I asked you to escape, but you became a soldier in World War II

Chapter 107: A copycat version of "Tunnel Warfare"

"Oh no, Captain, a lot of Germans have come to the village entrance!" A guerrilla covered in blood ran in to report.

"Why are you panicking? How many people are here?"

"I don't know. It was dark and we couldn't see clearly. Our sentries spotted the enemy and fired warning shots. We only know that there were quite a few enemies, more than ten trucks, several half-track armored personnel carriers, and heavy artillery. Their firepower was very strong."

"How could this happen?" Dravitch also realized the seriousness of the problem. Logically speaking, they would not be able to be equipped with such equipment even if they encountered the most powerful German attack.

"Captain, what should we do? Come up with a plan!"

"Notify everyone to quickly enter the underground tunnel and use it to teach these hateful German bandits a lesson!" Dravich ordered angrily.

Since everyone was familiar with the terrain, they quickly retreated to the tunnel.

The German troops they were referring to were the Bode battle group that followed them.

Although they hurried as fast as they could, they finally only found the vehicle abandoned by Lin Chen and others on the side of the road, and then they lost any trace of the Soviet squad.

Just when he was feeling extremely frustrated, he suddenly received a call for help from the nearest German supply point, saying that their logistics transport team had been ambushed.

Originally, he didn't want to care about such trivial matters, but the other party described that the enemy was very powerful and that an entire squad of German soldiers were killed. However, judging from the traces at the scene, not a single Soviet soldier was killed, which was worthy of his attention.

Ordinary local guerrillas could not do this, unless they were the disappeared Soviet squad.

After arriving at the scene, he verified his judgment through investigation and analysis, and then followed the very clear tire tracks left by the vehicle and chased it all the way to the village.

In order to cooperate with Bode's operation, the local German army also sent several veterans who had come to encircle and suppress the enemy to assist. From them, they learned that the village had been basically hollowed out, and rushing in like this would definitely be a losing business.

The cunning Bode immediately asked for "special bombs (poison gas bombs)" to be transported from the supply point.

He experienced the brutal Battle of Stalingrad. That ruthless street fighting was a lifelong pain for him. If he had not left for other reasons, he would have died in that city in the end.

It is also because of this that he has rich experience in street fighting. Dealing with such underground warfare may be more difficult than street fighting, so some special means must be used.

In order to find out the truth, he only sent a platoon of soldiers, who slowly approached the village that had been razed to the ground with the fire support of 120mm heavy mortars.

Dravich and others were not feeling well in the underground tunnel. Although the huge vibration caused by the 120mm heavy mortar did not cause any casualties, it destroyed their village. The most important thing was that his people had never experienced such a large-caliber heavy artillery bombardment, and many people's ears were bleeding.

After the heavy artillery passed, he began to command his men to move to the designated positions.

Because of the heavy artillery bombardment, many mines and traps became ineffective, and the German army easily rushed into the village.

As they walked along the street, several shiny black rifles slowly emerged from the hole. Dravitch fired first, and the others made accurate shots in the dark corners of the wall or in the holes hidden under the big trees.

The frustrated German army was attacked everywhere, but could not find the enemy's location.

In the end, they could only leave the corpses on the ground and retreat in a panic.

All of this was seen by the experienced Bode, who marked each of the exposed firing points on his paper.

Then we selected soldiers to form more than a dozen combat teams with clear division of labor.

Just wait for the special bullets to arrive and then launch the attack again.

The guerrillas were ecstatic about repelling a German offensive, but Lin Chen's expression was very solemn.

He could tell that the Germans had only launched a tentative attack, and that they had not launched any more attacks since then. They must have been waiting for some killer move.

"Dravic, I think the situation is not good if we continue like this. I suggest that we find a way to break out before it gets dark. The essence of guerrilla warfare lies in mobile warfare. It is extremely unwise to fight head-on."

"Captain Ghost, are you being too cautious? You saw the German attack just now. They have no way to deal with our underground tactics. The village is small, and we can't deploy too many troops. We have enough food and fresh water, so we can hold out for a while. If we break out now, our losses will be great. Besides, it's all plains outside. How can our two legs outrun the four wheels of the Germans?"

Dravic obviously didn't want to break out. If he did, what would happen to all the food? It would all have to be thrown away.

This was unacceptable to the guerrillas who had been starving for a long time.

Sergei and Kirilenko fully agreed with Lin Chen's opinion. Although they were a special operations team and their combat effectiveness was stronger than that of ordinary soldiers, it did not mean that they would not die. Being trapped in one place and fighting like a trapped beast was definitely a taboo in military strategy.

So they also wanted to break out under the cover of night.

Dragic said that if they had to break through, he would not be able to provide any other human help.

Lin Chen found Andre, and after struggling for a while, Andre decided to call his best friend to go with him.

When I heard his name, it turned out to be Sasha, the grandson of the old woman who had died a few days ago. It must be God's will that I could find him in such a vast crowd.

When Sasha heard that her grandmother was also killed by the German army, she cried bitterly and became more determined to follow Lin Chen and the others.

Seeing that they were two children, Dravich naturally didn't say anything. They were orphans anyway, so let them go. He provided Lin Chen and the others with some water and food, and Lin Chen also taught him how to use the mortar.

After midnight, Lin Chen and others were ready to leave. Dravich might have felt a little uncomfortable because Lin Chen and others were going to part ways, so he did not come to see them off.

Lin Chen did not think much about it, but what surprised them was that Uncle Lennon came quietly to say goodbye. He looked at Andre and Sasha with great affection.
"These two children, one is sixteen and the other is only fifteen. Captain, I don't ask you to protect them, but you must promise me not to let them fall into the hands of the Germans!" Lennon was an experienced man after all, and he knew that this time the German army was coming with more force and danger than any other time.

He actually agreed with Lin Chen's idea that as long as the green mountains remain, there will be no shortage of firewood, but Captain Dravic disagreed, and he had no good solution.

We can only hope that Lin Chen, his friends and the two children can break out safely.

"Come with me, we have a backup escape route. No one else knows about this route except me and the captain." Lennon thought for a long time and decided to violate the rules.

Because according to regulations, this last way to save life must never be known to others.

Led by Lennon, they turned several corners before arriving at a sewer.

"Come on, kids. If we go down here, we will reach the river. There is a pile of logs by the river. We can push them into the river and swim across." Several people said goodbye to him one by one, and then dived down.

The stinking ditch was extremely smelly and disgusting, but the few people still insisted on crawling slowly in the dark cave. After crawling forward for an unknown amount of time, they finally saw light ahead.

"Pfft!"

"Pfft!"

"Pfft!"

Following several sounds of people falling into the water, several people finally climbed out of the sewer.

It turned out that this was a sewage ditch in the village leading to the river. Although building sewage ditches in rural areas was extremely rare in the Soviet Union, this project was indeed very effective. It could not only drain sewage, but also leave a retreat for the villagers.

Moreover, the exit is full of water plants and cannot be found without careful observation.

The only drawback was that the water level of the river was a bit high, and the logs Uncle Lennon mentioned had long been washed away by the river.

If not everyone was good at swimming, there would be no way out.

Everyone encouraged each other and slowly swam across the river. When they looked back from the other side of the river, they found that the water level was actually rising slowly.

The sky above the upstream is already covered with dark clouds and heavy rain is about to fall. If the river water continues to rise, this exit will be blocked.

Although Andrei and Sasha were not yet adults, they had already become mature beyond their age during the war years, and they both understood what this heavy rain meant.

"Let's go! I hope Uncle Lennon and the others will be lucky." In addition to praying that the heavy rain will pass quickly, Lin Chen and his companions also hope that the guerrillas can deal with the German attack.
-
Reality is always cruel. The sky got light very late because of the sudden rainstorm.

Colonel Bode was studying the battle plan in a field tent. He analyzed it carefully all night and came up with an excellent way to deal with the guerrillas' underground warfare.

That is to take advantage of the military strength and launch one-on-one attacks on several possible attack points, leaving the Soviet army no chance to take advantage.

So when the special bullets arrived, he insisted on ordering his troops to start the attack despite the difficulties caused by the heavy rain.

The guerrillas were not used to the new tactics of the German army, especially the poison gas bombs which they had seen for the first time. Some soldiers who did not know the dangers of the attack even went up to smell them. Not long after, their skin ulcerated and they died wailing in pain.

Dravich and others were shocked and immediately activated the backup plan, blocking several combat tunnels with partitions.

Then he ordered all firepower points to attack the German army from behind. Unexpectedly, the German army had already been waiting outside. As soon as a flaw was revealed, they would immediately open fire and throw a few grenades.

Dravich's guerrillas suffered heavy losses. At this time, he finally began to understand why Lin Chen wanted him to break out with him.

But things had come to this point, and he didn't have any good ideas. He could only lead everyone to rely on the underground tunnels and fight back step by step.

Sure enough, when the guerrillas all retreated into the tunnels and refused to show their heads, the German army's poison gas bombs lost their effectiveness. Whenever the German army thought that the guerrillas below had been almost wiped out, the German soldiers wearing simple protective clothing would be killed as soon as they went down.

The tunnel was very dark, and the German soldiers could only rely on flashlights for lighting. It was also very narrow, only enough for one person to squeeze through.

The German soldiers crawling in the front were either facing a bayonet sticking out from somewhere, a trap, or a booby trap.

In short, it was impossible to defend against it, and the German casualties quickly increased.

Bode quickly called a halt to the offensive. In his opinion, it was absolutely impossible to fight the guerrillas in this way, because the old German soldiers who had previously encircled and suppressed the guerrillas had told him that the situation below was extremely complicated and it was impossible to attack at all!
He didn't believe it at first, but now he finally believes it. It takes a genius to build such fortifications.

In fact, Lennon has always been in charge of the fortifications in this village. It is hard to imagine that an old guy like him is actually a retired geotechnical expert. By chance, he discovered the structure of an ant's nest. He had an idea and put this structure into practice.

At the beginning, Dravich was strongly opposed to this costly and labor-intensive practice, but later he used this underground fortification to successfully repel several German encirclement and suppression attacks, and even made the German army rarely attack. Then he made up his mind to do it on a large scale, and almost the entire underground of the village was hollowed out.

"Uncle Lennon, you see, the German army really can't do anything to us. Your work is really amazing." Dravitch simply admired the old man to the extreme.

However, Lennon looked worriedly at the rain falling from the vent outside.

It is summer now and there is a lot of rain. If the weather doesn't clear up, the consequences will be disastrous.

Bode thought hard for a whole day but could not come up with a good way to deal with this kind of tunnel warfare. If he completely filled it with human lives, it was hard to say whether he could succeed, but his SS career was definitely over. No one would support a fool like him who would sacrifice all his main forces just to destroy a guerrilla group.

If he fails to take down the enemy, he won't need to be punished by his superiors. He can just reward himself with a bullet.

Are we really going to retreat? This is such a shame!
"Colonel, the rain is too heavy. The officers and soldiers outside are in a very bad mood, especially the wounded, who are very likely to be infected in such weather." A subordinate came to report.

"So emotional? You get emotional just because it's raining? Are you still a German soldier?" Bode had a look of disdain on his face. In his opinion, this rainy day was incomparable to the heavy snow in Stalingrad last year. Can't they overcome this little difficulty?

"Colonel, the quartermaster asked me to report that the river water level has risen sharply and the grain transport team cannot pass."

"I know, I know. Don't bother me with such trivial matters." Bode continued to outline the simple map of the village with red and blue pencils.

"Hmm? Wait, you said the river level was rising?"

The subordinate obviously didn't understand what the colonel meant, so he had to answer yes.

Unexpectedly, Bode pushed his subordinates away, rushed to a high hill without even putting on a raincoat, and looked down from above. Sure enough, the small river yesterday had become extremely turbulent.

The river is much wider than yesterday.

He looked at the sky, then at the village, and suddenly burst into laughter.

His men came down to put a raincoat on him, and even though he was soaked, he couldn't help but smile.

"I have an idea. Notify the commanders of each company and have them come to my headquarters for a meeting immediately."

(End of this chapter)