Rebirth: I am in Jin-Cha-Ji

"Let's talk about it when we get back. We've wasted too much time. The 8th Independent Mixed Brigade from Gubeikou has already entered Huailai and engaged the 16th Regiment. If we lose too much time here, the 16th Regiment will be under great pressure."

"Row."

After taking Xuanhua, it will take time to take the things away.

The Eighth Column was able to capture Xiahuayuan and Xuanhua in quick succession because it created a time gap. The troops stationed in Mongolia had been severely damaged and had not yet recovered. However, the Japanese army's combat effectiveness was undeniable.

Although the 8th Independent Mixed Brigade had just been formed, more than 3,000 people were dispatched this time.

Even if there are losses in the middle, the main force still exists.

The pressure on the Sixteenth Regiment to stop them was enormous. Therefore, Wang Qiuyun and Wei Hongjun had to act quickly and evacuate as soon as possible. The evacuation from Xuanhua was much faster than that from Xiahuayuan. This was because there were far fewer people to evacuate from Xuanhua.

There are also many people in Xuanhua who are willing to evacuate together.

It was not until March 3 that the entire army completely left Xuanhua.

"Old Wang, I have an idea. You should think about it."

"whats the matter?"

"My idea is that we build four main bases for the Eighth Column. One base in Ninggao Town, one base in Longyanchi, one base in Xuanzhuohuai, and one base in Changwanshan (Changping, Wanping, Fangshan). Currently, the Ninggao Town base is under the command of the Chaxi Detachment, and the Longyanchi base is under the command of the Chadong Detachment. However, the Xuanzhuohuai and Changwanshan bases lack a unified command."

"You mean to establish a detachment that can be under unified command."

"Hmm. What do you think?"

"I agree. Let's discuss the specifics when we get back."

"it is good."

Chapter 224 Four Bases

“从下花园和宣化来到根据地的总人口16758人。其中国军俘虏4700人左右，被日军所抓民夫4900人左右，自愿加入我八路军的工人、医生、老师及其家属5200来人。还有投奔我八路军的下花园和宣化等地农民有870人左右，投奔我八路军的张家口周围学生480人左右，俘虏伪军440来人。还有200多被俘八路军。”

At the headquarters of the 18th Regiment, the 8th Column held an impromptu meeting.

Li Shiping, deputy commander of the 8th Column, introduced the situation of this large-scale migration of personnel to everyone.

"Have all the personnel been arranged?"

"Make proper arrangements based on their physical conditions. For those whose physical conditions prevent them from continuing to travel south, we will arrange arrangements nearby to allow them to recover first."

Li Shiping is no longer the weak scholar he was a year and a half ago.

I have been with the army for a year and a half, and have been responsible for propaganda, conscription, and land reclamation. Now I am in charge of the logistics of the column, and I have grown a lot.

Although a large number of people were evacuated this time, Li Shiping worked with local officials to arrange for everyone.

"At this moment, the reason for holding this meeting is to discuss the column's next work plan. Let's first talk about the situation of these people. Now that we have brought them out, what should we do next?"

"Political Commissar, we originally formulated the plan to attack Xiahuayuan because Xiahuayuan had manpower. Chahar, as a whole, still has too few people. If our Eighth Column wants to expand its forces, it will be limited not only by weapons, ammunition, and food, but also by Chahar's population situation. A batch of manpower as good as this one is truly rare. So my suggestion is that the Eighth Column increase its establishment by three regiments.

Xiao Yongshi, deputy commander of the 8th Column, spoke.

Expanding the military isn't a game. You can't just tap your finger and churn out troops. There are actually many limiting factors. Lack of weapons and ammunition, and insufficient logistical supplies, all severely hamper expansion.

Just like the Pingxi Detachment before.

Poor.

Especially when there's no food. Even without guns or cannons, one can still go out to fight with swords and spears, seizing weapons, ammunition, and ammunition from the enemy. But without food, there's no way to expand the army. Because the troops are all off-duty, without food, they can't be fed. This was the situation of the Pingxi Detachment at the time.

The land they controlled was poor, and grain production was too low, leaving them with no food to support their troops. Otherwise, why would the Fourth Column have surrendered the Jidong troops they had brought to the base area to the First Division and the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei Military Region, leaving only 3,000 men behind? Simply put, there were too many men, and the Fourth Column simply couldn't afford to support them.

There is another restraining factor, which is population.

In areas with small populations, military expansion presents a barrier. You can't draft all the young and middle-aged men into the military. If you do that, who will farm the land and provide food for the base? Chahar is a typical example of a small population. The entire Chahar region has a population of only about three million.

The Eighth Column has grown to its current size and is beginning to reach this bottleneck.

If the Eighth Column wants to continue expanding its army, the underpopulation of Chahar will continue to affect it. To overcome this situation, the Eighth Column is also actively expanding its base area to increase its population. The current batch of soldiers in Xiahuayuan is very important to the Eighth Column.

"Three regiments? Do we have enough weapons and ammunition?"

"It depends on the type of regiment. If it's a small regiment of 1,000 men, the column can easily handle the weapons and ammunition problem. If it's a regiment of 2,000 men, the column should be able to handle the weapons and ammunition for two regiments. If the standards are slightly lowered, then equipping three regiments will be no problem.

But a regiment of 3,000 men doesn't have the strength to reorganize into a column."

Li Shiping answered.

The Eighth Column wanted to reorganize three new regiments, and the problem of weapons and ammunition began to become serious.

"Three regiments, two thousand strong. We've put so much effort into getting so many people from Xiahuayuan this time, we can't let them all go to waste. We don't have the strength to form a large regiment of three thousand men right now. We can still handle a regiment of twelve companies in the Eighth Column."

Wang Qiuyun didn't want to waste such a good source of troops.

Small regiments of a thousand men were out of the question. Such small regiments couldn't even accommodate the rescued Kuomintang prisoners. And regiments like the 16th and 18th, with over 3,000 men, were something the 8th Column couldn't currently afford.

Then we will form twelve companies, a regiment of more than 2,000 people.

Wei Hongjun nodded.

He supported Wang Qiuyun's idea and said, "Yes, with three main battalions under its command, and each main battalion under its command having four companies, a regiment of twelve companies is just right. The column is short of weapons and ammunition, so we should first allocate some weapons and ammunition from other units below. If the column has three more regiments of more than 2,000 people, it will be a good thing for the entire column. If any base needs support, the column can send them a main regiment."

If the Eighth Column can form three more main regiments, then the strength of the Eighth Column will be able to leap forward again. In particular, the three newly formed main regiments are not new recruits, but troops with a large number of officers and veterans.

Therefore, the three groups must be established.

"Then it's settled. Comrade Chu He will be responsible for forming these three new regiments."

Wei Hongjun mentioned the name of Chu He, the deputy political commissar of the 8th Column.

Wei Hongjun has also trained many political cadres in the Eighth Column over the years.

However, the Eighth Column was so short of cadres that all the trained cadres had to go to the army. For example, the two political cadres that Wei Hongjun valued most were Lu Weisheng, who was sent to the Ninggao Town Detachment as deputy political commissar, and Zhang Chao, who was sent to the 34th Regiment as political commissar.

There are too few cadres who can take charge of things independently.

Therefore, the task of forming three new regiments was given to Chu He. Chu He was one of the leaders of the Yidong Uprising, responsible for liaison and command of the Jidong Guerrilla Corps, and later led and participated in the reorganization of the Jidong Guerrilla Corps.

"Yes."

"Besides this, the Commander and I have another matter we'd like to discuss. We're going to form the Cha'nan Detachment, which will be responsible for the Xuanzhuhuai Base Area. We're going to form the Pingbei Detachment, which will be responsible for the Changwanshan Base Area. This is primarily to unify the leadership structures of the Xuanzhuhuai and Changwanshan Base Areas."

“Political Commissar, it is imperative to strengthen unified leadership in some base areas.

Our base area is now large, and direct command by the column poses many problems. I support the formation of the Cha'nan and Pingbei detachments.

"support."

"support."

Why did the Eighth Route Army allow each unit to develop independently?

A major reason for this was poor communications. With the Eighth Route Army's current communications capabilities, even after the battles on the front lines had concluded, headquarters might not even receive news of the fighting. Under these circumstances, many units were left to develop on their own.

The same goes for the Eight Verticals.

When the 8th Column consisted of only a few battalions or regiments, the column headquarters could directly command these units in combat. However, as the 8th Column expanded in size and staffing, direct command of these units became impossible. At most, the column headquarters could formulate broad strategies, but specific matters such as how the units would fight and how they would develop were left to the individual units.

But still the same sentence.

The Eighth Route Army was a regular armed force led by the Communist Party of China, not an undisciplined group of bandits. Therefore, while releasing them, leadership must also be strengthened. One way to do this was to strengthen the leadership structures on the front lines to implement orders from above.

Everyone knows this.

Seeing that everyone supported it, Wei Hongjun said, "To establish the Cha'nan Detachment, I propose that Comrade Zhang Zihua, commander of the 16th Regiment, serve as commander and political commissar of the detachment, Comrade Wu Qinghe, commander of the 18th Regiment, serve as deputy commander of the detachment, and Comrade Lei Jiabin, political commissar of the th Regiment, serve as deputy political commissar and director of the political department of the detachment. Comrade Guo Lin will serve as commander of the th Regiment, Comrade Guo Yonghuai, director of the political department of the th Regiment, will serve as political commissar of the th Regiment, and Comrade Zhang Shan will serve as deputy commander of the th Regiment. Comrade Li Wanfu will serve as commander of the th Regiment, Comrade Yu Ping will serve as political commissar of the th Regiment, and Comrade Sun Jiahe will serve as deputy commander of the th Regiment.

The current Eighth Route Army has not yet fully formed a party committee system.

In other words, in the current Eighth Route Army, the military and political leaders could directly decide the army's affairs. It was not until the Liberation War that the Party Committee system gradually became the general decision-making system in the army.

Wang Qiuyun and Wei Hongjun had already discussed the personnel arrangements for the newly established detachment and its subordinate regiments, and they were basically finalized. However, Wei Hongjun had been strengthening the Party Committee within the Eighth Column.

So even if he and Wang Qiuyun had already reached a tacit understanding, he still had to get the consent of the column’s party committee.

No one has any objection to this.

So it passed quickly.

Wei Hongjun continued, "To establish the Pingbei Detachment, I propose that Comrade Xiao Yongshi serve as the commander and political commissar of the Pingbei Detachment. Comrade Xiao Yongshi, what do you think?"

"I obey orders."

Of course Xiao Yongshi would not object.

He had come to the Eighth Column with the intention of fighting. However, the Column was short of cadres, so Xiao Yongshi was responsible for running the training corps and the Chanan Cadre School. Now, both the Chanan Cadre School and the training corps are starting to get on track. Xiao Yongshi no longer needs to be in charge.

Of course Xiao Yongshi wanted to go out and fight.

Wang Qiuyun and Wei Hongjun were also unwilling to let Xiao Yongshi, a talent who was capable of standing on his own, continue to stay in the headquarters.

Chapter 225 Equivalent Exchange

Wang Qiuyun and Wei Hongjun were already prepared for Japanese retaliation.

After all, the Xiahuayuan Campaign launched by the 8th Column made the entire North China lively for a while.

But no.

The Japanese army truly lacked the manpower to retaliate. The 8th Independent Mixed Brigade, exhausted from the journey, arrived in Huailai and engaged in several battles with the 16th Regiment, suffering heavy casualties. The 16th Regiment was known for its ferocity.

Of course, this is mainly because the 8th Independent Mixed Brigade was just established, and it has only been a month.

If it weren't for the order from the North China Front Command, a unit like this wouldn't be able to go out to fight for two or three months. They'd marched hundreds of miles, constantly harassed by the Eighth Route Army and suffering heavy casualties. They'd arrived in Huailai and engaged in several head-on battles with the 16th Regiment.

Although they completely drove the 16th Regiment away from the Pingsui Road, they also suffered heavy casualties and did not want to continue south to pursue the 16th Regiment.

The other Independent Mixed Brigade No. 9 was originally scheduled to come to Zhangjiakou.

But Fu Zuoyi's 35th Army was very cautious in Jining.

The impact was no less than the 8th Column's attack on a few county towns; it could be argued that it far surpassed it. For the North China Front Army, Fu Zuoyi's forces posed a far greater threat. If they were not defeated, the entire Suiyuan region would have fallen under Fu Zuoyi's control. Consequently, the 9th Independent Mixed Brigade and other surrounding units, including the puppet Mongolian Cavalry Division originally deployed to support Zhangjiakou, retreated. They launched a joint attack and recaptured Jining from Fu Zuoyi.

Not only that, the Japanese army gathered heavy troops and began to pursue Fu Zuoyi's troops.

Fu Zuoyi's troops were driven back into Wuyuan. The Japanese and puppet troops successively controlled important cities in Suiyuan such as Guisui and Baotou.

However, although the Japanese and puppet troops suppressed Fu Zuoyi's troops in Suiyuan, Fu Zuoyi's 35th Army was really very fierce.

The two sides fought several times in Suiyuan. Although the 35th Army was always retreating, it also dealt a heavy blow to the Japanese and puppet troops.

Meanwhile, Datong had just seen some movement. The First Division's troops, combined with the 19th Regiment, totaled four main military region regiments. Together with the First Division's local forces, they swept across the Yanbei region. The First Division's troops had once again advanced into East Datong, even storming the Datong coal mines and rescuing thousands of miners.

Wei Hongjun, the old leader, always takes advantage of any opportunity he sees.

As long as he is given a chance, he will never let it go.