, and cavalry regiment will all dismount, and the special forces will move stealthily along the railway line without discovering any enemy situation. The cavalry regiment and special forces will first quickly pass through the railway and enter Qingyuan territory. The infantry will follow behind, passing through the railway in a scattered manner. During the infantry's passage, the machine gun battalion, sharpshooter team, and sniper squad will be on guard duty. After the infantry and logistics team have passed, the machine gun battalion and sharpshooter team without horses will withdraw, and the sniper squad will withdraw last, mounting their horses to chase after the front troops. Finally, our troops will gather at the outer village of Xiajiabao in Qingyuan. Does anyone else have any opinions?"

  "Big brother, but the infantry battalion commanders, logistics team leaders and sharpshooter team leaders also ride horses, while a large number of ordinary soldiers have no horses. Can the speed of action between officers and soldiers be unified?" Hong Biao asked.

  "Alright, let's rearrange the personnel!" Li Bin said, "The infantry battalion commander, logistics team and the sharpshooter team commander's horses, including my own horse and Deputy Commander Xiao's horse, all of them will be handed over! They will be provided for the female soldiers to use. Liu Linhua will follow the special forces and cavalry, responsible for safely escorting those female soldiers to our assembly point. I will personally command the artillery battalion, at that time, I will act together with the artillery battalion. As for Deputy Commander Xiao, he will lead his logistics team."

  Actually, there aren't many female soldiers. Apart from Liu Linhua and Huang Hua, Wang Dandan went missing after the Jinzhou Battle. The main ones are the three female soldiers brought by Liu Linhua originally, plus two new little female soldiers who just joined, making a total of only seven female soldiers.

  Li Bin had just finished speaking when the little girl Qiu Rong said, "Big brother, but I don't know how to ride a horse." All along the way, she had been sitting in the big cart of the baggage team.

  Liu Linhua smiled and stroked the little girl's head: "Little sister, when the time comes, sister will take you with her."

  "Alright!" said Li Bin, "I've finished speaking, everyone hurry up and rest for a bit! As soon as it gets dark we'll set out in batches! We must arrive at the assembly point within one night!"

  After the arrangement was completed, Li Bin let everyone rest, and he himself took out a map, drew on it, and was arranging a long-term battle plan. The military book says: If you don't plan for a country, you can't plan for a city! Without a large strategic plan, it is impossible to drive the Japanese out of China by scattered attacks every day! First, stabilize the base area, and then plan for development.

  But where should this base be established? This is a very headache problem for Li Bin. According to the production capacity of the Chinese people at that time, it takes at least 30 to 40 people to support one soldier, and now there are about 1,800 people here in Li Bin, which means he needs to control an area with a population of around 60,000.

  However, Li Bin's frown soon disappeared from his face, he had already found a long-term plan, and he was about to implement it.

  As he thought of this, a faint smile appeared on his face. Li Bin, exhausted, slowly closed his eyes, and the map fell to the ground. He had fallen asleep, indeed too tired, since coming to this era, he hadn't slept well for a single night.

  Unconsciously, the sun had already slanted to the west. Li Bin woke up from his dream and jumped up shouting: "Everyone get ready, we'll set off when it gets dark! This is a controlled area of the devils! We can't start a fire to cook today, so finish your dry rations and drink some water before setting off. Check all the weapons again, there might be a fierce battle!"

  The sky gradually turned dark and the troops prepared to set off.

  Liu Linhua was about to lift Qiu Rong onto the horse, but was stopped by Li Bin: "Those female soldiers are not getting on the horses now. They will follow the logistics team first and let them ride horses to follow the cavalry after we gather at the railway line."

  After finishing speaking, Li Bin himself also felt that he was still young after all, and his consideration of the problem was not thorough enough, which would lead to the omission of this important detail when arranging work in the morning.

  Apart from the first battalion of Hong Biao's first company being responsible for protecting the logistics team, all other troops were dispersed and acted as units. This army, apart from more than 400 original Northeastern Army soldiers, had no military uniforms, and most people wore civilian clothes, while a small number of soldiers wore their original Northeastern police uniforms. However, this also had an advantage, which was that it was not easy to attract the enemy's attention.

  Troops operating under the cover of night quietly crossed the plain, and Fang Juntian's special forces unit was the first to arrive at the designated assembly point, which was only over 500 meters away from the railway line. Due to riding horses, Fang Juntian arrived two hours earlier than scheduled, and they were there to observe the enemy's movements.

  This railway is the main line connecting Shenyang to Harbin, and it often suffers from harassment by scattered guerrilla forces. Therefore, the devils strengthened their guard along the railway line, and armored vehicles occasionally passed through the railway, while on both sides of the railway line, there were frequent patrols by the puppet Manchukuo army.

  Fang Jun Tian and the special soldiers dismounted, tying their horses in a small grove. Then Fang Jun Tian led the warriors to quietly approach the railway line, hiding in the bushes one hundred meters away from the railway line.

  Soon after, a snow-bright light column came from afar, and an armored railway vehicle roared past on the rails. Five minutes after the armored vehicle passed by, a steam locomotive pulled a freight train whizzing past on the rails.

  After the train passed by, a warrior was about to get up, but Fang Jun Tian pressed him down: "Be careful, there's still movement over there!"

  In the darkness, a row of shadows appeared in the distance, coming along the railway line.

  It was a detachment of Cossack cavalry who patrolled back and forth along the railway line as a matter of routine.

  After the fake army passed by, Fang Juntian took out his luminous pocket watch and looked at it. The pointer was pointing to 12 o'clock. He secretly memorized the time and continued to ambush on the railway line to observe the movement.

  This is a busy railway line, in less than three minutes, another freight train loaded with coal and goods rushes south from the north. Seeing the full load of materials on the train, Fang Juntian secretly scolded: "Damn thieves! They robbed all our wealth in Northeast China!"

  Within ten minutes, three freight trains passed by, and for the next fifteen minutes, no train went through. When it was twenty minutes later, another whistle of a steam locomotive came, and a passenger car sped from south to north. After the passenger car had gone, there were the devils' armored cars coming back. After the armored cars had passed, three consecutive trains of devils' troops appeared.

  "The armored vehicle patrolled back and forth for twenty-three minutes." Fang Juntian secretly memorized this time.

  About twenty minutes later, another group of puppet army cavalry appeared from the edge of the railway line. Fang Juntian recorded the time again: "The puppet patrol troops pass by about every forty minutes."

  "Captain, shall we return to the assembly point and wait for Colonel Tan and the others?" a soldier asked softly in Fang Juntian's ear.

  "Not urgent, let's wait another 40 minutes! Let's observe a bit more! What if the enemy doesn't have any regular patterns?" Fang Jun Tian explained to the soldier.

  At around thirteen minutes past one, a small group of Japanese cavalry appeared on the railway line, galloping along it.

  "Damn it, there are also Japanese cavalry!" Fang Jun Tian cursed secretly. To know that the combat effectiveness of the devils is much stronger than that of the puppet army, and the previous team of puppet cavalry can basically be ignored. However, the Japanese cavalry is a bit troublesome. If they were to be eliminated by gunfire, the armored vehicle would soon arrive, and the devils and puppet troops in the city and nearby would also be alerted, which would hinder the troops from crossing the railway line.

  Fang Jun Tian recorded the enemy's activity patterns one by one: "The armored train takes 23 minutes for a round trip, the puppet army cavalry takes 40 minutes for a round trip, and the Japanese cavalry takes about an hour and a half for a round trip."

  After finishing his notes, he took a look at the time and it was already 1:26. He waved his hand: "Prepare to return to the forest and wait for Captain and the others!"

  Back in the forest, Fang Juntian found that Jing Hu's cavalry regiment and Huang Hua's sniper team had already arrived, and some infantrymen and sharpshooters had also rushed to the scene. However, most of the infantrymen, sharpshooters, machine gun battalion and logistics troops had not yet arrived.

  Li Bin had arrived in the woods early and was waiting. After seeing Fang Jun Tian, he asked: "Captain Fang, how's it going? Have you found the enemy's activity patterns?"

  Fang Jun Tian reported to Li Bin the enemy's activity patterns and specific times. After listening to Fang Jun Tian's report, Li Bin looked at his watch and said: "There are still half an hour, our people will arrive soon. This way, I calculated that after the devils' armored vehicle passes by, let Huang Hua's sniper team ride horses across the railway line first, and after arriving on the other side, find a place to ambush. The infantry and sharpshooters who arrived first also followed them in action, crossing the railway line first! Other troops will wait until the main force arrives before crossing the railway line in batches."

  "Team leader, what about us?" Fang Jun Tian asked.

  Li Bin said: "You ride your horses over there, first find a place to tie them up and then come back here! Wait, I still have tasks that need you to complete!"

  Huang Hua led the way, and after the devils' armored vehicle had passed by, they quickly brought the sniper team and some infantrymen to cross the railway line at the fastest speed, and ambushed in a grassland 700 meters away from the railway line. After Fang Juntian and his men rode past on horseback, they first tied up their horses and then quickly returned to Li Bin's side.

  By two o'clock, all teams had arrived at the assembly point one after another, and Xiao Bo's logistics team was the last to arrive.

  Xiao Bo knew that their heavy cart was clearly unable to pass through the railway line, so he asked Li Bin: "Brother, how are we going to get our cart across?"

  Li Bin pointed to a watchtower about one kilometer away: "There's a pass over there, but there's also a watchtower with heavy machine guns and searchlights on it. Let's see if Fang Jun Tian's special forces can take out that watchtower!"

  Fang Jun Tian looked in the direction Li Bin was pointing and asked: "Captain, when are we going to sneak up on that artillery tower?"

  "Action in twenty minutes! The cavalry and female soldiers will go first, after passing through, don't stay, immediately head towards Qingyuan! The infantry and machine gun battalion will follow the cavalry to pass through, after passing through, the infantry will advance first, and the machine gun battalion will ambush on the spot. If anything happens, they can reinforce at any time." Li Bin said.

  He finished speaking and turned his head to say to Fang Jun Tian: "I'll go with you! In five more minutes, we're going to the cannon tower!"