Chapter 36: The Captain's Care

  On February 10, 1925, at noon, the Guangdong Army troops attacked along Zhangmutou Town and occupied Tiandihui. However, after occupying Tiandihui, the Guangdong Army troops stopped their actions, and Chen's troops retreated to Danshui and Pinghu respectively.

  Regarding the actions of the Guangdong Army, Principal Chiang was extremely angry, but had no way to deal with it, and could only order the First Instructional Regiment stationed in Zhangmutou Town to quickly attack Pinghu.

  The Guangdong Army troops stopped action, clever people can see at a glance.

  On that day, Yang Ximin sent a letter to Hu Hanmin saying: If the salary is not continued, it will be impossible to dispatch troops. He hoped to send 300,000 yuan of military salaries for the Yunnan-Guizhou army and 200,000 yuan each for the Guangdong and Guangxi armies.

  Yang Ximin's meaning is simple: you give me money, I continue to fight; you don't give me money and want me to continue fighting, it's impossible. And the tax revenue of Guangdong Province is either controlled by Chen Jiongming or Yang Ximin, Liu Zhenhuan, Xu Chongzhi, these big financiers are crying poor to the Guangzhou Revolutionary Government, their purpose can be imagined.

  Yang Ximin's approach was simple. He didn't lack money, but military pay was his excuse, the best excuse to stop fighting and preserve his strength.

  Regarding this matter, the Shengjing Times commented: The leaders of the Yunnan and Guangxi armies took advantage of Sun Yat-sen's serious illness and the possible changes in the Guangdong situation. The Guangxi army was preparing to return to Guangxi, but it would be difficult for the Yunnan army to return to Yunnan. They planned to use the North River as their base, secretly sending representatives to negotiate a ceasefire with Chen Jiongming and Lin Hu, in order to preserve their strength. The disturbance over rations was just an excuse.

  Jo Hee, Department Head.

  After capturing Changping Town, Principal Chiang led the school's main personnel and hastily arrived here.

  When Yang Ximin asked for military pay, Principal Chiang immediately realized something. When he heard that the Guangdong Army had stopped attacking, Principal Chiang was even clearer that this time not only would the Yunnan and Guizhou armies cause trouble, but also Xu Chongzhi's Guangdong Army might have problems too.

  However, at this moment, Chiang Kai-shek was only the head of the Whampoa Military Academy and concurrently held the nominal position of Chief of Staff of the Guangdong Army. As for his position as Chief of Staff of the Guangdong Army, no Guangdong Army unit would obey his orders.

  He can command only the party's military forces, and as for political influence, Chiang Kai-shek at this moment has no influence whatsoever, far less than Hu Hanmin, Wang Jingwei, Liao Zhongkai and others.

  "Director Zhou, I'm afraid the situation has changed. The First Division should quickly capture Pinghu to boost the morale of the Allied Army." Principal Chiang said with a helpless expression while looking at the map.

  Politically, he can only make up for it from a military perspective. After capturing Pinghu, Chen Jitang's troops on the Guangzhou-Kowloon railway line will be eliminated by half. Faced with these territories, the Guangdong Army may be interested, and as long as they are interested, they will have to continue attacking.

  "Principal Chiang, I'm rushing to Zhangmu Town immediately to assist Commander He Yingqin in directing the battle." Director Zhou also realized something and said a sentence.

  Principal Chiang nodded and smiled on his face.

  At 1:00 pm on the same day, the First Division of the Teaching Regiment set out from Zhangmutou Town and attacked Pinghu via Tianxiangwei.

  "Battalion commander, headquarters order, our battalion is required to serve as the reserve team." Cai Guangju said, holding a document and walking up to Sun Xinghua.

  Sun Xinghua took over the document and looked at it. This time, it was indeed the team leader's care. Sun Xinghua's third battalion had received the order to serve as a reserve team for the first time.

  "Support the country, take your artillery company and assign it to the first battalion for combat, they are the main attackers this time." However, after a while, Director Zhou personally came to the third battalion to withdraw Sun Xinghua's artillery company.

  Looking at Director Zhou in front of him, Sun Xinghua also couldn't refuse and could only nod in agreement.

  Upon arrival at Pinghu, the battalion immediately launched an attack.

  Pinghu Chen Jun fiercely fired at the student army for 30 minutes, but the student army did not return fire. Just as Chen Jun was caught off guard, the student army took advantage of the cover of artillery and machine guns to launch a fierce attack. Chen Jun fled in disarray, and Pinghu was captured. The 1st Training Regiment remained stationed in Pinghu, while the 2nd Training Regiment arrived at Shigudun on the same day.

  Pinghu, the location of three garrisons.

  This time, the three battalions served as a reserve team, but they didn't get any benefits. Although the machine gun company also participated in the battle, it was always deployed at the back and couldn't charge inside. By the time the third battalion entered Pinghu, not even a single rifle or bullet was seen.

  The first battalion to enter Pinghu was quite rewarding. Every soldier had brand new military boots on their feet, and even non-combat personnel who lacked weapons had two rifles in each hand. Even a squad leader had one long gun and one short gun equipped on his body.

  The three battalions were rich and prosperous, but the poor officers and soldiers looked at the harvest of the first battalion with envy, all of them secretly complaining and privately cursing Commander He Yingqin for being unfair.

  But they seem to have forgotten that the great harvest of a few days ago had already made the three battalion troops strong and powerful, with fine equipment, and even each squad had a pack horse for transporting ammunition.

  "Battalion Commander, the first battalion has captured a lot of fuel. I went to ask for it, but they insisted that we exchange machine guns for it." Sun Guangping, the party representative and quartermaster of the third company, walked up to Sun Xinghua, saying with a face full of indignation.

  When they were in the village of Lao Bu, the Third Battalion had not given the First Battalion any less benefits. Now that the First Battalion had captured something, but was making conditions with the Third Battalion, it made Sun Guangping extremely displeased.

  "Exchange for exchange, five machine guns for all the fuel they captured." Sun Xinghua said with a smile. He had some captured machine guns here, and as long as the troops were short of them, he could exchange them at any time. After this battle, Sun Xinghua's merit points had already reached 150, which could be exchanged for some tanks and vehicles from World War I.

  However, these things are too bulky, and suddenly coming out with these things would inevitably raise suspicions among the officers and soldiers. Therefore, Sun Xinghua did not exchange them, but instead kept the merit points. Firstly, he wanted to wait until they were needed to exchange for machine guns and artillery, and secondly, Sun Xinghua wanted to see if having more merit points could be exchanged for something else.

  "Director Sun laughed and said, what fuel is more precious than five machine guns?" The laughter of Shen Ying from afar came over, and in a short while, Shen Ying arrived at Sun Xinghua's side.

  "Shen Yingchang, this is..." Looking at the soldiers behind Shen Yingchang carrying many large buckets, Sun Xinghua also realized something, but he pretended not to know.

  "We've obtained some fuel, and in the entire division, only your three regiments have a truck. If I don't send the fuel over, it would be a small gesture of goodwill from our first regiment." Shen Ying Shi said with a smile.

  A junior officer walked over, bowing his head and saying: "It was my fault just now, please forgive me, sir."

  Sun Xinghua smiled and put his arm around Shen Ying's neck, saying: "Alright, alright, you're being generous with one company, we can't be stingy with three companies. There are still some machine guns here, consider them a gift from the third company to you."

  After finishing speaking, Sun Xinghua glanced at Sun Guangping beside him. Sun Guangping immediately saluted and led several soldiers to run towards the camp headquarters. In a short while, four Madsen light machine guns were carried over.

  Shen Yingshi saw four Madsen light machine guns and a smile appeared on his face. He happily picked up one of the machine guns and examined it carefully.