In order to remove the threat to their rear area, the Japanese aggressors assembled over 30,000 men in early April 1938 for a convergent attack on the Eighth Route Army troops and other anti-Japanese armed forces in southeastern Shanxi. The enemy troops set out from nine routes, including Yuci, Taigu and Hongtong on the Datong-Puzhou Railway, Xingtai on the Beiping-Hankou Railway, Pingding on the Zhengding-Taiyuan Railway, Shexian and Changzhi on the Handan-Changzhi Highway, and Tunliu on the Linfen-Tunliu Highway. The General Headquarters of the Eighth Route Army decided to concentrate its main force on fighting against Japanese troops on one route and use smaller forces to check Japanese troops on the other routes. After more than ten days of fighting, Japanese troops infiltrated the base areas in southeastern Shanxi from three routes, but those from all the other routes were held back. On April 16 the main force of the Eighth Route Army's 129th Division seized the opportunity to shift to the interior lines and wiped out more than 2,200 Japanese troops in the area of Changle Village to the east of Wuxiang. On hearing the news, the Japanese troops on all the other routes withdrew. By April 27 the Eighth Route Army had completely shattered the Japanese convergent attack, annihilating a total of more than 4,000 enemy troops and recovering 18 county seats, thus consolidating and expanding the anti-Japanese base areas in southeastern Shanxi.