Chapter 30: Destroying the Troops (7)

  "We also have to fight heroically, in the whole division, our base was planned as logistics, but we are also soldiers, and when fighting, we can't be absent. For example, one day, the enemy crossed the defense line and infiltrated into the rear, just met by us, aren't we still going to kill the enemy?" Wei Qidong said: "Company Commander, seeing him is like seeing me back then, at that time you also supported me very much, didn't you? You also said that on the northern border, the frontier defense line also needs our contribution."

  "What's with the look of a wronged little wife? Have I ever said not to let your soldiers practice? You've been giving them boxes and boxes of bullets to practice, and I haven't said anything. And from what I hear, their marksmanship isn't bad either."

  "Haha, it's only in a company like yours that has such conditions. Except for special forces, which company has resources as rich as ours? But compared to you, Captain, they're all just small fries, little birds."

  "I said Old Wei, when did you learn how to flatter?"

  "No, Lianzhang, am I not standing with you? Our regiment also needs a fighting hero, a battle standard-bearer, and a flag that is not easily overthrown."

  "Hmm, then you'd better plant that flag for me. I don't want to see our unit's flag being easily pulled down by others."

  "Yes, Colonel!" Wei Qidong stood at attention excitedly.

  Xiao Lie felt that he hadn't been panting as much during his runs lately, which was a good sign of progress. Just then, he suddenly saw the ground beneath his feet move, and something shot out to trip him up. Under the force of inertia, he fell to the ground. Before he could even react, the dirt beside him suddenly exploded upwards, and what seemed like a person's shadow leapt out from within it, pinning him down with its body. A pair of strong hands pressed against his throat, rendering his limbs immobile.

  "Soldier, you're done for."

  Xiao Lie heard it was the voice of Class Monitor Wei Qidong.

  "Squad leader." Xiao Lie stood up, feeling embarrassed for no reason. If they were on a battlefield march, he would have been done for. As time went by in the troops, Xiao Lie gradually grew to like everything here and began to learn how to test himself with real combat.

  "Although we are not on the border line, and this is not an important military base, it does not mean that one day the enemy will suddenly attack us and let us go, nor can it be said that one day we will not go to the battlefield. We are the army, and there may be enemies hiding on land at any time. Just now I was lying here, and I deliberately exposed half of my shoe heel here, but you didn't even notice." Wei Qidong said: "You should learn about camouflage and anti-camouflage."

  Here, apart from the class leader and some old soldiers teaching themselves something, many things to be learned must be known through books. Although there is no shortage of guns, ammunition and explosives here, some reconnaissance equipment for field troops is not available here, let alone tanks and other vehicles, and some obstacle standards cannot be compared with those in field troops.

  "Camouflage is a subject that a qualified soldier must learn. In the 18th century, British military uniforms were all bright red, making them easy targets on the battlefield. To better launch surprise attacks and prevent being ambushed, camouflage became an essential subject for soldiers to learn." Wei Qidong said while running alongside Xiao Lie: "Why do people get bitten by snakes? It's because snakes hide in places that are hard to spot and their appearance blends in with their surroundings."

  In the era of cold weapons, battlefield camouflage mainly relied on natural conditions, such as plants and weather. Although the camouflage was simple, it was very effective due to the limited reconnaissance conditions at that time. There are many examples in "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", such as "Borrowing Arrows with Straw Boats" which mainly relied on weather conditions, setting up straw men and noise, making Cao Cao dare not easily go into battle, only using random arrows, allowing Zhuge Liang to pick up 100,000 free arrows. In Guishan Beach, Zhuge Liang mainly relied on plants, making Sima Yi suspicious and fearful, hastily withdrawing his troops and fleeing.

  By the time of the hot weapon era, the lethality and destructive power of weapons had been greatly enhanced, and reconnaissance methods had also been strengthened with the development of science and technology. However, just like spears and shields, the enhancement of reconnaissance technology stimulated the great development of camouflage technology.

  During World War II, after Britain suffered from the crazy bombing of the German air force, in order to protect its own air power, fake airports were set up near military airports across the country. The fake planes made of wood and paper inside almost looked like real ones, luring the German air force to drop tens of thousands of tons of bombs on these fake targets. Not only did this avoid more serious losses for the British air force, but it also wasted Germany's manpower and resources.

  Similarly, in the late stage of World War II, a large-scale camouflage net was set up at an aircraft factory near Hamburg, Germany, which completely blended with the local natural environment, successfully evading the Allied air raid.

  In the modern era of information warfare, reconnaissance technology has made rapid progress, and camouflage technology as a countermeasure is also developing. A large number of technologies are being applied to deceive, hide, reduce the probability of detection by reconnaissance, and lower the hit rate of precision-guided weapons.

  In the 1982 Lebanon War, Israeli military drones disguised as attack formations lured Syrian air defense radars to turn on, and after learning the Syrian wireless and radar frequencies, they jammed the Syrian radar with electronic interference, blinding them and successfully covering the Israeli Air Force's combat operations, achieving surprise in the campaign.

  In the Kosovo War, the weak former Yugoslav troops used camouflage techniques, causing most of the US airstrikes to hit fake targets, and at least 80% of the former Yugoslavia's military strength was preserved. The US military strike against the former Yugoslavia had little effect, and shifted its focus to attacking civilian facilities.

  In our army's counterattack against Vietnam, the camouflage of artillery positions was quite good. Our artillery troops had 30 years of experience in cannon warfare with the Nationalist Army and were extremely skilled in battlefield camouflage, even learning some tactics from the Nationalist Army (Chiang Kai-shek was originally an artillery officer, so his subordinates' artillery skills were naturally not bad). Generally, there were camouflaged artillery positions (setting up wooden cannons, placing fake people, laying empty shell casings, covering with camouflage nets, and then occasionally sending a few people to walk around, achieving a very high level of realism). Camouflaged firing points (when the Vietnamese army fired a cannon, our hidden and camouflaged teams would detonate pre-buried explosives, creating an illusion for the enemy's artillery observers, resulting in their shells becoming increasingly off-target). By 1985, the Vietnamese army's artillery had basically lost its ability to counterattack against our army.

  Modern camouflage techniques can be broadly classified into: plant camouflage, camouflage, artificial barrier camouflage, fake target camouflage, smoke screen camouflage, light and fire camouflage, sound camouflage, electronic camouflage, etc. Plant camouflage is well-known to everyone, which uses the branches and leaves of plants to blend itself with the natural environment, achieving the purpose of visual camouflage. Camouflage uses camouflage uniforms or camouflage coatings to make combat personnel, tanks, ships, aircraft, etc. blend in with the natural background, making it difficult to detect, while reducing the probability of being visually detected by obvious corners. Artificial barrier camouflage is achieved through the use of camouflage nets, which can achieve visual, radar, and infrared concealment. Fake target camouflage uses various low-cost materials to interfere with enemy reconnaissance, making it difficult for the enemy to distinguish between true and false targets, increasing the amount of enemy ammunition used. Smoke screen camouflage releases smoke bombs to interfere with enemy optical reconnaissance. Light and fire camouflage and sound camouflage are similar to fake target camouflage, so I won't discuss them further. As for electronic camouflage, the emergence of radar and infrared detection technology has led some people to mistakenly believe that any camouflage technique is useless against these technologies. However, radar and infrared detection technologies also have their limitations. For example, using a Luneberg lens reflector (a device that reflects radar waves back in parallel to interfere with radar) can attract the enemy's radar "attention" and cause it to make incorrect judgments. Using metal foil strips can cause radar to lose its tracking and capture capabilities. As for infrared detection, heat target simulators can be used to simulate the infrared characteristics of aircraft, tanks, warships, etc., making infrared detection equipment and infrared-guided weapons ineffective.

  On the 33rd day of the 38-day air campaign in the Gulf War, 70% of Iraq's tanks, 65% of its armored vehicles and 65% of its artillery remained intact. This was largely due to Iraq's use of advanced camouflage techniques to conceal its military equipment and facilities.

  The camouflage on the future battlefield will be more filled with high-tech atmosphere, biotechnology, stealth, mimicry and active interference technology will be widely used in camouflage, in addition to camouflaging weapons and equipment, airports, ports, communication centers, command posts, personnel and weapon gathering places and other military facilities will also adopt the above technologies for camouflage or concealment.

  Xiao Lie looked at the thick book "Camouflage in the Battlefield" in his hand, which was given to him by Wei Qidong this afternoon. Before, whenever he thought of camouflage, he would think of digging a hole or sticking some small twigs and leaves on himself, all of which were related to the movies he watched when he was young.

  Xiao Lie was reading a book and taking notes, in the dormitory today everyone was unusually quiet, each person was writing something in front of their bed. Xiao Lie took a look, they were actually doing the same thing.