Chapter 67 Evacuation from Great River City 1

November 11, 1938. Office of the 2nd Provisional Division in Jiangcheng.

Wang Yue stood on the roof of the office building, gazing out at the distant river surface. Watching the columns of smoke continually drifting westward, he felt a complex mixture of emotions. Because of his intervention, Jiangcheng had not fallen on October 27, but it had merely bought another half-month of time. Yet one should never underestimate this half-month; with this window, more supplies and personnel could be evacuated to the rear, preserving more of the nation's vitality for the future War of Resistance.

"Division Commander, the artillery battery has been evacuated." At that moment, Zhou Weiguo's voice rang out. The Japanese fleet had completed its preliminary mine-sweeping and was advancing toward Jiangcheng at high speed, supported by naval aviation. Continuing to hold the riverside batteries was pointless, so the navy had abandoned the final riverside battery according to plan.

"Keep a close eye on the situation at the airfield. Let's move out!" Wang Yue nodded. The personnel and supplies that needed to be transported away had long since been sent off. Only ten men remained here in Jiangcheng, along with a Boeing 247 and two pilots at the airfield.

The commander of the engineering company responsible for demolishing the riverside battery was an alumnus and junior schoolmate of Zhou Weiguo. They had already arranged it beforehand: once the navy withdrew, the engineers would follow to let them pick up whatever salvageable items they could carry, and then execute the pre-set explosive demolitions.

"Why are there still troops who haven't evacuated?" As the car drove down the empty and desolate streets, Wang Yue noticed soldiers still setting up barricades and defensive works. This came as quite a surprise; hadn't it been said that urban warfare would not be fought?

"Many offices and units have left behind rear-guard personnel, and they all need to be evacuated. There are also documents and equipment that need to be disposed of. In short, there's no end to the work," Zhou Weiguo explained with a worried expression. Compared to the situation in Jinling during the fall of the capital, Jiangcheng was in much better shape, but the sheer workload was overwhelming—how could it be resolved so easily?

"Milong, did those fellows from the Yunnan Army move the goods out?" Wang Yue turned his head to ask Milong, who was currently inspecting his firearms.

Following the Sichuan Army, the 60th Army of the Yunnan Army had also tracked this fellow down, proposing to trade their exhausted Brandt 120mm mortars for a batch of weapons to reorganize their troops and prevent the Ministry of Military and Political Affairs from downsizing them.

In the Battle of Xuzhou, the 60th Army had suffered over 5,000 deaths and more than 9,000 injuries, practically losing all combat effectiveness. Later, they were dealt another blow by the Japanese in Chongyang, leaving them with only a skeleton force. Rumors circulated that the Ministry of Military and Political Affairs planned to downsize the 60th Army from 12 regiments to 5—something clearly unacceptable for a decorated, meritorious military unit.

As for why they wanted to trade the Brandt 120mm mortars, there was actually no alternative. The National Revolutionary Army possessed very few of these artillery pieces, and all their shells were currently imported. With the maritime routes severed, the Ministry had very few stocks left in hand, making replenishment for the 60th Army impossible—or perhaps they simply didn't want to replenish them.

Yunnan itself could not acquire such shells due to the Third Republic's arms embargo. Consequently, these artillery pieces had become useless ornaments. Ordinarily, abandoning the guns wasn't entirely out of the question since mortar shells required no high technology and could eventually be domestically produced given enough time. But the problem was that the 60th Army lacked precisely that: time. Compared to these guns, preserving the unit's establishment was the right path.

In the end, the 60th Army traded 24 Brandt 120mm mortars for 10 Skoda M1915 37mm infantry guns, 1,000 rounds of 37mm high-explosive shells, 121 Kiraly light machine guns, 1,584 Hanyang rifles, 570 Shanxi-made Type 6.5 rifles, 1,300 Murata Type 22 cavalry carbines, 200,000 rounds of 8mm Murata rifle ammunition, and 82 Adrian helmets.

Coupled with the weapons and ammunition they had acquired through other channels, this should be enough to arm the troops. After all, the equipment holding rate of the Nationalist army in this era hovered around 30 percent. For instance, a German-equipped division of 12,000 men might possess only 3,000 rifles.

"They're moved out. They used the connections of the Gelaohui and shipped everything yesterday," Milong replied with some displeasure. To this day, he still felt he had taken a massive loss on this deal. No matter how good the Brandt 120mm mortar was, it was still just a mortar and simply wasn't worth that much.

Just before this transaction, he had traded four Hanyang-made 57mm mountain guns plus 400 shells with the 58th Yunnan Army in exchange for four Brandt 120mm mortars. Yet his own Division Commander insisted that the 60th Army was a heroic unit and must be supported as much as possible.

"Dammit, stop pouting over there. Our own arsenal can now produce 120mm mortar shells. In their hands, the Brandt 120mm mortar is scrap iron, but in our hands, it's heavy artillery—a heavy piece weighing over two hundred kilograms! It's only because those morons at the Ordnance Bureau are muddle-headed that we even get a chance to take advantage," Wang Yue couldn't help swatting Milong on the head.

Soon, they arrived at the long-abandoned artillery battery. Because it was Jiangcheng's final barrier, the heavy guns here had not been dismantled—nor was there time to do so. They were large-caliber heavy pieces; even if they could be unbolted, they couldn't be transported down the mountain in a short time. Furthermore, heavy lifting equipment would be needed to hoist them onto ships, and they were dead weight that small freighters simply could not haul.

Although he had done his homework beforehand, seeing the artillery left behind at the battery still shocked Wang Yue: one 203mm 45-caliber Armstrong T-type heavy gun, and six 120mm 45-caliber Armstrong Y-type heavy guns. This wasn't a fortress battery; these were damned naval guns!

The 203mm 45-caliber Armstrong T-type heavy gun was the main armament of the cruiser *Haiqi*. The Ordnance Bureau should have dismantled two of them originally; one was here, while the other seemed to have been lost at the Matang Fortress. With a range of 24 kilometers, any Japanese warship daring to enter Jiangcheng waters would tremble before this gun. The only regret was that few shells remained: a total of just 7 high-explosive shells, 22 armor-piercing shells, and, well, 50 training shells.

The 120mm 45-caliber Armstrong Y-type heavy gun served as the secondary armament of the *Haiqi*, which originally carried ten guns of this model. Two were lost at Matang, and another two were lost at another battery not far away—judging by the looks of it, likely destroyed by aircraft. Shells of this caliber were quite numerous, featuring 103 high-explosive shells, 238 armor-piercing shells, and 300 training shells.

To be honest, Wang Yue found it somewhat incomprehensible why training shells had been deployed here as well. Were they meant to scare people? It would have been far better to modify these training shells into combat-ready rounds.

After agonizing over it for a moment, Wang Yue let it go. The Ordnance Bureau probably possessed no other artillery of the same caliber, so no matter how many shells were left, they would go unused. Perhaps by the time they painstakingly modified the shells over here, the guns themselves would already be gone. Had he not intervened, that likely would have been the reality.