Miao Junzhang laughed, "Commander Liu, there's no need to pretend. At this time, no matter what color the troops are, the ones who can fight the devils are the good ones.

"They are the troops we soldiers need.

"The 'color' issue can be handled by the people at the top after the devils are driven away.

"We soldiers only need to think about driving out the invaders."

Liu Xing also remembered, "Brother Miao is right, the country is shattered, and the capital is lost. This is not the time to be restricted by 'color' issues."

While these officers were discussing, Lin Fan was operating his artillery, extending the barrage to the tail end of the cavalry formation.

The Japanese cavalry, who had just launched a well-coordinated charge, had now ceased their attack.

The survivors were now struggling to survive. Unlike the infantry, they moved like the wind when charging and retreated with the swiftness of rabbits.

Unlike the infantry of the 58th and 65th Regiments, they had a brief respite when the planes were in the air.

Unfortunately, this brief period was not enough for them to break through the Guoding defense line.

When the sky returned to silence, the infantry's hard times returned.

Under the fierce bombardment of the National Army's artillery, no matter how brave these infantrymen were, they had to stop their charge and lie down on the spot.

Those who stood and charged were much more likely to be injured by the shrapnel from exploding shells.

Momohara Mitsuo, the captain of the Japanese tank battalion, suddenly felt the ground trembling again.

The defenders' firepower had intensified.

The cries for help, groans, and reports of injuries coming from the radio assaulted his ears.

More than half of the tanks in the entire formation had been damaged, and the enemy's artillery fire was only intensifying.

This forced him to make a difficult decision: retreat!

After giving the order, Momohara Mitsuo, as the battalion commander, immediately set an example.

Leading the charge, he began to turn left, preparing to retreat and withdraw from the defenders' artillery bombardment zone.

The road to retreat was not easy either: it was full of shell craters, and sometimes they would encounter tanks from their own unit, destroyed and blocking the road.

This made Captain Momohara Mitsuo's journey home very difficult and tortuous.

Standing on the high Xiaoshan gun tower, Lin Fan watched as the fastest charging Japanese cavalry formation collapsed.

He began to select the most valuable targets to strike. From any perspective, Momohara Mitsuo's tank battalion was the most valuable target at this time.

Lin Fan also saw that these most valuable targets were already starting to flee.

Without hesitation, Lin Fan's first targets were those tanks that were fleeing the fastest.

Although Momohara Mitsuo was the one who gave the order and was the first to turn around, he was not the one who escaped the farthest. Because he was at the front, those who were slower to react but were far behind him during the charge were now ahead of him.

Kato Eitaro was an ordinary tanker in Momohara Mitsuo's tank battalion.

Since joining this battle, he had been following Captain Momohara Mitsuo, charging all the way, always victorious.

Therefore, he never questioned the captain's orders.

All the tankers in the battalion had absolute trust in Captain Momohara Mitsuo. They believed that the captain could lead them to victory! Victory! Continuous victory!

Inoue Yuta and the others thought the same way.

Just now, when Kato Eitaro received the captain's second retreat order this afternoon, Kato Eitaro's position was very good.

There were wide roads on both sides for him to turn around, so he turned to the left.

Just as he turned around, he saw Inoue Yuta's tank hit by a shell and immediately burst into flames.

Kato Eitaro stopped in shock, confirming that he was not seeing things, and confirming that no one had opened the hatch and escaped from Inoue Yuta's tank.

Poor Inoue-kun, he had been turned into grilled meat just like that, leaving behind his beautiful wife and a beautiful daughter.

Kato Eitaro's heart was both worried about his own fate and missing the two photos that Inoue Yuta had shown him.

The economic situation inside the empire was not good right now, and he wondered how Inoue-kun's wife and daughter would be able to survive.

For the first time, Kato Eitaro harbored a complaint against Captain Momohara Mitsuo: if the retreat order had been issued and consistently followed the first time they were bombed here.

He would have been resting in a safe place long ago.

He wouldn't be like this now, not knowing whether he would be hit by the defenders' artillery in the next second.

Although such a possibility was very low!

Kato Eitaro knew that tanks like his were not easily hit on the battlefield.

Not to mention that he was deliberately driving in a zigzag pattern to escape, which was the safest way.

Inoue Yuta must have wanted to escape the artillery bombardment range as quickly as possible.

As a result, he was hit by the defenders.

After Lin Fan fired the first shot at those tanks, he never stopped.

Those tanks that were running the fastest during the retreat were now Lin Fan's primary targets.

Then came the sequential targeting.

From Lin Fan's current position to the Japanese tanks, the distance was as much as six kilometers. At such a long distance, the shells would take nearly eight seconds to fly through the air.

Therefore, hitting those tanks accurately required leading the target.

Lin Fan encountered a tank that was not driving straight.

After aiming at the position where he estimated it would be in eight seconds and firing,

The tank actually veered sideways.

His shell missed for the first time today.

Lin Fan had a very good attitude and did not keep staring at it because of the tank's cunning.

On the contrary, Lin Fan was like taking an exam, temporarily putting the difficult problem aside.

He would do the easier ones first and leave this cunning devil for last.

Kato Eitaro was not a selfish person. He had already shared his zigzag maneuvering technique on the radio.

It couldn't be blamed on the entire Momohara Mitsuo battalion; they really had no experience in escaping.

Although they had experience being bombarded by the National Army's artillery, it had never been this dense and intense.

Therefore, their maneuvering had always been to rush straight at the target. As for escaping, today was the first time.

This zigzag maneuvering was not difficult!

It only took a word, and those who understood understood.

Those who didn't understand were all dead!

Lin Fan looked at the five tanks maneuvering in zigzag patterns in the distance and couldn't help but smile wryly.

He remembered when he was training at the shooting range, even though there were missiles and infrared automatic tracking and other high-tech products.

His company commander still required everyone to use artillery shells to strike the Blue Army's attacking tanks.

The Blue Army tanks' maneuvering at that time was much fancier than the Japanese tanks' maneuvering.

After all, the speed and maneuverability of tanks in later generations were many times stronger than the tanks of this era.

Lin Fan aimed at a tank that had just made a turn and calculated the lead.

Once again, he scored a direct hit, and there were only two Japanese tanks left.

Of the five tanks that had been remaining just now, two others had been destroyed by other shells.

Momohara Mitsuo watched as the tanks in front of him were constantly being hit. On his journey home, he had seen almost all the tanks in the entire tank battalion.

Those tanks only had one thing in common: they were all stopped in place, no longer moving.

Momohara Mitsuo, of course, knew what that meant.

Now, only Kato Eitaro was in front of him.

He was the one who had suggested driving in a zigzag pattern, which could effectively avoid the enemy's precise strikes.

However, such maneuvering would waste too much time and would also make the tanks stay in the enemy's artillery bombardment range for a longer time, which also meant more opportunities to be hit.

As Momohara Mitsuo was thinking this, he saw Kato Eitaro's tank suddenly stop.

Then he saw a plume of smoke coming from the tank.

Captain Momohara Mitsuo had seen this situation too many times today. He silently mourned for Kato Eitaro.

He knew that it was his turn next.

The entire battalion's tanks had been destroyed by the National Army. They would definitely not let him go.

Sure enough, just as Momohara Mitsuo realized this, he felt the entire tank shake violently.

Then, the entire tank was filled with all kinds of fragments flying around.

Many fragments struck Captain Momohara Mitsuo and the other three crew members in his tank.

In an instant, these people lost their lives.

Everyone on the entire battlefield, everyone watching from afar, breathed a sigh of relief after seeing all the tanks destroyed, regardless of whether they were friend or foe.

Commander Liu Xing pointed to the battlefield and said, "With this kind of fighting, we can defend Jiangyin for a very long time."

Army Commander Miao Zhengliu nodded with a smile, expressing his agreement.

Today, whether it was against the Japanese navy, the Japanese air force, or the current battle with the Japanese infantry.

The National Army had demonstrated good combat qualities and had achieved an unprecedented victory.

Although the battle at the front had not yet ended, the victory was already obvious.

Just now, when the Japanese tanks began to retreat, all the artillery on the entire gun tower was firing at the Japanese tanks.

Now that the tanks had been destroyed, these cannons began to bombard the Japanese infantry again.

The battle was not over yet, and Lin Fan certainly could not stop.

He just made a slight adjustment and started bombarding the Japanese infantry again.

At this time, Luo Yibin, the commander of the 613th Regiment, had already ordered, "Blow the horn! Charge!"

At this time, the Japanese planes had fled, and the Japanese tanks were finished.

The Japanese infantry was running away. Luo Yibin certainly didn't want to just watch those Japanese infantry run away without launching a charge.

The spirit of beating a dog in the water was essential.

There was no need to have any sympathy for a drowning dog.

Lin Fan always fought the Japanese, from large targets to small targets, from far to near.

Because he was afraid that if he attacked the Japanese nearby, those Japanese in the distance who were about to rush out of range would escape.

That would be Lin Fan's biggest regret.

Therefore, Lin Fan's cannon had been drawing a line for all the Japanese infantry at the farthest distance he could see.

The Japanese north of this line should not think about leaving once they came.

The Japanese south of this line could leave without him seeing them off.

Sasaki Doichi, the commander of the Japanese 58th Regiment, stood in the distance, watching his cavalry battalion lose at least two-thirds of its strength.

He didn't know where to vent the pain and anger in his heart.

The cavalry battalion of Nakayo Tatsuya, the commander of the 65th Regiment, suffered no less than the 58th Regiment.

The two regimental commanders looked at each other. Neither was any better than the other.

They watched the cavalry scatter and flee. At this time, the cavalry had been frightened out of their wits.

At least today, it was impossible to organize another attack.

In fact, Sasaki Doichi and Nakayo Tatsuya were also frightened.

Even if they could attack now, they would not dare to order it.

The orders they were giving now were the same: "Retreat! Let all the troops retreat."

As their orders were relayed, the infantry was retreating, and the tanks were also retreating.

The two regimental commanders kept watching those tanks. As the main attack force, only a dozen of the thirty-odd tanks were still struggling to survive in the smoke-filled battlefield.

They saw that those tanks had turned their direction, with their turrets facing the way they had come, and were trying to rush out of the artillery bombardment range.

It was obvious that the defenders had also discovered the tankers' intentions.

This time, the defenders were very unfriendly to the tanks!

Unlike how they treated the cavalry, as long as the cavalry scattered and ran away, they would no longer continue to attack.

The defenders treated the tanks with the intention of exterminating them, concentrating all their artillery fire on the tanks and temporarily abandoning the attack on the infantry.

Even if the defenders abandoned the artillery bombardment of the infantry, Sasaki Doichi and Nakayo Tatsuya still issued the order to continue retreating.

They did not dare to launch an attack just like that. The artillery fire of the Jiangyin defenders was too fierce.

In the eyes of the two regimental commanders, the tanks that were trying hard to escape were being hit, set on fire, and exploding one after another.

When the last tank was blown up, the two regiments gasped. Lieutenant Colonel Tanaka Goroku was probably going to be angry enough to vomit blood this time.

Division Commander Ogisu Rippei would definitely not let go of these defenders of the Jiangyin Fortress.

The two regimental commanders did not realize that they had no intention of relying on their own regiments to come and take revenge.

In their subconscious minds, they already had the idea that the defenders of the Jiangyin Fortress were invincible.

Therefore, they did not dare to have the idea of coming to take revenge.

Kitahara Sota, a squad leader, was just a squad leader under the 3rd Company, 2nd Battalion of the 58th Regiment of the Japanese 13th Division.

Since arriving at the Shanghai battlefield with the battalion, his experience had been the same as all the soldiers: constantly fighting, constantly advancing.

Although sometimes there would be injuries and deaths in his squad.

However, such situations were rare, and the casualties were also very small.

Therefore, Squad Leader Kitahara Sota was very willing to advance and very willing to participate in the charging formation.

Those who were serving as the vanguard of the entire regiment would receive some preferential treatment when they conquered towns.

For example, they were allowed to enter some areas first to search, pick up some spoils of war, or enjoy the local customs.

The people from the military law department would definitely not come to manage them.

Of course, the most lucrative thing to do was to go out and search the villages. This was the best easy job.

They would simply surround the entire village and then do whatever they wanted.

The only thing they had to do after doing it was to erase the entire village.

This was an unwritten rule: in the villages in the countryside, they could do whatever they wanted, but they had to erase the entire village after doing it.

Many soldiers had to be brave enough on the battlefield in order to fight for such opportunities.

The soldiers in Kitahara Sota's squad had already erased two such villages.

Having tasted the sweetness! Therefore, after Kitahara Sota's squad went to the battlefield, they did not need his command as a squad leader at all. These soldiers would bravely move forward.

They would strive for the right to search a small village next time.

However, the situation was a little different today: although Kitahara Sota's squad was still charging at the very front of the entire regiment.

However, after charging for a while, Squad Leader Kitahara Sota discovered that the defenders' artillery fire was a little different.

In the past, the 150mm howitzers would only provide artillery support for their own troops when they attacked.

Today, it was the first time they had endured the bombardment of such large-caliber artillery.

Squad Leader Kitahara Sota also discovered that the 150mm shells were not the largest caliber shells fired by the defenders.

Judging from the craters blasted in the ground, the caliber of this shell was probably 300mm.

When did the National Army have such powerful artillery?

Squad Leader Kitahara Sota had doubts in his heart, but this did not affect the attack of his squad.

The stronger the opponent, the more their own strength could be displayed.

That was what Squad Leader Kitahara Sota thought in his heart.

His squad was following behind a tank: in reality, it was useless now.

The defenders' bullets could not reach here, and the tank could not play the role of blocking bullets either.

Although he was thinking this in his heart, Squad Leader Kitahara Sota still honestly followed behind the tank.

He constantly changed direction from left to right, and then from right to left, observing the situation ahead.

He needed to find the best offensive route before launching the charge.

It was because he was good at thinking that the record of the entire Kitahara Sota squad had always been one of the best in the entire regiment.

Now he had already seen it: there was a river ahead, and the defenders had established a defense line on the opposite bank of the river.

There was only a stone bridge for passage on the river.

Judging from the wide roads on both sides of the stone bridge, this bridge could withstand the crushing of tanks.

Why didn't the defenders destroy this bridge?

Kitahara Sota had another question in his heart.

From his current position, he could not see the entire river. He needed to get closer to formulate a specific attack direction.

However, he had already ruled out the idea of rushing over the bridge in the first place.

Too many people had walked the easy path.

Kitahara Sota preferred to not walk the road if he saw one.

Just as he was thinking this, the empire's warplanes flew over in the sky.