Chapter 54: The Brigade Commander's Order

Afternoon of October 26, 1938, Headquarters of the Provisional 2nd Division in Qifeng County.

"Brother Wang, it is genuinely difficult to get into your territory." Li Yunlong complained while holding a somewhat crude temporary residence permit. Just moments ago, Li Ya had intercepted Li Yunlong and his entourage at the western checkpoint of Qifeng County, forcing Li Yunlong to obtain a temporary residence permit and compelling him to leave one of his guards' rifles as collateral with Li Ya. As for Li Yunlong's own sidearm, they refused to accept it outright.

This was simply because Wang Yue wanted to put on a show; otherwise, the entire reinforced company brought by Li Yunlong would have been forced to get temporary residence permits, and without a thousand silver dollars, they could forget about it. Earlier, the standoff between Li Yunlong and Li Ya, along with Li Yunlong "backing down," had all been photographed. These pictures would soon be sensationalized in the newspapers of the rear areas with headlines like "The United Front is in Peril," "The Eighth Route Army Actively Provokes Friction," "My Provisional 2nd Division's Garrison Attacked by the Main Force of the Eighth Route Army," and "The Misdeeds of Eighth Route Bandit Li Yunlong." That would guarantee to please that person at the Military Affairs Commission.

"Neither Qifeng County nor the Provisional 2nd Division is something I can decide entirely on my own. Combined with the recent rampant Japanese spies, we had to implement this 'temporary residence permit' system. It is no big deal, isn't it just six silver dollars? Next time, I will give you sixty extra rounds of ammunition." Wang Yue gently patted Li Yunlong's shoulder, his face full of helplessness.

"Well, Brother Wang, our brigade commander has already agreed to take a loan from your esteemed forces. I even brought the IOU right here." Li Yunlong did not dwell on the trivial details. After all, he had serious business to attend to this time, so he forced a smile and pulled three promissory notes from his chest pocket. Thirty thousand silver dollars! He, old Li, had never even held thirty silver dollars in his pocket combined.

"Hiss, thirty thousand silver dollars, your brigade commander is truly making a bold move." Wang Yue looked through the promissory notes one by one. Honestly, even if he used this stuff to play the Military Affairs Commission, he could keep them. In the future, as long as he or his descendants held these pieces of paper, they could still go collect the debt. Several of these guarantors would actually live well into the 21st century. Forget it, it was better not to get too entangled with them.

"It is indeed a bit much, but who can blame us Eighth Route Army for being poor?" Li Yunlong felt a little guilty too. The brigade commander's original intention was that if worst came to worst, borrowing for just one note would suffice, but for the artillery promised by the brigade commander, he genuinely wanted to take all thirty thousand silver dollars back.

"Fine then. However, the prices must be set according to my terms, considering that I am taking a risk by lending weapons to you." Wang Yue thought for a moment and nodded in agreement. Thirty thousand silver dollars—given that person's affection for the brigade commander, there should be no problem. This deal was definitely profitable.

"That is not a problem at all. We all trust Brother Wang's character." Li Yunlong nodded repeatedly, not forgetting to flatter Wang Yue.

Next, the two began a round of repeated bargaining. At the height of the tension, Li Yunlong even slammed the table, startling Li Wula outside the door so much that he rushed in with his men. Fortunately, everyone kept their sanity, preventing a fight from breaking out. However, this also gave Wang Yue a fresh understanding of Li Yunlong's hot-tempered dog of a personality; perhaps ending up the way he eventually did was not entirely without reason.

Finally, the two sides managed to finalize the order:

2,500 Hanyang-made old-pattern rifles at 40 silver dollars each, totaling 100,000 silver dollars.

The total number of old-pattern rifles Wang Yue had on hand was only 2,400. The extra hundred came from broken rifles inspected over the past few days. Actually, they did not have any major flaws; some just had slightly bent barrels, which could be straightened out by hammering them back and firing a couple of heavy-load rounds.

13 Hanyang-made 57mm mountain guns at 8,000 silver dollars each, totaling 104,000 silver dollars.
600 rounds of 57mm high-explosive grenades (included as a gift).

Wang Yue felt a bit guilty calling these things high-explosive grenades because the explosive charge inside the shells was simply too small. After Du Gui took apart a few rounds, he found that the explosive charge inside the shell was only 100 grams—about the same as a slightly larger grenade, though a grenade could never match their range and accuracy.

100 Sichuan-made 47mm mortars at 300 silver dollars each, totaling 30,000 silver dollars.
3,000 rounds of 47mm mortar shells (included as a gift).

100 Type 10 grenade dischargers at 400 silver dollars each, totaling 40,000 silver dollars.
2 Shanxi-made Type 38 heavy machine guns at 1,200 silver dollars each, totaling 2,400 silver dollars.
4 Saint-Étienne 1907 heavy machine guns at 1,000 silver dollars each, totaling 4,000 silver dollars.
1 "Old Yellow Ox" heavy machine gun at 1,000 silver dollars (priced at 1,200 silver dollars in the total, totaling 1,000 silver dollars).
197 crates of Mawei grenades (30 pieces per crate) at 30 silver dollars per crate, totaling 5,910 silver dollars.
20 Dagu-made MP18 7.63mm submachine guns at 80 silver dollars each, totaling 1,600 silver dollars.
3,000 sets of Year 1-style military uniforms at 3 silver dollars per set, totaling 9,000 silver dollars.
2,000 conical bamboo hats (included as a gift).
2,000 straw rain capes (included as a gift).
8,000 pairs of straw sandals (included as a gift).

Total: 300,510 silver dollars.

This price could not be called cheap, but it was definitely not expensive. For the current Eighth Route Army, even Sichuan-made single-shot rifles were good things, let alone the weapons in Wang Yue's hands—especially the artillery. As long as these Hanyang-made 57mm mountain guns made their debut, every single Japanese stronghold across North China would need to be upgraded. Previously, the Eighth Route Army's frequent use of 37mm autocannons had already made life very difficult for the Japanese. Just as they finally planned out reinforcement schemes and spent a fortune implementing them, they would find out it was still entirely useless.

The caliber and firepower of the Sichuan-made 47mm mortars were far inferior to the Japanese grenade dischargers, but the ammunition for these small mortars was cheaper than that used by the Japanese dischargers. The border region's arsenal would soon be able to produce it themselves, and even if a company had only one, it could play a massive role.

The Type 10 grenade discharger was also a good piece of equipment. Dedicated grenades were hard to come by, but Type 91 grenades were easy to get. A slightly shorter range did not matter; it still reached nearly two hundred meters, which was a vast improvement over the past.

The Saint-Étienne 1907 heavy machine gun indeed had a poor reputation, but the versions of this machine gun in China were all chambered in 7.92mm, making their performance much better than the original 8mm ammunition. Therefore, a large part of this machine gun's bad reputation was caused by that bizarre original cartridge—the exact same situation occurred with the Chauchat light machine gun.

When that batch of Chauchat light machine guns was first tested using imported ammunition, jamming occurred occasionally, but it was still much better than the original 8mm ammunition. After switching to reduced-load ammunition produced by a domestic military arsenal, they basically stopped jamming. Most of the time, the barrel had to become red-hot before any problems arose. As for the criticism of a slow rate of firing, one could only chuckle; given the Nationalist army's supply situation, if you dared to equip them with MG42 machine guns, they would dare to smash them to pieces.

The rifles were also enough to equip ten baseline regiments. By equipping ten regiments in one go, the Eighth Route Army's offensive capabilities across the entire North China battlefield would be greatly enhanced. Consequently, the Japanese would be forced to reassess the combat effectiveness of the Eighth Route Army, and many previously formulated combat plans would have to be adjusted accordingly.