Chapter 3: Requesting Battle
Just as everyone was making their final preparations, the cheerful sound of machine guns suddenly rang out. It turned out that the Markov heavy water-cooled machine gun, which had been captured by the Red Army during the counter-encirclement campaign, began to provide firepower support for them. Immediately afterwards, the "Boom Boom" sound of the 60mm mortar's firing sounded, and the two cannons in the artillery squad also began to support them.
At this time, the buried squad leader also dug out of the soil, pulled out the machine gun and started firing again, and the enemy was blocked in front of the position, unable to advance further. Taking advantage of this interval, Wang Yong hurriedly rushed to the front of the blown-up machine gun bunker, pulled the ammunition hand out of the soil, his chest was pierced by a shrapnel, blood almost drained instantly, Wang Yong shook his head slightly, sighed, put him aside, and took out the bullet clip from his body and inserted it into the machine gun's feeding port, this guy is going to 'pause' again, the enemy is about to rush in front of them.
Zhang Quanyou was shooting while glancing at Wang Yong, who was seriously supplying him with ammunition. For some reason, he didn't seem to dislike him as much today. Zhang Quanyou was a soldier from Henan, not very tall and slightly stout-looking, from a working-class family, and had joined the army when the Liberation Army marched south. He had never had a good impression of Wang Yong. You could say he was rough, but he was also a junior high school graduate who sometimes argued with you over trivial matters, making you lose your temper; or that he was stupid, yet he could perform various military actions perfectly, even better than an old soldier, and occasionally showed off his cleverness by slacking off during training. Or you could say he was smart, but he couldn't recite the rules from memory, and had a worse memory than an illiterate rural soldier. When you said he had violated the rules, he would say he didn't understand, with a silly expression on his face, leaving you frustrated. So Zhang Quanyou had never been friendly to Wang Yong, always looking for opportunities to scold him, and Wang Yong kept his distance, rarely talking to him or getting close to him. Unexpectedly, today they were fighting together, and he even volunteered to be Zhang's ammunition bearer.
The tanks at the foot of the mountain were not to be outdone, firing frequently and bombarding our army's position, trying to turn the tide. The commander of one tank thought they were far beyond rifle range, so he opened up the hatch and stuck his head out to direct the shooting. At this moment, a dramatic scene unfolded that no one could have anticipated: a shell fired by the artillery team flew like a missile, grazing the commander's body and landing precisely inside the tank's compartment. The shell exploded inside, and Wang Yong saw the tank being blown up like a balloon, bouncing twice in place before bursting into flames. None of the crew members were seen escaping. The nearby tanks, fearing "collateral damage", panicked and abandoned the infantry, turning around to flee. The exposed infantry also retreated, dragging over a dozen wounded soldiers with them, leaving behind a mountain slope littered with corpses!
"Rescue the wounded, repair fortifications, and clean up the battlefield!" As soon as the enemy retreated, the company's communication officer ran over along the trench to convey orders. Everyone quickly got up and collected the bodies of two comrades who had sacrificed themselves in battle, along with three wounded soldiers, and handed them over to the military engineer who was delivering ammunition for transportation. Then, they hastened to repair fortifications. Wang Yong took out a cigarette from a martyr's pocket and lit it on his still-smoldering sleeve, picked up a pickaxe to reinforce his own bunker...
It was dark early in North Korea, and by 5 pm it was pitch black. The planes couldn't fly, and the enemy retreated without launching a new attack. A sentry was left on the position, and everyone went to the back of the mountain to eat. They had been in Korea for exactly one week since crossing the river on October 21st. Before leaving the country, each person brought four days' worth of dry rations and two days' worth of food. The dry rations were almost all gone in the first two days, and these two days they had boiled corn kernels for every meal.
"I'm telling you, Squad Leader Sun, we're fed this every day and I've got constipation so bad that I can't even take a crap!" A veteran from the second squad complained to the cook squad leader as soon as he saw the food.
"Yes, yes..." a veteran beside him chimed in.
"I was thinking of getting you guys some food, but where can I find it?" Sun Class Leader said with a scoop of rice, not in a good mood.
"Old Sun, how can you talk nonsense with your eyes open? There's a big field of radishes in the mountain valley. When we were firing artillery just now, one shell landed there and the radishes flew all over the sky!" The old soldier said while gesturing.
"Director Sun, look at everyone being roasted by the fire for half a day, and the water has been drunk long ago. The soldiers are so thirsty that they can't take it anymore. Can we buy some radishes to quench their thirst?" Second Director approached him, pointing at the soldiers' dry and cracked lips, and discussed with him.
"Alas, Second Squad Leader, you think I don't care about everyone? I've searched the entire surrounding area and couldn't find the owner of the vegetable field. They've all fled!" Sun Squad Leader sighed, and everyone fell silent upon hearing this.
"In the past, Cao Cao gazed at a plum tree to quench his thirst. Today, let's just look at the radish field and eat corn instead!" A soldier said with a smile while eating his meal and glancing at the radish field.
"Haha!" His words brought a burst of laughter from everyone, "Old Li, you're really something..." "Old Li, your method is great, we should all eat half a bowl of rice more often!" ... The queueing warriors teased him with smiles.
Wang Yong looked at the optimistic soldiers chatting and laughing, forcing himself to swallow the half-cooked cornmeal into his stomach. In his heart, he had a lot of emotions. He didn't think the food was bad because he had eaten worse things before. It was just that the discipline of the Liberation Army made him sigh in admiration. The same army, but with different behavior - the Nationalist Party's elite troops he used to be part of would fight fiercely and bully civilians without mercy. After the victory against Japan, they entered Shanghai to take over, and the high-ranking officials occupied warehouses, seized companies, and slapped a "traitor" label on the bosses, taking everything for themselves. The low-ranking soldiers like him had no power or influence, so they could only scrounge around for food and drink. They wouldn't even dare to enter a big restaurant, but if they did, they would just take out their guns, slap them on the counter, and eat and drink for free. Although there were military police maintaining order everywhere, nobody dared to stop them! Now, everyone was hungry and thirsty, and they all wanted to pull up a radish to eat, but they endured and strictly followed the discipline of "not touching a single needle or thread of the Korean people's property". Even if the owners were nowhere to be found, nobody would dare to have any bad ideas. No wonder the Liberation Army was invincible in battle, growing stronger with each fight, while his old unit had already disbanded and become a relic of history!
At night, everything returned to calmness, with only the distant pseudo-army firing a few illuminating shells from time to time, lighting up the battlefield. The Second Regiment successfully cut off the pseudo-First Division's road to the north, coordinating with the main force of the army to put the enemy in a pocket and block them in the Yunshan area. At this time, the enemy did not realize the intention of our volunteer army, but instead ordered the US First Cavalry Division's regiment to speed up its advance, replacing what they thought was the pseudo-First Division's 12th Regiment, which was unfavorable for combat, to continue opening up the road to the north.
At midnight, the second camp launched an attack on enemy 288 highland with the support of mountain artillery and mortar, as a starting point for the general offensive. The fifth and sixth companies were the main attackers, the fourth company was the reserve team, and one row was sent to coordinate the attack from the left side.
The third company, as the spearhead, began to approach the high ground under cover when our army's artillery fire started. They were divided into small groups of three people, opening up their formation and charging forward fiercely. When they approached the middle of the mountain, the artillery fire stopped, and the enemy's two heavy machine guns suddenly opened fire, blocking the road ahead. The terrain was very unfavorable for them at this time, with a narrow path over one meter wide in the middle, a cliff more than ten meters away on the right side, and a steep slope of nearly sixty degrees on the left side, making it impossible to deploy a charging formation. The third company was pinned down by firepower at the foot of the mountain.
"Li Zhuozhu, we'll cover you, go take out the enemy's machine gun!" Squad leader ordered Li Zhuozhu of the second squad.
"Yes!" Li Gangzhu responded without hesitation, crawling to the forefront and making preparations for the charge. "Throw grenades!" Yang Zhanfu shouted, and the soldiers immediately threw two hand grenades forward. Li Gangzhu instantly jumped up, using the dust and smoke from the explosion as cover, and moved upwards. Unfortunately, he only advanced 7 or 8 meters before being hit by enemy bullets, falling to the ground motionless, his life or death unknown. Another old soldier saw Li Gangzhu get shot, immediately jumped up to replace him and charged forward, but was also quickly hit, rolling down the hillside.
"Damn it, I'm going up!" Yang Zhanfu punched the ground with his fist and was about to get up when he was pulled back by Wang Yong beside him. "Squad leader, I'll go, you cover me!" Yang Zhanfu is a good person, but he's a bit too rigid in battle, charging forward under such dense gunfire would only end with him being like that stupid pillar, Wang Yong didn't want his squad leader who had always taken care of him to die so quickly, so he volunteered.
Yang Zhanfu looked at Wang Yong and nodded: "Be careful, pay attention to the enemy's machine gun!"
