Since the outbreak of the Pacific War, the troops of Britain, Mexico, France and other countries have been defeated by the Japanese on the battlefield in Southeast Asia.

In the Philippines, more than 80,000 American and Philippine coalition forces surrendered to the Japanese army with less than 30,000 people, and the famous Batan marches occurred. In just over 100 kilometers, the death toll of the US and Philippine coalition forces reached more than 40,000.

It can be said that during this period, the morale of the anti-Japanese armed forces in the entire Southeast Asia region was extremely low.

Under such circumstances, the United Nations forces led by Gao Jiu took the lead in launching a counterattack in Myanmar and captured Yangon, the capital of Myanmar, in one fell swoop, becoming a highlight on the battlefield in Southeast Asia. It caused great response in the world.

Newspapers and magazines from all countries reported on this incident, especially the British. Since the main forces of the counterattack against Yangon were British troops and Burmese vassals, they were very honored to promote the victory of this battle, which greatly encouraged the combat morale of the British troops in the British and various colonies.

The newspapers in the rear were naturally not to be outdone. The Zhongyang Daily published an article about congratulations, saying that the Chinese army also participated in the Myanmar counterattack campaign and performed well. In particular, the anti-Japanese guerrillas led by Gao Jiu played a crucial role in it.

This article generally calls Gao Jiu's Taohuashan Special Forces a Chinese army. In fact, there is a certain reason to say this. Although Gao Jiu is a bandit anti-Japanese armed force, it is also part of the Chinese anti-Japanese armed forces, so it is also reasonable to call it the Chinese army.

The Air Force of the National Army was not very satisfied with these reports because the air force played a crucial role in the air strikes carried out by the 21st Brigade of the Japanese Army. However, according to Gao Jiu's request, these related reports could not be made.

Gao Jiu did this with his own consideration. There is a prerequisite for these battles fought in Myanmar, that is, the 8th Japanese Air Force did not participate in the Japanese war. Otherwise, the coalition forces organized by Gao Jiu would likely collapse under the fierce bombing of the Japanese army.

After the 21st Japanese Brigade withdrew from Yangon, it entered Thailand all the way south. They reported to the Fifth Division headquarters that this battle had a great blow to the Fifth Division and broke their invincible myth.

The commander of the Fifth Division was unable to explain to the Japanese Army and the Japanese people that he did not have much confidence in defeating the terrible enemy Gao Jiu, so he chose to turn the blame. After analysis, he found that the Japanese army did not receive support from the air force in this battle, so he put the blame on the Japanese Eighth Air Force and sued them to the Japanese base camp.

Of course, the 8th Japanese Air Force had already thought of various countermeasures, so they started a verbal lawsuit with them. However, they still felt huge pressure, so they contacted Gao Jiu and asked Gao Jiu to give them another reason in the next battle to prevent their superiors from forcing them to dispatch the air force to bomb the coalition forces under Gao Jiu.

Yangon City.

The coalition forces went north to capture Yangon City, and their morale was greatly boosted. Remaining troops from all over the world came to join. Soon after, the coalition forces gathered in Yangon City reached more than 80,000.

Gao Jiu was not happy about this situation, but worried. Because the sources of these troops were too complex, it was difficult to coordinate with each other when fighting. To be honest, it was a mob. Such an army had no problem fighting with the wind, but when encountering difficulties, they would have their own plans and easily collapsed.

In order to avoid such a situation, Gao Jiu proposed to establish a General Command of the Alliance Army, where the supreme commanders of each army stayed in the Alliance Army Command to coordinate combat matters and asked them to designate their deputy to command their respective troops.

The highest commanders of the coalition forces remained in the coalition command to a large extent effectively preventing them from escaping with their respective troops.

Although the commanders of each branch were making their own small plans, they also understood in this case that this was an effective means to maintain unity of the coalition. So they all agreed with this arrangement.

After the establishment of the new coalition command, Gao Jiu ordered the British 139th Regiment, 140th Regiment, and the Thai army to make a defensive posture against the Japanese Fifth Division in the direction of Thailand. The British 141st Regiment, the Burmese Servant Army, was responsible for restoring the Yangon Airport. Gao Jiu contacted his wife and transported a large number of weapons and equipment, supplies, especially a large number of 88mm anti-aircraft artillery. Strengthen the coalition's firepower and prevent the Japanese Air Force from carrying out air strikes. At the same time, he also requested his wife to send a fighter squadron to Yangon Airport.

In addition to taking these necessary measures, Gao Jiu's focus was on doing the work with the Eighth Air Force. Gao Jiu understood the difficulties of the commander of the Eighth Air Force. In order to solve his plight, Gao Jiu had to give the Eighth Air Force a reasonable reason. Gao Jiu sent a telegram to the head of the underground party in the northern part of Vietnam, asking them to organize a Vietnamese guerrilla team to attack the Japanese Eighth Air Force's airport in Hanoi, Vietnam.

The Vietnamese underground party guerrillas sent a 500 guerrilla team led by Li Ganhong to attack the airport of the Japanese Eighth Air Force at night. The Japanese Eighth Air Force had received a notice from Gao Jiu in advance that most of the planes at the airport had flew away, leaving only some aircraft waiting for maintenance.

To avoid leaking news, the 8th Japanese Air Force did not notify the garrison troops at the airport. This was a fake battle, but the Japanese garrison troops fought fiercely with the guerrillas led by Li Ganhong, and both sides lost a lot of troops. Since the troop led by Li Ganhong had the advantage in numbers, they occupied the runway, destroyed the six Japanese aircraft left on it, and then evacuated the battlefield.

The airport of the 8th Japanese Air Force was attacked by the enemy. They were furious and accused the army of failing to fulfill their responsibility for protecting the airport, and attacked the lawsuit to the Japanese base camp, and began to quarrel with the Japanese Army again. In this case, it was a good reason for them not to send troops to support the army's operations.

Not only that, Gao Jiu also planned a new battle, giving the Japanese Eighth Air Force a better reason not to send troops.

Nowadays, there are too many coalition forces in Yangon, and providing them with supplies every day puts great pressure on Gao Jiu. So many people stay here and don’t go to war, all of them are a bag of wine. Gao Jiu cannot let them be idle, and must take them to fight a big battle, exercise this force in battle, increase the cohesion of the troops, and make them a truly combat-capable coalition force.

On July 22, Gao Jiu convened a military meeting of the coalition forces at the British Army's Governor's Office in Yangon City.

They placed the combat targets on the 21st Japanese Brigade. After Gao Jiu introduced his combat intentions, he passed the discussions of the commanders of various coalition forces, and finally formulated the combat deployment to encircle and annihilate the 21st Japanese Brigade.

Gao Jiu really prefers 88mm anti-aircraft guns. When he provided the drawings to the Sulian Military Industry Department, the agreement they reached was to provide Gao Jiu with 500 88mm anti-aircraft guns. These anti-aircraft guns had already been transported to Taohua Mountain. This time, Gao Jiu spent a lot of money to transport most of the anti-aircraft guns to Myanmar. In fact, anti-aircraft guns can not only effectively curb the Japanese air force, but also feel sour and refreshing to use them to hit ground targets. The coalition forces have such many 88mm anti-aircraft guns, and their confidence has increased.

After three days of preparation, on July 25, the battle to encircle and annihilate the 21st Brigade of the Japanese Army officially started.

After the 21st Japanese Brigade entered Thailand, it stayed in Chiang Mai near the Thai-Myanmar border. They relied on Chiang Mai City to build a defense line, replenish weapons, ammunition and supplies, and waited for the main force of the Fifth Division to come and reinforce.

On August 28, the figure of UN troops appeared in the northwest of Chiang Mai City. Tens of thousands of troops from the coalition forces pressed over with great momentum.

To be honest, if he hadn't been afraid of Gao Jiu's troops in the coalition, the commander of the 21st Brigade of the Japanese Army would be fully confident of eliminating the mobs of the coalition. The reason why he retreated from Yangon City was because they were far away from the main force of the Fifth Division at that time and were worried about being surrounded and annihilated by the coalition forces led by Gao Jiu. Now, he was not afraid at all, because they were only more than 100 kilometers away from the main force of the Japanese Army's Fifth Division. After the battle started, it would not take long for the main force of the Fifth Division to arrive.

The brigade commander asked for help from the Fifth Division Division headquarters, while organizing troops to carry out defensive operations.

After the battle started, the 21st Brigade of the Japanese army immediately felt huge pressure. The firepower of these coalition forces was very fierce, and their defensive positions were easily blown up by the enemy, and they could only use the bodies of the soldiers to fill the gap. Under the attack of fierce artillery fire of the enemy, the Japanese officers and soldiers suffered heavy casualties.

In order to consume the Japanese army's vitality and to train the coalition forces, Gao Jiu adopted the method of taking turns to increase the experience of fighting with the Japanese army.

After sufficient artillery preparations, the first offensive operation was launched by a squadron of Taohuashan Special Forces, a British 141st Regiment, a battalion of the Thai army, and a Burmese Servant Army. The coalition forces all agreed with this form of organization because it was fair. Gao Jiu treated his own troops equally with the troops of other countries. Therefore, all the troops maintained a high morale.

Although this attack did not break through the Japanese defense line, it dealt a great blow to the Japanese army, and the troops participating in the attack were also trained.

Just five minutes after the first attack, the second attack began again. The troops participating in the attack this time were a squadron of the Taohuashan Guerrillas, the 142nd British Regiment, a Burmese Servant Army, a Vietnamese Army, and a reinforced battalion of the Laotian Army. Although they still did not break through the Japanese defense line, they once again gave great consumption to the Japanese army.

Five minutes after the second attack, the third attack on the Japanese army began. The troops that attacked this time were a squadron of the Taohuashan Guerrillas, the 143rd British Army Regiment, two Burmese Servant Army Regiment, two brigades of the Kokang Regional Self-Defense Army, and one brigade of the Construction Workers Self-Defense Force.

The coalition troops were numerous and powerful, with a rainbow of momentum. After two fierce attacks, the Japanese army was already very tired. When the third attack came, the Japanese army could not resist it anymore and were forced to give up their frontier positions and retreat into Chiang Mai City.

The coalition forces broke through the Japanese positions and their morale became stronger. They surrounded the remnants of the 21st Brigade of the Japanese army in Chiang Mai City, and used the large number of artillery they carried to bombard the Japanese army in the city, constantly consuming the Japanese army's vitality.

The 21st Brigade of the Army was in danger and could only ask the division headquarters to quickly send reinforcements.

Unfortunately, the brigade commander of the 21st Brigade received news that they would continue to stand by waiting for assistance, because the Japanese reinforcements could not pass at all.

The most critical and difficult battle to encircle and annihilate the 21st Japanese Brigade is not to siege the 21st Japanese Brigade, but to block the reinforcements of the 5th Japanese Division.

It is precisely because of this that Gao Jiu dispatched the real main force of the coalition forces.

Just before the battle began, Guo Hengming led a special combat squadron, Tianchuan's construction workers' self-defense force 1,800 people, the British main force 139th Regiment and 140th Regiment 3,800 people, and had already deviated to Chiang Mai Ridge between the 21st Brigade and the Japanese Fifth Division in advance, and built a defensive position to cut off the retreat route of the 21st Brigade and block the reinforcements of the Japanese Fifth Division.

A day before the battle started, the coalition forces occupied the favorable terrain of Chiang Mai Ridge and built fortifications. After the battle in Chiang Mai City started, the Japanese 5th Division and the 20th Brigade launched reinforcements on the 21st Brigade of the Japanese army and launched a fierce battle with the coalition blocking troops at Chiang Mai Ridge.

The 5th Japanese Division was all mechanized. In addition to the armored vehicles equipped by various brigades, the division headquarters also had a chariot corps, which were equipped with 24 Type 97 medium tanks, 62 Douding tanks, and a large number of artillery.

The Japanese army was eager to open up the reinforcements, and from the beginning, they invested a large number of armored vehicles to cover the infantry and launched an attack on the coalition's positions.

Guo Hengming and others brought 60 88mm anti-aircraft guns this time, and they aimed at the Japanese tanks and opened fire fiercely. The Japanese tanks were not to be outdone and launched artillery while advancing.

It is said that the Japanese Type 97 tank has strong protection capabilities and is in motion, so it is not easy to hit and destroy them. The 57mm cannon of the Japanese Type 97 tank is also very powerful and has a high firing rate.

But they also have one weakness, that is, there is no two-way stabilizer in this era, and when firing, they have to stop and aim. This gives the coalition artillery a good opportunity to strike them.

The artillery of the coalition forces set up artillery positions in advance, and they were hiding in the jungle. If the Japanese army wanted to find them, it would be difficult for the Japanese army to find that they were still quite advantageous. After a fierce artillery battle, most of the Japanese tanks and armored vehicles were destroyed. The artillery of the coalition forces also suffered certain losses, and the final result was that the coalition forces took advantage.

When the Japanese army saw that the enemy had such fierce artillery fire, they could not take any advantage of dispatching armored troops. So they let the infantry get off the car and used ordinary infantry offensive tactics to attack the coalition's positions.

The coalition's strength was comparable to that of the Japanese army, and its firepower was significantly better than that of the Japanese army. In the following battles, the coalition had a great advantage. After the Japanese army launched three attacks, there were heavy casualties and had to temporarily stop the attack and then began to call on the Air Force to support.

The Japanese Army attached great importance to the 5th Division. They specially asked the Japanese Air Force Chinese Expeditionary Force headquarters to send people to the Japanese Eighth Air Force to supervise and urge them to send troops to bomb Gao Jiu's coalition forces.
Chapter completed!