The Iron-Blooded Army of Beacon Fire

Chapter 280 Battle of Annihilation 13
The sound of artillery roared and the smoke filled the air. Although it had been long since the attack and explosion of two hundred flying thunder cannons, the dust and thick smoke that exploded on the Japanese army's position still shrouded the sky above the Japanese army's position.

The artillery group's four 150mm howitzers, four 75mm mountain guns and twenty 82mm mortars were still firing at the Japanese positions, exploding billowing white smoke and thick black smoke. Smoke and rising and falling pillars of earth.

Naturally, the deafening sound of artillery that soared into the sky could not all be caused by the firing of these artillery pieces. A considerable part of the sound of artillery came from the mobile team positions on the side of the main position.

There, the officers and soldiers of the mobile team who blocked the Japanese reinforcements were also fighting desperately, and Chen Xinsheng, the commander of the artillery company of the special agent battalion, was also commanding a large number of captured Japanese mountain artillery to attack the Japanese army.

The desperate battles on the two battlefields are all for a common goal - to eat the Japanese in the main position!
And now, the battle is approaching the most critical point.

In the command post, He Wei was still staring at the Japanese position, but He Shaozhou on the side was praising the firing effect of the thunder cannon on the Japanese position.

"This thing is so powerful. I'm afraid I'll be blown up badly by this flying thunder cannon!"

"Well done, well done."

He Shaozhou looked at the miserable situation on the Japanese army's position in the telescope, which was comparable to being plowed by a regiment of artillery fire. He couldn't help but applaud. He was obviously shocked by the powerful shooting effect of the humble thunder cannon.

The group's serial explosive salvo bombardment from two hundred mine cannon firing positions and the continuous artillery bombardment did buy a lot of time for the attacking 103rd Division troops.

The thick smoke and continuous shelling prevented the Japanese troops in the position from fighting back for the time being, and the two regiments of the 103rd Division were able to move forward calmly.

In He Wei's telescope, the two infantry regiments of the 103rd Division have successively accelerated their advance and launched skirmish line offensive formations. These two regiments are engaged in the attack with nine infantry companies within the organization.

The strength of two infantry regiments, that is, eighteen infantry companies, as they continued to advance, these attacking troops began to deploy in company units. The method of deployment was to divide two of the three infantry platoons belonging to each company into One line, and another infantry line for the second line.

The way each infantry platoon is deployed is to line up the three infantry squads belonging to the platoon. The soldiers in each squad are also lined up. The distance between each soldier is about two steps. about.

The light machine gunners, sub-machine gun shooters and ammunition soldiers of each squad also opened up the skirmish line and advanced like the riflemen. The deployment method of the machine gunners and riflemen in the offensive formation was exactly the same as in the forward state.

After each infantry company deployed, whistles and passwords sounded one after another in the attack queue of the 103rd Division. Most of these whistles and passwords came from the platoon commanders of each infantry platoon, and the company commanders of each company were responsible for Walking behind the company's skirmisher line to supervise the formation.

This is also an important feature of skirmish line tactics. The smallest basic tactical unit during an infantry attack is the infantry platoon, not the infantry squad.

He Wei knew very well that this was the standard line infantry style of World War I. Even though the 103rd Division had equipped its infantry squads with light machine guns, there was no trace of it at all in its offensive tactics. There is no shadow of the skirmishing tactics with the light machine gun as the core. In the old-fashioned line infantry tactical formation adopted by the 103rd Division, the light machine gun is essentially just a "large rifle" with strong firepower output. ”

After the long skirmish line formed by the two infantry regiments and eighteen infantry companies, six heavy machine gun companies belonging to the two regiments followed. The structure of the troops' offensive formation basically still has the assault infantry in front. Supports the old offensive formation structure with firearms behind.

Even if you don’t look at the overall offensive formation and formation structure of the attacking troops, the tactical movements of the soldiers are still not optimistic. Almost all the soldiers of the advancing 103rd Division stood upright with bayonets in hand. The soldiers advanced with their rifles, and very few soldiers took the tactical action of bending down and advancing in a low posture.

As a result, facing the Japanese army with a large number of automatic firearms, the area of ​​​​the 103rd Division's attack troops will be greatly increased.

Looking at the advancing troops of the 103rd Division, He Wei's expression became more solemn. The attack formation of the 103rd Division looked very spectacular, dense and rows of skirmishers, bright and clear. The bayonets and the mighty attack queue look quite intimidating and majestic.

But as early as World War I, such dense attack formations of skirmishers were eliminated by the large number of heavy machine guns equipped with armies of various countries and cost countless bloody lives.

What's more, what the officers and soldiers of the 103rd Division will face is the Japanese army equipped with a large number of light and heavy machine guns, infantry artillery, and wing artillery.

If the two sides really collide, it will really be a battle like a sea of ​​fire washing away people!

In fact, when He Wei led the spy battalion to the 66th Army to fight outside Tangshan, the Japanese army also used such tactics in order to capture the positions outside Tangshan as soon as possible. The final result was naturally that the spy battalion and the 66th Army were defeated. The 66th Army suffered heavy losses.

Thinking of that scene, He Wei felt a chill in his back. He didn't want to see the kind of massacre-style offensive scene that cost tens of thousands of people a day and lost a division a day in the positional warfare of World War I at this moment. Repeatedly in front of myself.

Although He Wei had already known the actual tactical level of the division's officers and soldiers when he and He Shaozhou reorganized the 103rd Division, he could only watch helplessly as the offensive troops of the 103rd Division were about to move in such a dense manner. When the skirmishing line formation was smashed and bloody in front of the Japanese army's dense fire net, how could they still look at it calmly?
Watching the troops of the 103rd Division getting closer to the Japanese defensive positions, He Wei was anxious and thinking about whether there were any remedial measures, even if they could change a little bit, even if they could slightly reduce the attack. The casualties of the troops are also good.

After all, there are two damn infantry regiments with more than 4,000 people and more than 4,000 lives!

Of course, He Wei also knew that this was difficult or even impossible, because if the tactics of the 103rd Division's offensive troops could not be fundamentally improved, heavy losses would be inevitable.

However, He Wei still refused to give up and began to repeatedly observe the Japanese positions and the offensive formation of the 103rd Division, hoping to get some clues and adopt some measures that could reduce the casualties of the 103rd Division's attacking troops during the enemy contact phase. effective means.

He Shaozhou also felt He Wei's anxiety, so he asked: "He Wei, what's wrong with the attacking troops?" He Wei did not answer him, but once again raised his telescope to observe the tactical formation of the attacking troops. , just at this moment, the artillery position once again heard the roar of artillery fire and the sound of artillery shells flying through the air. He Wei didn't even look at it. He judged that the gunmen who were firing were seven people just by the sound of the artillery fire. Fifteen millimeter Bofors gun.

The shooting skills of the Mountain Artillery Battery of the Army Artillery School Training Team still maintained a very superb level. Four 75mm Bofors Mountain artillery shells accurately created four exploding gray explosion points in the Japanese position. Naturally, another loud noise came from the Japanese army's position.

He Wei looked at the smoke column produced by the explosion of the mountain artillery shell through the telescope, and then looked at the attacking troops gradually approaching the Japanese position. He suddenly had a plan in his mind. However, He Wei was not excited at all after thinking of this plan, because this plan, It is also destined to be a tragic plan, a bloody plan!
"Sir, if we continue to fight like this, the brothers of the 103rd Division will suffer heavy losses. Facing the Japanese machine gun fire net with such an attack formation, we are simply going to die."

He Wei said eagerly to He Shaozhou.

He Shaozhou said calmly: "Of course I know, but now we can only fight like this, otherwise what else can we do?"

As soon as he finished speaking, He Shaozhou's expression suddenly changed, he looked at He Wei expectantly and said, "Do you have any plan?"

He Wei nodded and pointed at the skirmisher line of the attacking troops that had begun to accelerate gradually. He hesitated for a moment, then gritted his teeth and said, "I don't have any good ideas, but fighting like this will definitely not work. If the skirmisher line is allowed to hit the Japanese army, The firepower network of machine guns and artillery must be unable to defeat the position, and a lot of people will die. For this reason, it is better to take risks and let the artillery concentrate fire on one part of the Japanese position, and keep shooting, no matter what Keep firing under no circumstances, and then let the attacking troops focus on the impact point of the artillery shells. This strategy is most likely to be effective, but if you do this, many of our brothers will definitely fall under the fire of our own people. "

Hearing He Wei's last words, He Shaozhou asked: "What does it mean to fall under one's own fire? Please explain your fighting method more clearly."

He Wei was heartbroken and said anxiously: "Sir, to put it bluntly, my method is to use artillery to suppress the Japanese army, and then infantry attack. It is essentially a kind of infantry-artillery coordination. According to the general tactical principles, the direct-fire artillery (indirect aiming method) will rise and fall at medium speeds." The safe distance between the infantry and the attacking infantry on the terrain is about 300 meters. During the attack, only by maintaining this distance between the infantry and the artillery explosion point and moving towards the enemy position can the infantry and artillery coordination tactics be used to defeat the enemy more safely. military position."

"But our offensive troops have not received good infantry and artillery coordination training. We have no way to let artillery fire accompany the infantry movement. We can only focus all the artillery on attacking one point on the enemy's position, and then let the offensive troops take risks and directly hit the landing of the artillery shells." A small impact must be an effective strategy, but the infantry of the attacking troops will also be covered by our own artillery fire, and many brothers will fall under our own artillery fire."

"In other words, if the artillery fire doesn't stop, people must continue to rush towards the place where the artillery fire is."

After He Wei told the pros and cons of his own style of play, just when He Wei thought that He Shaozhou would definitely think about it before making a decision, he didn't expect He Shaozhou to give him an answer immediately.

"Then if we fight like this, we will be killed by our own artillery fire, but it will be worth it if we can capture the Japanese position! It is better than falling under the Japanese machine guns and not being able to capture the position!"

He Shaozhou's iron-blooded skills were once again vividly demonstrated. However, the facts are indeed what Shaozhou said. Since people are going to die, it is better to die more valuable. If you die with the cooperation of your own infantry and artillery, you may be able to capture the Japanese. position.

If you die under Japanese machine guns, there is a high probability that you will get nothing in exchange for it, and your death will all be in vain.

He Wei's method could not actually reduce the casualties and losses of the attacking troops of the 103rd Division. The only effect was to make the deaths of the officers and soldiers of the 103rd Division more valuable rather than in vain.

It's bitter and helpless, but at this moment, human life is so worthless.

"Sir, then I will also lead the spy battalion to press forward!"

"Go ahead and be careful."

At this time, it was impossible for He Wei to stay in the command post safely. He Wei reported to He Shaozhou, and after getting He Shaozhou's permission, he also rushed out of the command post and rushed into the command post with the officers and soldiers of the secret service battalion who had already assembled. After leaving the position, follow up behind the troops of the 103rd Division to capture possible fighters.

And He Wei's somewhat heartbreaking and helpless order was quickly conveyed to the artillery positions and the two infantry regiments in the forward attack.

After receiving the order, the artillery first changed its shooting tactics. Under the leadership of the mountain artillery company of the Army Artillery School's training team, the small artillery group that was shelling changed its tactics of dispersed shelling. Four 150mm howitzers were fired. Four 75mm mountain guns and twenty 82 mortars were all concentrated and fired at the center of the Japanese position.

The small artillery group originally implemented decentralized free-fire tactics, that is, howitzers, mountain artillery and mortars did not attack the same target together.

As the concentrated firing order was issued, all artillery began to fire at the center of the Japanese position, with 150mm grenades, shrapnel shells, 75mm grenades and 82mm yellow phosphorus shells and grenades. They hit the center of the Japanese army's position one after another.

The artillery bomb blast points on the Japanese position soon changed from blooming everywhere to a single explosion. The fierce shelling almost turned the three hundred meters in the center of the Japanese position into a field filled with gunpowder smoke and white mist. Fragment belt.

The traffic trenches and the 100 meters in front and back of the position were all filled with flying shrapnel and flying shrapnel bullets. The shock wave and bullet wind generated after the explosion of the artillery shells. And the Japanese troops hiding in the hidden part of this position were naturally He was stunned by the violent shelling.

Just as the artillery group began to concentrate its fire, the two infantry regiments of the 103rd Division had also advanced to less than one kilometer away from the Japanese position. As the charge horn sounded, the two infantry regiments The officers and soldiers began to accelerate the attack and launched a group charge towards the Japanese army in a skirmish line.

More than 4,000 officers and soldiers, bayonets shining brightly, shouting to kill, attacked the formation with an extremely spectacular skirmish line, and pounced on the Japanese position.

(End of this chapter)