Anti-Japanese War: Li Yunlong dared to attack Taiyuan

Why don't they laugh?

"Look for yourself."

Li Yunlong handed the delivery list to Fang Zheng. After reading it, Fang Zheng immediately understood why. The transportation capacity was insufficient. The independent column brought more than 15,000 people to attack Datong. Even if the number was doubled, they could not take away so many supplies.

Moreover, they have to carry these supplies and walk on the mountain road for seven days. Seven days is a conservative estimate. It took seven days to walk without too many supplies when they came. If they carry so many supplies, it will take at least ten days or even longer.

The Japanese are not fools. The news of Datong's capture cannot be concealed for long. They will definitely send troops to pursue us. We can't get far with these things.

Just as Fang Zheng was smoking with a sad face, Ding Chengye, the captain of the Fifth Detachment, rushed into the temporary command center with an excited look on his face.

"Commander, Commander, we've made a fortune, we've made a fortune! The supplies in the grain warehouse have been counted!"

When Ding Chengye walked into the headquarters, he saw Li Yunlong and the others smoking with their heads down. They didn't seem excited after hearing about getting rich. He couldn't help but touch his head and said, "Commander, has something big happened? Are the Japanese reinforcements coming? If they do, we'll just fight them back. The food in the warehouse is enough for our independent column to eat for two months!"

Li Yunlong sighed and said, "Tell me, how much food did you find?"

Ding Chengye immediately said excitedly: "Commander, the statistics are out. There are about 220 tons of flour of various kinds, about 230 tons of rice, and various other grains, such as corn, totaling 34 tons. There are about 10 tons of meat, more than 40,000 canned meats of various kinds, and more than 30,000 canned fruits..."

After Ding Chengye finished speaking, he waited expectantly for the expressions of Li Yunlong and others.

I hope to see surprise on their faces.

But why aren't they laughing?

Fang Zheng looked at Ding Chengye and sighed. Wasn't this the same person he was just now? He handed a cigarette to Ding Chengye and said, "Have a smoke first!"

"smokes?"

Ding Chengye was a little confused, and then Fang Zheng handed the list of seized materials in his hand to Ding Chengye, and then handed over the list of 50 tons of steel and a pile of weapons raw materials that he had seized.

After reading it, Ding Chengye rubbed his head and said, "Isn't this good? We've seized so much. Aren't we getting rich?"

"How do we move? You have to carry a ton of food back to our base!"

When these words came out, Ding Chengye was stunned at first, then he silently took out a lighter, lit a cigarette for himself, lowered his head and joined the smoking queue, as if he was really unlucky.

Several people smoked silently and thought about how to deal with the spoils.

The food sounds like a lot, but in fact it only adds up to more than 500 tons of food, which is less than two months' worth of food for 20,000 people, and this is based on the standard that each person consumes only one kilogram of food per day.

This is roughly the food consumption of the 26th Division and the puppet army in Datong City for one month.

Everyone was worried. This was the first time since the establishment of the Independent Column that everyone was worried about having too much spoils of war.

"How about we give some to the people?"

Ding Chengye thought for a moment and spoke slowly.

Li Yunlong looked at Ding Chengye and said, "We can still distribute food, but what about weapons and ammunition?"

Fang Zheng thought for a moment and said, "Commander, how about giving each of our miner guerrillas some weapons and ammunition? There are over 2,000 of them, but only a little over a hundred guns."

Xing Zhiguo glanced at Fang Zheng and slowly spoke, "These captured items are what's left after the miners' guerrillas were given weapons and ammunition. They each have a Type 38 rifle and 100 rounds of ammunition. We also have a reserve of 200,000 rounds of ammunition. They're also equipped with light and heavy machine guns, mortars, and grenade launchers. However, none of them know how to operate the Type 92 infantry gun, so we haven't given them any."

"..."

Just as a little hope was ignited, it was extinguished. After hearing this, Li Yunlong lowered his head again.

At this time, footsteps were heard outside the door. Li Yunlong was very worried. A man rushed in and shouted to him: "Commander, Commander, congratulations on your fortune!"

The other three also turned to look at the door with mixed emotions. They hoped to hear news about getting rich, but they didn't want to hear it either. After all, they already had too much supplies and couldn't take them away.

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief when the newcomer entered the headquarters. Zhao Gang walked in quickly, wiped the sweat from his forehead, picked up Li Yunlong's cup and took a big sip. He glanced at the people sitting on the ground and found a seat to sit down. "Why are you all sitting on the ground? What happened?"

"Old Zhao, how is the situation with the miners now?"

"Everything is stable now. I'm looking for you now to discuss what to do with these miners. If we don't care about them, they will be captured and used as miners when the Japanese come back."

Li Yunlong heard the serious matter and immediately put out his cigarette and asked, "What are your plans?"

Zhao Gang pulled a notebook from his pocket and said, "I'm going to let the miners choose voluntarily. If they want to go home, we'll arrange for them to go home. If they don't want to go home, just follow us. I've taken a look at these miners, and not many meet our conscription standards."

"Most of them are physically weak due to long-term labor and are malnourished. Many of them are also ill. If they were to join the army, they simply wouldn't be able to keep up with the intensity of our team's training."

"How many people are there in total?"

"More than 68,000 people. I found some abandoned mines in several mines. They were full of miners' bodies. The Japanese threw the miners directly into the abandoned mines after they died. If we hadn't acted decisively this time, these miners..."

Zhao Gang didn't continue. Li Yunlong knew very well that if Li Yunlong had not handled it properly, these miners might have died.

However, Li Yunlong also breathed a sigh of relief. These more than 60,000 miners could ease the transportation pressure and allow them to take away some supplies.

Li Yunlong planned to share the remaining supplies with the surrounding friendly forces, and finally give some to the people of Datong. It was not that Li Yunlong was stingy, but if Li Yunlong gave too much, the Japanese would still snatch it back when they returned.

"Let's do as you say. If these miners are willing to go home, we'll give them food to take with them. I'll have the troops make the food into large pancakes and steamed buns so they can carry it more easily. They can't handle carrying more than 20 kilograms of food."

Hearing this, Zhao Gang nodded in agreement and said, "Alright, I just happened to be here to report something else to you. This is what we seized from the warehouse at the mine. We've already counted it. Old Li, congratulations, you've really made a fortune this time!"

"..."

Li Yunlong looked at Zhao Gang. Lao Xing, Fang Zheng, Ding Chengye and others also stared at Zhao Gang.

Then Li Yunlong took the notebook and looked at it, then handed a cigarette to Zhao Gang.

Zhao Gang shook his head and said, "Old Li, I don't smoke."

"You'll be pumping soon!"

Li Yunlong sighed, and finally couldn't escape the words "Congratulations on your wealth".

When I was calculating the attack on Datong, how could I have forgotten that Datong would have so many supplies? It seems that my vision is a bit too narrow. Next time I attack Taiyuan, I must be prepared to transport supplies, otherwise I will face the same situation as today.

Chapter 197 I have a bold idea

"The mine has about 370 tons of various grains."

"Three hundred and seventy-six tons!"

Li Yunlong narrowed his eyes after hearing this number. "With so much food, they'd rather keep it in the warehouse than give it to the miners. These damned devils, have you arranged for the miners' meals? They should have some porridge first, and then slowly move on to other things. Otherwise, if they suddenly overeat due to malnutrition, it's easy to get into trouble."

Zhao Gang nodded and said, "It has been arranged. Let's have some porridge today, and we'll add some meat and other food tomorrow."

"Where did these weapons and ammunition come from?"

"These are all things the Japanese didn't have time to destroy. They are mainly various explosives and bullets. There are not many guns, but there are a lot of bullets."

"The Japanese are afraid that the miners will cause unrest, so they need to prepare more bullets to suppress them. One million rounds of ammunition, an infantry battalion plus more than a thousand puppet soldiers, that's a lot of bullets!"

"Oh, and there's a lot of mining equipment."

Li Yunlong thought for a moment and said, "We'll blow up the large mining equipment directly. We'll keep a few of the small mining equipment and transport them back. We won't leave the large ones to the Japanese if we can't transport them. This way, even if the Japanese want to reopen the mine, it will take time. It can delay them. Besides, it takes time for the Japanese to manufacture these large mining equipment."

Zhao Gang nodded and agreed with Li Yunlong's idea.

However, seeing that Li Yunlong was not overly excited with the list of seized goods in his hand, he couldn't help but ask curiously: "Old Li, why are you not happy with so many seized goods? This is not your style."

The implication is, Li Yunlong, why aren't you laughing?

Li Yunlong looked at the cigarette in Zhao Gang's hand, showing no sign of wanting to light it, and directly handed the rest of the troops' captured spoils to Zhao Gang: "Take a look at this."

Zhao Gang took it and took a look. After a moment of hesitation, he sat down next to Li Yunlong and stretched out his hand, saying, "Old Li, give me a fire."

Li Yunlong handed Zhang Dabiao, no, now it was Li Yunlong's lighter. After Zhao Gang lit the cigarette, he took a puff and then started coughing violently.

After getting used to the spicy smell of tobacco for a while, Zhao Gang put the lighter into his pocket and said, "With so much supplies, we don't have enough people!"

"I'm already annoyed by these things, not to mention the various medical devices and medicines in the hospital. Now I'm afraid of the word 'get rich'!"

"Oh, it's indeed a bit troublesome!" Zhao Gang also sighed and took a deep puff. He really needed to take a couple of puffs to relieve the pain.

Li Yunlong sighed and stood up, saying, "Stop smoking and let's think of a solution together. As long as our thinking doesn't slip, there are always more solutions than problems. If we tell others about our difficulties, we'll be laughed at. What we have now is not a problem, but an exciting worry. Half a year ago, we couldn't even imagine having so many supplies!"

"But today, we were able to seize so much supplies, so we must have a way to transport them out. Come over here and brainstorm. I have a bold idea. Let's hear it out and see if we can give it a try."

Everyone gathered around Li Yunlong, who turned his gaze to Zhao Gang and the others. "We can't confirm whether the Japanese know that Datong has been occupied by us, but before this news spreads, we must transport as much supplies as possible!"

Zhao Gang and the others didn't understand what Li Yunlong meant. Li Yunlong pointed to the train station outside Datong City and said, "There are two trains at the train station. They are used to transport coal. One train can carry four to five hundred tons of supplies!"

Zhao Gang understood what Li Yunlong meant and said, "There are two trains at the mine, also used to load coal!"

"Four trains. We'll use them to transport the supplies out before the Japanese know Datong has been occupied by us!"

Li Yunlong drew a line and said, "Starting from Datong and heading south, after arriving at Taiyuan, you can choose to turn towards Shimen or continue south to Puzhou."

"We just need to transport the supplies through Taiyuan, away from the enemy's noses. That way, we can have the train stop in the area where our troops are operating, and have headquarters send people to transport the supplies away."

"I calculated that four trains can transport a large amount of machinery, food, and ammunition. We can send out the remaining weapons, ammunition, and other items that cannot be taken away. There are also many brother troops around, so we can share them."

After hearing Li Yunlong's words, Zhao Gang and the others thought for a moment and said, "Isn't this a bit risky?"

"Otherwise, these supplies can't be transported away. We can only discard or destroy them. Let's take a risk. If the Japanese find us, we can blow up all these supplies!"

Li Yunlong finally said with gritted teeth that he was definitely reluctant to blow up these supplies, but if this batch of supplies could be transported to the base, it would enable the development of the entire Eighth Route Army to take several steps forward.

Especially the equipment in several factories in Datong, these things are priceless treasures, but it is too difficult to transport them out of the mountains by manpower.

There were also various medical devices and medicines in the hospital, all of which were urgently needed by the base. How many soldiers had died because of lack of medicine? Those were all veterans who had experienced actual combat. If we could save more of them, the combat effectiveness of the troops would also be able to make a qualitative leap.

“I think we can give it a try!”

Finally, after discussing various possibilities, Zhao Gang and others agreed with Li Yunlong's idea. Although it was risky, it was worth a try.

"Gather the staff at the train station and ask them about the departure time of the Japanese trains and the train scheduling. Don't let the Japanese find out about the problem!"

"Yes!"

At this time, Li Yunlong suddenly thought of something.

"Give Shen Quan the power to repair the railway. I almost forgot, but this guy demolished the railway!"

Shen Quan's battle plan was reported to Li Yunlong. After reading it, Li Yunlong praised Shen Quan: "Damn it, Shen Quan is a genius. He can come up with such a good plan. Promote it to all railway guerrillas in the future. Just fight like this and make all the Japanese trains derail."

Soon, Shen Quan received Li Yunlong's telegram.

"Building a railway?"

Shen Quan was stunned after reading the contents of the telegram. Wasn't it agreed to block the enemy reinforcements? He had finally destroyed the railway, and now he wanted to repair it again?

"Let's go and re-lay the tracks."

Although Shen Quan didn't understand what Li Yunlong was going to do, he still ordered the troops to move down the fake railroad tracks as required in the telegram, and then reinstall the removed railroad tracks.

However, Li Yunlong sent a second telegram, urging Shen Quan to repair the railway completely, as the independent column would use it.

At the same time, the cavalry battalion was chasing the defeated Japanese troops in the direction north of Datong. Ma Chengfeng stared at the few Japanese soldiers in front. There were many defeated Japanese troops along the way, and there were relatively few soldiers in the cavalry battalion, so many of them escaped and ran away for a distance.