Seven Seas Beacon Fire

Liu Shiyi let out a surprised "whoosh," probably not expecting the pampered princess to be so fierce and brave. However, it was clear that the princess's airs and words had no binding force on Liu Shiyi.

Because he was an orphan, and even among orphans, he belonged to the most miserable group, because he not only lost his parents, but also no other relatives—his parents had left their hometown to come to the Northeast, and died in a plague one winter.

In any other place within the Great Ming Dynasty, an orphan like him would have had little chance of survival. But Liu Shiyi was lucky. Although the area outside the Great Wall where he lived did not have the favorable natural conditions of the area inside the Great Wall, there were military garrisons under military control.

He grew up in the public orphanage of the garrison. After the age of 12, he entered the local youth military academy, where he received basic education and learned a series of skills such as standing in formation, shooting, and building fortifications. After turning 16 (the age of adulthood in the Ming Dynasty was 16), he first worked in the factory of the garrison. After the outbreak of war, he chose to join the army and became a soldier, and he still is now.

There were many orphans like Liu Shiyi in the garrisons outside the Great Wall. It could be said that without the garrisons, there would be no them. From a young age, they were taught by their instructors and teachers that although they were on the frontier of the empire, and although they were in a traditionally "bitter and cold place," only the garrisons outside the Great Wall were the fairest places in the entire Ming Dynasty.

The garrisons outside the Great Wall possess the fairest and most advanced system and institutions in the entire Ming Dynasty. The Northwest faction, led by Prince Jin, or politically known as the Great Harmony faction, is the force in the world that cares most about the survival and interests of ordinary people. Although no one directly propagated these ideas to the people of the garrisons outside the Great Wall, through various propaganda channels and indirect actions, this view has taken deep root in the hearts of the people outside the Great Wall.

So in Liu Shiyi's eyes, the princesses of the Ming Dynasty were nothing special, how could they compare to our grandson? If the grandson wanted to take the princess to the basement, then he would definitely take the princess to the basement.

Li Che watched as Zhu Miaoyun was taken away, half-forcibly. Then, just as Li Che was about to go find Commander Long to find out what was going on, he saw a cruiser entering the harbor from the window of the headquarters building.

At this moment, smoke was billowing from the stern of the warship, which made everyone in the harbor break out in a cold sweat. Li Che even felt his left eyelid twitching.

He's even having trouble distinguishing between his left and right eyelid twitches, and which one is auspicious and which one is inauspicious.

Because he knew very well that the cruiser entering the port was carrying Lieutenant General Cheng Hengqi, the supreme commander of this naval operation.

The main reason for choosing Cheng Hengqi as the supreme commander of this military operation was naturally because he was the most experienced general in the Ming Dynasty Royal Navy in commanding light combat ships over the years, and had long served in the destroyer force.

Of course, it was precisely because of his background that he was placed at the bottom of the traditional hierarchy of the Ming Dynasty Royal Navy, which is why his promotion speed was always slow. He was only awarded the rank of lieutenant general after the Battle of the Java Sea, because the fleet was able to successfully withdraw to Cam Ranh Bay in Surabaya thanks to the desperate cover provided by the destroyer force.

If something were to happen to this person, it would be difficult to quickly find a senior officer with similar experience in commanding light warships.

Li Che could only silently chant to himself, "Eyelier twitching is a normal physiological phenomenon; don't be superstitious," while ordering someone to drive directly to the dock.

When the vehicle was ready, the roar of the coastal defense guns had basically stopped. Although the situation on the sea was not visible, it was likely that the Federation personnel had followed General Cheng Hengqi's vehicle to the outer perimeter of the port, and upon seeing the coastal defense guns firing, they turned around and retreated.

Otherwise, such artillery battles could easily last for several hours.

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Upon arriving at the horse's head, Li Che immediately saw Cheng Hengqi walking down from the cruiser with a smile. In another world, he had seen photos and videos of this guy, and both were clearer than those of Sa Dingming.

After all, this was someone who had visited Colombia with a cruiser, so the federal journalist's photography skills and equipment were undoubtedly top-notch.

At this moment, Li Che saw someone seemingly throwing a tantrum at General Cheng Hengqi, which made him curious. Was there anyone in Vladivostok who could get angry at him? Even a coastal defense commander like Commander Long had to be as docile as a cat in front of Cheng Hengqi. Was there anyone who could control him?

Theoretically, the chief of staff should be able to criticize his risky behavior, but if the chief of staff were there, he wouldn't have let the commander run away. Just like when Lao Zhao was around, could Li Yunlong have become the assault team leader?

The reason he was able to personally board a cruiser to conduct reconnaissance this time was because the chief of staff was setting up a shore command post outside the Wonsan encirclement. To command hundreds of torpedoes to launch a large-scale attack, relying solely on a few cruisers at sea was far from sufficient. Therefore, Lin Yuanshan, the chief of staff of the First Fleet who was also in charge of this operation, was busy setting up as many as 20 shore command posts and had no time to keep an eye on Cheng Hengqi in the port of Vladivostok.

As for why so many shore command posts are set up, it is certainly not for redundant construction, nor is it to avoid leaving enough redundancy after being attacked.

This is simply because so many are really needed, and the number of these command posts is even the minimum requirement.

Li Che breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing that the man's limbs were intact, so he took the initiative to greet Cheng Hengqi, since the man wasn't even in the port when his group arrived yesterday.

Upon arriving at the dock, Li Che recognized the person "losing his temper" at Cheng Hengqi as a senior staff officer who seemed to have left behind an "imperial sword" before the chief of staff left. This person was probably tasked with "keeping a close eye on the commander," and now the mission had clearly failed. If the chief of staff found out, he would likely face dire consequences. Therefore, the senior staff officer was not so much throwing a tantrum as pleading desperately—"My lord, please don't take any risks, okay?"

Cheng Hengqi knew he was in the wrong, but that was just his style, and he couldn't change it now.

Faced with such a dutiful subordinate, he could only honestly say, "I'll definitely do it next time." Just then, he caught a glimpse of Li Che approaching, which gave him a sudden idea of ​​how to get rid of the headband that Tang Sanzang was chanting.

After Cheng Hengqi and Li Che exchanged military salutes with a smile, the lieutenant general actually shook Li Che's hand directly: "I didn't expect His Highness to arrive even earlier than expected. It was my fault for not personally welcoming him yesterday."

"No, no, I'm just an ordinary officer." Li Che subconsciously uttered a lie that even he didn't believe. However, Cheng Hengqi obviously didn't care much about the formalities they were exchanging. Instead, he said to Li Che, "Your Highness, you may not know this, but the Federation people haven't come to see me these past few days. This has made me curious about what the Federation people have been doing all this time. As the saying goes, seeing is believing, so I went to meet them."

"Such things can be left to the officers below. Although the bravery of the military commander may be more appreciated by the soldiers, I think that from the perspective of being responsible for the entire army and the entire operation plan, the general should never do such things again."

"Hey, how can the commander be a coward? I definitely have to set a good example for the sailors." Cheng Hengqi waved his hand with a smile:

"Those cruisers chasing me have been thoroughly harassed by me all the way. The Federation no longer has Omaha to throw into the Pacific Ocean; they've all been scattering their ships across the open ocean to catch our cruisers. Look, the combined 6-inch guns of the three Federation cruisers chasing me don't even have as many 150mm guns as this one cruiser. They've set me on fire twice; once it's out, I can deal with it."

You fucking think I'm praising you, huh?

Chapter Fifty-Eight: Outside the Encirclement

Good heavens, what kind of cannons are these white devils using to bombard us?

Inside the trenches at the forefront of the Ming army on the outskirts of Yuanshan, Zhang Bingde leaned out from the trench with a cannon and a mirror, looking at the high ground in the distance that was being bombarded by the Federation army's heavy artillery. He couldn't help but let out a gasp of cold air.

For the army, artillery with a caliber of 100 mm or more can be considered heavy artillery. A caliber of 150 mm is already considered heavy firepower at the corps or even army group level. If such heavy firepower were to fall near trenches, even trenches reinforced with wooden planks would collapse under the bombardment of the shells.

However, compared to the Federation's artillery fire, the traditional 150mm heavy artillery in the army's hands was no longer powerful enough. Through his glasses, Zhang Bingde saw that the friendly forces had just managed to capture the high ground from the Federation, and then the high ground was bombarded by the Federation's heavy artillery.

These heavy artillery pieces naturally came from the Federation warships at sea. Zhang Bingde didn't know exactly what caliber they were, but in his eyes, after those large-caliber cannons pierced the high ground, the high ground was like hot dishes being constantly stir-fried in a wok. After the shells landed, the ground rippled and undulated. This was the effect that only truly large-caliber heavy artillery could produce.

He witnessed firsthand how the heavy machine guns left behind by the United States Army on the high ground were hurled hundreds of meters into the air by the explosions, and how the entire rock mass, struck by the shells, shattered into countless showers of rocks, much like the birth of the Monkey King in Journey to the West...

Zhang Bingde couldn't bear to continue looking through the binoculars. The brother units that had just captured the high ground must be suffering heavy casualties. Under such heavy artillery bombardment, even trenches would be difficult to avoid casualties, because these artillery pieces would bury the trenches and the soldiers inside.

Just as he was about to put the binoculars into his breast pocket, a familiar voice came from beside him: "Give me the binoculars."

Zhang Bingde turned his head to look to the right, and only then did he realize that the second young master, Li Renxu, had arrived at his position without him noticing. Zhang Bingde was only a regimental commander, so his troops were deployed quite far forward. No one knew whether the cannons of the United States Navy, which could reach the hilltops over there, could reach this position.

"Second Young Master! This place is too far forward; you cannot stay here!"

Li Renxu glared at him and took the binoculars from his hand: "Stop talking nonsense. If I hadn't tripped and broken the binoculars on the way, do you think I would even look at this piece of junk? And you wouldn't even give it to me?"

Li Renxu's words sounded like he was blaming his subordinate for being stingy, but Zhang Bingde knew that the second young master was deliberately making lighthearted remarks to ease the atmosphere. This was because their current position was not only occupied by the old garrison troops, but also by Ming troops transferred from other places to Silla. The fighting spirit of those troops was like that of an Alto compared to an Audi, compared to the garrison troops.

For the soldiers of these units, they had probably never seen being bombarded by the navy's large-caliber heavy artillery before. If their morale could not be boosted and their psychological pressure reduced at this time, the effectiveness of these units in carrying out combat missions would certainly be greatly reduced.

In fact, they hadn't seen the garrison troops much. After all, they had never encountered large-caliber naval guns, whether on the Northwest battlefield or when they first entered the Silla battlefield. However, the garrison troops were an anomaly among the Ming army. They possessed incredible discipline, fighting spirit, and combat skills compared to other regular Ming army units.

Apart from the naval infantry, no other ground armed force in the Ming army could match the overall quality of the garrison troops. Considering that the garrison system was extremely corrupt hundreds of years ago, becoming the weakest fighting force in the Ming Dynasty, and that the garrison troops under the new garrison system have now become the strongest fighting force in the Ming Dynasty, there are many stories behind this. However, one undeniable fact is that no matter how strong the garrison troops are, their combined size is only equivalent to the 8th Army Group.

In a world war, an army group might be able to win a battle, but to win the war, more troops are needed, just like now, with the garrison troops and other Ming troops huddled in the same trench.

After Sun Bingde's binoculars were taken away, he noticed the expressions on the faces of the soldiers from other brother units in the trenches. They changed from shock and a little panic at witnessing the Federation's shelling to amazement at seeing Li Renxu personally on the front line of the trenches.

This young prince, who was effectively acting as the commander of an army group, was indeed different in style from most of the senior officers of the Ming army that other Ming soldiers had seen. Most senior officers of the Ming army were quite normal; you would hardly ever see a regimental-level officer leading the charge—and divisional and corps-level officers would be even less likely to do so, and they rarely even went to the front lines in person.

After watching for a while, Li Renxu put down his binoculars and turned to the chief of staff of the 8th Army Group beside him: "These should be United States Navy battleships firing at us? How long will it take for the Navy to deal with the Federation warships at sea?"

"The Navy hasn't revealed when they plan to start the operation yet, but I just confirmed with their naval officers that the United States Navy is deploying 9.2-inch and 14-inch guns this time," the chief of staff said. "But these guns aren't mounted on battleships; they seem to be some kind of shallow-draft gunboats."

"What the heck? Something that can dive underwater and carry such a huge cannon?"

"No, it's shallow in the sense of depth. These ships have a very shallow draft, so they can get very close to the shore and fire."

"Got it. It's not a battleship, but it's equipped with the same large-caliber guns as battleships, and it can get closer to support their ground troops. It's something even more troublesome than a battleship, right?" Li Renxu took a deep look at the high ground shrouded in smoke in the distance, and then raised his voice to all the officers and soldiers on this section of trench: "Everyone, continue to hold your posts. I will have a way to deal with them."

Then, Li Renxu casually tossed the binoculars back to Zhang Bingde. Even now, Li Renxu still goes to the front-line trenches to inspect the battlefield before a major battle. Right now, he took the opportunity to reassure the officers and soldiers here.

Under Zhang Bingde's thankful gaze, Li Renxu led his entourage away from this section of trench and walked along the communication trench to the rear.

After leaving the front-line trenches, Li Renxu no longer needed to "put on a show" in front of other friendly forces. At this moment, he gritted his teeth and slammed his fist hard on the rammed earth of the trench: "I knew the navy was unreliable. It's better to rely on ourselves than on them."

"Second Young Master, it's best not to say anything that could be detrimental to unity right now."

“I’m telling them now, but they won’t hear me!” Li Rensui waved his hand. “Besides, Chief of Staff! Have all the division commanders come to my headquarters for a meeting at 6 p.m. tonight. We need to consider a contingency plan for taking Wonsan without naval support.”

"Without naval support, if we rely on our army alone, wouldn't we be charging straight into the guns of enemy warships?"

Upon hearing that Li Renxu seemed to be preparing to launch a strong attack on Wonsan, the chief of staff immediately became alarmed and advised, "I think we can wait a little longer. I heard that His Highness the Crown Prince has already set off for Vladivostok, and I believe that the First Fleet in Vladivostok will soon take action."

"That kid went to Vladivostok?"

"Yes, it is said that Princess Changning was also brought along."

Upon hearing the chief of staff's words, Li Renxu's eyes widened slightly, clearly shocked. However, he quickly recovered and retorted, "So what if my nephew went to Vladivostok? You don't think my nephew can easily mobilize the fleet there, do you?"

"But His Highness the Crown Prince personally went to Vladivostok, which should be able to urge the navy to act as soon as possible. As you know, young master, the navy has sent a lot of people to set up many things around us that look like liaison stations. Even the chief of staff of the First Fleet personally came to lead the team, which shows that the navy is definitely planning a large-scale operation."

“I believe the navy will launch a large-scale operation, but I don’t believe it will happen in the short term,” Li Renxu said. “Besides, I know my nephew’s personality. Unless he’s been provoked by something, he won’t easily slam his fist on the table and throw bowls at someone. Expecting my nephew to slam his fist on the table with the navy and make them take action ahead of time? That’s not his style.”

At this point, Li Renxu said with some emotion, "My nephew is indeed very smart, but sometimes he's too smart, so he always hesitates and looks ahead. This kind of personality of his will never change unless he experiences some kind of shock in his life. But if we continue to drag this out, the United States' troops in the encirclement will board the ships and withdraw. I can't give the United States that opportunity."

“But…” The chief of staff recalled the bombardment by the United States’ large-caliber naval guns: “I think it will be difficult for us to launch an effective offensive now that we have dealt with these enemy warships. The morale of the enemy’s troops in the encirclement is becoming increasingly fragile. It is because of the continuous support from the enemy navy that we have not been able to take it down yet.”

The chief of staff's words can be interpreted more directly as: if we could take it, we would have done so long ago. Why should we share half the credit with the navy?

The key issue now lies with the warships at sea, which is precisely the problem that the army struggles to solve.

“I know what you’re thinking, Lao Zhao. We really can’t do anything about those warships at sea on our own. We shouldn’t bother with troubles like this that we can’t solve for the time being.” Li Renxu said, “We will launch an attack at night. This way, the enemy’s naval guns will have difficulty providing accurate support. In this way, we can offset the enemy’s naval artillery support as much as possible without dealing with the enemy’s navy. Besides, night fighting is our specialty.”

When Li Renxu said these words, he exuded a strong sense of confidence.

He was certainly confident—the garrison troops, or rather the entire 8th Army Group, being the highest-quality ground combat force in the Ming Dynasty, certainly had some unique skills.

Since the start of the war, the 8th Army has always had three killer weapons that have been invincible when encountering the enemy.

Night battles, artillery, cavalry.

At present, it is impossible for them to be superior to the United States warships floating at sea in terms of artillery, and the cavalry's performance in the mountainous terrain of the Silla Peninsula is also unsatisfactory, especially when launching an uphill attack on the high ground, it is even more impossible for the cavalry to charge up on horseback.

Fortunately, they still had one last trump card: night combat.

While traditionally, night combat is generally a time when the side with inferior equipment can leverage its advantages, before the widespread deployment of modern night vision equipment, the darkness seemed to be a natural ally of the weaker side.

But in fact, the night is not a natural ally of the weaker party; the night has always been a natural ally of the more courageous party.

The biggest difference between the 8th Army Group and other Ming armies and the armies of various countries in earlier years is that the 8th Army Group's soldiers were equipped with cavalry machine guns at a much higher rate than other units.

The so-called cavalry machine gun actually refers to the Type 08 cavalry machine gun. This machine gun is based on the Danish Madsen light machine gun introduced in 905. It was domestically produced and trial-produced in 908 and equipped the Ming army cavalry units, and was named the Type 08 cavalry machine gun.

This machine gun was copied by the Gongxian Ordnance Bureau. Of course, if there was a light machine gun, there was also a heavy machine gun. In the same year, the MG-08 heavy machine gun was introduced from Letania and copied by the Hanyang Ordnance Bureau under the name of "infantry machine gun". The trial production was completed in 910 and mass production began. It was named the Type 10 infantry machine gun.

Although the sustained firepower of cavalry machine guns is far inferior to that of infantry rifles, which are heavy machine guns, the biggest advantage of light machine guns is that, compared to people from other countries at that time, they were extremely valuable automatic weapons that could accompany troops on offensive operations at any time.

The large number of light machine guns deployed by these forces allowed the 8th Army to gradually develop a special forces system that was different from, but somewhat similar to, the Storm Commando.

Li Renxu was preparing to deploy these troops in a night battle, hoping to break through the situation without naval intervention.

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Chapter Fifty-Nine: Prelude to the Attack

"Second Young Master, are you planning to join the Lightning Commando?"

When Chief of Staff Zhao Biao heard Li Renxu say that he was prepared to rely on the army to solve the problem, he roughly guessed the tactics that Li was about to implement.

In this world war, a series of large-scale European battles in the early stages of the war had already proven that simply relying on large-scale infantry charges and artillery bombardments could not effectively break through modern field defense systems. Even if a breakthrough was finally achieved by concentrating a large number of troops and artillery advantages, the high cost of casualties would greatly diminish the significance of the breakthrough and even cause the troops to lose the ability to conduct subsequent deep assaults.

Therefore, apart from the Eastern Front in Europe and the Northwest Front in Asia, which were too vast to form a stable battle line, the tactics adopted by various countries to break through the enemy's defenses on other battlefields where a stable battle line could be formed can be described as each country displaying its own unique abilities.

But in general, it can be divided into two routes.

First and foremost is the layered armor – tanks, which first appeared on the European battlefield, have always been plagued by reliability issues, but at present, this type of equipment is undoubtedly the most powerful land warfare weapon. While the Ming Dynasty's army wasn't without armor, its equipment numbers, even to put it more succinctly, were roughly equivalent to those of the top-tier European army, the German Army.

Overall, only a few models of this equipment were developed and equipped in the Ming army, totaling two or three hundred vehicles. Not only was the number of vehicles small, but it was also clearly not suitable to be transported to the Silla Peninsula to launch attacks in the mountains at present.

In contrast to the "showy but impractical" tanks, both the Lai and Ming armies chose to form small-scale assault teams to create breakthroughs. Simply put, they relied on small light infantry units composed of highly qualified non-commissioned officers and veterans, equipped with advanced automatic weapons and individual support firepower, to overwhelmingly defeat the enemy's infantry of the same size with their superior firepower and skills. At the same time, they deployed multiple assault teams along a single front to break through the enemy's lines in a rapid and decisive manner.

Both sides shared similar tactical ideas and exchanged experiences after military exchanges. The Letanians formed the Storm Assault Team, while the Ming Dynasty's garrison forces formed the Lightning Assault Team.

However, this tactic relies heavily on highly qualified non-commissioned officers and veterans. For the Ming army, only the garrison troops were capable of organizing such assault teams. Even the reorganized Ming army divisions after the operation could not organize such assault teams.

While it's true that the Ming army's later reorganized divisions could easily assemble assault teams composed of relatively high-quality non-commissioned officers and veterans, forcing the Ming army's reorganized divisions to form such an assault force would be equivalent to the BTGs organized by the Mao army's brigade-level units before special military operations. BTGs are indeed capable of fighting, but this capability is based on the premise of depleting the effective combat power of the entire brigade-level unit.

If a BTG is crippled, the corresponding Ursus brigade will essentially lose its offensive capabilities, and may even be unable to perform its defensive duties effectively.

Or to use another analogy—it's like the household guards and troops of the late Northern Ming Dynasty.

For the division commanders, they prefer to use highly qualified non-commissioned officers and veterans as the backbone of the division to lead those soldiers who have been trained but are not highly qualified or experienced, so that the overall combat effectiveness of the division can be brought above the passing grade.

“Is there a better way now? Look at our situation these days, or you could go down and ask our soldiers if they believe in the navy.” Li Renxu pointed in the direction of Wonsan: “You are my senior, and I believe you should know better than I do that the enemy has already begun to withdraw from Wonsan Port. Before long, they will be able to take away the enemy in our encirclement. At that time, these officers and soldiers who have accumulated experience in fighting us will become our most troublesome enemies on other battlefields.”

“I know, but Second Young Master, we should at least wait two more days. The deadline promised by the Navy hasn’t arrived yet, and besides, we only have two garrison divisions at our disposal.” Zhao Biao also argued for the current situation.

"Currently, the vast majority of the troops on the outer perimeter of the encirclement are reorganized divisions transferred from within the country. Our reserve forces consist of Silla's mobilized divisions and a small number of Tokugawa Shogunate troops. Among all these forces, only our own two old divisions are capable of organizing a lightning strike. These two divisions are the linchpin of the Wonsan battlefield. If we suffer too many losses and fail to capture it..."

“We can handle it.” Li Renxu said decisively, “I know our old troops. They are the best soldiers in the world! I have also investigated the troops in our encirclement. These federal troops were rotated back to China for rest and reorganization in 17. Later, they were sent to the Asia-Pacific theater. These troops have never faced the Leitanian Storm Commandos on the battlefield. They have no experience in dealing with our kind of commandos.”

"However, the Federation has the support of naval guns. Even at night, the Federation can call in naval guns to continuously cover a designated area to stop our advance. The darkness cannot completely help us eliminate the enemy's artillery advantage."

"That's because our conventional offensive speed isn't fast enough. As long as our assault teams quickly engage the enemy at night, I want to see how the Federation's naval artillery will fight back. Can their large-caliber heavy artillery distinguish which are our assault teams and which are Federation soldiers on the position?"

“I’ll say it again, Second Young Master, please wait two more days. If the navy doesn’t make a move within two days, I won’t object to your attack.” Zhao Biao said, “The navy has set up so many liaison stations and shore command posts here recently. They can’t just be playing around in these desolate wilderness areas, can they?”

After a moment of silence, Li Renxu's attitude remained unchanged: "Even so, the attack must proceed."

"Second Young Master, why are you so determined to launch an attack now?" Zhao Biao asked, somewhat puzzled. "Are you trying to prevent the Federation army from escaping, or do you want to lead the troops alone and claim all the credit? Such thoughts of rushing forward to claim credit on the battlefield are unacceptable!"

"Uncle Zhao, do you think I'm trying to claim all the credit and being greedy for credit?" A look of helplessness and anger appeared on Li Renxu's face: "I haven't forgotten what my teacher taught me. I can tell what's important in the current situation."

After saying that, he pointed to the direction of Yuanshan Port again: "Yuanshan Port is not a big port. Large ships cannot enter the port. The United States has to use smaller ships to continuously dock and transport ships. The port's throughput is limited. Even if the Navy can launch an attack within the stipulated time, I have to consider whether the Navy can achieve a decisive victory. What if the Navy cannot completely cut off the Federal Army's retreat route?"

Whatever happens, it is worthwhile for us to continue our offensive and put pressure on the United States front. The Union Army lost a lot of weapons and ammunition when it retreated from Pyongyang. Now, facing our offensive, they don't have much ammunition left in their original stockpile. Therefore, the United States must use some of its transport capacity to deliver weapons and ammunition to the troops in their encirclement. Moreover, they need to prioritize the evacuation of the wounded.