After Hu Zongnan abandoned Xinyang and longed for Nanyang, the Japanese army sent the 3rd Division to support in order to ensure that it could capture Pingjing Pass, but in fact the cavalry of the 10th Division had broken through a pass. In this way, the 10th Division was in the front, and the 3rd Division was in the rear, all the way to the key point of the Pinghan Line, the Huayuan Railway Station, and advanced.
At the same time, the 16th Division, under the command of Fujie Hp, also took another pass under Jigong Mountain, Wusheng Pass.
Pingjing Pass and Wusheng Pass, located at the junction of Henan and Hubei, one in the east and one in the west, have belonged to one of the nine passes under the heavens since ancient times, and the geographical location is very important. If both passes were occupied by the Japanese army, then the gate of Hubei facing Henan would be opened, and the Battlefield in Jiangbei would be difficult to fight.
At this time, Li Zongren's headquarters had just been transferred from Xiadian to Chenjiazhuang not far away. Perhaps out of the sensitivity of the commander, he was so anxious that he could not sleep after nightfall, as if someone had reminded him that this place could not stay long.
So Li Zongren ordered overnight that the headquarters should be moved westward. In the face of the questioning of Chief of Staff Xu Zuyi, Li Zongren did not explain, but only urged everyone to withdraw immediately. At dawn, a group of people arrived in Anlu, and just two hours after Li Zongren took the people away, a large group of Japanese cavalry surrounded Chen Jiazhuang, which was extremely dangerous.
At this time, the Japanese cavalry had already crossed the Pingjing Pass, cut off the road from the Garden Railway Station to Xiangfan, and the Japanese troops on the north and south sides actually formed a huge encirclement on the Pingshan Line.
In this way, Li Zongren's life is not good.
According to the orders of the military headquarters, Hu Zongnan's troops were assigned to the Fifth Theater of Operations, but Hu Zongnan had his own arrogance and rarely contacted Li Zongren, let alone reported the enemy situation. At the time of Taierzhuang, Li Zongren was upset by Tang Enbo, and now there is another Hu Zongnan.
On the battlefield of southern Henan, Zhang Zizhong's performance was still good. He led the 59th Army to support Yu Xuezhong of Shangcheng, but by the time he reached Luoshan, Shangcheng had already fallen, and he had blocked the Japanese army for many days in the area of Huangchuan County. After the mission was completed, Zhang Zizhong took a battalion of pistols and a regiment of infantry to cover the transfer of the large army, just like the Xuzhou battlefield.
Due to his excellent completion of the cover mission, Zhang Zizhong was also commended by the Central Military Commission and promoted to commander-in-chief of the 33rd Group Army, and Feng Zhi'an's 77th Army and Cao Fulin's 55th Army were also placed under his control. During the War of Resistance Against Japan, Zhang Zizhong had no decisive thoughts, only decisive actions, and practiced his promises bit by bit.
After out of Pingjing Pass Wusheng Pass. If the Japanese army went to Yingshan, Anlu, Yunmeng, Xiaogan, and Hanchuan, the Chinese army fighting northeast of Dabie Mountain would soon be surrounded. Therefore, the Central Military Commission ordered Li Zongren to quickly command the troops to move to the northwest, and also reminded him to leave a unit in Dabie Mountain to carry out guerrilla warfare.
For Li Zongren, every order was a difficult choice, and leaving two troops was also a problem, so he called Li Pinxian and Liao Lei and told them that the Central Military Commission had decided to leave a unit and asked them who would like to stay. Li Pinxian this guy is more cunning, has not said a word, the burden can only be pressed on Liao Lei's body. Later, Liao Lei had been painstakingly operating in Dabie Mountain, and in October 1939, due to fatigue and illness, he died prematurely. Liao Lei's deeds, we will have a detailed introduction later.
After Liulin Station was captured by the Japanese army, the situation in Jiangbei deteriorated rapidly. After Receiving Sun Lianzhong's call, Song Xilian went directly from the xiaojieling line to the west of Zhongxiang via The Garden, Yunmeng, and Jingshan. At this time, the wounded of Song Xilian's 36th and 88th Divisions had already gone to Xiangfan to rest. It was Song Xilian who, with the remaining combatants of the two divisions, retreated along the road from Huang'an to the Garden.
Until this time, the 16th Division of the Japanese 13th Division broke through Dabie Mountain and attacked the Beijing-Han Line near Xiaogan and the Garden, which was a huge test for Song Xilian. Japanese planes roared through the sky, but instead of attacking them, they flew southwest, and Song Xilian understood that the purpose of the Japanese army was to bomb the bridge there.
After arriving at the garden, Song Xilian learned that Zhong Song's troops did not retreat to Zhong Xiang, but instead went in the direction of Xiaogan. All the men and horses that the Chinese army had withdrawn were gathered at the Garden Railway Station, and those who were leaderless all joined Song Xilian's troops, hoping to lead them out of the encirclement.
The Huayuan Railway Station is not only a transportation hub, but also an important supply place for the Chinese army, which once had a large number of weapons, ammunition, and military food. In order to avoid falling into the hands of the Japanese army, the quartermasters here shouted everywhere, so that the Passing Chinese army could take as much as it could, and some strong soldiers even carried two or three machine guns.
Song Xilian judged that if he continued to travel westward, the situation would not be good, because there was already a noise in the direction of Anlu, and if there was no accident, the Japanese army had occupied Anlu, and there was no enemy in the northern area, under such circumstances, Song Xilian resolutely ordered to go east along the original road, and then turned to the north after an hour, and reached Xuanhuadian and Sanli City in a day.
After arriving at Sanli City, there was no such atmosphere here, and the local quartermaster told Song Xilian that there were more than 2,000 packs of military food here, which made the hungry soldiers overjoyed. In this way, Song Xilian took more than 10,000 veterans, crossed the road from Xinyang to Huangchuan, and arrived at Zhumadian in Henan through XiXian County, jumping out of the encirclement circle of the Japanese army.
Chiang Kai-shek had always been concerned about the situation of the 71st Army, and when Song Xilian was in Zhumadian and sent a telegram to Chiang Kai-shek that he had jumped out of the Japanese encirclement, Chiang Kai-shek was overjoyed and ordered him to go to Nanyang to rest.
In terms of the overall campaign, the Chinese army fought very passively, but it is necessary to pay attention to what the general idea of the early stage of the War of Resistance was: to block the Japanese army, consume the Japanese army, and win time for the transfer of the rear. From this point of view, the purpose of the Chinese army has been fully achieved.